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11 Edicts are the legal instrument of Brencis's rule over Vale Sangora. They are decrees: rules proclaimed by the vrakhir court and enforced by its soldiers, and in The Blood of Dawnwalker they are the form the antagonist's attention takes. When Coen becomes a problem, Brencis does not simply send assassins. He changes the law.
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33 The Law of the Valley
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55 Vale Sangora is an occupied province rather than a lawless one. The vrakhir court holds the castle at Greifberg and the city of Svartrau, and the valley's people live under terms the court sets. The blood tax is the most concrete of those terms, and it is reported to be the specific concession Brencis can offer Laslea in one of the documented endings: exemption from the tax, and permission to practise Christianity, granted as an exception to rules that otherwise apply to everyone.
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77 The regime's reach is not only legal. Roadside shrines across the valley now carry Brencis's likeness rather than the old saints, which is the same authority working through religion instead of through soldiers.
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1010 How Edicts Are Issued
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1212 Edicts are tied directly to the notoriety system. As Coen undermines the regime, his infamy rises, and Brencis answers. A new edict is proclaimed at sunrise, at the start of a fresh day on the 30-day clock, so each cycle of the calendar can carry a new restriction. The higher the meter, the harsher the decree.
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1414 Creative director Mateusz Tomaszkiewicz described the mechanism in plain terms before launch: undermining Brencis gains notoriety, and the more notorious Coen becomes, the more edicts Brencis passes in order to thwart him. The intent, in the same account, was that edicts would twist and change the general open world gameplay rather than simply raise enemy counts.
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1616 Documented Restrictions
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1818 EdictEffect in PlayMore soldiers on the roadsPatrol density rises across the valley, which makes overland travel between quests slower and louder. See Exploration.More soldiers in the villagesSettlements gain garrisons, which narrows where Coen can move openly by day.Military checkpointsReported as a specific response to clearing camps, gating routes that were previously open.Fewer people out at nightThe fifth edict leaves fewer people outdoors between dusk and dawn, which means fewer people to feed on at night. Pre-release coverage described this as a curfew. This presses directly on blood craving.City lockdownIn the harshest documented case, Svartrau itself is sealed, and crossing the capital becomes a problem in its own right.
1919 Because the time cost of a journey is real, an edict is not only an obstacle but a tax on the calendar: routing around a lockdown or waiting out a curfew spends segments that could have gone to a quest.
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2121 The Nine Edicts
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2323 Walkthroughs of the shipped game report nine edicts, one for each infamy level, always in the same order. Each is issued a day after the infamy level rises rather than at once, and is announced in a cutscene in which it is read out in Svartrau. The edicts stay hidden in the Court menu until they are issued, and their restrictions stack.
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2525 EdictEffect1Additional patrols in settlements.2Military checkpoints appear throughout the valley.3Prices rise throughout the valley.4More soldiers patrol the roads, and patrol commanders now recognise Coen.5Fewer people are outdoors between dusk and dawn.6Further checkpoints and further price rises.7Headhunters appear in the valley, and all soldiers now recognise Coen.8All soldiers become stronger.9The gates of Svartrau are shut, and the city can only be entered by climbing the walls at night.
2626 Infamy rises through court activities and through clearing soldier camps, and defeating each of the three boyars raises it by a full level. See Court Activities.
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2929 Who Enforces Them
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3131 Edicts are regime wide, but the officers beneath Brencis run their own territories and track Coen's interference with them separately. Ambrus, Bakir and Xanthe each hold operations in the valley, and provoking one of them raises a personal aggression meter alongside the global infamy that drives the edicts. The distinction matters: edicts are the court's answer, while an officer's response is personal and opens a questline of its own. Factions covers the wider political map, including the rebels who read a harsh edict as a recruiting opportunity.
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3333 After the Regime
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3535 The reported epilogues treat the edicts as the thing that ends when Brencis does. Where the vrakhir are removed, the valley becomes independent and somewhat lawless, with the Manumits keeping the worst opportunists in check and the old religion returning. Where a new ruler takes the castle instead, reports describe fresh impositions rather than freedom: heavy taxation and encouragement to inform on neighbours. Where Brencis survives, the blood tax and the court's rules continue, with Laslea's exemption as the narrow exception. Law changes hands in this story; it does not disappear.
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3737 What Is Not Confirmed
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39-No first-party list of edicts has been published, so the nine steps above follow walkthroughs of the shipped game.Whether an edict can be lifted by lowering infamy, or only expires on its own, has not been documented.Whether the text of proclamations can be read in the world, in the way the epilogue notices on the tree in Laslea are read, is unstated.
39+No first-party list of edicts has been published, so the nine steps above follow walkthroughs of the shipped game.Infamy cannot be reduced, and proclaimed edicts remain active for the rest of the current run. Their restrictions accumulate as further edicts are issued.Whether the text of proclamations can be read in the world, in the way the epilogue notices on the tree in Laslea are read, is unstated.