Zod had originally thought Atlantis and Wakanda would coexist peacefully for a while. After all, in this world there were no mutants, no Namor, no conflict between the two civilizations.
But before even a week had passed, his people told him that Wakanda and Atlantis were fighting.
"Fighting? What are they fighting about? Wakanda has just that one dome shield. Without that dome, how could they possibly beat Atlantis?"
Zod's face showed genuine surprise as he asked.
The underwater warriors of Atlantis could fly on land too, and those triangular fish-shaped fighters could also fly in the sky. To put it bluntly, the Atlantean military had no problem fighting on land or in the air. Zod even suspected those underwater energy ships had the ability to fly out of the atmosphere for space combat.
Wakanda's combat power could be seen from the Avengers. There was really no sign of advanced technology anywhere except that energy shield.
Wakanda: "The outside world is still so backward, still using guns."
Others: "Then what do you use?"
Wakanda: "We use spears!"
The image of Wakanda and Atlantis fighting was, in Zod's mind, nothing but nouveau riche versus old aristocracy.
Yeah, Atlantis had mastered controlled nuclear fusion a long, long time ago. Even though they blew themselves up and Atlantis sank, the accumulation of their civilization's foundation, combined with the vast resources of the ocean, meant they truly had the combat power to take on the entire surface world single-handedly and crush it.
Wakanda was... hard to describe.
When those two nations went to war, the United Nations couldn't do anything about it. The technology was still too advanced. Only S.W.O.R.D. could handle it.
Zod took the opportunity to argue that S.W.O.R.D.'s authority was only responsible for dealing with strange people, not managing the internal affairs of two nations.
Unless they granted more authority to S.W.O.R.D.
When it came to Zod Heath seizing opportunities for leverage, the United Nations had no real recourse. After some discussion, and also worried that Atlantis or Wakanda might destroy the other while trying to develop in peace, they ultimately decided to restructure S.W.O.R.D.'s authority and grant the organization more power.
Wakanda!
Capital city, Birnin Zana!
This scenic and prosperous nation had been feeling gloomy lately. Not the weather, but the mood of its people.
They were at war!
Ever since that Atlantean civilization had moved in next door, conflicts between the two sides had been constant.
Wakanda worried their vibranium resources would be discovered. Atlantis, in turn, saw Wakanda as a watchdog for the surface world.
This had kept relations extremely tense, until now, when neither side could stand it any longer.
The Wakandans were isolated from the world. Without outside cultural influence, their traditions remained completely intact. Every one of them had been raised as a warrior since childhood. They had fierce, warlike spirits and no fear of battle.
But not fearing war didn't mean they liked it. No one wanted to see their loved ones die on the battlefield.
Moreover, Wakanda was a small African nation with limited population and military strength. Every warrior was an extremely precious resource. Occasional skirmishes between tribes were acceptable, but going to war with a civilization like Atlantis, whose technology was in no way inferior and might even be more advanced, the outcome was impossible to predict.
War was an eternal topic. Its root causes could be explained in many ways: living space, natural resources, overpopulation, social productivity, and production relation.
Since the emergence of humanity, war had never stopped. It ran alongside brilliant civilization throughout the river of history, catalyzing the advancement of civilization while also threatening human survival.
In truth, war existed even before humanity appeared. War was not humanity's exclusive domain. Even ants fought.
Strip away the complex concepts, war was about resources: attacking, plundering, and strengthening oneself.
At the forward command post, listening to the sparse gunfire from their own positions, T'Chaka felt deeply helpless.
He had sold vibranium, made deals with the U.S. government, and built an American-equipped military force. But the tribes' warriors looked down on guns and cannons, stubbornly using the bows and arrows they had practiced with since childhood.
This was the drawback of Wakanda's isolation. Without outside cultural influence, the tribal people were conservative in their thinking and unwilling to accept new things.
T'Chaka had recognized the problem when he first took the throne, and the outbreak of modern warfare had only shown him more clearly how backward his nation was. He had wanted to promote basic national education, but the elders of other tribes strongly resisted this policy, believing it would shake the nation's foundations. The proposal had been shelved for a long time.
It wasn't that the tribal elders lacked foresight. Rather, the ruling class was extremely strict about controlling knowledge. Between a bunch of uneducated common people and a group of intellectuals with their own ideas, anyone with sense knew which to choose.
The outside world was advancing too quickly. T'Chaka also knew he couldn't change the elders' backward thinking overnight. So his approach was to promote a national strengthening strategy within the Golden Tribe, where resistance was smallest. After ten or even twenty years, when the other tribes fell too far behind, they would have to go along with the trend to survive, and the outdated thinking would collapse on its own.
Governing a nation couldn't be done in one stroke. In T'Chaka's plan, his generation needed to change the primitive, backward thinking. Wakanda would truly grow strong in the next generation. After he paved the way, his son would inherit the throne and lead the nation to rise.
So far, his plan was going very smoothly, except for this sudden war.
For Wakanda, Atlantis was like a person holding a stone tool, encountering an orc with an automatic rifle in the jungle.
All the other humans were still in an era without even stone tools, yet now they had to deal with an orc holding an automatic rifle.
But fortunately, Wakanda had vibranium, something Atlantis couldn't comprehend.
Atlantis had initially thought dealing with Wakanda might be somewhat difficult but not too problematic. After all, they had energy weapons.
So what was this nonsense before their eyes?
Those Wakanda natives charged forward with spears and shields. An energy blast shot toward them, and they raised those crude, laughable, pitiful shields. And then... they blocked the energy blast?
The Atlanteans started to panic.
Mainly, they suspected they had been out in the sun too long and gotten too dehydrated, causing hallucinations.
But their clothes were still intact. They shouldn't be dehydrated.
Then Wakanda swung their spears and sliced open the armor of an Atlantean soldier. Armor that could withstand multiple tank shell impacts without deforming, and they cut through it as easily as if his clothes were made of tofu.
And Wakanda used those primitive bows and arrows. Their fingers released, and the arrows went whoosh, punching straight through an ocean ship from the front.
This was the triumph of materials science.
/-\
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