Shadow, originally The Shadow Realm, was an active nation on Horizon's End from April 2023 to July 2024, led by Ae0n (de facto by star_litty starting in winter 2023/2024). The nation was, at alternate points in its history, dominated by pirates and by colonists, and had varying priorities over the course of its existence. The nation's capital was ThievesHaven on Chimgara.

Shadow was succeeded by Radiance on 3 July 2024.

History[edit | edit source]

	Shadow
	; Icon of Shadow
General
Demonym	Shade
Activity level	Disbanded
Capital city	ThievesHaven
Settlements	ThievesHaven, Cicatrix, The Rose Garden
Stations	Jay
Government
• Sovereigness	Ae0n
• Ambassador	star_litty
• Director of Operations	Astrobolt
Formation
Foundation date	27 April 2023
Dissolution Date	3 July 2024 (politically); 8 October 2024 (purged)
Culture
Language	English
Links

Early Days[edit | edit source]

In April 2023, a group of friends began joining Horizon's End in search of a new server to play on. They were previously organized as a crew (equivalent to a nation) named Shadow, led by Ae0n, on the Movecraft server "PirateCraft." On 27 April, when many of them had already joined Horizon's End, Ae0n created Shadow as a formal nation in-game. Over the course of the following months, Shadow would quietly develop its bases throughout the Ilios System, largely staying out of server political affairs at the time.

Shadow-Orovika War[edit | edit source]

On 22 August 2022, the nation of Shadow, under the leadership of Ae0n (with significant influence from Noix444), declared war on the colonist nation of Orovika, sparking the 40-day Shadow-Orovika War. The war quickly became unpopular among many of Shadow's members as they were the targets of Orovikan attacks. This was also influenced by the builder playstyle of many Shadow members at the time, which conflicted with the SvS-oriented playstyle of many recent recruits including Noix444, AdelieXY, and FellOffBridge.

Over the course of the war, several members of Shadow (such as star_litty and VoidsentRose) elected to leave the nation in-game in order to excuse themselves from conflict with Orovika, a movement which highlighted overall dissatisfaction with the war and brought Shadow to the negotiating table on two separate occasions. Following a catastrophic first round of diplomatic negotiations between Orovika and Shadow, which were broadly perceived by both Orovikan and Shadow witnesses as a diplomatic failure on Ae0n's part, star_litty became accepted by Orovika as the primary diplomatic contact for Shadow. This recognition was initially unknown to Ae0n, leading to internal conflict between her and star_litty after star_litty coordinated surrender terms with Orovika. These conflicts abruptly led to star_litty's departure from the nation. Following this, Astrobolt picked up star_litty's negotiations, working closely with both Ae0n and Orovika to end the war. After continued negotations, Astrobolt was able to secure Shadow's surrender to Orovika on 29 September 2023, using the terms that star_litty had previously arranged, which involved the turn-over of one 12k destroyer to Orovika.

Rebuilding Shadow[edit | edit source]

After the end of the Shadow-Orovika War, Ae0n became increasingly inactive, eventually leading star_litty to assume a de facto leadership position during the winter of late-2023/early-2024. By this point, Shadow had been materially exhausted due to the Shadow-Orovika War - an issue that was only compounded by the start of the server-wide Horizon Federation-RentDueYesterday War just a week later on 6 October - essentially requiring the nation's infrastructure to be rebuilt from scratch

During this period of de facto leadership, internal politics changed drastically. Astrobolt coordinated with Ae0n, who eventually named Astrobolt and star_litty as co-leaders (as opposed to their previous position as Council members). Following various role permissions changes, star_litty became the primary leader in spring 2024 in all aspects except formal in-game leadership (as recognized by server plugins) and except ownership of the discord server. During star_litty's de facto leadership, Shadow drastically, yet gradually, changed course to become more builder-centered and community-centered. The nation admitted several new players including KBUSJ, EloMilo, and Kay_2905, who began contributing significantly to Shadow. Diplomatic priorities also pivoted; Shadow began distancing itself from players like FellOffBridge (who had since gone on to form RentDueYesterday), and aligning with the colonist nations on the server via the Horizon Federation. Positive diplomatic engagement with nations such as Cortesia Del Mar gave Shadow access to more advanced ship and factory technology, as well as combat training that reduced the nation's previous reliance on imported muscle. On 26 March 2024, star_litty founded the settlement of Cicatrix (then "cherrytown") on Aerach, continuing the ongoing, informal process of moving Shadow's primary activity and operations away from ThievesHaven on Chimgara.

On 23 April 2024, after over a week of careful negotiations, Shadow formed the Ilios Alliance alongside Cortesia Del Mar and Orovika. The Ilios Alliance would prove to be crucial for Shadow throughout the following months.

Radiant Revolution[edit | edit source]

While star_litty had been operating as Shadow's de facto leader and, alongside Astrobolt, eventually became a co-leader of the nation, she was still formally considered the nation's Ambassador. During the late-winter and early-spring of 2024, this increasingly became an issue. While Ae0n's influence over the nation was dwindling due to her inactivity, she still retained all formal leadership and, in hopes of becoming more active in the future, still wished to be part of major discussions while star_litty and Astrobolt were co-leaders.

This situation led to increasing conflicts between star_litty and Ae0n regarding formal leadership. Following discussions led by Astrobolt, these concerns were temporarily put aside and plans were put in place for Ae0n to formally and voluntarily transfer formal leadership of the nation to star_litty. These plans, however, became delayed for outside reasons and, following continued internal conflicts, were set aside altogether.

These conflicts culminated in June and July 2024. As a result of numerous miscommunications, general support for star_litty among Shadow's members, significant pressure and influence from other nations, and failed negotiations by Astrobolt, Ae0n removed in-game permissions from all nation members, including Astrobolt and star_litty. While initially intended to be temporary (although this was unknown to anyone at the time), this was seen by many members - and especially by other nations - as malicious. Because of this, star_litty formed the nation Radiance on 3 July; the new nation quickly took hold of many of Shadow's assets, and was joined by every active settlement of Shadow.

Radiance immediately received widespread diplomatic support from nearly the entire server, including from the Ilios Alliance. The new nation received especially strong support from Cortesia Del Mar, one of the members of the Ilios Alliance, allowing Radiance to quickly build itself up. On 8 July 2024, Horizon's End staff manually transferred several Shadow claims to Radiance and Ae0n was permanently banned from Horizon's End.

Shadow was purged in-game on 8 October 2024 after being upheld through activity logging for several months. Nearly all of its remaining assets were claimed by Radiance.

Legacy[edit | edit source]