Editing About Atlantis (Tobyverse) (section)

==='''The Origin of Atlantis'''===
In 1857, while Britain was distracted and embroiled in the conflict in India, Baron Cornelius Klough, aka Baron Nemesis, Master of Mechanism, struck. His plan was truly diabolical. It had always been known that he was a master engineer, metallurgist and clockmaker, but his mastery of geology and tectonics was, until now, unknown. Loading hijacked freighters with a series of strange devices, he then proceeded to sink them at a series of points in the middle of the Atlantic. Then, at some unknown signal, the devices activated, and Baron Nemesis achieved the impossible, and somehow created land. It could be that he raised an already sunken island, or manipulated the plate tectonics. Or even triggered an as-yet unknown underwater volcano, bringing it to the surface. 

What is known is that he dragged a huge landmass to the surface. Then he and his hidden legion struck. They seized the island within a matter of hours and began fortifying it. Nemesis hoped to use it as a nigh-impenetrable staging ground for his forces, able to strike at both sides of the Atlantic with his armored battleships and submersibles. They even began laying the groundwork for a series of war-factories. But one piece of bad luck would doom Nemesis's mad plot. The clipper The Prince of Wales happened to be crossing the Atlantic at the time, and spotted the legions of darkness. 

The first mate, William Shore, had once been a marine, and fought the Baron's forces at the Orkney Islands and off the coast of France before, and recognized the dangers. Deft handling by the captain, Eustace Shrive, allowed The Prince of Wales to escape the slower armored ships of Nemesis's forces, and as night fell they were able to slip away under cover of darkness. Racing back to England, the officers and crew of The Prince of Wales immediately descended en masse on the offices of the Admiralty, and after a short time and some truly desperate pleas, the British military ground into action. Their anti-Nemesis task force was called in from near Prussia, and the situation was reported to the various embassies. The British task force set sail at once, hoping to catch the Baron while he was still constructing his defenses. They did, and the battle raged with incredible ferocity. A full half the task force was sunk, and only the intervention of a convoy of French and Spanish ships were able to save the day. The remainders of the fleet bombarded the island heavily, and marines stormed the main buildings. Baron Nemesis looked to make his escape on one of his experimental rocket balloons, but was shot by marksmen before getting out of range. 

To this day his body and vehicle have not been recovered.