The world had entered a delicate state. On the one hand, fires continued to burn long after those who had initiated them were reduced to ashes. The Great War was over, but the wounds created during its chaos and destruction still bled deeply—vast as oceans of the sanguine substance spilled across multiple continents.
Imperialism had entered a difficult territory, as if the German Reich's open declaration of seizing Anglo-French colonies in Mittelafrika—just to begin a long and stable process of decolonization—had been napalm added to already all-consuming flames.
Britain's empire burned, and their army, now returned home from the likes of Ypres and Flanders, began being redeployed to put down local rebellions that spanned the entirety of their colonies. From Ireland to what remained of British Africa, and east toward the Raj and the lands still held in the Pacific, a time had come for the locals to overthrow their British masters. And it was a gruesome, bitter affair.
