Fountain Palace

The Fountain Palace, situated in the center of Chume'Dan on Hapes, is the nexus of power in the Hapes Consortium. The palace complex is surrounded by a vast garden decorated with fountains and statues that pays homage to the Hapan love of nature, as well as to the long and proud history of the Consortium.

It is the primary Royal Hapan Palace, having acted as the Royal residence first from 2020 to 3946, and again from 4034 to the present day. It was used as the Royal Palace of the Sword Confederacy faction from 3966 to 3966 during the Hapan Civil War. Following the end of the hostilities, the palace compound was so badly damaged from repeated bombardments and assaults it had sustained, that it took decades to finally restore it to its former glory and beyond.

The newly renovated palace is considered one of the Wonders of the Consortium, home to the revered Royal Family, where resides the Hapan throne from which the kings of Hapes rule over the peoples of the Hapes Cluster in accordance to ancient traditions.

The Fountain Palace was constructed at the dawn of the Second Antiquity Era when the Hapes Consortium and especially Hapes Prime enjoyed an influx in wealth and authority following its successful expansion and settlement of more systems of the Hapes Cluster in the Second Expansion Era which ended some years earlier. Queen-Mother Dal'kuran I, the first in a dynasty that would rule for 800 years, celebrated this newfound wealth be ordering the construction of a new Royal residence in the center of Ta'a Chume'Dan as a symbol of the power and unlimited resources of the Hapan crown. This era was also marked as further expansion and solidifying of Hapan culture and the new Royal Hapan Palace became the crowning achievement of her rule.

Dahalia Qeen was the chief architect of the project and was given free reins to make the palace and its surrounding compound as majestic as possible. The Olanji Mining Guild provided the bulk of the raw materials required for the construction and architects, landscape architects and construction workers kept at the project for close to ten years before its final unveiling in 2020.

The Fountain Palace would serve as the primary Royal residence for the rest of the Age of Queen-Mothers, some 1900 years. It was considered one of the Wonders of the Hapes Consortium, the very symbol of Hapan culture and the power of the Hapan throne. Aside from serving as a home to the Royal Family, its handmaidens, staff and Royal Guard, parts of the compound were also devoted to government business. The Queen-Mother would continue to meet with the Hapan nobility and government officials until Lorell Hall was completed in 2449.

When the Hapan Civil War broke out, Princess Ta'lan and her supporters managed to maintain control of the Hapan system. As a reaction in to the aggression of the Draconian Union, the Sword Confederacy was founded on Hapes Prime and based in the Fountain Palace. However, control of Hapes Prime was always the goal of the Draconian Union which attacked the system on multiple occasions over the fifty year long conflict. While no Draconian assault ever succeeded in swaying Sword control of the planet, they did manage to dig in and fortify some positions for short periods of time. As a reaction to the Sword bombardment of the Draconian world Belgor, the Draconians launched a massive attack on the Hapan system in 3978. Terephon was bombarded from orbit until all cities had been obliterated and Hapes Prime was subjected to multiple bombing runs. Druui Assault Bombers inflected serious damage to Ta'a Chume'Dan and the Fountain Palace in particular. The north tower collapsed in to the gardens, the central dome was severely shattered and numerous of its defensive facilities were obliterated. Half of the Palace staff were killed in the attack, along with a few lower members of the Hapan nobility.

Following this attack, the Sword Confederacy leadership restricted their use of the Fountain Palace to the sub-terrain levels until the end of the war. Andrew Starfyre, the leader of the Phoenix Movement made numerous speeches in front of the ruins of the Fountain Palace from 3996 until his coronation in 4000. Even so, with the reunified Hapes Consortium in financial ruin, restoration of the compound was seen as too costly and it was abandoned with the King moving in to the old Royal Palace, the Castle of Per'Agthra instead.

Some years in to the reign of King James, the Ministry of Culture received approval to use a substantial sum on the restoration of the old Royal Palace compound. Over the years that followed, countless credits were spent on everything from the basic raw materials needed to reconstruct portions of the palace, extravagant flora and exotic fauna to complete the gardens, as well as on millions of tons of valuable gems like berubian, vertex and lowickan for external friezes and internal decoration. The reconstruction of the central dome in Ice Moon material was said to have cost the annual tax income from Terephon alone. The renovated Fountain Palace was unveiled and opened for the Royal Family on the birthday of King James in 4034.

Aside from the Fountain Palace, two other locations have acted as Royal Residences over the history of the Consortium, and thus are considered Royal Palaces; The Reef Fortress (Royal residence from hapan year 1 on to 280), as well as the Castle of Per'Agthra (Royal residence from 280 onto to 2020, and again from 4001 till 4034), the latter of which is still often seen in imagery depicting the Royal Palaces.

Read more about the Royal Palaces in our Library