High Pontiff Everard II
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Everard II (Common: Everard II; High Imperial: Everardus II) (24th of Horen's Welcome, 1499 - 4th of the Amber Cold, 1537) was born as Edmond de Montfort and served as High Pontiff from his election in 1525 to his untimely assassination at the hand of Church dissenters in 1537. During his life, he was commonly called the Watcher for his refusing to draw arms against Canonists during the Dukes' War, and posthumously called the Wise for his role in the renaissance and revitalization of the Church of the Canon.
The beginning of Everard II's reign coincided with the death of Guy de Bar (which he himself help plot to achieve) and the Horen Restoration which saw John Frederick Horen crowned and the Holy Orenian Empire restored. Through his close contact with John I and control over the former crusading forces of the Tarchar Crusade, Everard II led a path of reform throughout the entire church. Paired with his close adviser and long time companion, Bishop Adrian Chivay, Everard II would pass the most Golden Bulls out of any Pontiff to date, solidify the Church's neutrality, and found numerous missions to both the Elven States and the Grand Kingdom of Urguan.
However, Everard II's policies of expansionism and non-human conversion did not sit well with every clergymen. The last three years of his reign would be stained by the controversial Turnball Affair, which the monk John Turnball created petition to have the pontiff step down. Numerous lords (including Everard II's own nephew, Otto of Carnatia) and clergymen (most famously the Bishop of Kvasz and the Bishop of Metz) signed the petition, which eventually had John I intervene in the Second Diet of Metz, from where the Emperor sided with the Pontiff and arrested the clergymen, including John Turnball himself. Despite the lords involved being pardoned, both the Bishops of Kvasz and Metz were executed, leading many minor clergymen disenfranchised with Everard II. The souring of his relations with the Istriot clergymen would prove his downfall, with he and Adrian Chivay stabbed in the streets of the Felsen by a pair of angered monks.
Everard II would prove to become one of the greatest High Pontiffs to have lived, successfully coordinating and safeguarding Church power while assisting the centralization of the Orenian Empire. His reign and growth of the church took up majority of the period what is known as the Everardian Period.
Biography
Early Life
Edmond de Montfort was born in the Adrian village of Montfort, as the second son of Paul de Montfort, Baron of Montfort, and Emma Vladovic, famed general of the Schism War.
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