Three days ago, on the border between the Hayato Empire and the Takamagahara League, a fight broke out at garrison station 14. At least 45 troops were injured, with six Taka soldiers and two Hayato soldiers killed.

Takamagahara officials say their troops were doing routine maintenance on one of their fortifications when the Hayato troops “suddenly came over across the line, barking in their potato language that we needed to stop.”

Potatoes are not native to Tsuchi. They were introduced to by foreign merchants, so it’s become a slur against the Hayato people.

Hayato officials claim that this ‘routine maintenance’ involved cutting down branches from a tree that was on the Hayato side of the line, but reached over to the Takamagahara side. Therefore, the branches belonged to Hayato and they had no right to cut them down.

The fight quickly escalated, blades were drawn, and eight issei were killed.

The truth of what happened really doesn’t matter. Hayato bases its legitimacy as a sovereign, centralized state on its prestige, historical legacy, and military might. Backing down at this stage would be an unacceptable show of weakness. Meanwhile, Takamagahara bases its coalition on standing up to the Hayato.

Perhaps they could have reached a settlement or handled things quietly, but Hayato immediately made the incident public and started mobilizing their forces. The Takamagahara have done the same in turn, and the fighting has begun.

The Hayato do have a sound strategic reason to push the war now. They’ve been developing their territory, industrializing, and training their military for decades. The Taka are new and haven’t dug in but possess sprawling, still undeveloped, interstellar territories. The Hayato believe that an early war is preferable.

Protectorate and Axis forces will not participate in the fighting. This is an issei civil war.