Editing Бpoнeпeхoтa/A Brief History of Humanity (section)

===Imperial Rule===
Years 4360-4370 saw the beginning of Trade Wars (later dubbed Pre-Empire Military Conflicts). Not being able to use its standing military fleet against the separatists (who weren't in any breach of any actual law by doing what they did), the Protectorate found another option - inspiring and sponsoring "independent" militaries who could attack the unruly planets, allowing the Protectorate to racket them. A century of such treatment turned the situation into a powder keg: by year 4450, thousands of Dominion planets were ready and willing to rise up in arms against the Golden Hundred's predatory policies; underground unions and alliances were formed to prepare for the rebellion.

That's when a third side appeared. On year 4451, about 30 Protectorate-controlled inhabited systems in the Ursa Major cluster were attacked by hundreds of well-armed ships, with hundreds of thousands identical human men acting as planetary invasion troops.<br />
This was the Dominion's first encounter with the Polaris Empire.

No one in the Dominion had a hint on how did the Scout Corps, who had previously isolated themselves for 1600 years, turn into a fearsome Empire; but it was absolutely true that they preserved and enhanced the old tech, that they knew the "secret" Protectorate beacon passcodes, and that they prepared the Protectorate space for an invasion by seeding it with beacons of their own.<br />
During the First Wave of Invasion (years 4451-4461), the Empire triumphed, and the Protectorate panicked - having had controlled approximately eight thousand systems, it lost three thousands to the ten years of the Empire's victorious march.

Many separatists initially welcome the Empire in hopes that it would end the age of the Golden Hundred's yoke. Very soon, their hopes were dashed, as the supposed cure turned out to be much worse than the presumed disease. The Empire preached the belief of an ideal human - a warrior human; with the role prepared for the rest being that of slaves.

During the initial years of the war, the Protectorate was effectively unable to foster any resistance due to its rather loose structure and internal conflicts. It took the Second Wave (years 4478-4495) to end as another imperial victory for the Protectorate leaders to invent a method to strike back.<br />
More than five thousand systems in the galactic north were now under the Emperor's control. To counteract that, the Protectorate, unused to direct action, created the institute of Advisors - agents able to infiltrate the imperial planets and organize insurrections from within. Numerous smugglers, grown much stronger during the Trade Wars, offered their services in arming the rebellions as well. On year 4522, when the Third Wave started, more than a thousand planets of the Empire rose up in flames, the riots guided and supported by Protectorate advisors. The Empire now had to fight a war on a thousand fronts, and even the biggest clone soldier factories weren't intended to replenish losses of a scale inevitable for such a war - or, rather, hundreds of guerrilla wars.<br />
Furthermore, this was the first time when the Empire met fierce resistance on the planets singled out for conquest. Mercenaries, Trade Wars veterans, and Protectorate cyberinfantry fought with fury and tenacity. Robots, unable to fear death, perished by hundreds, but did not back down. Thousands of beacon probes were sent into imperial space, allowing Protectorate special forces to strike deep and destroy numerous strategically important targets, including two of the largest biofactories. The invasion started to choke, and internal intrigues did not help.

The last, the most desperate, effort of the Empire was the assault of the city-planet of Velian (years 4527-4528), which got to a stalemate. Soon, the Third Wave was to end due to certain events.