Puppet Nation Jistav

Puppet Nation Jistav (傀儡国ジスターヴ) is the country formerly under Demon Lord Clayman's control. Jistav is a mountainous region consisting of scarce vegetation and valleys. Initially a recreation of Ultra-Sorcery Kingdom of the Elves built by the "Curse Lord" Kazalim, it was later divided into two separate territories for both Kazalim and Clayman, but was later successfully merged under Clayman's reign, after the defeat of its founder. The Marionette Master gradually expanded the territory when the Curse Lord was defeated, however when he was killed, Jistav stopped existing as a single nation and was then delegated to Milim Nava as one of her new dominions.

History
In the distant past, the Ultra-Sorcery Kingdom of the Elves was once prosperous, but by its own stupidity, called upon its destruction after angering Milim Nava, and was wiped out overnight. The elven survivors went on to spread across the land and walked down different paths. Driven away by the Chaos Dragon, they sought refuge from their elven ancestors. Those with power explored and settled in the wilderness before building new kingdoms. Some escaped in secret, became reclusive, and lived away from civilization. Kazalim was one of them.

Kazalim, who was not yet a Demon Lord, managed to survive Demon Lord Milim's wrath and were among the few remaining members of the elven royal family. They escaped to a distant land to build a nation in the image of their hometown. They managed to preserve all the elven technology and recreated physical copies. Kazalim's greatest accomplishment was the fortress city and capital of Amrita, which he built using all his memories of elven magic and technology to recreate a fraction of their glory days. The nation that was born as a result was the Puppet Nation Jistav.

A few hundred years ago, Kazalim challenged the self-proclaimed Demon Lord Leon Cromwell. Unfortunately, Amrita fell to ruin due to his battle with and defeat by Leon, and the ruins were built over by Clayman's castle in order to prevent thieves from looting any valuables, though Amrita's leftover automatic defenses would serve their purpose if necessary. After Kazalim's defeat, previous subordinates of him willingly submitted to Clayman's reign, even helping him become Demon Lord. Clayman took over the territory since then and ruled it until his death. The council of Demon Lords didn't object this decision, thus the merging process afterwards proceeded smoothly. Nobody knew that this just a precautionary plan of Kazalim, which he devised for special times like this and was preparing Clayman in advance for the role of receiver.

As time went by, Clayman gradually expanded Jistav's territory and became a recognizable force to be reckoned with, as one of the Ten Great Demon Lords.

Clayman's Castle
The Castle that acted as Clayman's primary base and residence, originally belonged to Kazalim when they were the ruler of Jistav. Upon their physical death in Leon's hands, Clayman soon took over the castle in his stead.

The Castle itself acted as Clayman's primary power base where he plotted out his operations and held meetings with his associates, including the members of the Moderate Harlequin Alliance and other Demon Lords. It was well protected by Legions of Undead created by Adalman, the Index Finger of Clayman's Five Fingers, who was cursed by Kazalim to act as the guardian.

The interior of the castle is described as extravagant, decorated with many expensive arts and furniture. After Clayman's downfall, the castle is being managed by Dark Elves.


 * -|Light Novel=

Ruins of Amrita
Underneath Clayman's Castle lies the cavernous ruins of Amrita, accessible via an enchanted giant gate that was located inside the castle, which only Clayman could open previously and only he knew what was held there, since other Dark Elves wasn't allowed there and were only able to enter the upper floor. The giant gate to the second level of ruins has been enchanted with ancient magic and could be opened by solving a coded spell. The true worth of the ancient ruins is the magical defense mechanism for the city setup by Kazalim. Unlike the city on the surface protected by Adalman, Amrita was mainly guarded by Kazalim’s spells and their numerous golems carrying several Unique-grade equipment.

There is a settlement for the Dark Elves that lived within the ruins.

The ruins are divided into three levels, with the deepest one serving as a crypt. The first level of ruins acted as the treasury, that was already transferred during Demon Lord Clayman's reign, and is now being used as living quarters.

If the first floor was lightened by linking it with the orbit of the sun, the middle floor has magic candlesticks on the stone walls, that emit faint inextinguishable light created by magic. The middle floor greatly differs from upper floor mostly because of usage of stone walls with fabulous murals painted on them replicating the life of the elven ancestors, narrow corridors and low ceiling. The second level also consisted of some more invaluable trophies, such as Unique-grade gears, treasures, jewels and other riches.

The third level was where the closely guarded crypt lied. Presumably, Kazalim brought some of his fellow elven corpses, with a possibility that the crypt contained the bodies of the Royal family, since Kazalim was a former Royal, and to bury them in his new kingdom. The crypt was also where the Dark Elves stored many treasures, including valuable murals, weapons, gold coins and some stellas (a very rare and extremely expensive valued currency). The corridors that lead to the crypt still guarded by numerous enchanted dolls, were programmed to allow only certain biological life-form patterns, repelling any intruders who didn't match them through the golems and even going so far in order to defend the crypt to building his castle atop the ruins to prevent any graverobbers from stealing valuables.

Currently, the crypt is damaged beyond repair.

Death Valley
A path winding through jagged mountains. It was a rough, unfastened road that linked Clayman’s territory and the Eastern Empire. Despite this treacherous road being laden with monsters, traces of Clayman’s subordinates using the road had been found. Kumara's homeland—the “Cryptid County" was also located here.

Military
Clayman's troops could be divided on two separate groups of armies.

For offensive maneuvers, Clayman used an army that consisted of 30,000 various Majin and other non-human beings ranked from level B to level A. By being able to use his predecessor’s legacy, knowledge and magic, Clayman was capable of improving the combat capabilities of his subordinates by utilizing spells and artifacts, as well as recruit Majins who crave power. Clayman excelled at luring Majins by using great amounts of wealth and then manipulating them. They were led by Yamza, who was the Middle Finger of the Five Fingers. By being loyal enough to his master, he was given the position of Commander-In-Chief of Clayman's army.

The second group, consisted of numerous undead minions created and operated by Adalman. The most prominent figures in this army, besides Adalman is skilled swordsman Albert and rampaging Death Dragon. The usage of magic mist, allows them to create an ambush for hostile trespassers. They serve as and primarily acted as the defense force for Clayman's castle.

For espionage and intel gathering, Mjurran and Pirone usually acted as Clayman's spies. Apart from them, he also had a group of subordinates specifically for these purposes, who often wander through various regions around the world, allowing him to gather information more conveniently for his own ends.

Eastern Empire
The Eastern Empire had no particular interest towards Jistav initially, though some years after Amrita's establishment they did attack it once, and its defenses failed. Years following Kazalim's demise and Clayman's ascension as one of the Ten Great Demon Lords, the Empire began a trading relationship with Jistav through Damrada with Clayman purchasing many high-grade weapons and other equipments for his army. However, the Empire's true intention was to use Clayman in conquering the Great Jura Forest by having him crush any threats to their conquest, and for this reason, Tatsuya Kondou – head of the Empire's Intelligence Bureau – placed Clayman under mind control, forcing him to focus on destroying the Jura Tempest Federation as well as defeating the Storm Dragon Veldora, who had once foiled their invasion of the Great Jura Forest in the past.

Armed Nation of Dwargon
Jistav also had a trading relationship with the Armed Nation of Dwargon and would trade many high-quality weaponry and others for Clayman's army. Despite Clayman being known to be a ghastly man, Dwargon continued trading though they were highly cautious while doing so. However, following the revelation of Clayman being the mastermind behind the allied attack on the Jura Tempest Federation, Dwargon was hostile towards the Demon Lord and supported Tempest in their plans to defeat him.

Holy Empire Ruberios
Clayman considers the Western Holy Church to be a mysterious organization and wishes to learn about it's secrets. In order to do so, he sent Laplace to investigate the Church, but his infiltration attempts failed twice. Ruberios, on the other hand, has never interacted with Jistav.

Economy
Puppet Nation Jistav established completely different economic distribution compared to other domains ruled under Demon Lords. Clayman is the only one of the few rulers, who knew how to exploit financial situations and even Rimuru had come to acknowledge his potential genius when he heard how Clayman treated his territory's economy. Unlike other ruling Demon Lords, Clayman was the only one who allowed free and legal commerce. Establishing the trade relationships with almost every country around the world through use of merchants. By being the one of only country with free independent trade system, Puppet Nation Jistav had decent amount of merchants placed all over the Magic Continent.

For most of Jistav's agricultural output, Clayman primarily used slave labor. However, not everything was domestically produced. Some of the items were supposed to be imported beyond Jistav's borders, such as fruits, bread, and dairy products as well as other consumable goods. These products couldn’t be teleported by magic, so they were transported physically. In order to store exported products, Clayman had bases all over the world, most of which were warehouses. He bought them personally with a goal to store goods such as wine, fruits and other stuff bought from the Eastern Empire. This could explain how he was able to feed the Orc army consisted of 200,000 orc troops.

We cannot forget about additional and no less important source of income for Clayman's exchequer - selling the heirlooms and artifacts buried beneath the first level of Amrita's ruins. The ancient relics, artifacts, treasures, sets of Unique-grade equipment and weaponry, golden coins alone costed an entire fortune. Only by selling a small portion of them was enough for anyone to live like the nobility for centuries.

Trivia

 * Interestingly enough, Clayman never considered himself to be the ruler of Jistav. He always considered the territory to be Kazalim's and stated that he was taking care of it until his return.
 * Kagali had planned to restore the ruins of Amrita back to its glory days after she handled the issues she and her allies were facing. However, following the crypt's destruction, she was discouraged from doing so.
 * In Tensura Nikki, it was revealed that Clayman's Castle has a name of "Shadow Castle", where he regularly held Demon Lord conferences, which were more informal versions of Walpurgis Banquets. They also included fancy tea parties and palatable Clayman's own hand-made pastry.
 * Clayman's Castle was created not just as a base of operations, but as a secondary layer of protection for the ruins of Amrita that lies beneath it. It was more specifically built to protect the crypt within the third level of the ruins from possible graverobbers or thieves.