A/N: Hello again, I decided I couldn't quite wait to put this one out, so here's chapter 2 for all of you. Chapter 3 will probably come sometime next week, and if it's delayed past that it will be because I ended up getting caught up with writing ISoaN again (as writing chapter 1 and 2 of this has indeed gotten me past my writers block, so hopefully that will be out sometime next week too)

As it is, I'm grateful for the support already! 18 Followers on day one I'd say is a pretty solid day. Thank you to everyone who left a review. I'm glad you all enjoyed this (and that I'm not accidentally ripping anyone else off here.) And yes, I am a fan of Space Battleship Yamato, for those of you who don't know that series, and want a mental picture of ships like the Harima Class Battleships, then look up that series. Generally the biggest difference between ships in this setting and the ones in SBY is that here the ships are mirrored around the red part of the Yamato, and thus have a full gun deck on the bottom instead of just the upper deck (also no wave motion cannon.) Also I'm considering making inter-chapters that are just long Codex entries or a series of them, because honestly, I had to cut back the codex at the end of this chapter because it was getting way to big. (Comes with being an engineer and historian I think)

Admiral Makoto was not in a good mood. The woman was pacing her command bridge as the haze of faster than light travel breezed over all their sensors. The blindness of sensors during FTL was one of it's most concerning parts to the military commander, and she'd have been worried enough if that was all there was to fear out there.

Instead though, she had to prepare herself to battle aliens. Aliens. Aliens. No matter how she said it it still sounded impossible to her ears. Unfortunately, no matter how impossible every modicum of her reason insisted it was, that did nothing to change reality. The last message she received from Tsuyoshi she was going to be facing quite a large number of them.

"Sixty enemy contacts coming through the relay. We will hold the line."

That had been received by her flagship, the Harima, just before they entered into FTL for Shanxi. That had only been half an hour ago, and they were just minutes away from transition back into real space. They would have been here earlier, but each relay that connected to Shanxi dropped off at a different point. The relay they had transitioned through had been a bit out of the way, but put her closer to the planet and with adequate distance from the primary relay.

"Transition complete in two minutes ma'am." Said one of the many people aboard her bridge and she sighed. No more time for worrying. With her battleship, along with the two other Harima class ships Tamba and Aki leading the transitioning fleet, and her carriers Tate and Minami at the rear it was a rather classical formation by space combat standards.

Mentally she began to count down as she went over everything she knew. They needed to avoid the front of the enemy vessels as much as they could. The alien vessels used entirely bow armaments and those weapons packed enough punch to take down a destroyer in one hit despite its compartmentalization.

Standard practice would be to engage the enemy at long range to give more maneuvering time, but as it was according to Tsuyoshi's report the alien's cannons had much better velocity than their own. So instead they'd need to try to close the distance faster than the enemy could track them if they wanted to get into effective range.

Three, two, one

With an audible snap they came out of FTL and Makoto was already scanning the battlemap ahead of her as the scanners lit up the battlefield. The sight made her scowl. Ahead of her Tsuyoshi's flagship, along with one of his heavy cruisers, a light cruiser, and three destroyers were still engaging the enemy force. The wreckage of the rest of the Vice Admiral's fleet was drifting alongside the corpse of Shanxi's space station. They hadn't gone down without a fight though, and four enemy vessels drifted languidly through space while another two burned as they leaked atmosphere.

Unfortunately that still left more than fifty enemy vessels, including one that dwarfed even the Harima class battleship, engaging the flagging remains of the twelfth fleet. Even worse, the battlemap showed multiple ships dropping out at the relay as well.

Immediately her hand went for the comms and she broadcasted. "Tsuyoshi, withdraw toward our positions. You have enemy reinforcements on the way. We will cover you till you link up."

The holographic projection that came back flickered in and out, and it was rather obvious the Dewa must have suffered heavy damage by this point to cause it. Despite that he was doing his best to keep a calm tone. "Of course Admiral. We'll change course now. Watch the large one, it's cannons hit hard."

Makoto nodded to the projection and sent orders for the rest of the fleet to form into battle formation and a moment later gave the order to fire. While Tsuyoshi's fleet had been able to put out an impressive number of rounds, the vessels of Makoto's seventh fleet put that to shame. The volley of tonnage they sent down range was enough to ensure hits even at this distance, and the alien fleet turned its guns from Tsuyoshi's limping vessels and toward the new arrivals.

The first shells impacted against the seventh fleet's shields shortly after that. Makoto gripping onto a nearby railing as the Harima shook from an impact against its shields. The seventh fleet's own shells hit shortly thereafter. The broadside from the Aki, moving at 40,000 meters per second, digging into an enemy cruiser's shields. The barriers collapsed and a single round punched through the light armour of the enemy vessel, setting off the warhead's fuze. Two unlucky aliens happened to be in the direct path of the shell and promptly ceased to exist, before unknown to the gunners on the Aki, the round punched into the enemy's drive core just as the fuse counted down to zero.

The Aki's gunners cheered as they saw the cruiser go up in a bright blue explosion and turned their guns to the next target.

Meanwhile, on the alien battleship lined its own guns up with the Tamba, and the half dozen bow mounted weapons launched through space at one point three percent the speed of light. Crossing the distance in effectively an instant. The shells slamming into the Tamba's shields, and all four layers collapsed near instantly while only stopping two of the enemy shells. The Tamba's armour dented as a third shell failed to penetrate, and the fourth and fifth rounds punched clean holes in the hull. Unlike with the IJN vessels though, the alien rounds were pure tungsten, and passed through the ship with minimal damage as blast doors shut and internal shield generators stopped the vessel from decompressing. A moment later the Tamba's shields were back online, saving it from a follow up barrage by an enemy cruiser.

Even as the fleets began trading fire, the two carriers released their own weapons. Dozens of small combat craft taking off from their bays and winging around the fleets. Flying around the veritable wall of tungsten and explosives the craft activated internal mass effect engines and took off in an instant. Crossing the void at nearly the same speed as the seventh fleet's shells. Small guns on the enemy vessels meant for shooting down missiles came to life to try to swat the small craft from the sky. Even with the ability to start and stop on a dime, the bombers suffered heavily trying to pass through the point defense screen, and for every five only one would manage to launch its payload of a single 'torpedo.' The human natives had long since decided that long range missile bombardment was a lost cause in space, and had resorted to trying to get said missiles as close as possible before firing. With minimal guidance, and a significant amount of armour as well as explosives, torpedoes mounted on the small combat craft had become the delivery method of choice.

Many of those torpedoes detonated against enemy shields, but others would slip through, breaking through multiple decks before grinding to a halt. The aliens that saw such torpedos only getting a moment to pray to their makers before they'd detonate, and either take the ship, or a significant part of it, with it.

By the time the bombers, now numbering only maybe 35% of their initial number, escaped the enemy's point defense range and returned to their carriers. The alien fleet had lost another dozen ships. The twelfth fleet was down an equal number of destroyers, five light cruisers, and two heavy cruisers. The Tamba had taken another two penetrating hits but was still in operational shape, and the Aki had to resort to using its secondary bridge after the primary one was knocked out.

Still, it was enough time for Tsuyoshi's ships to reach the fleet, and Makoto opened her comms again to say. "All ships, enter FTL, we're withdrawing to the second planet in the system." She could only hope the aliens didn't decide to pursue them. They seemed quite intent at Shanxi, and had blocked off the relay so the Twelfth/Seventh Fleet couldn't escape the system, but they could certainly keep away until further reinforcements could arrive.

-WoE-

Primarch Opso Bromraka was torn between a smile and a frown at the alien's retreat. A smile that he had sent what seemed to be the primary force of the aliens running, and a frown at the casualties he had suffered. Along with the knowledge that evidently this species had colonies out there that would need to be subjugated. Unfortunate, but nothing his fleet couldn't handle, especially now that his patrol groups were flooding back to replace his losses.

The turian had been surprised when one of his scout fleets had reported the activation of the 314 relay, and he had congratulated them for their quick thinking in coming to him first instead of the council. All he had to do now was defeat these aliens and subjugate them into the Hierarchy and he'd be a hero for the rest of his life back on Palaven.

He had been surprised as well when that same scout fleet had been annihilated in minutes by these aliens when they had come out of the relay. He had been hoping they would make a beachhead for his primary fleet and he'd be able to drive straight to the aliens homeworld and send in his marines. Instead he found himself in a forgone naval action. The alien fleet had fought valiantly he would admit, but even with the reinforcements they knew they couldn't face his fleet.

Maybe they'd make good warriors to join the Hierarchy's ranks after they had been integrated. The volus had their uses, but war was not one of them. Turning his attention back to the now undefended planet he'd pull up the scans of the surface they had taken. The largest city of possibly two billion people on the planet was nestled into a mountain range. It was a sound decision by whatever ancient designers had decided on the location. Ground assault against it would be difficult to say the least. He had the ability to deploy troops by the air though, and even as he watched he could see the hundreds of shuttles from the newly arriving boarding carriers winging their way down to the surface.

Unfortunately for Admiral Bromraka, the surprises just weren't going to stop today.

-WoE-

Shanxi Surface

Even as raid sirens range throughout the streets of New Yuncheng, a great grinding noise drowned out nearly everything as three of the nearby mountains seemed to move. It wasn't actually true. The mountains weren't moving. The tips of the mountains though were shifting, ice and snow breaking off as great openings were opened in their surface. Before the grinding stopped, only for three booms that shattered glass throughout the city to blast through the valley. Great beams of 'light' arced into the sky toward the orbiting aliens, and the sky went red for a moment as one of them exploded.

-WoE-

"What in the spirits was that!" Bromraka shouted as the cruiser Imperii exploded and two other shells impacted amongst his fleet.

"Sir, the enemy appears to have large anti-orbital cannons built into the mountains here, here and here." His command VI said, lighting up the locations of the shells that even now were flying toward his fleet once again. Forewarned the vessels were able to dodge the immense projectiles and watched them explode harmlessly a few thousand kilometers past.

Bromraka was concerned that a species would go this far in the name of planetary defense. The volus hadn't had any weapons on their homeworld when the Turians had arrived, these aliens must have been incredibly paranoid.

"Begin returning fire on those installations, I want them out of action before the shuttles can land." Bromraka ordered calmly, having schooled himself back into stoicism. Watching as his fleet followed his orders and shells burned through the atmosphere. The shots impacted against what must have been a truly massive shield generator, or a collection of smaller ones, and it took another wave of bombardment to bring down one of the planetary defense center's shields. Shells burying their way through the mountain rock like it wasn't even there shortly thereafter until the gun went silent.

The process was repeated again for the other two installations, and Bromraka silenced them without another casualty on his side. The destroyer Centra was going to be in dire need of repairs though.

-WoE-

The evacuation sirens still rang across the streets of New Yuncheng long after the civilians had evacuated to great underground bunkers or scattered to the wilds outside the city. The only people still above ground in the capital was the IJA and CCPSA garrison. Holding in preplanned strong points all throughout the city they waited, remembering their training. That training had been against an invasion by another human power, not aliens, but it was all they had.

As the alien shuttles came in through the atmosphere, they'd be met with anti air fire from flak and cannon batteries throughout the city. The venerable flak shell had survived the introduction of mass effect technology more or less intact, only with stronger explosive filler and shell materials changing. The heavy shells fired out into the stratosphere and detonated among the falling shuttles. Small shards of metal impacting against shields and sometimes slipping past to bury themselves in the hulls of the landers themselves. Against other humans the rounds would have been devastating. Against the aliens, with their advanced kinetic barriers, it was only marginally more effective than throwing stones. For the hundreds, or maybe thousands of shuttles that were coming their way, only a small handful dropped from the sky in flames.

The automatic cannon fire that started to cut through the air as the aliens came closer to the surface would be marginally more effective, but it still was nowhere near enough. Missiles and mass driver rounds flared out of the shuttles and tore apart anti-air batteries. Explosions blossomed through the city as the aliens made landing zones for their troops.

Private Ren Kobayashi watched from the building he was holding up in as the battery in the nearby park was blown to pieces. Clutching his Type 48 rifle the private couldn't believe that this was happening. Aliens, aliens were invading Shanxi! He wasn't from this blasted planet! He was from New Okinawa! As Shanxi was a Chinese Co-Prosperity Sphere world it was effectively a Japanese planet, and the primary combat garrison was drawn from other Japanese world's. The CCPS garrison only trusted with basic policing duties. In this case though the man beside him at the window was a chinese. The policeman holding a near ancient Type 22 rifle.

He had spent years in training, and wargames. Pirate raids and border skirmishing. Never though had he ever seen an invasion like this. He had never even thought that he'd be involved in an invasion like this. He prayed to the emperor and any god that listened that he'd make it home alive. That he wouldn't die to an unknown enemy.

The alien shuttles were landing now, and Ren peaked up over the slit of the window. Watching armoured aliens file out of the landers. His grip on his rifle got tighter.

"Stand and fire!" Came the shouted order from his officer over the comms. Ren lifted the Type 48 to his shoulder and felt it kick against him as it barked. The 7.72mm rounds, propelled first by gunpowder, before being picked up by mass effect enhanced rails and propelled even faster, soared through the air. The armoured figures shimmered, revealing personal shield generators. Ren felt a moment of fear at that, personal shield generators were well beyond any human nation's capacity to develop in large enough numbers to equip assault troops with them. Some special forces might see them but even that was rare. Even armour was beyond most human soldiers, with troops wearing little more than a uniform and a helmet. The weight of dozens of rifles doing their work bringing down the shields and the aliens behind them. The first aliens to step off the shuttles collapsing into heaps until another door opened on the shuttle to reveal what could only be the alien equivalent of a heavy machinegun.

The weapon chattered with a rate of fire that put even the Germans machine guns to shame and the buildings around the landing site were peppered with a hail of bullets. Ren throwing himself away from the window and watching as the CCPS police man fell as rounds punched through the walls of the building and the soldier. Ren scampering to the stairwell to retreat down to the ground floor as the walls half felt like they were exploding. Bullets hitting all around him as he found his journey accompanied by others.

The lieutenant in charge of his platoon was there with them, ordering them to fall back toward second line defenses before a rocket of some kind flew in through the window and reduced the man to a red mist. The rest of the platoon spurred to follow his last order even more. Once they were clear of the building they saw a sight that rallied their flagged spirit, a squadron of Chi-Ri 53s rolling down the street toward the shuttles. The enemy's machine guns sparking harmlessly off their armour as the tanks cannons roared their counter. One of the shuttles exploded a few feet off the air and crashed back to earth as the cannon hit it and the machine guns mounted on the roof of the Chi-Ri's fired into the milling alien infantry.

Behind the tanks came another company, and Ren and his platoon found themselves pulled into the larger force and turned back toward the aliens. Falling in behind the advancing tanks they fired their rifles on the move in an attempt to keep the offloaded aliens suppressed. Unfortunately they weren't the only ones getting reinforcements, as aliens began pouring in from a street on the far side of the quad. Including a single seemingly light looking armoured vehicle with a long barreled cannon on its back.

The Chi-Ri turned their attention onto the enemy tank, but their turrets turned too slowly, and the enemy vehicle fired. A small, bullet sized shell shot forward and impacted the lead Chi-Ri. The round going in the front and out the back with enough force to trail a cloud of blood behind it as the crew were pulled out through the exit hole. The other two IJA tank's cannon's barked. The enemy tank weathered both hits, and fired back again, taking out a second Chi-Ri. The third shell from the Japanese tanks finally took the enemy vehicle down. The 105mm round punching through its shields and blowing off the front off the alien tank.

Unfortunately in the chaos caused by the alien tanks arrival, the alien infantry had managed to rally. A moment later a trio of rockets slammed into the remaining Chi-Ri and blew it to pieces. The infantry behind the three tanks, having stood stunned as their behemoths were taken out in less than a minute, dove into cover among the wreckage.

Ren watched as one enterprising man though lept on one of the gutted tanks, and jumped inside it. The aliens didn't hit the vehicle as it didn't start firing again. A decision they'd regret later.

For now the aliens had the upper hand, and were beginning to advanced toward the pinned down IJA troops. Return fire from the humans was sporadic at best as any that popped their heads up were mowed down in a hail of fire. They took their advance slowly, carefully. There was no need to risk more casualties now.

Unfortunately that was when the man who had gotten into the Chi-Ri kicked open the back hatch. The major who had been hiding behind the vehicle nearly going to reprimand the private when the man mentioned the tank's engine and shield generator were still operating.

The major caught on quickly, and shouted to the surrounding men to form up behind the tank once more as the private ducked back inside. Most human tanks these days had what was known as a 'bunker' mode. Generally designed for when the tank was on the defensive. Instead of an all around, but rather light shield, in bunker mode it was directed entirely in a forward, semicircular 'wall.'

IJA tactics dictated that this mode had an offensive use as well. Even as infantry scrambled behind the vehicle. Even as the aliens almost letting them do it as it'd make them easier to take out once they had surrounded them. Even as shells were falling everywhere. Even as the Chi-Ri kicked into forward gear, and the bunker shield flickered to life. The major stood up, raising his ceremonial katana and shouted to the surrounding men. "Banzai!"

Now, just because it was in the offensive playbook, didn't mean a tactic was always a good one. If Ren was to be honest to himself though, at least it was something. They couldn't retreat under the enemy fire. They couldn't stand and fight. At least this way they would perish with honour demanded of their station as defenders of the Empire.

What he hadn't expected was that the aliens would be utterly caught off guard by this tactic. It wasn't much, but it bought them a few seconds to rush forward. Bayonets unfolding from their Type 48s as they cleared a few meters before the return fire began again. Ren felt himself covered in warmth as the man beside him tumbled to the ground without a head. Rounds sparked off the Chi-Ri's shield, but many shots still came in around it. Solders crumpled on the ground between their old positions and the alien's.

Then the charge struck home, and the aliens, barely three dozen in number, found themselves on the receiving end of the better part of a hundred and fifty bayonets. The kinetic shields the aliens had didn't seem to do a good job protecting them from the melee attacks. The armour they were wearing on the other hand, did. Still, bayonets slipped in among cracks. Where they could find no purchase the soldiers resorted to clubbing the aliens with their rifles to buy time for their comrades to find a weakpoint. Ren himself took down one of the creatures by slipping his bayonet in between the helmet and the torso, almost taking the creature's head off.

Then it was over, and the quad fell silent except for the rumbling of the Chi-Ri's engine. Around them the sounds of distant battle rang through the city, and the major gathered the survivors to begin heading toward the next battle.

Codex Entry: A comparison of Infantry Weapons on Shanxi

During the ground combat of the Shanxi war, the vast gulf between Human and Turian technology was proven much more conclusively than in the conflicts over the planet. Though surprisingly it was not considered such at the time. Both sides soldiers had a 'the grass is greener' on the other side mentality to their opponents equipment.

The average soldier of the Imperial Japanese Army was equipped much like his modern counterpart. Personal shields and body armour were considered an unnecessary and extremely expensive luxury for human troops. A mentality that has carried on beyond the war by all human powers. As such the average foot soldier was equipped with his uniform, ammunition, grenades, and either a Type 48, 39, or 22 rifle. These rifles were similar in operation, and unlike turian weapons did not rely on a mass effect field for the entirety of the firing process of a round. Instead human weapons used and still use a chemical powder base. This projects the round into a mass effect enhanced rail system which launches the round at extremely rapid speeds, though slower than Council weapons. This use of a two stage launch allowed the rifles to use much smaller mass effect power sources, and the slower projectile speed makes them less prone to overheating.

The Type series rifles, along with similar weapons from most human nations, use what is considered a 'full powered rifle cartridge.' These rounds are generally 7.92mm, 7.76mm, or similar in diameter (notable exceptions exist for the Italian 6.5mm cartridge and the Swedish 6.5mm.) In comparison to the 8/10mm of citadel weapons, these cartridges caused grievous injury when they managed to penetrate shields. Turian soldiers found their body armour was quite useless in the face of these more powerful rounds, but their slower projectile velocity made the weapons ineffective against mass effect shields. Humans stating they needed an entire magazine (generally twenty rounds) to take down a single Turian. In reality, ten to thirteen hits would be enough to take down a turian soldier according to tests conducted after the war. The majority of these rounds were wasted against the shield, with usually only one or two needed to kill after the shield was broken.

In comparison, the turian Vanguard rifle actually took a relatively similar number of rounds to kill a human. Though they could be as low as one shot to do it, or as many as twenty. The small rounds of the Vanguard, and most citadel weapons, were well known at the time to be poor killing weapons but the versatility of their immense ammo reserves and high fire rates compensated. Against the average unarmoured human, a turian was capable of inflicting 6 to 1 casualties at times in combat as the lack of shielding or armour on human soldiers left them vulnerable to the relative 'storm' of rounds the Vanguard could put out. Turian forces also did not need to worry about ammunition, and in protracted firefights would usually come out on top as human forces ran out of rounds and could be overrun.

In both cases, sides would 'swap' weapons with corpses, though it was much more prone for IJA and other human soldiers to take turian weapons then the other way around. Turian soldiers found the human rifles to be frighteningly effective against human forces, but would regularly forget they had limited ammunition with weapons. Human soldiers adored the Vanguard's long lasting abilities, but were confused at the overheat issues, and frustrated at the weapons seeming lack of killing potential when it had been used so effectively against them. With the Vanguard actually requiring more rounds to take down a turian soldier then their rifles did as turian infantry armour proved effective against the citadel rounds.