While the European Elites were partying away along the Nile river skirmishes were taking place fueled by industrializing countries the skirmishes would often times end up being a bloody affair.

Along the blue Nile Byzantines also began increasing their military presence in the area recently thanks to many German inventions such as quinine for malaria, penicillin for regular diseases and paddle steamers invented by a French immigrant for the German company called  Tirpitz-Schiffe (Tirpitz marine vessels). However the Aksumite empire countered this by building up its own presence in the region using the Nile to import many German weapons and Items until they either copied them or made their own version.

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On a paddle boat going down the blue Nile river at night

"Oh boy I can't wait until this expedition is over. What do you think is even the point of all of this is?" A byzantine soldier said wearing the uniform of the Wehrmacht based off that of the Afrika Korps.

"I don't know but what I do is that there is a large paycheck coming to me when this is over."

"What will you do with the money?"

"I don't know buy a house, visit Germany, get a girl, I don't know the possibilities are endless"

"I don't know about you two but my children will be fat!" A third chimes in happily

You have children?" The second byzantine 

"Minas you should know that your their godfather!"

Minas laughed as did the third

"I am just kidding Pericles!"

Pericles was a much larger man than Minas so he grabbed him in a head lock and in a brotherly fashion ruffled his hair with his fist.

"Hey you asshole cut it out!" Minas cried out

The first soldier was also laughing then noticed a German officer walking around behind him

"Guys you should stop before an officer sees you." he says quietly to warn them

"Bah Vasilios you're no fun."

"But he is correct." A German officer said in fluent Greek from behind them "Keep your voices down we are about to enter hostile waters and I will not reprimand you this time but there better not be a next time."

The soldiers saluted the officers but stayed silent

the officer walked back to the bridge of the ship where he talked to the captain of the ship 

"Captain how much longer until we reach or drop off point?" 

"Just two more days, and no need for formalities Gustav we are the same rank."

"Captain I see it as a sign of respect to be formal so if you don't mind."

the captain sighed and reached for a bottle of whiskey

"Always with that stick up your ass whatever you say Major Blucher." the captain smiled as he drank some whiskey

"Anyways captain how do---" Blucher was interrupted

"Blucher my name is Maximilian Schwerin if you want to call me Max that is fine and I don't know why you ground trotters are so strict with discipline even with people who are the same rank but since you are in my ship I order you to say my name."

"Very well Max."

"See that wasn't to bad now was it Blucher?" Max asked before handing him a glass of whiskey which was declined by Blucher

'Thank god he didn't take it this shit is expensive.' Max thought to himself

*Plop plop* the two officers looked up to see it was raining and heavily so at first they just shrugged then

*Bang* *Bang* *Bang*

Gunshots were heard and seen from either side of the river

"Blucher get your troops to battle positions"

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"Minas do you think we won't get to fi---"

*Bang**Bang**Bang* the shots heard immediately silenced Pericles original thought

"MEN get to battle positions!!!" Blucher could be heard screaming loudly

soldiers were woken up and were rapidly deployed across the boat to try and fight back because of the muzzle flash we were kind of able to see them.

"You three are cannoneers right." a German naval officer asked although not really asking

it took me a second to realize that we actually were. "Yes sir!" 

"than get to your stations dumbasses!!" He yelled at us

Pericles and Minas came to one of the three cannons on the boat loaded it with Greek fire bombs and hurled them to wherever we thought the enemy was at. We tried to make sure no water got in the barrel or the munitions which was hard as the was pouring so heavily it felt like we were at the bottom of a waterfall.

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The king of Aksum is a twelve year old boy named Isaiah Selassie and despite his age was seen as one of the most intelligent people in the world especially by those within his kingdom which he had carved out himself with the Amhara people as its core He controlled modern day Ethiopia, Somalia but he was very off put by the fact that the Byzantines had come this far down into Sudan as he had heard they had fallen to the Ottomans.

He had sent a small contingent of soldiers led by his general Esra Mamo Selam to stop any byzantine reinforcements from making it to fort Konstantinos where a large byzantine force was being besieged.

Despite his knowledge he was unable to make his own fire arms so he resorted to buying the German copy of the Ottoman rifle which was produced en masse and dirt cheap so he would capture slaves from his conquest to whoever would buy them and then use the money to buy German made weapons. and with the help of some private European businesses he began industrializing his empire.

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The sun rose over the river were the Byzantines and Aksumites were still fighting viciously but and it was no longer raining. Because of the heat the Aksumites retreated but not after another few hours of fighting under the blazing sun which caused many on both sides to go down from heat stroke and from as vicious as the fighting was the sun and heat proved to be even more. the Byzantines supplied by the Germans were able to recover their forces quickly from heat stroke but the Aksumites not so much.

The boat arrived at the fort as planned only a couple days after the battle only to find the fort full of dead Byzantines and Aksumites.

"Well Gustav I'd say that if we attack them we'd win." Captain Schwerin said

"The price would be too great and we don't have enough equipment for a siege."

"The cost doesn't matter these men are Greek, so get that stick out your ass!" he got progressively louder the more he spoke

"I would rather have a stick up my ass than a dick like you do!"

"launch the attack or we will weigh anchor here." He lowered his tone launching his ultimatum

"Fine." Blucher finally conceded 

Troops were being quickly unloaded with all the army equipment Blucher came down with them to oversee the troops who he had grown very fond of. Once every thing was in place Blucher led the troops from the front bombarding the insides of the walls with Greek fire exhausting every last round they had left in the first half of the battle. The result of the battle was a slaughter of the Aksumite forces and the destruction of the fort.

Noticing something out the corner of his eye Blucher turned around to see the steam boat paddling away.

"HEY HEY HEY" He yelled out as the steam boat started speeding up

With the battle over many of the Byzantine soldiers started yelling out in a vain attempt to get it to turn back but as it started fading around

Blucher's second in command Stamatis walked up to him "What now?" the man asked

"We'll head back marching along the Nile hopefully our rations last long enough."

The man saluted "Yes sir."