This is an introduction to the Exiles at War world. Exiles at War is a alt-history fanfiction project, set in the world of Equestria at War mod for Hearts of Iron 4.
This is Exiles at War world. Exiles at War is an alt-history fanfiction project designed by a group of friends, set in the world of Equestria at War mod for Hearts of Iron 4.
The Point of divergence is the Griffonian Revolution partially succeeding, the consequences of which affect every continent; from the River Coalition collapsing into war, to the Changellings losing a War against the Olenians before they could strike Equestria, to the Storm King being defeated by the Chirropterrans before he could plunder much of North Zebrica.
The first of the major changes is that of Olenia and the Changeling lands. By 1002 the historically divided Changeling Lands had been united by Queen Chrysalis, creating one of the most economically and militarily powerful states in Equus. Still, the state was internally unstable, with political scheming having become a mainstay of the Changeling political scene, even as Queen Chrysalis fought to further unify her kind.
This internal instability presented a chance for the newly crowned King Johan of Olenia to cement Olenian rule of various disputed border territories. Following him dispatching troops to various of these disputed locations, Queen Chrysalis sent an ultimatum to King Johan to surrender the territories, hoping to both regain some of her state's lost prestige but also to unify her nation by presenting the queens with a collective enemy.
What followed was the Changeling-Olenian War. While the Changelings managed to make impressive gains in the first weeks of the war, unfinished military reforms and poor Olenian infrastructure meant that the advance soon slowed down. With weeks turning into months, the already present fractures within the Changeling state grew ever wider. The Changelings made slow progress across Olenia, but in the 9th month of the war, something unexpected happened.
The Olenians had utilised their superior navy to make a landing at Neverwarm Point, far behind enemy lines, crushing the local garrison and thereby opening up a second front. This was yet another humiliation for Chrysalis. In order to save her reputation, she sought out scapegoats for the failures of the Changeling Navy and the wider war effort. She decided on the Queens of Vraks and Dytrisium.
In a surprise twist, they had actually been scheming against her and her accusation had forced their hooves and declared a revolt against the Chrysalis regime. This threw the nation into civil war, which paralysed the Changeling military, allowing Olenian forces to not only force out the invaders but also strike deep into the Changeling lands.
Just a couple of months after the Olenians landed on Neverwarm point, the Changeling-Olenian war came to an end. The revolting Queens had declared the founding of the Federation of Changeling Hives and joined with the Olenians to crush Chrysalis. Once the war ended the Olenians used their military supremacy to annex vast swaths of Changeling territory and turn the FCH into an Olenian puppet. Though, the Olenian army's own weakness allowed several northern and northeastern queens to achieve independence for themselves, staying largely free from Olenian influence.
The second major change is that of the Republican Revolution of 978. The southern and Aquilean secessions went along as they did in the original timeline, but the subsequent Republican Revolution went the way of the revolutionaries, in both the Herzlands and Aquilea. It began in 978 when the revolutionaries took Griffenheim, declaring the creation of the Griffonian Republic led by Schnabel Sunglider, now the official leader of both the NRP and the Republic. They made quick advances across the Herzlands, though, after a round of defeats against the knights of Hellquill, who had decided to join with the Imperial loyalists, the President signed into law an almost legendary decree, the decree of Revolutionary Unity.
This granted wide autonomy to any republican group that liberated lands that had not yet been taken by the Republic. This led to a massive wave of uprisings and betrayals in the Republican ranks, with revolting sailors taking the Sky Coast, Socialist revolutionaries rising up in Yale and Greifenmarschen, turning on their Imperial masters. This saved the republic from imminent defeat. The revolutionary wars went on for another 5 years, ending in a ceasefire.
By 1007 the Griffonian republic has since cemented its rule as one of the continent's great powers, controlling almost all of the Herzlands (with an exception for parts of the south and east) and heading the Republican Pact, the alliance of post-revolutionary states in Aquilea and the Herzlands.
Still, not all is good in the Republic. A long list of economic problems troubles much of the republican sphere, from unemployment to stagnant economic growth. The autonomy given to the Herzlandic sister republics makes economic integration harder and hinders the enforcement of law and order and Aquilea is rapidly recovering from civil war and seemingly developing into a rival for leadership of the republican cause.
Luckily, these hindrances are slowly being cleared away, with Gwenaël Godard heading the newly established Central Economic Council, which has had some success in curbing economic shortcomings. With economic recovery comes reinvigorated legitimacy, which President Sunglider hopes to use to both bring the autonomies closer to Griffenheim and to temper Aquilean ambition or at least redirect it.
If we turn towards Aquilea we see another one of the children of the Griffonian Revolution, one that has arguably suffered even worse than the Griffenheim government. Aquilea began its republican journey under the leadership of Théodore Vérany and his liberal FJA. Vérany wished to follow the NRP dream of a pan-griffonian state, something he found to be wildly unpopular among the general public but also a large part of his own party. This would see the rise of Cécile Gaudreau, the leader of the party’s left-wing and nationalist faction, with her openly challenging Vérans'y. This intra-party war continued for years, hurting the image of the FJA and distracting from the nation's sluggish economy.
This conflict bubbled over into a full-scale civil war in 999, which provoked an intervention for the rest of the Republican Pact. While at first wanting to support Vérany, his growing unpopularity as well as worries about his lack of support led to Griffinheim striking up an alliance with the PAT, the largest opposition party in Aquilea.
The intervention was successful and the PAT was put in charge of rebuilding Aquilea. In just 7 years the PAT has managed to build a relatively stable socialist democracy, somewhat recover from the economic hole the 1st republic left it in and restore Aquileas place as a respected member of the Republican Pact, even though its military development has lagged behind Griffinheim. The years have also seen the PAT and the People's Assembly grow ever more divided, with various factions and parties dividing the Aquilean political scene, bringing back uncomfortable memories of the waning days of the 1st republic.
Heading down south we first encounter the Imperial remnants, centred around the city of Griffonstone. When the empire was forced to abandon the Herzlands they fled down south, occupying the largely divided Kingdom of Griffonstone. The Empire is a husk of its former self, but still remains a credible threat to the Republicans to its north. Through their sphere of influence in southern Griffonia and allies in Cloudbury and Longsword-Hellquill (The region unified following the election of Count Pallas Dusktalon as Grandmaster of Hellquill) they encircle the Republican Herzland, their veteran officers and well funded army is the equal to any republican force and an alliance with several private sector companies greatly aids in building up the imperial economy.
Still, ever since the end of the Republican Wars in 985, the Empire has fought beak and claw to expand its power in the hope of one day reclaiming its homeland. The first important move was to reinforce the alliance with the Cyanolisians, thereby gaining valuable reinforcements for the beleaguered imperial arm. Eros VII was the one who managed this initial recovery, acting as regent for the young Grover V.
Another thing that was going on in southwestern Griffonia was the South Griffonian Wars. Post-imperial border disputes between Falcor and Wingbardy escalated into an all out war, the so called Wingbard War. Early into the war Falcor was put on the back foot and was on the verge of losing. But in Falcors darkest hour came Sicameon... to take the Jojo islands, thereby starting the Jojo War.
This prompted an Imperial intervention. With the Wingbardian army exhausted form their offensive, combined with the arrival of fresh reinforcements from the Empire, the Imperial-Falcorian counterattack was massively successful, crushing Wingbardian fighting ability and forcing the nation into a humiliating peace agreement in February 989. Falcor then began focusing on its front with Sicameon and in a joint offensive with Cyanolisia managed to crush the Sicameonese defence, forcing said nation into a similarly humiliating peace, exactly one year after Wingbardy had done so. Following these two victories, Falcor annexed vast swathes of land off of their Wingbardian and Sicameonese enemies and reafirmed their loyalty to the Empire.
Their defeats in the Wingbard War and Jojo War respectively, would horrendously destabilise the two nations. In the waning days of the war, Wingbardy was already on the way to collapse, with its king killed during the war and its economy in the gutter, communists had seized the city of Wrobert and liberal republicans fought against the royalist government in the streets of Karthin. This instability would last until Francis VIII, who'd refused to join in the Wingbard War with his erstwhile allies, invaded, swiftly conquering what remained of once mighty Wingbardy and claiming its crown.
Sicameon was in a similar, if not worse position. As soon as the armastice was signed, the nation collapsed. With the nation now unable to defend itself or its interest, the Sicameonese were forced to sit by as their once glorious fleet fell into the claws of corsairs and Cyanolisia seized Scarlet Isle after the central government (which no longer existed) failed to keep up with debt repayments. The resulting explosion in piracy provoked an Imperial intervention commonly dubbed the Pirate War, a series of joint military actions across the Middle Sea, carried out by the Falcorian, Cyanolisian and Colthagian navies.
Heading further east, we come to the Evi Valley, which is currently running red with griffon blood. The Kingdom of Brodfeld had remained neutral following the Republican revolution, refusing to ally with the Empire to its west. The peace held until 1003 when the assassination of the queen led to an armed uprising by the communists, which began the Brodfeld Civil War.
This was shortly followed by an uprising in Lushi, with communists taking the south of the country. Both these wars were grave threats to the Empire, which after several communist victories decided to organise an expeditionary force to aid King Klouseu. Klouseu however, refused to accept any aid, not wanting to fall back under the Herzlandic yoke. The Empire, angered by the king's insolence decided to send in a force into Brodfeld anyway, ideally to take the country, but at least defeat the communists.
Lushi was seen as less important and therefore gained little attention from the Imperial court. Fearing that the communists would take the country, a group of officers in the imperial army decided to take matters into their own claws. In the fall of 1006, a division of the imperial army under the command of General Marshtail went AWOL, crossing the border and taking a large part of western Lushi. Their aim was to retake Lushi in the name of the Empire and use it as a staging ground for arming imperial loyalists in the Herzlands.
Back down south is Gryphus. Formerly united as one governorate during imperial rule, but the area has entirely collapsed following the republican revolution. The land is now divided between various city-states, all with various beliefs and governments, ranging from zealous knights in the eastern mountains to republican revolutionaries in the south. Gryphus is another pie in which the Empire has stuffed its claws, having seized the island of Agradia as a staging ground for a future push into the region.
Now we’ll continue east, into the Riverlands. The Riverlands, once united, have now divided, a result of the Riverland Crisis of 999 and the subsequent War of the League of Ceann Tór.
The Riverlands had been unified in the form of the River Coalition, an economic and defensive alliance of the east Griffonian states. This was all well and good, until the 80’ and the election of Ema Rosic as Chancellor of the River Republic. An officer of the Rijekan army and an ardent anti-communist, she would scheme together with her close friend Archlight, the newly appointed director of the OHS, to undermine left-wing political movements in the Republic, with a special effort to be taken to weaken the SKR.
This project, named the Hydra Programme, was a great success, leading to a landslide victory for the HSR in the election of 989. Still, while the perceived threat of communism was subdued at home, various left-wing movements were gaining steam across the Riverlands.
So under the Rosic administration and the succeeding Coltsevic administration the Hydra Programme was expanded to cover all the Riverlands. This massive conspiracy would last for almost a decade, but when it was finally uncovered in 999 it brought the River Coalition to its knees. In response, Wittenland managed to convince the Nimbusians, Bakarans and Pònaidheans to join in a punitive expedition against the Rijekans, who had by now fallen into civil war. This would crush the River Republic, leaving it a slowly dying husk of its former self.
Lake City had, due to internal instability, decided to not join the League of Ceann Tór against the Republic. Instead, the Vanguards under Westerly Leeward would assume rulership of the republic. Since then Lake City has united with the dictatorial states of Diamond Mountain and Deponya in a new military alliance, due to fears of Herzlandic expansionism. The Kingdom of Firtree gained candidacy status, aiming to join the alliance following a process of military modernisation.
Well finish by heading down below the equator to our favourite of God's mistakes, Zebrica. Due to lack of much lore for most of the continent we’ll be sticking to north Zebrica for now and to start we have to discuss the Storm King's invasion of the region. After crushing the Zarantians, Warzenans and Zumidians in 1005, the Storm King decides to secure his flank before invading Colthage and goes to secure the western peninsula, a largely unexplored and uninhabited jungle region.
The plans for a quick occupation are foiled, as this region is in fact home to Chiropterra, a militaristic and fanatically zealous Nightmareist state. The thousand-year secret of their existence, now broken, prompts a quick mobilisation of the Chiropterran legions to deal with the invader. While the initial push manages to pierce a way into Chiropterra, the legions manage to in one quick offensive, encircle the Storm King's army and utterly annihilate it, with the Storm King being killed in single combat by Lady Commander Lunar Hail.
With North Zebrica having fallen into chaos and the Legions already fully mobilised, the Chiropterrans decided to strike out to occupy as much of the region as possible, before the Colthagians or Hippogriffians could do the same. They come a long way, but meet the Colthagian army in Ain Trotgourait. What follows in a huge battle which the legionnaires win. This marks the beginning of the North Zebrican War.
While the legionnaires were the most elite force on the continent, they couldn’t match the Colthagians numbers, especially when the Hippogiffians intervened on the side of Colthage. Following a surprise attack by vengeful Zarantians the four legions who had been out conquering, (Firstborn, Nightmare, Children of the Moon and Starborn Legion) were in a terrible state and seeing that defeat was imminent and with the way back to Chiropterra cut off by enemy armies, decided to flee down south, further into the continent. With their supplies low they also decided to split their forces to make scavenging easier.
With most of their elite military forces retreating south, the two legions who remained in Chiropterra (Silver Moon and Ursa Legion) fought hard, making sure that the enemy paid dearly for every inch of ground. But in the end, as the final defensive lines were being broken down, they too decided to escape.
By 1007 the legionary exiles are scattered across Zebrica in three hubs. The Children of the Moon and Starborn Legion are in the Andelaya Mountains, the Firstborn and Nightmare Legions have made it all the way down to the Zongolese jungle and the Silver Moon and Ursa Legions made their way to Klugetown, which they took over.
Having emerged victorious from the North Zebrica War, Colthage has become one of the great states of the region. The republic annexed both Warzena and Zumidia in the subsequent peace, while also having taken a sizable amount of land from Quaggatai. This led to Zamilcar Zarca forming the Zonican Federation, with his children being appointed leaders of the federations member states.
Hippogiffia likewise gained a lot from the war. With the isolationist Raft Wood having been replaced by the more militaristic Cloud Breeze just a year earlier, the Royal Army was sent to the continent to aid the Zebricans in putting down the dangerously fanatical Chiropterrans. The following peace gave the Hippogiffians custodianship of Chiropterran territory and massively expanded its diplomatic influence in the region.
In 972, after the mysterious death of the Wingbardian king and the subsequent decision by the regency council not to investigate his death, Wingbardy and its allies Francistria, Talouse and Arantiga declared independence from the Empire. When the Empire was unable to react due to the squabbling of the regency council others followed suit and by 974 only the Herzlands, Griffonstone, Falcor, Cyanolisia and Gryphus remained. The collapse of the empire had catastrophic effects upon the economy of the continent, as borders once only there in name suddenly became immense barriers to trade and the economic downturn only worsened the conditions of the already poor peasantry.
Things didn't get better in 976, as a famine ravaged the imperial countryside, but even as the peasants starved the nobility still ate like nothing was happening and even worse, many lords raised taxes so that their income wouldn't decrease. After the harvest failed again in 977 due to bad weather the peasants of Interriver and Ernevarra rose up, signaling what was yet to come. In a last ditch effort to suppress the coming revolution several high ranking members of the NRP were arrested. While these arrests arguably delayed the revolution they only fueled the anger of the commoners.
On the 7th of February 978 rumors that the regency council was planning to revoke the reforms of Grover IV sparked riots in the streets of Griffenheim, which further escalated into a full on revolution after Reichsarmee units within the cities were ordered to forcefully disperse the protests, but instead turned on the empire and joined the crowds. Not soon after the revolutionaries overwhelmed the few remaining loyal units within the city, chiefly the Palace Guard, and broke into the imperial palace which the emperor had only fled minutes before. Thus, the center of the empire fell into the grasp of revolutionaries, and chaos reigned in all Griffonia.
The Republican War
News of the revolution in Griffenheim spread across the empire like wildfire, inspiring many sister uprisings. While most of these were crushed by local nobility sooner or later these also stopped any proper imperial response to the revolution in Griffenheim for the time being. Additionally the uprisings put the local nobility back into charge over their fiefdoms, undoing the decades of centralization that were the life works of the previous two emperors within only a few months.
978
Meanwhile, Grover V, Archon Eros VII and what remained of the imperial court fled south to Griffonstone where Archon Eros VII, as the only remaining member of the regency council, declared himself regent of the empire and used his powers as Regent and Archon to force the regency council of Griffonstone to also elect him as regent of Griffonstone. Now the (mostly unrecognized) ruler of the empire, Archon Eros immediately began organizing the imperial response to the revolution. However his efforts were severely trampled by his lack of legitimacy and so he first had to reassert his authority by traveling around the empire and meeting with the local nobles of the empire, and giving them concessions so as to ensure their cooperation.
The most important noble Eros had to meet with was Countess Emilia II of Cyanolisia, who, after extorting many concessions from the Archon, agreed to help in the evacuation of the 200.000 or so Reichsarmee soldiers garrisoning south Griffonia. Not much later most of the imperial presence collapsed, leaving only Cyanolisia under nominal imperial control.
The revolutionaries did not waste time after taking Griffenheim and immediately struck out into the countryside. They managed to take Prälatsheim, Helheim and Crona with ease as the imperial vassals were either in shock of the fall of Griffenheim or had to deal with their own republican uprisings.
The first battle of the Republican War was fought in Interriver where Count Jonas of Interriver led an imperial army tasked to retake Griffenheim. Due to him underestimating the military capabilities of the republicans his forces were crushed and nearly wiped out entirely. Vinnin, the largest city of the county however proved not nearly so easy to take as Alexander Kemerskai’s father Aldus Kemerskai held his lands with the loyalist troops that had fled Griffenheim and his own army. The republicans were defeated in the first battle of Vinnin and had to make concessions to the peasants of Interriver, who were also rebelling at the time. With the aid of the peasants' militias as well as reinforcements from Griffenheim another assault on Vinnin was launched. At first it seemed like this battle was to be a repeat of the last one, but Aldus Kemerskai, now convinced of his son’s military incompetence counterattacked. This counterattack failed miserably and Vinnin was finally taken in late June.
At the same time as the campaign in Interriver was going on revolutionaries in Katerinburg stormed the palace there and seized the principality.
Meanwhile in Griffenheim, the NRP leadership decided to delay general elections until the revolution was completed. Instead, a congress of NRP representatives elected the party’s de facto leader, Schnabel Sunglider, to the position of President of the Republic.
In September the republicans also captured Kronburg. With that, fighting ended for a while as both sides were licking their wounds and preparing for the coming battles.
The Archon used this time to finally meet with the rulers of Feathisia, Strawberry and Bronzetail thereby cementing his authority as regent of the empire. However not all his diplomatic efforts were successful, as Yale, Romau, Greifenmarschen and the Knights of Hellquill all declared neutrality. The Yale's neutrality was especially concerning for the empire, since it meant that the imperials would be split in two. Worse yet for the empire, the republicans did not sit by idly and instead used the winter to almost triple their forces by integrating many of the soldiers that had deserted the empire in the previous year. All this meant that while the Republicans started the spring campaign of ‘79 with some 250.000 soldiers, the imperials only had a total strength of about 100.000.
979
When spring came, the Republican Revolutionary Army struck out in all directions. General Claus Rosewing marched with the second-largest part of the army into the until then neutral Yale. This front proved quite easy, as a revolt in Cyrusval led by the anarchist students and an uprising in Greenback by the Griffonian Socialist Party split the already minimal forces of the rectorate. Soon Yale was completely under the revolutionaries' control, with Willie Scherler’s anarchists and the GSP-Militias joining Rosewing’s army.
While these were without doubt stunning victories, the greatest victory would be won in the Strawberry duchy. Generals Kemerskai and Suntail led the majority of the army into Strawberry where they met the largest imperial contingent yet. Through a stunning use of artillery, they routed the imperials, and with the front now safe, the two generals split the army, Kemerskai leading one-half into Bronzehill, while Suntail stayed in Strawberry to defend until Kemerskai returned.
The Bronzehill campaign would prove slow and costly. The local population was firmly royalist, which meant that the Revolutionary Army was the one facing guerrilla attacks for once. Kemerskai’s reliance on artillery also faced problems, as the guerrilla attacks drained his stock of cannons and the mountainous terrain reduced the efficiency of large-scale artillery use.
When summer reached its end, the National Revolutionary Army had made significant progress and had shattered almost every Imperial army they faced. But the young nation still planned a last autumn offensive to the south.
Having been reinforced by Bluhm’s army and bolstered his own by integrating the Yalish revolutionaries, Rosewing planned to strike the imperial remnants in Angriver before moving on to Giffonstone. The imperials were being reinforced by the remnants of the once vast garrisons of southern griffonia, which started arriving in great numbers during the late fall of 979.
Wanting to deal a quick killing blow to this vestige of monarchism before too many reinforcements arrived, Rosewing and Bluhm planned to attack into Angriver, while sending a detachment into Verenia to outflank the 50.000 strong imperial army.
Once the autumn offensive began, it seemed to go as well as the earlier offensives, with Bluhm going far into eastern Angriver. The problems appeared in Verenia as the republican generals had grown accustomed to being supplied by locals. In Verenia they were seen as foreigners invading their land and thus the locals were rather hostile. Still they made good progress and even managed to capture the somewhat popular Duke of Verenia and his family. When they were subsequently executed for treason against the people, as was the standard republican procedure, thereby giving the Verenians a martyr to rally around. Worse yet, the new Duke of Verenia invited the imperials into the duchy, and together their armies managed to push the republicans back and inflicted considerable casualties in the process.
When the expected support from Rosewings army never materialized, Bluhm was left to face most of the rapidly growing army of Angriver on his own. This greatly depleted Bluhm’s army over the autumn months, until he was forced to pull back to more defensive positions along the Angriver.
When the national congress in Griffenheim was informed of this, three decisions were rapidly made. First, Suntail would take the majority of his army and move south to help stabilize the frontline. Second, the NRA would begin a massive conscription campaign in the liberated parts of the Herzland with the aim of both reinforcing Kemerskai’s and Bluhm’s armies and establishing a new army. The third decision was to court-martial Rosewing and Scherler since they hadn’t actually gotten government approval to invade Verenia, but on this point Sunglider intervened, using executive powers and some political maneuvering to at least delay Rosewings trial until after the war. The arrest of Scherler also alienated the anarchists who split off and started to wage a guerilla war on their own.
Suntail quickly marched his army to the Verenian front and managed to aid in a couple of victories, but eventually, the winter came and most offensive actions were put on halt.
979 was no doubt a disaster for the imperials. The second wealthiest part of the empire, the Strawberry Duchy had been lost whilst the republicans now had a firm grip on the central and southern Herzlands. However not all was lost as the republican invasions of Yale and Verenia proved to the rest of Griffonia that the republicans couldn’t be trusted. Thanks to the brilliant diplomacy of Duchess Gabriella Eagleclaw, the Knights of Hellquill and the Duke of Cloudbury both made secret deals with the empire to join them in the coming year. The winter would also see a stabilization among the imperial remnants, with food supplies more secure following a somewhat successful anti-bandit campaign.
But for the republicans, the winter meant more than stabilization, as they used it to massively expand their military. The so-called “Winter Army”, consisting mostly of conscripts, was rapidly trained and reinforcements to the armies were sent out.
980
The imperial strategy for 980 was to try and stall the republicans for as long as possible to give Hellquill and Cloudbury time to prepare for the fight.
In the spring of 980 it seemed like this year would be the one to finally yield victory for the republicans. The only remaining imperial strongholds in Griffonstone and Bronzehill were separated, and the imperials were outnumbered nearly two to one. Like in the years before the republicans split their forces: Bluhm was to hold the southern front, Kemerskai would once again attempt to take Bronzehill and Suntail would lead the majority of the army into Feathisia.
The offensive into Feathisia made large progress at first but was then stalled in Luxwingburg for weeks. Even when the town fell, most of the relatively small Fethisian army was able to retreat and dug in in De Vleugels to repeat the siege of Luxwingburg. Suntail would not have this and sent the majority of his forces to encircle De Vleugels. While his attempts at an encirclement were unsuccessful, the Feathisian army still chose to abandon De Vleugels and instead retreated north, holding the easily defensible Griffking River.
Kemerskai’s second invasion of Bronzehill, which was commencing at the same time, was going better than his first one, but once again the resilient Dogs held their lines and harassed the hated republicans whenever possible.
In June, Grandmaster Trappenfeld reaffirmed his oath to Grover V and led the knights of Hellquill against the revolutionaries. Furthermore, Duke Otto II of Cloudbury also joined the imperials in the anti-republican struggle. Last but not least the imperials began an offensive on the southern front. This sudden change in the power balance had the republican leadership in Griffenheim panicking, especially as there wasn’t an army between them and Trappenfeld’s elite knights.
July proved to be a terrible month for the republic. The imperial offensive in the south smashed through the republican lines and just three weeks into it they found themselves at the gates of Romau, which over the course of 979 had slowly aligned with the republic. At the same time Kemerskai was forced to abandon all progress he had made in Bronzehill to defend Griffenheim and Suntail had to abandon his most recent gains as Otto’s intervention meant that he now had the lower troop count.
In order to save the revolution, on the 1st of August, Sunglider signed the decree of revolutionary Unity. The decree promised near total autonomy to any democratic republican organization in any territory it liberated. This sparked a new wave of uprisings across the Herzland. In Yale, Cyrusval and Greengate anarchists rose up and took the towns, in Romau the workers of the towns armed themselves and threw out the city council, in Skyfall and Rottendedam sailors of the imperial fleet rebelled and seized the coast and Greifenmarschen finally joined the republic. Most of what remained of the Imperial Fleet sailed to Cyanolisia while a battlecruiser, three cruisers and two destroyers and most of the Skyfallian High Society fled to Haukland. The Duke of Feathisia, Gerlach IV and what remained of the Feathisian nobility fled to the Feathisian South Zebrides on the small Feathisian Fleet.
The revolts in Feathisia and Skyfall completely compromised the imperial lines there and they were forced to flee behind the Griffking. In the south the socialists and anarchists halted the advance of the imperials and with reinforcements from Greifenmarschen, Bluhm’s army counterattacked and managed not only to restore the Angriver line, but with aid from the anarchists even took Greengate.
With the other fronts having been stabilized, most reinforcements were sent to Kemerskai’s army. With his now expanded army he counterattacked and defeated Trappenfeld and his knights. The knights attempted to retreat to Kronburg but most of them, including Trappenfeld himself, were killed in the chaotic retreat.
The battle of Kronwald effectively neutralized the Hellquillian threat for the time being, and so Kemerskai chose not to follow up on them into Hellquill, especially as he did not wish to repeat another Verenia.
This ended fighting for a few months as nobody had the strength to continue on fighting. The Knights used this time to elect Pallas Duskalton, the heir to Longsword as Grandmaster under the condition that he stay loyal to the empire and aid it in the fight against republicanism. Shortly after his election, his father died under mysterious circumstances.
980 also saw the Aquilean monarchy being overthrown in the Aquilean revolution. The revolutionaries in Aquilea didn’t waste time and used the winter of 980 to ally with the republicans in the Herzland, not as a republican autonomy but as an allied nation in the republican pact. However this was not as bad as it would seem for the Imperials, as the Aquilean republic was too unstable to significantly contribute to the republican wars.
Back in Griffonstone the Archon faced a crisis, as he and his ally Gabriella Eagleclaw were both humiliated by the apparent failure of their plan to defeat the revolutionaries. To preempt a power struggle the Archon launched a coup in Angriver, seizing the Barony and reorganizing the Herzlands into a Governorate. Thanks to the coup, the biggest threat to their rule, Baron Leer was dealt with, while also making an example out of the somewhat disloyal Baron.
981
In spring of 981 the Aquilean republicans launched a campaign to link their territories up with the Herzlands. Their campaign was successful, and within months they had captured Pomovarra and Flowena, which they annexed, and the western part of Verenia, which they turned into a sister republic. The Aquileans succeeded in taking Verenia where the republicans failed because unlike the republicans they didn’t rely as heavily on being supplied by locals.
Many of the Flowenan patricians had fled the City before it was conquered by Aquilea, taking as much money and gold with them as they could carry. Most of them fled to Griffonstone where they, and the millions of Talons they brought, were warmly welcomed. They were given autonomy in the town of Blackhollow, which was turned into a Free City, in exchange for aiding the rebuilding of the imperial economy.
At the same time Alexander Kemerskai once again invaded Bronzehill and Suntail started an offensive on the northern Front with the goal of pushing the imperials out of Feathisia. The third invasion of Bronzehill proved to be just as difficult as the two before, but this time Kemerskai wasn’t going up against guerillas, but against an organized army holding an easily defensible line between the Raven Lakes. The campaign was a nightmare as Kemerskai usually relied on outmaneuvering his enemies. Instead he had to attack heavily entrenched defenders in a few chokepoints. After a disastrous attack on Hundefeld saw him lose thousands in a week, he turned to simply shelling his enemies until there was nothing left to defend.
Due to being heavily reinforced throughout the winter of 980 and being able to maneuver, Suntail fared much better than Kemerskai and was able to push the empire out of Feathisia by October of 81.
In the southern front General Ebonwing’s army of Angriver and General Bronzetail’s Army of Verenia launched a two pronged offensive to push the republicans out of Katerin and Yale. The offensive started out on good footing, with Ebonwing capturing Andorstadt and Bronzetail pushing the republicans out of Greenback and beyond the Angriver. However Ebonwing was halted in the Scheißwald by Bluhm’s army and Bronzetail’s attention was needed in Verenia itself as the Aquilean offensive threatened to compromise the imperial flank, so the offensive simply fell apart. In late summer the Knights of Hellquill had somewhat recovered from the defeat dealt to them a year earlier, and together with the Longswordian army made their own small offensive into Katerin. They were easily able to capture the exposed town of Strathburg, but like Ebonwing they too were halted in the Scheißwald.
With the beginning of winter, fighting once again stopped in most places, except for Bronzehill where Kemerskai was unwilling to give the defenders any time to dig in further.
The failing of the offensives in the south also proved that the empire had firmly lost the initiative. Knowing that just staying on the defensive would lose them the war as the republicans would simply crush the disconnected armies of the empire one by one, the empire adopted a new strategy. The republicans would almost certainly have to focus their forces on one front if they wanted a serious chance of defeating whatever army they were attacking. The resulting weakness on the other fronts could then be exploited by the other imperial armies which would then quickly advance on Griffenheim, forcing the republicans to choose between crushing one of the imperial remainders and keeping Griffonstone.
982
In spring of 982 the republicans launched their spring offensive into Cloudbury. At first the republicans were making good progress, but thanks to the new strategy of the empire the republicans soon had to divert much of their offensive forces to the southern front where the army of Angriver was threatening to take Katerin. Once the winter came the Cloudburians counterattacked and pushed the republicans out of their land.
In late 982 the barony of Rumare also rejoined the empire in exchange for their claimed lands, but effectively this was the empire annexing Rumare in exchange for making Rumarean an official language in the Barony of Rumare.
983-985
In 983 the republicans launched a naval invasion of Vedina in an attempt to flank Cloudbury. They managed to take Turhamn but the hostility from the locals proved too much and the invasion force was eventually defeated. General Rosewing, the leader of the expedition, was among the ones captured by the Vedinans and was personally executed by the king.
983, 984 and 985 were peaceful years for the empire, at least if one ignores Bronzehill where Kemerskai continued to slowly grind forward, building to building, street to street, town to town. The war in Bronzehill finally ended when the republicans had taken the lowlands and felt that the imperials were far enough from Griffenheim to no longer be an immediate threat, and with it ended the Republican Wars.
Falcor was one of the few vassals in the empire that didn’t leave the empire as soon as it had the opportunity. This was mostly down to the fact that the Queen of Falcor, Maximilliana, feared that Falcor would simply fall under Wingbardian influence should it declare independence. Left with the choice between an imperial overlord that had brought peace to Falcor for two centuries or domination by the ancient enemies of the Falcorians, the most despicable Wingbardians, she chose the empire. Like the rest of Griffonia, Falcor’s economy also collapsed with the empire as borders started to matter again. Unlike most of Griffonia, the Falcorian economy bounced back within only a few years since the mostly agrarian nation was not greatly dependent on trade and could simply sell more of its produce to the Herzlands.
The revolution in 978 effectively gave Falcor independence as the empire was now busy fighting for its very life and could no longer afford to garrison Falcor. Due to the nation's trade ties with the Herzlands the Falcorian economy collapsed again, but this time the recovery was much slower. The revolution also meant that Wingbardy could now assert its claims on Falcorian territory, and Falcor was forced to step in to defend itself. The Falcorian army was a modern force, but it did not have nearly the numbers needed to take on Wingbardy and so conscription was introduced, tripling the size of the active army and giving Falcor the ability to mobilize a large force quickly.
In 985, a clash broke out in the border town of Meranclawo. Both sides sent in reinforcements and the clash became a skirmish, the skirmish became a battle and finally the battle became a war.
985
Thanks to having been first to mobilize and her efficient mobilization system Falcor got to enjoy a three to one advantage over the Wingbardians in the early weeks of the war. Knowing that this would not last, Field Marshal Neighgue ordered a front wide offensive to crush the Wingbardians before they could mobilize their forces. This started the 2nd bloodiest two weeks of the war as open combat on a modern battlefield left soldiers no cover from artillery, mortars, machine guns or gunfire.
Thanks to their superior numbers in men and artillery, the Falcorians suffered only 23.000 casualties compared to the 35.000 on the Wingbardian side, a 50% loss ratio for the Wingbardian troops on the border. Nevertheless the offensive was a failure since reinforcements left the Wingbardians with more numbers in the field than at the beginning of the war. Additionally most of the Falcorian casualties had been with her best professional army units, leaving her with little offensive capabilities. In the weeks following the (offensive) both sides were incapable of offensive action, instead using the time to dig in and replenish their numbers. Thus ended the short but brutal phase of open combat, replaced with slightly less brutal trench warfare.
986
Only in February of 986, six months after the war began did the staring contest across no man's land end with the 2nd battle of Meranclawo. The Wingbardians had long realized this would be a war of attrition and had planned their offensive accordingly.
The battle began with an hours-long bombardment from 500 pieces of artillery, followed by an assault from 3 infantry divisions. The assault faced fierce resistance from the Falcorians whose trenchworks had mostly survived the bombardment but the outnumbered Falcorians were still pushed back to their second trench line by the end of the first day. On the 2nd and 3rd day the offensive slowly ground down, giving the Falcorians time to reinforce their positions and bring in their artillery, evening the field. Even as mountains of casualties piled up on both sides neither was willing to accept defeat so the battle went on for months longer. During the 3rd month of the battle the Falcorians introduced poison gas to the battlefield which was soon also adopted by the Wingbardians. The 2nd battle of Meranclawo only ended in December of 986 as by then the Wingbardians had firmly exhausted themselves.
Behind the lines Falcor was struggling along as the war economy and mobilization were putting the already poor peasantry into even more dire positions. These conditions were fertile grounds for republicanism and communism to fester and spread. Meanwhile, Griffonstone was watching the events in Falcor with great interest, sensing both the opportunity to return Falcor to the empire and also the threat a republican Falcor would pose to the imperial position. Consequently Griffonstone began sending military and economic aid to Falcor so as to alleviate the situation there.
987
Thanks to the imperial aid Falcor was in a much better position and could finally prepare an offensive of its own to knock out the Wingbardians for good. This was to be achieved by attacking the weak left side of the Wingbardian front and exploiting any breakthrough with relatively light infantry formations. Once the offensive began in March of 987 the weak 2nd Army was quickly overwhelmed in the battle of Clawporetto. Within only three weeks the Falcorians advanced the frontline more than 20 kilometers deep into Wingbardy, even encircling and wiping out two divisions. The success of the offensive could have ended the war, were it not for the flooding of the Piumave River which gave the 2nd Army the time it needed to rebuild its defenses.
For all the victories it brought, the offensive had come at the great cost of nearly 50.000 casualties. Additionally, the offensive had only been possible due to the withdrawal of several divisions from the right side of the front where the Falcorians consequently were heavily outnumbered. Once the Wingbardians caught wind of their weakness attacked with devastating success, especially on the right flank where the 4th Army managed to cut the rail connection between Sudfolc and Falcor and the 3rd Army advanced ever closer to Falcor.
In June, the heavy casualties taken in the prior three months, the bad living conditions on the front and in general and an unwillingness to fight for feudal lords lead to a wave of desertion and rebellion in the army. In a desperate attempt to restore morale for at least a few weeks, Queen Maximilliana promised democracy to her subjects. This restored some semblance of order to the army enabling one last desperate counterattack.
In their advance on Falcor and Sudfolc respectively, a three kilometer gap had opened between the 3rd and 4th armies. Erika Feveros, who at that time was only commander of a single battalion, exploited this gap to get behind the 3rd Army and attack it from behind. This caused sufficient chaos to stall their advance for just long enough to allow the forces in Falcor to launch their offensive which managed to push the Wingbardians back out of artillery range from Falcor.
While Falcor was struggling to stay alive, the vultures in Sicameon used the opportunity to seize the JoJo islands. Falcor was unable to react to this, but it was able to call out to the empire for aid. As tensions between the empire and republic had slowly decreased after 985, Griffonstone finally felt ready to intervene directly. The empire also drew in Cyanolisia which had been waiting for a good casus-belli against Sicameon ever since the War of Asterionese Independence. This started another war, the JoJo War, between the empire and its vassals / allies of Falcor and Cyanolisia on the one and Sicameon and Asterion on the other side.
Seeing as Falcor was just weeks away from total defeat, the empire wasted no time and immediately sent 350.000 soldiers to the front under the command of General Cornelio Galluzzo. This drastically changed the balance of forces from one somewhat favoring the Wingbardians to one favoring the empire and Falcor. Yet, Gen. Galluzzo did not use this advantage for the time being, instead replacing most Falcorian units on the frontline so as to enable the Falcorian army to rebuild itself. Thus, the Wingbardians continued to have more troops on the frontline even as they had inferior numbers in total. Still, now that they no longer had an advantage in resources they were much more reserved with offensive operations for the rest of the year, only launching a few small offensives to secure their grip over the Falcor-Sudfolc rail line.
988/989
The imperial intervention in the war led to a panic in Wingbardy as the war suddenly seemed both impossible to win and to be about national survival. The prospect of losing their independence rallied the Wingbardians better than even their hatred of Falcorians had, and even the socialists and communists that so far had been fervently opposed to the war aligned with the Monarchy, favoring the bourgeois democracy to the feudalistic empire. With newfound morale and another wave of freshly trained troops Wingbardy entered 988 with a force that could and would still fight. Additionally, WIngbardy also tried to put pressure on Francis VIII. to join the war, but Francis refused due to the threat of an Aquilean intervention to retake Tarrin.
988 had battered the Falcorian army so thoroughly that it took almost a full year for it to fully recover. While some forces har been ready to fight again as early as October of 988, those were used to staff the relatively inactive front with Sicameon. Overall this meant that for the first few months of 988 the Wingbardians would retain their advantage in numbers, but as soon as the Falcorian army would be back in the fight the Wingbardians would be outnumbered very heavily.
The Wingbardians, very aware of this, planned one major offensive for the year to inflict high enough casualties on the empire to convince it that the war wasn’t worth it and withdraw from the war. Thus in spring of 988 the Wingbardians launched their final offensive, named after their king Garibald. The Garibaldi offensive was supposed to cut the land route to Sudfolc while also taking Falcor as a side objective.
Once the offensive began it quickly became clear that the offensive would not go as planned. The first day of the offensive saw an entire division wiped out and the next few days didn’t go much better as the Wingbardians were torn to shreds under heavy artillery barrages. After only 14 days the offensive was called off due to unsustainable casualties. As it turned out, Gen. Galluzzo had, with considerable help from Gen. Feveros, predicted that the Wingbardians would try to cut off Sudfolc and prepared accordingly. Nearly all of the imperial artillery had been concentrated on the small Wingbardian bridgehead across the Falcor River. And thus, once the Wingbardians attacked from said bridgehead they were under constant bombardment with no shelter. Consequently the attack did not only fail miserably, but half of the 100.000 casualties were deaths. As it was now clear that Wingbardy would lose the war, Talouse, which had joined the war back in 986 and done nothing for the duration of the war, withdrew from the war and signed a ceasefire with the empire.
Not long after the failed Garibald offensive did the Falcorian army finally return to the frontline, cementing the imperial advantage over Wingbardy. As the Falcorians and imperials were growing ever tired of the war they wanted to bring an end to the war as soon as possible. Thus they made sure not to give the Wingbardians much time to recover, and launched their own offensive to end the war. Having learned from years of trench warfare, the Falcorians and imperials finally adapted their tactics to a modern battlefield and implemented so-called “stormtrooper” tactics (developed by a certain Gen. Feveros). Heavily armed knights and tanks would break the enemy line in a given place, after which lighter infantry would exploit the breakthrough and wreak havoc behind enemy lines.
Once the offensive began the stormtrooper tactics proved devastatingly successful. Within only a few weeks the Wingbardian army was pushed back into Wingbardy. The advance was temporarily halted for a few weeks by the bad infrastructure in northern Wingbardy, giving the Wingbardians some time to dig back in. Once imperial engineers had managed to build a proper supply line the offensive continued on. Again, the Wingbardian lines were broken easily. By November the imperials were at Griffano where the Wingbardian 1st Army had dug in. Protected on one side by the Warthog Forest and on the other by Talonca River it had to be taken if the imperials were to continue their advance on Karthin.
The battle of Griffano was the last major battle of the war as the Wingbardians were unwilling to give even an inch of the city and thus contributed all forces they had left to the defense of the city. The battle itself was a slogfest as the imperials didn’t want to risk unnecessary casualties in an assault and thus just kept on shelling the city for months. In February of 989, King Garibald Talonuel III was killed during a front line visit to Griffano. News of his death broke the morale in the city leading to mass desertions. Finally, the Imperials attacked the city which fell with almost no resistance. As the news of Garibald’s death and the fall of Griffano spread, the spirit to fight on was finally broken. Thus, the Wingbardians signed a ceasefire that put half the country under imperial occupation.
Aftermath of the War
While half of Wingbardy was under imperial occupation, the other half was collapsing into civil war. Communist revolutionaries proclaimed proclaimed a Worker’s state in Wrobert and began fighting the liberals, reactionaries were fighting the communists, the conservatives were fighting republicans, the new king was fighting the liberal government, the liberals were trying to hold the country together and what remained of the army was fighting everyone and itself.
The imperial government originally had planned to just annex Wingbardy, but seeing the absolute state it was in it did not wish to get any more involved than it had to be for any longer than it had to be. Thus, the empire left as soon as it formally ended the war with the Treaty of Karthin. In exchange for Independence, Wingbardy ceded Asbolus, and much of the borderlands up to the Warhog River, dissolved the Karthinian Pact, ceded its fleet to Cyanolisia, (promised to) demilitarize and was to pay millions in reparations. Knowing that the government that signed the treaty would collapse as soon as the imperial occupation ended, the empire demanded all of its reparations be paid immediately. However Wingbardy was at this point all but bankrupt, so it instead had to pay its debts by handing over what assets it had, foreign and domestic, to the empire.
The chaos of the Wingbardian Civil War gave Francis VIII an opening to seize the crown of Wingbardy for himself like he had done with Tarrin a decade before. In spring of 990, Francis crossed the Folino and began his invasion of Wingbardy, adding another side to the war there. As he had a professional army he was easily the strongest of all belligerents and quickly managed to take control of Karthin.
Conquering the rest of Wingbardy proved not to be so easy as he spent the next two years in fighting the communists in Wrobert all the while having to put down uprisings in Wingbardy and Tarrin. In an act representative of the whole war Francis VIII torched Wrobert to the ground after finally conquering it. This act and the many others like it that occurred during the invasion and civil war caused immense destruction to the nation, killed many tens of thousands and displaced millions, causing a refugee crisis in southern Griffonia.
Although the empire’s collapse only really began in 972 with Wingbardy’s secession, imperial rule in South-Eastern Griffonia had been wavering ever since Grover IV. took the throne. By 930, the Prywhenian principalities were independent in all but name, Gryphus was only staying loyal to Griffenheim because of its trade relations with the rest of the empire, so was Sicameon and the Kingdom of Asterion was in a constant state of civil war as uprisings against the puppet government had become a national pastime. In all of South-Eastern Griffonia there was only a single bastion of imperial rule, the County of Cyanolisia.
In 932, seeking to reinforce the imperial presence in South-Eastern Griffonia, which traditionally was the third wealthiest part of the continent, Grover IV. massively expanded the Reichsarmee presence in the region. The local garrisons were reinforced by some 150.000 Herzlandic soldiers at great cost to the treasury. Additionally, the griffonisation of Cyanolisia was sped up by making it the primary penal colony of the empire, a role traditionally fulfilled by Nova Griffonia.
Grover’s reforms were successful in reinforcing the imperial rule and the region became dependent on the empire for protection and stability. This however had the effect that once the imperial collapse came in 972 and the revolution came in 978 the south-east suffered especially much.
The Imperial Collapse
Although Asterion had been fighting for its freedom pretty much ever since the empire showed up, their rebellions were always quickly put down by the large imperial garrison. This changed with the independence of Wingbardy as imperial rule collapsed like a house of cards. Imperial weakness emboldened the populace causing yet another wave of uprisings across the country. These were incredibly successful in liberating the countryside but failed to take control of the major population centers.
In 975 the various Asterionese guerilla armies and resistance groups formed a united front that coordinated the war effort. As the guerillas still were too weak to fight the imperials in open battle, they instead focused on luring out imperial units from the cities and then isolating them in the countryside where they could easily be cut off. Additionally supply lines to inline cities were attacked so as to cut off the imperial units stationed there. These tactics were incredibly successful in liberating the country, so much so that by 976 the imperials were banished from all but a few coastal towns.
The Asterionese advance was stalled in the coastal towns for two years since the Asterionese barely had any modern guns, much less the heavy artillery required to properly assault fortified positions. The coastal cities only fell in late 978 after imperial troops withdrew on orders from Griffonstone, but not before sacking Aster’s Landing and “evacuating” the Kingdom’s gold reserves.
The Withdrawal of the imperial garrison did not end the war as the Cyanolisian army stepped in to fill the gap and continued the war. With the empire out of the picture (and banished from the region for the time being) Macawia and Sicameon started supporting Asterion openly allowing for the Asterionese to liberate the rest of the Archipelago by 980. The next obvious step was liberating Kyanoia, but as the Cyanolisians had a fleet, one that had just been reinforced by many vessels from the Hochseeflotte, the Asterionese could not simply liberate it. Instead, they supported the mainland minotaurs through military aid and encouraged them to rise up for their freedom.
As soon as the imperial garrison of Gryphus left for Griffonstone, the country fell into revolution and counterrevolution. After a chaotic winter and spring, Gryphus had split into many small fiefdoms and republics that in the next three decades periodically fought wars to try and unify the country, although none of the belligerents in these wars ever came close to achieving their goals. Besides devastating the land these wars also saw the banishment of the Gryph-Süd GmbH from Gryphus. Much of the company either relocated to Cyanolisia, where they and the money they brought with them were greatly appreciated, or to Agradia where they built their own fiefdom.
In this time the Cyanolisian economy did not fare well, as the trade dependent nation saw its biggest trading partner, Gryphus, collapse, while all its other most important trade partners’ economies also faltered thanks to the imperial collapse. Industrialization was halted as the capital that had been abundant in the empire just a decade prior had disappeared, while the many refugees from Asterion and the émigres from Gryphus all needed to be housed, something that the state could not spare any resources to do, since the Cyanolisian State was busy trying to keep itself alive while threatened from within and without. Conequently, the Refugees simply ended up in slums and shantytowns on the outskirts of Thymíaustadt.
It was in these difficult times that the old Countess Emilia von Lívany, who had ruled Cyanolisia for five decades, died, leaving the troubled County to her granddaughter Taillow von Lívany.
The Cyanolisian Recovery
In the first few years of her reign Countess Taillow attempted to reconcile with the minotaurs, however these efforts did not bear fruits as centuries of occupation and colonization could not be undone by a few liberties here and there together with a handshake or two.
Although the war with Asterion had ended as both sides lost the ability to conduct offensive actions, that did not stop the Kyanoian Minotaurs from fighting their own war of independence against the Cyanolisians. The uprising was supported by Asterion, and thanks to that support and the weakness of Cyanolisia the rebelling Minotaurs liberated most of the outback, leaving only the urban centers under Cyanolisian control as they lacked the heavy equipment needed to attack them.
Still, Cyanolisia was at a low point having lost control of more than 70% of its nominal territory, leaving Taillow Sumpfkiel to choose between ignoring the uprising and continuing to try and negotiate her way out of this mess, which could cost Cyanolisia its very existence, or cracking down on the insurgency. She of course chose the latter, ordering the army to restore order in the outback. The crackdown was relatively effective, as it destroyed those rebel forces that could pose a serious threat to Cyanolisia, but it failed to restore control over the outback.
Due to the crackdown Taillow Sumpfkiel had also lost the little bid of good will she had with the minotaurs, and assassination attempts against her ramped up significantly. The failure of negotiations with the Minotaurs and all the attempts on her life hardened the countess' resolve, but for the time being she continued reforming Cyanolisia, if only for the good of her griffon subjects.
In 986 the countess' beloved husband Robert von Sumpfkiel was assassinated by an Asterionese nationalist. In the aftermath, the countess used her emergency powers to suspend the constitution that she had only signed a few years before and replaced civilian governance with a series of military governors so that all the power rested with her in Thymíaustadt. At the same time, she also ordered another crackdown on Minotaur resistance and the Minotaurs in general. Fueled by propaganda and the illusion of justified revenge, the army was sent into the outback where they brutally restored order and crushed most open resistance groups, but even as the crackdown was a success and Cyanolisia was in control of the outback, Cyanolisia still lacked the numbers to permanently control the outback without leaving other areas undefended.
To deal with the lack of numbers, the countess removed most restrictions from joining the military such as not being of Herzlandic descent and introduced conscription. Still, it was not sufficient, so the countess launched the Land for Service program in which foreign griffons were given land in exchange for them serving in the Cyanolisian army. At first the land given away was unoccupied land around Thymíaustadt but when there was no more of that tens of thousands of minotaurs were deported to Cannabia so as to make more space for settlers.
In order to remove the minotaurs who lived in the lands that were to be given away the Kommission für Minotaurische Gebiete und Landbeschaffung (Commission for Minotaur Territories and Land Acquisition), short KfMGuLb or “the Sfíka'' was formed. Besides managing deportations, the Sfíka also had the task of keeping the minotaurs living in the outback in check, primarily by terrorizing them and defeating any one warlord / group before they could pose a serious threat. The term “Sfika” originated with the minotaurs and later spread to the Cyanolisian griffons, then the world at large.
The JoJo War
After the seizure of the JoJo islands in June of 987 the Cyanolisians finally had a good casus-belli to go to war with Sicameon, something which the Countess had wanted to do ever since they helped the Minotaurs in their war of liberation. Due to the Creeper and Arahno Mountains, the war had two fronts, one between Cyanolisia and Sicameon in the east and one between Falcor and Sicameon in the west.
With the Reichsarmee busy fighting Wingbardy and guarding the Angriver, Falcor’s army still recovering from the losses of 987 and much of the Cyanolisian forces guarding the coast and outback, nobody in the empire truly had the troops ready to fight this war. In total, Cyanolisia could only scrape together some 50.000 through almost completely pulling out of the outback and leaving many smaller coastal towns with only a few militiagriffs as defense. The Reichsarmee and Falcor had little more to offer, sending some 75.000 very exhausted Falcorian troops to guard their front from any attack, but as it stood these forces would not be able to conduct any offensives.
Luckily, Sicameon was similarly unprepared, only having a small professional army of 25.000. Their small army was supplemented by some additional 90.000 militia ready to be called up at any time, and some 200.000 trained militiagriffs who could be mobilized within three months. At the beginning of the war however, only the large towns in Sicameon were defended, either by the army or militias.
The Rotrankielfluss Offensive
The Cyanolisians started the war with a two pronged offensive- into the outback. Gen. von Botschaftstedt would lead the 1st and 2nd Seelandedivisions from Thymíaustadt up the Rotrankielfluss to attack Roca Leon, while Gen. von Thymíaushafen would lead the 7th & 8th Infantry Division as well as several brigades of knights with a strike towards the Snowtop Mountains.
Von Botschaftstedt’s push was a painful affair, the local minotaur populace constantly harassing his force, both militarily by shooting at them, and by being a pain, holding extra loud festivities wherever the expedition made camp for the night and being obnoxious in general. By the time his expedition had finally made it to the border he had already lost some 200 of his 20.000 to guerilla attacks and another 330 to disease. Once in Sicameon, the attacks by the Minotaurs stopped, replaced by local militiagriffs that used much of the same tactics. When, in late August, the expedition finally arrived at Roca Leon, the town was defended by a militia some 3.500 strong. Luckily, this militia proved not to be much of a challenge as his 19.000 veterans were better trained, coordinated and equipped. After surrounding the city, Gen. von Botschaftstedt ordered all his forces to charge into the city at once, overwhelming the militia within hours while taking some 2.000 casualties in the process, 10% of them deaths. After having taken the town, he left 5.000 of his troops stationed there under the command of Generalmajor Eggert Duskwing, while taking the rest of his force to meet up with Gen. von Thymíaushafen for a combined attack into Eritrocefalia.
Von Thymíaushafen had a much better time pushing up the border, taking minimal casualties in the process. After having secured the border, von Thymíaushafen simply dug in and waited for Gen. Botschaftstedt’s reinforcements.
The Sicameonese meanwhile were forced to just sit and let the Cynaolisians have the initiative, seeing as their militia that made up the vast majority of the army lacked any offensive capabilities, and their proper army was scarcely enough to win the war. Training up new troops took time and effort, but luckily they were assisted in this by the Macawians who sent advisers to train troops, equipment and even allowed theirs to volunteer in the Sicameonese army.
This motivated the Cyanolisians, under command of Admiral Scile von Sprache, to sail their fleet to Rio De Jandaia and pose an ultimatum - cease any support to all enemies of the empire or Rio De Jandaia will be flattened. Being completely unprepared the Macawian government caved in. The Macawian people however did not forget this humiliation turning the nation into even more of an enemy of the empire than it was before. Yet, for the time being Macawia was out of the picture. Of course this did not mean an end to the SIcameonese army improving, but it did significantly slow them down.
Besides threatening neutral nations the Cyanolisian / Imperial Fleet also blockaded Sicameon, devastating the already weakened trade dependent economy. As the Cyanolisian navy had a slight tendency to shoot on Asterionese shipping the war with Asterion also flared up again, although the Asterionese found themselves unable to do much in the war due to a Cyanolisian blockade.
By the time von Botschaftstedt’s force finally met up with Gen. von Botschaftsted’s main force in De Aguilar in November, the Sicameonese had already completed their mobilization, and the Cyanolisian force of 44.000 was opposed by almost 100.000 militiagriffs and 20.000 professional soldiers. Still, they decided to launch their planned attack into Eritrocefalia, hoping that naval bombardment and superior training would even the fight.
The Battle of Eritrocefalia
The battle of Eritrocefalia started with a devastating Cyanolisian naval bombardment carried out by three battleships, four battlecruisers, two heavy cruisers and several smaller vessels, totalling over one hundred guns. Next, the army launched its own much smaller bombardment by a total of 24 howitzers, 49 mortars and seven pieces of field artillery. Only then, after almost eight hours of bombardment, the army launched its attack across the river, supported by the navy landing the ‘Feuervogel’ Seelandebrigade south of the city.
While the initial attack across the river failed disastrously and resulted in over 1.000 of their own dead, the landing south of Eritrocefalia had caused sufficient chaos that a secondary attack by the local chapter of the Order of Eyr established a bridgehead across the river. From there, the Order of Arcturius managed its establish contact with the ‘Feuervogel’ Seelandebrigade, cutting of Eritrocefalia from the rest of Sicameon, and trapping some 30.000 militiagriffs in it.
This encirclement only lasted a few hours, as the Sicameonese army, led by Gen. Glacialez counterattacked and forced the Cyanolisians to consolidate their forces in a defensive perimeter around the bridgehead. Thus ended the first day of the battle.
On the morning of the 2nd day of the battle, Gen. von Thymíaushafen sent all his knights into the bridgehead, preparing to deal one devastating strike to cut off Eritrocefalia. In this, he was assisted by a naval bombardment, as well as the 2nd Seelandedivision that had also been deployed across the river. At first this attack was very successful, cutting deep into the Sicameonese line, but like on the day prior a counterattack by the proper army forced him back.
On the 3rd day of the battle, Cyanolisia had firmly lost the initiative to Sicameon. Gen. Glacialez used this to prepare one large attack to drive the Cynaolisians into the river and destroy their force, the preparations of which were ready by day 4. Said attack started with an assault of 15.000 militiamen to soften up the Cyanlisian defenses and detect weak spots in the line. While this attack didn’t inflict many casualties on the Cyanolisians and came at the devastating cost of 8.000 casualties, it did eat up a lot of Cyanolisian ammunition, which the Cyanolisians later lacked when the actual attack by the army came. This attack was much more successful, almost completely annihilating the bridgehead, were it not for the navy covering the cyanolisian retreat with an extensive naval bombardment.
At the end of the battle, the Cyanolisian force on the front was reduced to some 35.000, while the Sicameonese suffered some 25.000 casualties, a third of them from friendly fire on the chaotic first day. In Cyanolisia, Generalfeldmarschall Yohn Vogelbeck was left scrambling together whatever could be stripped from her other territories, managing to put together a new force of 10.000 slum dwellers equipped with flintlock rifles. In Sicameon, General Vallentin Glacialez’s aggressive, careless tactics made him incredibly unpopular with the people, and not much later he was relieved of his command and replaced by General Cipriano Garra, a much more cautious commander.
Mudbeak's Expedition
As both sides were licking their wounds, the front fell silent for the next few months. In this time, the Sicameonese Army was greatly expanded from 30.000 to 66.000. The Cyanolisians however, could not so easily expand their numbers. Instead, Countess Taillow was forced to grovel the empire for reinforcements. As the Archon still owed the house Lívany a favor for them aiding in the evacuation of the imperial garrison, he agreed to dispatch a force of 30.000 soldiers to Cyanolisia.
There was however the problem of getting these to Cyanolisia. They could not simply go by boat since Sudfolc, the only imperial port at the time, was blockaded thanks to the Jojo Islands’ occupation. This left only the land route across the Creeper Mountains, a treacherous route that would also take them through the jungles of Cannabia.
This expedition, led by Gen. Mudbeak, a veteran of the Bronzehill front, assembled in Blackhollow, from where it departed in April of 988. Once they made it to the Creeper Mountains they were constantly attacked by the local minotaurs, forced to fight themselves through mountain passes more than once they had a miserable time. Once they reached the griffon town of Höhehalle, the expedition restocked their supplies and rested for a few days, before continuing their crossing. After two more weeks of misery, the expedition finally reached the town of Gräfinbühl (formerly Limanioú). There they were awaited by a force of 3.000 Sfíka troops and a fleet of river boats. After resting again, the expedition began the hardest part of the journey, the crossing of the jungles.
While relatively short compared to the rest of the journey, only lasting a week, the expedition took the most casualties during its time in the jungle. Malaria, a lack of supplies, extreme heat and the dreaded minotaur tribes all collaborated to give the expedition as hard a time as possible, killing almost 3.000. Once the expedition finally reached Stierkopf (formerly Ekklisía) it was exhausted, demoralized and had lost almost a fifth of its equipment, courtesy one of the riverboats sinking. Still, the hard part of the journey was complete and what was left to be done was to hop on another boat headed to De Aguilar.
The Garra Offensive
The Sicameonese had not sat idly waiting for the expedition to arrive, and instead used the time to launch their own attack against Cyanolisia. Knowing that De Aguilar was defended by the best Cyanolisia had to offer, Gen. Garra decided it would be best to attack the weak force holding Roca Leon, from where there would be no force between them and Thymíaustadt.
In April, the offensive began with the Sicameonese encircling Roca Leon, using several unguarded mountainpasses to sneak several thousand behind the Cyanolisian line. Gen. Garra, cautious as he was, did not dare risk thousands in an assault on the town, but instead settled in for a siege. This siege would last three weeks before the defenders, who were already undersupplied before the siege had begun, surrendered.
From there, Gen. Garra marched his army down the Rotrankielfluss, the same one Gen. Botschaftstedt had sailed up a year prior, towards Thymíaustadt. The first serious resistance he faced was in Tarmuth, where local militiagriffs held him back for a day. More importantly, they also alerted Thymíaustadt that there was a hostile army a mere 20 km away.
Keeping a cool head even in this rather precarious situation, Generalfeldmarschall Yohn Vogelbeck quickly started organizing the city’s defenses, handing out weapons to sailors and loyal griffons, organizing for street barricades to be built, ordering Gen. Mudbeak’s expedition to depart for Thymíaustadt at once, and evacuating the government to Sankt Eyrsbrück (formerly Auropallieta).
Two days later, Gen. Garra reached the walls of Thymíaustadt, but ever cautious he did not immediately attack the fortified city, instead preparing a proper plan for the assault, to be carried out the next day. Meanwhile, Gen. von Botschaftstedt had secretly marched two divisions up to the Rotrankielfluss, effectively encircling Gen. Garra’s force, and slowly closed in on the SIcameonese army from behind. This however left De Aguilar very weakly defended, something that the Sicameonese forces on that front did not immediately exploit.
Once Garra began his attack on Thymíaushafen, he was met with stiff resistance. Given a bloody nose in the first attack, Garra put orders for the second attack on halt for two hours while reevaluating his plans. In these two hours, Gen. Mudbeak’s expedition finally arrived in Thymíaustadt, though they did not make it to the battlefield for another two hours.
The second assault into Thymíaustadt bore more fruit than the first, making it to within sight of the Countess’ palace, but was ultimately driven back by Mudbeak’s forces. Over the remaining hours of the day, Mudbeaks forces slowly drove Garra back from Thymíaustadt, who then retreated all the way to Tarmuth where he could consolidate his forces for a proper defense.
On the next day, Garra’s force awoke to the sight of being encircled tens of miles behind enemy lines by a force twice as large. Seeing that his situation was hopeless, Garra surrendered his 25.000 strong force.
The failure of Garra’s offensive had greatly changed the balance of power between Cyanolisia and Sicameon; whereas Sicameon had outnumbered Cyanolisia nearly 3:1 beforehand, their forces were now about equal in size, though the Cynaolisian force was of far better quality.
As the Wingbard War was wrapping up in the west, the Sicameonese knew they had to knock out Cyanolisia now or never. A total of 100.000 militiagriffs that had previously been stationed on the western front were reassigned to the east, and the 100.000 Sicameonese on the eastern front were ordered to launch an all out assault immediately.
At first, this desperate attempt to salvage the terrible situation Sicameon had found herself in actually went well. The weak Cyanolisian forces holding the border were easily forced into retreat, and only De Aguilar managed to hold out with its garrison of 20.000. Her fortunes changed as soon as the main Cyanolisian force came down onto the militiagriffs carrying out the attack. With the garrison of De Aguilar also staging a counterattack, the Sicameonese were stuck between a rock and a hard place.
In this now even more disastrous situation, the military was forced to reinstate General Vallentin Glacialez’s command over the army of the east, who managed to organize a retreat back to Eritrocefalia in time before all of the army was destroyed. There, he harshly restored order in the army, court martialing anyone who had retreated before the order to retreat was given, and also all those who had retreated after the deadline for the retreat was given.
As reinforcements from the west started pummeling in, Gen. Glacialez could continue holding Eritrocefalia for the time being, but any hope of winning the war had been crushed within only three weeks. Half her professional army had been captured, together with all of her best equipment, and a sixth of her militiagriffs lay dead in the green fields of Cyanolisia.
The Feveros Offensive
Nevertheless, there was hope in Sicameon that resisting enough could at least save the nation from complete annexation, leading her to fight on against the odds. For now though, the fronts remained silent as neither Cyanolisia nor Sicameon were willing to risk any offensives. In this time, the Sicameonese slowly moved more and more forces back west to prepare for the inevitable imperial attack.
This lull in fighting continued all the way until late 989, as the empire and Falcor still had to finish off Wingbardy, who held out until February of 989, and after that needed to give their armies some time to recover. By September, the empire and Falcor had amassed over half a million soldiers and 2.500 pieces of artillery on the border and finished preparations for the Feveros Offensive. On September 1st, the Reichsarmee and Falcorian Army descended upon Keowen, shredding any forces in the field into dust and completely breaking the Sicameonese line within hours. The advancing imperials were held at Keowen for three days, by far the longest time any Sicameonese force held out during the Feveros Offensive.
The eastern front was not faring much better, as a joint offensive by Mudbeak’s expedition and the Cyanolisian army broke through the Sicameonese lines and began rapidly advancing south.
The Aftermath of the War
With total defeat looming overhead, Sicameon finally came to the negotiating table, and a ceasefire was finally called, ending the war. The Countess called for the complete annexation of Sicameon, but the Empire proper and Falcor that had in the end done most of the fighting favored a more “lenient” peace that merely stripped Sicameon of its ability to fight another war against the empire. Thus, in may of 990 the empire and Sicameon signed the Treaty of Thymíaushafen, stripping Sicameon of her northern provinces; the Aranho Ridge and Keowen were ceded to Falcor and the Snowtop Mountains were ceded to Cyanolisia. Sicameon was further forced to pay hefty reparations to Cyanolisia.
Almost as soon as the Treaty went into effect and the empire withdrew from Sicameon, or what remained of it, Sicameon collapsed into anarchy and civil war. The weeks after the war ended were so chaotic that, in the time it took the diplomats that had signed the Treaty of Thymíaustadt to return to Midoria, the city had already switched hands four times, from the government to communist revolutionaries, to the army and then back to the communists, only for the city to be taken over by the nation’s navy, in the name of the civilian government.
This civil war lasted for years more and caused immense damage to the nation, and saw Sicameon also lose Scarlet Island to the Cyanolisians, who occupied it as a substitute for all those war preparations Sicameon never paid. It further caused the Pirate War thanks to the Sicameonese fleet falling into the claws of the infamous Sicameonese Corsairs. The civil war only ended in 995 with the return of the exiled civilian government, aided by Macawia.