The bad guys are semi anarchistic oligopolistic city states run by quasi corporate absolute-slaver necromancer monopolies that have banded together to ruthlessly eradicate any other form of government after rising to power under the shelter of weak and easily corrupt republics and democracies.

While the good guys are the leaders of the very first incarnation of a constitutional feudal monarchy where the crimes of corruption or unworthiness carry the punishment of immolation through semi-divine artifacts in a world stunted to the bronze age by the lack of necessity or benefit for innovation and constant disasters both relating to the existence of magic.

The good guys are dictators because they end up forcing an entirely new governing system onto an existing non-feudal non-absolute monarchy before a predicted collapse due to war with the necromancers and internal corruption and then continue on to conquer the continent.