The Grand Parliament Building, Lincolnshire

Population: 1.1 Million (Humans, Elves, Reptillians, and other fantastical creatures)

Allegiance: The Falkland Commonwealth

Type: Capital City

The streets of Lincolnshire were bustling on this rainy day. The cold season was waning, though temperatures were still low. All the snow had been cleared by workers in the streets, and it now only rested on the rooftops and trees of the most advanced city on the continent.

The Falklands were in the midst of their second industrial revolution. New ideas, innovations, and advances in technology, philosophy, and doctrine, resulted in the boom that was felt across the Commonwealth. Even inside of the Colonies. Steam-powered engines moved trains as they bustled across great spans of the Isles, coal mined from the hills of the Pictish lands were transformed into electricity to light up the world's first electric lamps in the city streets. Steam-powered boats and vessels jubilantly paraded in the waters of the nation, projecting Commonwealth might everywhere they went. Buildings were constructed taller than ever, with some apartments reaching 10 stories high and standing at a jaw dropped 138 feet tall. Unheard of for large, square, buildings at the time. Airships floated above the city providing transportation to the ultra-rich of the city, while workers toiled in the mines, factories, and sewers below. Soldiers carried the world's first Breech-loaded Rifles, with the muskets and barrel-loaded rifles of twenty years ago now being old technology, despite it only just now making its appearance on the Continent. The Commonwealth was a nation that was experiencing rapid growth in the span of twenty years. While all of this growth wasn't necessarily good, it wasn't all bad either. Highly protective of its technological advancements, rarely did anyone get to see what the Falkish were up to. The Revolutionaries in the Empire were lucky that both they and Falkish merchants had common enemies, as the merchants secured grants from the Parliament to sell the outdated guns to their militants. Eventually, they'd start to ask for better weapons for lease, but for now, the Commonwealth kept their lips sealed.

The Commonwealth had come a long way since the war twenty years ago. It was seen as a national disgrace, a legacy that they tried to live down. What they lacked in dragons, ekron, and manpower; they made up with steel, engines, guns, and technology. They were destined to fight their rivals once again, to show the entire world once and for all which nation was truly superior…

And they smelled opportunity…

Inside of the Parliament building was where talked of it. They wore dark suits and elegant dresses, woven at the latest of fabric mills in the nation. Parliamentarians were all debating something that could change the course of the nation's history forever.

"We have to strike now while the iron is hot! The Imperials are in a state of decline, now is the time to push ourselves forward!" Said one parliamentarian.

"We cannot risk it! Don't you know how expensive the last war we fought was? We are lucky that we've managed to hold onto most of our colonies! If we push now, we could very well lose it all!" Argued another.

"Attention! The Prime Minister has arrived! This Parliament is now in session!" Said an elf judge with the strike of a gavel, "The floor goes to MP Sir Ellis, representing the Whigs! Sir Ellis, you have the floor!"

"Thank you, Judge Felix," A human stood up from his seat with a mess of documents on his table. He fixed his blue coat, a cultural color of the Lincolnites, "On behalf of all the members of the Whig party and their constituents, I have proposed that the Falkland Commonwealth and his majesty's colonial dominion, ought to make contact with the people know as 'The Ithacans'."

After the man's words, there was a lot of murmuring amongst the crowd. Lizardmen from the Low Countries and Elves from Berkia chattered amongst each other about the proposal.

"For the entirety of our history, there have been two dominant powers on the continent. The Commonwealth and the Empire. But to see our nemesis struggle so harshly against an as-of-yet unknown third faction presents our people with an opportunity that cannot be missed!" He argued. His supporters cheered, his opponents scowled and heckled, such was the atmosphere of a Grand Parliamentary Assembly. In the Commonwealth, all five realms had their own Parliaments. But the Parliament in Lincolnshire, the Grand Parliament, was the highest organ in all the land beside the Royal throne itself. It was in the Grand Parliament, that politicians from all over the country met.

"Order! Order! Sir Ellis please, continue!" The Judge ordered.

"It would be, I daresay, foolish of us to miss this crucial opportunity in the history of our great nation! We must seize this moment, by opening ourselves to a faction, that may very well be more advanced than we are! Think of the potential benefits! And to top it all off, the Ithacans are confirmed to be human!"

Lots of chatter between the MPs came after that.

"He has a point."

"It's bloody ridiculous."

"I'd like to see one of the Ithacans myself."

"Order, please! I'd like to invite Lord Fitch to speak, representing the Lord's Party. Lord Fitch, you have the floor!" Said the Elf Judge keeping the discussion moving forward.

A very rich-looking lizardman stood. His coat was a deep purple color, a very rare pigment. In its seams were gold colors and silver embroiderings. His scales were a bright yellow, and his eyes were almost pitch black. A serpentine tongue slithered out every other second, as he stood to debate.

"Now, we cannot get ahead of ourselvesss," His tongue hissed the 's' beginning or ending every word. Even his accent was rich. He spoke softly, very softly. With a haughty voice buried deep inside, much different from the nasally accent that Sir Ellis spoke with, "In thisss era of peace, we have found ourselves in the height of an impossible explosion of wealth, riches, and growth. Even if it meant sssacrificing our title of victory in a war. Involving ourselvesss back into fighting would only hold usss back!"

More mumblings from the assembly. In the twenty years of relative peace that the Falklands had, they had grown exponentially. While unable to fight against the Empire directly due to fear of being on the losing side yet again, they had certainly rebuilt whatever they lost. And they had lost a lot. Many wanted revenge on the Empire, understandably so. Families were torn apart, people were kidnapped and sold in the markets of Fargo and Minerva. It was a war that had cost the Commonwealth many souls. For that same reason, a greater argument existed to restrain from entering into yet another conflict with the Imperials.

"Prime Minister Lucan, representing the Government. Have you and your government come to a decision regarding current matters?" Asked the judge.

A rather squat and well-fed looking man stood from amidst the benches, "You're honor, I believe we have."

"You have the floor then."

"With the power vested in me as the leader of the 29th Falkish Parliament in power, we have concluded that we will order the Commonwealth Ministry of Foreign Relations to send a dispatch alerting the named 'Ithacans' of our presence, and a willingness to cooperate further! We will refrain from involving ourselves in the current war between the Ithacans proper and the Empire, asides from supply the Minervan Revolutionaries with our weapons and officers to train their revolutionary militia!"

"Aye!"

"Nay!"

"Order! Order! Order! Please finish, Minister Lucan."

"With this, we will explore further diplomatic channels between the Commonwealth realms, our colonies, our allies with the Dogger-Kodiaks, and the Ithacans. This is the reached conclusion that my government has come to!"

With the conclusion of the very public Parliamentary meeting came a wave of rumors and hushed whispers about who the Ithacans were. Rumors circulated that they were aliens from another planet, with technology that outclassed even the most advanced of what Falkish engineers could create. But the issue is, nobody knew where these people came from. It could be possible that they were humans from the continent across the Arian ocean, but both the Empire and Commonwealth had been in contact with those people for centuries, and there were no reports of Ithacans there. The Commonwealth maintained many trade routes and sort-of-pacts with the nations abroad, not one of the discovered countries has technology better than the Falkish. And among them, none of their diplomats know anything about an 'Ithaca'.

The diplomats were confused. Perhaps they were a rogue terrorist group that managed to gain hold of advanced magical equipment that could be easily mistaken for technology? Perhaps a political movement to send a message to the Empire? It would've been believable if the city of Minerva hadn't been completely reduced to anarchy by an invading army. Terrorist groups--even the Revolutionary Independent Militia in Minerva--were small, disorganized, and weak. The Revolutionaries fighting for Minervan independence wouldn't have been able to hope for the opportunity for an uprising until the Ithacans invaded.

None of the diplomats could point a nation out on the map. The only source they got was from a Falkish officer working in Minerva as a commander of Revolutionary forces to assist in their fight against the Iscariots. And he claimed that their origins were somewhere in the sparsely inhabited, yet strategically vital, southern tip of the Albya River Peninsula. That's where their main fortress was. That being as good of a guess as they had, the Falkish quickly organized their best ship to set sail from the massive ports in Lincolnshire bound to the Peninsula. If they could woo the Ithacans over to their side, history could very well be changed.

And as such, three hundred sailors and Falkish Soldiers boarded the ship. The soldiers showing off their colorful pink, blue, and red tunics, grey slacks, and black boots. Some of the more elite forces wore cloth slouch hats that were pinned to one side as per tradition, scarves, and khakis instead of the colorful pinks, blues, and reds of the main army. Clutched in their arms were the rifles used in battle. While nobody expected fighting, anything was possible. And besides, Falklanders never missed a chance to show off their technology to others.

Sails opened on the masts and dragged the ships out of the Lincolnshire Naval Yards, a massive complex of docks, piers, and naval services that fueled the backbone of the ever-growing Commonwealth. With their destination set, the navy set sail to the south. For better or for worse…

"Oval Office."

"President Carter, this is Defense Secretary Lamarr."

"Mister Lamarr, what news do you have for me today?"

"I have good news and bad news. And they all relate to Mysterium."

President Carter sighed. Of course, while undertaking a secret operation as large as this one, there was bound to be a few hiccups, "Tell me the bad news," He said, putting his feet up on the oak desk and combing back his hair.

"To support his war, Jefferson has requested for the transport of a lot of large and very bulky equipment to go through the portal."

"Equipment like…?"

"A fleet of UH-1Y venoms, AH-1Z Vipers, CH-53E and CH-53K Stallions, Abrams Main Battle tanks, and there is an order of two F-35C's on their way."

"Jesus Christ, that's a lot of money."

"And a lot of attention. Due to the size of the actual portal opening, logistical teams in the Ascension Base in Florida have to manually disassemble the larger pieces of equipment so that teams in the Ithacan Base can reassemble them. This creates a huge backlog of logistics that becomes very noticeable to civilians."

"Oh no."

"Recently the Ascension Base has had five instances in which they had to shoo away trespassing journalists and the Press looking for answers."

"What are our options?"

"Well, with the larger demands in Mysterium comes a greater need for logistical personnel. With more personnel comes more risk of the operation being leaked to the media which would severely impact not just your administration's public standing but also would have a huge negative effect on Mysterium. One option is to declassify our knowledge of the new world early, but with the war going on against the Iscariots…"

"That isn't an option."

"Right. The media will smell blood, and they'll find out before we can burn any of the information. The next option is to simply continue on our journey. The FBI estimates that it's only a matter of weeks until a major leak in data occurs either via Logistical personnel or via third party involvement."

"Russians?"

"Russians, Chinese, Iranians, it doesn't matter who exactly. The NSA is monitoring the web currently for any information on the New World. They haven't found anything yet, but the risk is still very large for a mole to leak classified documents through the dark web."

"What's the third option?"

"Tell Jefferson that he'll get only one final wave of reinforcements, and he'll need that to end the war. He will not receive any more reinforcements, manpower, or vehicles until the war is finished."

"Bully him into being more aggressive?"

"That's what we are hoping for. Now, Jefferson is already a very aggressive general. You should see what the city of Minerva currently looks like. But he isn't using a fourth of his manpower in actual combat. If he sent at least half to the frontlines, we predict that we can expect victory in the New World sometime in two to three months."

"All of those seem like bad options. But I guess the least bad option, is the latter. Tell Jefferson to wrap this up and that no more equipment will be given to him."

"Noted."

"What's the good news?"

"We might receive a little bit of foreign help in our war with the Iscariots."

"Well yes, I've already spoken to MI6 and the NATO Council. The FECU should already be in the new world right?"

"No, not help from Earth."

"Elaborate."

"At 1300 hours, the Base in Ithaca was approached by a single warship from a nearby empire who have introduced themselves as the Commonwealth."

"The Commonwealth? That sounds modern."

"They are. Relatively speaking. From the impression that they made on our guards, they sit at around 1860s to just before the 1900s in terms of technological advancement. There was a warm greeting between the two parties, and they claimed that they could help us."

Carter straightened up on his desk, pondering, "I see. I want a diplomat in Ithaca to represent our nation immediately. Tell them that we're willing to hear them out."

"As you wish."