The Empire of Hands
"In the name and by the power of Her Enduring Majesty, a trade embargo and quarantine in absolute perpetuity has hereby been declared on the Empire of Hands."
"1. No ship of London is to permit aboard a Pentecost ape without express and prior permission of the Admiralty. 2. Any and all acts of spirifrage are prohibited. 3. They know what they did." - Excerpt from Standard Naval Regulations, Vol IV.
The Empire of Hands is the homeland of the soul-loving Pentecost Apes (really, monkeys), who believe that if they steal enough souls from people, they will become human. Thus, the more souls an ape has in its body, the more important it is in their society. (The most important, the First Emperor, had 100 souls.) The rest of their culture mimics the various human cultures they have interacted with, and those are few - the Empire is not as old as it claims to be.
The Empire consists of five islands:
- Port Stanton, where the apes are building a huge zeppelin (how?!)
- Sovereign Island, where the apes hold court
- The Ash Isthmus, where two apes are raising a human child (who isn't soulless... yet)
- Fountainhead Island, the location of the vault of the First Emperor, which is secured by an unsolvable puzzle
- Hearthsake, which is a pirate fort inhabited by actual humans (who are cannibals due to lack of food)
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A jungle in the Empire of Hands. Art from SS. -
A Pentecost Ape. Art in both games.
