A GATE: and so the JSDF Fought/Alternate Timeline Fic: GATE: and so the Iron Pact Fought

Now for the Holy Empire of Alnus's hierarchy:

Now, before I post a prototype on some politics within the Holy Empire of Alnus, I'm going to post what I believe politics within the Holy Empire of Alnus is like, starting with the most basic one: hierarchy.

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At the very top of the entire political and social hierarchy of the Empire is the seat of Emperor/Empress. He is the final arbiter of the nation and he can rule as he sees fit... but within reason of what amounts to a Constitution. The Emperor/Empress is also beholden to the laws and statures of the Empire, and this is why in canon GATE the senators were appalled when Piña told them that Malt had enslaved numerous Japanese citizens before openly -through both diplomatic and public channels- declaring war against them. This is actually a major law that has very few punishments. This stemmed from an abused tradition that was used to boost manpower during the early years of the Holy Empire of Alnus. The abuse was so bad that it was quickly made into law (or the Empire would have far too many enemies to fight and near-constant slave revolts)... causing quite a few major clans to suffer immense depopulation issues, along with three Emperors' heads.

If -say- a Legate broke this law, then said Legate would be stripped of his/her rank, his/her lands, and his/her capital for simply a dozen captives illegally made into slaves. If it goes more than that? There is the aforementioned stripping of rank, lands, and capital with the Legate in question becoming a slave. If in the hundreds? Execution. Malt, in the case in canon, would be forced to abdicate by the Senate immediately -unless during times of crisis, in which there are provisions to allow him to stay for a maximum of six months- and his designated heir to the throne will be barred from the Imperial Election (which means Zorzal would be barred from making his case and being a runner for Emperor) that would follow in the following months, with the empty seat being filled by the Dictator until the election -which in of itself would take about three days with the occasional election taking up to two weeks, but getting everyone ready can take months- is completed. This is in addition to the punishment of the law in question. So... in the case of this fanfic, Malt is going to loose a lot of political power due to various 'association amendments' -to get around the issue of having the law politicized by various factions by establishing 'degrees of association', which get less and less punishing as you go further from the 'first degree'- to the law and will be forced to abdicate.

Now the Emperor is the Head of State and, in legal theory, is the man who rules all of the Holy Empire of Alnus but in reality the political situation is more like a mix of Republic era Rome, the days of the Byzantine Empire, and the Holy Roman Empire. The Emperor is the one at the top of the tax chain. In addition to a budget that he and the Senate must jointly agree on (and if there is no budget for more than three weeks at the start of each year, then the last confirmed budget will be used, a law that was put into place due to the legendary budget fights between Emperor Maximus Vagnius Mucianus and the Senate of his time... which nearly caused the Empire to fall due to the lack of funds), he directs what has been jokingly called the 'Tax Legions' -the literal legions of tax collectors, census takers, appraisers, and other tax-related officers that go around the empire and make sure that taxes are done as efficiently and fairly as humanly possible- by many to work their unappreciated work. The 'Tax Legion' is responsible of compiling all the owed taxes (peasants don't owe much in terms of taxes while the upper class of the Empire pay a lot in taxes, with the more stubborn upper class being outright tortured to pay up and branded for future reference), the number of people within a province, the values of the land, the productivity of the land, produce statistics of mortality rates, and the like. The taxes that are collect are then recorded, compiled, and invoiced before calculating the amount of tax money via applying a percentage (roughly 25%) to the total taxes collected. This centralized taxing system proved to be less of a headache as tax revolts were less frequent, which meant more taxes collected overall.

The Emperor has the ability to raise four Imperial legions during times of peace and up to a dozen in times of war. He also has a lot of say in ordering around the non-Imperial legions (whose limit is basically 'how much free manpower' and 'how much do we have in the budget'), and the only reason that the laws on giving the Senate reasons for the use of Legion [insert roman numeral here] being sent to [insert location here] are largely understated is because it usually causes more headaches and work for the Senate, which makes it harder for them to actually make laws due to the constant interruptions. Now each legion garrisoned in the empire takes care of any large-scale banditry that the local nobility -be of the Senatorial class or genuine lords and ladies- wouldn't be able to handle with their militias. This -effectively- kept banditry down overall and became a second line of defense against various revolts. If the legion is stationed at the frontier provinces, then their job now includes blunting any invasions from the non-tributary states, which have become non-existent these days. Legions stationed in the Tributary States of the Empire are there to keep the tributary states in line and make sure that none try to break off or miss a payment (these legions work closely with the Tax Legions, given this job) alongside being essentially a tripwire for non-tributary states attacking the Empire's tributary states.

Now, as you would expect, rising the legions required to enforce all of this not only costs a pretty penny but also is manpower intensive and incredibly stressful. That is why a rotation system has been instituted for the various legions to minimize legionary/auxiliary wear and maximize logistics efficiency. When a legion rotation happens, the replacement legion meets up with the legion that is going to be replaced at their main fort. The tired and weak legion then accepts the orders to return to a logistics point -during times of war- or what is considered 'core' territory within the Empire -during times of peace- while the fresh legion accepts the transfer of post. Once at a logistics point or within a 'core' territory, the tired legion begins the long process of releasing those who have done their service, replacing supplies and armaments, and training new recruits. It is this system that keeps the legions the best trained GATE!World. Problem is the loss of institutional knowledge when someone can easily wipe out the legions comes along and fights the Empire.

The Empire's navy isn't much to talk home about, as it is similar to most pre-industrial navies, particularly pre-Renaissance. Which means they're basically part-time merchants to keep costs low and retain the institutional knowledge of building, supplying, and training crews for ships. Despite the dangers of the waters in GATE!World, this navy is good enough to attempt an invasion on the continent Equestria is on while being able to keep up with the merchant shipping of the various colonies and naval tributary states the Empire has.
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The next layer down in the hierarchy is the nobility, which consists of the Senatorial Class, the Electoral Class, and the Lords and Ladies. Not only do they make up many of the Legates and officer corps within the Empire, they also are a major income in taxes due to their immense estates. Despite the Gracchi Brothers not existing here, many of their reforms were instituted within the Empire thus placing strict restrictions on how much land a citizen or noble can hold. The punishment for breaking these restrictions tended to be a fine that is based off of the value of the land, how much land, and how long the land was illegally owned. So a noble or citizen that had effectively swindled the populous out of a lot of land for years would be ruinously fined while those who only gone over the limit somewhat for a short while (discounting what amounts to rounding errors and terrain like lakes, rivers, and other large bodies of water) are forced to pay a significant -but not ruinous- fine.

The job of the nobility is to be the top of the local government (be the entire province or just the local village(s)). They are required by their station via law to ensure that a local copy of the imperial paperwork is filed and cataloged, that they are able to raise a legion of professional soldiers at times of peace and keep peasant levies trained and armed in case of war, enforce the laws instituted by the Senate and by the courts, and ensure that things run smoothly.

The Senatorial Class consists of 600 clans and make up of the Senate much like Rome with anyone within these families able to run for Senator. In addition to being part of the Senate, they consist of the vast majority of the top leadership of the provinces with each clan being responsible for a non-Electoral province. Generally they have at least a member of their clans be consul and much like in Rome they're the leaders of the Senate.

The Electoral class are separate from the Senatorial Class but carry many of the duties and this class is made up of 150 clans and when a Imperial Election is called, the heads of each clan -or the head's designated heir- is sent to the capital to elect a new emperor. These clans make up the top leadership of the core or 'electoral' provinces and make up of a council to advise the Emperor, usually electing one of their own to be the Emperor's adviser(s).

The Lords and Ladies make up the bulk of the nobility and run many of the day-to-day operations that the nobility is required by law and stature to do. It should be noted that many of the low-level lords and ladies are presiders of various city/town/village councils and thus have a pulse on the local issues.
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The middle layer of the Empire's social, political, and economic hierarchical cake is the Patricians, which is made up mostly of semi-autocratic merchants and incredibly well-off merchants. They are the second largest source of tax income that the Empire has and are significant in keeping every village supplied with food and other goods that require materials that aren't likely to be available locally (even if money is made on the side) while selling luxuries to those of the Patricians and nobility. When war outstrips the legions ability to keep logistically solvent, the Empire effectively conscripts as many of the Patricians as they can without ruining the internal logistics network.

This group is a powerful political force due to many of them being extremely rich citizens.
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The third to last layer of the hierarchical cake is the Citizens, which make up a significant fraction of the population. They provide about 5/8ths of the military manpower of the Empire and are third place in terms of tax income. This layer represents the voting populous, as to become a full-fledged citizen you must serve in the legions for at least five years, with the highest elected political offices available to those not of the Electoral or Senatorial classes requiring a full 25 years. This is perhaps one of the more expansive classes of the Empire, as a significant fraction of the Patricians are the richest of the Citizens.

It isn't unheard of to have one of the Consuls be from this group, particularly after the Plebeian Reforms (which not only created the Plebeian Forums that many cities rely on for local governance, but also the town and village councils too), and are noted to have some of the best mobility within the hierarchy.
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The second to last layer of the hierarchical cake is the Peasants, which consists of the non-voting population. They provide the remaining 3/8ths of military manpower within the empire and much of the economic activity by harvesting crops, mining metals, doing smith work, working small-scale smelters, harvesting wood, among many more activities. While not as well off as the Citizen or Patricians, they aren't impoverished or unnecessarily oppressed. They produce very little in terms of tax revenue compared to the rest of the hierarchy but have impressive numbers to make up for it.

Like every other class outside of slaves, the peasants are guaranteed to have an education (which is mostly funded by the province government) and this is due to the fact that a basic education improves the productivity of every activity in general.
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Now we hit the bottom of the hierarchical cake, which is made up of slaves. While the vast majority of these are war captives that became slaves after a long process, they provide incredibly cheap labor for the Empire. Most of the slaves rarely gain an education more than basic language skills and counting, at least outside any previous education. Now there are laws to limit the oppression and brutality forced upon slaves, but these laws are bent till they nearly break.

When comparing their size between the classes, the slave class is comparable in size to the peasant class.

GATE!Earth Politics:

So, you might be wondering what is on GATE side of things? Well, I'm going to say 1) buckle up and 2) you might hate me for this but given the situation in Real Life... it is sadly better than what could happen:

Let's start with the GATE US first, because that's going to have a major departure from the norm. GATE!US isn't led by a Donald epxy nor a Hillary epxy. In this case it's pretty much Mattis... due to the fact that the US military and intelligence services -with the Supreme Court signing off on this- having to implement plans under Scenario Hot Under Collar Cyclone, which is the name of a worst-case scenario where a major political party is effectively seditious (or outright treasonous) and has control of the elected portions of the government. The worst-case scenario plan for Hot Under Collar Cyclone is pretty complex, and mostly still classified in 2017 but what little that has been declassified simply has the Supreme court in it's entirety signing every major checkpoint as the situation continued. The UC IC had gathered a lot of intelligence that 1) the 2016 elections was going to be an electioneering job on a scale unheard of in all of history and 2) major movers and shakers of the GOP are seditious. Now outside of the worst-case scenario, all the GOP had to do to not get thrown in jail/executed in mass was simply agree to allow the Supreme Court to disenvow the candidate Donald Trump from running in the elections when the compiled dossier was put into the intelligence committees in August (basic line of thought here is that Trump -and much of his staff- violated several clauses for candidacy for President). The GOP answered in line of the worst-case scenario and decided to make it a partisan matter, much to the horror of the Democrats.

So, in November, everything was ready to implement the worst-case scenario plan for Hot Under Collar Cyclone. The Supreme Court -with extreme reluctance- signed on the line of no return and the US military and IC went into action. The elections were suspended and a surprisingly lightly redacted version of the Steele-IC dossier was published at gunpoint by the news media. The US military picked Mattis to lead the interm government and pretty much put Trump and the vast majority of the GOP under arrest for sedition and high treason. As you would expect, Pro-Trump enclaves flared up in insurgency but were quickly and brutally put down within two months. The world was understandably shocked by this, but the surprises didn't end there as Mattis instituted even harsher sanctions against Russia and got the rest of the world -including North Korea of all nations!- to hop aboard. Russia is now in major financial trouble by the end of the year, which only worsened as the sanctions were iron clad. Still, Putin and his marry band is still in charge, but for how long isn't for certain.
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For GATE Japan, the situation is a bit odd as the Abe epxy now found himself with a 'hung government' in 2016... as the Steele-US IC dossier had implicated the current right-wing government with indirectly supporting Russia for their own gains. While investigations cleared of Abe and friends from the general mess, a lot of the key seats that Abe had relied on now found themselves empty. It didn't help that the Japanese Emperor had gone on national television to voice his disapproval with Abe's party as they courted treason. While the key seats would be filled by less radical members of Abe's party and radical liberals, Abe wasn't able to enforce his political will as much as he used to. This got the more Imperialist-like factions of the JSDF giving murmurs of disapproval with the situation, leading to the situation where they'll be pawns later.

Thankfully, the vast majority of the JSDF sent to the 'Special Region' -aka Falmart, aka the Holy Empire of Alnus- are of the liberal/non-Imperialist side of things. This makes it easier for Abe to not get Mattis breathing down his neck for whatever happens in the Special Region, as Abe is literally walking on a very thin tightrope politically.
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GATE Russia is... undergoing the early phases to revolution in 2017. Despite Putin's best efforts, the Russian economy became worse than during Yeltsin's reign thanks to the sanctions... which is saying something. So far Putin and friends had been unsuccessful in clamping down on descent, with citizens protesting before being gunned down by the infamous OMON or 'Black Barretts'... and that has them getting desperate as they foresee that Russia will be locked out of the world economy in a similar fashion to the fictional nation of Zaftra in the Front Mission series, which in Left Alive is undergoing a civil war.
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GATE China is currently focusing on keeping North Korea in line and trying to control the immense amounts of refugees coming from Russia as the situation within the country deteriorates further... although the Chinese intelligence service has been helping the US by feeding information from the various refugees and asylum seekers... which are then correlated with what few US intelligence assets within Russia has dug up.

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GATE!EU is, as mentioned, becoming a heavily armed camp. With Edrogan quickly stating his allegiance to Russia in the winter of 2016 when the Steele-US IC dossier outted him as a Russian ally, the EU quite literally kicked Turkey out of the EU. Now I'll go into further detail with notable individual nations within the EU later but safe to say if you want someone to be the personification of the EU right now, the Black Ops 1 character Daniel Clarke (aka 'even though I'm a deadman, I'm not going to die quietly and thus extremely well prepared for such an occasion') is the best fit despite being a deadman in-game. Crackdowns on those from the Middle East refugees are rampant as well, as they are generally scene as a possible 5th column. Like any sane nation-state -or collection of such- they are also worried that the Gate will appear in Berlin or Paris.
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GATE!Germany is quickly shedding a lot of it's pacifistic views given the threat of the situation in Russia boiling over and causing problems. For the military, money is no object right now and everything is being overhauled while new production is put on higher priority. Not only that, Germany has been cracking down on anyone from Russia or the refugees from the Middle East. Russians for obvious reasons and the Middle East refugees because of the possibility of them becoming a 5th Column threat. Then there is the Nazi crackdown to end all Nazi crackdowns, thanks to the Steele-US IC dossier. Numerous groups were simply annihilated in this crackdown, with many more going to ground in the aftermath. Many groups had their leaderships tried for treason then executed.

Then there is the massive jump in popularity for the Hohenzollern family to retake their place as the royal family of Germany... which isn't causing much trouble other than the added paperwork from the increased volume of petitions.
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GATE!Britain is in a bit of a mess. With the current leading coalition having been implicated in treasonous acts -with some members being outright treasonous!- thanks to the Steele-US IC dossier, Queen Elizabeth the Second had her hand forced and dissolved Parliament. After the immense crackdown that followed and quite a few hangings and investigations, Parliament had new elections after six months of preliminary investigations and crackdowns. Parliament is at it's most vulnerable position ever since it's conception. One bad move and the people would consider having Queen Elisabeth and her advisers and bureaucrats to run the nation instead of them... and currently a left-wing coalition is walking on a very thin tightrope politically.

It doesn't help that MI5 is having it's hands full with trying to play wack-a-mole with Russian-backed secessionist movements.
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GATE!France is slightly on fire. No, quite literally it's slightly on fire. With Le Pen and company outright stated to be traitors, the French people have taken to the streets in support/against the right-wing groups in France. Fortunately the French government was able to keep order but politically France is still metaphorically on fire as internal security units go through with a massive crackdown on right-wing groups in general.

Militarily, the French army is moving a vast majority of it's forces to Poland to help secure the border and strong armed -along with Britain and Germany- NATO into doing an intervention in Ukraine to minimize Russia's avenues of approach into Europe...
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GATE!South Korea is also in a bit of an upheaval as the reigning government has been implicated with being buddy-buddy with Russia... although in this case it's less for power and money and more guarantees that North Korea wouldn't decide that [insert day here] would be a good day to invade South Korea. Despite the political upheaval, the South Korean military is on the highest military alert, just in case things go pear-shaped in a similar manor to Wargame Red Dragon's Busan Pocket scenario.
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GATE!Vietnam is like everyone else in Southeast Asia at this point, but even more so. It has cut all ties with Russia and yet isn't trusting of China who they assume would take the situation into their favor...
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GATE!Turkey is... on fire. No, it's quite literally on fire as Edrogan's announcement of being an ally of Russia caused civil unrest in the eastern part of the country and is quickly veering towards civil war. With the US quickly taking their nukes and turned their base into a fortress, the situation continues to deteriorate in 2017.

Hell, Edrogan has been forced out of Istanbul for christ's sake! The major reason that Istanbul hasn't been changed back to Constantinople is the fact that the anti-Edrogan forces would go Ataturk if anyone was serious about it.
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Also, the current reactions:

I'll give the reaction first. The EU (outside of Turkey) in this case is taking a 'wait and see' approach alongside South Korea and US aligned nations in Asia, waiting what happens next (be Russia or the Gate). Europe at this point is acting and looking like a giant armed camp with guns pointed in Russia's (for obvious reasons) and Turkey's (because Edrogan is being an idiot and is starting to work with Russia) direction. Germany, France, and a whole slew of European Nations not only used the Steele-US IC dossier to purge their governments of Russian pasties/pawns, and in Britain the various nationalistic groups got slapped with treason charges and were dissolved... with quite a few leaders literally getting the noose with the Queen watching with her best 'you fucked up' face.

So, since people had asked what the situation is on Iron Pact!Earth, I’m going to reveal a little and how in some ways it is more peaceful and in others it’s a worse powder keg than our/GATE!Earth.

Now to start this informational, we’ll start with the overall technology of the Iron Pact because that’s a pointed question that has some consequences in reactions for both sides.

Now the world where the Iron Pact resides is quite similar to our own, even if it is simply more advanced in some areas due to the various circumstances. For example, the Iron Pact is very advanced in terms of hydrogen fuel cells compared to our/GATE!Earth, this is partially because hydrogen fuel cells were discovered quite a bit earlier in the Iron Pact timeline due to the Kaiser Wilhelm Foundation of the Sciences and Arts basically pouring money into the idea… and this is a common thread among many technologies thanks to the fact that there was a very rich organization who simply poured money into the sciences because the original chair -Kaiser Wilhelm the Second (aka the Flawed)- being a humanist technophile.

This has many perks to say the least. Nuclear fission being in its 6th generation and digital computers being a generation ahead thanks to their earlier adoption in the late 1940s/early 1950s, as an example. Most of the consistent energy consumption on Iron Pact!Earth is managed by fission plants across the world with a very impeccable safety record (Chernobyl didn’t happen due to the USSR’s more measured nuclear expansion process -and thus having an adequate cadre of trained staff to man all their plants- and Three Mile Island’s #5 experimental reactor -which was inside a triple reinforced reactor building- had its fuel rods slightly fuse together -thanks to an air bubble- but the inner reactor casing held, allowing the reactor to be salvaged from the incident) with natural gas, hydroelectric, geothermal, and other renewables able to pick up any variable electrical consumption as needed.

Coal -for the most part- has been relegated to keeping the coal-fired steam locomotives running, being converted to synthetic oil, being used as Graphene/Diamond feedstock, or pretty much sitting in their veins as part of a strategic resource reserve. Oil is still very important, as it’s myriad of uses are extremely useful. While oil may not simply dominate the world economy as it used to, petrochemicals are still a vital component of the world economy (the versatility of the family of chemical compounds is still practically unmatched). You are just as likely to see petrochemical plastics showing up as biopolymer-based plastics (basically specific plant resins -be trees, flowers, or other plants- mixed with specific algae types, and is one of the African Commonwealth’s major exports), with certain fields -particularly in construction- being dominated by biopolymer plastics.

Fusion -much like it is in our/GATE!Earth- is somewhat mimetic due to the fact that it’s not advancing as much as people wanted it to and promising projects failed disastrously as some undiscovered variable ruined it for everyone. Although, the large mount of resources put into this has put electro-motive systems at a far higher level than ours/GATE!Earth’s (and it’s only comparatively slower because the Cold War ended on our/GATE!Earth).

In addition to these, Zeppelin technology has been rather prolific, especially after being proven to be rather capable cargo transports during the Great War of Resistance. What little of the Zeppelin fleet Imperial Germany was able to scrounge up were converted in a ‘short-range’ configuration of L-59 and were able to help alleviate the logistical burden of the Great War of Resistance. Hundreds of thousands -to millions- of tons of supplies -be ammunition, food, parts, or medicine- would have exacerbated the initial train traffic jam during the prelude and initial days of the Great War of Resistance in Germany.

One thing that the Iron Pact is noticeably more advanced in -compared to our/GATE!Earth- is robotics and cybernetics. This is partially due to Wilhelm the Second’s push for robotics to not only help alleviate Germany’s bloodletting during the Great War of Resistance but also to give cripples and those missing limbs a chance at life. Hauptmann Aaron Neumann is a posterboy of cybernetics due to the fact that if it weren’t for the -then- experimental cybernetics that were used, he would have been dead.

While Wilhelm the Flawed would never see the fruits of his financial labors (as he died helping the defense of Koenigsburg in the early days of World War 2), it is this heavy investment in robotics that birthed the first Gepanzerte Kampfläufer (Armored Fighting Walker), the quad-legged ‘Läufer V1’. While the Imperial German military didn’t accept it -outside a few alpine 'test' regiments- due to its unreliability, uselessness on flat ground, limited combat time, and extreme costs in manufacture and maintenance, it would be China and Japan that would further the concept due to the majority of the environs they fought in preclude traditional AFVs, environs like jungles, terrain simply filled with hills, the terraces, mountainous regions, among others. The ‘GKL’ concept would evolve as time went on.
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Now this also has a bad side, and that is thanks in part to the political situation on Iron Pact!Earth. There are technological fields that are actually restricted as a whole by the various governments of not only the two major power blocks (which are the Iron Pact and the Comintern) but the various smaller nations outside those power blocks. One of these fields is the field is gene-engineering.

Iron Pact!Earth (even the verifiablely insane Commune of India does this) has the field on panopticon levels of watch, and for good reason thanks to a bunch of idiots from the British Union on an uninhabited island off the coast of England. What those idiots managed to do with somewhat older equipment and techniques was create a strain of anthrax that is all but impossible to get rid of by conventional (i.e. non-nanotech/radiological) means, sure the people who cooked this up died when their containment failed but they proved that it could be done.

Next time, it is sanely reasoned, that the world won’t be so lucky.

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Now the political situation is basically a Cold War between the Iron Pact and the Comintern. Depending on which ‘front’, you’ll either have something akin to ‘playful banter across the border’ or ‘hope to whatever god(s) you worship that the other is not going to do something crazy today!’. Yeah, the situation is that bipolar… and thus dangerous.
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The Iron Pact was forged out of the fires of the Great War of Resistance, originally by the US, Imperial Germany, and (Old Men, a summary being essentially "Everything that the Imperialists aren't", yes they have some expansionist aims but from what I can tell it's more mercantile than conquest) Imperial Japan. The alliance soon extended to China (which managed to get its shit together during and after the Great War of Resistance, having two powerful colonial empires willing to carve up a European nation sort of puts new emphasis on getting one’s shit together), Vietnam (which gained its independence in 1923 with the help of Imperial Japan), and Poland (Wilhelm the Second once stated that ‘my ancestors must be spinning in their graves as we are fighting with the Poles with genuine gusto!’), Brazil, along others during the inter-war years from 1925 to 1945. The Iron Pact after WW2 would become something of a mix of NATO and the economic union part of the European Union, and it is this immense trade that got the word far richer than it would have been.

In the aftermath of the Great War of Resistance, the Soviet Union came to be -initially led by a Neo-Leninist (aka the 'Gardening' school of Socialism) but later led by a Georgian who was friends with Stalin in the mid 1930s... who then started World War 2 in 1945 and got deposed in 1948 when his own cabinet killed him as Iron Pact forces neared Moscow- while much of the former British and French empires contracted. The salt in the wound in Britain's case isn't discovering that Churchill and friends pulled a coup on the House of Windsor but the fact that India was successful in violently gaining it's independence. With the death of various non-violent independence leaders in 1921 (including one Mahatma Gandhi), the independence movement in India became an outright armed rebellion. The Rajah was quickly disposed and an interim democratic republic was instituted until a complete constitution was written. Sadly, this democratic republic government would fall to a new brand of communism, causing the creation of an Indian communist state. What would be known as Pakistan would break off of India shortly after as a multi-ethnic state due to shear necessity as those who didn't want to be part of the new communist state migrated in mass.

While the USSR would only have a bout of expansionism during the Second World War, the Commune of India is the equivalent of a slightly schizophrenic Mao's China in this timeline and is considered somewhat bipolar at a minimum in terms of geopolitics. The early stages of the ongoing Cold War had been mostly the Commune of India throwing its depleted weight around while the Soviets either facepalm or facedesk at their actions, mumbling about why they have to work with the crazies. Later they went for a more subversive methodology. Commune of India’s attempts to remake certain former British/French colonial states in their own image has caused no end of grief for everyone to say the least. It isn’t uncommon for UN or Iron Pact forces to become under fire from Commune of India aligned groups in northern and southern Africa or across the Saudi peninsula.

Much of the British and French's African holdings were sold -quite cheaply I might add- to the United States who then jointly administered them with Imperial Germany (using the ‘a dollar of prevention is better than spending thousands in cleanup’ argument). It was this joint administration that started an evolution of the original 'MittleAfrika' plan, slowly creating the African Commonwealth... and it is various discoveries from the African Commonwealth that things like modern bio-polymers are a thing. The African Commonwealth is actually a major player on solar and bio-polymer development in the grand scheme of things… better than our/GATE!Earth where it’s pretty much a mess to say the least.

Terrorism is even more horrific -and sadly a more regular occurance- than on our/GATE!Earth. Numerous groups -many of them hailing from nations like Britain and France, holding certain political ideologies like the Dixiecrats/Neo-Confederates or Tribalism (basically Nationalism, but taken into a tribal extent), and certain religions like Wahhabi- have become not only incredibly brutal as a rule, but regularly commit ISIS-grade atrocities (or worse, like the remnants of the British Union trying to cook up what amounts to be super anthrax using 'modern' techniques and equipment during the early 1990s or the (Wahhabist) Palestinian Liberation Front's chemical bombings of Jerusalem's Jewish and Christian quarters in 1974 which killed thousands) on a regular basis. It has gotten to the point that entire swathes of the Middle East and Africa had become 'Government-less Zones' where -outside the areas that UN peacekeepers control- there is no law and order.

Now onto a more detailed look into the mechanics of ghosts!

Now, across all three (and a whole lot more) universes the rules and ‘laws’ -in the scientific sense- are the same, with very little deviation from them outside of certain circumstances (like, say, some idiot tapping into the Celestial Plane to start Armageddon… yeah, that had happened a few times across the multiverse).

Now for our/GATE!Earth, anyone who looks into ghosts and their kin tend to be considered a bit eccentric at best, outright insane at worst. With Falmart and Iron Pact!Earth though, it is considered less psudo-scientific and more science fact -well in the case of Falmart Greco-Roman!Science and not modern science but you get the idea- with groups being made to cartail any ghostly activity.

For the most part the MOs of these ghosts is generally finding closure or settling non-violent business in the land of the living. It isn’t uncommon for those with survivors guilt to have the ones that they sufferers of survivors guilt to have those that they are guilty over talk them out of suicide… and yes, that has happened quite a few times strangely enough. For every majority, there is a minority, and ghosts aren’t any different. Now there are ghosts that want to settle scores in the land of the living, and quite often by any means in their disposal. The good thing is that those who can talk to ghosts can also fight ghosts, and the various groups that the nations across Iron Pact!Earth have various technologies and techniques specifically designed to neutralize them. Historically -across all untold numbers of universes- this means that shamans/shawomen and other people who work with spirits were chosen based on their ability to talk to ghosts.

Now, Falmart has the Apostles to do most of the work when it pertains to ghosts although those with the ability to interact with ghosts are around, they’re rare as hell. This is partially due to the fact that the Empire is the sort of place that isn’t conductive to someone who can interact with ghosts survive all that long (they tend to be physically and mentally more fragile than their more normal kin) and partially due to the fact that every cemetery in the Empire and its tributary states are restructured to ensure that they are extremely hardened against necromancy. Still, if there has been enough emotionally significant death, then a ghost could come into being. Even on great battlefields they rarely go above a hundred or so. There hasn’t been a battlefield where thousands of ghosts dwell. Now, there are those who who have the ability to interact with ghosts -and are not Apostles- that have worked to utilize ghosts for good or ill, but the Gods tend to ensure that any attempts don't go anywhere...

In Iron Pact!Earth… it’s a different story. While mankind had only a literal handful of people capable of seeing and interacting with ghosts in the modern era, the technology to see and interact with ghosts started to show up in the 1960s to counter supposed Soviet and Commune of India's psychic programs. Kaiser Frederick would found the Advanced Sciences and Investigations Division… better known as Wolfenstein.

Now… the alternative name might raise eyebrows with you Wolfenstein fans, but it’s not that Wolfenstein. It is actually named after a castle from Fläming Heath hill range folklore that got named after a minor free lord (closest thing that pretty much everyone else has is ‘baron’) with the last name of Wolfenstein. Baron Wolfenstein was part of the Northern Crusades with his Teutonic brethren, but he was less interested in spreading the faith and more interested in studying -and recording- local fables and things and beings of magic. According to legend, Baron Wolfenstein’s studies initially got him a little flak from his Teutonic brethren but quickly changed their tune when, according to legend, he managed to defeat an entire army of undead raised by, and again according to legend, a mad local warlock with only knowledge and some skill in the magical arts.The Teutons decided to allow Wolfenstein to continue on his collection and studies of what was considered unholy, to find weaknesses and methods of easily countering or containing them. Some of these studies, again according to legend, were later sent to the Vatican and helped serve as the foundation for improved purification and exorcism rituals. Eventually, according to legend, this castle was destroyed only after quite some time after Baron Wolfenstein’s death during one of the wars that took place during the tail end of the Northern Crusades.

While the original founders of Wolfenstein wouldn’t believe in these legends, it would be the mysterious solutions for paranormal activity that started showing up in the mid-to-late 1970s to lead to some believing that those legends have grains of truth in them. Eventually this led to the discovery that ghosts do exist… and more often than not they simply want to tie up dangling threads -i.e unfinished business- in the land of the living with a few actually helping Wolfenstein (including one Gustave Eiffel -who ‘dabbled’ into the paranormal when not making significant strides in whatever field he was in at the time- of all people… I’m being serious here).

Wolfenstein’s paranormal division generally ensures that paranormal things don’t go out of control… and more often than not they are called in to contain and/or remove ‘psi-memories’. A Psi-memory is basically a literal memory -usually an extremely emotional event- left by someone who died. These can be objects, spaces in locations like rooms, or rarely an entire building and must be dealt with properly. Almost all of these psi-memories can be easily removed and put into replacement anchors before being put into containment… but there are those that can be only contained on-site… which can solve some problems if the containment has to be replaced or the anchor has to be visible or maintained.

If drawn into a psi-memory, you literally relive the memory(ies) that the anchor is connected to. These range from simply reliving the last living moments to entire battles going by before you reach the end of the memory. Wolfenstein has developed numerous technologies to carefully extract some poor sap that has inadvertently -or is simply unlucky enough- to find a psi-memory and get it to engage in playback. It isn’t uncommon for people who don’t find proper help to quickly commit suicide because of engaging in playback with a particularly nasty memory.

Alright, I'm going to start explaining magic to everyone. Now on Falmart, Magic has a scientific component to it as we've seen in canon!Gate... but this is to make the spells more efficient. It is this ever increasing drive for efficiency that drives magic researchers ever forward. Now in addition to the canon fields of magic, there are also magic that pertains to music, dance, even martial arts. As such, fighting someone with magical abilities can be incredibly painful as you have to let them start the fight which is bad if they're a trained combat mage. All mages that are born in Falmart are first trained in defensive magics, barriers and shields and the like, to protect themselves from any backfiring that they'll have in their training. These are relatively easy to master and don't take a lot of energy to use if used on an individual person but gets more taxing if they cast a barrier over an area.

Now in order to use spells, you have to be able to utilize an energy called 'mana'. Mana is a type of energy that is used to cast spells, do rituals, and other things that are considered 'magic'. How efficient you use your mana is heavily dependent on how much one can grasp the underlying mechanisms of not only the universe but mana as well. However, the reason for all this research into mana is that a mage can only draw, store, and expel (i.e. use to cast spells) so much mana at any one time. Now you can train to increase these attributes or utilize mana-infused materials like 'mana crystals' to expand their mana capabilities. That is why many mages in the Empire utilize some sort of staff or wand, they have mana-infused materials either on them (like the crystal shapes on staves) or within them (like wands, which are made up of two comparable mana-infused materials, specifically a magically solvent wood and a core of either mana-metal or mana-crystal for the most part, although cores with unicorn horns or hairs and other magically adept beasts are rarely used) to enhance their mana capabilities.

Some races can utilize what is known as 'spirit magic', which is the equivalent of magical voodoo. Spirit Magic requires the user to utilize mana to communicate (and only communicate, those who can interact with spirits is a whole different ballgame) to spirits -usually the equivalent of divine underlings- and utilize their services. This has the downside of making the user unable to utilize other methods of magic but with the support of a spirit, can utilize spells that are far more powerful... although to gain consistency out of spirit magic, one has to be in good relations with the spirit(s) whose services they're using. The best 'spirit mages' are those who can keep their spirit(s) happy by paying the mana on time, give them gifts, and the like.

If an army has a cadre of both good mages and spirit mages... their combat ability triples against an equivalent unit without them. For example, during the revolution that got Emperor Molt into power, he was able to get some of the best mages in Falmart including one Cato El Altestan into his two cohorts. When they fought against his brother Caeso in the field, Cato and his fellow mages helped Molt to absolutely annihilate Caeso's own cohorts in the field, eventually allowing Molt to take Caeso's head and ending the revolution then and there. However, Caeso have effectively caused the mages to distrust the Empire with his mage purges, despite all the good will that Molt had done after he gained power. Cato is known for his incredibly wide array of spells, immense understanding of mana, and immense mana capabilities (which is a mix of innate ability and brutal self-training, training that he gave to all of his apprentices). If Cato is on the warpath, run, run as fast and as far as you can and hope to whatever divine you worship that you're far enough away.

This is one of the reasons why the Empire failed in their invasion of Equestria, as Equestria had a third of it's population able to utilize spells like their mages (unicorns), a third of it's population able to manipulate the weather with their bare hands via innate magic (Pegasi), or the last third which are capable of incredible feats of strength and durability via innate magic (Earth ponies). Then there is the fact that they discovered how to weave music with magic... which is a game changer in the eyes of the Empire. Instead of having one person being the mana conduit, you can have small group of battle musicians use music to gather, store, and cast mana. Combat Music that can strengthen morale, heal wounds, and more are within the Equestrian arsenal and came as a major shock to the legions sent to Equestria. However, this requires not only those with magic able to play music but their instruments have to be made out of mana-conductive materials, which Equestria has (comparatively) a lot of. It also explains why Equestrians break out into song on occasion, as the magic of the music enhances everyone doing the song and dance.

Alicorns... well... let's just say there is a reason that alicorns are considered gods by the Empire's soldiers. Get them to take the field is a surefire sign that things are going to suck for whomever got them roused enough to take the field.

Most necromancy is considered a high crime across the world where Falmart resides. Partially because it gets a lot of afterlife gods really pissed off, partially because it requires an immensely powerful mage to do it, and partially because necromancy loves to cause problems. Period. There are ways to disrupt necromanic magic however, and designing/redesigning cemeteries in certain designs reduce or even outright disperse necromatic magic. Although, there have been accounts that those who practice necromancy did it for good reasons like trying to allow people say goodbye to their loved ones one last time. That is how mages like Quintus Rufrius Adepphius became known by the title 'Final Rester', which is a good thing too given that shamans -what people call those whom can interact (i.e. talk and touch) with spirits- are incredibly rare, even among highly-magical races like Equestrians... and allowing this is pretty much the only exception to the no necromancy rule.