The World on Edge Prequel, World on Edge:Three Romes is now Available on the Steam Workshop.
Heres the Link: Steamcommunity.com
Background History of World on Edge: Three Romes
In 1907 The Academy of Fine Arts Vienna accepted the enrollment of a man named Adolf Hitler. Hitler’s painting style at first was not that unique and fairly regular but after his experiences in the Great War his paintings took a dark and surreal turn, and through this unique style of painting Hitler became highly renown.
At the Battle of Dorylaion upon their decisive victory in July of 1921, the Greek Army successfully managed to take the opportunity and encircle the Turkish Forces, from here rather than advancing on Ankara the Greek forces move to secure more of the eastern Aegean coastline and Thrace instead. Turkey is unable to force the Greeks out and the Treaty of Lausanne re-ends the war between the Ottoman Empire and western powers, in late 1922, as well as defining the new borders of a reborn Greece and newborn Turkey. Shortly after the signing of the treaty. Later on it is revealed that French and the Italians had concluded private agreements with the Turkish revolutionaries in recognition of their mounting strength. This creates a large rift between Greece and the west, France and Italy in particular, and Greece feels like they attempted to betray the promises made to Greece in the Great War. However despite this, the Greeks find even more disdain in the Soviets who directly supported the Turks throughout the war. In 1923 King Constantine I declared himself Emperor Constantine XII of the Byzantine Empire, declaring the fulfillment of the Prophecy of the Marble King and the success of the Megali Idea, the success also leading to a massive decline in the power of the Liberal Nationalist Venizelos Party, who more or less faded away. Constantinople is rechristened, and the capital is moved there thusly(in concordance with the Megali idea). Negotiating with the UK, who has long supported Greece, he manages to annex Cyprus along with other British Aegean Territory.
Most of his reign is spent further industrializing the country, and the enacting of pro-natalist policies to increase the Byzantine, previously Greek, population, with the main focus being on repopulating former Ottoman lands. Relations with the new Turkish Republic remain tense, climaxing when there was widespread reports of Turkish Genocide perpetrated upon Armenian minorities. A soon as these reports began to surface Constantine took action, forcing turkey to give up their remaining land on the Black Sea in the Treaty of Trabzon. During the Bulgarian coup d'état of 1923, Prime Minister Aleksandar Stamboliyski convinced Tsar Boris to flee to Byzantium and set up a government in exile. In the aftermath of the coup the Bulgarian Communist Party began an uprising in late August, quickly gaining steam with Soviet support. Seeing an opportunity Constantine offers to help the Bulgarian Government in exile, the government accepted, and in early September 1923 the Treaty of Thessaloniki was signed between the two governments. The Royal Hellenic Army, invaded in late September, catching both the fascists and communists by surprise, and with the support of loyalist forces, by early December victory had been achieved, and coup leader Aleksandar Tsankov fled the country. With Byzantine forces occupying the country, Constantine had gained an enormous amount of power over Bulgaria. Bulgaria is more or less subsequently forced into signing the Treaty of Varna, which established the dual monarchy and created the Byzantine-Bulgarian Empire.
The Union was rather short lived though because if the sudden death of the Bulgarian Tsar in 1925, which some people theorize may have been planned by Constantine. Upon one day after he Tsar's death, Constantine declared himself the sole ruler of the Byzantine Empire, of which Bulgaria was made into a province. Over the course of the next year several minor revolts occurred across Bulgaria but all of them were easily defeated. In order to avoid future conflict Constantine opted to compromise with Bulgarian officials, and the Linguistic Cooperative Act of 1925, was signed in late June, the treaty dictated that neither Bulgarian or Greek would be used in certain areas, and instead Latin, a neutral language with association with the empire, went into official use in some cases. this also factored into the paired Military Reorganization Act, which restructured the Byzantine Military into the "Novam Legionem Ratio", in which the largest level of organization was a Legion, which consisted of ten cohorts each with 10,000 men. In the beginning of 1926 the Empire had three legions of men, along with seven unassigned cohorts.. After his short but effective tenure, Emperor Constantine XII passed away on March 3, 1926, and was succeeded by his son George.
Taking the name Emperor George I, his reign sets out on a high note, the economy booming and a high sense of national unity. In 1928 he manages to annex Macedonia from Yugoslavia. Despite the popularity of this action it is quickly overshadowed by the events that struck the next year. The Great Depression hit hard, hitting Byzantium harder than much of the rest of the world, partially due to the large scale industrial expansion of the last decade. Factories closed, unemployment skyrocketed, and George’s approval ratings plummeted. What or how George would have solved this crisis is unknown, because only shortly after in early 1930 George is assassinated by Nicolas Perrin, a former factory worker who blamed George for the poor economy and loss of his job.
Paul, George’s younger brother, ascends to the throne at the young age of 28, taking the name Theodosius IV. The new Emperor takes quick action, expanding the size of the government to nearly triple its previous size. He rapidly began to expand the military, opening up new factories to produce arms and munitions for the growing army. along with other supplies for the military. Theodosius invests heavily into the private sector to allow businesses to regain their footing. All these actions combine to create millions of new jobs, resting late the economy, and bring back the sense of national unity, that had been lost. In the process of this Theodosius seizes more power from the legislature, who he frames as being unable to work efficiently, which to some extent was true. The Byzantine Empire emerges in 1934 not only far stronger than before, but also growing in strength.
