Emperor Cain through the Ages is reproduced here with the permission of the Solaris Imperial Appreciation Institute, and is comprised of a series of lectures left by Emperor Cain for his numerous progeny, to be shown in the event of his death.
All dates are listed in Cain Era (CE), since, after all, Emperor Cain doesn't have much to say about anything before it!
Thanks to Institute Director MrsYuiRicdeau@aol.com for concept and images!

CE 3401 - Caesar Cain at the Siege of Etrenak

This picture depicts a dark time in the history of Solaris... the Siege of Etrenak by barbarians! I can't recall a time when my duties were quite so pressing, or the responsibilities placed upon me were greater. There were a lot of people being slaughtered, you see, so I had to work doubly hard to keep the population steady!

This was doubly difficult because Miang and the Gazel Ministry were continually pestering me to go out and lead the troops into battle, or inspire the people, or some such nonsense. I lost many valuable hours to such utterly trivial tasks, and sometimes I think it's a wonder that the feeble spark of civilization didn't sputter out for lack of manpower then and there.

By the time the barbarians (who were probably led by some Contact or another, knowing how they usually are) reached the gates of Etrenak, we were in a pretty serious bind, let me tell you. Of course, at this time Etrenak wasn't in the air. If it had been, we wouldn't have had near the problems we did, since the barbarians just had a few red biplanes and the odd V-2 rocket.

I'd already suggested several clever strategies that involved charging forward at them, but the Gazel Ministry refused to take my advice. As if I hadn't picked up a few tricks in 3400 years! But thanks to their poor generalship, we ended up losing several big battles that I don't remember the names of, as I wasn't actually present.

We settled in for a long siege, which was quite difficult since we didn't actually have any walls. Some of the people ended up taking refuge in the coliseums we'd built all over the city, which turned out to be a bad idea since our lions had gotten hungry during the chaos. Fortunately, the Imperial Palace was well-protected. No thanks, I might add, to those twelve ingrates, who all went out leading 'expeditionary forces' but probably just ran away.

That's why I was addressing the troops in this picture. I decided to lead a final desperate charge myself. Everyone ended up getting slaughtered except me, but I considered it a glorious victory since we held the enemy for a few minutes, and only -Cain- can kill -Cain- after all. It was quite painful, though.

While I was getting hacked to bits, Miang paid a visit to the barbarian chieftain to negotiate a deal. Imagine everyone's surprise when he had a brain aneurysm and died soon after! To this day, it amazes me how coincidental it all was! It really broke the back of the enemy assault, although my not-quite-last-stand was probably more important.