Ashura Grando University

The University functions as a universal asylum, providing a politically untouchable environment for academics, defectors, and students hailing from any nation or unrecognized territory. Anyone can be accepted as long as they are not wanted by the World Council itself.

If a recognized “Omnicritical Threat” seeks asylum, the Chairman is legally obligated to either neutralize them internally or temporarily lift the doctrine for World Council forces.

Refusal to surrender an Omnicritical Threat automatically reclassifies the Academy City-State as a hostile harborer of global terrorism.

Its defining geographical feature is being landlocked by four Great Sovereigns: Eiria, Delsur, Uttaria, and Atteria, while being completely surrounded by the Ashura Forest.

Ashura Grando is located entirely within the Alspring Zone.

The institution is primarily an urban academic territory rather than a conventional state. As a chartered academy city-state, Ashura Grando concentrates laboratories, lecture halls, residential districts, archives, libraries, testing facilities, and controlled transit inside its jurisdiction.

Its architecture supports both dense population and institutional separation from foreign military authority.

The legal border is the university’s most important landmark. C-BAR and sovereign militaries cannot enter under official capacity, making the boundary an unusually strong example of jurisdictional restriction in Kepler.

Its greatest defense is the political cost of violating neutrality: any invasion would challenge the World Council’s own constitutional order.

Ashura Grando’s current Chairman is redacted ██████████, who was promoted to the position on January 1, 278 XE.

How one becomes the Chairman of Ashura Grando University has a lot to do with loyalty and tenure at the institution, as well as a lack of outside affiliations.

The Student Body Representatives act as the enforcers of the university’s rules and regulations.

A second set of rules applies specifically to the general Ashura Grando city-state areas outside the university itself. These regulations are also enforced by high-level Student Body representatives and staff.

Its chartered status gives it absolute neutrality. External sovereign or C-BAR military authority is forbidden inside its borders.

This distinguishes it from a sovereign state, which retains ordinary territorial sovereignty, and from a protectorate, which receives limited Council defense.

The Chairman governs through a mixed academic and administrative structure. Faculty, research directors, student representatives, and security officials all possess influence.

Because the university is neutral, its internal security is separate from C-BAR and from the armed forces of any sovereign. Instead, the primary defenders are its staff of professors, tutors, and the Student Body Representatives known as the Tenured 10.

C-BAR provides neutral border protection to chartered states but cannot exercise ordinary military authority within Ashura Grando. This arrangement protects the institution from invasion while preserving its autonomy.

Foundation Before the Exodus Era

Ashura Grando was established on October 28, 36 BXE. Its foundation predates the World Council by some decades, and the university’s chartered neutrality was built into the later international order rather than created by it.

Charter and Neutrality

The World Council formally recognized Ashura Grando as a chartered state on January 1, 1 XE, placing the university outside ordinary sovereign competition while granting it representation in two Bodies of the World Council.

The Charter

The charter was created because Kepler needed a place where research, education, diplomacy, and historical investigation could continue without being subordinated to any one nation.

Its early establishment made it a trusted neutral site before the World Council existed.

It was created by Ashura Grando to bridge the racial gap, particularly between Espers and Strigois, and later accepted Normans as well.

The university became increasingly important as Psinecraft research, Psinecore science, and cross-species education became politically sensitive.

Neutrality allows rival states to send students and scholars while limiting the risk that the institution becomes a national weapons laboratory.

Outside Ashura Grando University itself lie more specialized schools focusing on Business, the Arts, Zoology, and Cryptozoology, including the study of labyrinth beasts. All of these institutions remain within the Ashura Grando city-state territory.

Ashura Grando has its own island, water supplies, resources, merchants, and even people who permanently live there.

The Tenured 10 are the primary student defenders and enforcers of Ashura Grando University’s internal order.

Ashura Grando University students regard themselves as the Sunmelon of students of Kepler.

Because of the University’s track record, a good stint at Ashura Grando University almost guarantees a successful career and life once a student leaves the university.

Because of this prestige, Ashura Grando University students are often snobby and sometimes consider themselves above those in other rival universities and academies within the general Ashura Grando city-state, and even those from sovereign-nation institutions with less prestige.

The University is home to its own folklore and mysteries, including the 7 Mysteries of Ashura Grando which are mysterious events that are perpetuated throughout the university but are mostly unsubstantiated throughout the wider world.

The Lost Hour

Clocks jump forward by exactly one hour, and no one can remember what happened during that time. Security cameras and records show only static.

The Soundless Day

Every sound on Kepler ceases for exactly one day. People can move, wind blows, waves crash—but absolute silence reigns.

Daily life revolves around education, research, professional guilds, residential colleges, laboratories, archives, and student societies.

Social class is organized around academic rank and the Tenured 10, even though outside prestige also holds weight among students.

Its student population includes Lalumists, Pentagonists, Cartaists, Neo-Cartaists, and minor sects, as well as approximately 20% Norman, 40% Strigoi, and 40% Esper, making the university a living experiment in pluralism.

Because its purpose is education and research, Ashura Grando likely has the most formally integrated population of any political entity in Kepler.

That integration is still imperfect: Esper abilities, Strigoi biology, and Norman technology continue to generate separate academic niches, clubs, and social stereotypes.

Ashura Grando University is also the birthplace of many of Kepler’s acronyms and backronyms.

Psine

The term Psine was already in use long before it became short for Psion Nexus Energy.

C-BAR

Many people on Kepler once referred to C-BAR as “the regiment” or called each letter individually. Ashura Grando University popularized the pronunciation “C-Bar”, which many soldiers hated when it first gained popularity.

AGUA

AGUA can refer to Ashura Grando University, the Ashura Grando Academy, or the Ashura Grando University area.

It is one of the more niche acronyms that nobody outside of Ashura Grando University uses, serving as proof that not everything created by the University is instantly canonized.

NEETs / NEETS

NEETs, or Neural Engram Encoded Tools, is the scientific name for Psinecraft artifacts or relics.

Exodus Era / XE

Exodus Era, or EX, is the official dating of modern Kepler that many attributes to earlier scholars at Ashura Grando in the post Convergence War Era. But it is still highly debated where the XE originated from.

• Edwin Baines — deceased former King of Teranua.
• Oksana Ivanov — Jureslavic diplomat colloquially regarded as “The Eight Great Wanderer.”
• Lady Linnea Robbespierre — Executive Chief of Kanata.
• Dreyk Ignis — one of the Seven Great Wanderers.
• Giovanni Mari. — one of the Seven Great Wanderers.
• Wolfgang Jackolan. — one of the Seven Great Wanderers.
• Sotsui Akitsune. — one of Eiria’s Seven Virtues of Bushido.