The tyranny of Henry Noman was directed primarily at those who the citizens desired to punish more severely: the criminals, the corrupt officials, the disruptors.

  When his men took action in front of the populace it was to shut down active bad behaviour. A guard would drag a drunk away from the market, or they would break up a fight by arresting the brawlers, or they would section off an area for a drug bust and direct people around the scene. Everything in the public eye was handled carefully.

  It was how these actions concluded behind closed doors that became a growing concern. If one man attacked another and started a fight, they might both be dragged away. Civilians might assume that the attacker would be punished and the defender set free after confirmed their account, but that was rarely the case. It could take weeks to do things properly, so there was a tacit agreement between the guards and the courts that minor situations could be addressed with simple punishments without legal examination. Most often, both of the fighters - the assaulter and the assaulted - would find themselves beaten until they couldn't fight again. A drunk might have his jaw broken, left with difficulty drinking. A thief might lose a hand.

  To compensate for the slowness and inconsistency of the justice system, Noman settled on a policy of barbarism. To him it was most important to prevent future unrest. If that meant cruelty to those causing the unrest, so be it.

  Noman made it clear to his guardsmen that, in the eyes of the public, they should take action in the least disruptive ways possible. If they attempt to solve unrest with their own chaos then the people would be no better off. This left the citizens of Beorne largely unaware that their justice system was falling apart entirely, failing to convict people as they move through the process, failing to move criminals into the legal system, and failing to keep criminal away from the public until they could be rehabilitated.

  Lieutenant Even, at the time in charge of the inner city, was aware of these problems, but he lacked the influence to do anything about it. In his district the crimes were minimal; his guardsmen were tasked with being present to provide a sense of security and discourage criminals from even showing up. There were enough checks to ensure criminals couldn't even reach the inner city, with inspections at the gates and permit requirements, that Noman's tyranny barely impacted the upper classes Even was responsible for.

  Without taking even more drastic measures he was left with few options. Out of the public eye he talked with judges and barristers, and even spoke with the Regent himself on a few occasions, but he failed to convince anyone that action was necessary. The legal system felt less burdened, caring little about being less effective, and the Regent saw the overall crime reduction as a net benefit.

  At least, that was what the Regent claimed. In reality, he was glad to see that the disruptions he made his money off of were no longer being investigated. The assault of a merchant for missing protection payments would not be linked to gangs, and through those gangs to his office; the people involved would simply be beaten. Low-level drug dealers would not be linked to their sources, their organizations, and their funding, but instead be killed out of the public eye and buried quietly.

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  For Braven, Noman was an ideal captain: quick to judgement without a need to confirm, quick to solve problems on his own that should have been solved with broad changes, and most importantly more dedicated to public order than to justice.

  Noman received a tip several years into his tenure as captain regarding Lord Braven's indiscretions. It was not something he could action at the time; the impact of arresting the Regent would be enormous, and the public confusion would be unmanageable. His policy was set, and the people saw his reign as secure and helpful, leaving him hesitant to change his ways.

  He sat on the information, keeping it in the back of his mind for every meeting he had with the Regent, desiring to find a solution but unable to juggle his competing priorities. If he had known from the start, maybe Noman would have made a different choice, but after years in his role certain practices were becoming solidified. Consistent messaging was turning into culture, and in a dangerous way.

  Noman inadvertently fostered a cult of personality among too many guards to control on his own, needing to rely on lieutenants who were slowly morphing into zealots. They dealt out the harshest punishments, gave the most brutal orders, targeted the most minor crimes. And Noman could not find a way to dissuade them without losing their loyalty entirely.

  A tipping point was reached when loyalty tests started among the outer city guards. There were no shortage of criminals in the slums, downtrodden folk forced into crime to get a day's food or a month's rent, and they would be regularly swept off the streets into holding cells for "processing." At night, some of these people would be pulled out and placed before a guardsman that the others felt was too soft, unable to push forth Noman's perceived will of an ironclad order in Beornia. Their options were to kill the criminal, only knowing that they had been arrested for some reason, or to be beaten and pushed to the fringes of the guard corps.

  Most often the criminal would die.

  Even among the outer city the disappearances started being noticed. The scale of arrests increased, the scale of the tests increased to demand more blood for less reason, the scope broadened and brought guards from other sections to the outer district to be tested. Those who passed marked themselves with red scarves, wrapped around their necks and easy to pull over their faces, and some even tattooed themselves with nooses and guillotines, their preferred methods when an execution was to happen in public.

  When even the inner city guards, notorious for avoiding any real work, started being dragging into these tests, and thus started joining this growing movement, Even confronted Noman. He had brought up concerns in the past, but things had clearly gone too far, just as he worried they would. And Noman finally agreed; the extremism of the guards had broken containment, and the people were growing worried for their safety again. Due process was no longer a guarantee in Beorne.

  Do nothing to stand out or you risk your life. Do nothing to question authority or you risk your life. Be normal, be average and uninvolved, or risk your life. That was the message the people of Beorne were hearing.

  Noman attempted to reign in his lieutenants, but they were too far gone. If they just pushed a bit harder the criminals would be wiped out entirely and the city would be safe. He attempted to speak with guardsmen directly, but they were little better. They practically worshipped an ever warping version of him, but that was not him. And even more important, he was not the one under pressure from his fellow guards to be brutal or be beaten.

  The Beorne guard corps needed a reset. It had become its own gang causing its own problems, but there was no one left to arrest them. Noman decided he needed to take drastic action to trigger that reset.