Rob

Rob starts as an OPM located in Afghanistan. It is the only country in the world to have Zunist as its state religion. Its capital province, Bamyan, is one of only three provinces to follow the Zunist faith. After conquering Afghanistan, Rob can form Zun, empowering its national ideas, although it does not get a new mission tree.

## Lore

Afghanistan has long been a solitary land; a place of frigid deserts and high mountains. The roots of the divisions which plague the region lie with the Huns, nomadic invaders from the steppes who overran Afghanistan completely in the 400s. Originally just one host, the Huns fragmented into numerous confederations after their initial conquests, but none would last more than a century until the Shahis. Unlike the other Hunnic states, the Shahis would not suppress Buddhism, and Barha Tegin Shahi even submitted to Empress Wu of China in AD 670, converting to Buddhism in the process.

Although the Shahis could govern their majority Buddhist subjects, there were still those among the Huns who rejected Buddhism - particularly the cult of Zun - Hindu dissidents whose doctrine blended steppe traditions and vedic worship. While Barha Tegin was able to keep his state together, it split upon his death, with Sri Tegin Shahi staying loyal to the Tang and Buddhism, while his brother Rutbil Zabul took his own host under the Zunist banner. The next several centuries would see intermittent warfare between the two sides, but little would change.

The Varazid Dynasty of Persia would shatter the status quo, conquering Afghanistan in AD 1178 and subjugating the Zunists and Shahi. The House of Suren would be appointed Satraps over Afghanistan from Bost by the Varazids, and by AD 1207 they had expanded to include Balkh and Ghor in their domains. However, Varazid rule did not last; the Mongols under Genghis Khan shattered Persia, and by AD 1251 they turned towards Afghanistan, sacking Kabul and Bost, and putting Ghazni to the torch. The Zunists, in the wake of their holy city's immolation, retreated to the fortified citadel of Rob, the only stronghold completely untouched by the Mongol raids. The Surenas would meanwhile lose the Northern half of their domains to the Ilkhanate. Mongol rule in Afghanistan was brief, as the Ilkanid governor of Ghor, Wisnasp Ghoriyan, would revolt and subsequently drive the Ilkhanate out of Afghanistan entirely by AD 1283.

The downfall of the Mongol Khanates would provide much relief to the shattered lands of Afghanistan, yet within a century tensions would once again rise. Come AD 1444, they are primed to boil over once again. In the South, the Surenas posture as legitimate claimants to not just Afghanistan but all Persia, yet their lands are divided between Buddhists, Zunists, and Zoroastrians; the glory of their illustrious ancestors lost. The Shahi are still a loose tribal federation, vulnerable to divisions and destabilisation. Ghor, meanwhile, is sandwiched between Nestorians in the North and Zoroastrians in the South and West, although their military prowess has saved them from conquest so far. In the highest passes of the Hindu Kush lies the citadel of Rob, the only nation of the Zunist faith, isolated and diminished. Overlooking both Persia and India, Afghanistan may yet prove to be these empires' graveyard, or be doomed to conquest itself.