Welcome to a clockpunk world where the 1600s never ended.

It is the Year of Our Lord 1941. Even in the 20th century, the eternal conflict between true Christendom and the heathen continues. The two sides have not fought a direct war since the 19th century, but a "shadow war" continues. Spies prowl through the night, stealing state secrets and assassinating important targets. Alchemists devise new and terrible weapons, haemonculi endlessly patrol the borders, all preparing for the final war. Though the domain of the Habsburgs stretches through the entire New World, the Sublime Porte and their treasonous French allies have redoubled their efforts in resisting the might of Christ, and as unrest grows in the New World many fear, and some hope, for the fall of the Habsburg Empire.

The Catholic League is predominantly composed of the Habsburg Empire, under the rule of the autocratic Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, who is also the King of Spain and Burgundy. The Habsburg Empire is theoretically several states, with several different courts, united only by the person of the Emperor, but as the Habsburg line has had control of all of them for centuries and this has created one superstate that spans most of the globe. Though the wealth and military might of the Habsburg Empire is unmatched, the breadth of their empire means that they have to invest considerable resources to even keep the empire together. On the other hand, the viceroyalties, still formally part of the Spanish Empire, have become de facto independent states. The viceroys of the colonies have almost all rights and responsibilities for governance, their obligations to the Emperor limited to paying taxes and ensuring their troops are ready for a general war involving the empire.

The Habsburg Empire is fanatically Catholic, a result of the violent Protestant Reformation. This does not mean that the Pope has any secular power; he is a puppet of the Emperor, and any Pope that preaches peace and tolerance for the Empire's enemies finds himself having an unfortunate accident. The Inquisition has moved from Spain to cover the entire empire, rooting out heresy and anti-Imperial sentiment throughout both the colonies and Europe. Those discovered to be heretics are burned at the stake, a spectacle that can now be broadcast through wireless video. The Inquisition has practically become the Empire's secret police, also serving as its primary intelligence gathering agency.

Aligned to the Habsburgs is the Tsardom of Russia. Although a formerly Orthodox state, the threat of the Ottoman Empire gradually convinced the Tsars to convert to Catholicism to gain Imperial support. An autocratic despotism frequently under the rule of bloodthirsty Tsars, life in Russia has not changed much since the Middle Ages. However, the new Tsar, Joseph II, is planning on changing this. Through his "Men of Steel" program, Joseph II is importing Habsburg alchemists and their haemonculi servants en masse, in his plan to create his own alchemical industry to bring Russia into the 20th century.

Opposing the Habsburgs is an alliance united by nothing but hatred for the Habsburgs. Leading this alliance is the Sublime Porte, the Great Caliphate, the Ottoman Empire. Dominant over the Middle East and southern Europe for centuries, the Ottomans have expanded further to northern Africa and have a series of Islamic puppets through Africa and South Asia. In response to the Habsburg's religious fanaticism, the Ottomans have taken their Islam more seriously. The office of the Sultan has taken the role of Caliph more and more seriously over the centuries, and by the 20th century a radical form of Sharia law governs the country. Infidels are not tolerated, even the "people of the book," and a public display of non-Islamic religion is met with public stoning. Sunni-dominated, the Shia minority within the Ottoman Empire is persecuted, but not totally banned. This is posed to change in the future, if trends continue.

Aligned with the Ottomans are the Protestants. While having little love for the followers of the Prophet, the Protestants recognize the Habsburg Catholics as the greater threat. The Protestant kingdoms vary in their fanaticism, with the Scandinavians tolerating Catholics so long as they do not organize, and the French punishing any Catholic they find with decapitation. Being separate from the Sublime Porte and receiving limited support from Istanbul, the Protestant states are heavily militarized, the various militaries overshadowing even the royals and the nobility.

Technology has advanced leaps and bounds. Alchemy has revealed some of the secrets of the universe, making life much easier. The panacea has been found, but the process to create it is so expensive that only royalty have ready access to it. The five elements, fire, water, wind, earth, and quintessence, can now be extracted pure from raw materials and recombined to form new materials. Clockwork automatons do most industrial work, but peasants are still needed in agricultural work. Homunculi fill the simplest and most disposable roles, such as that of pikemen and fusilers in the vast armies of the Habsburgs and the Ottomans. But alchemists are still pushing the bounds of the field, and some of the madder alchemists claim to have discovered the source of all life....