Fiction:Orichalcum Elf Imperium/Iusticiarii

"It was conceived to be the eyes and ears of the Imperator. However, Imperator Eustachius - Aur-ārel watch over his soul - was overtly mad. The Iusticiarii has found itself in times of ill repute. But do I intend this cloud to hover over our heads? That I indeed disapprove of. But the must be reminded time and time again - we are the Imperator's. Not them."

- Legatus of the Iusticiarii, Marius Alcesimarchus c. 7128 BNA

The Iusticiarii of the  were a militant branch of the Orichalcum Elf Imperium's royal command, formed in the mid nineteenth millennium BNA under the rule of Eustachius Castus Eustachius Beniaminus, the fourth Imperator of the Christopherus Dynasty and the nineteenth Imperator of the Orichalcum Elf Imperium. Tasked with the reassurance and assertive control of the Imperator, the Iusticiarii was formed to aggressively seek out dissidents and conspirators against the Imperator, however eventually evolved into more protective service in the dynasties after. The Iusticiarii was considered a tyrannical and brutal force for more of its duration than not, and was received in the millennia after the dissolution of the Orichalcum Elf Imperium as an example of the darker side of the Orichalcum Elves.

Formation
The reasons of the Iusticiarii's formation was due to three prevailing factors during Eustachius Castus' rule; his father, the previous Imperator Adamus Castus was highly unpopular with both the citizens and the royal family as he was both an illegitimate child of his father Christopherus - a totalitarian Imperator, and of his decision to sire incestual ties within the royal family to affirm his legitimacy to the throne. As a spawn of incest, superstition fed reality as what was the fear of a mad Imperator eventually devolved into a politically corrupt and economically disastrous rule led by a virtually insane ruler. The primary factor of the economic crash during his rule was the formation of the Iusticiarii - originally conceived by Eustachius as a more insular division of the Custodes Imperatoris, although had rapidly evolved into a policing force that numbered in the thousands. The Custodes Imperatoris was quickly rendered obsolete and rebelled against the Imperator, however the newly formed Iusticiarii had quashed the rebellion, and the Custodes were met with either death or the opportunity to become part of the Iusticiarii themselves. What was the Custodes became a facade of the Iusticiarii, as the larger body began to operate in full swing.

The incentives to become part of the Iusticiarii was only open to males of active service and those the Imperator deemed a threat - to join the Iusticiarii was to surrender to the Imperator's whim. Apparent records of the time suggest that the Iusticiarii were paid thirty times that of an active auxiliary (approximately 1,500,000 nomismata; an amount of money comparable to a Legatus' salary), which quickly plunged the Orichalcum Elf Imperium into disarray. Other accounts were less savoury - some that survive imply that the Imperator pressurized the Iusticiarii members into serving under threat of imprisonment or the imprisonment and probable torture and execution of members of their family. This created a spiteful work ethic within the Iusticiarii and thus the Iusticiarii began to work not only efficiently, but in a manner of great cruelty.

Despite the increasing unpopularity of the Imperator as the Iusticiarii plagued the streets, it was only until in the year 18,202 BNA, Eustachius approved of the action to arrest probable conspirators that the people of the Empire retaliated. Most of the alleged conspirators were lords and the sons of lords - vague accounts of the time suggest that Iusticiarii arrested at least two thousand individuals and executed up to nine hundred of them. The rest were released with either reduced sums of remaining wealth or with scars from torture. This led to a rapid loss of influence within the Orichalcum Elf Imperium, and territories that were long standing since the times of the God-Emperor soon fell into anarchy and rebellion against the crown. The years leading up to the rebellion saw the fracture of the military, and many soldiers within the Imperial Legion began to defend their territories against s and other political enemies without pay due to the permanently dire situation of the outer world. Eustachius was aware - though ignorant to truth that the military was primarily funded by the lords he had plotted to imprison and execute, and whilst the Legion served the Imperator, the removal of their benefactors sparked an immediately aggressive response.

During his reign however, Eustachius had not only siphoned the coin into the Iusticiarii, but into households that he knew were loyal to him. The fracture of the military splintered the Imperial Legion into two forces; those that were loyal to the Imperator's inner circle, and those who were not. As the war had lasted five years, the Imperator's inner circle had begun to fall apart as the funding for their military - and now their trust had begun to wane as Eustachius mindlessly funded the Iusticiarii. The war eventually ended as Eustachius' inner circle and the Iusticiarii fell apart under its own weight, and surrendered to the opposing forces. As there was no contest within the Imperator, Eustachius was assassinated within his own throne room as his enemies flooded the palace of Sarisanelium.

Years to the Micaelis Tyranny
During the civil war, the - already immediately critical of the Iusticiarii had refused to aid the Imperator upon the Imperator's command. This had spawned a great distrust between the two factions and began an argument of legitimacy that continued until the Imperium's dissolution over ten thousand years later. Eustachius' son, Gualcherius had assumed the throne - one of great argument as to whether Gualcherius was legitimately able to take the role as Imperator, though it had appeared that the lords of the Imperium planted the young Imperator under their guidance in order to restore the economy that his father had effectively destroyed. It was done by the return of the stolen wealth of the families of the Imperium - all accounted for by Eustachius' overtly analytical nature - as well as the dissolution and reformation of Iusticiarii into a more privatised force that was paid far less, although the incentives were open to those within and no longer in service. The primary function of the Iusticiarii at this time was peacekeeping - the vitriolic political climate of the Imperium was slowly knitted back together underneath the Iusticiarii's influence, although other provinces that were terrorised by the Iusticiarii in the years beforehand aggressively refused to bend the knee to Imperator Gualcherius. It was by his advisors' decision that Gualcherius travelled to these territories, although was met with violent outbursts and thus the Iusiticarii and the Imperial Legion were thrust into an aggressive conflict. Gualcherius was killed in the midst of the campaign, and his son, the youthful Leolinus was crowned during the war.

Leolinus' realisation of the rebelling provinces was that most of these provinces were of foreign and thus lower class populations - and instead of employing the Iusticiarii and the Legion, began to open dialogues with the authorities of this province and negotiated agreements to allow the province to become part of the Imperium's administration once more. Due to the policies that Leolinus implemented - of which allowed many more rights to the lower population granted him a near enough equal span of territory that Eustachius had lost. As these cultures began to restore their identity, the Iusticiarii became silent and operated within these provinces to maintain peace and to root out any insurrectionists that may still be reviled by the Imperium. Imperator Terentius, the successor of Leolinus however began to reverse these policies and in turn created distrust in the crown, and appeared to have been assassinated without much intervention by the Iusticiarii, implying that the Iusticiarii had a profound duty to maintain these cultures. Due to the uncertainty of the Iusticiarii's role in the assassination, Terentius' son Ludovicus began to reduce the size of the Iusticiarii in order for the crown to keep its grasp on far reaching members. In turn, he began to employ more advisors as these provinces began to become restless once again.

The Iusticiarii's role became highly diminished following the uprising of the Micaelis Dynasty through the demonic elf known as, having committed many untraceable atrocities that targeted foreign populace as well as the Iusticiarii, and in turn Ludovicus began to increase the size of the Iusticiarii once more in order to combat this threat. However, Ludovicus was eventually assassinated by Akharav who revealed himself to be a co-conspirator of Micaelis Regulus, who later renamed himself to Micaelis Castus as he forcefully assumed the throne.

The Micaelis Tyranny
Following the years of the Micaelis Tyranny, the Iusticiarii was carved into a far more brutal form of its former self, representing a similar incarnation to that of the Iusticiarii during Eustachius' rule. The previous members of the Iusticiarii were either executed or converted to Imperator Micaelis' rule, and began to repeat history as numbers increased in order to remove probable conspirators, although with a more violent hand than in times gone by. Although this was the case, Ludovicus' assassination had sparked uproar with the foreign provinces with whom he had increased relations with in the years before his death, and rapidly spread across the entire Empire which eventually resulted in Micaelis' forced removal from the throne, either by Akharav or his only daughter, Misericordia. Under Misericordia, the Iusticiarii was incarnate in its most vehement form; it was tasked with the destruction of temples and religious iconography and the forceful establishment of a personality cult in the Imperatrix, and entire noble families that stood since Imperator Castus thousands of years prior were wiped out. In this time, the Order of Sol became the last surviving force that opposed the Micaelis Tyranny, and the band of heliomancers began to take in refugees in the Holy City of Aursalavareum, and those fortunate enough to escape from the Imperatrix swore loyalty to the ancient power of the Imperium. This rose to one of many wars between the Iusticiarii and the Order of Sol, with the Order of Sol having triumphed over them many more times.

Much of the Iusticiarii's records past the initial atrocities sanctioned by Misericordia are lost to history, although it is believed that during Misericordia's infamous assassination, they did not come to her aid. Some historical accounts of the time recount that some members of the Iusticiarii even rejoiced and aided in the parading of her headless body from Sarisanelium to Aursalavareum. The years during Guglielmus' reign - the longest civil war in the Imperium's history (primarily due to an uprising of surviving members of the destroyed families) saw little intervention from the Iusticiarii, and many of the members were said to have defected to fight in the civil war itself, effectively rendering it defunct.