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The German Second Reich is established when William the First is named Emperor in 1851, 20 years earlier than our history. The Emperor, being 'crowned' on the eve of German industrialization, pushed hard for a heavy industrialization, leading to massive jumps in technology spearheaded by the extremely effective steam engine, recently implemented into German railways and industrial factories. Throughout the 50's, Germany began to surpass even Britain as the leading industry, pumping out ever-more efficient trains, manufacturing plants, ships, etc, greatly improving their economic standing.
In 1859, the Emperor declared that the Reich would reclaim what had once been the Holy Roman Empire, and the military began expanding east. Unfortunately, for all the great advances in technology they'd been making, little to none of it allowed their military to hold any power over that of the rest of the world due to the previous focus on economic growth. The Reich immediately was stopped at the borders of Poland, whose cavaliers were backed up by the powers of the Slavic states and Russia. Thus, William commissioned a team of scientists to take the new-found technologies and shape them into a military form. The most prominent of the recent advances had been the steam engine, what was seen as an undeterrable behemoth of metal and locomotive power. By removing the only restriction of the steam train (its reliance on rails), the team designed the first of what would be known as a tank, able to move straight through enemy territory on its own without giving a second thought to cavalry or musketry.
With this rather simply complex design, Germany quite literally steamrolled over the hostile nations they conquered, eventually stopping at the borders of Ukraine. In 1867 after assimilating Austria, Hungary, Poland, and Serbia along with the rest of the smaller nations in between, the German Empire was satisfied with its borders, and had established itself as a new world power.
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The handful of scientists, engineers, and technicians who'd developed the empire-forging machines of war were hailed as national heroes, and were thanked personally by the Emperor through the gifts of massive grants to allow them to continue their work in advancing technology for the Empire. Along with this, in 1870, as a sign of goodwill to the world, William announced the beginning of a massive science project, one in which he welcomed and sponsored scientists from around the world to join his own in an international "think tank" hosted in Germany. Inventors and engineers flocked in droves from America, Britain, Russia, Japan, and a myriad of other countries to offer their knowledge for the good of mankind.
Among the many who attended the conferences, several stood out and were selected to work personally with the Reich's best scientists. These few included the young Wright Brothers of the American Midwest, the professional Dr. Jekyll from her Majesty's England, an aging Victor Frankenstein of Austria, as well as some outstanding representatives of the Empire of Japan. For ten years this renowned team worked closely, making leaps and bounds in technology of all fields, their names plastered on newspaper headlines across the globe as each new discovery was revealed to the world at large. Each nation's representatives shared knowledge of their own areas of expertise which was then magnified by the genius of their compatriots when working together, effectively removing the upward boundary of their progress.
Of course, every so often a team member would return to their own country, sharing advanced plans of what they'd made the most progress in personally or what they thought would benefit their nation the most. While the think tank's purpose was to improve technology for humanity as a whole, national pride and patriotism often took precedence. This light espionage is what came to shape the world in the years to come:
Orville and Wilbur Wright together created the first wood and fabric plane during their time with the team, but then afterwards let the rest of the team do as they wished with the designs; they'd already begun work on new, more durable planes able to be outfitted with sturdier frames as well as more accurate controls than their earlier wing-warping design thanks to the clockwork systems they'd garnered from the Victorians.
Dr. Jekyll worked very closely with the German chemical teams, making many breakthroughs in the medical and chemical fields to both debunk previous methods of inferior treatment as well as develop new medicines through work with chemicals. In his work, he developed an extremely effective injection system which allowed basic chemicals to be combined and then directly injected into a subject's bloodstream. His work also led to potent chemical mixtures he dubbed "mutagens," cocktails which could temporarily (or not so temporarily) warp a drinker's DNA to make them faster, stronger, or otherwise physically changed. These he kept to himself, and personally presented the first non-test batch to the Queen herself, who was becoming frail in her old age.
Victor Frankenstein, a student of alchemy and other near-occult sciences, made a private discovery which he kept to himself through the entire time with the team, though rumors were spread of an attempt made to reanimate fully a dead body which many said he was successful in... Regardless, his work with the human body was astounding, and with the help of the British managed to blend clockwork and biology to create replacement limbs, organs, and other body parts to help those injured in war, industrial accidents, or the like. Much of this was powered by small steam engine technology, courtesy of the Germans, or complex clockwork as given by the British. His work was accepted and lauded throughout the world, and almost every clinic in a civilized land will offer basic augmentation, though full clockwork limb replacement is the domain of scholastic surgeons. Without a home nation to go home to, however, Frankenstein noticed that the Russians had no representatives, and later in his stay began work with the Japanese before presenting the Czar with the fruits of his labor in both areas.
The Japanese, hailed as the greatest sword and armor smiths of history, as well as being the only nation to have any semblance of magical power, blended their two most defining features; the figure of the samurai, and the magic of their mystically inclined. Their key development for the world was a vast improvement on the German steam engine design; a magical power source of augmented chemicals donated by Dr. Jekyll which many referred to as Alchemist's Oil. It burned extremely slowly and very hot, meaning that once ignited as the source of heat for a steam engine, the engine could continue for hours or days depending on the size of the source (this is a factor in what allowed the Wright Brothers to create such a lightweight engine for their best planes). Working with the German and British scientists in a mixture of steam engine and clockwork mechanics, the Japanese devised a prototype suit of powered armor, one which increased the strength of a wearer three fold. As it improved, many different variants were created; sealed environment suits for work in extreme cold or other uninhabitable environments, diving suits, industrial working suits, etc. Victor Frankenstein took a prototype of these suits to the czar early in their progress, believing that the ability to industrialize much easier in the harsh Russian winters would allow the nation to stabilize and make progress itself during its near-revolutionary chaos of the previous century. The Japanese eventually continued unhindered development of this powered armor on their own land, leading to the creation of larger armor, primarily very heavy and well-armed clockwork suits able to withstand extremely destructive conditions and withering hails of fire without stalling. They progressed steadily, and soon the apex of these creations were large, golden, steam-powered samurai-shaped monstrosities, up to a hundred feet tall and requiring the skill of a steam cleric or sorcerer or a team of engineers to power and pilot it.
