Really, no Philip K Dick VALIS mention? The book that repeats “the empire never ended” and argues that much of the time between now and the was “false?”
See also: https://philipdick.com/resources/miscellaneous/the-religious....
There's a guy in Rome still holding one of the Roman emperors' titles, pontifex maximus (held by some of them anyway).
Meanwhile, there’s a powerful army marching all over the world with an eagle standard and a commander-in-chief who recognizes the Roman guy's authority in some matters but not others. He's trying to deal with rising food and oil prices while organizing resistance to an invader from the east and warding off a domestic usurper.
When did the Roman empire fall again?