'The Riven Realms, they call it. A fine, poetic name for something as rotten and twisted as our land has become. It was not always so. The Old Empire - the oldest and noblest society created by humans - spanned almost the whole continent of Xeryn, the Cradle of Man. But after thousands of years of progress and incomparable achievements, inevitably, the Empire began to fall into stagnation and decadence. [...] The subjugation of weaker realms; the enslavement of whole nations; the strip mining of foreign resources; the oppression of Imperial citizens; war on several fronts; genocide… Eventually the gods could not tolerate such horrors done in their name. Foretold by a slew of divine omens, they descended upon the Empire to right its wrongs. In a chain of dreadful events that became known as The Calamity, they destroyed the Empire in a matter of days.’

A fearless rover with a great nose for profit

‘Following the Restoration era, more and more Imperial citizens ended up living semi-nomadic lives, constantly on the road between the isolated settlements, carrying goods and news. Soon, a new kind of leader figure emerged: the fearless rover with a great nose for profit. Romanticized often by the common folk, a vagrus could in truth be as harmless as an infant, or become the most vile of criminal scum. Their significance in the revival of commerce is vastly overrated of course, but even so, they deserve a passing mention here.‘

- Excerpt from Ars Historica by Irn-Pelenis, Court Historian of His Imperial Majesty Valen Xevaris

In the world where the game is set, a vagrus is a person who leads a group of travellers to their destination. Literally meaning ‘wanderer’ in the Imperial language, vagrus now refers to anyone who leads a comitatus, whether it’s temporary or permanent. A comitatus is a sort of caravan, though the word ‘caravan’ may be a misnomer, since comitati (pl.) do not only deal in trading, but often take on mercenary work or volunteer as scouts, or explorers of forsaken places. Although settlements were rebuilt after the Calamity, roads between them are still extremely dangerous, if they are there at all. That is the reason why armed travellers are often the only way to trade and communicate between settlements, making comitati - and vagri (pl.) - essential and therefore, often well-respected.