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Pakitsk wrote:Right-o! We'll keep it safe from the penguin menace.
Clones myself, hands each clone a rifled musket with bayonet, and has them stand guard around the robot.

Good! If it somehow gets broken, telegram me, send it back, and I’ll fix the bot and give you better guns to protect the repaired bot, including, but not limited to, the Electricum V-40 (x5), the Polaris D-84 (x5), and the Executioner B-97 (x5). Kaeyokuan guns are very dangerous should they fall into the wrong hands. Do the best to prevent this from happening. Do not let my guns fall into the wrong hands.
WARNING: KAEYOKU DOES NOT TRUST MANY NATIONS WITH THEIR GUNS. THEY ARE ONLY TO BE HELD BY ANY NATION IF KAEYOKU GRANTS PERMISSION. THE EXECUTIONER B-97 IS ONLY TO BE HELD BY THE VERY FEW NATIONS KAEYOKU TRUSTS NOT TO ABUSE. THIS IS ONLY FOR YOUR SAFETY!! I trust you not to abuse the Executioner B-97 and I grant you permission to use any of the above.

Me: Makes a really large post. 'v'

Also me: Detects three grammatical errors. >.>

Hellslink wrote:I HATE ALL OF YOU!

<3

The tesseris sikelies

Restoration of Eastern Kaiserreich wrote:U didn't say no homo

Why always no homo? Why not... yes homo
*Winks ;)*

The tesseris sikelies wrote:Why always no homo? Why not... yes homo
*Winks ;)*

>->

Stellar Colonies, Volinovia, Aivintis, and The tesseris sikelies

Makes this dispatch.

Yes, I know, I used the Earthbound title font, sue me please don't, Itoi, I'm innocent!

Episode one: Liberated lands.

Sminishia wrote:

Two days.

Two days after the end of the conflict, and one day after celebrations in the now-part-of-Sminishia liberated lands, dozens of news reports still have to make it to nearly isolated villages inside those said lands. Miladena Popov, a female journalist working for Sminishia's biggest independent news media Gradvest, is driving her car to a village not presented in most maps, named Skalistykholm, which never had a journalist visit it. She has heard stories of a foreign journalist trying to enter the town, only to be rejected and arrested by Kurikian police during the communist era of the USR. Miladena, knowing that the town is now in Sminishian territory, hopes that won't be a big problem knowing again that her country is a libertarian regime despite being socialist.

You are now approaching your destination, Skalistykholm, Sminishia, 5 minutes before arrival.

Miladena Popov is finally arriving to that town after hours of tiring road trips. It's freezing outside, snow was everywhere in both camp and roads, even her metal bottle of coffee has cooled down, it's negative 34 Celsius outside! - It can't be that cold now, it's still summer!" - Not like she has a problem with the cold, since Sminishia too is a cold country, but she does not believe that the temperature can be very freezing in a hot season, it feels like she's going nearer to the planet's northern pole. Of course, she has her car's AC blowing hot air to warm it up a bit, even holding her metal bottle of coffee in front of it.

You are now approaching your destination, Skalistykholm, Sminishia, 1 minute before arrival.

Despite her smartphone's GPS telling that she has one minute, Miladena has already arrived to the entrance of the town with the village's name on it's sign. Other than that, the sign says 'Добро пожаловать в Сталистихолм, Союз Социалистических Республик.' which means 'Welcome to Skalistykholm, Union of Socialist Republics.'. She isn't very good at Kurikian, but she can tell that it says something about the communist regime of the USR. - "They still think they live in the Union of Socialist Republics?" - She says to herself, turning off her car near the entrance (but not blocking the sign) and readying herself. Miladena is wearing two layers of winter jacket, gloves, boots and a scarf. Soon, she hops out of the car, immediately feeling the breeze of cold winds and walking through heavier snow than of "northern" Sminishia. As soon as she enters, it is indeed a small village, but bigger than expected since it seems to have more buildings. This reminds Miladena of her childhood, growing up in a small, wooden village like the one here, she's glad that her village is more 'modernized'. Besides being a journalist, she didn't bring a crew to the place, because she's going alone, she's holding a digital camera with a wireless microphone. The town of Skalistykholm is almost all wooden and cobblestone, and because it's freezing, most buildings have chimneys and fires on them turned on.

Despite the peace and decent looks, they still hold communist USR flags in some places, even their coat of arms in the mayor's place. Do they not have even televisions? She goes to ask a villager a question. - "Excuse me." - She says while tapping a villager who just bought bread. - "I'm Miladena Porpov, journalist of Gradvest and Sminishia's biggest independent news media, I have questions to ask." -

The villager looks at her in... a weird way. - "You're one of those people who the big-city dwellers call 'journalists', right?" - He asks a question. - "If so, then... this is the first time I've seen one." - Indeed it is, and so is the town's.

- "Right, uhhh... First question, doe-" - She gets interrupted by the villager.

- "If you want to ask important questions, at least ask the police or the militsiya, I do not want to get in trouble with foreign journalists." - Says the villager, leaving with his bread and going on the way to his house. This marks the fear that authoritarianism still rules with an iron fist despite the USR officially no longer existing.

Miladena sighs, she'll make edits on the footage to blur the face of the villager later, she marks the fear of authoritarianism, and then does what the villager said, ask the law enforcement of the town. Minutes after feeling the cold and blowing winder cloud smokes, she enters the warmer police station building. The building design is just as expected, a building with wooden logs, 'modern' concrete and cobblestone. - "Good evening, citizen, is there some trouble you will report?" - Asks a police officer, always ready to arrest a person who commits felony.

The Sminishian journalist Miladena shakes her head. - "No, I came here to ask you questions, I am a Sminishian journalist." - She says.

- "A journalist? This the first time this town has ever gotten one, but now that we rarely receive policy reports from the police commissar and the premier, I'd gladly answer these questions as long as you don't insult the glorious USR." - The officer confirms despite authoritarianism. - "Make it quick though, I am rather busy." -

- "Okay, umm, first question: Have you ever heard of the most recent war ever?" - She asks.

- "The most recent war?" - The officer looks down to the journalist. - "What war? Did the USR win this one or lose?" -

This make Miladena Porpov take a full document of what happened in the war and the aftermath of it, including the Treaty of Paragould. - "Take this document, good sir." - She says, handing the documents, as she marks that the town really is isolated. - "I'll give you minutes to read and clarify." -

Minutes later, reading with police officers, they realized that Kurikian governments changed, later became part of a revolting nation, and now the town is part of Sminishia, this wrecks the officer's mind. - "... My God..." - The officer is... shocked, they're now part of a smaller country?! - "This really happened?" - He asks, with Miladena nodding. - "I'm going to have to report this to the mayor, I think we've been isolated for this long, we'd even have to change our laws and make a public announcement. Are there any Sminishian military units coming?" - He asks.

- "Probably, they seem to come later than I did though." -

- "Ask me questions later, right now I have to report this to the mayor." -

Hours later, the mayor of the Skalistykholm town has made a public announcement about his resigning of being mayor, and presenting a new local democratic system allowing people to elect local legislators and future majors. However, the journalist stays there for a while, being in an interview with town officials.


Sminishia wrote:

Third day.
Three days after the conflict, and one day after an isolated village was convinced about it's current status, the no-longer isolated town Skalistykholm has changed their flags from old ones from the brutal USR regime to the new ones resembling the Sminishian Socialist Republic. The journalist Miladena Popov has stayed in that town for a day after gathering information about the place: What kind of food do they eat; How rich are they compared to other villages (treasury); What's the newly established local Democratic system now; How large is the town; How developed is it; And finally, where they ethnically Sminishian or Kurikian? All of the answers are given according to the information: Mainly stale bread and reindeer meat; One of the poorest towns in the entire country so far; Locally direct democracy; 3.5 KM in area; Still developing; Ethnic Sminishian, although they seem to be Kurikianized, not to mention actual ethnic Kurikians ran this place.

After all the information gathering done by Miladena Popov, she finally got out of the entrance after a nice cup of coffee given by a polite villager. She would say that she's tired now, but the coffee woke her up and energized her. - "Well... not done with my job yet." - Miladena enters the car, inhaling and exhaling, turning on the vehicle. Before she could drive away, she was marking a GPS destination to another area that has been annexed by Sminishia. She drives now, with her face looking like she doesn't want to do another long trip, just wants to go home, throw herself to bed and breathe warm house air. Of course, she does this to support the Gradvest media, who have now managed to broadcast the no-longer isolated town, and for the salary they're paying to her because of the job.

You are now approaching your destination, Spokoyreka, Sminishia. 58 minutes before arrival.

Despite an estimated time of one hour, her car's fuel is about to run out of fuel for one hour and a half. Miladena realizes this, and she sighs strongly, if she does make it, she hopes that there's a working gas station since the city was probably hit by war. Why is she being called to a city? She has heard that it's facing a growingly mild humanitarian crisis, if it's deadly, she prays for herself not to be killed despite being irreligious. Her GPS is interrupted, for someone is calling her, it is Milanko Kovac, head of Gravest, she picks up. - "Good morning, sir Kovac." - She simply greets on the phone while driving (her car is on speaker).

- "Good morning, madam Miladena, how was Skalistykholm?" - Asks Kovac while talking in phone with the journalist.

- "Em, decent, I'm guessing. At least I made them realize their official status. I sure do hope the Sminishian state cooperates to develop the town for it's bright future." - She gave her opinion. - "How about you, Kovac? How is Gradvest going?" -

- "Glad you asked, we broadcasted every single bit of your footage after we edited them to blur people's faces." -

- "Good to hear, I'm going to a town called Spokoyreka, last time I saw the town in the GPS map, it looked like it was between the border of Sminishia and Belekria, is that true?" -

- "Yes, I heard reports from security guards and even soldiers that the town is split into two urban regions and there's a mild humanitarian crisis, but that's all I know, we're sending you there to uncover reasonings of why is the crisis happening." - Says Kovac.

Miladena now really looks like she doesn't want to do it, but she has to. - "Ah, sh¡t. I'm assuming city neighbors don't like each other, do they?" -

- "I... guess. Just have your camera and wireless microphone ready, do not worry, I'll call a law enforcement official for a bulletproof vest for you to guarantee safe journalism. Remember, if a shootout happens, do not attempt to fight, stay in cover. Good luck." -

- "Wait, I have another que-" - Miladena is interrupted, as Kovac has hung up from the phone. She groans out of worry for safety, slight anger and a feeling of 'I really don't want to do this'.

Ypu are now approaching your destination, Spokoyreka, Belekria. 49 minutes before arrival.

Miladena doesn't question why the country name is changed to Belekria, since she heard it's split into two administrations.

Fifty minutes later, at Spokoyreka.

*Pa-ckl*

A stamp is heard, following next with a small "book" being closed, papers shuffling and a person being really thankful of something. As the thankful person passes something, an official by the name of Bohda Zacharov, a Sminishian border official, is seen working to keep the new borders safe. This border is exactly in the middle of the city square of Spokoyreka. - "Checkpoint 04 available, next!" - He said while grabbing a microphone for the speaker to sound. Just after that, a man from Sanada steps in the checkpoint with his readied documents, the line was faster than expected, but he was still uncomfortable from waiting an hour while he was using his smartphone to it's battery death.

- "Papers, please." - Zacharov performs a small hand gesture of quickly moving his fingers back at him, telling the person to hand over the documents.

The Sanadan man sighs. - "Of course, I hope it's worth approving. " - He says, handing over three documents, which are: ID supplement that includes average appearance, date of birth, weight, height, fingerpri of thumb and coded numbers; An entry permit listing purpose of border passing, time of staying in the country, name and expiration date; Most importantly, the passport which lists the date birth, gender (male), issuing city, expiration date, coded numbers and most importantly, the country. Despite being Sanadan, he has a Krionikian passport due to Sanada being administrated by the Confederal Kingdom of Krionik.

Zacharov begins inspecting the documents before asking questions. - "Purpose of visit?" -

- "I-I'm passing through." - Answered the Sanadan man, named Rotislav Hanak according to the documents.

- "Duration of time?" -

- "About two weeks, inspector." -

After a full minute of investigation and reading rulebooks, the documents are all legitimate, Zacharov stamps a green approval to Hanak's passport, then giving him back the documents. - "Please, behave properly." -

- "Will do." -

Hanak steps out of the checkpoint, stepping his feet in Sminishian territory. Zacharov does not get a citation of punishment, but does get called to take a lunch break, so he grabs the speaker's microphone. - "Checkpoint 04 will change inspector for one hour, please ready your documents as he positions himself in the ckeckpoint." -

Minutes later, Zacharov grabs a grilled cheese he made this morning and saved it to this time. Before taking a bite, he accidentally bumps to a woman with a bulletproof vest, almost falling, but thankfully not doing so. - "Forgive me, madam, I was being impatient." - He apologized, but then stopped again this time more calmly.

- "Excuse me, sir. Are you a border inspector?" - Asked the woman.

- "Well, yes, I'm currently taking a lunch break, why do you ask? Was there a mistaken person I let through?" - Answers Zacharov, only for him to question twice.

- "I'm that gal you met a year ago, Miladena Popov, I came here as journalist to uncover a humanitarian crisis here." - Said Miladena, who is wearing a bulletproof vest a police officer gave her the vest even marks the Gradvest logo.

- "... You are that woman! Popov! Dobro je vidjeti vas! (It is good to see you!)" - Greeted Zacharov in Lovci language (Sminishian primary language). - "Yes, there is a humanitarian crisis, just yesterday there was a terrorist attack committed by an unknown extremist group, and dozens of people from Belekria, who aren't even from Belekria, are coming to Sminishia." - He says.

- "Glad to see you too, Zacharov. I feel sorry for those killed by the terrorist attack, it's shocking." - Said Miladena.

- "Indeed it is, even neighbors from both borders are yelling at each other profanities and slur words. You can ask me any question you want!" - Zacharov leads Miladena to a lunch table for further discussion. Just after that, they are having an interview with each other.

Nobody knows what will happen next, but it won't be as dark as yesterday.

Sminishia wrote:

Still the third day.

In the corresponding time when the journalist Miladena Popov has arrived to the Sminishian side of Spokoyreka, or as they like to call it, 'South Spokoyreka', both her and the border inspector she met a year ago, Bohda Zacharov are sitting on a lunchroom table. Miladena Popov is holding her papers with questions that she'll need to ask, while Zacharov is taking bites after bites of his grilled cheese sandwich. The sandwich tastes good, but it would be better if it was warm, he couldn't find a microwave despite claims that they had plenty, they must have either been lying or unsure. - "Sister-fvckers lying about a microwave here, don't see any." - Murmured Zacharov as he's taking final bites of the sandwich, it just... makes him less happy eating cooled down food that was supposed to be warm and hot.

Miladena Popov waits for Zacharov to finish his food, she practices in her mind asking questions and overthinks about the crisis in the city and border. When she no longer hears any biting or eating, she clears her throat. - "Are you done?" - She asks a non-journalistic question first.

A gulp, not loud like in the cartoons, but "loud" enough to be surprising, is heard from Zacharov's throat, means he finished eating. - "Indeed." - He confirms, wrapping his paper bag like it was a a ruined homework essay, and then throwing it to a nearby trash bin. The wrapped up paper bag was likely going to miss the bin, but it hit a box nearby, successfully landing inside the said trash bin, Zacharov raises his fist. - "Ura!" - He expresses a little bit of joy, he then turns his head to Miladena. - "Okay Popov, you can ask me any question now." - He said with a smile.

- "A-All right." - Miladena puts down her papers that included questions she must ask, and then proceeds to talk. - "First question, what is happening in this moment?" - She asks, as she records with a smaller camera and gives the wireless microphone to Zacharov.

- "Things are... dark so far, the police from both sides of the border and nation are heavily armed, they do not even look like police, they look like soldiers of war, regardless that there's actual military in some border checkpoints. Like I have said to you, there has been a terrorist attack nearby checkpoint 04 of the city's administrative borders between two nations. Nobody knows what group or individual is behind this, but we are inspecting right now." - Zacharov gave a bit long answer, but it was a journalistic question, so he had to explain it.

Miladena writes that inside her mind, remembering the description, but the camera will save it. - "Have there been any reports of injuries and deaths within this attack? -

- "Only one was killed, which was a police officer, but there have been plenty of injuries, possibly between ten and fifteen. The most uncomfortable part, most of them were civilians. I am glad they are living their lives as the hospitals save them, and I pray my condolences for the dead officer. The terrorist was even arrested half an hour after the attack." -

- "Poor officer. If there's an afterlife, I hope he gladly lives there." - Says Miladena, before asking the next question. - "Next one, why is the crisis happening?" -

Zacharov sighs. - "The reasoning with most probability are ethnic tensions between Sminishians and ethnic Kurikians which are Belekrians, despite both them being Slavic and Yastrean. With said tensions most likely leading to terrorist attacks like the one yesterday." - He says the first reason. - "But the reason I said isn't confirmed yet, other possible reasons are human rights violations in both city administrations, collapsed infrastructure, living conditions being worsened by the previous war, wide spread street crime, others alike. While the least possible reason is famine, I don't see people starving, begging for food or their ribs being exposed, they all have food. Well, the poorest of them would likely starve, but I do not think it is part of the crisis. It may have some possible sides though." - He gave a lot of possible reasons for the crisis.

- "That's horrible..." - Says Miladena. - "Next question... What do you think will happen in the future and what will be the aftermath of the crisis?" - She asks, it may be the final question.

- "Forgive me if I sound really desperate in this one, but I sincerely wish things go better after this crisis. I gained hopes after seeing that both the state and state-owned companies would help war torn urban areas to develop further in order to make future living conditions better than they are right now. Sadly, I see some negative sides, such as borders closing completely and the military shooting at anyone who passes. More positively, I hope the place becomes safe and that both tensions and violence stop." - Zacharov answered the questions. - "Is that all the questions?" -

- "Yes, that is all." -

- "Good, I'll have to work again in fifteen minutes. One more thing, I sincerely hope the people vote out corrupt officials who run the southern administration of the city." - Zacharov stands up from the table. - "We are all comrades." -

- "We are all comrades." - Miladena repeats the motto of the country. After Zacharov leaves the place, she sighs. She may still have some places to uncover, so she finishes recording the camera and calls Kovac with her smartphone.

After seconds of the phone internally ringing, it is picked up. - "Good afternoon, Popov." - Kovac greeted in his phone.

- "It's still morning, just near noon." - Responded Miladena Popov. - "By the way, I did an interview with a border inspector about a humanitarian crisis, I have it all in my camera." - She says.

- "That's good, did you record anything else than the interview?" - Asks Kovac.

- "Yes, I've recorded at least two officers arresting people with forged documents, a Sminishian person begging for a Belekrian border inspector to let her pass and even a person who failed at murder of a border enforcement police officer." - Miladena confirms, with another sigh. - "It's bad. Probably not the worst thing I've seen, but I felt bad for people who begged." -

- "Seems bad indeed, people would watch broadcasts of your footage, don't worry about editing footage, we'll do it for you." - Says Kovac.

- "Have a question though, do I need to uncover other cities of these so-called "liberated lands"?" - Asks Miladena.

Kovac starts thinking. - "Hmmm." - He uses an interjection, then answering. - "No, that is all. We have other journalists that would uncover other cities and towns of the liberated lands. You get to go home for now." - Says Kovac. - "Damn, 'liberated lands' sounds propagandic and biased, I think we should change it sometime soon." -

Miladena Popov inhales and greatly exhales out of relief. After just 2 locations, she gets to go home earlier. She even chuckled at 'propagandic' part. - "Thank you so much, Kovac, I'll head to my car, buy gasoline and drive to my home town." -

- "Alright, just upload the footage before getting out, and be careful when you start leaving." -

- "I will. Goodbye." -

- "¡Adios!" - Kovac used a Sanctish word before hanging up.

Miladena then takes a charged laptop from her backpack, connecting to public WI-FI of the lunchroom and uploading footage she captured in her camera. As she does this, she wondered why Kovac used a language from a country far away that has nothing to do with Sminishia, she guesses that Sanctish is a widely spoken language across the planet of Valsora, although she speaks the Sminishian language Lovci. After uploading, she saves the laptop in her backpack and stands up, ready to leave.

Sminishia wrote:

Third day evening.

Still in the corresponding time in the town of Spokoyreka, the journalist Miladena Popov leaves the place of the lunchroom, she has finished uploading every single bit of the footage she captured on the camera to the Gradvest website's submission page. Now all she has to do is buy gasoline from a gas station in the southern administration of the divided and war torn city they call Spokoyreka. Minutes after driving to a station, she finds one undamaged, best part is, the usually long time of waiting is now short, for almost everyone who needed gasoline has bought them, so she sighs in relief and parks her car in the station. Just after parking, she hops out of the car, still wearing vest and being wary about the surroundings of the currently deadly city, she even panics inside a little.

After hopping off the car, she enters the gas station, and just like every gas station in the planet, it is also a small store. Miladena Popov has her wallet ready, but despite only here to pay for gasoline and car refueling, she hasn't eaten since the morning, so she spends a little time looking for oven baked potato chips and water bottles. She takes three bags of chips and one water bottle. As Miladena took all of those, she accidentally bumps into two men holding packs of vodka, immediately being awkward. - "S-Sorry, won't happen again." - She apologizes, then passing by. The two men, instead of forgiving her, make very mean glares at her. When Miladena is in front of the cashier, those two same men get on line behind her, making her sweat out of nervousness.

The cashier named Spas Kondratiev takes the chips and the water bottle, scanning their barcodes with... a laser barcode scanner. - "That would be twenty six Smils with four cents." - He said the price.

Miladena Popov then includes something. - "Can you turn on thirteen gallons of gas in number four? I need to refuel." - She says.

- "Of course, that would be eighty five Smils with eight cents, making that one hundred twelve Smils with two cents in total." - Kondratiev said it calmly. Despite a lot of people coming in to get gasoline, Miladena is one of the fastest customers the station has ever had this day. Kondratiev is an ethnic Kurikian or Belekrian, but he's friendly even to Sminishians.

Miladena Popov takes out bills worth of one hundred twenty Smils and gives it to Kondratiev, who then gives her the chips, water bottle and the change worth of seven Smils with eight cents. Popov then thanks the cashier, and heads out, leaving the building of the station. After leaving, she approaches her car while again, being wary of the surroundings, and opens the vehicle's door of it's back seat, placing the chips and water bottle there. She even hops in the car, but before she could start the car, she realizes that she has yet to refuel, and thus facepalms, underestimating her intelligence by murmuring 'I'm stupid'. Miladena hops out of the car again, and starts refueling it with gasoline. While she refuels the car, she trembles of both fear and cold, blowing 'cloud smokes' out of her mouth despite wearing warm clothes. Less than a minute later, it stops refueling, meaning that she has finished, and thus places back the pump to the tank.

Before Miladena could start her car, one of the two men from the gas station "mysteriously" shows up in front of her, making her jump out of surprise. - "A-Aw jeez, you scared me." - She said, while her heart bumped a bit faster.

- "Oh, I'm sorry for that." - Apologized the man. - "Just thought of coming over to you to say... I forgive you." -

- "... Forgive me for what?" - Asked Miladena, who kind of forgot what happened.

- "Well, accidentally bumping into us, sorry for not forgiving you as well." - He said, forgiving and apologizing at the same time.

- "It's... it's alright, but honestly, this is a bit weird." - Miladena did feel slightly uncomfortable.

- "No worries. By the way, your name is Miladena Popov, just like in the broadcasts, right?" - Asked the man.

Miladena Popov, the journalist woman, was now feeling more uncomfortable. - "Y-Yeah, guess I am. Listen, I have to go, for my job here is done." - She says, trying to hop in to her car, only to be stopped by said man.

- "Hold on there, I haven't introduced myself yet." - Said the man while blocking Popov from the driver's seat door. - "My name is Nediljko Hospod, I just want to talk with you." - He introduced his name, but it doesn't impress the poor woman.

- "That's great and all, but I seriously have to go!" - Said Miladena, desperate to go back home. As she tries to avoid talking with Hospod, a car parks at number three of the gas station.

After the parking, Hospod then whistled with his fingers in his mouth, confusing Miladena. Another one of the men shows up behind her, catching her. - "Got you." - Said the second man, that is where the woman struggles.

- "Let me go!" - She struggles, stomping hard with her strength on the man's feet. Fortunately, the man's shoes were old, as he felt pain, releasing the woman. However, Hospod takes the woman.

- "Stop moving, woman!" - Hospod begins to struggle to hold the woman, this is an abduction attempt.

The driver of the car that has parked in number three of the gas station sees the abduction attempt, and quickly opens the driver's seat door, hopping out of the car and running towards the action. As he gets near Hospod, he blows out a punch to his right cheek, eventually releasing Miladena. The journalist woman gets released, almost falling, then looks at the man who punched the guy. That man is Bohda Zacharov, the border inspector who has finished his job today. - "... Zacharov?" -

Zacharov nods. Because the punch was strong and painful, both Hospod and his partner run away to the streets, failing to abduct a not-so-popular journalist. Zacharov finally answers to Miladena after punching Hospod. - "Indeed." -

Miladena widely smiles with a happy grin. - "Thank you so much!" - She thanked Zacharov, hugging him after. - "Never experienced this before, but I'm really glad you came in." - She says, still hugging him.

Zacharov makes a slight blush, he's never been hugged by a woman before other than his mother. That guy ran away because of one painful punch? Pathetic, usually he would have put a longer fight than just one hit. He hugs Miladena back for a while, but then releases her later. - "Well, don't put all the thanks for me, put some thanks for you too, you put up a good fight. You're welcome by the way." -

Popov then releases Zacharov from the hug. - "I have to go now. I'll remember this moment, make this city safe." - She says to Zacharov, as she hops in the car, waving. Zacharov waved goodbye to her, he was here to refuel his car, but he's really happy he prevented a serious crime from happening. Miladena finally starts her car, driving out of the station and to the city's many exiting roads. She continues to be alert on her surroundings as she drives, her car drives a bit faster now that she refueled it. As she drives slowly in the city, she sets up the GPS destination to her home town, Suncetlo, inside Sminishia's "original" land.

You are now approaching Suncetlo, Sminishia, 2 hours before arrival.

She sighs after fully exiting the city, now going a bit faster.

Two hours later. Suncetlo, Sminishia.

After another tiring road trip, she's finally in a city that's just as developed as Novvy Sotsialny' Gorod, but less larger. Miladena Popov drives to her neighborhood and house, she parks her car there. After parking, she enters the building, which is very clean and equally fashionable as every other house in the neighborhood. Because it is night, she doesn't have time to make dinner for herself, as she ate oven baked potato chips during trip, meaning she's not hungry, so she goes to take a shower and then sleep.

[ I'm sure tomorrow will be a blissful day. ]

Miladena Popov has said inside her mind, just after minutes of showering, changing clothes and seconds after dropping to her bed, finally going to sleep.

Sminishia wrote:

Fourth day, 6:20 AM
Four days after the Treaty of Paragould, and two days of a journalist doing her job, Miladena is currently still sleeping, having a not-so-sweet dream, but is pretty comfortable sleeping while relaxing from stressful jobs. Her smartphone vibrates, along with a 1980's song 'Working for the weekend' playing, it is an alarm set up by her to wake up. Miladena Popov wakes up slowly, with her eyes not opening yet due to her sleep being rudely interrupted. She opens her eyes, but only slightly, then picks up her phone and turns off the alarm, yawning shortly after. She stands up from the bed, going to the bathroom to brush her teeth. Two minutes later, her teeth are whiter than yesterday and moment she woke up. Miladena, after changing clothes, walks down the stairs of her house, approaching the kitchen.

As she makes coffee with her... coffee maker, her phone rings, it's Kovac calling her, so she answers. - "Good morning." - Her tone is a bit tired.

- "Good morning, Popov." - Greeted Kovac on his phone. - "Today I have some great news." - He said, sounding like he said it proudly.

- "Do I get my salary?" - Miladena immediately assumed, desperate to get payed after she almost got abducted yesterday.

- "You sure are a desperate woman." - Said Kovac. - "Yes, you are getting a salary today. Just don't question about your salary too much next time, or they'll call you a greedy capitalist pig." - Responded Kovac, giving Miladena a warning.

- "Sir, I only asked once today, but thank you anyways." - Said Miladena, finishing her coffee and taking a sip so she doesn't fall asleep again. She then goes to the living room, where there is a television.

- "Yeah, I'm kidding." - Claimed Kovac, before being serious. - "Seriously though, there's another thing I want to tell you. Today you get a break, however, tomorrow you'll go uncovering the stories of family reunion in the libera- uh, annexed lands." -

- "That's... something and all, but it's not wrong to call the areas "Liberated Lands", they are ethnic majorities of us anyway." - Miladena turns on the flatscreen TV, which is of course 'smart technology' as well, she switches to the Gradvest News channel to see what Kovac told people to broadcast. - "By the way, I'm having a little fun on watching the channel of your studios, Kovac." - She smiles.

- "Well, thanks for watching!" - He imitates an internet video channel owner's voice. - "That is all I'm going to say, make sure to come today at twelve PM to receive your salary." - Says Kovac.

- "Goodbye." -

- "Bye!" - Kovac hangs up.

Miladena sighs, sure, she gets a break today, but does she want to drive far away again with her car? Well, her job is journalism, so that is pretty fine. The channel she's watching finishes broadcasting the footage of the interview she captured, only for it to start broadcasting a humanitarian crisis in mainland Kurikia that makes the one in Spokoyreka look like a baby's first steps, meaning it is a lot worse. - "Poor bastards." - She said to herself, commenting the situation in Kurikia, she lives in a horrid planet, but that's how it is.

10 minutes after the Kurikian crisis and interview broadcasts, it switches to a Gorbastani state-owned company building a factory with a naval port inside Sminishia, and then a parade being planned in Novvy Sotsialny' Gorod, both civilian and military. With the civilian one resembling celebrations of families and ethnic brothers and sisters reunifying with them, while the military one resembling victory over the war. Miladena hopes those people don't glorify war in general, cause if so, she will be pissed off.

Novvy Sotsialny' Gorod. 11:00 AM

In the streets of the capital and largest city of Sminishia, a celebration is already going on. Dozens of bars are filled with cheers and singings while vodka bottles clash, barbeques being set up in house backyards, people waving the flags of the country, and even civilian parades in some streets. They know they are 4 days late to celebrate, but it's better late than never to express happiness. Not all people are celebrating though, as families mourn and express their sadness on their relatives who joined the military and died fighting to serve the country, some wives of dead soldiers even started crying.

Military parade.

The Sminishian military, after civilians were finished from doing festive parades, now march on the streets. With the first line being old models of the Sminishian People's Army, which were brown and white uniforms of soldiers holding old submachine guns and AK rifles while tanks with thin armor were rolling. They have a marching band behind them, so it makes music for the soldiers to gladly march. After lines from older to newer models, a line of completely modern models march, with combat vests, assault rifles and even thick armored tanks with computing systems march on the streets.

After all the parades, some people nationwide in Sminishia offered welfare and jobs for ones who live in the so-called "Liberated Lands", even offering them equal and fair payment. People even give speeches about why war should not be glorified, showing footage of war torn cities and refugees flocking to other areas.


Episode 2: People's Rule, Now!

Sminishia wrote:

Fifth Day.

Fifth day morning, city of Suncetlo. Miladena wakes up very tiredly to a sound of a phone text message notification. Her eyes open slowly, seeing the unusual sunlight through her windows, then yawning. The journalist woman yawns, picking up her phone from the night table and starting to read the following notification:

__________________________________________________
| You have 6 missed calls and 13 text messages from Kovac. |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

With big numbers of missed calls and text messages, she opens her eyes wide despite tiredness. Did she just oversleep? She knew it was a bad idea to stay up all night talking with celebrating strangers. Miladena then starts to read the last message of the missed notifications:

Popov! WHERE. ARE. YOU?! YOU'RE BEING TOO LATE!

Miladena gasps, she freaks out, typing up a text message so fast she makes several grammatical errors.

OMG IM SORRY I WIlL WAK EUP NOE

She facepalms quickly after sending the message, but she has no time, for Miladena jumps out of the bed to the bathroom, doing everything she needs to do when she wakes up, such as brushing teeth quickly, changing clothes and such. She runs downstairs after wearing socks and shoes, taking a piece of bread from the kitchen and putting it on her mouth, then grabbing her journalistic backpack and leaving the house. Just after getting in the car, she starts to call Kovac in phone before starting the vehicle, she honestly doesn't remember which city to go to.

Kovac picks up the phone. - "Ah, you finally answered me." - He said.

- "Please forgive me, I overslept, I'm sorry that I'm too late." - Miladena apologized twice.

- "Ma'am, it's fine. People make mistakes, and so do I." - Kovac forgives Miladena. - "In case you forgot, you're heading back to the Annexed lands to a new province named Kamenistrava, named after it's city." - Says Kovac. - "I've heard reports that... stuff from it's local politicians having something suspicious. You might have crossed the Kamenistrava province, so I think you'll know what it looks like there." -

- "Thank you, I'll set up the GPS to Kamenistrava right now." - Said Miladena, definitely setting up the destination in the city.

- "I'll give further instructions when you drive, good luck!" - Kovac hangs up.

After the hanging nup, Miladena starts up her car, and it sure does start nicely. She drives off her home, with the destination set up in the GPS application on her smartphone. She remembers the line "something suspicious", beginning to think that there may be corruption she'll have to uncover. Sure, she has uncovered humanitarian crises to warn people, guarantee them safety and let humanitarian aid organizations know that they have a mission to relieve victims, but she has never uncovered political corruption.

You are now approaching your destination, Kamenistrava, Sminishia, 1 hour and 30 minutes.

Miladena is too tired, but she can still drive, as she'll probably grab some fresh coffee from that city.

Sminishia wrote:

You are now approaching your destination, Kamenistrava, Sminishia, 30 minutes of arrival.

After a long hour of driving, the journalist woman Miladena Popov is very tired indeed, she hasn't had coffee today due to waking up too late to do her job. All she ate for breakfast is one slice of bread, that is all. She's even hungry, she definitely wishes food is equally cheap in Kamenistrava. Why is she hoping that? During and after the war, food prices have risen slightly, which was part of a taxation for the government to support the military during the war and reconstruction projects after the war. Was the military secretly bankrupt? Or was it to pay replenishments for military divisions and funerals for dead soldiers? It matters little now, since the war is over, at least Miladena is 30 minutes from her destination. Bored, and trying to make the times a little spicy, she turns on the radio of her car and switches to news numbers.

 -ays after celebrations, huge public concern have been going on nationwide in Sminishia, first starting, and especially in the city of Kamenistrava, one of the urban places inside the so-called "Liberated Lands" or "Annexed Lands". The concerns are about the mysterious disappearance of a foreign journalist who was identified as Albina Barrueco, with said journalist coming from a major country named San Sierra. This public concern has quickly given birth to conspiracy theories that the major of the Kamenistrava city has ordered the local police to either secretly arrest the journalist or assassinate her. The theory isn't confirmed just yet, but if proven to be true, there would most likely be events of public outrage.

Mysterious disappearance of a journalist? Arresting? DEATH?! No matter if outside the car is cold as the planet's poles, Miladena Popov begins to sweat, have her eyes open wide and even her pupils shrunk. Would she have to play Inspector and risk her life to uncover local government corruption? Or just uncover what people think of the situation and even let the national police know to start an investigation? If this Aliba Barrueco theory is real, she would have to be really careful.

In other news, possibly related or unrelated to the previous reports, people nationwide, especially in the "Original Lands" have begun to peacefully demonstrate their protests against the representative system of the Sminishian government, even wishing for a direct democracy. Demonstrations mostly take place in urban cities, but the largest one is in the capital city of Novvy Sotsialny' Gorod, since it is the largest city in the nation after all. Demonstrators don't make up the majority of the population just yet, but with it's increasing popularity, it is likely that the demands would be turned to a true thing. This is Sobeslava Brod of Macevalac News, signing off.

Macevalac News is the second biggest independent news media organization in Sminishia, even though they share similar political views with Gradvest, they are both engaging in rivalry for news media and who's the most accurate form of news reports. However, with situations, the rivalry doesn't matter at this moment, if Miladena Popov does uncover government corruption, she thinks it would be likely to fuel up demands of direct rule from the people. As long as she gets to say anything she wants, it won't be bad to have the people rule the country.

You are now approaching your destination, Kamenistrava, Sminishia, 10 minutes of arrival.

She's almost there.

9 minutes later, Kamenistrava.

You are now approaching your destination, Kamenistrava, Sminishia, 53 seconds of arrival.

Miladena Popov is finally in the city, she doesn't like long road trips, but as journalist it's her job. By the second she arrives at the many entrances of the city by road, she already sees demonstrations against the major of the city Damek Petrov and his representatives. Demonstrations include: Protesting with calm anger, raising signs, waving the Sminishian flags (with some of them having power fist instead of hammer), marching on the streets, chanting words like "Petrov get out" and others alike. She parks her car in a parking lot.

Just after she hops out of the car, she grabs her backpack of her camera with wireless microphone and her laptop, being a journalist, she's about to have a journey in this great city's situation. Booo, lame joke. Anyways, because she's tired and hungry, she heads to a nearby cafeteria, but before she could, she gives a reaction to the demonstrations held by the people. - "Jeez, they really are angry, is it because of that theory? Or something else happen?" - She questions herself while walking. finally, she enters a cafeteria, which, unsurprisingly, even the employees are shouting activist words, but still working to serve customers.

- "Out Damek Petrov, we are the people." - Says an employee, expressing his activism. As he sees the journalist woman come in, he clears his throat. - "Good afternoon woman, welcome to Litvak's Café, how can I take your order?" - He asks, taking a note.

Miladena inhales and exhales. - "Hello, can I have an order of waffles and... latté? Please?" - She says.

- "Of course." - The employee says, writing his note. - "Anything else?" -

- "Yes, I'm a journalist of Gradvest, I want to talk with you about these protests and the situation in the government." - She said a little bit outloud.

- "A... a journalist? Sure! I'd love to have a ta- I mean, that'll be 30 Smils, good ma'am." - He sayd.

- "Right." - Miladena reaches her wallet, taking out 30 Smils and giving it to the employee, who then saves it in the cash register.

- "Food will be on it's way." -

Minutes later.

Miladena is sitting on a chair, at a table, while holding her phone and going to social media applications for further news. The employee, like a waiter, brings in a cup of latté and a plate of sugar powdered waffles for Miladena. - "Thank you." - She says.

- "You're welcome." - Welcomed the employee to Miladena. - "By the way, can I introduce my name?" - He asks.

- "For the sake of the interview, yes." - Affirms Miladena to the employee, as she starts recording with a fully charged camera and gives it's wireless microphone to him.

- "Well, my name is Vivien Fouquet, and I prefer tea over coffee." - He gives out his name to Miladena Popov proudly.

- "The name sounds... a bit exotic, are you Gorbastani?" - Asks Miladena.

Fouquet nods. - "Of course, my grandparents come from Gorbastan." -

- "Interesting, haven't really seen Gorbastani people in former Kurikian lands. Anyways, first question... what is happening?" - The bold question marks that Miladena thinks is very, very complex and a mess.

- "Glad you asked, ma'am." - Fouquet clears his throat. - "The mayor of the city Damek Petrov has been blatantly caught bribing a police officer to arrest his more popular political rival for crimes he never did nor there was evidence for, a trial was held after, and even if again, there was no evidence for any crimes he did, the city's judiciary system has sentenced the said rival named Vukan Jakesch to 20 years to prison, we could see easily see bills of former Kurikian dollars and current Sminishian Smils popping up from pockets of the judge. Not only that, he has rigged the most recent mayor election to keep him in local power just for his own benefits." - Explained Fouquet.

- "Aw jeez. I... think we had something like that in the past, but the Sminishian central government sanctioned them. Next que-" - Miladena says, before she gets interrupted.

- "Oh, one more thing. As you have heard from other news sources, Petrov even rejected state-owned companies' offers to help in development of cities and even took the funding for welfare and education for his own personal wealth. I've heard other city mayors have done the same, and we saw the true evils of a representative system, so we are protesting as you see now." - Fouquet added further explanations.

- "... Oh, so they are that bad." - Said Miladena. - "Right, I would ask why is it happening, but you have already explained it, so I'm just going to skip ahead and ask the final question." - She says, before clearing her throat. - "Do you see a bright future that the protests would bring?" -

- "Certainly. We might have some flaws, but the people will be the ones to decide who is going to be leader of that, and even call for said leader or figure to resign whenever they want. Free speech will spread more, but I do hope the protests work peacefully." - Fouquet sure is certain about the future.

- "Right, thank you for talking with me, I'll enjoy this breakfast you gave me." - Said Miladena, smiling.

- "You're welcome." - Fouquet stands up, he may be a cafeteria employee, but he sure is a political nerd. - "Bon appétit." - He says to Miladena, as he goes back to work.

Miladena Popv stops recording, she'll upload that when she eats her breakfast. She sips latté, and it sure is good, she cuts a piece of waffles, and eats is, sure is good too. After eating breakfast and drinking latté, she has indeed enjoyed the meal like Fouquet told her to do so. As she has finished eating, she has already paid, and has gone outside of the cafeteria, her mission to analyze the theory has begun.

Sminishia wrote:

Out, Damek Petrov!

Upon the not-so-clean streets, and upon cold, yet smoking air, Miladena Popov opens the door of the cafeteria, exiting the building after a nice conversation and breakfast, she feels her stomach a bit full. Right now, as people march the streets, raising fists and signs, waving flags and even yelling 'Напоље, Дамек Петров!' which means 'Out, Damek Petrov!', Miladena now takes her camera she's been recording the interview with. She begins recording the protests, and even city police officers watching the demonstrations against the mayor and doing almost nothing about it. The police who do something against the protests are called back by his partners, they would have to let citizens protest since this country has a policy that allows rights to protest.

Jeez, the people are angry alright. Miladena, while recording, walks around the city of Kamenistrava. After a protester sees the Gradvest logo at Miladena's left shoulder, he reaches out to her, fast walking. - "Hej!" - He calls.

Miladena flinches, she sees a protester approaching her, so she inhales and exhales. - "Ummm..." -

Before Miladena Popov could say anything, the protester finally stood in front of her. - "I see that you are a journalist, right?" - He asked. - "If so, have you had an interview with a fellow comrade participating in a protest?" - The protester added a second question.

- "Uhhhh..." - Miladena couldn't answer yet, she was too busy quietly recording the protests, not that she was against it though, she's in support of it, she is just here to gather information and... uncover something. - "Yes, and yes. You wanted to talk with me about something?" -

- "Da. I did not want an interview with you, I just wanted to tell you something." - The protester looks at both sides, then back at Miladena. - "Last time there was a journalist here, she mysteriously disappeared. It might have to do something with the mayor and the corruption, if you wish to have an interview with any local politician of Kamenistrava, remember what I told you." -

- "Yeah, I heard. Hope she isn't dead or something." - Miladena Popov sure does hope that the missing journalist isn't killed.

- "Right, so if you want to interview mayor, just remember that I warned you. Don't end up like Barrueco." - He said, going back to protesting.

Less than half an hour later.

With protests still happening, mayor Damek Petrov finally agrees to have a conversation with the woman journalist Miladena Popov. This makes Miladena sweat REAL hard, two security guards escorting her to the mayor's palace of Kamenistrava doesn't help either, what if they make an ambush to arrest, or if worse, execute her? Even though her job is to uncover corruption, she panics inside while thinking too much of Albina Barrueco. While hoping not to "disappear", she finally makes it to the Mayor's office.

Despite Sminishia being a Socialist country, and the city looking like almost nothing has improved, the office looks surprisingly looks better than most mayor offices of any Sminishian city, Damek Petrov is seen sitting on the chair of his desk, awaiting for Miladena to sit down. After awkward seconds of Miladena standing there, Petrov says something. - "Why won't you take a seat, young woman?" -

The way he said 'woman' made the journalist uncomfortable. - "O-Of course, mayor." - She obliges, sitting down on the chair in front of the mayor's desk. She slowly clears her throat, didn't sound clear at all. - "... My name is Miladena Popov, journalist- " -

- "Of Gradvest, Sminishia's biggest independent news media? I watched your broadcasts." - Petrov interrupted Popov, finishing her sentence. - "I know what you came in for, interview, right?" -

- "Y-Yes, I came here to ask you questions. Mind if I ask one?" - Asks Miladena, already recording with her camera, but hiding the red lights and not telling the mayor.

- "Don't be nervous, madam, I'm definitely open to answers." - Petrov put a smug face. - "I don't mind at all." -

That 'definitely' did not sound definite, something is up, she swears inside her mind. Miladena finally starts to ask a question. - "First question... what do you thi-" -

- "Think of the protest? They are all ungrateful bastards who don't respect good mayors like me, who would want to force a man to resign from power whenever the people and even the poor feel like it? And who would want every people to be in power of something?" - Petrov interrupted Miladena once again, and even though he answered, it sounded like he was admitting that he likes being a dictator.

- "... I'm not religious, but for God's sake, please don't interrupt me again." - Says Miladena, annoyed. - "Glad I received your answer, but if you don't like majority of people deciding stuff, please remember you live in a Democracy, well, at least in a constitutional one." -

- "Alright, alright, I won't do it again, princess." - Petrov promised to not interrupt again, still sounding rude though.

Miladena almost groans, but because of the disappearance of a journalist, she keeps it quiet. - "N-Next question... are you thinking of resigning one day?" -

- "I'll resign when I die." - That means Petrov wants to rule for the rest of his life.

[ Damn, this guy really is the worst mayor in this country. ] Thought Miladena to herself, before asking the next journalistic question. - "Another question, what do you think happened to Albina Barrueco?" - She mentions the San Sierran journalist who reportedly disappeared in this municipality.

- ". . ." - Dot dot dot indeed, Petrov kept quiet.

- "Sorry if I'm making you think through sir, I'll give you time to -" - Miladena stops after Petrov hands him something.

What Petrov is handing is a wad worth of ten thousand Smils. - "You did not hear of that woman." - He said, attempting bribery to escape this question.

Miladena shrinks her pupils. - "... Are you..." - She shakes her head. - "Are you bribing me, sir?" -

- "Just take the money you fu-" - Immediately, he gets interrupted by a guard.

- "I can show you what happened to Albina, Miladena." - He said. - "I can even escort you." -

This raises suspicion, yet a lot of concern for the journalist, will the guard betray the mayor and show what really happened to the foreign journalist? Miladena thinks for a moment before standing up. Then, nods. - "Please do." -

- "Hey, no no no! There's nothing about her you idiot!" - Denied Petrov, only to be ignored by both people.

The second guard doesn't let Petrov stand up. - "Let them be." - Turns out he isn't really loyal to the mayor at all.

The first guard then opens up a hidden trapdoor, which it's space was usually empty. Unfortunately, this isn't the usual times, Petrov puts his right hand on his forehead, thinking he's doomed because of a man he thought was loyal is doing something. As the trapdoor is open, it reveals a terrifying discovery, it's Albina's corpse. Her skin is still "soft", but it's also whiter than before, her dead face looking disturbingly emotionless, her eyes dry and even having her bloody wound in her chest being exposed. This makes Miladena let out a huge horrified gasp, is this what happened to a woman from a fricking foreign country?! She has a will to scream.

- "This is the missing person you're looking for." - Said the guard, before looking at Petrov looking very guilty.

As the journalist shivered and looked at the body, she revealed her camera's red lights, it is still recording, she shows it to the guards and even Petrov. She was startled for seconds, then looked at the disgusting freak of a mayor. - "Did... did you kill her?!" -

- "So..." - Damek Petrov, the local tyrant of the city, sighed. - "You have seen it... to answer your question, yes, I have killed her." - He said with admission, as the second guard takes the handcuffs and puts it on Petrov's hands.

- "Unbelievable... murder by a government official..." - Miladena has never seen a lifeless corpse in her entire life other than entertainment sources.

- "Let's get out ma'am, I'll tell you more later." -

More minutes later.

As the interview went... unexpected, demonstrations against Petrov are still happening, especially in front of the mayor's palace. Finally, Petrov, the two guards and the journalistic woman Miladena Popov show up while exiting the building. Upon demonstrators seeing Petrov handcuffed, minor cheers are immediately made, but most are still angry, as they want to spit right at the mayor's face. The guards call for nearby officers of the city's police, at least the least corrupt ones, to enter the palace, while letting the Miladena go and forcing Petrov to make a speech before being fully arrested.

Soon, the mayor finally gives a speech. - "Citizens of Kamenistrava... as you may all know, I am the mayor of the city, and I was before this place has been transferred to being part of Sminishia." - As he says his first sentence, many boo's are heard from the crowd and demonstrators. - "Please, citizens, let me give a chance to talk. Since you have showed demonstrations against me, since you have called and wished for me to be taken out of office, I have an announcement to make." - He inhales and exhales. - "I, Damek Petrov, am hereby resigning as mayor from office, firstly known as Mayor Petrov... now as regular old citizen Petrov." -

With the announcement given, the crowd immediately cheers up, whistles and yelling of the words 'URA!' are heard, and then chanted, as they wave the Sminishian flags, which makes Petrov look down. - "Further announcements about me will be likely released tomorrow, but further news will likely be broadcasted by Gradvest as welll." - This doesn't stop the crowd from cheering.

Miladena Popov is still scarred from seeing a corpse, especially belonging to a fellow journalist. She returns to the cafeteria, taking her laptop, using the cafe's free WI-FI and uploading everything she recorded. She has uncovered government corruption, but she'll never forget what she saw.

Sminishia wrote:

Midnight between fifth and sixth day, Kamenistrava.

It has been less than 9 hours since the money ridden mayor Damek Petrov has resigned from ever governing the city of Kamenistrava ever again, but this stops the national police from nothing. Protests that were occurring in the day were done today, with their leaders calling for demonstrators to sleep since it is night, and to continue protesting in the next day, as the police investigate the mayor's palace and even collect the corpse of a then-journalist, but they yet have to find her passport and data of which city she lived in.

There are fifteen police units inside the mayor's palace, with four of them in the mayor's office and desk room (where the corpse is located). Because of the cold outside, they are all wearing waterproof heated vests and ushankas that have a hammer badge. Ten more police units, including one sergeant named Mlivoj Klima, are awaiting outside for the men inside the place to finish finding everything they need to gather. Sergeant Klima holds a portable two-way radio device, pressing and holding a button which makes a beeping sound, then, he speaks through the device. - "Did you find anything yet, comrades?" - He asks, being a little desperate while standing in the literal cold.

/\/\ We definitely found a corpse that the other woman kept talking about, we have even discovered a trapdoor where the body exactly is. Unfortunately, our boys couldn't find her identification card nor a passport, neither could I. Over. /\/\

- "You found the corpse, but couldn't find an ID card? Did you check the pockets?" -

/\/\ Aye aye, there's a note of reports possibly written by the woman, although I can't understand the language. Still, we couldn't find her ID card nor any documents with her identity. Either she must have been mistakenly accepted, or Damek Petrov got rid of them. /\/\

- "Bastard, was he trying to cause a war?" - Sergeant Klima has gotten a little angry.

/\/\ Uh, excuse me Sarge, but what does this have to do with war? /\/\

- "He killed a foreign journalist, there have been national conflicts over deaths of individuals of their national identity. Continue searching, I'm sure the capitalist pig has hidden it somewhere." - Sergeant Klima's mention of war and national conflict worried nearby officers that are outside with him. Some have even doubted, why a war?

/\/\ Sarge, while you were speaking, one of our comrades have finally found her identification card, documents and even her passport. It was hidden in a storage locker outside the mayor's room and in some hallway. We split up to multiple teams, so we weren't the ones who found it. /\/\

Klima sighs of relief. - "Tell one of the other teams that they have done a nice job." -

/\/\ Of course. However, we have found something very... concern... oh my God. /\/\

- "What's wrong boys? Did you find something?" -

/\/\ Well, um... Sarge, you would want to see this. /\/\

- "Is it this concerning? If so, bring it to me, I'm sure the Police Commissioner would like to see it as well." -

Minutes later, two teams of police officers, making 9 of the units in total, go out of the mayor's palace, holding stuff they have found, while one team holds a morgue brought in by the police to carry the corpse of the then-journalist Albina Barrueco, and the other team holding ID documents and one a folder of documents with a company's logo stamped on it. Sergeant Klima gives off a very interesting look at the officer holding the folder. - "What do we have here, compatriot?" -

- "It's... you're right, the Police Commissioner has to see this." - Says the officer, as he hands over the folder of documents, it includes a stamp of a logo from one of the largest state-owned companies.

- "Tehnicki Nacini? I thought they were defunct." - Assumed Sergeant Klima, Tehnicki Nacini is a currently active, but largely forgotten state-owned IT company. - "I'm going to take a read on this on the vehicle. Not to worry about the night, I have my flashlight." - He says, heading to his police car. As he hops in the car with the folder in his hand, he turns on his flashlight and opens the folder to read the documents. Why didn't he turn on his car for light? He doesn't want to waste his vehicle's energy. As he passes pages of documents, the first results are contracts and deals made by the company and agreed by Damek Petrov and his representatives in the city council, the contract was about the company helping not only Damek Petrov, but also local representatives and politicians of cities especially located in the annexed lands to rig their elections and unfairly win them in return for financial support to keep the company up even without economic benefits to the general IT industry of Sminishia and the national economy.

After reading all these, Sergeant Klima could not believe it, is a state-owned company really helping politicians rig elections so that they could get more funds from provincial governments? - "What in the..." - He pauses. - "This is corrupt debauchery! I need to tell my men and the commissioner." -

Half an hour later, many policemen have left the city capitol area, few remained continuing to search for more suspicious clues, but most were heading to report journalists and people of news media, even the sarge had to tell his captain and the police commissioner about the recently discovered documents. Miladea Popov, the journalist woman who let the police know about a dead woman, is currently hanging around her most recently favored cafeteria in the city, yes, in midnight. She's still awake because of coffee, and her body is on a mild tremor, she's being addicted to caffeine, although she can still think well. Miladena is offered glasses of water by Vivien Fouquet, who just wants to go home, but Miladena refuses, suddenly, she gets a call from her phone, so she answers.

- "Good... morning, I guess, Miladena Popov of Gradvest, how can I-" -

- "This is the police, you remember when you gave me a number?" -

- "Oh, morning officer, I guess I do." -

- "Good, I need to know where you are, because I have something to report." -

Miladena sighs. - "I'm at Litvak's Café, still with my laptop watching the footage. If you do have something to report, why not do it with text message?" -

- "It's something you need to see in person." - The calling officer responds. - "But.. You're at Litvak's Café? It's midnight. Whatever, I'll bring em' to you." -

- "... Thaaaaaaanks." -

A door immediately opens after the 'thanks', it's the cop that was calling Miladena in phone, he was standing in front all this time. - "You know it's rude to thank me like that." - He says jokinly, hanging up his phone call while physically looking at Miladena.

- "Whaaaa..." - She still sounds tired and unamused, while Fouquet chuckled.

- "I'm joking." - The policeman chuckled as well. - "But seriously though, what is a recently discovered document, you might want to report it and help warn the public." - He says, while sliding the folder of the documents. - "This is a copy I received from a nearby police station in this city, but it says everything that the original contained." -

Miladena gives the folder a look. - "... Interesting." - Very interesting indeed. - "I'm... I'm sorry if I sound unenthusiastic, I'm just really tired and my coffee isn't working." - She says, giving an excuse.

- "It's fine woman, just read it." -

And so, Miladena opens the folder, with the first paper having a logo of Tehnicki Nacini, the forgotten but still active Sminishian state-owned company. She gives it a read of pages, she had the same reaction as Sergeant Klima did... unbelievable. - "What the hell is this?" - Said Miladena. - "Did... did they really do this?" -

- "Of course they did. We'd be happy if you let the public know about this fast, maybe take photos of the documents and publish them to your media Gradvest." - Said the policeman.

- "... Understood." - Miladena obliged, taking photos of documents that contain contracts that have caused corruption, and soon after taking pictures of all pages, she uploads those pictures to the website of Gradvest, even adding descriptions that a policeman gave it to her, and that the documents are a copy of the original.

- "Good work, woman." - He motions her up. - "By the way, you need some sleep, mind renting an hotel?" - He offers.

- "I need sleep indeed... But I won't rent an hotel, I'm fine sleeping in my car." - Said Miladena with a more tired face.

Vivien Fouquet jumps in kindly. - "She can stay at my place." - He offers to Miladena. - "No need to pay anything, I even have a spare head." -

Miladena smiles at Fouquet, nodding. - "I... I guess I'll pick Fouquet's place." - She says, it makes Fouquet happy.

The cop smiles. - "Well, at least you don't get to pay anything just to sleep comfortably, or you don't need to hurt your back to rest." - He admits. - "Fouquet, you're lucky, because if one or more youngsters were here, they'd call you, umm... what is it named..." - The cop tries to think of what the kids call, and then points at Fouquet with his right hand and finger. - "A simp. My nephews have called me that whenever I did something for my wife." -

Fouquet sighs, such is the internet today. Miladena could have giggled, but she didn't due to her tiredness. Because it's done uploading, she closes her laptop and puts it on her backpack, grabs her camera and wireless microphone, then stands up. - "Let's go..." -

Minutes later, the three people get out of the cafeteria, with lights turning off and Fouquet putting a 'Closed' sign. Fouquet takes Miladena Popov to his place for her to sleep and rest in, and so she does sleep there. As Miladena sleeps, she awaits for Gradvest to find out about the scandal and make public reports about it, she even wonders how people would react to that and the company for doing so.

Sminishia wrote:

Sixth day, 8:48 AM.

It is still cold outside despite being in the summer. Miladena has already been awake, she has sleeping for nearly eight hours, feeling well rested compared to yesterday. She's in Fouquet's Soviet-era apartment in the number of 288, the place surprisingly looks a lot better than most communal apartments, but that's only the inside look, since the outside look appears very similar and equal to said communal apartments. As the kitchen is ridden with the great smell of food since Vivien Fouquet is cooking, Miladena Popov, still in her sleeping clothes, turns on the Television just to see if Gradvest is broadcasting her footage she recorded. The TV is definitely switched to the channel, with it's news member speaking.

Yesterday, as protests and demonstrations were active nationwide especially in the northern cities, our journalist Miladena Popov has found a dark secret of a mayor Damek Petrov of the Kamenistrava city and province, who has later resigned following the time being arrested by the police.

There were two dark secrets, one found by said journalist, and one found by the police, but too uploaded by the journalist. Inside the city capitol, or at least the mayor's palace, a dead body was discovered, said body belonged to the foreign journalist who has mysteriously disappeared, the police have said that they took time to find the documents, and after this discovery, the Sminishian central government issued a strong apology including details that they arrested the mayor and that they would return the body to her country of origin. Not only was a corpse found out, a folder of documents was discovered by the police during an investigation after arrest, these documents include contracts and deals with city politicians and a state-owned company Tehnicki Nacini, with contracts detailing that the company would support city candidates cheating in local elections in return for financial support to keep the said company active and powerful despite doing very little to benefit the IT industry and the use of silicon. The first man to read it after discovery was police officer Borzivoi Bobkov, and later following police sergeant Milivoj Klima, who described the contracts as 'corrupt debauchery'. 

This too, has been uploaded by journalist Miladena Popov, who claimed that the documents she received was a copy made in a police station of the original, made to not lose data. In other news... The Kurikian Military Government has threatened actions considered as war cri-

Miladena turns off the TV, sighing. Despite being glad that her reports made it to the channel, she's still scarred from seeing the dead body, and is overthinking of how protests would grow after seeing corruption. The footage of the dead body even made it, however, in the broadcasts, it was censored to prevent people from being disturbed, although it only did very little of that. Then, Fouquet calls to Miladena.

- "Breakfast is ready!" - He yelled out.

- "Coming!" - Miladena responded, standing up from the couch and approaching the kitchen.

As she entered the kitchen, the smell of food is good. Vivien Fouquet has cooked fried eggs, bacon and Gorbastani toast (Valsoran equivalent for French toast). Alongside is black tea, which serves the same purpose of coffee, but like Fouquet said, he preferred tea than coffee. Fouquet smiles at Miladena. - "Bon Appétit." - He told the woman to enjoy her food.

Miladena Popov nods without saying anything, she picks up a fork and knife, cutting a piece of fried egg, taking it with the fork and eating it. It tastes good indeed, she's seen smiling, but before she says anything, she does the same to the Gorbastani toast, and eats the piece, tasting even better. - "You're a great cook, Fouquet." - She compliments the guy's cooking skills, before starting to actually eat the breakfast.

Fouquet blushes a little bit, but succeeds in hiding it and returning his face color to normal. - "Thank you very much." - He smiled greatly, soon sitting down and beginning to eat alongside the journalist woman.

Meanwhile, at Vetrojesto. 9:00 AM

The city of Vetrojesto is a partially polluted city, but locals and officials are doing their job to remove said pollution and clean up the city. Not only that, the city has computer factories that are being upgraded with IT, automation and easier jobs for workers with technology, and the city is near a silica-rich mine site, which is owned by the state. That city is also the HQ place for Tehnicki Nacini, the state-owned company behind the corruption in the annexed lands. Inside the HQ building, it's Head of Company (Sminishian term for CEO) is watching the Gradvest news, they found out everything that he has done, not to mention the shock he had as he found out a mayor he supported killed a foreign journalist, he's making a stressed gesture with hands clenched, and then placed on top of his head.

The Head of Company's name is Bojan Svarovsky, while he didn't found or establish this state-owned company, he still runs it, and now, because of what he's done, he's bringing the entire thing to an end. He presses his fingers onto his nose bridge. - "What have I done? What have I done? Why have I done this?" - Svarovsky repeats it himself over and over, deeply regretting his decisions and realizing that he put a shameful and stained reputation in one of the once largest state-owned companies in the country. While questioning himself why did he agree to secretly intervene and cheat in elections, he received both an Email and a text message in his smartphone, they are both from the central government of the Socialist Republic. He expects it to be government pressure, as he checks out the text message in his phone and Email, he reads the text message, which says:

Good morning, Bojan Svarovsky, this message is from the Ministries of: Economics and Law Enforcement.

Read the Email and print it, please.

The text message was really short, but it sounded a little bit threatening, but he obliged, opening the email in his laptop with the company's logo. The email reads about the consequences of Svarovsky's actions, reports of revealed documents about contracts and a corruption scandal connected to the said contracts. Following this, the email also contains decisions made by the government for something about the company, including seizing currency behind the scandal and forceful shutdown, since the company barely produces benefits of their purpose anymore. After Svarovsky finishes reading, he lied his head onto his desk, ready to cry, but before he could, his phone is vibrating along with a ring. He first expects more pressure from the government, but it's actually from one of his employees.

He picks it up. - "... Hello?" - His tone sounded crushing, but his employee sounded panicked.

- "Boss! I see the police has parked their cars in front of our headquarters, do you have any idea what's going on?" - Said the employee, who is outside and was about to work today.

- "... They..." - Svarovsky couldn't believe it, the police are already here? He knows he deserves this, but they're here that fast? He clears his throat. - "That fast?" - He asked, still making stressed gestures and on the verge of tears.

- "What do you mean 'that fast'? Has anyone done something inside?" -

- "You'll... you'll find out." -

Bojan Svarovsky hangs up from the phone, awaiting his arrest. After the call has hung up, dozens of police officers get out from their cars, entering the headquarter building of Tehnicki Nacini. They are here to investigate everyone associated with the company, and to arrest the Head of Company. Two police officers enter the office room of the Head of Company, arresting Bojan Svarovsky while the police force fill the building with radio chatter and quotes by the policemen.

Back at Kamenistrava.

Miladena Popov and Vivien Fouquet both leave the apartment after eating breakfast and changing clothes. Miladena looks at Fouquet. - "Thank you for letting me stay on your place, Vivien." - She smiles.

- "You're welcome" - Says Fouquet, waving goodbye. - "I have to go to work now, it was nice knowing that Petrov resigned, bye!" - He said, walking away to the cafeteria to go to work, he has customers to serve.

Miladena waves back. - "Bye!" - She said a farewell.

As Fouquet walked to go back to work, Miladena grabbed her stuff, readying to record stuff one more time and then go home. As she presses the record button, she walks upon the environment of demonstrators gaining larger crows and being a bit more loud. They are enraged that a company intervened in all this corruption, it's leader stands up at a fountain with a megaphone while holding the Sminishian flag.

- "Attention, comrades! As you may have heard, we are demonstrating for direct People's Rule! But something came up, it was recently discovered that capitalist degenerates have rigged city elections in favor of greedy local politicians and helped unfairly elect representatives to city legislations for monetary gains, they wanted nothing but currency as the people they helped make us suffer with tyranny. This shows the TRUE EVILS of a representative system, we thank the police officers and journalists for uncovering this filth, but for something like this to not happen again, we spread the word and demand the abolition of a representative system, having it proved it is a danger to Sminishian democracy. We are all comrades!" -

The protest leader who gave the speech is named Niklaus Borodin, to show support for the demonstrator's demands, he was democratically elected to be leader of these protesters. Protesters chant 'We are all comrades' to show the purpose of the protests.

Miladena Popov has recorded this, however, she doesn't have time to upload it now, as she has to go home. One protester stops her from going to her car for a minute, Miladena hopes this isn't an abduction attempt like last time. To make things good, it isn't. - "Thank you for uncovering this, you are a great compatriot." - Says one of the protesters part of the crowd, who spoke to her before about warnings of being a journalist.

- "T-Thanks." - She says.

- "You mind if I take a selfie with you? Don't worry, I'll make a bit of distance." - Said the protester.

- "Well... a photo won't be bad." -

- "Good!" - He takes his smartphone and stands side Miladena, making him and her smile, and taking a photo shot. He soon distances a bit more from the woman. - "Thank you again, Popov, this time for making me happy." -

Miladena smiles. - "You're welcome." - She says, walking away to her car.

- "We are all comrades." -

Soon, Miladena hops in her car, feeling a bit accomplished. She starts the vehicle, and when driving away, she expects Kovac to text and call her all over again.

Read dispatch

Sminishia wrote:Makes this dispatch.
Yes, I know, I used the Earthbound title font, sue me please don't, Itoi, I'm innocent!

Episode one: Liberated lands.

Sminishia wrote:

Two days.

Two days after the end of the conflict, and one day after celebrations in the now-part-of-Sminishia liberated lands, dozens of news reports still have to make it to nearly isolated villages inside those said lands. Miladena Popov, a female journalist working for Sminishia's biggest independent news media Gradvest, is driving her car to a village not presented in most maps, named Skalistykholm, which never had a journalist visit it. She has heard stories of a foreign journalist trying to enter the town, only to be rejected and arrested by Kurikian police during the communist era of the USR. Miladena, knowing that the town is now in Sminishian territory, hopes that won't be a big problem knowing again that her country is a libertarian regime despite being socialist.

You are now approaching your destination, Skalistykholm, Sminishia, 5 minutes before arrival.

Miladena Popov is finally arriving to that town after hours of tiring road trips. It's freezing outside, snow was everywhere in both camp and roads, even her metal bottle of coffee has cooled down, it's negative 34 Celsius outside! - It can't be that cold now, it's still summer!" - Not like she has a problem with the cold, since Sminishia too is a cold country, but she does not believe that the temperature can be very freezing in a hot season, it feels like she's going nearer to the planet's northern pole. Of course, she has her car's AC blowing hot air to warm it up a bit, even holding her metal bottle of coffee in front of it.

You are now approaching your destination, Skalistykholm, Sminishia, 1 minute before arrival.

Despite her smartphone's GPS telling that she has one minute, Miladena has already arrived to the entrance of the town with the village's name on it's sign. Other than that, the sign says 'Добро пожаловать в Сталистихолм, Союз Социалистических Республик.' which means 'Welcome to Skalistykholm, Union of Socialist Republics.'. She isn't very good at Kurikian, but she can tell that it says something about the communist regime of the USR. - "They still think they live in the Union of Socialist Republics?" - She says to herself, turning off her car near the entrance (but not blocking the sign) and readying herself. Miladena is wearing two layers of winter jacket, gloves, boots and a scarf. Soon, she hops out of the car, immediately feeling the breeze of cold winds and walking through heavier snow than of "northern" Sminishia. As soon as she enters, it is indeed a small village, but bigger than expected since it seems to have more buildings. This reminds Miladena of her childhood, growing up in a small, wooden village like the one here, she's glad that her village is more 'modernized'. Besides being a journalist, she didn't bring a crew to the place, because she's going alone, she's holding a digital camera with a wireless microphone. The town of Skalistykholm is almost all wooden and cobblestone, and because it's freezing, most buildings have chimneys and fires on them turned on.

Despite the peace and decent looks, they still hold communist USR flags in some places, even their coat of arms in the mayor's place. Do they not have even televisions? She goes to ask a villager a question. - "Excuse me." - She says while tapping a villager who just bought bread. - "I'm Miladena Porpov, journalist of Gradvest and Sminishia's biggest independent news media, I have questions to ask." -

The villager looks at her in... a weird way. - "You're one of those people who the big-city dwellers call 'journalists', right?" - He asks a question. - "If so, then... this is the first time I've seen one." - Indeed it is, and so is the town's.

- "Right, uhhh... First question, doe-" - She gets interrupted by the villager.

- "If you want to ask important questions, at least ask the police or the militsiya, I do not want to get in trouble with foreign journalists." - Says the villager, leaving with his bread and going on the way to his house. This marks the fear that authoritarianism still rules with an iron fist despite the USR officially no longer existing.

Miladena sighs, she'll make edits on the footage to blur the face of the villager later, she marks the fear of authoritarianism, and then does what the villager said, ask the law enforcement of the town. Minutes after feeling the cold and blowing winder cloud smokes, she enters the warmer police station building. The building design is just as expected, a building with wooden logs, 'modern' concrete and cobblestone. - "Good evening, citizen, is there some trouble you will report?" - Asks a police officer, always ready to arrest a person who commits felony.

The Sminishian journalist Miladena shakes her head. - "No, I came here to ask you questions, I am a Sminishian journalist." - She says.

- "A journalist? This the first time this town has ever gotten one, but now that we rarely receive policy reports from the police commissar and the premier, I'd gladly answer these questions as long as you don't insult the glorious USR." - The officer confirms despite authoritarianism. - "Make it quick though, I am rather busy." -

- "Okay, umm, first question: Have you ever heard of the most recent war ever?" - She asks.

- "The most recent war?" - The officer looks down to the journalist. - "What war? Did the USR win this one or lose?" -

This make Miladena Porpov take a full document of what happened in the war and the aftermath of it, including the Treaty of Paragould. - "Take this document, good sir." - She says, handing the documents, as she marks that the town really is isolated. - "I'll give you minutes to read and clarify." -

Minutes later, reading with police officers, they realized that Kurikian governments changed, later became part of a revolting nation, and now the town is part of Sminishia, this wrecks the officer's mind. - "... My God..." - The officer is... shocked, they're now part of a smaller country?! - "This really happened?" - He asks, with Miladena nodding. - "I'm going to have to report this to the mayor, I think we've been isolated for this long, we'd even have to change our laws and make a public announcement. Are there any Sminishian military units coming?" - He asks.

- "Probably, they seem to come later than I did though." -

- "Ask me questions later, right now I have to report this to the mayor." -

Hours later, the mayor of the Skalistykholm town has made a public announcement about his resigning of being mayor, and presenting a new local democratic system allowing people to elect local legislators and future majors. However, the journalist stays there for a while, being in an interview with town officials.


Sminishia wrote:

Third day.
Three days after the conflict, and one day after an isolated village was convinced about it's current status, the no-longer isolated town Skalistykholm has changed their flags from old ones from the brutal USR regime to the new ones resembling the Sminishian Socialist Republic. The journalist Miladena Popov has stayed in that town for a day after gathering information about the place: What kind of food do they eat; How rich are they compared to other villages (treasury); What's the newly established local Democratic system now; How large is the town; How developed is it; And finally, where they ethnically Sminishian or Kurikian? All of the answers are given according to the information: Mainly stale bread and reindeer meat; One of the poorest towns in the entire country so far; Locally direct democracy; 3.5 KM in area; Still developing; Ethnic Sminishian, although they seem to be Kurikianized, not to mention actual ethnic Kurikians ran this place.

After all the information gathering done by Miladena Popov, she finally got out of the entrance after a nice cup of coffee given by a polite villager. She would say that she's tired now, but the coffee woke her up and energized her. - "Well... not done with my job yet." - Miladena enters the car, inhaling and exhaling, turning on the vehicle. Before she could drive away, she was marking a GPS destination to another area that has been annexed by Sminishia. She drives now, with her face looking like she doesn't want to do another long trip, just wants to go home, throw herself to bed and breathe warm house air. Of course, she does this to support the Gradvest media, who have now managed to broadcast the no-longer isolated town, and for the salary they're paying to her because of the job.

You are now approaching your destination, Spokoyreka, Sminishia. 58 minutes before arrival.

Despite an estimated time of one hour, her car's fuel is about to run out of fuel for one hour and a half. Miladena realizes this, and she sighs strongly, if she does make it, she hopes that there's a working gas station since the city was probably hit by war. Why is she being called to a city? She has heard that it's facing a growingly mild humanitarian crisis, if it's deadly, she prays for herself not to be killed despite being irreligious. Her GPS is interrupted, for someone is calling her, it is Milanko Kovac, head of Gravest, she picks up. - "Good morning, sir Kovac." - She simply greets on the phone while driving (her car is on speaker).

- "Good morning, madam Miladena, how was Skalistykholm?" - Asks Kovac while talking in phone with the journalist.

- "Em, decent, I'm guessing. At least I made them realize their official status. I sure do hope the Sminishian state cooperates to develop the town for it's bright future." - She gave her opinion. - "How about you, Kovac? How is Gradvest going?" -

- "Glad you asked, we broadcasted every single bit of your footage after we edited them to blur people's faces." -

- "Good to hear, I'm going to a town called Spokoyreka, last time I saw the town in the GPS map, it looked like it was between the border of Sminishia and Belekria, is that true?" -

- "Yes, I heard reports from security guards and even soldiers that the town is split into two urban regions and there's a mild humanitarian crisis, but that's all I know, we're sending you there to uncover reasonings of why is the crisis happening." - Says Kovac.

Miladena now really looks like she doesn't want to do it, but she has to. - "Ah, sh¡t. I'm assuming city neighbors don't like each other, do they?" -

- "I... guess. Just have your camera and wireless microphone ready, do not worry, I'll call a law enforcement official for a bulletproof vest for you to guarantee safe journalism. Remember, if a shootout happens, do not attempt to fight, stay in cover. Good luck." -

- "Wait, I have another que-" - Miladena is interrupted, as Kovac has hung up from the phone. She groans out of worry for safety, slight anger and a feeling of 'I really don't want to do this'.

Ypu are now approaching your destination, Spokoyreka, Belekria. 49 minutes before arrival.

Miladena doesn't question why the country name is changed to Belekria, since she heard it's split into two administrations.

Fifty minutes later, at Spokoyreka.

*Pa-ckl*

A stamp is heard, following next with a small "book" being closed, papers shuffling and a person being really thankful of something. As the thankful person passes something, an official by the name of Bohda Zacharov, a Sminishian border official, is seen working to keep the new borders safe. This border is exactly in the middle of the city square of Spokoyreka. - "Checkpoint 04 available, next!" - He said while grabbing a microphone for the speaker to sound. Just after that, a man from Sanada steps in the checkpoint with his readied documents, the line was faster than expected, but he was still uncomfortable from waiting an hour while he was using his smartphone to it's battery death.

- "Papers, please." - Zacharov performs a small hand gesture of quickly moving his fingers back at him, telling the person to hand over the documents.

The Sanadan man sighs. - "Of course, I hope it's worth approving. " - He says, handing over three documents, which are: ID supplement that includes average appearance, date of birth, weight, height, fingerpri of thumb and coded numbers; An entry permit listing purpose of border passing, time of staying in the country, name and expiration date; Most importantly, the passport which lists the date birth, gender (male), issuing city, expiration date, coded numbers and most importantly, the country. Despite being Sanadan, he has a Krionikian passport due to Sanada being administrated by the Confederal Kingdom of Krionik.

Zacharov begins inspecting the documents before asking questions. - "Purpose of visit?" -

- "I-I'm passing through." - Answered the Sanadan man, named Rotislav Hanak according to the documents.

- "Duration of time?" -

- "About two weeks, inspector." -

After a full minute of investigation and reading rulebooks, the documents are all legitimate, Zacharov stamps a green approval to Hanak's passport, then giving him back the documents. - "Please, behave properly." -

- "Will do." -

Hanak steps out of the checkpoint, stepping his feet in Sminishian territory. Zacharov does not get a citation of punishment, but does get called to take a lunch break, so he grabs the speaker's microphone. - "Checkpoint 04 will change inspector for one hour, please ready your documents as he positions himself in the ckeckpoint." -

Minutes later, Zacharov grabs a grilled cheese he made this morning and saved it to this time. Before taking a bite, he accidentally bumps to a woman with a bulletproof vest, almost falling, but thankfully not doing so. - "Forgive me, madam, I was being impatient." - He apologized, but then stopped again this time more calmly.

- "Excuse me, sir. Are you a border inspector?" - Asked the woman.

- "Well, yes, I'm currently taking a lunch break, why do you ask? Was there a mistaken person I let through?" - Answers Zacharov, only for him to question twice.

- "I'm that gal you met a year ago, Miladena Popov, I came here as journalist to uncover a humanitarian crisis here." - Said Miladena, who is wearing a bulletproof vest a police officer gave her the vest even marks the Gradvest logo.

- "... You are that woman! Popov! Dobro je vidjeti vas! (It is good to see you!)" - Greeted Zacharov in Lovci language (Sminishian primary language). - "Yes, there is a humanitarian crisis, just yesterday there was a terrorist attack committed by an unknown extremist group, and dozens of people from Belekria, who aren't even from Belekria, are coming to Sminishia." - He says.

- "Glad to see you too, Zacharov. I feel sorry for those killed by the terrorist attack, it's shocking." - Said Miladena.

- "Indeed it is, even neighbors from both borders are yelling at each other profanities and slur words. You can ask me any question you want!" - Zacharov leads Miladena to a lunch table for further discussion. Just after that, they are having an interview with each other.

Nobody knows what will happen next, but it won't be as dark as yesterday.

Sminishia wrote:

Still the third day.

In the corresponding time when the journalist Miladena Popov has arrived to the Sminishian side of Spokoyreka, or as they like to call it, 'South Spokoyreka', both her and the border inspector she met a year ago, Bohda Zacharov are sitting on a lunchroom table. Miladena Popov is holding her papers with questions that she'll need to ask, while Zacharov is taking bites after bites of his grilled cheese sandwich. The sandwich tastes good, but it would be better if it was warm, he couldn't find a microwave despite claims that they had plenty, they must have either been lying or unsure. - "Sister-fvckers lying about a microwave here, don't see any." - Murmured Zacharov as he's taking final bites of the sandwich, it just... makes him less happy eating cooled down food that was supposed to be warm and hot.

Miladena Popov waits for Zacharov to finish his food, she practices in her mind asking questions and overthinks about the crisis in the city and border. When she no longer hears any biting or eating, she clears her throat. - "Are you done?" - She asks a non-journalistic question first.

A gulp, not loud like in the cartoons, but "loud" enough to be surprising, is heard from Zacharov's throat, means he finished eating. - "Indeed." - He confirms, wrapping his paper bag like it was a a ruined homework essay, and then throwing it to a nearby trash bin. The wrapped up paper bag was likely going to miss the bin, but it hit a box nearby, successfully landing inside the said trash bin, Zacharov raises his fist. - "Ura!" - He expresses a little bit of joy, he then turns his head to Miladena. - "Okay Popov, you can ask me any question now." - He said with a smile.

- "A-All right." - Miladena puts down her papers that included questions she must ask, and then proceeds to talk. - "First question, what is happening in this moment?" - She asks, as she records with a smaller camera and gives the wireless microphone to Zacharov.

- "Things are... dark so far, the police from both sides of the border and nation are heavily armed, they do not even look like police, they look like soldiers of war, regardless that there's actual military in some border checkpoints. Like I have said to you, there has been a terrorist attack nearby checkpoint 04 of the city's administrative borders between two nations. Nobody knows what group or individual is behind this, but we are inspecting right now." - Zacharov gave a bit long answer, but it was a journalistic question, so he had to explain it.

Miladena writes that inside her mind, remembering the description, but the camera will save it. - "Have there been any reports of injuries and deaths within this attack? -

- "Only one was killed, which was a police officer, but there have been plenty of injuries, possibly between ten and fifteen. The most uncomfortable part, most of them were civilians. I am glad they are living their lives as the hospitals save them, and I pray my condolences for the dead officer. The terrorist was even arrested half an hour after the attack." -

- "Poor officer. If there's an afterlife, I hope he gladly lives there." - Says Miladena, before asking the next question. - "Next one, why is the crisis happening?" -

Zacharov sighs. - "The reasoning with most probability are ethnic tensions between Sminishians and ethnic Kurikians which are Belekrians, despite both them being Slavic and Yastrean. With said tensions most likely leading to terrorist attacks like the one yesterday." - He says the first reason. - "But the reason I said isn't confirmed yet, other possible reasons are human rights violations in both city administrations, collapsed infrastructure, living conditions being worsened by the previous war, wide spread street crime, others alike. While the least possible reason is famine, I don't see people starving, begging for food or their ribs being exposed, they all have food. Well, the poorest of them would likely starve, but I do not think it is part of the crisis. It may have some possible sides though." - He gave a lot of possible reasons for the crisis.

- "That's horrible..." - Says Miladena. - "Next question... What do you think will happen in the future and what will be the aftermath of the crisis?" - She asks, it may be the final question.

- "Forgive me if I sound really desperate in this one, but I sincerely wish things go better after this crisis. I gained hopes after seeing that both the state and state-owned companies would help war torn urban areas to develop further in order to make future living conditions better than they are right now. Sadly, I see some negative sides, such as borders closing completely and the military shooting at anyone who passes. More positively, I hope the place becomes safe and that both tensions and violence stop." - Zacharov answered the questions. - "Is that all the questions?" -

- "Yes, that is all." -

- "Good, I'll have to work again in fifteen minutes. One more thing, I sincerely hope the people vote out corrupt officials who run the southern administration of the city." - Zacharov stands up from the table. - "We are all comrades." -

- "We are all comrades." - Miladena repeats the motto of the country. After Zacharov leaves the place, she sighs. She may still have some places to uncover, so she finishes recording the camera and calls Kovac with her smartphone.

After seconds of the phone internally ringing, it is picked up. - "Good afternoon, Popov." - Kovac greeted in his phone.

- "It's still morning, just near noon." - Responded Miladena Popov. - "By the way, I did an interview with a border inspector about a humanitarian crisis, I have it all in my camera." - She says.

- "That's good, did you record anything else than the interview?" - Asks Kovac.

- "Yes, I've recorded at least two officers arresting people with forged documents, a Sminishian person begging for a Belekrian border inspector to let her pass and even a person who failed at murder of a border enforcement police officer." - Miladena confirms, with another sigh. - "It's bad. Probably not the worst thing I've seen, but I felt bad for people who begged." -

- "Seems bad indeed, people would watch broadcasts of your footage, don't worry about editing footage, we'll do it for you." - Says Kovac.

- "Have a question though, do I need to uncover other cities of these so-called "liberated lands"?" - Asks Miladena.

Kovac starts thinking. - "Hmmm." - He uses an interjection, then answering. - "No, that is all. We have other journalists that would uncover other cities and towns of the liberated lands. You get to go home for now." - Says Kovac. - "Damn, 'liberated lands' sounds propagandic and biased, I think we should change it sometime soon." -

Miladena Popov inhales and greatly exhales out of relief. After just 2 locations, she gets to go home earlier. She even chuckled at 'propagandic' part. - "Thank you so much, Kovac, I'll head to my car, buy gasoline and drive to my home town." -

- "Alright, just upload the footage before getting out, and be careful when you start leaving." -

- "I will. Goodbye." -

- "¡Adios!" - Kovac used a Sanctish word before hanging up.

Miladena then takes a charged laptop from her backpack, connecting to public WI-FI of the lunchroom and uploading footage she captured in her camera. As she does this, she wondered why Kovac used a language from a country far away that has nothing to do with Sminishia, she guesses that Sanctish is a widely spoken language across the planet of Valsora, although she speaks the Sminishian language Lovci. After uploading, she saves the laptop in her backpack and stands up, ready to leave.

Sminishia wrote:

Third day evening.

Still in the corresponding time in the town of Spokoyreka, the journalist Miladena Popov leaves the place of the lunchroom, she has finished uploading every single bit of the footage she captured on the camera to the Gradvest website's submission page. Now all she has to do is buy gasoline from a gas station in the southern administration of the divided and war torn city they call Spokoyreka. Minutes after driving to a station, she finds one undamaged, best part is, the usually long time of waiting is now short, for almost everyone who needed gasoline has bought them, so she sighs in relief and parks her car in the station. Just after parking, she hops out of the car, still wearing vest and being wary about the surroundings of the currently deadly city, she even panics inside a little.

After hopping off the car, she enters the gas station, and just like every gas station in the planet, it is also a small store. Miladena Popov has her wallet ready, but despite only here to pay for gasoline and car refueling, she hasn't eaten since the morning, so she spends a little time looking for oven baked potato chips and water bottles. She takes three bags of chips and one water bottle. As Miladena took all of those, she accidentally bumps into two men holding packs of vodka, immediately being awkward. - "S-Sorry, won't happen again." - She apologizes, then passing by. The two men, instead of forgiving her, make very mean glares at her. When Miladena is in front of the cashier, those two same men get on line behind her, making her sweat out of nervousness.

The cashier named Spas Kondratiev takes the chips and the water bottle, scanning their barcodes with... a laser barcode scanner. - "That would be twenty six Smils with four cents." - He said the price.

Miladena Popov then includes something. - "Can you turn on thirteen gallons of gas in number four? I need to refuel." - She says.

- "Of course, that would be eighty five Smils with eight cents, making that one hundred twelve Smils with two cents in total." - Kondratiev said it calmly. Despite a lot of people coming in to get gasoline, Miladena is one of the fastest customers the station has ever had this day. Kondratiev is an ethnic Kurikian or Belekrian, but he's friendly even to Sminishians.

Miladena Popov takes out bills worth of one hundred twenty Smils and gives it to Kondratiev, who then gives her the chips, water bottle and the change worth of seven Smils with eight cents. Popov then thanks the cashier, and heads out, leaving the building of the station. After leaving, she approaches her car while again, being wary of the surroundings, and opens the vehicle's door of it's back seat, placing the chips and water bottle there. She even hops in the car, but before she could start the car, she realizes that she has yet to refuel, and thus facepalms, underestimating her intelligence by murmuring 'I'm stupid'. Miladena hops out of the car again, and starts refueling it with gasoline. While she refuels the car, she trembles of both fear and cold, blowing 'cloud smokes' out of her mouth despite wearing warm clothes. Less than a minute later, it stops refueling, meaning that she has finished, and thus places back the pump to the tank.

Before Miladena could start her car, one of the two men from the gas station "mysteriously" shows up in front of her, making her jump out of surprise. - "A-Aw jeez, you scared me." - She said, while her heart bumped a bit faster.

- "Oh, I'm sorry for that." - Apologized the man. - "Just thought of coming over to you to say... I forgive you." -

- "... Forgive me for what?" - Asked Miladena, who kind of forgot what happened.

- "Well, accidentally bumping into us, sorry for not forgiving you as well." - He said, forgiving and apologizing at the same time.

- "It's... it's alright, but honestly, this is a bit weird." - Miladena did feel slightly uncomfortable.

- "No worries. By the way, your name is Miladena Popov, just like in the broadcasts, right?" - Asked the man.

Miladena Popov, the journalist woman, was now feeling more uncomfortable. - "Y-Yeah, guess I am. Listen, I have to go, for my job here is done." - She says, trying to hop in to her car, only to be stopped by said man.

- "Hold on there, I haven't introduced myself yet." - Said the man while blocking Popov from the driver's seat door. - "My name is Nediljko Hospod, I just want to talk with you." - He introduced his name, but it doesn't impress the poor woman.

- "That's great and all, but I seriously have to go!" - Said Miladena, desperate to go back home. As she tries to avoid talking with Hospod, a car parks at number three of the gas station.

After the parking, Hospod then whistled with his fingers in his mouth, confusing Miladena. Another one of the men shows up behind her, catching her. - "Got you." - Said the second man, that is where the woman struggles.

- "Let me go!" - She struggles, stomping hard with her strength on the man's feet. Fortunately, the man's shoes were old, as he felt pain, releasing the woman. However, Hospod takes the woman.

- "Stop moving, woman!" - Hospod begins to struggle to hold the woman, this is an abduction attempt.

The driver of the car that has parked in number three of the gas station sees the abduction attempt, and quickly opens the driver's seat door, hopping out of the car and running towards the action. As he gets near Hospod, he blows out a punch to his right cheek, eventually releasing Miladena. The journalist woman gets released, almost falling, then looks at the man who punched the guy. That man is Bohda Zacharov, the border inspector who has finished his job today. - "... Zacharov?" -

Zacharov nods. Because the punch was strong and painful, both Hospod and his partner run away to the streets, failing to abduct a not-so-popular journalist. Zacharov finally answers to Miladena after punching Hospod. - "Indeed." -

Miladena widely smiles with a happy grin. - "Thank you so much!" - She thanked Zacharov, hugging him after. - "Never experienced this before, but I'm really glad you came in." - She says, still hugging him.

Zacharov makes a slight blush, he's never been hugged by a woman before other than his mother. That guy ran away because of one painful punch? Pathetic, usually he would have put a longer fight than just one hit. He hugs Miladena back for a while, but then releases her later. - "Well, don't put all the thanks for me, put some thanks for you too, you put up a good fight. You're welcome by the way." -

Popov then releases Zacharov from the hug. - "I have to go now. I'll remember this moment, make this city safe." - She says to Zacharov, as she hops in the car, waving. Zacharov waved goodbye to her, he was here to refuel his car, but he's really happy he prevented a serious crime from happening. Miladena finally starts her car, driving out of the station and to the city's many exiting roads. She continues to be alert on her surroundings as she drives, her car drives a bit faster now that she refueled it. As she drives slowly in the city, she sets up the GPS destination to her home town, Suncetlo, inside Sminishia's "original" land.

You are now approaching Suncetlo, Sminishia, 2 hours before arrival.

She sighs after fully exiting the city, now going a bit faster.

Two hours later. Suncetlo, Sminishia.

After another tiring road trip, she's finally in a city that's just as developed as Novvy Sotsialny' Gorod, but less larger. Miladena Popov drives to her neighborhood and house, she parks her car there. After parking, she enters the building, which is very clean and equally fashionable as every other house in the neighborhood. Because it is night, she doesn't have time to make dinner for herself, as she ate oven baked potato chips during trip, meaning she's not hungry, so she goes to take a shower and then sleep.

[ I'm sure tomorrow will be a blissful day. ]

Miladena Popov has said inside her mind, just after minutes of showering, changing clothes and seconds after dropping to her bed, finally going to sleep.

Sminishia wrote:

Fourth day, 6:20 AM
Four days after the Treaty of Paragould, and two days of a journalist doing her job, Miladena is currently still sleeping, having a not-so-sweet dream, but is pretty comfortable sleeping while relaxing from stressful jobs. Her smartphone vibrates, along with a 1980's song 'Working for the weekend' playing, it is an alarm set up by her to wake up. Miladena Popov wakes up slowly, with her eyes not opening yet due to her sleep being rudely interrupted. She opens her eyes, but only slightly, then picks up her phone and turns off the alarm, yawning shortly after. She stands up from the bed, going to the bathroom to brush her teeth. Two minutes later, her teeth are whiter than yesterday and moment she woke up. Miladena, after changing clothes, walks down the stairs of her house, approaching the kitchen.

As she makes coffee with her... coffee maker, her phone rings, it's Kovac calling her, so she answers. - "Good morning." - Her tone is a bit tired.

- "Good morning, Popov." - Greeted Kovac on his phone. - "Today I have some great news." - He said, sounding like he said it proudly.

- "Do I get my salary?" - Miladena immediately assumed, desperate to get payed after she almost got abducted yesterday.

- "You sure are a desperate woman." - Said Kovac. - "Yes, you are getting a salary today. Just don't question about your salary too much next time, or they'll call you a greedy capitalist pig." - Responded Kovac, giving Miladena a warning.

- "Sir, I only asked once today, but thank you anyways." - Said Miladena, finishing her coffee and taking a sip so she doesn't fall asleep again. She then goes to the living room, where there is a television.

- "Yeah, I'm kidding." - Claimed Kovac, before being serious. - "Seriously though, there's another thing I want to tell you. Today you get a break, however, tomorrow you'll go uncovering the stories of family reunion in the libera- uh, annexed lands." -

- "That's... something and all, but it's not wrong to call the areas "Liberated Lands", they are ethnic majorities of us anyway." - Miladena turns on the flatscreen TV, which is of course 'smart technology' as well, she switches to the Gradvest News channel to see what Kovac told people to broadcast. - "By the way, I'm having a little fun on watching the channel of your studios, Kovac." - She smiles.

- "Well, thanks for watching!" - He imitates an internet video channel owner's voice. - "That is all I'm going to say, make sure to come today at twelve PM to receive your salary." - Says Kovac.

- "Goodbye." -

- "Bye!" - Kovac hangs up.

Miladena sighs, sure, she gets a break today, but does she want to drive far away again with her car? Well, her job is journalism, so that is pretty fine. The channel she's watching finishes broadcasting the footage of the interview she captured, only for it to start broadcasting a humanitarian crisis in mainland Kurikia that makes the one in Spokoyreka look like a baby's first steps, meaning it is a lot worse. - "Poor bastards." - She said to herself, commenting the situation in Kurikia, she lives in a horrid planet, but that's how it is.

10 minutes after the Kurikian crisis and interview broadcasts, it switches to a Gorbastani state-owned company building a factory with a naval port inside Sminishia, and then a parade being planned in Novvy Sotsialny' Gorod, both civilian and military. With the civilian one resembling celebrations of families and ethnic brothers and sisters reunifying with them, while the military one resembling victory over the war. Miladena hopes those people don't glorify war in general, cause if so, she will be pissed off.

Novvy Sotsialny' Gorod. 11:00 AM

In the streets of the capital and largest city of Sminishia, a celebration is already going on. Dozens of bars are filled with cheers and singings while vodka bottles clash, barbeques being set up in house backyards, people waving the flags of the country, and even civilian parades in some streets. They know they are 4 days late to celebrate, but it's better late than never to express happiness. Not all people are celebrating though, as families mourn and express their sadness on their relatives who joined the military and died fighting to serve the country, some wives of dead soldiers even started crying.

Military parade.

The Sminishian military, after civilians were finished from doing festive parades, now march on the streets. With the first line being old models of the Sminishian People's Army, which were brown and white uniforms of soldiers holding old submachine guns and AK rifles while tanks with thin armor were rolling. They have a marching band behind them, so it makes music for the soldiers to gladly march. After lines from older to newer models, a line of completely modern models march, with combat vests, assault rifles and even thick armored tanks with computing systems march on the streets.

After all the parades, some people nationwide in Sminishia offered welfare and jobs for ones who live in the so-called "Liberated Lands", even offering them equal and fair payment. People even give speeches about why war should not be glorified, showing footage of war torn cities and refugees flocking to other areas.


Episode 2: People's Rule, Now!

Sminishia wrote:

Fifth Day.

Fifth day morning, city of Suncetlo. Miladena wakes up very tiredly to a sound of a phone text message notification. Her eyes open slowly, seeing the unusual sunlight through her windows, then yawning. The journalist woman yawns, picking up her phone from the night table and starting to read the following notification:

__________________________________________________
| You have 6 missed calls and 13 text messages from Kovac. |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

With big numbers of missed calls and text messages, she opens her eyes wide despite tiredness. Did she just oversleep? She knew it was a bad idea to stay up all night talking with celebrating strangers. Miladena then starts to read the last message of the missed notifications:

Popov! WHERE. ARE. YOU?! YOU'RE BEING TOO LATE!

Miladena gasps, she freaks out, typing up a text message so fast she makes several grammatical errors.

OMG IM SORRY I WIlL WAK EUP NOE

She facepalms quickly after sending the message, but she has no time, for Miladena jumps out of the bed to the bathroom, doing everything she needs to do when she wakes up, such as brushing teeth quickly, changing clothes and such. She runs downstairs after wearing socks and shoes, taking a piece of bread from the kitchen and putting it on her mouth, then grabbing her journalistic backpack and leaving the house. Just after getting in the car, she starts to call Kovac in phone before starting the vehicle, she honestly doesn't remember which city to go to.

Kovac picks up the phone. - "Ah, you finally answered me." - He said.

- "Please forgive me, I overslept, I'm sorry that I'm too late." - Miladena apologized twice.

- "Ma'am, it's fine. People make mistakes, and so do I." - Kovac forgives Miladena. - "In case you forgot, you're heading back to the Annexed lands to a new province named Kamenistrava, named after it's city." - Says Kovac. - "I've heard reports that... stuff from it's local politicians having something suspicious. You might have crossed the Kamenistrava province, so I think you'll know what it looks like there." -

- "Thank you, I'll set up the GPS to Kamenistrava right now." - Said Miladena, definitely setting up the destination in the city.

- "I'll give further instructions when you drive, good luck!" - Kovac hangs up.

After the hanging nup, Miladena starts up her car, and it sure does start nicely. She drives off her home, with the destination set up in the GPS application on her smartphone. She remembers the line "something suspicious", beginning to think that there may be corruption she'll have to uncover. Sure, she has uncovered humanitarian crises to warn people, guarantee them safety and let humanitarian aid organizations know that they have a mission to relieve victims, but she has never uncovered political corruption.

You are now approaching your destination, Kamenistrava, Sminishia, 1 hour and 30 minutes.

Miladena is too tired, but she can still drive, as she'll probably grab some fresh coffee from that city.

Sminishia wrote:

You are now approaching your destination, Kamenistrava, Sminishia, 30 minutes of arrival.

After a long hour of driving, the journalist woman Miladena Popov is very tired indeed, she hasn't had coffee today due to waking up too late to do her job. All she ate for breakfast is one slice of bread, that is all. She's even hungry, she definitely wishes food is equally cheap in Kamenistrava. Why is she hoping that? During and after the war, food prices have risen slightly, which was part of a taxation for the government to support the military during the war and reconstruction projects after the war. Was the military secretly bankrupt? Or was it to pay replenishments for military divisions and funerals for dead soldiers? It matters little now, since the war is over, at least Miladena is 30 minutes from her destination. Bored, and trying to make the times a little spicy, she turns on the radio of her car and switches to news numbers.

 -ays after celebrations, huge public concern have been going on nationwide in Sminishia, first starting, and especially in the city of Kamenistrava, one of the urban places inside the so-called "Liberated Lands" or "Annexed Lands". The concerns are about the mysterious disappearance of a foreign journalist who was identified as Albina Barrueco, with said journalist coming from a major country named San Sierra. This public concern has quickly given birth to conspiracy theories that the major of the Kamenistrava city has ordered the local police to either secretly arrest the journalist or assassinate her. The theory isn't confirmed just yet, but if proven to be true, there would most likely be events of public outrage.

Mysterious disappearance of a journalist? Arresting? DEATH?! No matter if outside the car is cold as the planet's poles, Miladena Popov begins to sweat, have her eyes open wide and even her pupils shrunk. Would she have to play Inspector and risk her life to uncover local government corruption? Or just uncover what people think of the situation and even let the national police know to start an investigation? If this Aliba Barrueco theory is real, she would have to be really careful.

In other news, possibly related or unrelated to the previous reports, people nationwide, especially in the "Original Lands" have begun to peacefully demonstrate their protests against the representative system of the Sminishian government, even wishing for a direct democracy. Demonstrations mostly take place in urban cities, but the largest one is in the capital city of Novvy Sotsialny' Gorod, since it is the largest city in the nation after all. Demonstrators don't make up the majority of the population just yet, but with it's increasing popularity, it is likely that the demands would be turned to a true thing. This is Sobeslava Brod of Macevalac News, signing off.

Macevalac News is the second biggest independent news media organization in Sminishia, even though they share similar political views with Gradvest, they are both engaging in rivalry for news media and who's the most accurate form of news reports. However, with situations, the rivalry doesn't matter at this moment, if Miladena Popov does uncover government corruption, she thinks it would be likely to fuel up demands of direct rule from the people. As long as she gets to say anything she wants, it won't be bad to have the people rule the country.

You are now approaching your destination, Kamenistrava, Sminishia, 10 minutes of arrival.

She's almost there.

9 minutes later, Kamenistrava.

You are now approaching your destination, Kamenistrava, Sminishia, 53 seconds of arrival.

Miladena Popov is finally in the city, she doesn't like long road trips, but as journalist it's her job. By the second she arrives at the many entrances of the city by road, she already sees demonstrations against the major of the city Damek Petrov and his representatives. Demonstrations include: Protesting with calm anger, raising signs, waving the Sminishian flags (with some of them having power fist instead of hammer), marching on the streets, chanting words like "Petrov get out" and others alike. She parks her car in a parking lot.

Just after she hops out of the car, she grabs her backpack of her camera with wireless microphone and her laptop, being a journalist, she's about to have a journey in this great city's situation. Booo, lame joke. Anyways, because she's tired and hungry, she heads to a nearby cafeteria, but before she could, she gives a reaction to the demonstrations held by the people. - "Jeez, they really are angry, is it because of that theory? Or something else happen?" - She questions herself while walking. finally, she enters a cafeteria, which, unsurprisingly, even the employees are shouting activist words, but still working to serve customers.

- "Out Damek Petrov, we are the people." - Says an employee, expressing his activism. As he sees the journalist woman come in, he clears his throat. - "Good afternoon woman, welcome to Litvak's Café, how can I take your order?" - He asks, taking a note.

Miladena inhales and exhales. - "Hello, can I have an order of waffles and... latté? Please?" - She says.

- "Of course." - The employee says, writing his note. - "Anything else?" -

- "Yes, I'm a journalist of Gradvest, I want to talk with you about these protests and the situation in the government." - She said a little bit outloud.

- "A... a journalist? Sure! I'd love to have a ta- I mean, that'll be 30 Smils, good ma'am." - He sayd.

- "Right." - Miladena reaches her wallet, taking out 30 Smils and giving it to the employee, who then saves it in the cash register.

- "Food will be on it's way." -

Minutes later.

Miladena is sitting on a chair, at a table, while holding her phone and going to social media applications for further news. The employee, like a waiter, brings in a cup of latté and a plate of sugar powdered waffles for Miladena. - "Thank you." - She says.

- "You're welcome." - Welcomed the employee to Miladena. - "By the way, can I introduce my name?" - He asks.

- "For the sake of the interview, yes." - Affirms Miladena to the employee, as she starts recording with a fully charged camera and gives it's wireless microphone to him.

- "Well, my name is Vivien Fouquet, and I prefer tea over coffee." - He gives out his name to Miladena Popov proudly.

- "The name sounds... a bit exotic, are you Gorbastani?" - Asks Miladena.

Fouquet nods. - "Of course, my grandparents come from Gorbastan." -

- "Interesting, haven't really seen Gorbastani people in former Kurikian lands. Anyways, first question... what is happening?" - The bold question marks that Miladena thinks is very, very complex and a mess.

- "Glad you asked, ma'am." - Fouquet clears his throat. - "The mayor of the city Damek Petrov has been blatantly caught bribing a police officer to arrest his more popular political rival for crimes he never did nor there was evidence for, a trial was held after, and even if again, there was no evidence for any crimes he did, the city's judiciary system has sentenced the said rival named Vukan Jakesch to 20 years to prison, we could see easily see bills of former Kurikian dollars and current Sminishian Smils popping up from pockets of the judge. Not only that, he has rigged the most recent mayor election to keep him in local power just for his own benefits." - Explained Fouquet.

- "Aw jeez. I... think we had something like that in the past, but the Sminishian central government sanctioned them. Next que-" - Miladena says, before she gets interrupted.

- "Oh, one more thing. As you have heard from other news sources, Petrov even rejected state-owned companies' offers to help in development of cities and even took the funding for welfare and education for his own personal wealth. I've heard other city mayors have done the same, and we saw the true evils of a representative system, so we are protesting as you see now." - Fouquet added further explanations.

- "... Oh, so they are that bad." - Said Miladena. - "Right, I would ask why is it happening, but you have already explained it, so I'm just going to skip ahead and ask the final question." - She says, before clearing her throat. - "Do you see a bright future that the protests would bring?" -

- "Certainly. We might have some flaws, but the people will be the ones to decide who is going to be leader of that, and even call for said leader or figure to resign whenever they want. Free speech will spread more, but I do hope the protests work peacefully." - Fouquet sure is certain about the future.

- "Right, thank you for talking with me, I'll enjoy this breakfast you gave me." - Said Miladena, smiling.

- "You're welcome." - Fouquet stands up, he may be a cafeteria employee, but he sure is a political nerd. - "Bon appétit." - He says to Miladena, as he goes back to work.

Miladena Popv stops recording, she'll upload that when she eats her breakfast. She sips latté, and it sure is good, she cuts a piece of waffles, and eats is, sure is good too. After eating breakfast and drinking latté, she has indeed enjoyed the meal like Fouquet told her to do so. As she has finished eating, she has already paid, and has gone outside of the cafeteria, her mission to analyze the theory has begun.

Sminishia wrote:

Out, Damek Petrov!

Upon the not-so-clean streets, and upon cold, yet smoking air, Miladena Popov opens the door of the cafeteria, exiting the building after a nice conversation and breakfast, she feels her stomach a bit full. Right now, as people march the streets, raising fists and signs, waving flags and even yelling 'Напоље, Дамек Петров!' which means 'Out, Damek Petrov!', Miladena now takes her camera she's been recording the interview with. She begins recording the protests, and even city police officers watching the demonstrations against the mayor and doing almost nothing about it. The police who do something against the protests are called back by his partners, they would have to let citizens protest since this country has a policy that allows rights to protest.

Jeez, the people are angry alright. Miladena, while recording, walks around the city of Kamenistrava. After a protester sees the Gradvest logo at Miladena's left shoulder, he reaches out to her, fast walking. - "Hej!" - He calls.

Miladena flinches, she sees a protester approaching her, so she inhales and exhales. - "Ummm..." -

Before Miladena Popov could say anything, the protester finally stood in front of her. - "I see that you are a journalist, right?" - He asked. - "If so, have you had an interview with a fellow comrade participating in a protest?" - The protester added a second question.

- "Uhhhh..." - Miladena couldn't answer yet, she was too busy quietly recording the protests, not that she was against it though, she's in support of it, she is just here to gather information and... uncover something. - "Yes, and yes. You wanted to talk with me about something?" -

- "Da. I did not want an interview with you, I just wanted to tell you something." - The protester looks at both sides, then back at Miladena. - "Last time there was a journalist here, she mysteriously disappeared. It might have to do something with the mayor and the corruption, if you wish to have an interview with any local politician of Kamenistrava, remember what I told you." -

- "Yeah, I heard. Hope she isn't dead or something." - Miladena Popov sure does hope that the missing journalist isn't killed.

- "Right, so if you want to interview mayor, just remember that I warned you. Don't end up like Barrueco." - He said, going back to protesting.

Less than half an hour later.

With protests still happening, mayor Damek Petrov finally agrees to have a conversation with the woman journalist Miladena Popov. This makes Miladena sweat REAL hard, two security guards escorting her to the mayor's palace of Kamenistrava doesn't help either, what if they make an ambush to arrest, or if worse, execute her? Even though her job is to uncover corruption, she panics inside while thinking too much of Albina Barrueco. While hoping not to "disappear", she finally makes it to the Mayor's office.

Despite Sminishia being a Socialist country, and the city looking like almost nothing has improved, the office looks surprisingly looks better than most mayor offices of any Sminishian city, Damek Petrov is seen sitting on the chair of his desk, awaiting for Miladena to sit down. After awkward seconds of Miladena standing there, Petrov says something. - "Why won't you take a seat, young woman?" -

The way he said 'woman' made the journalist uncomfortable. - "O-Of course, mayor." - She obliges, sitting down on the chair in front of the mayor's desk. She slowly clears her throat, didn't sound clear at all. - "... My name is Miladena Popov, journalist- " -

- "Of Gradvest, Sminishia's biggest independent news media? I watched your broadcasts." - Petrov interrupted Popov, finishing her sentence. - "I know what you came in for, interview, right?" -

- "Y-Yes, I came here to ask you questions. Mind if I ask one?" - Asks Miladena, already recording with her camera, but hiding the red lights and not telling the mayor.

- "Don't be nervous, madam, I'm definitely open to answers." - Petrov put a smug face. - "I don't mind at all." -

That 'definitely' did not sound definite, something is up, she swears inside her mind. Miladena finally starts to ask a question. - "First question... what do you thi-" -

- "Think of the protest? They are all ungrateful bastards who don't respect good mayors like me, who would want to force a man to resign from power whenever the people and even the poor feel like it? And who would want every people to be in power of something?" - Petrov interrupted Miladena once again, and even though he answered, it sounded like he was admitting that he likes being a dictator.

- "... I'm not religious, but for God's sake, please don't interrupt me again." - Says Miladena, annoyed. - "Glad I received your answer, but if you don't like majority of people deciding stuff, please remember you live in a Democracy, well, at least in a constitutional one." -

- "Alright, alright, I won't do it again, princess." - Petrov promised to not interrupt again, still sounding rude though.

Miladena almost groans, but because of the disappearance of a journalist, she keeps it quiet. - "N-Next question... are you thinking of resigning one day?" -

- "I'll resign when I die." - That means Petrov wants to rule for the rest of his life.

[ Damn, this guy really is the worst mayor in this country. ] Thought Miladena to herself, before asking the next journalistic question. - "Another question, what do you think happened to Albina Barrueco?" - She mentions the San Sierran journalist who reportedly disappeared in this municipality.

- ". . ." - Dot dot dot indeed, Petrov kept quiet.

- "Sorry if I'm making you think through sir, I'll give you time to -" - Miladena stops after Petrov hands him something.

What Petrov is handing is a wad worth of ten thousand Smils. - "You did not hear of that woman." - He said, attempting bribery to escape this question.

Miladena shrinks her pupils. - "... Are you..." - She shakes her head. - "Are you bribing me, sir?" -

- "Just take the money you fu-" - Immediately, he gets interrupted by a guard.

- "I can show you what happened to Albina, Miladena." - He said. - "I can even escort you." -

This raises suspicion, yet a lot of concern for the journalist, will the guard betray the mayor and show what really happened to the foreign journalist? Miladena thinks for a moment before standing up. Then, nods. - "Please do." -

- "Hey, no no no! There's nothing about her you idiot!" - Denied Petrov, only to be ignored by both people.

The second guard doesn't let Petrov stand up. - "Let them be." - Turns out he isn't really loyal to the mayor at all.

The first guard then opens up a hidden trapdoor, which it's space was usually empty. Unfortunately, this isn't the usual times, Petrov puts his right hand on his forehead, thinking he's doomed because of a man he thought was loyal is doing something. As the trapdoor is open, it reveals a terrifying discovery, it's Albina's corpse. Her skin is still "soft", but it's also whiter than before, her dead face looking disturbingly emotionless, her eyes dry and even having her bloody wound in her chest being exposed. This makes Miladena let out a huge horrified gasp, is this what happened to a woman from a fricking foreign country?! She has a will to scream.

- "This is the missing person you're looking for." - Said the guard, before looking at Petrov looking very guilty.

As the journalist shivered and looked at the body, she revealed her camera's red lights, it is still recording, she shows it to the guards and even Petrov. She was startled for seconds, then looked at the disgusting freak of a mayor. - "Did... did you kill her?!" -

- "So..." - Damek Petrov, the local tyrant of the city, sighed. - "You have seen it... to answer your question, yes, I have killed her." - He said with admission, as the second guard takes the handcuffs and puts it on Petrov's hands.

- "Unbelievable... murder by a government official..." - Miladena has never seen a lifeless corpse in her entire life other than entertainment sources.

- "Let's get out ma'am, I'll tell you more later." -

More minutes later.

As the interview went... unexpected, demonstrations against Petrov are still happening, especially in front of the mayor's palace. Finally, Petrov, the two guards and the journalistic woman Miladena Popov show up while exiting the building. Upon demonstrators seeing Petrov handcuffed, minor cheers are immediately made, but most are still angry, as they want to spit right at the mayor's face. The guards call for nearby officers of the city's police, at least the least corrupt ones, to enter the palace, while letting the Miladena go and forcing Petrov to make a speech before being fully arrested.

Soon, the mayor finally gives a speech. - "Citizens of Kamenistrava... as you may all know, I am the mayor of the city, and I was before this place has been transferred to being part of Sminishia." - As he says his first sentence, many boo's are heard from the crowd and demonstrators. - "Please, citizens, let me give a chance to talk. Since you have showed demonstrations against me, since you have called and wished for me to be taken out of office, I have an announcement to make." - He inhales and exhales. - "I, Damek Petrov, am hereby resigning as mayor from office, firstly known as Mayor Petrov... now as regular old citizen Petrov." -

With the announcement given, the crowd immediately cheers up, whistles and yelling of the words 'URA!' are heard, and then chanted, as they wave the Sminishian flags, which makes Petrov look down. - "Further announcements about me will be likely released tomorrow, but further news will likely be broadcasted by Gradvest as welll." - This doesn't stop the crowd from cheering.

Miladena Popov is still scarred from seeing a corpse, especially belonging to a fellow journalist. She returns to the cafeteria, taking her laptop, using the cafe's free WI-FI and uploading everything she recorded. She has uncovered government corruption, but she'll never forget what she saw.

Sminishia wrote:

Midnight between fifth and sixth day, Kamenistrava.

It has been less than 9 hours since the money ridden mayor Damek Petrov has resigned from ever governing the city of Kamenistrava ever again, but this stops the national police from nothing. Protests that were occurring in the day were done today, with their leaders calling for demonstrators to sleep since it is night, and to continue protesting in the next day, as the police investigate the mayor's palace and even collect the corpse of a then-journalist, but they yet have to find her passport and data of which city she lived in.

There are fifteen police units inside the mayor's palace, with four of them in the mayor's office and desk room (where the corpse is located). Because of the cold outside, they are all wearing waterproof heated vests and ushankas that have a hammer badge. Ten more police units, including one sergeant named Mlivoj Klima, are awaiting outside for the men inside the place to finish finding everything they need to gather. Sergeant Klima holds a portable two-way radio device, pressing and holding a button which makes a beeping sound, then, he speaks through the device. - "Did you find anything yet, comrades?" - He asks, being a little desperate while standing in the literal cold.

/\/\ We definitely found a corpse that the other woman kept talking about, we have even discovered a trapdoor where the body exactly is. Unfortunately, our boys couldn't find her identification card nor a passport, neither could I. Over. /\/\

- "You found the corpse, but couldn't find an ID card? Did you check the pockets?" -

/\/\ Aye aye, there's a note of reports possibly written by the woman, although I can't understand the language. Still, we couldn't find her ID card nor any documents with her identity. Either she must have been mistakenly accepted, or Damek Petrov got rid of them. /\/\

- "Bastard, was he trying to cause a war?" - Sergeant Klima has gotten a little angry.

/\/\ Uh, excuse me Sarge, but what does this have to do with war? /\/\

- "He killed a foreign journalist, there have been national conflicts over deaths of individuals of their national identity. Continue searching, I'm sure the capitalist pig has hidden it somewhere." - Sergeant Klima's mention of war and national conflict worried nearby officers that are outside with him. Some have even doubted, why a war?

/\/\ Sarge, while you were speaking, one of our comrades have finally found her identification card, documents and even her passport. It was hidden in a storage locker outside the mayor's room and in some hallway. We split up to multiple teams, so we weren't the ones who found it. /\/\

Klima sighs of relief. - "Tell one of the other teams that they have done a nice job." -

/\/\ Of course. However, we have found something very... concern... oh my God. /\/\

- "What's wrong boys? Did you find something?" -

/\/\ Well, um... Sarge, you would want to see this. /\/\

- "Is it this concerning? If so, bring it to me, I'm sure the Police Commissioner would like to see it as well." -

Minutes later, two teams of police officers, making 9 of the units in total, go out of the mayor's palace, holding stuff they have found, while one team holds a morgue brought in by the police to carry the corpse of the then-journalist Albina Barrueco, and the other team holding ID documents and one a folder of documents with a company's logo stamped on it. Sergeant Klima gives off a very interesting look at the officer holding the folder. - "What do we have here, compatriot?" -

- "It's... you're right, the Police Commissioner has to see this." - Says the officer, as he hands over the folder of documents, it includes a stamp of a logo from one of the largest state-owned companies.

- "Tehnicki Nacini? I thought they were defunct." - Assumed Sergeant Klima, Tehnicki Nacini is a currently active, but largely forgotten state-owned IT company. - "I'm going to take a read on this on the vehicle. Not to worry about the night, I have my flashlight." - He says, heading to his police car. As he hops in the car with the folder in his hand, he turns on his flashlight and opens the folder to read the documents. Why didn't he turn on his car for light? He doesn't want to waste his vehicle's energy. As he passes pages of documents, the first results are contracts and deals made by the company and agreed by Damek Petrov and his representatives in the city council, the contract was about the company helping not only Damek Petrov, but also local representatives and politicians of cities especially located in the annexed lands to rig their elections and unfairly win them in return for financial support to keep the company up even without economic benefits to the general IT industry of Sminishia and the national economy.

After reading all these, Sergeant Klima could not believe it, is a state-owned company really helping politicians rig elections so that they could get more funds from provincial governments? - "What in the..." - He pauses. - "This is corrupt debauchery! I need to tell my men and the commissioner." -

Half an hour later, many policemen have left the city capitol area, few remained continuing to search for more suspicious clues, but most were heading to report journalists and people of news media, even the sarge had to tell his captain and the police commissioner about the recently discovered documents. Miladea Popov, the journalist woman who let the police know about a dead woman, is currently hanging around her most recently favored cafeteria in the city, yes, in midnight. She's still awake because of coffee, and her body is on a mild tremor, she's being addicted to caffeine, although she can still think well. Miladena is offered glasses of water by Vivien Fouquet, who just wants to go home, but Miladena refuses, suddenly, she gets a call from her phone, so she answers.

- "Good... morning, I guess, Miladena Popov of Gradvest, how can I-" -

- "This is the police, you remember when you gave me a number?" -

- "Oh, morning officer, I guess I do." -

- "Good, I need to know where you are, because I have something to report." -

Miladena sighs. - "I'm at Litvak's Café, still with my laptop watching the footage. If you do have something to report, why not do it with text message?" -

- "It's something you need to see in person." - The calling officer responds. - "But.. You're at Litvak's Café? It's midnight. Whatever, I'll bring em' to you." -

- "... Thaaaaaaanks." -

A door immediately opens after the 'thanks', it's the cop that was calling Miladena in phone, he was standing in front all this time. - "You know it's rude to thank me like that." - He says jokinly, hanging up his phone call while physically looking at Miladena.

- "Whaaaa..." - She still sounds tired and unamused, while Fouquet chuckled.

- "I'm joking." - The policeman chuckled as well. - "But seriously though, what is a recently discovered document, you might want to report it and help warn the public." - He says, while sliding the folder of the documents. - "This is a copy I received from a nearby police station in this city, but it says everything that the original contained." -

Miladena gives the folder a look. - "... Interesting." - Very interesting indeed. - "I'm... I'm sorry if I sound unenthusiastic, I'm just really tired and my coffee isn't working." - She says, giving an excuse.

- "It's fine woman, just read it." -

And so, Miladena opens the folder, with the first paper having a logo of Tehnicki Nacini, the forgotten but still active Sminishian state-owned company. She gives it a read of pages, she had the same reaction as Sergeant Klima did... unbelievable. - "What the hell is this?" - Said Miladena. - "Did... did they really do this?" -

- "Of course they did. We'd be happy if you let the public know about this fast, maybe take photos of the documents and publish them to your media Gradvest." - Said the policeman.

- "... Understood." - Miladena obliged, taking photos of documents that contain contracts that have caused corruption, and soon after taking pictures of all pages, she uploads those pictures to the website of Gradvest, even adding descriptions that a policeman gave it to her, and that the documents are a copy of the original.

- "Good work, woman." - He motions her up. - "By the way, you need some sleep, mind renting an hotel?" - He offers.

- "I need sleep indeed... But I won't rent an hotel, I'm fine sleeping in my car." - Said Miladena with a more tired face.

Vivien Fouquet jumps in kindly. - "She can stay at my place." - He offers to Miladena. - "No need to pay anything, I even have a spare head." -

Miladena smiles at Fouquet, nodding. - "I... I guess I'll pick Fouquet's place." - She says, it makes Fouquet happy.

The cop smiles. - "Well, at least you don't get to pay anything just to sleep comfortably, or you don't need to hurt your back to rest." - He admits. - "Fouquet, you're lucky, because if one or more youngsters were here, they'd call you, umm... what is it named..." - The cop tries to think of what the kids call, and then points at Fouquet with his right hand and finger. - "A simp. My nephews have called me that whenever I did something for my wife." -

Fouquet sighs, such is the internet today. Miladena could have giggled, but she didn't due to her tiredness. Because it's done uploading, she closes her laptop and puts it on her backpack, grabs her camera and wireless microphone, then stands up. - "Let's go..." -

Minutes later, the three people get out of the cafeteria, with lights turning off and Fouquet putting a 'Closed' sign. Fouquet takes Miladena Popov to his place for her to sleep and rest in, and so she does sleep there. As Miladena sleeps, she awaits for Gradvest to find out about the scandal and make public reports about it, she even wonders how people would react to that and the company for doing so.

Sminishia wrote:

Sixth day, 8:48 AM.

It is still cold outside despite being in the summer. Miladena has already been awake, she has sleeping for nearly eight hours, feeling well rested compared to yesterday. She's in Fouquet's Soviet-era apartment in the number of 288, the place surprisingly looks a lot better than most communal apartments, but that's only the inside look, since the outside look appears very similar and equal to said communal apartments. As the kitchen is ridden with the great smell of food since Vivien Fouquet is cooking, Miladena Popov, still in her sleeping clothes, turns on the Television just to see if Gradvest is broadcasting her footage she recorded. The TV is definitely switched to the channel, with it's news member speaking.

Yesterday, as protests and demonstrations were active nationwide especially in the northern cities, our journalist Miladena Popov has found a dark secret of a mayor Damek Petrov of the Kamenistrava city and province, who has later resigned following the time being arrested by the police.

There were two dark secrets, one found by said journalist, and one found by the police, but too uploaded by the journalist. Inside the city capitol, or at least the mayor's palace, a dead body was discovered, said body belonged to the foreign journalist who has mysteriously disappeared, the police have said that they took time to find the documents, and after this discovery, the Sminishian central government issued a strong apology including details that they arrested the mayor and that they would return the body to her country of origin. Not only was a corpse found out, a folder of documents was discovered by the police during an investigation after arrest, these documents include contracts and deals with city politicians and a state-owned company Tehnicki Nacini, with contracts detailing that the company would support city candidates cheating in local elections in return for financial support to keep the said company active and powerful despite doing very little to benefit the IT industry and the use of silicon. The first man to read it after discovery was police officer Borzivoi Bobkov, and later following police sergeant Milivoj Klima, who described the contracts as 'corrupt debauchery'. 

This too, has been uploaded by journalist Miladena Popov, who claimed that the documents she received was a copy made in a police station of the original, made to not lose data. In other news... The Kurikian Military Government has threatened actions considered as war cri-

Miladena turns off the TV, sighing. Despite being glad that her reports made it to the channel, she's still scarred from seeing the dead body, and is overthinking of how protests would grow after seeing corruption. The footage of the dead body even made it, however, in the broadcasts, it was censored to prevent people from being disturbed, although it only did very little of that. Then, Fouquet calls to Miladena.

- "Breakfast is ready!" - He yelled out.

- "Coming!" - Miladena responded, standing up from the couch and approaching the kitchen.

As she entered the kitchen, the smell of food is good. Vivien Fouquet has cooked fried eggs, bacon and Gorbastani toast (Valsoran equivalent for French toast). Alongside is black tea, which serves the same purpose of coffee, but like Fouquet said, he preferred tea than coffee. Fouquet smiles at Miladena. - "Bon Appétit." - He told the woman to enjoy her food.

Miladena Popov nods without saying anything, she picks up a fork and knife, cutting a piece of fried egg, taking it with the fork and eating it. It tastes good indeed, she's seen smiling, but before she says anything, she does the same to the Gorbastani toast, and eats the piece, tasting even better. - "You're a great cook, Fouquet." - She compliments the guy's cooking skills, before starting to actually eat the breakfast.

Fouquet blushes a little bit, but succeeds in hiding it and returning his face color to normal. - "Thank you very much." - He smiled greatly, soon sitting down and beginning to eat alongside the journalist woman.

Meanwhile, at Vetrojesto. 9:00 AM

The city of Vetrojesto is a partially polluted city, but locals and officials are doing their job to remove said pollution and clean up the city. Not only that, the city has computer factories that are being upgraded with IT, automation and easier jobs for workers with technology, and the city is near a silica-rich mine site, which is owned by the state. That city is also the HQ place for Tehnicki Nacini, the state-owned company behind the corruption in the annexed lands. Inside the HQ building, it's Head of Company (Sminishian term for CEO) is watching the Gradvest news, they found out everything that he has done, not to mention the shock he had as he found out a mayor he supported killed a foreign journalist, he's making a stressed gesture with hands clenched, and then placed on top of his head.

The Head of Company's name is Bojan Svarovsky, while he didn't found or establish this state-owned company, he still runs it, and now, because of what he's done, he's bringing the entire thing to an end. He presses his fingers onto his nose bridge. - "What have I done? What have I done? Why have I done this?" - Svarovsky repeats it himself over and over, deeply regretting his decisions and realizing that he put a shameful and stained reputation in one of the once largest state-owned companies in the country. While questioning himself why did he agree to secretly intervene and cheat in elections, he received both an Email and a text message in his smartphone, they are both from the central government of the Socialist Republic. He expects it to be government pressure, as he checks out the text message in his phone and Email, he reads the text message, which says:

Good morning, Bojan Svarovsky, this message is from the Ministries of: Economics and Law Enforcement.

Read the Email and print it, please.

The text message was really short, but it sounded a little bit threatening, but he obliged, opening the email in his laptop with the company's logo. The email reads about the consequences of Svarovsky's actions, reports of revealed documents about contracts and a corruption scandal connected to the said contracts. Following this, the email also contains decisions made by the government for something about the company, including seizing currency behind the scandal and forceful shutdown, since the company barely produces benefits of their purpose anymore. After Svarovsky finishes reading, he lied his head onto his desk, ready to cry, but before he could, his phone is vibrating along with a ring. He first expects more pressure from the government, but it's actually from one of his employees.

He picks it up. - "... Hello?" - His tone sounded crushing, but his employee sounded panicked.

- "Boss! I see the police has parked their cars in front of our headquarters, do you have any idea what's going on?" - Said the employee, who is outside and was about to work today.

- "... They..." - Svarovsky couldn't believe it, the police are already here? He knows he deserves this, but they're here that fast? He clears his throat. - "That fast?" - He asked, still making stressed gestures and on the verge of tears.

- "What do you mean 'that fast'? Has anyone done something inside?" -

- "You'll... you'll find out." -

Bojan Svarovsky hangs up from the phone, awaiting his arrest. After the call has hung up, dozens of police officers get out from their cars, entering the headquarter building of Tehnicki Nacini. They are here to investigate everyone associated with the company, and to arrest the Head of Company. Two police officers enter the office room of the Head of Company, arresting Bojan Svarovsky while the police force fill the building with radio chatter and quotes by the policemen.

Back at Kamenistrava.

Miladena Popov and Vivien Fouquet both leave the apartment after eating breakfast and changing clothes. Miladena looks at Fouquet. - "Thank you for letting me stay on your place, Vivien." - She smiles.

- "You're welcome" - Says Fouquet, waving goodbye. - "I have to go to work now, it was nice knowing that Petrov resigned, bye!" - He said, walking away to the cafeteria to go to work, he has customers to serve.

Miladena waves back. - "Bye!" - She said a farewell.

As Fouquet walked to go back to work, Miladena grabbed her stuff, readying to record stuff one more time and then go home. As she presses the record button, she walks upon the environment of demonstrators gaining larger crows and being a bit more loud. They are enraged that a company intervened in all this corruption, it's leader stands up at a fountain with a megaphone while holding the Sminishian flag.

- "Attention, comrades! As you may have heard, we are demonstrating for direct People's Rule! But something came up, it was recently discovered that capitalist degenerates have rigged city elections in favor of greedy local politicians and helped unfairly elect representatives to city legislations for monetary gains, they wanted nothing but currency as the people they helped make us suffer with tyranny. This shows the TRUE EVILS of a representative system, we thank the police officers and journalists for uncovering this filth, but for something like this to not happen again, we spread the word and demand the abolition of a representative system, having it proved it is a danger to Sminishian democracy. We are all comrades!" -

The protest leader who gave the speech is named Niklaus Borodin, to show support for the demonstrator's demands, he was democratically elected to be leader of these protesters. Protesters chant 'We are all comrades' to show the purpose of the protests.

Miladena Popov has recorded this, however, she doesn't have time to upload it now, as she has to go home. One protester stops her from going to her car for a minute, Miladena hopes this isn't an abduction attempt like last time. To make things good, it isn't. - "Thank you for uncovering this, you are a great compatriot." - Says one of the protesters part of the crowd, who spoke to her before about warnings of being a journalist.

- "T-Thanks." - She says.

- "You mind if I take a selfie with you? Don't worry, I'll make a bit of distance." - Said the protester.

- "Well... a photo won't be bad." -

- "Good!" - He takes his smartphone and stands side Miladena, making him and her smile, and taking a photo shot. He soon distances a bit more from the woman. - "Thank you again, Popov, this time for making me happy." -

Miladena smiles. - "You're welcome." - She says, walking away to her car.

- "We are all comrades." -

Soon, Miladena hops in her car, feeling a bit accomplished. She starts the vehicle, and when driving away, she expects Kovac to text and call her all over again.

Read dispatch

*copy/pastes the dispatch and puts into low effort newsletter*

Euricanis wrote:*copy/pastes the dispatch and puts into low effort newsletter*

>.>

*Arrests you*

Sminishia wrote:>.>

*Arrests you*

*runs away like a coward tactical genius*

Euricanis wrote:*runs away like a coward tactical genius*

Darn, he ran away, better go chase him!

Sminishia wrote:Darn, he ran away, better go chase him!

*continues running away because why would you stop?*

Sminishia wrote:Darn, he ran away, better go chase him!

Policeinishia: Damn, he ran away, better go shoot him.

Sminishia and Volinovia

Fetudersialand

Hey kids. Who wants so investment in your country.

i think 3 sentences is just about enough to sum up TAZE Euricanis

nation=euricanis/detail=factbook/id=1415200

Fetudersialand

Euricanis wrote:i think 3 sentences is just about enough to sum up TAZE Euricanis

nation=euricanis/detail=factbook/id=1415200

So Gulag?

Fetudersialand wrote:So Gulag?

...no

Fetudersialand

*Goes to slep*

Zukchiva, Kampf Empire, Osterreich und ungarn, Volinovia, and 2 othersRestoration of Eastern Kaiserreich, and The tesseris sikelies

The Terreich Aeronautics and Space Administration (TASA) is an independent agency of the Terriecher Federal Government founded to develop and expand Terriecher Space capabilities and air travel. TASA was established in 1947, becoming one of the space-orientated organizations established in the world at that time. Originally, the organization was to focus of the development of improved air travel and transportation,, however, due to the discovery of the rocket engine and advances in space flight, TASA shifted its focus to Space-oriented projects. Since TASA's establishment, most of Terreich's space-oriented projects were led by TASA, such as Volk-2, the first-ever satellite from Terreich und Preussen to be launched into space, and the Allegiance Project, one of the biggest space stations in the entire world. There are only a few countries are considered competitors to TASA and its space initiative. One of those nations is Shavara (San Sierra), which has made its organization known with its recent flight to the planet of Eta.

Currently, there are three main stations created by TASA in orbit above Valsora: Alpha, Phönix, and Bayreuth. Each of these stations is vital to the security and research development for Terreich und Preußen. Without them, the country's security and stability would be vulnerable. Together, these stations form the ISS Allegiance.

Alpha Station is the biggest station that is in orbit around Valsora with a population of 21. This station is responsible for running all three stations efficiently and effectively, evaluating the information provided by other stations, and defending itself and the other stations in any case where it may be threatened. To achieve this defense, Alpha station has access to a surplus of space warfare equipment such as rockets to defend itself. The government of ISS Allegiance is made up of representatives from each station. Each of these representatives is a supervisor and leader of the many jobs that are required to run Alpha station, such as Head of Medical and Head of Engineering. Alpha Station also has a nuclear reactor, an algae farm, and a hydro-farm to provide power, food, and clean oxygen. Alpha Station and the other ring stations rotate to create artificial gravity using centripetal force.

Phoenix is the second biggest station in orbit around Valsora with a population of 14 people. This station is responsible for research development, space exploration, and experimentation. Phoenix also has access to the TASA Telescope, which is used to study far-out stars and their planets. At the lower levels of this station are the laboratories. These laboratories are specially used to carry out research and experiments that require a space-like environment but are also used to create new technologies, like the TASA Telescope, which was created in the Pheonix station. This station also houses the living quarters of the astronauts that live on the station.

Bayreuth is the smallest station in orbit around Valsora with a population of 10 people. This station is mainly used for communications with the Valsora and other neighboring satellites.



Member Nations and Associated Corporations and Institutions
  • Terreich und Preußen

  • Xi-Chang

  • Schteiermark

  • Arkadia

  • Volkstechnolgie

  • TASA

  • University of Berlin

  • Aschmark College of Astrophysics

  • University of Rosenburg

  • University of Neu Litien

ISS Allegiance
Read dispatch

Finished the logo!

Fetudersialand

Terreich und Preussen wrote:

The Terreich Aeronautics and Space Administration (TASA) is an independent agency of the Terriecher Federal Government founded to develop and expand Terriecher Space capabilities and air travel. TASA was established in 1947, becoming one of the space-orientated organizations established in the world at that time. Originally, the organization was to focus of the development of improved air travel and transportation,, however, due to the discovery of the rocket engine and advances in space flight, TASA shifted its focus to Space-oriented projects. Since TASA's establishment, most of Terreich's space-oriented projects were led by TASA, such as Volk-2, the first-ever satellite from Terreich und Preussen to be launched into space, and the Allegiance Project, one of the biggest space stations in the entire world. There are only a few countries are considered competitors to TASA and its space initiative. One of those nations is Shavara (San Sierra), which has made its organization known with its recent flight to the planet of Eta.

Currently, there are three main stations created by TASA in orbit above Valsora: Alpha, Phönix, and Bayreuth. Each of these stations is vital to the security and research development for Terreich und Preußen. Without them, the country's security and stability would be vulnerable. Together, these stations form the ISS Allegiance.

Alpha Station is the biggest station that is in orbit around Valsora with a population of 21. This station is responsible for running all three stations efficiently and effectively, evaluating the information provided by other stations, and defending itself and the other stations in any case where it may be threatened. To achieve this defense, Alpha station has access to a surplus of space warfare equipment such as rockets to defend itself. The government of ISS Allegiance is made up of representatives from each station. Each of these representatives is a supervisor and leader of the many jobs that are required to run Alpha station, such as Head of Medical and Head of Engineering. Alpha Station also has a nuclear reactor, an algae farm, and a hydro-farm to provide power, food, and clean oxygen. Alpha Station and the other ring stations rotate to create artificial gravity using centripetal force.

Phoenix is the second biggest station in orbit around Valsora with a population of 14 people. This station is responsible for research development, space exploration, and experimentation. Phoenix also has access to the TASA Telescope, which is used to study far-out stars and their planets. At the lower levels of this station are the laboratories. These laboratories are specially used to carry out research and experiments that require a space-like environment but are also used to create new technologies, like the TASA Telescope, which was created in the Pheonix station. This station also houses the living quarters of the astronauts that live on the station.

Bayreuth is the smallest station in orbit around Valsora with a population of 10 people. This station is mainly used for communications with the Valsora and other neighboring satellites.



Member Nations and Associated Corporations and Institutions
  • Terreich und Preußen

  • Xi-Chang

  • Schteiermark

  • Arkadia

  • Volkstechnolgie

  • TASA

  • University of Berlin

  • Aschmark College of Astrophysics

  • University of Rosenburg

  • University of Neu Litien

ISS Allegiance
Read dispatch

Finished the logo!

Need any funding my guy?

The tesseris sikelies wrote:Why always no homo? Why not... yes homo
*Winks ;)*

Heterosexual People: No Homo
Homosexual People: Yes Homo
Bisexual People: Maybe Homo
Confused People: IDK Homo
Hard of Hearing People: Can You Repeat The Question Homo

Bonus

Asexual People:

Sminishia wrote:Makes this dispatch.
Yes, I know, I used the Earthbound title font, sue me please don't, Itoi, I'm innocent!

Episode one: Liberated lands.

Sminishia wrote:

Two days.

Two days after the end of the conflict, and one day after celebrations in the now-part-of-Sminishia liberated lands, dozens of news reports still have to make it to nearly isolated villages inside those said lands. Miladena Popov, a female journalist working for Sminishia's biggest independent news media Gradvest, is driving her car to a village not presented in most maps, named Skalistykholm, which never had a journalist visit it. She has heard stories of a foreign journalist trying to enter the town, only to be rejected and arrested by Kurikian police during the communist era of the USR. Miladena, knowing that the town is now in Sminishian territory, hopes that won't be a big problem knowing again that her country is a libertarian regime despite being socialist.

You are now approaching your destination, Skalistykholm, Sminishia, 5 minutes before arrival.

Miladena Popov is finally arriving to that town after hours of tiring road trips. It's freezing outside, snow was everywhere in both camp and roads, even her metal bottle of coffee has cooled down, it's negative 34 Celsius outside! - It can't be that cold now, it's still summer!" - Not like she has a problem with the cold, since Sminishia too is a cold country, but she does not believe that the temperature can be very freezing in a hot season, it feels like she's going nearer to the planet's northern pole. Of course, she has her car's AC blowing hot air to warm it up a bit, even holding her metal bottle of coffee in front of it.

You are now approaching your destination, Skalistykholm, Sminishia, 1 minute before arrival.

Despite her smartphone's GPS telling that she has one minute, Miladena has already arrived to the entrance of the town with the village's name on it's sign. Other than that, the sign says 'Добро пожаловать в Сталистихолм, Союз Социалистических Республик.' which means 'Welcome to Skalistykholm, Union of Socialist Republics.'. She isn't very good at Kurikian, but she can tell that it says something about the communist regime of the USR. - "They still think they live in the Union of Socialist Republics?" - She says to herself, turning off her car near the entrance (but not blocking the sign) and readying herself. Miladena is wearing two layers of winter jacket, gloves, boots and a scarf. Soon, she hops out of the car, immediately feeling the breeze of cold winds and walking through heavier snow than of "northern" Sminishia. As soon as she enters, it is indeed a small village, but bigger than expected since it seems to have more buildings. This reminds Miladena of her childhood, growing up in a small, wooden village like the one here, she's glad that her village is more 'modernized'. Besides being a journalist, she didn't bring a crew to the place, because she's going alone, she's holding a digital camera with a wireless microphone. The town of Skalistykholm is almost all wooden and cobblestone, and because it's freezing, most buildings have chimneys and fires on them turned on.

Despite the peace and decent looks, they still hold communist USR flags in some places, even their coat of arms in the mayor's place. Do they not have even televisions? She goes to ask a villager a question. - "Excuse me." - She says while tapping a villager who just bought bread. - "I'm Miladena Porpov, journalist of Gradvest and Sminishia's biggest independent news media, I have questions to ask." -

The villager looks at her in... a weird way. - "You're one of those people who the big-city dwellers call 'journalists', right?" - He asks a question. - "If so, then... this is the first time I've seen one." - Indeed it is, and so is the town's.

- "Right, uhhh... First question, doe-" - She gets interrupted by the villager.

- "If you want to ask important questions, at least ask the police or the militsiya, I do not want to get in trouble with foreign journalists." - Says the villager, leaving with his bread and going on the way to his house. This marks the fear that authoritarianism still rules with an iron fist despite the USR officially no longer existing.

Miladena sighs, she'll make edits on the footage to blur the face of the villager later, she marks the fear of authoritarianism, and then does what the villager said, ask the law enforcement of the town. Minutes after feeling the cold and blowing winder cloud smokes, she enters the warmer police station building. The building design is just as expected, a building with wooden logs, 'modern' concrete and cobblestone. - "Good evening, citizen, is there some trouble you will report?" - Asks a police officer, always ready to arrest a person who commits felony.

The Sminishian journalist Miladena shakes her head. - "No, I came here to ask you questions, I am a Sminishian journalist." - She says.

- "A journalist? This the first time this town has ever gotten one, but now that we rarely receive policy reports from the police commissar and the premier, I'd gladly answer these questions as long as you don't insult the glorious USR." - The officer confirms despite authoritarianism. - "Make it quick though, I am rather busy." -

- "Okay, umm, first question: Have you ever heard of the most recent war ever?" - She asks.

- "The most recent war?" - The officer looks down to the journalist. - "What war? Did the USR win this one or lose?" -

This make Miladena Porpov take a full document of what happened in the war and the aftermath of it, including the Treaty of Paragould. - "Take this document, good sir." - She says, handing the documents, as she marks that the town really is isolated. - "I'll give you minutes to read and clarify." -

Minutes later, reading with police officers, they realized that Kurikian governments changed, later became part of a revolting nation, and now the town is part of Sminishia, this wrecks the officer's mind. - "... My God..." - The officer is... shocked, they're now part of a smaller country?! - "This really happened?" - He asks, with Miladena nodding. - "I'm going to have to report this to the mayor, I think we've been isolated for this long, we'd even have to change our laws and make a public announcement. Are there any Sminishian military units coming?" - He asks.

- "Probably, they seem to come later than I did though." -

- "Ask me questions later, right now I have to report this to the mayor." -

Hours later, the mayor of the Skalistykholm town has made a public announcement about his resigning of being mayor, and presenting a new local democratic system allowing people to elect local legislators and future majors. However, the journalist stays there for a while, being in an interview with town officials.


Sminishia wrote:

Third day.
Three days after the conflict, and one day after an isolated village was convinced about it's current status, the no-longer isolated town Skalistykholm has changed their flags from old ones from the brutal USR regime to the new ones resembling the Sminishian Socialist Republic. The journalist Miladena Popov has stayed in that town for a day after gathering information about the place: What kind of food do they eat; How rich are they compared to other villages (treasury); What's the newly established local Democratic system now; How large is the town; How developed is it; And finally, where they ethnically Sminishian or Kurikian? All of the answers are given according to the information: Mainly stale bread and reindeer meat; One of the poorest towns in the entire country so far; Locally direct democracy; 3.5 KM in area; Still developing; Ethnic Sminishian, although they seem to be Kurikianized, not to mention actual ethnic Kurikians ran this place.

After all the information gathering done by Miladena Popov, she finally got out of the entrance after a nice cup of coffee given by a polite villager. She would say that she's tired now, but the coffee woke her up and energized her. - "Well... not done with my job yet." - Miladena enters the car, inhaling and exhaling, turning on the vehicle. Before she could drive away, she was marking a GPS destination to another area that has been annexed by Sminishia. She drives now, with her face looking like she doesn't want to do another long trip, just wants to go home, throw herself to bed and breathe warm house air. Of course, she does this to support the Gradvest media, who have now managed to broadcast the no-longer isolated town, and for the salary they're paying to her because of the job.

You are now approaching your destination, Spokoyreka, Sminishia. 58 minutes before arrival.

Despite an estimated time of one hour, her car's fuel is about to run out of fuel for one hour and a half. Miladena realizes this, and she sighs strongly, if she does make it, she hopes that there's a working gas station since the city was probably hit by war. Why is she being called to a city? She has heard that it's facing a growingly mild humanitarian crisis, if it's deadly, she prays for herself not to be killed despite being irreligious. Her GPS is interrupted, for someone is calling her, it is Milanko Kovac, head of Gravest, she picks up. - "Good morning, sir Kovac." - She simply greets on the phone while driving (her car is on speaker).

- "Good morning, madam Miladena, how was Skalistykholm?" - Asks Kovac while talking in phone with the journalist.

- "Em, decent, I'm guessing. At least I made them realize their official status. I sure do hope the Sminishian state cooperates to develop the town for it's bright future." - She gave her opinion. - "How about you, Kovac? How is Gradvest going?" -

- "Glad you asked, we broadcasted every single bit of your footage after we edited them to blur people's faces." -

- "Good to hear, I'm going to a town called Spokoyreka, last time I saw the town in the GPS map, it looked like it was between the border of Sminishia and Belekria, is that true?" -

- "Yes, I heard reports from security guards and even soldiers that the town is split into two urban regions and there's a mild humanitarian crisis, but that's all I know, we're sending you there to uncover reasonings of why is the crisis happening." - Says Kovac.

Miladena now really looks like she doesn't want to do it, but she has to. - "Ah, sh¡t. I'm assuming city neighbors don't like each other, do they?" -

- "I... guess. Just have your camera and wireless microphone ready, do not worry, I'll call a law enforcement official for a bulletproof vest for you to guarantee safe journalism. Remember, if a shootout happens, do not attempt to fight, stay in cover. Good luck." -

- "Wait, I have another que-" - Miladena is interrupted, as Kovac has hung up from the phone. She groans out of worry for safety, slight anger and a feeling of 'I really don't want to do this'.

Ypu are now approaching your destination, Spokoyreka, Belekria. 49 minutes before arrival.

Miladena doesn't question why the country name is changed to Belekria, since she heard it's split into two administrations.

Fifty minutes later, at Spokoyreka.

*Pa-ckl*

A stamp is heard, following next with a small "book" being closed, papers shuffling and a person being really thankful of something. As the thankful person passes something, an official by the name of Bohda Zacharov, a Sminishian border official, is seen working to keep the new borders safe. This border is exactly in the middle of the city square of Spokoyreka. - "Checkpoint 04 available, next!" - He said while grabbing a microphone for the speaker to sound. Just after that, a man from Sanada steps in the checkpoint with his readied documents, the line was faster than expected, but he was still uncomfortable from waiting an hour while he was using his smartphone to it's battery death.

- "Papers, please." - Zacharov performs a small hand gesture of quickly moving his fingers back at him, telling the person to hand over the documents.

The Sanadan man sighs. - "Of course, I hope it's worth approving. " - He says, handing over three documents, which are: ID supplement that includes average appearance, date of birth, weight, height, fingerpri of thumb and coded numbers; An entry permit listing purpose of border passing, time of staying in the country, name and expiration date; Most importantly, the passport which lists the date birth, gender (male), issuing city, expiration date, coded numbers and most importantly, the country. Despite being Sanadan, he has a Krionikian passport due to Sanada being administrated by the Confederal Kingdom of Krionik.

Zacharov begins inspecting the documents before asking questions. - "Purpose of visit?" -

- "I-I'm passing through." - Answered the Sanadan man, named Rotislav Hanak according to the documents.

- "Duration of time?" -

- "About two weeks, inspector." -

After a full minute of investigation and reading rulebooks, the documents are all legitimate, Zacharov stamps a green approval to Hanak's passport, then giving him back the documents. - "Please, behave properly." -

- "Will do." -

Hanak steps out of the checkpoint, stepping his feet in Sminishian territory. Zacharov does not get a citation of punishment, but does get called to take a lunch break, so he grabs the speaker's microphone. - "Checkpoint 04 will change inspector for one hour, please ready your documents as he positions himself in the ckeckpoint." -

Minutes later, Zacharov grabs a grilled cheese he made this morning and saved it to this time. Before taking a bite, he accidentally bumps to a woman with a bulletproof vest, almost falling, but thankfully not doing so. - "Forgive me, madam, I was being impatient." - He apologized, but then stopped again this time more calmly.

- "Excuse me, sir. Are you a border inspector?" - Asked the woman.

- "Well, yes, I'm currently taking a lunch break, why do you ask? Was there a mistaken person I let through?" - Answers Zacharov, only for him to question twice.

- "I'm that gal you met a year ago, Miladena Popov, I came here as journalist to uncover a humanitarian crisis here." - Said Miladena, who is wearing a bulletproof vest a police officer gave her the vest even marks the Gradvest logo.

- "... You are that woman! Popov! Dobro je vidjeti vas! (It is good to see you!)" - Greeted Zacharov in Lovci language (Sminishian primary language). - "Yes, there is a humanitarian crisis, just yesterday there was a terrorist attack committed by an unknown extremist group, and dozens of people from Belekria, who aren't even from Belekria, are coming to Sminishia." - He says.

- "Glad to see you too, Zacharov. I feel sorry for those killed by the terrorist attack, it's shocking." - Said Miladena.

- "Indeed it is, even neighbors from both borders are yelling at each other profanities and slur words. You can ask me any question you want!" - Zacharov leads Miladena to a lunch table for further discussion. Just after that, they are having an interview with each other.

Nobody knows what will happen next, but it won't be as dark as yesterday.

Sminishia wrote:

Still the third day.

In the corresponding time when the journalist Miladena Popov has arrived to the Sminishian side of Spokoyreka, or as they like to call it, 'South Spokoyreka', both her and the border inspector she met a year ago, Bohda Zacharov are sitting on a lunchroom table. Miladena Popov is holding her papers with questions that she'll need to ask, while Zacharov is taking bites after bites of his grilled cheese sandwich. The sandwich tastes good, but it would be better if it was warm, he couldn't find a microwave despite claims that they had plenty, they must have either been lying or unsure. - "Sister-fvckers lying about a microwave here, don't see any." - Murmured Zacharov as he's taking final bites of the sandwich, it just... makes him less happy eating cooled down food that was supposed to be warm and hot.

Miladena Popov waits for Zacharov to finish his food, she practices in her mind asking questions and overthinks about the crisis in the city and border. When she no longer hears any biting or eating, she clears her throat. - "Are you done?" - She asks a non-journalistic question first.

A gulp, not loud like in the cartoons, but "loud" enough to be surprising, is heard from Zacharov's throat, means he finished eating. - "Indeed." - He confirms, wrapping his paper bag like it was a a ruined homework essay, and then throwing it to a nearby trash bin. The wrapped up paper bag was likely going to miss the bin, but it hit a box nearby, successfully landing inside the said trash bin, Zacharov raises his fist. - "Ura!" - He expresses a little bit of joy, he then turns his head to Miladena. - "Okay Popov, you can ask me any question now." - He said with a smile.

- "A-All right." - Miladena puts down her papers that included questions she must ask, and then proceeds to talk. - "First question, what is happening in this moment?" - She asks, as she records with a smaller camera and gives the wireless microphone to Zacharov.

- "Things are... dark so far, the police from both sides of the border and nation are heavily armed, they do not even look like police, they look like soldiers of war, regardless that there's actual military in some border checkpoints. Like I have said to you, there has been a terrorist attack nearby checkpoint 04 of the city's administrative borders between two nations. Nobody knows what group or individual is behind this, but we are inspecting right now." - Zacharov gave a bit long answer, but it was a journalistic question, so he had to explain it.

Miladena writes that inside her mind, remembering the description, but the camera will save it. - "Have there been any reports of injuries and deaths within this attack? -

- "Only one was killed, which was a police officer, but there have been plenty of injuries, possibly between ten and fifteen. The most uncomfortable part, most of them were civilians. I am glad they are living their lives as the hospitals save them, and I pray my condolences for the dead officer. The terrorist was even arrested half an hour after the attack." -

- "Poor officer. If there's an afterlife, I hope he gladly lives there." - Says Miladena, before asking the next question. - "Next one, why is the crisis happening?" -

Zacharov sighs. - "The reasoning with most probability are ethnic tensions between Sminishians and ethnic Kurikians which are Belekrians, despite both them being Slavic and Yastrean. With said tensions most likely leading to terrorist attacks like the one yesterday." - He says the first reason. - "But the reason I said isn't confirmed yet, other possible reasons are human rights violations in both city administrations, collapsed infrastructure, living conditions being worsened by the previous war, wide spread street crime, others alike. While the least possible reason is famine, I don't see people starving, begging for food or their ribs being exposed, they all have food. Well, the poorest of them would likely starve, but I do not think it is part of the crisis. It may have some possible sides though." - He gave a lot of possible reasons for the crisis.

- "That's horrible..." - Says Miladena. - "Next question... What do you think will happen in the future and what will be the aftermath of the crisis?" - She asks, it may be the final question.

- "Forgive me if I sound really desperate in this one, but I sincerely wish things go better after this crisis. I gained hopes after seeing that both the state and state-owned companies would help war torn urban areas to develop further in order to make future living conditions better than they are right now. Sadly, I see some negative sides, such as borders closing completely and the military shooting at anyone who passes. More positively, I hope the place becomes safe and that both tensions and violence stop." - Zacharov answered the questions. - "Is that all the questions?" -

- "Yes, that is all." -

- "Good, I'll have to work again in fifteen minutes. One more thing, I sincerely hope the people vote out corrupt officials who run the southern administration of the city." - Zacharov stands up from the table. - "We are all comrades." -

- "We are all comrades." - Miladena repeats the motto of the country. After Zacharov leaves the place, she sighs. She may still have some places to uncover, so she finishes recording the camera and calls Kovac with her smartphone.

After seconds of the phone internally ringing, it is picked up. - "Good afternoon, Popov." - Kovac greeted in his phone.

- "It's still morning, just near noon." - Responded Miladena Popov. - "By the way, I did an interview with a border inspector about a humanitarian crisis, I have it all in my camera." - She says.

- "That's good, did you record anything else than the interview?" - Asks Kovac.

- "Yes, I've recorded at least two officers arresting people with forged documents, a Sminishian person begging for a Belekrian border inspector to let her pass and even a person who failed at murder of a border enforcement police officer." - Miladena confirms, with another sigh. - "It's bad. Probably not the worst thing I've seen, but I felt bad for people who begged." -

- "Seems bad indeed, people would watch broadcasts of your footage, don't worry about editing footage, we'll do it for you." - Says Kovac.

- "Have a question though, do I need to uncover other cities of these so-called "liberated lands"?" - Asks Miladena.

Kovac starts thinking. - "Hmmm." - He uses an interjection, then answering. - "No, that is all. We have other journalists that would uncover other cities and towns of the liberated lands. You get to go home for now." - Says Kovac. - "Damn, 'liberated lands' sounds propagandic and biased, I think we should change it sometime soon." -

Miladena Popov inhales and greatly exhales out of relief. After just 2 locations, she gets to go home earlier. She even chuckled at 'propagandic' part. - "Thank you so much, Kovac, I'll head to my car, buy gasoline and drive to my home town." -

- "Alright, just upload the footage before getting out, and be careful when you start leaving." -

- "I will. Goodbye." -

- "¡Adios!" - Kovac used a Sanctish word before hanging up.

Miladena then takes a charged laptop from her backpack, connecting to public WI-FI of the lunchroom and uploading footage she captured in her camera. As she does this, she wondered why Kovac used a language from a country far away that has nothing to do with Sminishia, she guesses that Sanctish is a widely spoken language across the planet of Valsora, although she speaks the Sminishian language Lovci. After uploading, she saves the laptop in her backpack and stands up, ready to leave.

Sminishia wrote:

Third day evening.

Still in the corresponding time in the town of Spokoyreka, the journalist Miladena Popov leaves the place of the lunchroom, she has finished uploading every single bit of the footage she captured on the camera to the Gradvest website's submission page. Now all she has to do is buy gasoline from a gas station in the southern administration of the divided and war torn city they call Spokoyreka. Minutes after driving to a station, she finds one undamaged, best part is, the usually long time of waiting is now short, for almost everyone who needed gasoline has bought them, so she sighs in relief and parks her car in the station. Just after parking, she hops out of the car, still wearing vest and being wary about the surroundings of the currently deadly city, she even panics inside a little.

After hopping off the car, she enters the gas station, and just like every gas station in the planet, it is also a small store. Miladena Popov has her wallet ready, but despite only here to pay for gasoline and car refueling, she hasn't eaten since the morning, so she spends a little time looking for oven baked potato chips and water bottles. She takes three bags of chips and one water bottle. As Miladena took all of those, she accidentally bumps into two men holding packs of vodka, immediately being awkward. - "S-Sorry, won't happen again." - She apologizes, then passing by. The two men, instead of forgiving her, make very mean glares at her. When Miladena is in front of the cashier, those two same men get on line behind her, making her sweat out of nervousness.

The cashier named Spas Kondratiev takes the chips and the water bottle, scanning their barcodes with... a laser barcode scanner. - "That would be twenty six Smils with four cents." - He said the price.

Miladena Popov then includes something. - "Can you turn on thirteen gallons of gas in number four? I need to refuel." - She says.

- "Of course, that would be eighty five Smils with eight cents, making that one hundred twelve Smils with two cents in total." - Kondratiev said it calmly. Despite a lot of people coming in to get gasoline, Miladena is one of the fastest customers the station has ever had this day. Kondratiev is an ethnic Kurikian or Belekrian, but he's friendly even to Sminishians.

Miladena Popov takes out bills worth of one hundred twenty Smils and gives it to Kondratiev, who then gives her the chips, water bottle and the change worth of seven Smils with eight cents. Popov then thanks the cashier, and heads out, leaving the building of the station. After leaving, she approaches her car while again, being wary of the surroundings, and opens the vehicle's door of it's back seat, placing the chips and water bottle there. She even hops in the car, but before she could start the car, she realizes that she has yet to refuel, and thus facepalms, underestimating her intelligence by murmuring 'I'm stupid'. Miladena hops out of the car again, and starts refueling it with gasoline. While she refuels the car, she trembles of both fear and cold, blowing 'cloud smokes' out of her mouth despite wearing warm clothes. Less than a minute later, it stops refueling, meaning that she has finished, and thus places back the pump to the tank.

Before Miladena could start her car, one of the two men from the gas station "mysteriously" shows up in front of her, making her jump out of surprise. - "A-Aw jeez, you scared me." - She said, while her heart bumped a bit faster.

- "Oh, I'm sorry for that." - Apologized the man. - "Just thought of coming over to you to say... I forgive you." -

- "... Forgive me for what?" - Asked Miladena, who kind of forgot what happened.

- "Well, accidentally bumping into us, sorry for not forgiving you as well." - He said, forgiving and apologizing at the same time.

- "It's... it's alright, but honestly, this is a bit weird." - Miladena did feel slightly uncomfortable.

- "No worries. By the way, your name is Miladena Popov, just like in the broadcasts, right?" - Asked the man.

Miladena Popov, the journalist woman, was now feeling more uncomfortable. - "Y-Yeah, guess I am. Listen, I have to go, for my job here is done." - She says, trying to hop in to her car, only to be stopped by said man.

- "Hold on there, I haven't introduced myself yet." - Said the man while blocking Popov from the driver's seat door. - "My name is Nediljko Hospod, I just want to talk with you." - He introduced his name, but it doesn't impress the poor woman.

- "That's great and all, but I seriously have to go!" - Said Miladena, desperate to go back home. As she tries to avoid talking with Hospod, a car parks at number three of the gas station.

After the parking, Hospod then whistled with his fingers in his mouth, confusing Miladena. Another one of the men shows up behind her, catching her. - "Got you." - Said the second man, that is where the woman struggles.

- "Let me go!" - She struggles, stomping hard with her strength on the man's feet. Fortunately, the man's shoes were old, as he felt pain, releasing the woman. However, Hospod takes the woman.

- "Stop moving, woman!" - Hospod begins to struggle to hold the woman, this is an abduction attempt.

The driver of the car that has parked in number three of the gas station sees the abduction attempt, and quickly opens the driver's seat door, hopping out of the car and running towards the action. As he gets near Hospod, he blows out a punch to his right cheek, eventually releasing Miladena. The journalist woman gets released, almost falling, then looks at the man who punched the guy. That man is Bohda Zacharov, the border inspector who has finished his job today. - "... Zacharov?" -

Zacharov nods. Because the punch was strong and painful, both Hospod and his partner run away to the streets, failing to abduct a not-so-popular journalist. Zacharov finally answers to Miladena after punching Hospod. - "Indeed." -

Miladena widely smiles with a happy grin. - "Thank you so much!" - She thanked Zacharov, hugging him after. - "Never experienced this before, but I'm really glad you came in." - She says, still hugging him.

Zacharov makes a slight blush, he's never been hugged by a woman before other than his mother. That guy ran away because of one painful punch? Pathetic, usually he would have put a longer fight than just one hit. He hugs Miladena back for a while, but then releases her later. - "Well, don't put all the thanks for me, put some thanks for you too, you put up a good fight. You're welcome by the way." -

Popov then releases Zacharov from the hug. - "I have to go now. I'll remember this moment, make this city safe." - She says to Zacharov, as she hops in the car, waving. Zacharov waved goodbye to her, he was here to refuel his car, but he's really happy he prevented a serious crime from happening. Miladena finally starts her car, driving out of the station and to the city's many exiting roads. She continues to be alert on her surroundings as she drives, her car drives a bit faster now that she refueled it. As she drives slowly in the city, she sets up the GPS destination to her home town, Suncetlo, inside Sminishia's "original" land.

You are now approaching Suncetlo, Sminishia, 2 hours before arrival.

She sighs after fully exiting the city, now going a bit faster.

Two hours later. Suncetlo, Sminishia.

After another tiring road trip, she's finally in a city that's just as developed as Novvy Sotsialny' Gorod, but less larger. Miladena Popov drives to her neighborhood and house, she parks her car there. After parking, she enters the building, which is very clean and equally fashionable as every other house in the neighborhood. Because it is night, she doesn't have time to make dinner for herself, as she ate oven baked potato chips during trip, meaning she's not hungry, so she goes to take a shower and then sleep.

[ I'm sure tomorrow will be a blissful day. ]

Miladena Popov has said inside her mind, just after minutes of showering, changing clothes and seconds after dropping to her bed, finally going to sleep.

Sminishia wrote:

Fourth day, 6:20 AM
Four days after the Treaty of Paragould, and two days of a journalist doing her job, Miladena is currently still sleeping, having a not-so-sweet dream, but is pretty comfortable sleeping while relaxing from stressful jobs. Her smartphone vibrates, along with a 1980's song 'Working for the weekend' playing, it is an alarm set up by her to wake up. Miladena Popov wakes up slowly, with her eyes not opening yet due to her sleep being rudely interrupted. She opens her eyes, but only slightly, then picks up her phone and turns off the alarm, yawning shortly after. She stands up from the bed, going to the bathroom to brush her teeth. Two minutes later, her teeth are whiter than yesterday and moment she woke up. Miladena, after changing clothes, walks down the stairs of her house, approaching the kitchen.

As she makes coffee with her... coffee maker, her phone rings, it's Kovac calling her, so she answers. - "Good morning." - Her tone is a bit tired.

- "Good morning, Popov." - Greeted Kovac on his phone. - "Today I have some great news." - He said, sounding like he said it proudly.

- "Do I get my salary?" - Miladena immediately assumed, desperate to get payed after she almost got abducted yesterday.

- "You sure are a desperate woman." - Said Kovac. - "Yes, you are getting a salary today. Just don't question about your salary too much next time, or they'll call you a greedy capitalist pig." - Responded Kovac, giving Miladena a warning.

- "Sir, I only asked once today, but thank you anyways." - Said Miladena, finishing her coffee and taking a sip so she doesn't fall asleep again. She then goes to the living room, where there is a television.

- "Yeah, I'm kidding." - Claimed Kovac, before being serious. - "Seriously though, there's another thing I want to tell you. Today you get a break, however, tomorrow you'll go uncovering the stories of family reunion in the libera- uh, annexed lands." -

- "That's... something and all, but it's not wrong to call the areas "Liberated Lands", they are ethnic majorities of us anyway." - Miladena turns on the flatscreen TV, which is of course 'smart technology' as well, she switches to the Gradvest News channel to see what Kovac told people to broadcast. - "By the way, I'm having a little fun on watching the channel of your studios, Kovac." - She smiles.

- "Well, thanks for watching!" - He imitates an internet video channel owner's voice. - "That is all I'm going to say, make sure to come today at twelve PM to receive your salary." - Says Kovac.

- "Goodbye." -

- "Bye!" - Kovac hangs up.

Miladena sighs, sure, she gets a break today, but does she want to drive far away again with her car? Well, her job is journalism, so that is pretty fine. The channel she's watching finishes broadcasting the footage of the interview she captured, only for it to start broadcasting a humanitarian crisis in mainland Kurikia that makes the one in Spokoyreka look like a baby's first steps, meaning it is a lot worse. - "Poor bastards." - She said to herself, commenting the situation in Kurikia, she lives in a horrid planet, but that's how it is.

10 minutes after the Kurikian crisis and interview broadcasts, it switches to a Gorbastani state-owned company building a factory with a naval port inside Sminishia, and then a parade being planned in Novvy Sotsialny' Gorod, both civilian and military. With the civilian one resembling celebrations of families and ethnic brothers and sisters reunifying with them, while the military one resembling victory over the war. Miladena hopes those people don't glorify war in general, cause if so, she will be pissed off.

Novvy Sotsialny' Gorod. 11:00 AM

In the streets of the capital and largest city of Sminishia, a celebration is already going on. Dozens of bars are filled with cheers and singings while vodka bottles clash, barbeques being set up in house backyards, people waving the flags of the country, and even civilian parades in some streets. They know they are 4 days late to celebrate, but it's better late than never to express happiness. Not all people are celebrating though, as families mourn and express their sadness on their relatives who joined the military and died fighting to serve the country, some wives of dead soldiers even started crying.

Military parade.

The Sminishian military, after civilians were finished from doing festive parades, now march on the streets. With the first line being old models of the Sminishian People's Army, which were brown and white uniforms of soldiers holding old submachine guns and AK rifles while tanks with thin armor were rolling. They have a marching band behind them, so it makes music for the soldiers to gladly march. After lines from older to newer models, a line of completely modern models march, with combat vests, assault rifles and even thick armored tanks with computing systems march on the streets.

After all the parades, some people nationwide in Sminishia offered welfare and jobs for ones who live in the so-called "Liberated Lands", even offering them equal and fair payment. People even give speeches about why war should not be glorified, showing footage of war torn cities and refugees flocking to other areas.


Episode 2: People's Rule, Now!

Sminishia wrote:

Fifth Day.

Fifth day morning, city of Suncetlo. Miladena wakes up very tiredly to a sound of a phone text message notification. Her eyes open slowly, seeing the unusual sunlight through her windows, then yawning. The journalist woman yawns, picking up her phone from the night table and starting to read the following notification:

__________________________________________________
| You have 6 missed calls and 13 text messages from Kovac. |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

With big numbers of missed calls and text messages, she opens her eyes wide despite tiredness. Did she just oversleep? She knew it was a bad idea to stay up all night talking with celebrating strangers. Miladena then starts to read the last message of the missed notifications:

Popov! WHERE. ARE. YOU?! YOU'RE BEING TOO LATE!

Miladena gasps, she freaks out, typing up a text message so fast she makes several grammatical errors.

OMG IM SORRY I WIlL WAK EUP NOE

She facepalms quickly after sending the message, but she has no time, for Miladena jumps out of the bed to the bathroom, doing everything she needs to do when she wakes up, such as brushing teeth quickly, changing clothes and such. She runs downstairs after wearing socks and shoes, taking a piece of bread from the kitchen and putting it on her mouth, then grabbing her journalistic backpack and leaving the house. Just after getting in the car, she starts to call Kovac in phone before starting the vehicle, she honestly doesn't remember which city to go to.

Kovac picks up the phone. - "Ah, you finally answered me." - He said.

- "Please forgive me, I overslept, I'm sorry that I'm too late." - Miladena apologized twice.

- "Ma'am, it's fine. People make mistakes, and so do I." - Kovac forgives Miladena. - "In case you forgot, you're heading back to the Annexed lands to a new province named Kamenistrava, named after it's city." - Says Kovac. - "I've heard reports that... stuff from it's local politicians having something suspicious. You might have crossed the Kamenistrava province, so I think you'll know what it looks like there." -

- "Thank you, I'll set up the GPS to Kamenistrava right now." - Said Miladena, definitely setting up the destination in the city.

- "I'll give further instructions when you drive, good luck!" - Kovac hangs up.

After the hanging nup, Miladena starts up her car, and it sure does start nicely. She drives off her home, with the destination set up in the GPS application on her smartphone. She remembers the line "something suspicious", beginning to think that there may be corruption she'll have to uncover. Sure, she has uncovered humanitarian crises to warn people, guarantee them safety and let humanitarian aid organizations know that they have a mission to relieve victims, but she has never uncovered political corruption.

You are now approaching your destination, Kamenistrava, Sminishia, 1 hour and 30 minutes.

Miladena is too tired, but she can still drive, as she'll probably grab some fresh coffee from that city.

Sminishia wrote:

You are now approaching your destination, Kamenistrava, Sminishia, 30 minutes of arrival.

After a long hour of driving, the journalist woman Miladena Popov is very tired indeed, she hasn't had coffee today due to waking up too late to do her job. All she ate for breakfast is one slice of bread, that is all. She's even hungry, she definitely wishes food is equally cheap in Kamenistrava. Why is she hoping that? During and after the war, food prices have risen slightly, which was part of a taxation for the government to support the military during the war and reconstruction projects after the war. Was the military secretly bankrupt? Or was it to pay replenishments for military divisions and funerals for dead soldiers? It matters little now, since the war is over, at least Miladena is 30 minutes from her destination. Bored, and trying to make the times a little spicy, she turns on the radio of her car and switches to news numbers.

 -ays after celebrations, huge public concern have been going on nationwide in Sminishia, first starting, and especially in the city of Kamenistrava, one of the urban places inside the so-called "Liberated Lands" or "Annexed Lands". The concerns are about the mysterious disappearance of a foreign journalist who was identified as Albina Barrueco, with said journalist coming from a major country named San Sierra. This public concern has quickly given birth to conspiracy theories that the major of the Kamenistrava city has ordered the local police to either secretly arrest the journalist or assassinate her. The theory isn't confirmed just yet, but if proven to be true, there would most likely be events of public outrage.

Mysterious disappearance of a journalist? Arresting? DEATH?! No matter if outside the car is cold as the planet's poles, Miladena Popov begins to sweat, have her eyes open wide and even her pupils shrunk. Would she have to play Inspector and risk her life to uncover local government corruption? Or just uncover what people think of the situation and even let the national police know to start an investigation? If this Aliba Barrueco theory is real, she would have to be really careful.

In other news, possibly related or unrelated to the previous reports, people nationwide, especially in the "Original Lands" have begun to peacefully demonstrate their protests against the representative system of the Sminishian government, even wishing for a direct democracy. Demonstrations mostly take place in urban cities, but the largest one is in the capital city of Novvy Sotsialny' Gorod, since it is the largest city in the nation after all. Demonstrators don't make up the majority of the population just yet, but with it's increasing popularity, it is likely that the demands would be turned to a true thing. This is Sobeslava Brod of Macevalac News, signing off.

Macevalac News is the second biggest independent news media organization in Sminishia, even though they share similar political views with Gradvest, they are both engaging in rivalry for news media and who's the most accurate form of news reports. However, with situations, the rivalry doesn't matter at this moment, if Miladena Popov does uncover government corruption, she thinks it would be likely to fuel up demands of direct rule from the people. As long as she gets to say anything she wants, it won't be bad to have the people rule the country.

You are now approaching your destination, Kamenistrava, Sminishia, 10 minutes of arrival.

She's almost there.

9 minutes later, Kamenistrava.

You are now approaching your destination, Kamenistrava, Sminishia, 53 seconds of arrival.

Miladena Popov is finally in the city, she doesn't like long road trips, but as journalist it's her job. By the second she arrives at the many entrances of the city by road, she already sees demonstrations against the major of the city Damek Petrov and his representatives. Demonstrations include: Protesting with calm anger, raising signs, waving the Sminishian flags (with some of them having power fist instead of hammer), marching on the streets, chanting words like "Petrov get out" and others alike. She parks her car in a parking lot.

Just after she hops out of the car, she grabs her backpack of her camera with wireless microphone and her laptop, being a journalist, she's about to have a journey in this great city's situation. Booo, lame joke. Anyways, because she's tired and hungry, she heads to a nearby cafeteria, but before she could, she gives a reaction to the demonstrations held by the people. - "Jeez, they really are angry, is it because of that theory? Or something else happen?" - She questions herself while walking. finally, she enters a cafeteria, which, unsurprisingly, even the employees are shouting activist words, but still working to serve customers.

- "Out Damek Petrov, we are the people." - Says an employee, expressing his activism. As he sees the journalist woman come in, he clears his throat. - "Good afternoon woman, welcome to Litvak's Café, how can I take your order?" - He asks, taking a note.

Miladena inhales and exhales. - "Hello, can I have an order of waffles and... latté? Please?" - She says.

- "Of course." - The employee says, writing his note. - "Anything else?" -

- "Yes, I'm a journalist of Gradvest, I want to talk with you about these protests and the situation in the government." - She said a little bit outloud.

- "A... a journalist? Sure! I'd love to have a ta- I mean, that'll be 30 Smils, good ma'am." - He sayd.

- "Right." - Miladena reaches her wallet, taking out 30 Smils and giving it to the employee, who then saves it in the cash register.

- "Food will be on it's way." -

Minutes later.

Miladena is sitting on a chair, at a table, while holding her phone and going to social media applications for further news. The employee, like a waiter, brings in a cup of latté and a plate of sugar powdered waffles for Miladena. - "Thank you." - She says.

- "You're welcome." - Welcomed the employee to Miladena. - "By the way, can I introduce my name?" - He asks.

- "For the sake of the interview, yes." - Affirms Miladena to the employee, as she starts recording with a fully charged camera and gives it's wireless microphone to him.

- "Well, my name is Vivien Fouquet, and I prefer tea over coffee." - He gives out his name to Miladena Popov proudly.

- "The name sounds... a bit exotic, are you Gorbastani?" - Asks Miladena.

Fouquet nods. - "Of course, my grandparents come from Gorbastan." -

- "Interesting, haven't really seen Gorbastani people in former Kurikian lands. Anyways, first question... what is happening?" - The bold question marks that Miladena thinks is very, very complex and a mess.

- "Glad you asked, ma'am." - Fouquet clears his throat. - "The mayor of the city Damek Petrov has been blatantly caught bribing a police officer to arrest his more popular political rival for crimes he never did nor there was evidence for, a trial was held after, and even if again, there was no evidence for any crimes he did, the city's judiciary system has sentenced the said rival named Vukan Jakesch to 20 years to prison, we could see easily see bills of former Kurikian dollars and current Sminishian Smils popping up from pockets of the judge. Not only that, he has rigged the most recent mayor election to keep him in local power just for his own benefits." - Explained Fouquet.

- "Aw jeez. I... think we had something like that in the past, but the Sminishian central government sanctioned them. Next que-" - Miladena says, before she gets interrupted.

- "Oh, one more thing. As you have heard from other news sources, Petrov even rejected state-owned companies' offers to help in development of cities and even took the funding for welfare and education for his own personal wealth. I've heard other city mayors have done the same, and we saw the true evils of a representative system, so we are protesting as you see now." - Fouquet added further explanations.

- "... Oh, so they are that bad." - Said Miladena. - "Right, I would ask why is it happening, but you have already explained it, so I'm just going to skip ahead and ask the final question." - She says, before clearing her throat. - "Do you see a bright future that the protests would bring?" -

- "Certainly. We might have some flaws, but the people will be the ones to decide who is going to be leader of that, and even call for said leader or figure to resign whenever they want. Free speech will spread more, but I do hope the protests work peacefully." - Fouquet sure is certain about the future.

- "Right, thank you for talking with me, I'll enjoy this breakfast you gave me." - Said Miladena, smiling.

- "You're welcome." - Fouquet stands up, he may be a cafeteria employee, but he sure is a political nerd. - "Bon appétit." - He says to Miladena, as he goes back to work.

Miladena Popv stops recording, she'll upload that when she eats her breakfast. She sips latté, and it sure is good, she cuts a piece of waffles, and eats is, sure is good too. After eating breakfast and drinking latté, she has indeed enjoyed the meal like Fouquet told her to do so. As she has finished eating, she has already paid, and has gone outside of the cafeteria, her mission to analyze the theory has begun.

Sminishia wrote:

Out, Damek Petrov!

Upon the not-so-clean streets, and upon cold, yet smoking air, Miladena Popov opens the door of the cafeteria, exiting the building after a nice conversation and breakfast, she feels her stomach a bit full. Right now, as people march the streets, raising fists and signs, waving flags and even yelling 'Напоље, Дамек Петров!' which means 'Out, Damek Petrov!', Miladena now takes her camera she's been recording the interview with. She begins recording the protests, and even city police officers watching the demonstrations against the mayor and doing almost nothing about it. The police who do something against the protests are called back by his partners, they would have to let citizens protest since this country has a policy that allows rights to protest.

Jeez, the people are angry alright. Miladena, while recording, walks around the city of Kamenistrava. After a protester sees the Gradvest logo at Miladena's left shoulder, he reaches out to her, fast walking. - "Hej!" - He calls.

Miladena flinches, she sees a protester approaching her, so she inhales and exhales. - "Ummm..." -

Before Miladena Popov could say anything, the protester finally stood in front of her. - "I see that you are a journalist, right?" - He asked. - "If so, have you had an interview with a fellow comrade participating in a protest?" - The protester added a second question.

- "Uhhhh..." - Miladena couldn't answer yet, she was too busy quietly recording the protests, not that she was against it though, she's in support of it, she is just here to gather information and... uncover something. - "Yes, and yes. You wanted to talk with me about something?" -

- "Da. I did not want an interview with you, I just wanted to tell you something." - The protester looks at both sides, then back at Miladena. - "Last time there was a journalist here, she mysteriously disappeared. It might have to do something with the mayor and the corruption, if you wish to have an interview with any local politician of Kamenistrava, remember what I told you." -

- "Yeah, I heard. Hope she isn't dead or something." - Miladena Popov sure does hope that the missing journalist isn't killed.

- "Right, so if you want to interview mayor, just remember that I warned you. Don't end up like Barrueco." - He said, going back to protesting.

Less than half an hour later.

With protests still happening, mayor Damek Petrov finally agrees to have a conversation with the woman journalist Miladena Popov. This makes Miladena sweat REAL hard, two security guards escorting her to the mayor's palace of Kamenistrava doesn't help either, what if they make an ambush to arrest, or if worse, execute her? Even though her job is to uncover corruption, she panics inside while thinking too much of Albina Barrueco. While hoping not to "disappear", she finally makes it to the Mayor's office.

Despite Sminishia being a Socialist country, and the city looking like almost nothing has improved, the office looks surprisingly looks better than most mayor offices of any Sminishian city, Damek Petrov is seen sitting on the chair of his desk, awaiting for Miladena to sit down. After awkward seconds of Miladena standing there, Petrov says something. - "Why won't you take a seat, young woman?" -

The way he said 'woman' made the journalist uncomfortable. - "O-Of course, mayor." - She obliges, sitting down on the chair in front of the mayor's desk. She slowly clears her throat, didn't sound clear at all. - "... My name is Miladena Popov, journalist- " -

- "Of Gradvest, Sminishia's biggest independent news media? I watched your broadcasts." - Petrov interrupted Popov, finishing her sentence. - "I know what you came in for, interview, right?" -

- "Y-Yes, I came here to ask you questions. Mind if I ask one?" - Asks Miladena, already recording with her camera, but hiding the red lights and not telling the mayor.

- "Don't be nervous, madam, I'm definitely open to answers." - Petrov put a smug face. - "I don't mind at all." -

That 'definitely' did not sound definite, something is up, she swears inside her mind. Miladena finally starts to ask a question. - "First question... what do you thi-" -

- "Think of the protest? They are all ungrateful bastards who don't respect good mayors like me, who would want to force a man to resign from power whenever the people and even the poor feel like it? And who would want every people to be in power of something?" - Petrov interrupted Miladena once again, and even though he answered, it sounded like he was admitting that he likes being a dictator.

- "... I'm not religious, but for God's sake, please don't interrupt me again." - Says Miladena, annoyed. - "Glad I received your answer, but if you don't like majority of people deciding stuff, please remember you live in a Democracy, well, at least in a constitutional one." -

- "Alright, alright, I won't do it again, princess." - Petrov promised to not interrupt again, still sounding rude though.

Miladena almost groans, but because of the disappearance of a journalist, she keeps it quiet. - "N-Next question... are you thinking of resigning one day?" -

- "I'll resign when I die." - That means Petrov wants to rule for the rest of his life.

[ Damn, this guy really is the worst mayor in this country. ] Thought Miladena to herself, before asking the next journalistic question. - "Another question, what do you think happened to Albina Barrueco?" - She mentions the San Sierran journalist who reportedly disappeared in this municipality.

- ". . ." - Dot dot dot indeed, Petrov kept quiet.

- "Sorry if I'm making you think through sir, I'll give you time to -" - Miladena stops after Petrov hands him something.

What Petrov is handing is a wad worth of ten thousand Smils. - "You did not hear of that woman." - He said, attempting bribery to escape this question.

Miladena shrinks her pupils. - "... Are you..." - She shakes her head. - "Are you bribing me, sir?" -

- "Just take the money you fu-" - Immediately, he gets interrupted by a guard.

- "I can show you what happened to Albina, Miladena." - He said. - "I can even escort you." -

This raises suspicion, yet a lot of concern for the journalist, will the guard betray the mayor and show what really happened to the foreign journalist? Miladena thinks for a moment before standing up. Then, nods. - "Please do." -

- "Hey, no no no! There's nothing about her you idiot!" - Denied Petrov, only to be ignored by both people.

The second guard doesn't let Petrov stand up. - "Let them be." - Turns out he isn't really loyal to the mayor at all.

The first guard then opens up a hidden trapdoor, which it's space was usually empty. Unfortunately, this isn't the usual times, Petrov puts his right hand on his forehead, thinking he's doomed because of a man he thought was loyal is doing something. As the trapdoor is open, it reveals a terrifying discovery, it's Albina's corpse. Her skin is still "soft", but it's also whiter than before, her dead face looking disturbingly emotionless, her eyes dry and even having her bloody wound in her chest being exposed. This makes Miladena let out a huge horrified gasp, is this what happened to a woman from a fricking foreign country?! She has a will to scream.

- "This is the missing person you're looking for." - Said the guard, before looking at Petrov looking very guilty.

As the journalist shivered and looked at the body, she revealed her camera's red lights, it is still recording, she shows it to the guards and even Petrov. She was startled for seconds, then looked at the disgusting freak of a mayor. - "Did... did you kill her?!" -

- "So..." - Damek Petrov, the local tyrant of the city, sighed. - "You have seen it... to answer your question, yes, I have killed her." - He said with admission, as the second guard takes the handcuffs and puts it on Petrov's hands.

- "Unbelievable... murder by a government official..." - Miladena has never seen a lifeless corpse in her entire life other than entertainment sources.

- "Let's get out ma'am, I'll tell you more later." -

More minutes later.

As the interview went... unexpected, demonstrations against Petrov are still happening, especially in front of the mayor's palace. Finally, Petrov, the two guards and the journalistic woman Miladena Popov show up while exiting the building. Upon demonstrators seeing Petrov handcuffed, minor cheers are immediately made, but most are still angry, as they want to spit right at the mayor's face. The guards call for nearby officers of the city's police, at least the least corrupt ones, to enter the palace, while letting the Miladena go and forcing Petrov to make a speech before being fully arrested.

Soon, the mayor finally gives a speech. - "Citizens of Kamenistrava... as you may all know, I am the mayor of the city, and I was before this place has been transferred to being part of Sminishia." - As he says his first sentence, many boo's are heard from the crowd and demonstrators. - "Please, citizens, let me give a chance to talk. Since you have showed demonstrations against me, since you have called and wished for me to be taken out of office, I have an announcement to make." - He inhales and exhales. - "I, Damek Petrov, am hereby resigning as mayor from office, firstly known as Mayor Petrov... now as regular old citizen Petrov." -

With the announcement given, the crowd immediately cheers up, whistles and yelling of the words 'URA!' are heard, and then chanted, as they wave the Sminishian flags, which makes Petrov look down. - "Further announcements about me will be likely released tomorrow, but further news will likely be broadcasted by Gradvest as welll." - This doesn't stop the crowd from cheering.

Miladena Popov is still scarred from seeing a corpse, especially belonging to a fellow journalist. She returns to the cafeteria, taking her laptop, using the cafe's free WI-FI and uploading everything she recorded. She has uncovered government corruption, but she'll never forget what she saw.

Sminishia wrote:

Midnight between fifth and sixth day, Kamenistrava.

It has been less than 9 hours since the money ridden mayor Damek Petrov has resigned from ever governing the city of Kamenistrava ever again, but this stops the national police from nothing. Protests that were occurring in the day were done today, with their leaders calling for demonstrators to sleep since it is night, and to continue protesting in the next day, as the police investigate the mayor's palace and even collect the corpse of a then-journalist, but they yet have to find her passport and data of which city she lived in.

There are fifteen police units inside the mayor's palace, with four of them in the mayor's office and desk room (where the corpse is located). Because of the cold outside, they are all wearing waterproof heated vests and ushankas that have a hammer badge. Ten more police units, including one sergeant named Mlivoj Klima, are awaiting outside for the men inside the place to finish finding everything they need to gather. Sergeant Klima holds a portable two-way radio device, pressing and holding a button which makes a beeping sound, then, he speaks through the device. - "Did you find anything yet, comrades?" - He asks, being a little desperate while standing in the literal cold.

/\/\ We definitely found a corpse that the other woman kept talking about, we have even discovered a trapdoor where the body exactly is. Unfortunately, our boys couldn't find her identification card nor a passport, neither could I. Over. /\/\

- "You found the corpse, but couldn't find an ID card? Did you check the pockets?" -

/\/\ Aye aye, there's a note of reports possibly written by the woman, although I can't understand the language. Still, we couldn't find her ID card nor any documents with her identity. Either she must have been mistakenly accepted, or Damek Petrov got rid of them. /\/\

- "Bastard, was he trying to cause a war?" - Sergeant Klima has gotten a little angry.

/\/\ Uh, excuse me Sarge, but what does this have to do with war? /\/\

- "He killed a foreign journalist, there have been national conflicts over deaths of individuals of their national identity. Continue searching, I'm sure the capitalist pig has hidden it somewhere." - Sergeant Klima's mention of war and national conflict worried nearby officers that are outside with him. Some have even doubted, why a war?

/\/\ Sarge, while you were speaking, one of our comrades have finally found her identification card, documents and even her passport. It was hidden in a storage locker outside the mayor's room and in some hallway. We split up to multiple teams, so we weren't the ones who found it. /\/\

Klima sighs of relief. - "Tell one of the other teams that they have done a nice job." -

/\/\ Of course. However, we have found something very... concern... oh my God. /\/\

- "What's wrong boys? Did you find something?" -

/\/\ Well, um... Sarge, you would want to see this. /\/\

- "Is it this concerning? If so, bring it to me, I'm sure the Police Commissioner would like to see it as well." -

Minutes later, two teams of police officers, making 9 of the units in total, go out of the mayor's palace, holding stuff they have found, while one team holds a morgue brought in by the police to carry the corpse of the then-journalist Albina Barrueco, and the other team holding ID documents and one a folder of documents with a company's logo stamped on it. Sergeant Klima gives off a very interesting look at the officer holding the folder. - "What do we have here, compatriot?" -

- "It's... you're right, the Police Commissioner has to see this." - Says the officer, as he hands over the folder of documents, it includes a stamp of a logo from one of the largest state-owned companies.

- "Tehnicki Nacini? I thought they were defunct." - Assumed Sergeant Klima, Tehnicki Nacini is a currently active, but largely forgotten state-owned IT company. - "I'm going to take a read on this on the vehicle. Not to worry about the night, I have my flashlight." - He says, heading to his police car. As he hops in the car with the folder in his hand, he turns on his flashlight and opens the folder to read the documents. Why didn't he turn on his car for light? He doesn't want to waste his vehicle's energy. As he passes pages of documents, the first results are contracts and deals made by the company and agreed by Damek Petrov and his representatives in the city council, the contract was about the company helping not only Damek Petrov, but also local representatives and politicians of cities especially located in the annexed lands to rig their elections and unfairly win them in return for financial support to keep the company up even without economic benefits to the general IT industry of Sminishia and the national economy.

After reading all these, Sergeant Klima could not believe it, is a state-owned company really helping politicians rig elections so that they could get more funds from provincial governments? - "What in the..." - He pauses. - "This is corrupt debauchery! I need to tell my men and the commissioner." -

Half an hour later, many policemen have left the city capitol area, few remained continuing to search for more suspicious clues, but most were heading to report journalists and people of news media, even the sarge had to tell his captain and the police commissioner about the recently discovered documents. Miladea Popov, the journalist woman who let the police know about a dead woman, is currently hanging around her most recently favored cafeteria in the city, yes, in midnight. She's still awake because of coffee, and her body is on a mild tremor, she's being addicted to caffeine, although she can still think well. Miladena is offered glasses of water by Vivien Fouquet, who just wants to go home, but Miladena refuses, suddenly, she gets a call from her phone, so she answers.

- "Good... morning, I guess, Miladena Popov of Gradvest, how can I-" -

- "This is the police, you remember when you gave me a number?" -

- "Oh, morning officer, I guess I do." -

- "Good, I need to know where you are, because I have something to report." -

Miladena sighs. - "I'm at Litvak's Café, still with my laptop watching the footage. If you do have something to report, why not do it with text message?" -

- "It's something you need to see in person." - The calling officer responds. - "But.. You're at Litvak's Café? It's midnight. Whatever, I'll bring em' to you." -

- "... Thaaaaaaanks." -

A door immediately opens after the 'thanks', it's the cop that was calling Miladena in phone, he was standing in front all this time. - "You know it's rude to thank me like that." - He says jokinly, hanging up his phone call while physically looking at Miladena.

- "Whaaaa..." - She still sounds tired and unamused, while Fouquet chuckled.

- "I'm joking." - The policeman chuckled as well. - "But seriously though, what is a recently discovered document, you might want to report it and help warn the public." - He says, while sliding the folder of the documents. - "This is a copy I received from a nearby police station in this city, but it says everything that the original contained." -

Miladena gives the folder a look. - "... Interesting." - Very interesting indeed. - "I'm... I'm sorry if I sound unenthusiastic, I'm just really tired and my coffee isn't working." - She says, giving an excuse.

- "It's fine woman, just read it." -

And so, Miladena opens the folder, with the first paper having a logo of Tehnicki Nacini, the forgotten but still active Sminishian state-owned company. She gives it a read of pages, she had the same reaction as Sergeant Klima did... unbelievable. - "What the hell is this?" - Said Miladena. - "Did... did they really do this?" -

- "Of course they did. We'd be happy if you let the public know about this fast, maybe take photos of the documents and publish them to your media Gradvest." - Said the policeman.

- "... Understood." - Miladena obliged, taking photos of documents that contain contracts that have caused corruption, and soon after taking pictures of all pages, she uploads those pictures to the website of Gradvest, even adding descriptions that a policeman gave it to her, and that the documents are a copy of the original.

- "Good work, woman." - He motions her up. - "By the way, you need some sleep, mind renting an hotel?" - He offers.

- "I need sleep indeed... But I won't rent an hotel, I'm fine sleeping in my car." - Said Miladena with a more tired face.

Vivien Fouquet jumps in kindly. - "She can stay at my place." - He offers to Miladena. - "No need to pay anything, I even have a spare head." -

Miladena smiles at Fouquet, nodding. - "I... I guess I'll pick Fouquet's place." - She says, it makes Fouquet happy.

The cop smiles. - "Well, at least you don't get to pay anything just to sleep comfortably, or you don't need to hurt your back to rest." - He admits. - "Fouquet, you're lucky, because if one or more youngsters were here, they'd call you, umm... what is it named..." - The cop tries to think of what the kids call, and then points at Fouquet with his right hand and finger. - "A simp. My nephews have called me that whenever I did something for my wife." -

Fouquet sighs, such is the internet today. Miladena could have giggled, but she didn't due to her tiredness. Because it's done uploading, she closes her laptop and puts it on her backpack, grabs her camera and wireless microphone, then stands up. - "Let's go..." -

Minutes later, the three people get out of the cafeteria, with lights turning off and Fouquet putting a 'Closed' sign. Fouquet takes Miladena Popov to his place for her to sleep and rest in, and so she does sleep there. As Miladena sleeps, she awaits for Gradvest to find out about the scandal and make public reports about it, she even wonders how people would react to that and the company for doing so.

Sminishia wrote:

Sixth day, 8:48 AM.

It is still cold outside despite being in the summer. Miladena has already been awake, she has sleeping for nearly eight hours, feeling well rested compared to yesterday. She's in Fouquet's Soviet-era apartment in the number of 288, the place surprisingly looks a lot better than most communal apartments, but that's only the inside look, since the outside look appears very similar and equal to said communal apartments. As the kitchen is ridden with the great smell of food since Vivien Fouquet is cooking, Miladena Popov, still in her sleeping clothes, turns on the Television just to see if Gradvest is broadcasting her footage she recorded. The TV is definitely switched to the channel, with it's news member speaking.

Yesterday, as protests and demonstrations were active nationwide especially in the northern cities, our journalist Miladena Popov has found a dark secret of a mayor Damek Petrov of the Kamenistrava city and province, who has later resigned following the time being arrested by the police.

There were two dark secrets, one found by said journalist, and one found by the police, but too uploaded by the journalist. Inside the city capitol, or at least the mayor's palace, a dead body was discovered, said body belonged to the foreign journalist who has mysteriously disappeared, the police have said that they took time to find the documents, and after this discovery, the Sminishian central government issued a strong apology including details that they arrested the mayor and that they would return the body to her country of origin. Not only was a corpse found out, a folder of documents was discovered by the police during an investigation after arrest, these documents include contracts and deals with city politicians and a state-owned company Tehnicki Nacini, with contracts detailing that the company would support city candidates cheating in local elections in return for financial support to keep the said company active and powerful despite doing very little to benefit the IT industry and the use of silicon. The first man to read it after discovery was police officer Borzivoi Bobkov, and later following police sergeant Milivoj Klima, who described the contracts as 'corrupt debauchery'. 

This too, has been uploaded by journalist Miladena Popov, who claimed that the documents she received was a copy made in a police station of the original, made to not lose data. In other news... The Kurikian Military Government has threatened actions considered as war cri-

Miladena turns off the TV, sighing. Despite being glad that her reports made it to the channel, she's still scarred from seeing the dead body, and is overthinking of how protests would grow after seeing corruption. The footage of the dead body even made it, however, in the broadcasts, it was censored to prevent people from being disturbed, although it only did very little of that. Then, Fouquet calls to Miladena.

- "Breakfast is ready!" - He yelled out.

- "Coming!" - Miladena responded, standing up from the couch and approaching the kitchen.

As she entered the kitchen, the smell of food is good. Vivien Fouquet has cooked fried eggs, bacon and Gorbastani toast (Valsoran equivalent for French toast). Alongside is black tea, which serves the same purpose of coffee, but like Fouquet said, he preferred tea than coffee. Fouquet smiles at Miladena. - "Bon Appétit." - He told the woman to enjoy her food.

Miladena Popov nods without saying anything, she picks up a fork and knife, cutting a piece of fried egg, taking it with the fork and eating it. It tastes good indeed, she's seen smiling, but before she says anything, she does the same to the Gorbastani toast, and eats the piece, tasting even better. - "You're a great cook, Fouquet." - She compliments the guy's cooking skills, before starting to actually eat the breakfast.

Fouquet blushes a little bit, but succeeds in hiding it and returning his face color to normal. - "Thank you very much." - He smiled greatly, soon sitting down and beginning to eat alongside the journalist woman.

Meanwhile, at Vetrojesto. 9:00 AM

The city of Vetrojesto is a partially polluted city, but locals and officials are doing their job to remove said pollution and clean up the city. Not only that, the city has computer factories that are being upgraded with IT, automation and easier jobs for workers with technology, and the city is near a silica-rich mine site, which is owned by the state. That city is also the HQ place for Tehnicki Nacini, the state-owned company behind the corruption in the annexed lands. Inside the HQ building, it's Head of Company (Sminishian term for CEO) is watching the Gradvest news, they found out everything that he has done, not to mention the shock he had as he found out a mayor he supported killed a foreign journalist, he's making a stressed gesture with hands clenched, and then placed on top of his head.

The Head of Company's name is Bojan Svarovsky, while he didn't found or establish this state-owned company, he still runs it, and now, because of what he's done, he's bringing the entire thing to an end. He presses his fingers onto his nose bridge. - "What have I done? What have I done? Why have I done this?" - Svarovsky repeats it himself over and over, deeply regretting his decisions and realizing that he put a shameful and stained reputation in one of the once largest state-owned companies in the country. While questioning himself why did he agree to secretly intervene and cheat in elections, he received both an Email and a text message in his smartphone, they are both from the central government of the Socialist Republic. He expects it to be government pressure, as he checks out the text message in his phone and Email, he reads the text message, which says:

Good morning, Bojan Svarovsky, this message is from the Ministries of: Economics and Law Enforcement.

Read the Email and print it, please.

The text message was really short, but it sounded a little bit threatening, but he obliged, opening the email in his laptop with the company's logo. The email reads about the consequences of Svarovsky's actions, reports of revealed documents about contracts and a corruption scandal connected to the said contracts. Following this, the email also contains decisions made by the government for something about the company, including seizing currency behind the scandal and forceful shutdown, since the company barely produces benefits of their purpose anymore. After Svarovsky finishes reading, he lied his head onto his desk, ready to cry, but before he could, his phone is vibrating along with a ring. He first expects more pressure from the government, but it's actually from one of his employees.

He picks it up. - "... Hello?" - His tone sounded crushing, but his employee sounded panicked.

- "Boss! I see the police has parked their cars in front of our headquarters, do you have any idea what's going on?" - Said the employee, who is outside and was about to work today.

- "... They..." - Svarovsky couldn't believe it, the police are already here? He knows he deserves this, but they're here that fast? He clears his throat. - "That fast?" - He asked, still making stressed gestures and on the verge of tears.

- "What do you mean 'that fast'? Has anyone done something inside?" -

- "You'll... you'll find out." -

Bojan Svarovsky hangs up from the phone, awaiting his arrest. After the call has hung up, dozens of police officers get out from their cars, entering the headquarter building of Tehnicki Nacini. They are here to investigate everyone associated with the company, and to arrest the Head of Company. Two police officers enter the office room of the Head of Company, arresting Bojan Svarovsky while the police force fill the building with radio chatter and quotes by the policemen.

Back at Kamenistrava.

Miladena Popov and Vivien Fouquet both leave the apartment after eating breakfast and changing clothes. Miladena looks at Fouquet. - "Thank you for letting me stay on your place, Vivien." - She smiles.

- "You're welcome" - Says Fouquet, waving goodbye. - "I have to go to work now, it was nice knowing that Petrov resigned, bye!" - He said, walking away to the cafeteria to go to work, he has customers to serve.

Miladena waves back. - "Bye!" - She said a farewell.

As Fouquet walked to go back to work, Miladena grabbed her stuff, readying to record stuff one more time and then go home. As she presses the record button, she walks upon the environment of demonstrators gaining larger crows and being a bit more loud. They are enraged that a company intervened in all this corruption, it's leader stands up at a fountain with a megaphone while holding the Sminishian flag.

- "Attention, comrades! As you may have heard, we are demonstrating for direct People's Rule! But something came up, it was recently discovered that capitalist degenerates have rigged city elections in favor of greedy local politicians and helped unfairly elect representatives to city legislations for monetary gains, they wanted nothing but currency as the people they helped make us suffer with tyranny. This shows the TRUE EVILS of a representative system, we thank the police officers and journalists for uncovering this filth, but for something like this to not happen again, we spread the word and demand the abolition of a representative system, having it proved it is a danger to Sminishian democracy. We are all comrades!" -

The protest leader who gave the speech is named Niklaus Borodin, to show support for the demonstrator's demands, he was democratically elected to be leader of these protesters. Protesters chant 'We are all comrades' to show the purpose of the protests.

Miladena Popov has recorded this, however, she doesn't have time to upload it now, as she has to go home. One protester stops her from going to her car for a minute, Miladena hopes this isn't an abduction attempt like last time. To make things good, it isn't. - "Thank you for uncovering this, you are a great compatriot." - Says one of the protesters part of the crowd, who spoke to her before about warnings of being a journalist.

- "T-Thanks." - She says.

- "You mind if I take a selfie with you? Don't worry, I'll make a bit of distance." - Said the protester.

- "Well... a photo won't be bad." -

- "Good!" - He takes his smartphone and stands side Miladena, making him and her smile, and taking a photo shot. He soon distances a bit more from the woman. - "Thank you again, Popov, this time for making me happy." -

Miladena smiles. - "You're welcome." - She says, walking away to her car.

- "We are all comrades." -

Soon, Miladena hops in her car, feeling a bit accomplished. She starts the vehicle, and when driving away, she expects Kovac to text and call her all over again.

Read dispatch

Terreich und Preussen wrote:

The Terreich Aeronautics and Space Administration (TASA) is an independent agency of the Terriecher Federal Government founded to develop and expand Terriecher Space capabilities and air travel. TASA was established in 1947, becoming one of the space-orientated organizations established in the world at that time. Originally, the organization was to focus of the development of improved air travel and transportation,, however, due to the discovery of the rocket engine and advances in space flight, TASA shifted its focus to Space-oriented projects. Since TASA's establishment, most of Terreich's space-oriented projects were led by TASA, such as Volk-2, the first-ever satellite from Terreich und Preussen to be launched into space, and the Allegiance Project, one of the biggest space stations in the entire world. There are only a few countries are considered competitors to TASA and its space initiative. One of those nations is Shavara (San Sierra), which has made its organization known with its recent flight to the planet of Eta.

Currently, there are three main stations created by TASA in orbit above Valsora: Alpha, Phönix, and Bayreuth. Each of these stations is vital to the security and research development for Terreich und Preußen. Without them, the country's security and stability would be vulnerable. Together, these stations form the ISS Allegiance.

Alpha Station is the biggest station that is in orbit around Valsora with a population of 21. This station is responsible for running all three stations efficiently and effectively, evaluating the information provided by other stations, and defending itself and the other stations in any case where it may be threatened. To achieve this defense, Alpha station has access to a surplus of space warfare equipment such as rockets to defend itself. The government of ISS Allegiance is made up of representatives from each station. Each of these representatives is a supervisor and leader of the many jobs that are required to run Alpha station, such as Head of Medical and Head of Engineering. Alpha Station also has a nuclear reactor, an algae farm, and a hydro-farm to provide power, food, and clean oxygen. Alpha Station and the other ring stations rotate to create artificial gravity using centripetal force.

Phoenix is the second biggest station in orbit around Valsora with a population of 14 people. This station is responsible for research development, space exploration, and experimentation. Phoenix also has access to the TASA Telescope, which is used to study far-out stars and their planets. At the lower levels of this station are the laboratories. These laboratories are specially used to carry out research and experiments that require a space-like environment but are also used to create new technologies, like the TASA Telescope, which was created in the Pheonix station. This station also houses the living quarters of the astronauts that live on the station.

Bayreuth is the smallest station in orbit around Valsora with a population of 10 people. This station is mainly used for communications with the Valsora and other neighboring satellites.



Member Nations and Associated Corporations and Institutions
  • Terreich und Preußen

  • Xi-Chang

  • Schteiermark

  • Arkadia

  • Volkstechnolgie

  • TASA

  • University of Berlin

  • Aschmark College of Astrophysics

  • University of Rosenburg

  • University of Neu Litien

ISS Allegiance
Read dispatch

Finished the logo!

<slaps a huge Lerasi Seal of Approval on them>

Oh yeah updoot time

Sminishia and Terreich und Preussen

Fetudersialand wrote:Need any funding my guy?

Nope. Our Space Administration is fully funded.

Fetudersialand

Fetudersialand

Terreich und Preussen wrote:Nope. Our Space Administration is fully funded.

Ok.

I set my alarm to 6am and I still woke up late
REEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

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