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It was the year 638 AD

The sun beat on the Roman soldier below as they seperated their dead from the Mohammedeans.

Emperor Constantine Alexander I slouched in his saddle and surveyed the carnage below. He had to divert his troops from the conquest of the Sassanians to deal with the new threat and while the enemy had been killed to the last man. They were still out there.

The Imperator smiled as he considered his next move and made a note to send a prayer of thanks when he was alone.

The romans would triumph, for they had God on their side.

Later that night the Emperor detached some of his best men to scout out the far east of the Sassanian empire and beyond.

Tiberius Maxiumus paused to get his breath as he glanced back at the column of exhausted soldiers. It had been five years of constant running and scouting until the reached the borders of southren china and the ocean. And another three years to come home. He could see the sun glimmering on the Hagia Sophia and he smiled.

646 AD

The Imperator and his underlings listened intently as Tiberius told them of his units travels and discoveries.

"It will be another three years before the sassanians can fully recover, we did our work very well coming to back to meet the Arabs."

The emperor pointed to the map, the romans had taken every inch of arabia. "This will be a staging point, as well as the garrison troops we have over 80,000 men gathered in northren arabia for the invasion of the sassanians. And another 50,000 here in asia minor. We send our weakest force in first, which is by far stronger than most of the sassanians have at hand. While their occupied with an attack they're expecting. The troops in arabia will attack."

"But, I have another 70,000 men in egypt who will sail to southren persia and land there, they won't meet the other armies but will head directly north to break the persians backs. I will direct the 80,000 we have stationed in northren asia minor, they will move north across the steppes gathering what auxilaries they can and then strike the sassanians."

He turned to Tiberius, "And you will be going back to the eastern sea and leading the troops the chinese have place under your command."

In return for acsess to the sassanian elephant and horse breeding grounds and a large amount of gold (Half of which had been delievered by Tiberius' expedition and half of of which would be paid on completion of the conquest) the chinese had raised an army of 200,000 men to roman standards and placed it under Tiberius' command.

"Once the roman forces meet at the sassanian capital we will press on until we meet with the egyptian force. Their we will rest and then press on to meet with Tiberius."

The Emperor had simplified the army, Heavy Cavalry would be the dominant arm all the others would be subjegated to it and used as agressive heavy cavalry support. The Emperor had then made them into Marines. Able to fight on land and on and from the sea. He had just finished converting the whole of the roman infantry into Marines and re-arming and equipping them. New laws had been passed. Rape would be punished with death as would looting, conscription had been outlawed as well. If you wanted something from civilians you had to buy it. He'd made sure that the lower ranking officers had flexibility of decision as well as ordering a training college built in the city.

Now for the church and the noblility. The church itself simply needed to be re-ordered by the law and the more power-hungry leaders quietly removed. They would obey after all the emperor controlled the army.
Constantine sat down at his desk and began drafting and order, one that would strip the nobles of all political power and influence.

He frowned for a moment, and then drafted another that would outlaw eunuchs and the making of them.

The Persians fought with gallantry against the first 50,000 or the 1st Marine Force as they were known. But they fought in vain. The forces wheeled and clashed but finally they were surrounded by the roman troops and decimated before they finally surrendered.

On the sea the 2nd Marine Force landed on the shores of southren persia virtually unnopposed. The 70,000 Marines formed up and moved out in record time heading north.

King Khosrau IV bit back a curse as he read the news of the 70,000 marines that for all intents and purposes broken the back of his empire. He looked up to a messenger rush in. The boys clothes were torn and dusty, as well as covered in dried blood.

The King read the two messages and his heart sank.

80,000 Roman Marines from arabia and the only army between his capital and the first 50,000 was destroyed.

He called his subordinates togther and swiftly gave orders.

"Muster every man we can and have them ready to meet the first two roman assaults, have everyone who can't fight moved from the city. He turned to Suhavad his son. "You must muster every soldier you can find east of here and move to counter the 70,000, you have a way with words boy, turn the peoples hearts against them. If you can't fight them head on, fight them as guerillas. Now go."

The Emperor contemplated the reports, the nobles had been outraged and so had the church but they didn't move against him, he still had several thousand marines stationed all over the empire, an organized and disiplined unit of spies and his ace in the hole. Constantine had formed a unit of 10,000 men. Each of them had been trained as elite soldiers, as cataphracts they could fight with missile weapons, and on foot if need be. They had been trained to master every type of known warcraft including guerilla warfare.

He smiled as he read the report of his spies work on Heron of Alexandria's experiments, every one of them had been successfully duplicated and now they working on other applications. The Emperor had plans for the empire.

He took three of the 10,000 with him and walked down to his laboratories, here his spies and most talented men worked without ceasing on new inventions. They had accsess to every text relevant to their studies and every technological device known to mankind.

He turned to Basil the chief of the department and raised an eyebrow.

The skinny inventor coughed. "Augustus we have made great strides, there are several substances that we know that are actually lighter than air. One in particular- Well you should see for yourself."

Basil led Constantine and his men through the laboratory to a balconey and despite himself the emperor couldn't hide a smile.

Far below Basil's underlings worked over a small reed boat, the kind one might see every day on the Nile, except for the ropes attached to the ungangly cloth bag. The bag had been wrapped with more rope and hung above the boat on its own defying gravity.

The workers stepped back and lifted the weight from the reed boat, which lifted off the ground held only by a singled rope.

"Of course we still have no way to propel it and it can't carry anything much heavier than a child. But I've been working on that and I think eventually we could put something the size of a Dromon in the air." Said Basil.

"How high?" Constanine didn't take his eyes of the air-boat.

"As high as we could."

Suhvahad read the reports and swore softly, whoever commanded these romans was no fool. The people had nothing against them as long as they were left alone. And the romans moved like a storm. They had captured several elephants and were using them to increase the pace of their army. They had put several horses to each supply wagon and had several more solely for carrying troops. And there were 70,000 of them.

He'd barely managed to muster 18,000 men and they were spread out across the front. While he'd ordered his nobles to lend some of their horses for the purposes of speeding up their supplies and pulling troop wagons. They simply didn't have enough. His supply wagons varied in size and weight while the roman's were standardized. He tried to ignore the headached and the fact that his hairline had noticeably receded in the past few weeks.

He considered the map of the empire placed before him and tried to think like the roman commander. The few reports he'd found told him that the roman commander was young, very young, but his conduct was beyond reproach. Sahvahad felt a certain amount of respect for the Valentinian. The Sea Wolf as his troops called him. But why was he continuing north? The roman could have just moved west to roll up the sassanians and broken their backs just as easily. The roman position right now reminded him of a two sided anvil.

Sahvahad froze. He'd heard reports of some romans traveling through the countryside. If these 70,000 romans were an anvil then there had to be a hammer. He glanced at the eastern frontier of the sassanian empire and bit back a curse. He frantically dug through the piles of papers on his desks and scanned the old reports. Of course the roman travelers would have time and numbers to carry enough gold to raise an army, and time to train them into an army he wouldn't care to face.

He hurriedly gave orders for messengers to hurry to the east before the roman officers completely cut the empire in half. His brother had to know what was happening.

He ran hand through his hair and gave orders to gather his army. They had to attack now while the anvil was still soft.
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