  • Crusader Kings III Available Now!

    The realm rejoices as Paradox Interactive announces the launch of Crusader Kings III, the latest entry in the publisher’s grand strategy role-playing game franchise. Advisors may now jockey for positions of influence and adversaries should save their schemes for another day, because on this day Crusader Kings III can be purchased on Steam, the Paradox Store, and other major online retailers.


    Real Strategy Requires Cunning

Michaelangelo

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I can only assume from that last part that you're from an alternate dimension interacting with ours. You haven't happened to have been around any stranger mirror-like objects, have you?
 

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Huh, didn't expect you to break the fourth wall.
 

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I can only assume from that last part that you're from an alternate dimension interacting with ours. You haven't happened to have been around any stranger mirror-like objects, have you?
Well, Willy does have a mirror in his room, so...
Huh, didn't expect you to break the fourth wall.
Willy's meant to be this universe's version of me, not the actual me (whose father didn't die in 9/11, fyi). Tbh, I was planning this from at least the 1970s, when I was looking through the event files and found a random event for the modder's birthday which happened to be quite close to mine. Then I decided to extend the mod's end date from 2000 to 2021 to accomodate my alien invasion events, and then I decided to add myself into the story.
 

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Sophia’s Rage

Sophia would not stand by as nations revived a rival ideology and embraced it; already, there were protests in the streets of Nanjing calling for her abdication and for Chancellor Xi to assume control as a president, with the Guomingdang forming a new Diet to replace the one that Sophia had set up in the aftermath of the invasion. Sophia responded by sending in troops and increasing funding for the police. She sent subsidies and troops to Germany and Austria-Hungary to keep them afloat, and slowly their economies began to improve, with their streets cleaned of crime and the unemployed and homeless given jobs and housing by the prepared Chinese soldiers. It would not be enough, though, to end the economic crisis that gripped most of Europe and benefited Greece. It controlled the food imports and exports, as well as the flow of raw materials to and from Europe. The Mediterranean Economic Union basically decided the fate of Europe’s economy on a whim, currently wishing to torture Germany for its role in the Seventh Weltkrieg. However, all of that assumed that the Earth economy was independent of the rest of the galactic economy.

Sophia sent her ships to other planets, negotiating deals and sometimes using gunboat diplomacy to secure trade agreements. Soon, food and raw materials were being supplied to Europe, especially Germany and Austria-Hungary, from off-world, going around Greece’s bottleneck on Mediterranean trade; neutral nations referred to it as the “space-lift.” As Greece’s profits and its stranglehold on European trade dwindled, its president signed a secret agreement with the United States and the other republics to destroy the monarchies once and for all in the name of freedom. The same day, Sophia met with Arthur and the Kaiser in Nanjing to discuss a strategy for the imminent global war against the democracies. Whichever ideology won would decide the fate of the entire world. They devised a plan in case war broke out.

On July 4, 2016, a bomb planted by CIA agents in Washington, D.C. severely damaged the Capitol building and killed several congressmen, as well as the president’s family but not the president himself, while all were attending the patriotic July 4th parades. The Americans blamed the attack on Canada and issued an ultimatum to King Arthur II of England: either abdicate and institute complete democracies in Canada, England, and the other members of the British Commonwealth, along with the dismantlement of the already specified Commonwealth, or face war and certain destruction. Arthur chose war, as part of Sophia’s plan.

And so the Monarchists, consisting of China, Germany, Austria-Hungary, England, Scotland, Wales, Australia, Canada, Korea, Japan, Vietnam, Bengal, Thailand, Burma, Indonesia, the Papal State, the Caliphate, Denmark, Iceland, Greenland, Russia, Egypt, South Africa, Israel, Carthage, Ireland, Afghanistan, and Persia, went to war with the Republicans, consisting of Greece, the United States, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, Peru, Chile, Mali, Ethiopia, Arabia, Hawaii, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Hyderabad, Rajastan, New Zealand, Spain, France, the United States of Central America, Kurdistan, California, Columbia, Texas, Deseret, Alaska, Cherokee, the Confederacy, the Free States, Cuba, Haiti, Jan Mayen, Quebec, Newfoundland, the Maritime Union, Ukraine, Congo, Madagascar, and Kilwa, sparking the Eighth and Final Weltkrieg among the nations of Earth.

Sophia realized that with most of the nations of the world involved in this war, things were going to get really bloody really fast. The scale of the war was beyond anything she or anyone for that matter could have predicted and prepared for, but her plan still held.

A combined Monarchist space fleet met the Republican space fleets in orbit over Africa in the first battle of the war; with over a hundred ships participating, this battle dwarfed any naval or space battle previously fought. Nobody won the battle, because both sides lost the majority of their space fleets in the fierce fighting. The wreckage from the battle rained down over the Republic of Ethiopia, causing massive damage to infrastructure and a crippling famine, eventually leading to its surrender and the restoration of its emperor. But that was part of Sophia’s plan to wipe out the Republican fleet and distract the Republicans from the real battle on the ground. The capitulation of Ethiopia was an added bonus, giving the Monarchists a stronghold in Africa.

Sophia ordered an invasion of India, supporting Bengali forces into Hyderabad and Rajastan at the start of the monsoon season, which was a big mistake as she soon realized, as the heavy rains dampened the ammunition and disabled the explosives, frustrating her efforts. The Chinese troops quickly became bogged down in the rain and the mud, with Rajput and Deccan troops using guerilla tactics against the Bengalis and Chinese. The Siamese, having been allied to the Chinese since 1926, eagerly launched an invasion of Sri Lanka, with Burmese support. Once the island fell to Monarchist forces, they marched northwards and conducted amphibious invasions of Hyderabad. Once Hyderabad fell, Rajastan would be surrounded on all sides and be forced to capitulate to Monarchist forces, as part of Sophia’s plan

Elsewhere, the Imperial navies of Japan and China invaded Hawaii and occupied the islands quickly, forcing the president’s surrender and the installation of a distant relative of the Hawaiian royal family; this placated Sophia for now. The next part of her plan was to use Hawaii to begin an invasion of California, using the old battle plans from the Pacific War in the 1940s. However, that part was quickly derailed.

The Alaskans invaded Siberia, with the harsh winters doing nothing to stop them, as they were generally used to such extreme conditions, forcing the Imperial Navy to scramble from Hawaii to blockade the Bering Straits. Sophia ordered troops to be diverted from India all the way to fight the Alaskans in Siberia, where the Koreans and Japanese were working hard to at least slow them down. The Alaskans managed to push all of the way to Haishenwai in Outer Manchuria, sieging it for four brutal weeks before the Imperial Army arrived to fight them. Eventually, the Alaskans were driven back across the Bering Strait, with Koreans and Japanese launching invasions of Alaska in retaliation.

In the Middle East, the Persians invaded Arabia and Kurdistan, getting as far as Baghdad before the Republican troops could retaliate against them with hit-and-run tactics. As a large sandstorm set in, both sides dug into the ground to fortify themselves, reviving the trench warfare tactics that had been used a hundred years ago to devastating effect; neither side made any progress for most of the war, although Arabia was continuously harassed by religious extremist militants. Israel marched down the Red Sea coast of Arabia, seizing the Muslim holy sites and ticking off the entire Muslim world, which feared that the holy sites (already destroyed by the Goa’uld) would be destroyed by the Israelis again, causing the Caliph to impulsively nuke Jerusalem, which in turn caused the Pope to nuke Ankara, which then caused the Caliph to nuke Rome, killing both heads of religion and almost provoking a Christian-Muslim sectarian war. Sophia and Arthur managed to mediate an agreement between the new Pope and new Caliph before the two could declare devastating crusades and jihads against each other.

With Alaska under siege by the Koreans and Japanese, the United States, Alaska, Columbia, California, Mexico, and Quebec simultaneously invaded Canada (again) to put more pressure on the Monarchists, effortlessly seizing Toronto, which was burned to the ground and looted. The Canadian forces retreated northwards, scorching the earth as they went. The winter set in as the Americans advanced on Ottawa, killing thousands on both sides in the harsh conditions. English troops landed in Eastern Canada, assaulting the fortifications of Quebec, Newfoundland, and the Maritime Union from land and sea, with the latter’s navy proving to be more than a match for the once glorious Royal Navy.

In Europe, a combined Russian, German, Papal, and Austrian offensive drove deep into France, while the English invaded from Normandy. The Monarchist forces pushed into Paris by the winter of 2016, forcing a French surrender, which coincided with a Ukrainian invasion of Russia. The Tsarist forces retreated like the Canadians, scorching their own cities to make sure the Ukrainians had nothing to loot or live on. When the Ukrainians reached Moscow, their numbers had dwindled significantly, allowing the Russian reinforcements to effortlessly smash them.

Austria-Hungary attempted to invade Greece itself, seeking to gain international fame by crushing the Republicans at their source, but its outdated and underfunded armies, however propped up by the Chinese, were no match for the elite and advanced Greek forces, which plowed through wave after wave of Habsburg soldiers like a trireme through the waves. Ottoman attempts at crossing the Bosporus were frustrated by the Greek and Ukrainian navies, and the walls of Constantinople again rebuffed any attempt by the Ottomans to storm the city.

In the spring of 2017, Canada surrendered to the United States, which annexed the entire nation, to the outrage of even the other Republicans. President George Bush claimed that it was only “natural” that Canada be a part of “Greater Texas,” immediately deploying his nukes and turning on the Confederacy, the Free States, California, Cherokee, Texas, Columbia, and Alaska, annexing all of them into the United States in days. Mexico then underwent a huge and chaotic monarchist revolution, restoring the Iturbide family and the monarchy to power, prompting an American invasion. Sophia, enraged that the United States was aiming for continental hegemony at the expense of former tributary states, quickly sent in troops to fight the Americans and protect the Mexicans, having secured all of Asia for the Monarchist cause.

In Europe, things weren’t looking good. Despite the capitulation of France and the imminent surrender of Spain, Austria-Hungary and Russia could only take so much beating at the hands of the Greeks and the Ukrainians. Germany’s and England’s troops were tied up in Spain, and Africa was, simply put, a mess. If the Greeks could break out of the stalemate with the Habsburgs and destroy Austria-Hungary, Germany would be left open to attack from the south and the east, should Ukraine manage to also defeat Russia.

Soon the Americans had crossed the Rio Grande and cut a bloody swathe south, crushing Mexican troops easily. Central American troops marched up from the south, seizing the Yucatan in weeks.

Chinese troops arrived in Mexico by the millions in the spring of 2018, halting an American advance on Mexico City and driving back the Republican forces. Spain surrendered to the Monarchist forces, freeing up German and English troops to fight on the Southern Front. Greece suddenly found itself surrounded on all sides: the Ottomans from the east, the Egyptians and Israelis from the seas, the Austro-Hungarians and Germans from the north, and the Papal State from the west. It didn’t help that Russia finished “protecting its oppressed Russian minorities” in its enemy Ukraine, annexing the entire republic.

After its army ran out of ammunition and its navy mutinied, allowing the Ottomans to seize Constantinople from the Greeks and march unopposed into northern Greece, a military coup by desperate generals overthrew the Greek president, negotiating an armistice with Sophia and the Kaiser as Sophia positioned her rebuilt Zheng He-class carriers above Greece in preparation for a ruthless orbital nuclear bombardment that would obliterate Greece and wipe its civilization off the face of the planet. The Republic of Greece and the majority of the Republican nations surrendered on November 11, 2018—the one hundredth anniversary of the First Weltkrieg. The United States continued the fight alone until New York, Washington, Boston, Chicago, Detroit, Richmond, Savannah, Houston, and several other major cities were repeatedly nuked from orbit by the Chinese. The president attempted to surrender on December 1, with all of his cities and armies trampled and his lands full of deadly radiation, but Congress refused to send the surrender, prompting the president to veto Congress. Congress responded by overriding the veto and then assassinating the president and his supporters to cement its power. A final nuke dropped over Philadelphia managed to destroy most of the Congress in one blast, forcing the survivors to surrender unconditionally.

The Eighth Weltkrieg ended, with German and China finally victorious. All defeated nations that fought with the Republicans, with the exception of the United States of America (as Sophia argued that “American Empire” or “Kingdom of America” didn’t sound appropriate, as well as the fact that there was no royal family able to take the American throne), had monarchies installed in them. Germany and China reestablished control over their former African colonies, with the former reestablishing a more moderate Mittelafrika colonial and the latter re-founding a puppet Empire of Mali to control West Africa. All territorial gains made by the Monarchist nations would remain in place (England, for example, received the Falklands and South Georgia from Argentina). The United States was forced to release all of the North American nations that it had annexed in 2017, with Canada annexing Quebec and the other breakaway states and China re-annexing the former Pacific States, leaving Texas, Cherokee, and Columbia as buffer states; a subsequent attempt by the United States to invade Canada and Mexico simultaneously on December 15 resulted in the former’s partition between the kingdoms of Mexico, Texas, the Cherokee, and Canada. Bengal annexed the republics of Hyderabad, Sri Lanka, and Rajastan, proclaiming the Empire of Bharat the day after Armistice, with a simple but charismatic young farmer claiming to be from the legendary Suryavansha dynasty ascending the Indian throne as the Samrat Chakravartin. Denmark annexed the other Scandinavian states and declared the reformation of a Norse-worshipping Scandinavian Empire. In a national referendum, the people of Scotland, Ireland, and Wales voted to join England in restoring the United Kingdom, after a surprise Greek invasion from space forced them to realize that divided the four of them would be easy targets for their enemies. King Arthur II was crowned king of Ireland, Scotland, and Wales the next day in St. Paul’s Cathedral, with millions watching from around the world.

All Republican nations were forced to pay harsh reparations to Germany and the rest of the Monarchist nations, but not Greece, which received special treatment.

Greece and Arabia were annexed into the Ottoman Empire, now a Great Power again, for their roles in the Eighth Weltkrieg and their failures to stop militant insurgencies, respectively. The Ottomans also demanded the annexation of Kurdistan in the peace treaty, but Sophia intervened on behalf of the Kurds.

The victories propelled Germany back into Great Power status, practically fixing its economy and putting it on par with that of China’s. Around the world, people watched as a monarchy’s economy rose to supplant the former Greek one, and nations began switching back to monarchies. Austria-Hungary’s economy also grew, and the prospering times led the Archduke to declare a huge centralization program for his empire, rendering the Dual Monarchy obsolete and replacing it with a highly centralized Austrian Empire, a liberal yet absolute monarchy ruling from Vienna.

China returned to the number 1 position among the Great Powers. After two years of careful planning, Sophia smiled in relief. Her rule and reign were secured. She was still sad that people had to die to secure the monarchists’ cause. At least a hundred million died, or ten percent of the population of Earth, with the total population of Earth down to around 900 million, a third of which lived in China. Much of the world was reduced to irradiated nuclear wasteland, with millions poised to die from radiation poisoning soon.

At the end of 2018, the Great Powers were, from least to most influential: Spain, France, the Empire of Bharat, the Ottoman Empire, Austria, the United Kingdom, the German Empire, and the Chinese Empire. All were monarchies, as they should be, Sophia reflected.

With issues on Earth resolved, the Great Powers turned to space again…
 
Last edited:

Michaelangelo

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I'm surprised anyone can live on Earth at all anymore with all those nukes flying free. You'd think everything would be so irradiated that plant and animal life would die out. :rolleyes:
 

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I'm surprised anyone can live on Earth at all anymore with all those nukes flying free. You'd think everything would be so irradiated that plant and animal life would die out. :rolleyes:
That I will discuss in a future update. Don't worry, this ends up benefiting Earth.
 

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To the Stars

At the end of the Eighth and Final Weltkrieg, much of Earth had been reduced to irradiated wasteland due to the liberal use of nuclear weapons by almost every participant nation (yes, including Jan Mayen). A hundred million people had died already, with millions more poised to die from radiation poisoning, famine, lack of infrastructure, or hunger. The Asgard returned, again, providing medicine that could counteract the effects of radiation poisoning in addition to cleaning up most of the radiation. But the damage was done. Most people wanted to leave Earth and settle on other planets.

In 2019, the Chinese Tian Agency and German Projekt Asgard began full-scale colonization of the galaxy, soon followed by the other Great Powers. Posters were put up to recruit colonists to settle suitable uninhabited planets; many more than expected came. Within a few weeks, New Brandenburg’s settlements had maxed out their quotas. People were just eager to get away from the chaos on Earth.

The rest of the Great Powers started claiming planets for themselves so that they wouldn’t be left out of the “Scramble for Space.” A crisis arose in the spring of 2019 between the Ottomans and the Indians over who colonized a planet first. Sophia’s decision was to split the planet straight down the middle, with the Ottomans having the right to colonize one hemisphere and Bharat having the right to colonize the other. She came to be respected by the other Great Powers as a fair and just decision-maker, despite her relatively young age.

Spain became well-known for charting out the galaxy ahead of the other Great Powers, establishing friendly diplomatic relations with other planets (except an Aztec-derived civilization, which the Spanish “accidentally” destroyed by blowing up the system’s star with a gate connected to a black hole, wiping out five-sixths of the system). Spanish explorers and pilots were hired by all nations, as they were among the best on Earth.

France sought civilizations that it could establish trade relations with, setting up trade routes throughout the galaxy that brought Earth into a larger economic community. The Bourbons soon became rich from their interstellar trade routes, using their profits to establish personal resorts taking up entire star systems at a time. “New Versailles,” originally supposed to be a personal retreat for King Louis XIX and his family, became a popular tourist destination after the National Assembly sent a strongly worded letter to the king.

The United Kingdom sought to spread its culture into the stars, sending advisors and colonists to planets with a medieval-level technological advancement and encouraging the natives to start drinking tea and speaking like Victorian gentlemen, as well as improving their quality of life by introducing advanced technologies to them. Many cultures saw King Arthur as the return or the reincarnation of the legendary Arthur who assisted the Ancient Merlin in building the Holy Grail anti-Ori device, making it easier for the British to establish relations with those cultures. Some planets even swore fealty to Arthur, making the phrase “the sun never sets on the British Empire” literally true.

The Russians and Austrians colonized uninhabited planets they found rich in natural resources with the former seeking out frozen wastelands that nobody else wanted and the latter seeking out planets that were practically identical to Earth. Austrian culture was adopted by many of the natives on inhabited worlds near Austrian colonies, with Mozart’s music becoming popular and the waltz being danced by a variety of cultures; the more advanced civilizations, those with Enlightenment-level absolutist monarchical societies, simply restructured their governments to mirror the Habsburg government, complete with the fashion of Maria Theresa and the endless state waltzes where The Blue Danube played. Of course, the Habsburgs attempted to send some of their family members to marry local nobility in the hopes of inheriting foreign thrones…and, more importantly, planets and star systems.

Bharat and the Ottomans found themselves with simply too many people for their Earth-based infrastructures to support (even at such low populations), and millions of Turks and Indians streamed out onto planetary colonies after the two empires converted much of their space fleets into transportation ships. Greeks and other groups, feeling that they had no place on Earth after the Monarchist victory, fled to neutral and uninhabited planets, far from the colonial possessions of the Great Powers, bringing with them their cultures and ideas to the local societies, allowing small-scale democracies and Greek culture to survive and flourish in the stars despite their persecution on Earth; they would come to form the frontier of Earth colonization, with Wild West cultures developing there. Poland-Lithuania, still on exile on Dakara, began spreading out again into nearby systems, hoping to preserve its civilization in the case of another galactic threat or threats attempting to partition it. Its efforts were slowed by the fact that most nearby planets were already settled by Jaffa or claimed as de jure territory by the Greater Jaffa Empire, a semi-constitutional monarchy patterned on the German and British empires founded by former Goa’uld slaves and Jaffa which inherited most of the holdings of the old Goa’uld Empire that it rebelled from.

Germany convened a Second Berlin Conference in the winter of 2019, as Sophia had urged the Kaiser and Arthur to help her keep the space colonization scramble under control; already some off-world societies were complaining of British, French, and Russian attempts to extort extraterritorial rights and “unequal treaties” from them, mostly Asian-culture planets, which particularly alarmed Sophia. Representatives from the eight Great Powers met in Berlin to divide the galaxy uninhabited planets up between them. Each Great Power was given a slice of the Milky Way to colonize, with independent inhabited planets (and especially Poland-Lithuania) not to be attacked unless in “self-defense.” As for the Mongols, who were still out there, raiding French and Ottoman caravans and looting entire planets sometimes (some nicknamed them the "Reavers" for their brutality), the Great Powers agreed that they were just a nuisance and everybody had a right to attack them.

The year 2020 rolled around, and the population of Earth continued to drop as millions migrated off-world in search of better opportunities. The Tau’ri had joined the interstellar community, becoming more and more linked into the galactic economy. As people streamed out from Earth, new ideas came back to Earth. Germany and China welcomed interstellar immigrants, whether they be Jaffa or human disillusioned by the societies they grew up in, as their populations could grow and their workforces could be increased. These immigrants brought with them a few advanced technologies, but the vast majority were simple farmers or peasants coming from medieval-level civilizations. Luckily, the vast majority of immigrants spoke fluent German, English, or an archaic form of Mandarin, somehow.

Some nations banned interplanetary immigration, advocating for “pure Earth” populations; the most prominent of them was Australia, to the disappointment of Arthur. Sophia wrote the Australian government off as the descendants and successors of fascists and nativists from Portugal and the Confederacy.

The year 2020 was a peaceful year. As Earth continued to rebuild and recover, the bonds between nations grew stronger, although nothing could supplant nationalism, at least not in Sophia’s lifetime; there were small movements advocating for Chinese and German Empires to unite into a single empire called "The Alliance." On May 4, the Chinese Imperial University was reopened, this time in the bustling city of Nanjing, now the official capital of China while the north was being resettled and the former capital of Beijing was under reconstruction. Sophia gave a speech to the incoming class at the dedication ceremony, praising the efforts of the Chinese people at rebuilding and preserving their civilization in the face of adversity.

Arthur became a patron for the arts as well as the military and industry. It was under his guidance that the Graystone Industries, which had recently patented the robotic “Cybernetic Lifeform Node” or “Cylon,” flourished and expanded out onto other planets. In order to crush complaints about his legitimacy, he married a woman from the Windsor family (Harold’s dynasty) and claimed descent from the original King Arthur.

All in all, Earth was at peace again.


One hundred years had passed since Yuan Shi-Kai declared an invasion of the warlord of Manchuria. One hundred years had passed since the First Weltkrieg came to an end. One hundred years had passed for the people of Earth, and everything had changed.

The Xuantong Emperor of Great Qing, later Heinrich I "the Great," Chinese Emperor, and Kaiser Wilhelm II "the Great," German Emperor, were the last traditional monarchs of the 19th century. Under their guidance, China and Germany were led to greatness, coming to dominate the world. Puyi redefined monarchy, modernizing Imperial China and making it able to stand up to the Europeans, if not surpassing it. Kaiser Louis Ferdinand presided over the German Empire as it consolidated its power over Europe, a time of relative peace, periodically interrupted by chaotic wars. He instituted liberal reforms for his people, just as Puyi had done. Despite his efforts at liberalizing, he was partly responsible for the German Empire’s downfall in 1991.

Wilhelm I, Chinese Emperor, and Kaiser Georg Ferdinand, German Emperor, were responsible for the downfall of humanity, however indirectly; but they would be immortalized as martyrs and saints of not only their respective faiths, but of all of humanity and Earth civilization. Their successors, Sophia I and Wilhelm III, revitalized humanity and restored it to greatness. When they ascended their thrones, they brought humanity into a larger galactic community, joining together with its long lost brothers and sisters across the galaxy. The human species was at a turning point; they would turn to space and spread out, becoming worthy heirs of great species such as the Asgard and the Ancients.

The Age of the Weltkrieg, of an isolated Earth, of a time of semi-constant war, had ended. A new Age of Discovery, an age of semi-constant peace, had begun.


(Final update up next after a supplementary picture update! Thanks for reading!)
 
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zenphoenix

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Michaelangelo

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Well that was certainly a change in attitude. Apparently colonization distracts nations from conquest. Surprised they had enough people left to colonize entire worlds at all.
 
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DKM

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Well that was certainly a change in attitude. Apparently colonization distracts nations from conquest. Surprised they had enough people left to colonize entire worlds at all.
I'm rather surprised that all of the planets only had 1 civ on them.

Great story through and through. Thanks for the ride zen.
 

zenphoenix

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I'm rather surprised that all of the planets only had 1 civ on them.

Great story through and through. Thanks for the ride zen.
Well, that's the default in Stargate, so I used that here. I always found that a bit unrealistic as well, but oh well...
I'm glad you enjoyed it. This was my first attempt at writing an AAR and found the experience fun. I'm currently working on the first couple chapters of my EUIV AAR (tentatively called Legacy of Zheng He) which I will post in a couple weeks.
Well that was certainly a change in attitude. Apparently colonization distracts nations from conquest. Surprised they had enough people left to colonize entire worlds at all.
Firefly coughing intensifies
 

zenphoenix

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Supplementary Picture Update (Obviously Picture Heavy)

Wilhelm II, German Emperor, in civilian clothing

Official portrait of Wilhelm II, German Emperor

Xuantong Emperor, aka Heinrich I, Chinese Emperor

Victoria Louise, Chinese Empress and daughter of Wilhelm II, German Emperor

ICN Zheng He conducting naval operations in the Pacific War

SMS Bismarck on patrol in the North Sea

Chiang Kai-Shek, War Minister (1926-1934), Chancellor of Chinese Empire (1934-1976), Chairman of Guomingdang (1928-1976)

Imperial trooops fighting in Haishenwai (Vladivostok)

The Kaiserliche Heer carrying out Operation Barbarossa

The Courtyard of the Old Residency in Munich, a painting by the renowned artist and general Adolf Hitler

Soviet planes during the Third Weltkrieg

Herman Goring, Colonial Governor of Mittelafrika (1921-1930)

Manfred von Richthofen, the "Red Baron," First and Second Weltkrieg fighter ace, recipient of Iron Cross, member of Prussian General Staff (1926-1940), Supreme Commander of Luftstreitekraft (1940-1965)

A photo taken just after Puyi's assassination (1976)

Deng Xiaoping, Chancellor of Chinese Empire (1976-1987)

"Goddess of Democracy" statue displayed at Tiananmen Square in 1989

"Tank Man" standing in front of Imperial tanks

The traitorous Zhu Rongji

September 11 attacks on the Imperial Stock Exchange in Shanghai and the War Ministry in Beijing

Initial Goa'uld attack on Earth

Last transmitted satellite image before Goa'uld fleet destroyed all Earth communications networks
upload_2015-8-17_10-49-56.jpeg

Anubis, scourge of Earth
upload_2015-8-17_10-50-16.jpeg

SMS Bismarck in 2006

A Zheng He-class spacecraft carrier, built in 2010

An Ori ship emerging from the supergate near Dakara
upload_2015-8-17_10-52-13.jpeg

Dakara, capital of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in exile
upload_2015-8-17_10-52-57.jpeg

The Zheng He jumping into the atmosphere over Antarctica
upload_2015-8-17_10-53-52.jpeg

Zheng He's fighter squadrons engaging Goa'uld aircraft

Harold of England, shortly before his abdication​
 

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A small group of soldiers advance through the early morning, carrying German rifles. They advance on the Forbidden City stealthily, the sleeping inhabitants unaware of their impending doom.
With ease they scale the walls of the former imperial palace using grappling hooks. One guard notices them, but it is too late, as another commando ambushes him from behind and strangles him.
Now nothing can stop the soldiers from reaching their main target--dictator and "president" Yuan Shi-Kai of the Chinese Republic.
Behind them, reinforcements arrive. The soldiers open the Tiananmen Gates and let in a small light tank. The noise from this machine is large enough to fully wake up the inhabitants, and chaos breaks out.
As the guards scramble to their senses, the commandos shoot them down with silenced rounds and run toward the living quarters, where they find the dictator still in his bed, guarded by four Mongol bodyguards. The soldiers immediately shoot down the Mongols and aim their weapons at Yuan, who puts up his hands in defeat. Surprisingly, the soldiers don't shoot him down on the spot. Instead, they make way for another man, a younger man with a moustache. Yuan recognizes him on the spot by his uniform.

"General Chiang Kai-Shek," says Yuan, "I didn't expect you to show up at a time like this."
"Give up, Yuan," Chiang replied, "It's all over. The facade of a republic no longer needs to be maintained."
"What are you going to do, proclaim yourself president? As if you were as skilled a politician as I was!" Yuan laughed.
Chiang struck him with the butt of his rifle. "Oh, I'm not going to install a true democracy, at least not me..."
He leaned towards Yuan, who was by now trembling in his bed.

"The Celestial Emperor and the Kaiser would like to have a word with you."​


Willy changed the channel. “Seriously?! I expected better! Donnie Yen is the worst person to be cast as Chiang Kai-Shek! This has got to be one of the worst movies I have ever seen on the Northern Expedition and the Restoration!”

“Hey, why don’t we watch Red Sky instead?” suggested his cousin, Jim. “I heard they have Don S. Davis as the Texan leader of a Soviet Syndicalist holdout on the moon!”

“Eh, a bit over the top, how about we watch the latest episode of Extrem Wurmloch NS-10? The one where the aliens played by Italian actors manage to invade Earth and the Kaiser single-handedly kills them all with Charlemagne’s sword while shouting ‘Deutschland über alles’?”

“No, I prefer Blue Dawn, where the fascist Syndicalist American menace managed to invade China in the 1970s. Or we could always watch one of those alternate history movies based on that one Scandinavian video game. Like that one I watched last week where the Germans lost the First Weltkrieg and the Entente carves up the world. There was all sort of crazy stuff, like Germany and Austria becoming fascist and going on a rampage, an incompetent Italy, a republican China under Chancellor Chiang and most of Asia falling to Syndicalist forces after the Japanese successfully invade China, Syndicalism and Republicanism becoming the dominant ideologies of the world, a Cold War fought between the Russians and Americans instead of the Chinese and Germans all over the world, and Poland existing.”

“You don’t have taste, Jim. I suppose we should just watch the New Year’s stuff, or maybe a stupid History Channel documentary on conspiracy theories surrounding Puyi’s assassination. You know, the one where it was all caused by aliens that are not the Goa’uld or Ori?”

“Neither do you. You don’t appreciate reading about the hypothetical or the what-ifs.”

At that moment, Sophia burst into the room, startling the two young men. “Boys!” she said. “Cut it out!”

Willy was not sure what to react to first—the woman’s orders to “cut it out,” or the fact that the woman was the Chinese Emperor herself, showing up late at night, dressed in a dress (Sophia never really liked dresses) and with her hair grown out (she had cut it short after the Goa’uld had been driven from Earth and defeated).

Then Constantine, Willy’s older brother, appeared behind her, along with his and Sophia’s young son and heir, Heinrich, and he remembered that he was the Emperor’s brother-in-law and the heir’s…uncle.

“What are you doing here?” he asked.

“I would ask you what you are doing here, young man, in your apartment in suburban Quanzhou watching television, a luxury most people don’t even have, instead of studying for your Ancient technology engineering PhD, which you should not even be near at age 23, but instead I’ll order you to accompany me to the hospital,” said Sophia, somewhat informally.

“What happened?” asked Jim.

“It’s your grandmother, William,” said Sophia, suddenly serious, “She’s dying. The whole family’s already there at her side.”

In minutes they were all in the car, with Sophia behind the wheel and flooring the gas pedal.

They arrived at the hospital, and Sophia actually ran for the first time in a long time, followed by Willy and the others.

They found Victoria Wong, a woman of ninety-nine years, lying in the bed, connected to various life support apparatuses. The doctors explained to Willy that her body was simply shutting down after operating for a century. There was nothing wrong with the body; no cancers, no sickness, nothing at all. She was just tired of living and life, in a matter of speaking.

Sophia found Puyi already there, and both of them knelt by the side of the bed. The founder of the modern Chinese nation was dressed in a simple 1930s suit and tie.

Victoria feebly pointed towards Willy. “Come here, William.”

He approached his dying grandmother. “Yes, grandmother?”

“You are here, along with the rest of the family. That is good. I’ve been through a lot in my one hundred years, and now I can finally go in peace.”

“Victoria, with all due respect please ascend!” pleaded Puyi. “You’ve met all of the criteria for being worthy of ascension, so the Others will accept you when I go back to them. You can live on with us.”

“What is the point of that?” said Victoria. “I’ve lived my life. I don’t want to live another life for eternity, watching over a world I can’t touch or interact with. I’m just…tired. What of you? You’ve completed your duty, Your Majesty, and it is only your reward that you return to Heaven. As for me…I want to rest.

“I was born on the day, perhaps the exact hour, minute, or even second, that General Yuan declared war on Manchuria. He reconquered the entirety of China by the time I was five. All of my life, my birthday was the time for auspicious incidents to happen. The Northern Expedition at age 5. The Second Weltkrieg at age 12. The numerous punitive wars and wars of revenge against Japan and the final War of Glorious Japanese Subjugation when I was in college and after I graduated. The Partition of the Soviet Union at the end of the Third Weltkrieg. The wars against the Italians that culminated in the Fourth Weltkrieg and the crisis over France that led to the Fifth Weltkrieg. The destruction of the Commune of France, the United States, Italy, and the Worker’s Commonwealth in my middle age. Puyi’s assassination and ascension at age 55. All of that happened in my life, on my birthday. In my one hundred years, I’ve watched China and the Chinese people grow from a backwards, poor, sad little illiterate rump state, bullied around by Japan and the Great Powers, into the most powerful nation in the world and perhaps in the whole galaxy, worthy of the title of “Celestial Empire,” ruler of all under Heaven. I’ve lived through seven of the eight Weltkriegs. I saw the Goa’uld invasion firsthand and was among those who relocated to New Brandenburg for several months, having lost my entire home planet. Isn’t it time that I took a rest? Alternatively, what’s so special about me? Why me? Wait, don’t answer that, you can’t possibly answer that correctly.”

She turned to Sophia, not expecting an answer from anybody. “Your Imperial Majesty, you’ve been through a lot. But be careful about the future, my granddaughter, and set your empire, our mutual empire, the Chinese Empire, on the right path to enlightenment. Teach your son, my great-grandson, the traditional and modern ways. He will need both moving forward.”

She turned to Puyi. “I’ve seen you before for most of my life; I grew up knowing you, as your loyal servant. You have been a legend for the Empire and the world; some in Europe and Asia have even canonized you, and the Pope and his cardinals are debating on whether or not you are the Second Coming of Jesus. But I agree with you—your purpose on Earth is complete, humanity is saved, and you can go home now.”

She turned to Willy. “To my grandson: you have always represented the best in me. Your spark of creativity and innovation, your quest to learn more, you embody not only me, but all of us, the best in the Chinese people. Please carry on my legacy, William.”

She coughed, and the monitors started beeping erratically. Impulsively, Willy grabbed Victoria’s hand in his hand lightly. “Please, stay with us, grandmother!”

Looking up at Sophia, Willy saw that Puyi had vanished without a trace, to parts unknown. He had returned to wherever the Ancients lived, his destiny on Earth and this physical and mortal plane complete.

“I’m afraid my time is up, my grandson,” said Victoria, her voice fading, “I shall live to see one last New Year, one last birthday, and nothing more. I’ll see you on the other side, all of you.”

As the countdown on the TV progressed and January 1, 2021 rolled around, the monitor flatlined, and Victoria Wong passed away, aged 100.


Finis
----
Well, I guess that's it! Thank you so much for reading this, and I hope to see you all in my upcoming AAR in a couple weeks! It's been great writing this!
 
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Michaelangelo

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Well, that's the default in Stargate, so I used that here. I always found that a bit unrealistic as well, but oh well...
I'm glad you enjoyed it. This was my first attempt at writing an AAR and found the experience fun. I'm currently working on the first couple chapters of my EUIV AAR (tentatively called Legacy of Zheng He) which I will post in a couple weeks.
There was that one episode where they encountered humans and some other race living together and even inter-breeding, although that was sort of a side issue with the focus on Sam participating in an intergalactic space race. :p

After so many world wars, so many nukes, and so many alien invasions, they can finally enjoy some peace and quiet. At least I hope they do. That was even more chaotic than the historical 20th century. :rolleyes:
 

HIMDogson

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They could watch "Dragon and Sun Forever", where the Qing and Taiping team up against the British and fly spaceships to London. Or, how about "TL something or other", where the Taiping win the civil war and the history of America is lifted over to Europe! Of course, they'd better watch out for the Baptist State in the Town of Westboro while they're at it. In any case the Ming colonial aar sounds interesting.
 

zenphoenix

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They could watch "Dragon and Sun Forever", where the Qing and Taiping team up against the British and fly spaceships to London. Or, how about "TL something or other", where the Taiping win the civil war and the history of America is lifted over to Europe! Of course, they'd better watch out for the Baptist State in the Town of Westboro while they're at it. In any case the Ming colonial aar sounds interesting.
I go the "TL something or other" reference, but what about the others?
I had other ideas for that scene, but I couldn't find a way to add them in, like the time-traveling Syndicalist-hunting "Professor Ho," two brothers hunting Syndicalist monsters in "Spooky Demons," "Back to the Tang Dynasty," "Sinica Universalis," "Obliterator," "Space-Battleship Bismarck," etc. I also considered putting in a commercial for Empress Victoria Louise's fashion company.
The Ming AAR probably will be interesting, but so far I've played ten years and I've done pretty much nothing. Maybe once I get exploration ideas things'll get interesting...
There was that one episode where they encountered humans and some other race living together and even inter-breeding, although that was sort of a side issue with the focus on Sam participating in an intergalactic space race. :p

After so many world wars, so many nukes, and so many alien invasions, they can finally enjoy some peace and quiet. At least I hope they do. That was even more chaotic than the historical 20th century. :rolleyes:
But didn't that planet still have one primary civilization on it? I thought both of their civilizations kind of mixed together quite well.
Yes, I hope that they all get some peace and quiet (especially Poland-Lithuania). I think the Eighth Weltkrieg on its own was twice as deadly as RL World War II and World War I combined, not to mention the Sixth Weltkrieg and the billions of casualties.
 

HIMDogson

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Dragon and Sun forever is Stars and Stripes forever, an utterly ridiculous alternate history where the Union and Confederacy team up to destroy the British after the British attack them for no discernible reason. It's considered by most to be one of the worst things ever. Baptist State in the Town of Westboro is a mix of ISIS and the Westboro Baptist Church. For Anime, you have Fullmetal Confucionist, for starters.
 
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