[ WP ] The year is 3200 . Today your history class is covering your favorite topic the Dark Ages ; that lasting from 1647 to 2233 .

`` Between the midst of the 17th century and the 23rd, humanity entered what is now known as the second Dark Age.'' The voice-over narrated the timeline which stretched from one end of the room to the other, displayed by the holo-teach. It went on. 
 
 `` At one end of the room, you can see 1492 and the'discovery' of the Americas by Columbus. At the other, on the right side of the room, 2246, the year in which Jalil Balakrishnan first reached Sirius by superluminary travel. The Alcubierre drives back then were horrifically inefficient and required gigatons of hydrogen fuel to be fused to even jump between stars, but for the time, they were a quantum leap in technology over what had existed for the 800 years before.'' 
 
 I already knew a lot of this. The Second Dark Ages were one of my favourite periods of time, although the third age of war was also intensely interesting. 
 
 `` So why are these times known as a Dark Age? See for yourself.'' Immediately, the timeline faded and was replaced by several common items of the time. Primitive kinetic firearms were the first to appear, all the way from flintlock pistols used by the sea captains of old, to type-34 heavy bombardment cannons which were utilised in the great wars of 2134. But these were only a small section of the array of objects which were now distributed all over the room, and were labelled under a large sign reading `` WAR''. Carbon-driven automobiles, horse pulled wagons, Orion class spacecraft - they were all here. The deep, bassy voice of the narrator spoke again. 
 
 `` From the beginning of recorded history, humans have used fire as a tool. But from the 1600s onwards, the power of the flames was truly harnessed by man - for better, or for worse.'' Factories appeared, and spewed fumes into the room. Although I knew they were n't real, the compulsion to cough still tickled at the back of my throat. `` But soon enough, man was to learn the error of his ways. His greed began to damage the world around him.'' A graph showed at the front of the room, with a curve which bent upwards exponentially. `` Between 1850 and 2055, global temperatures rose by a total of 4 degrees celcius as a result of carbon dioxide and methane pollution in the atmosphere. The notion that such gases would be allowed into the environment is abhorrent to us today, but their effect was not fully understood until the decade of the 1980s, and ignored willfully for years after that.'' 
 
 `` Of course, this had dire effects on the biosphere. The holocene extinction event wiped out 94 % of species on planet Earth, and human population began to fall from a peak of 9 billion in 2029 to a low of 2 billion by 2086. But even this was not the greatest danger. In fact, instead of banding together against the storm of their own making, mankind turned on each other. By 2046 two major geopolitical blocks had developed - one known as `` the West'' and the other `` the East''. As resources dwindled and famine spread, it was the East who struck first. Tensions rose to a breaking point and it was the invasion of a small rich nation known as `` Korea'' which caused war to break out.'' 
 
 `` This war, as you should all know, is now called the Third World War. The specifics of the war are both complex and incomplete, as much of the historical data and evidence was destroyed. But it is known that there were two major stages: the conventional war, lasting from 2047 to 2065, in which both sides fought using traditional kinetic weaponry and drone warfare. Over 300 million people died in this stage of the war, and the East took the brunt of the losses - nearly 200 million - leading to a near victory by the West.'' 
 
 The narrator paused for a moment while maps and battle clips played across the room. It showed a long, arduous struggle; red and blue armies pushing against each other across the world while around them, the seas advanced unstoppably. 
 
 `` By 2065, the East had been pushed back and the situation was dire. Famine and revolution were commonplace. If the conventional phase had continued, estimates show that the East would have collapsed and lost by 2070. And so, cornered and in a state of desperation, the East unleashed its final weapon, and the war entered the second phase: thermonuclear bombardment.'' 
 
 All around us, nuclear warheads detonated and rose in huge plumes of fire and smoke. 
 
 `` Over two weeks of continual nuclear warfare, more people died than in all the wars in history combined.'' The narration paused again to let the fact sink in. `` Although the specifics are unknown, it is known that both the East and the West were annihilated almost completely. It is estimated that 2 billion people perished in nuclear fire over the course of a month. We will look at the war in far greater detail in coming lessons, but for now, this is all that is necessary.'' 
 
 `` However, despite the horror of this war, there was an upside. The resulting nuclear winter cooled global temperatures by almost 2 degrees.'' The temperature graph showed again, with a distinct dip after 2065 after which it did not rise. `` This was a blessing for the nations which had survived the war. Most notably, India, one of the few nuclear states which had made it through the war, became the new superpower - the only superpower. The nation's population of 360 million, down from a 2019 peak of 1.37 billion, began to recover. With cooling global temperatures, climate change was suitably negated to support agriculture on a scale which could provide food for the entire world population again. Although still plagued by problems, human civilisation began to recover.'' 
 
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 *Thanks for reading! I may continue this if people want me to, but right now I'm not so happy with it and I'm going to take a break. *
