[Tyrant]

Excuse me for sec, i need to light some incence to cover up the stench of Yomis DIPLOMACY FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE. ( spooky ghost noise )

There, much better. Now let me begin with a chronology of the actual events between Yomi and Ulm.



1) Yomi requested a peace pact. No mention of TC was made. I did not reply.

2) Several turns passed

3) TC attemped to recruit me into an alliance against Helhiem. I declined because i have a border pact with Helheim.

4) Yomi began massing armies on our border.

5) TC, not Yomi, asked me to stay out of an alleged war between him and Yomi.

6) I attacked Yomi and failed, slaying a pair of Dai Oni during the battle.

7) Yomi abandoned their capitol and surrendered all of their land to TC without a fight, put their entire force in a pile and suicided against me, slaughtering my forces prodigiously.

It's possible that there are a few widows somewhere in T'ien Chi, but as far i can tell neither Yomi nor TC lost more than a small handful of troops in this so-called war. Yomis' graph went down only because of me, and TC's never did. I had a half dozen scouts on the scene and they never once witnessed a battle between flagged forces. To put it nicely, Ushi Ushi was weak in the knees and his suicide was a sissy move.

As to TC's request that i keep out of their war, it was clearly a ploy. Was it was cover for an attack on me in alliance with Yomi, who was, i repeat, massing his troops on my border and not defending against TC. Or did he just want me to wait till he was done overrunning Yomi before he attacked me. (Sorta like how he wants you out of the way while he overruns me.) Check the map, he had no where else to go.

Having driven Yomi to suicide with whispers of despair, the silver tongued diplomats of T'ien Chi now attempt, with Rovian guile, to divert attention elswhere so they can press the advantage they have gained against my weakened kingdom without interfernece. They wave their hands, dance tap, refer vagely to graphs and spin peculiar prophecies about future events as they attempt to focus attention on Helhiem. But their performance omits a key point- they are not fighting Helheim, they are invading Ulm. They do not even share a border with Helheim yet. Indeed, if you succeed against Helheim they never will have.

Yes, Helheim has sent some raiders against TC in order to give me time to recover from my losess against TC's puppet. They have desecrated some temptes and scared off some flocks, but no more than that. We are greatful for the help, but these raids will not decide the war, my army's fate will.

Lord of Caelum, I appeal to you to reconsider your alliance with T'ien Chi.

Both Helheim and TC casually dismiss the idea that a fight between them over my territory will bog them both down, but you know what, that's exactly would happen. I ask you to let it happen. Let the heavily blessed TC Warriors, Demons of Heavenly Waters, and Pegasus riders fight with the heavily blessed Valkyries. I have no idea how powerful your forces are, but unless they are darn good it seems to me that you are getting the short end of the stick. You fight powerful Helheim while your ally gets to pick off yet another weakened nation and grab the spoils. How does this help you? Sit it out, build up, aviod losses, and let me try to bleed TC. You can always join in later.

For me it'simple, i'm going to defend myself. Unlike Yomi i'll fight for my castles. The Warriors of the Five Elements, with their spiffy blessings and fancy pants, are going to be spending a year digging ditches and complaining to the mess hall cook about beans to eat three meals a day. Like Yomi, we will very likely fall, unlike Yomi, we will fight with honor to the end.