In the land of Aspirtum, the priests ruled all. The courts were theirs; the jails were theirs; the roads were theirs; the mysterious machines that made noises like God clearing his throat were theirs. Peasants lived in fear of the priests, and with good reason. The priests controlled life and death. After every harvest and every livestock slaughter, the priests collected taxes. If you were known to be a good and righteous man, then you were taxed less. If you were suspected of having cheated someone in the market place or making lewd glances at another man’s wife, you were lucky to live three weeks on what they left you.
It hadn’t always been this way. Once, there had been a King. There had been nobles. They had been almost as horrible to the poor folk as the priests, but not everyone had been poor. Also, the nobles had been susceptible to bribes. Back in those days, the priests had been kind and charitable. The Archbishop often pleaded with the King lower taxes, to prevent his soldiers from entertaining themselves with the peasant women. If you were ill, you could go to a church or an abbey and find healing. If you were hungry, the priests would set you to some small task, like cleaning a stained-glass window, before giving you a good meal.
Then, in the days of King Randall, everything had changed. The Archbishop denounced the King and many nobles for licentiousness. They were burned. When the Archbishop declared all the nobles heretics, they fought back. The priests came with horrible weapons and killed many. By the time it was over, the palace was a charnel house which the priests then burned. They took control, revealing some of the machines they had developed in secret over the previous centuries. They put peasants to work in their mysterious buildings with the steaming towers. Those who performed such work poorly were punished by never conceiving children. Apparently every man did his work poorly.
Such is the sad land of Aspirtum. The priests have the power: religious, secular, mechanical, and electrical. The peasants have nothing. Will they stand for it?