Necho's Gold

Found some time to finish this old one. Based on robertp6165’s Ancient Egypt Survives to the Present Day.

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In 600BCE, Pharaoh Necho II sent an expedition to find a way to circumnavigate Africa. While this expedition failed in its original mission, being forced to turn back, the explorers did find the great gold mines of Ophir. These gold reserves filled the growing gap left by those of Egypt’s own declining reserves, and allowed them to resist the growing Persian Empire.

History happens. The Egyptians trade with, and sometimes do battle with, their Greek and Persian neighbors. When the Persian Empire collapsed, the Egyptians conquered portions of Mesopotamia, but were later pushed back. The Egyptians supported the Carthaginians against the Latins, who turned their efforts more to conquering Germania and establishing a foothold over the continent. Egyptian explorers and merchants traveled ever-increasing distances, eventually reaching the ports of India and the Orient. Dynasties came and went, religious movements flourished and sputtered, but Egypt persisted.

In the 21^st century, the world has started to reap the benefits of mass production, heavier-than-air flight and the petroleum engine. Egypt, or Kemet as they like to call themselves, is still the greatest power, but is a first among equals. Still under the rule of the pharaohs, whose divine status is just paid lip service to, Kemet has long been the center of the western world. They do still have absolute power over Kemetite society, and while a privy council exists, it is made up of appointees and relatives of the pharaoh. While claiming their legacy, modern Kemet’s culture would be unrecognizable to Necho II or his predecessors. The pantheon has expanded to include the gods of the Greeks, the Arabians, the Indians and even those from the Orient and the Occident. The language has evolved to include words from places as far as the Nasca Empire. Kemet is now an empire based primarily on trade, both from foreign nations and from within its empire proper, and the Nile Delta is the site of the world’s busiest ports. Kemet is a very patriotic and proud nation, although one paranoid about its position as the dominant power. Therefore, its modern culture has become dominated by so-called Waiting War, the great game between the powers. The enemies of Kemet, foreign or domestic, are to be hunted down and arrested for spreading their corruption through the great kingdom, and the government has created several bureaus to deal with this problem.

Kemet has many allies around the world, befitting its status as a world power. Many of its allies are closely related as they were once Kemetite colonies, but they were granted independence due to the costs of maintaining those colonies being much higher than the revenue they generate.  But Kemet’s greatest and most equal ally is the Nasca Empire. The Nasca, a former Shau colony that gained its independence with the assistance of Kemet, dominates the continent that the Kemetites call Ikhekut. Like the Kemetites, the Nasca consider their absolute monarch divine, although they are quite a bit more serious about the emperor’s status as the “Son of Heaven.” Indeed, lèse-majesté is a capital offense, equated with heresy. 

Opposing the Two Thrones Alliance is the Rome-Luoyi Axis. Made up of two of the oldest empires on Earth, with only Kemet being older, these two governments are dominant in their own spheres but seek to topple Kemet from its position as the dominant civilization on Earth. This is the only cause that unites them: both the Latins and the Shau know that they would turn against each other should either of them have a chance at being number one. The Latin Republic is an interesting polity that the Kemetites have always called a not-kingdom: an absolute monarchy that fervently claims that it is not. The Latins call their leader the First Citizen, and while he rules and acts like any other autocrat, it is considered politically necessary for him to insist that he is merely the first among the equal people. However, if any Latin commoner were to treat the First Citizen as if he were just another man, he would quickly be crucified. The Shau take an opposite approach: the emperor is the Son of Heaven, and is also the wisest man in all of the land by the will of the gods. Of course, should the gods look upon the Emperor with disfavor, they will show this by bestowing great misfortune upon the Shau people, and this misfortune will only end if the Emperor and his dynasty are deposed. This gives the Shau emperors great incentive to demonstrate their wisdom.

Then there is the Zoroastrian League, acting as a fanatical third faction to the Waiting War. Although Zoroastrianism has existed for millennia, and the civilizations of the world considered it of no more import than the other religions running about, the destitution of the Middle East and India in recent centuries has led to its radicalization. The Persian Wars, which saw the rise of the new Persian Empire, was motivated by Zoroastrian extremists that now rule over Persia. Persepolis now calls for the entire world to submit to Zoroaster’s teachings, or else. This revolution similarly motivated the Vatasa, whose new regime quickly expelled or killed any non-Zoroastrians they could find and is seeking to expand their religious fundamentalism to the rest of the subcontinent.

Then there are the unaligned great powers, who want nothing to do with the Waiting War. The Wagadu are merely interested in maintaining their trade empire and keeping their former colonies within their sphere of influence, and their leaders have expressed their desire to be totally neutral in the event that the Waiting War becomes an actual war. Their business oligarchs, the true power behind the Wagadu throne, have already made plans to profit in case such a conflict happens. The similarly-minded and governed Austmen are also committed to neutrality, but their powerful military leaders do express an interest in expanding into Europe should Roman influence there wane.