Chalco

Chalco was one of the greatest Nexalan Revered Counselor in Maztican history who reigned in the early 14 century DR.

History
After the death of the failed warmongering Revered Counselor Pakli in the, and forty years of military stagnation that preceded, Chalco was chosen as the new ruler because he was the most powerful warrior of his time and a cousin of Pakli, several times removed.

Immediately, Chalco proved to be a forceful ruler. He launched the biggest invasion of Kultaka ever attempted by Nexal, capturing the largest number of captives in the empire's history. Numerous bloody battles ravaged the old rival of Nexal. Kultaka City itself was saved only by the timely emergence of the hero Takamal among the Kultakans' ranks. The young warrior was a renowned and accomplished soldier and his commitment, along with the desire to protect their families, inspired Kultakans to fight with unmatched ferocity. After a prolonged siege, Revered Counselor was forced to retreat, leaving Kultaka City unconquered once again. Despite losing the final battle, Chalco gained great honor, and popularity through ten thousand captured Kultakan slaves.

He decided his next target would be the Otomis. Chalco personally led the campaign and marched Nexal's great army through subjugated Huacli territory, demonstrating the power of the Nexalan empire and ordering Huacli warriors to join the conquest. Revered Counselor Chalco greatly devastated Otomis towns and villages and reached the peoples' main city-state. The siege was a fierce conflict. Otomis used rare copper-tipped arrows against the Nexala, missiles that easily penetrated their pluma and hishna armor. With heavy losses, Chalco overpowered the Otomis with his army's great numbers. Despite Otomis never surrendering, Chalco reached successes never achieved before: the city was overrun, and its temple was torched in honor of Bloody Zaltec, Nexalan patron god of war. Several thousands of surviving Otomis fled the now empty city, leaving it for the enemy. Chalco kept a force within the forced city, but Otomis refused to return. They only did so several years later, after Nexala abandoned it and returned to the Valley.

Apart from military aspirations, Chalco developed two obsessions: to find the Nexalans' ancestral home and to find the fabled Tewahca. For years Revered Counselor Chalco commanded Nexala traders to travel in search of the lost homeland, where centuries prior, cleric Tecco uncovered the holy pillar of Zaltec that changed the Nexala forever. The Revered Counselor interrogated each returning merchant about legends and stories they learned along the way. The second obsession was the reason he sent numerous expeditions into the hot desert of the House of Tezca. But the quests for the City of the Gods and the ancestral cavern both ended with no success.

After his death in the, following the twenty-six-year reign, his grandson, Axalt, became the next Revered Counselor. The new ruler inherited the empire in its strongest.