Four years later, Alex's forces captured the entire Black Sea coastal cities after years of bloodshed, while his general made a rapid advance and captured the southern part of Anatolia including the capital.

Unfortunately, his victories wouldn't last as news of the collapse of his most important allies began to reach him.

Khorran his most important just collapsed into a multi-factional civil war due to the Avar clan prince Bayan I assassinating the current emperor Filian with the support of the Turkic Centaurs and then proclaimed himself Kagan of Avaria to appease the Stepp population of his empire this resulted in a massive opposition from half of the clan who viewed his usurpation as a transgression against the nature and the gods, the Shaman priests proclaimed his ex-communication, this didn't help as the human tribes or the Magyars rebelled against the rule of Bayan I.

Back to the Romans, hearing the news of his ally's collapse he immediately stopped his offensive on central Anatolia and wrote a letter to Samantha requesting a report of the frontlines.

Byzantium in the imperial palace in the year 422:

After returning from the Frontlines of Anatolia, Alex received a letter from his girlfriend and commander he was shocked. He handed the letter to his minister and told him to read it.

"Dear Emperor

Well, things were going well, we reached Jerusalem and completely conquered Semetia but the Persians right after their civil war, and the usurper Ardeshir Sasan who started the Sassanid Dynasty, he suddenly invaded our lands with the declaration that he came to help the republican rebels, I had nearly conquered all of Greater Syria but Sassanid troops pushed our forces back to Semetia and after a bloody battle, they were defeated and chose to stay in their occupied territory". The minister's hands were shaken, Alex was utterly livid and scared but remained confident and told everyone that he would figure out something.

He left the throne room in a hurry and went to his private room.

The Emperor's Room:

For the first time, Alex felt that he had no idea what to do as he had tried hard to keep the power that he acquired through the Divine Decree. He thought maybe dictatorship wasn't the right thing and that he should allow for democracy.

"What should I do? Democracy is already a dysfunctional system with a high chance that a corrupt retard may come to power through Elections but a dictatorship can produce Chaos maybe I was reckless, but the only way to face these problems is never to run away or to avoid confrontation for the sake of diplomacy and negotiation. I must respond to escalation with escalation, I will confront anyone who dares to mess with my power, even if there will be massive bloodshed and I will never negotiate".

Unfortunately for everyone, this declaration will be disastrous for the entire stability of the region.

Byzantine Imperial Palace, June to September 422:

There were no military activities, reported by the commander of the Byzantine armies of Africa and Egypt Samantha, and neither did the rebels.

The Emperor was still in his room, planning his next move. When he finally emerged, Constantine Valerious - son of General Flavius Valerius Constantius - made a joke, thinking the Emperor would suggest that war was the only solution to end the civil war once and for all.

The emperor laughed and told him that this is what he would do, and the moment Zagrios heard it, he went Nuts: "NOT AGAIN!" and kept complaining that the emperor's reckless warmongering and dictatorship was what led to this mess in the first place.

"Zagrios, I understand your opinion but I know in this case, negotiations mean weakness, and as a matter of fact, negotiations with enemies are always a weakness and defeat and I only negotiate on my terms".

Zagrios didn't like what he heard, so he went to look for advice from his father since his protege was stuck in an endless crisis and it didn't help that he kept escalating the situation even more.

The underworld:

Hades was watching the events on Earth with great interest; however, he started to think the confrontational diplomacy that the Eastern Roman Emperor was following would one day damage him.

"Goddamit Alex, you need to learn diplomacy and that negotiations aren't for the weak," Said Hades with some worry.

Zagrios agreed, he told his father everything and explained the dire situation of the Eastern Empire.

"Father, the Persians intervened in the civil war and annexed the remaining Republican lands, I think it best to avoid confrontation," Zagrios said with a scared tone.

His father laughed and said: "The emperor already decided to go to war and Kahn is lending him a hundred thousand troops, oh he is trying to mobilize hundreds of thousands of men for his war effort and I honestly like him".

Byzantium, autumn of 422:

Before the autumn season started, Alex invested a large sum of the Byzantine into recruiting two hundred thousand mercenaries, Kahn offered a hundred thousand Gallic Roman soldiers and he spent the entire summer preparing and mobilizing more men for his army until he got three hundred thousand troops due to Romans volunteering en masse after the Persian invasion to protect their nation and a hundred thousand Orcs and dragon knights and escaping trolls.

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Once mid-autumn started, seven hundred thousand troops were mobilized. The emperor was happy and ecstatic, he told his officials to deliver a declaration of war to the Persian Sassanid empire.

He also issued a decree stating that the troops have the freedom to plunder cities and kill anything that moves, he issued a war plan to his generals and told them that it must be followed, then he left for the frontlines.

the war in Anatolia, December 422 to June 423:

Unfortunately for both nations, the war that Alex decided to unleash would be very destructive as he decided to launch a multi-frontal attack in Anatolia he divided his forces into Army Group Anatolia under his command and Army Group Africa.

Massive bombardment started by the mage units and for the first time, Poison gas magic was used and unleashed on the air devastating the farmlands. The Persians and the collaborator's forces didn't expect the attack and were forced to retreat to avoid the poison gas, then Hordes of cavalrymen and infantry from multiple sides, the Persians decided to stand firm and defend their newly gained territory but the Byzantines decided to burn everything to the ground, there were fierce and bloody battles where each meter gained a hundred men lost per day.

Both sides exchanged gains and neither army was able to gain the upper hand on this front, disregarding the casualties of the war kept attacking the enemy forces and even intensified the use of poison magic which led to a lot of deaths.

Anatolia's population kept getting devastated not only by the civil war but by the war between the imperial regime of Alex and the Persian Sassanids, hundreds of thousands were killed and the remaining population fled in massive waves to Persia as refugees.

The emperor's forces kept advancing after the defeat of the Persians in the battle of Cappadocia and the massive destruction the city endured due to Byzantine bombardment, no prisoner of war was safe as Alex gifted them to his Orc and troll soldiers as food and then sent their heads to the Persian Shah.

Even the Gallic general Aetius Flavius who was sent as the commander of the Gallic allied forces, was utterly shocked at the scenes of destruction and the brutality of Kahn's friend. Meanwhile, the Persian army's commander Kavad in Anatolia was so enraged at the scene of the beheaded soldiers that he tried to attack Trebizond but an ambush by The Gallic army destroyed his entire forces with him barely escaping back to Persia ending the Sassanid rule in Anatolia

The war in Egypt and Greater Syria:

In Egypt, the war was harder due to Shapur's skills as a commander.

He lured Samantha to advance Sidon while she was unaware of the trap magic spell until she lost a lot of soldiers each time she kept advancing, and after weakening the Byzantine forces under her command.

The war in Syria has continued to escalate even further as Samantha's inability to score further victories against Shapur, forced her to resort to requesting the help of the Unhinged Emperor Alex who was glad to attack.

The Persian emperor who got the news of the massive losses of his forces decided to meet him in battle and see the guy who not only killed his soldiers but killed half of Anatolia's population.

After several hours, both armies met outside of Berytus, wasting no time. The Persian Shah sent his horse archers trying to do a flanking maneuver but Alex stopped it when he sent his Orcs to stop it and the orcs defeated the horse archers despite heavy losses. The Byzantine Emperor, learning the danger of the Persian Cavalry archers, decided to start advancing in line formation. The Persian Shah's hordes of troops started their attack as he aimed to end the battle in his favor.

Alex saw his advance and laughed at him: "Units and mages, prepare to fire at the enemy and Shapur, I hope you would like a certain surprise for you". The Byzantine and allied forces started to shoot enemy forces with fire spells and arrows, killing many advancing soldiers while the Persians did the same and killed several Byzantine mages.

What Shapur didn't expect happened as Samantha decided to attack from behind his forces, both sides clashed in a bloody clash that was a stalemate, and even when pincered by two Byzantine forces, the Sassanid forces fought ferociously and even successfully broke the pincer as the Byzantine forces couldn't maintain the encirclement due to massive casualties and despite regaining the momentum, Shapur decided to abandon the Syrian campaign and retreat to his capital.

"I want the head of our enemy". Alex ordered, his army started a pursuit and his dragon units started air bombardment trying to burn him from the air.

The organized retreat turned to a chaotic one as the Sassanid soldiers were slaughtered, and only twenty thousand troops including Shapur the Shah of the Sassanid empire barely survived and escaped to Persia which forced the dragons to stop the pursuit.

The destructive civil war that started as a rebellion of the Republican movement against Alex’s dictatorial rule and progressed to destruction and extreme brutality and finally a Persian Sassanid invasion finally ended in a Byzantine victory with Emperor Alex successfully keeping his power and rule despite the massive bloodshed and destruction.

The consequences of the civil war in Byzantium had a devastating effect, thousands were killed and cities were destroyed beyond repair.

Farmlands in Anatolia were destroyed which led to a near collapse of the Byzantine economy as most farmers were dead, and the once thriving cities in Anatolia were reduced to ghost towns and rubles, the surviving population started to suffer from multiple epidemics.

Byzantium:

In the palace, the government started an emergency session to discuss what to do with the former rebel lands and select a new governor of Egypt after the former governor lost his life in battle.

One of the ministers said: "My emperor I came here to report that epidemic and starvation are spreading in Anatolia and Syria and the Anatolian lands are now no more and it has become a hellish nightmare and we will face a crisis called mass unemployment as we need to demobilize our troops now that the civil war and the Byzantine Sassanid war is won by us".

The emperor was listening to all the ideas of his ministers and one of them started bringing settlers from the Divided Italy and Gaul to replace the lost population and give them the means to repopulate Anatolia.

The Emperor informed everyone of his decision:" Now that we are in urgent need of recovering our economy and strength as we can expect even more trouble will visit us, so I decide this and write it down and pass it toward the rest of the governors:

-The Ministry of War will be tasked with managing the rebuilding operations of Anatolia, every mobilized troop will be employed as a builder and a farmer, and as a reward, they will be granted the lands they farm and the homes they build.

-All mages of the empire will be dispatched to remove the remaining poison magic that is still damaging the Anatolian lands.

-To stimulate the economy, Alex announces that he shall establish the ministry of industry and will unite all scattered artifact manufacturing facilities into industrial complexes.

He instructed everyone to do as he said and ensure that the rebuilding process ends very quickly because the nation is severely weakened by war.