Qua-Toyne, capital.
"Gloria Patri, et Fili, et Spiritui Sancto.
Sicut erat in principio, et nunc et semper,
et in saeccula saeculorum,
amen." An Argentinean Catholic priest was giving mass in a chapel to a group of demi-humans, the smell of incense filled the place and on the altar there was a wooden cross with an image of the crucified Christ. Although the priest spoke Latin, everyone could easily understand him.
"Amen" was repeated by those present.
"Next week there will be new baptisms." The priest reminded them with a smile, although in Argentina the number of believers was beginning to drop alarmingly the rest of the world was a breeding ground for the Christian faith, even in Qua-Toyne Christianity was becoming popular despite the worship of the goddess Astarte.
However it was not easy for the Argentinean Catholic Church to find a way to preach their faith, after all things like magic existed in this world and the enormous fertility of the land in Qua-Toyne was a reality and was associated to the goddess, so they simply could not convince the natives that the goddess did not exist, luckily they found the answer, a solution that was used to convert the American continent before: syncretism.
The first challenge was to find a saint who shares characteristics with the goddess of the natives, first thought San Isidro the labrador for its connection with agriculture but could not take the place of the goddess for obvious reasons. However they soon found the answer in the Virgin Mary, not the European version but in the version syncretized with the Pachamama of the Aimaras, a minority existing in the country.
There was no way that Christianity could prosper in this world if it prohibited magic, so theologians began to "reinterpret" the sacred scriptures and to affirm that God was referring to the dark magic obtained by pacts with demons or through human sacrifices or curses.
From this froma, when missionaries set sail to the new world to evangelize, they obtained a great success by being accepted willingly and without colliding directly with the core ideas of the new civilizations, A success that could not be replicated by the Protestants who denied the divine character of the virgin Mary and the other saints, who also lost a large number of followers in Argentina and it was not long before they fell into irrelevance to the point that they would become considered sects in the future.
Of course, this expansion of the Catholic church was not only because they wanted to save the natives. The crisis of faith meant no more tithing, donations or state funding, so this was a desperate move by the church to get new believers to fund the institution.
They went to President Cristobal to allow them to leave and to offer help using the excuse of providing humanitarian aid in the poorest regions and as a way to increase the opinion of the natives with the country.
Despite being an atheist, the president agreed to help them, if the church initiative was successful then it would mean that Argentina's influence in the region would be greater, and if they failed then all state funding would be cut off.
Despite the plan of syncretism, even the church was surprised that they had so much acceptance in Quila and Qua-Toyne and very little if any resistance. The reason for this was several, but the most important were two; the first is that the Argentines were seen as heroes by both countries and the second because they considered that there was no way that a nation without magic could reach so far without divine intervention, So they were naturally more open about what the Argentine preachers had to say, this added to the surprise that the Argentines had their own "gods/saints" caused the faith to expand quickly.
In the Louria kingdom it was a much slower expansion, due to the war and resentment that some had with the Argentines, however no one dared to pursue that religion for fear of reprisals, With the passage of time, Catholicism was able to strengthen itself in Louria without many problems.
In Louria and Qua-Toyne the missionaries concentrated mostly in the big cities, however in Quila, seeing the difficult living conditions, they began to create Misiones; self-sustaining communities with a preacher as their head and who taught the natives to cultivate using modern techniques, building channels and teaching to read and write. These misiones penetrated the territory of the kingdom far beyond what YPF and YCF ventured. These autonomous communities founded by missionaries were autonomas of the kingdom of Quila and responded to Argentina, so it could be said that they were colonies in all rule.
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Le Brias, capital of the Altaras kingdom.
In the fields around the summer palace, gunpowder gunfire was beginning to be heard, the Altaran soldiers were practicing with a new weapon.
"These new muskets are amazing!" Captain Ryal was amazed by the effective range of 225 meters and with a maximum distance of 675m.
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"That's not a musket, Mr. Rylan, that's the Monique 7-93 rifle, the Leiforian army's muzzle-loading rifle before the Heckler." Replied an officer in Leiforian uniform.
"We thank you for helping us in this time of war, with this we will be able to repel the Parlpadians if they decide to invade us!" Leiforia had donated about 20,000 Monique rifles for Altarus to continue the fight and weaken Parlpadia.
Soon the Leiforian ship would set sail to make a stop in the kingdom of Fenn and drop off a few thousand weapons, after that it would continue its course to the Topa kingdom where about 600 volunteers would help in the fight against the demon lord.
Watching the target practice were also King Taara and Ambassador Frank, Taara looked very relieved.
"When Mu withdrew his support for us I really started to worry, but with this new equipment we will be able to resist." Said the king.
"Your majesty, we cannot win a war of attrition, how are the negotiations with Fenn going?" asked the new British ambassador.
"Fenn has already accepted our proposal, they will be our stepping stone to Philiades, how is the submarine coming along?"
"It is patrolling the city of Duro, we are identifying where the coastal fortifications are and where would be a good place to land."
"I think we could use-" The king's words were interrupted as an alarm began to sound, an alarm coming from the dock. "What's going on?!"
"Your majesty!" A soldier who had received the news by magical communicator was appearing before the king. "Krakens! They are attacking our fleet!"
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Riding quickly to the docks, they watched as tentacles surrounded four of their ships, beginning to tear apart the wood.
"Fire! fire!" ordered the captains, the few cannons of their frigates and their guns were not enough to stop the sea monsters.
"Abandon ship!" Ordered one of the captains as he watched his ship begin to break in half due to the force of the tenaculos, the sound of the wood cracking and the water flooding the interior made it clear that continuing to protect the ship was a lost cause.
The same happened with the other three ships... however the krakens soon changed their target to four other ships, which also could not do much to avoid being destroyed or seriously damaged.
"Shit! This doesn't make sense! Krakens are very territorial, they would never attack in a group!" The king was shocked and terrified at what his eyes were seeing.
Already having sunk 10 ships and severely damaged four others, the wyvern knights arrived on the scene, beginning to hurl blasts and fireballs at the tentacles of the krakens, some lashing out to rip and tear chunks of flesh with their claws and teeth.
Cries of pain from the sea beasts forced those present to cover their ears, the loud screams caused one of the wyvens to be stunned, causing one of the tentacles to crush him with force against the surface of the sea, killing the wyvern and his rider in the act.
However the pressure of the Wyvern knights caused the Krakens to decide to return to the bottom of the sea.
The following hours were spent saving the sailors at sea and burying the fallen. King Taara was pale, shattered to see a significant part of his fleet destroyed.
"Why did this have to happen to us?..." the monarch said in a shaky voice.
For his part, Frank was also stunned, this spoiling the entire plan of attacking Duro and moving on the offensive as well as significantly reducing the Altarian capabilities of defending themselves.
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Esthirant, Parlpadian Empire.
In the imperial council chamber, laughter was heard from all those present as they heard the report. All were celebrating uncovering champange, leaving aside their labels as nobility.
"The project of the deep was a success!" Emperor Ludius raised his glass in a toast.
"For the glory of the Parlpadian Empire!" Arde joined the toast and soon everyone followed him, the ability to control sea monsters was an important victory after so many humiliations.
"Those Altarian idiots believed that we would not know of their plan to ally with Fenn, our intelligence boreu did well to take a look at Fenn, now we know that they have rebelled against their suberano by accepting the proposal of the fool of Taara." Rius said laughing and drinking.
"My faithful subdistricts." The emperor began to speak, causing everyone to pay attention. " Our great nation has passed through difficult times lately, to say truth was beginning to believe that the gods had turned their backs on us... But now we know that this is not so! We are the most powerful empire of the third civilization and the third world power! This victory is proof of our greatness and our potential to reach Mu and Mirishial!"
"Long live the Empire!" they all said in unison.
"Our enemies said we were a decaying empire, that we were a giant with feet of mud that would fall by its own weight, we showed them they were wrong! we continue to advance and we will trample on the one who gets in our way!"
The emperor's speech to his council was having the desired effect of encouraging everyone and filling his spirit with patriotism.
"Altarus, Argentina, Falklands, Fenn, Leiforia... they will all be crushed! its resources will be ours and its people will be slaves who feed the Parlpadian war machine! The traitors of Fenn will be the perfect example before the world! I want a flotilla to go and destroy them!"
"So shall his majesty!" Arde nods a military salute. "The capital of Fenn will be only ruins, we can leave within a month."
"Perfect, and I want the krakens to sink every merchant ship bound for Altarus, staging the boats of you-know-who."
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Nishinomiyako, Fenn Kingdom.
"This... is beautiful!" said one of the history school students who had traveled illegally to Fenn. He was amazed to see the architecture and oriental clothing.
"Of course you'll like it, you filthy otaku, you always said you wanted to know Japan." one of his companions said.
"But... all I see are ordinary humans as in Jin-Hark..."
"Disappointed they don't have cat girls? , I'm sorry but reality doesn't care about your fetishes" he said teasing him and laughing slightly.
"But it doesn't make sense! The rest of the world is like an isekai anime but right where there is supposed to be a Japanese version of this world there are only normal people!"
"Well, if you were to pay attention in class instead of jerking off with everything that comes out of Japan then would you know that it's normal, how much do you bet that this version of the Japanese wiped out demi-humans on the island?"
"Eh?! Why do you think they did that?!"
"That's what they did to the Ainu, taking them further north into poverty. You must stop idealizing cultures and paying attention to classes or you will fail yoyr tests again."
"What are you doing there?! The inn is here!" The teacher called them to not separate from the group.