Sylean Grand Fleet
A naval power in Core Sector, specifically within the Sylean Protectorate, during the Long Night.
Sylean trade with nearer worlds of the Sylean Main attracted the attention of a number of desperate raider bands from Lishun Sector. Initially, the rulers of Sylea ignored reports of Reaver attacks on merchant vessels. However, in -962, a series of raids on ships near Sylea itself led to a belated response. In -959, Baron Ricardo Urquhardt, a young Solomani nobleman, gathered substantial support among Vilani merchant families and some of the more aggressive Solomani nobles. He levied warships, marines, and armed merchantmen from his supporters, and organized a force that he named the Sylean Grand Fleet. The Fleet wasn't equipped or trained to mount anti-piracy fleet actions, but instead enforced the Urquhardt Doctrine: Any Reaver attack on a Sylean merchant ship would be answered by a massive retaliatory assault on a Reaver planet. Over the following thirty years, the Grand Fleet became infamous for its ruthless efficiency.
After these campaigns were concluded, Baron Urquhardt returned as the victorious commander of the Grand Fleet. However, although the High Protector and many of the noble families now wanted to disband the Fleet, Urquhardt held significant support among Vilani nobles and the general populace, and was reluctant to release his hold on power. Urquhardt and the Grand Fleet had gathered enormous wealth from Reaver plunder (some of which had itself been stolen from Sylea), and they resisted the Sylean nobility's attempts to exert control. In -908, High Protector Francis Xl issued Baron Urquhardt an ultimatum -- disband the Fleet or be exiled from Sylea. The Baron's response was not entirely unexpected; Urquhardt declared himself King Ricardo I of Sylea, blockaded the planet, and threatened orbital bombardment of his opponents' major industrial centres if the High Protector didn't abdicate. The stalemate held for two years, until at a conference in early -905 the parties achieved a compromise. Ricardo would be King of Sylea and retain responsibility for defense of the Realm, but he and his military forces would never attack Sylean territory or ships, and would never set foot upon the planet itself. In return, Repzinski would step down as High Protector, but would retain all of his properties and receive a new, hereditary noble patent, the Duchy of Ararnoth. The nobility would provide money and personnel to Ricardo, who would hold court in an L-5 orbital habitat above Sylea. This habitat became known as Ton Vorn, Sylean for "City of Kings".
The Kingdom of Sylea survived for another two hundred years, but the compromise arrangement was essentially unstable. Inevitably the power of the Sylean Kings ebbed as their wealth declined. Finally, in -650, Queen Rowena abdicated under pressure from a number of senior Solomani nobles, and the Kingdom of Sylea was transformed into the Sylean Federation.