6. Old hatreds

MAO WAS not surprised that his attack had been rebuffed, when the enemy had superior numbers and superior technology, and your own people turned against you it was very difficult to win victories. Mao studied the maps, if he continued to fight he would be fighting a defensive battle, road links were poor so it would be difficult to reinforce his outermost cities. He had a large group of Indian knights heading towards his capital, and a long line of English archers. Individually he could probably hold out against either of them, but with both of them his generals were having fits. He would have to speak to the Indians, and speak to them soon.
Gandhi had been getting increasingly unhappy with the way his civilization was going. There was too much war going on. He had developed his army so that no-one would attack the Indian empire, but he realized that his civilization was destined to concertina. If he kept fighting eventually his enemies would group together. He would make peace with his enemies and then concentrate on his technology, whilst always keeping an eye on his army.
Sidhu was waiting to receive Chang. Both men were aging well. After the formalities were over Chang asked for a peace treaty, Sidhu demanded two more Chinese cities and money, Chang bargained him down to just the two cities. And so two more cities enjoyed the enlightened leadership of the Indian empire. The Chinese formed a peace treaty with the Indians.
Queen Elizabeth was more than annoyed. The Indians had suddenly stopped fighting, after acquiring a great deal of money and cities from their enemies, and the great wall. What did she have to show for her troubles? 50 gold pieces. The Chinese had given them to her to stop fighting, they all knew that without the Indians the Chinese were more than a match for the English, and that soon the Chinese army would be back up to full strength.
Montezuama had never been so enraged. Russian diplomats had tried to bribe his units!! Montezuama would not waste the lives of his honorable troops against these honorless curs, he had already disbanded the remote fourth city and had sold all of the city improvements in the rest of his cities. Now he was destroying his existing cities and pillaging any improvements around them. He was leading his peoples in a great exodus into the polar wastes, the triremes were already ready. He would not share his land with anyone!!! years from now he may come back to teach the peoples the meanings of honor, but until then he would leave.
Lenin was surprised how expensive it was to bribe an Aztec legion. Then one day the Aztecs weren't where they usually were. Reports from along the border told him the Aztecs had gone, where?? It was the English all over again, but at least he had a rough idea where the English were.
Lenin had recently made contact with more civilizations than he could keep tabs on. A council of leaders had been started now that all of the land within the great continent had been explored. Triremes had been sent round the continent and thereby concluded that the council members were the only inhabitants of it, Lenin suspected that the Aztec civilization had been wiped out, maybe by one of the plagues which were going about. In the council Lenin had already starting setting apart allies and enemies. The Zulu’s and Chinese had suffered at the hands of the Indian empire and were therefore against it and its allies, although the Chinese seemed to be more Anti-English than Indian of German. Lenin was against the English which naturally put him in opposition of the Indians and Germans, although from what he had heard from the Zulu's, the Indian empire was not a good one to fight.
In terms of military strength the Indians were marginally more powerful than the Russians, the Russians had more units but the Indians ones were higher up on the technological scale. The Chinese and Zulu’s were next, being about equal, and The German & English were joint last, although the German army was growing rapidly. The Indians had a population as large as the Chinese one, but it was growing quicker than the Chinese because the Indians had more cities. Next were the Russians, then the Germans and the Zulu’s, and last were the English. The Indians were also ahead in infrastructure, being slightly better than the Germans and English although not by much. The Zulu’s and the Chinese both had a reasonably good infrastructure, Lenin's Russian empire had no infrastructure to speak off, something to work on though, and in technology the Indians were well ahead of everyone else who were roughly equal.
Ultimately two power blocks were emerging, if one nation declared war against another nation now, all hell would break loose.
Frederick was more worried than he had been in a little while. He would have felt safer if the Indian Empire had kept fighting everyone, now that it had settled down it gave other empires a chance to build up their armies. By allying himself with the Indians Frederick realized he could have set himself up for trouble. If any of the 3 'outer empires' as they had been called attacked the 'central triumvirate or vice versa his nation would have to mobilize its armies. However, being part of the central triumvirate gave several advantages. Trading with the Indian empire was really boosting his economy. Zulu traders were not allowed into his market places and vice versa, which meant that to trade Zulu caravans had to travel all the way around his empire, not surprisingly this was hampering the Zulu’s somewhat. Besides, the Zulu’s would fear attacking him now.
Anand's son Akbar had witnessed the death of his father. He had been there at his father’s bed when he had died. Anand had a good innings, he had been a settler in the days when the empire needed roads. He had been fighting in the now legendary battle of Shanghai. Now Akbar was continuing in the steps of his father. He was in one of the Indian crusader units. There had been no battles for several years, and Akbar was still untried in battle, but the training he had received made him believe he was ready for anything, especially being a crusader unit, a unit not as good defensively as the knight unit but better in attack, making it more than a match for anything in the outer empires.
The Indian population had soared recently, strengthening the economy and increasing the rate at which technology was researched. The peace gave Akbar plenty of time to contemplate what to do in the future. Then one day orders came, it looked as if they were going for war.
The Russian civilization had finally found the English cities, they had mobilized their armies and were moving towards them with great speed. The Chinese had already approached the Indians and said that they had no intention of fighting them. The Indians had said they warned the Russians that they would fight if the English were invaded. The Russians denied that they would attack, but they were fooling no-one. The Zulu’s had said that they would fight the Indians if the Indians attacked the Russians, but they would be neutralized as the Germans said they would attack the Zulu’s if the attacked the Indians. Ultimately this would mean a battle between the Outer empires - the Chinese Vs the central triumvirate. With the Zulu’s & Russians having concentrated on building massive attacking armies this was an equal match up, the Indians would have to fight on 2 fronts, and the commitment that the Germans would make was dubious.
To this end the Indian armies were moving towards the Russian & Zulu borders, and explorer activity increased dramatically on the Chinese border to give the Indians plenty of time if the Chinese allegiance changed. All of this was promising to be, as one German officer was heard to remark 'A very rare fight'.
Queen Elizabeth was surprised at the boldness of the Russians, they were advancing straight towards her capital in force. By concentrating their force they were bypassing many of her defenses along the border. The Russians were using a highly mobile force, intending to win on speed.  The main body of their force was elephants, a force of horsemen and chariots which were acting as scouts supported them. All of the knights that the Russians had were also in the force, but they only had a few as yet.
The English force to counter this was far less mobile, the few horsemen and chariots that there were had already been positioned so as to make pre-emptive strikes when Russians approached cities, hoping to cause mayhem and destroy the elephants that were weak in defense.  Most of the English force comprised of archers, these littered the course the Russians would have to take. Inside each city were 2 phalanx, an archer units, and catapults, making them quite difficult to take, however Elizabeth was in no doubt that the Russian force would reach her cities, whatever she did. By her calculations the Indian relief force would arrive just before the Russians could reach her capital, assuming that nothing went wrong. She would keep a large detachment of her archers hidden in her capital, after the Indians and Russians had killed each other she could use these to recapture any cities she lost, and punish the Russians for their impudence. Let the Indians shed their blood for her empire, her soldiers blood would be shed on Russian lands.
Mpondo was going back to war. It felt good to be back into the strategy room after a decade of micro-management of cities. The Russians had warned him that they should expect trouble from the Indians and the Germans. This had given Mpondo enough time to build up his army to the force it was today. He would attack the Indians, the first city he would take was Ulundi, the city that the Indians had taken off him 12 years ago. If he did not attack the Germans they would have to attack him or be accused of playing neutrality. They would have to leave their excellent defensive positions for battlefields of his choosing. In one foul swoop he would inflict damage upon the Indian empire and conquer the entire German empire for himself, after which the Zulu empire would be the largest, and most populated civilization in the world, and take its rightful place at the head of civilizations.
Indian cities had been developing a lot of projects, the pyramids and the oracle had both been built in Indian cities, these 'wonders' rivaled the lighthouse in Moscow, copernicus's observatory in Minsk, the hanging gardens in Peking, and King Richards crusade in Swaziland, and  Marco Polo’s embassy in Berlin. Now the Indian Empire had constructed a few more wonders, Leonardo's workshop in the Punjab, and Michelangelo's chapel in Calcutta. Leonardo's workshop was proving to be a most useful addition to the army, it had provided cheap upgrades to make the old units as good as new ones, unfortunately, Gandhi remarked 'It cannot make units out of thin air'
It was the year 0bc and the world was going to war..
The English archers had retreated from the hill, Russian horsemen had appeared from the South early in the morning. These were outriders, set to secure the path before the main body of the army came through. The English archers lay down, as the horsemen rode a path between two hills, heading North the English archers got up and opened fire. It was a cloudy day, and so the arrows seemed to take the shape of a new rapidly moving cloud. Against the dark Grey of the sky the arrows shivered, and then fell. The Russians heard the noises, and looked around, then half of them fell to the ground. The Russians broke and retreated. Then a Russian chariot unit charged up the hill. The English archers defending the hill were veterans, they timed their volleys together, making the Russians shy away. Some of the Chariots reached the archers, their long swords carved notches into the English ranks before being hit by arrows, or skewered by the English short swords. Then the archers saw a Russian knight unit in the background. Archers had learned to fear knights, and so the archers retreated back to the next range of hills.
There a catapult waited, trained upon the ground between the two hills, where the knights must emerge. They waited for what seemed like an eternity.. Maybe the Russians had spotted the trap, maybe they were making their way behind the catapult, just then the Russian knights came into view. Once a few knights had passed the catapults fired.
Knight armor was incredibly tough. Iron, hardened by being struck repeatedly, forged and reforged, was made into breastplates and helmets. More armor was made for the arms, and legs, chain mail filled the gaps ultimately making a man very difficult to kill with arrows. Veteran knight units, who were paid more could afford larger horses, and tougher and thicker armor. Almost all of them chose to make this investment for their own sakes. The armor on these veteran units totally protected them from arrows at long range, and even at short ranges arrows could not penetrate the armor on the head or torso, meaning that a knight could survive several hits.
The Russian knight unit were veterans, however, none of their armor did much to stop the basketball-sized chunks of rock hurtling towards them, accelerated to great speed by the mechanism of the catapults. They were literally blown from their horses. The knights were momentarily disorientated by the fierce accuracy of the veteran English catapults. Suddenly a smattering of arrows fell among the knights. Little was done to the knights but their horses died. Immobilized and assailed by two different units in defensive terrain the Russian knight unit reluctantly retreated.

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