Historty of Arkmunster - Revolution to Modern Day

For those interested in the previous history of Arkmunster, see the Rise and Fall of Auchendale.

Auchendale before the Storm

The Kingdom of Auchendale was, at least in the beginning, an advocate for Constitutionalism. Following the Commons Act, the Kingdom had been ruled in tandem by both King and Parliament. According to the Act, Constitutionalism was inseparable from the King and Parliament, so much so that the King himself could hold and dismiss Parliament at will and Parliament crowned the King. However, this carefully planned out balance was ultimately disrupted by the Mill Strikes. A minor strike that centred around the textile industry in Middlemoor, it called into question who was authorised to use the Auchendale Army in matters of civil disobedience.

While both King David and Parliament were agreed in breaking the strike, the acting General in Middlemoor was not. Asking for specific orders from the King or Parliament (since officially only one can call for martial law), the Parliament and King consulted with the Commons Act, and did not find an answer. The Parliament claimed the ability for themselves, leading to the King disbanding Parliament and calling for new elections. These new elections included several 'rotten boroughs', ensuring that the National Party would claim majority and uphold King David's ruling. The Mill Strikes were crushed summarily under the King's ruling. This subversion of Constitutionalism caused significant unrest in the upper class, which helped lead to King David stepping down a year later. Despite this, the King's power over Constitutionalism was now significant and the delicate balance disrupted.

The next in line for the throne was King David's only child, Michael. King Michael would not reign for very long, passing away five months later in the night. Known for being a sickly child, his death still took many by surprise. With no direct descendent, the throne went to Claude, King David's brother. Claude, or more accurately General Claude, had served primarily overseas in administering the Crown Colonies. His rule there shaped him into an autocratic leader, beloved by the military and loathed by the populace. Nevertheless, he proved an effective administrator with significant corporate backing and at the time, a generally uncontroversial successor.

Ascending to the throne as King-General Claude, his first actions were largely bureaucratic. Prominent representatives from various companies were selected in the Auchendale Business Council (ABC), forming the first deliberately anti-democratic move. The ABC was the premier influence on the economic interests in Auchendale, superseding Parliament in the later Economic Restructuring Act. Made up of General Oil, Old Electric, and Tuesday Manufacturing Incorporated, ABC would eventually fold a few more companies into its ranks, foremost of which being the James Farming Corporation. While this shuffling would take time, King-General Claude was making his moves on the public sphere.

King-General Claude through expanded usage of rotten boroughs and two separate regional snap elections, consolidated power in the National Party to form a majority in Parliament. He had also married the sister of the National Party's leader, granting the King significant influence on the political process. He had also made overtures to the army on the mainland to significant effect, hashing out several funding bills and photo opportunities. Behind closed doors, however, he had offered the General Staff Chief a premier political position as second in command. The Chief accepted.

The opening ceremony of the Summer Parliament was the beginning of the end of Auchendale, as the King announced the slew of military and economic legislation to be passed by the National Party. Accompanied by a few short protests in the following days, these acts granted the ABC power and authorised a new Auchendale Government Council (AGC) to be made. The AGC would be made of only three people - General Staff Chief Kimberly, Nationalist Party leader Peterson, and the King himself. However, Kimberly's second in command - one Eric Manschel - found himself excluded from the AGC. Manschel would take this as a great slight and an effective career ender in the King's service.

For the public abroad, underground socialist parties were beginning to emerge after the blanket ban imposed under King David. The National Union was the most successful one, coordinated both Union movements (having reached their greatest might) and the people, binding the two to one cohesive political party. Fuelling discontent beyond the flagrant disregard for Constitutionalism, the economic depression lingering for years now had reached a new height as Tuesday Manufacturing took over the rival Montgomery Company, leading to several factory closures. Despite this, the King pushed on, committed to bearing short term unrest for complete dominance.

The King was well aware of the threat posed by the National Union and in response to the growing surge of unrest by August, passed the National Security Act. Entailing a tax increase to fund new projects by the ABC and authorised the first Secret Police in Auchendale history. The Auchendale Intelligence Agency (AIA) would be led by Mister Hitchens (a figure hailing from the King's work in breaking up local independence movements in the Colonies) and in second command, none other then Manschel. Granted significant freedom to defeat the National Union, the political manoeuvring between the King, Hitchens, and Manschel who all wanted different things stymied the AIA before it even got off the ground.

However, the tax increase would show some signs of halting the National Union's progress. Managing to successfully reopen several Montgomery factories and launch a public works initiative, it got about four percent of the population of Auchendale back on the job. While hardly a lethal blow, the National Union was forced to turn to other areas of the population. The airforce, a bleeding edge technology for Auchendale, was the primary recipient of this new campaigning. Frustrated at the dominance of the army and navy in the government, refugee of several Constitutionalists, and the worst paid job in the Auchendale military, it was a prime breeding ground for dissent.

This partnership would reach the growing ears of the AIA and end up on Manschel's desk. Manschel sought an opportunity to take charge of the government and claim his rightful spot in the sun, and an organisation in need of help to overthrow the government was just waiting for him to take the reigns. The partnership between Manschel and the National Union is a complicated one, with the Constitutionalist wings suspicious of anyone who would willingly involve themselves in the government and Manschel seeking supreme power himself. The first war of the revolution was fought on the soul of it, between these two forces for the opportunity to lead it.

Manschel, however, had the significant edge. The AIA and the rooms beneath it were ready to remove any threats to his power and give something to Hitchens to send off to the King. This war would rage on in the background however, as the call for a General Strike was in full force. Striking for better wages and an end to the rotten boroughs, this would effect every major industry in Auchendale. Unwilling to negotiate, the King ordered the army to break up the General Strike. While successful in some areas of the country, the army was unable to completely end the General Strike as protesters took to the streets. In a tense standoff that stretched on for a week, the protestors would not leave and the King was not willing to order them to fire.

Finally, by the end of the week, the ABC met with union leaders and agreed to a modest wage increase. The National Union had reached it's limit in regards to peaceful action - without the ability to provide for the protestors, they were ultimately beholden to what little money the protestors had to stay afloat. While early plans for the Constitutionalists were drawn up to form countryside collectives, they ultimately fell through as Manschel intimidated or arrested them. The National Union, or at least the Constitutionalist wing, had failed. Ultimately not having moved quickly enough to secure food or ensure operational security against Manschel, they had been driven underground and only Manschel was left in power.

Setting about reforming the National Union, Manschel would dig deep into his bank account to finance militant wings. Tapping officers to train them, he began to follow actions similar to the King. Working with or intimidating leading union members to follow his plans, engaging the populace in public affairs by trusted representatives, the National Union shifted away from ideas of peaceful revolution. The Winter Parliament opened and the stage was finally set.

Auchendale Civil War

The March on Ravenhaf was originally meant to have Manschel lead it and perform a coup on the government with the gathered militias. However, the AIA was warned a short few hours before the march would take place, leaving Manschel in the AIA and the militias on the march. While overseen by Officer Amorost on the march, significant figures were able to escape the Palace. King-General Claude, General Staff Chief Kimberly and most of the ABC. The militias would successfully take the palace and Parliament with a short skirmish, arresting most of the National Party and bureaucracy. The National Party leader Peterson would be killed in his attempt to flee in a waiting car by militiamen and Hitchens would be murdered by Manschel himself. The inability to successfully conduct a clean coup soon brought the King to assemble a new government in Ryde and the army soon consolidated around him.

Manschel, in a last bid effort to cleanly end the civil war before it began, ordered the bombing of Ryde by the airforce. A squadron was scrambled four hours after the fall of Parliament and Ryde was pounded from the sky. While several important military figures would be killed in the bombing, the King would survive and go into hiding, making a proclamation via the radio shortly after the bombing ended.

Manschel similarly gave a radio speech shortly after, declaring himself as the new head of state of Auchendale and encouraging continued revolution. Backed by popular support and militias, the first few days of the civil war were marked by Manschel's forces raiding local army bases and arming the populace, launching harassment attacks and air raids on the King's army. Grand Officer Manschel (as he now went) set up a temporary government in a pub named Arkmunster and jokingly named the armed forces after it, which would eventually become de facto in official correspondence.

Auchendale forces, meanwhile, went about securing and cleaning out resistance at home. Driven by a mixture of fear and anger, the planned arrests turned into summary executions on the streets and farms by zealous members of the army. The ABC began to dismantle the remains of Parliament and officially stepped in as the political and economic force in the nation, turning all companies in controlled lands to the corporations in the council and beginning a severe rollback of worker's rights. Preparing to tighten it's belt in the war, they also green lit new waves of propaganda to fill the walls of company floors and apartment blocks. Calling for everything from trust to resistance against Manschel's tyranny, forming a bulk of the artwork of the Civil War.

The first month meanwhile was marked by trenches dotting farms and martial law imposed across the cities - most of which in Manschel's control. Auchendale forces launched a series of September offences, spearheaded by artillery bombardment and tanks overrunning Arkmunster trenches. Pushing the line back to the city of Middlemoor, Arkmunster forces managed to turn back the Auchendale military just by a hair. Middlemoor, however, seemed doomed to fall and the kilometres between it and Ravenhaf to go with it. A surprise snowstorm, however, blanketed the field in snow and made further advances impossible. The upperhand shifted to Arkmunster, launching air raids on the encamped army, bombing arms and men indiscriminately.

As winter fell, the King emerged from hiding to flee the country entirely. Fleeing from Willowsfield to Harrow on a train, it would cross primarily loyalist territory but for a short stint be in the territory of a neutral 'Peacekeeping Force'. The train departed with it's usual load of coal and food to Harrow, but with the addition of a passenger car holding King-General Claude and several royal relatives against better judgement by the ABC. The Arkmunster forces were well aware ahead of time of the possibility of the royalty fleeing and the addition of the passenger car tipped the willingness to organise a military intervention into the neutral territory. Easily defeating the Peacekeeping Force and planting bombs on the track, the Arkmunster military detonated a series of bombs on the track. Forcibly derailing the train and killing the conductor and two members of the royal family, King-General Claude was grievously wounded. A short show trial was performed and he was executed for crimes against humanity by Officer Amorost. While the royal family was not yet dead - the line would convolutedly pass to a second cousin who was seven years old at the time - the legitimacy of the crown was significantly hurt and a great victory by Arkmunster.

As winter warmed up to spring, Arkmunster forces launched the Grand Offensive. Launching attacks all across the line with the active movement of thirty-seven thousand men, Auchendale forces bravely resisted but ultimately were pushed back, losing several artillery pieces but managing to keep tanks out of Arkmunster hands. This offensive proved costly with over six thousand dead on Arkmunster's side and three thousand and four hundred dead on Auchendale's side, the most costly offensive in the war. Air bombardment continued over the end of the week, leading to the effective disbandment of several divisions of Auchendale forces.

The ABC and acting head of state Kimberly prepared to flee in exile via air as Arkmunster gained a decisive hand. The weeks turned into a two month long affair of retreating by Auchendale forces as brave pyrrhic battles were waged in cities across the nation. Finally, with their backs against the wall in Ryde, Auchendale forces surrendered to Manschel. No civil war was over, a hundred and thirty thousand dead in eight months of fighting. Cities bore the scars of bombing and street to street fighting, but there was now only one ruler in Auchendale.

Rise of Arkmunster

Manschel quickly set about implementing a post-war government made up of the Trade Union Congress (TUC) - selected military officers and trade union leaders to advise Manschel - and rebuilding the shellshocked bureaucracy. The first law Manschel signed was the National Recovery Administration (NRA). The NRA was responsible for reconstructing Auchendale cities and to purge royal influence from the nation as a whole. Under the August Report by the NRA, the name Auchendale was seen as inherently reactionary and royalist and advocated to replace it with Arkmunster. To Manschel's wry amusement, he agreed. The nation as we now know it - the Republican Union of Arkmunster - replaced the official name of Auchendale in a bill signed by Manschel.

The NRA's primary focus was to rebuild national infrastructure and begin enforcing communism on the nation. The landlords were removed, the market economy was put into a transitional state, and women's rights were championed by them. Sweeping away the vestiges of 'reactionary social culture', the NRA supported gay rights, women in the workplace, communalism, and abolishment of marriage to be replaced with free love. 

Manschel also created the Revolutionary Security Administration (RSA), which would conduct its first purge shortly after it's creation. Thoroughly purging the old and new army, navy, and airforce, it would move to thoroughly arm the populace and organise militias. It also absorbed the remains of the AIA and soon began to covertly watch the populace and jail Constitutionalist and royalist movements.

This period was dotted with uprising by Constitutionalists and Royalists which would be crushed in relatively short order by the militias and in time the social purity would be championed by these militias. Manschel equally began to thoroughly invest in pet projects such as local arms manufacturing and technological progress, which would in time began to supplant the traditionally manufacturing economy.

The NRA held it's first Winter Session, launching a comprehensive revitalisation plan. Beginning in three steps (or revolutions as it was called), it was passed by Manschel a short while later. The first revolution was industrial, transitioning the industry into a fair market social economy. It subsided and supported the Technocratic Union, the Arms Union, and Farm Union to begin a process of rebuilding and new developments on a local scale. It also standardised and increased the rail lines dotting the country, becoming the primary use of transport.


The second was a social one, with forcible integration of racial minorities, minority education program, and women advocacy programs. This one caused a minor stir but ultimately proved relatively popular with the populace, especially with the women who found an new home in the revolution. It also structured a safety net and created the Arkmunster Health Service.

The third and final one was technologically. Auchendale and then Arkmunster struggled technologically, relying more and more on colonial exports and manufacturing to make up for the stunning weakness in education. The NRA overhauled the Arkmunster Education System and built several new schools, while the Ravenhaf Innovation Fair would celebrate advances made in technological progress.

The RSA, meanwhile, began it's focus on the civilian populace with significant piles of 'anti-revolutionary traitors' to work through. It would be expanded during this time to help deal with the significant amount of people it needed to process and would purge approximately a thousand citizens and jail another thousand.

Manschel had begun to consolidate his own power around himself, securing his place as the Grand Officer and began to create the Trade Council. A sprawling complex to house the TUC, the bureaucracy, and his own palace, it would sighted on the previous royal palace.

As Arkmunster rebuilt itself and Grand Officer Manschel grew more powerful, the reconstruction of the nation had come to a halt finally and the Trade Council was completed. The economy began to shift from market social to a fully socialist economy and the wounds of the war began to heal. Manschel would live in the Palace a few short months, before he would make a speech outside the Trade Council. This speech would be cut short by an attempt on the Grand Officer's life, with several bullets to the chest and one to the leg. Despite the best efforts of trained doctors, Manschel would die three days after the attempt.



Power Struggles, Political Collapse, and Rebirth

The Trade Union Council attempted to take over from Manschel in the following days, only to find itself blocked by the RSA. The RSA viewed itself as the legitimate successors and wasn't afraid to use it's agents to wage a dirty war on the TUC. The TUC's favoured candidate, one Amelia Lewis (private that rose to officer in the Civil War), was a renowned survivor of political attacks. She, in time, became one quite good at avoiding assassinations as well. Between car bombs, poisonings, and gunfire, she survived six assassination attempts by the RSA.

The RSA, however, didn't survive the militia. Several leading heads of the RSA were gunned down as the militias took to the streets, promised with the carrot of democratic reforms by Amelia Lewis. As the RSA dispersed to save themselves from the militia, they went into hiding with a bloody mark. Successfully murdering several TUC members, the RSA would in time slowly shift from attempts to win the succession battle and become a terrorist organisation, acting as the remains of the old government. Representing this shift, the name RSA was replaced with the Revolutionary Front (RF). Taking to the forests, hills, and anywhere they could find willing safehouses, the TUC was now firmly in charge.


First Citizen Amelia Lewis (as she titled herself, shifting away from the more militant late Manschel) began by attempting to balance a heavily armed, angry citizenship with the demands of the TUC. Driven by a mixture of demands of democracy and further centralisation of the state, Lewis would spend her first months in office cajoling a home rule bill to pass the TUC. This home rule bill would allow citizens to limitedly elect selected representatives to city or county council. It failed to pass the TUC despite her best efforts, lacking the leverage on enough of the members to pass it.

She instead worked towards fixing the nationalisation mess that made up Arkmunster. Old, pre-war companies were nationalised on a local basis by militias or by the workers. This lead to a bloated bureaucracy dealing with disparate worker-led companies, especially when local companies would end up being nationalised by five or six different groups in the same city. Creating the National Industrial Board (NIB), similar companies were consolidated based by city, cities by region, and region by an overall head represented in the NIB. In exchange, the workers were organised cohesively into unions which held a significant amount of power on local day to day operations. This streamlining effect hurt several industries, while helping others.

The main beneficiaries of this program were the technologically driven sectors - specifically planes and electronics. The broad nationalisation and standardisation of these areas lead to actual, feasible nationwide projects to be undertaken using the information from the limited, locally nationalised regions from before to steer innovation. The biggest loser, on the other hand, was manufacturing. Locally owned factories, catering to the needs of the region, had their production shifted away and lead to the failure of several 'community cooperatives' where industrial goods were exchanged for farmed ones. This decision, more then anything (but perhaps the 'Third Revolution' from Manschel's rule) shaped the modern Arkmunster economy, shifting into a service economy and leaving the manufacturing one behind.

These changes were not all well liked, however. The failure of the community cooperatives disrupted the delicate food security in Arkmunster, leading to shortages and then bread riots as aid was denied by the TUC. These bread riots would feed into the Constitutionalist movement, breeding the first inklings of what the end goal was. The movement, primarily lead by Officer Ellie Nicholas (a renowned militiaman from Middlemoor who had fought in the war), was the beginnings of syndicalist movements. Driven by a desire of libertarianism, socialism, and democracy, the old idea of Constitutionalism began to fade as workplace democracy (an extension on what Lewis had already done) and political democracy began to shift into the forefront. The idea of a controlling head of state declined in favourability as the appeal of an elected one, limited by an assembly, grew. Nicholas managed to keep a lid on the bread riots as time passed, waiting for the right movement to spur a popular protest.

That time would come soon, as Lewis failed to pass a significantly weakened home rule bill through the TUC. Her repeated failures made her seem weak, relying on the TUC for legitimacy. Finally being fed up, she used the ill defined powers to dismiss all of the TUC and finally push through a home rule bill with a 100% yes vote - her being the only vote. While a minor victory, the TUC refused to dismiss and called the vested powers in Lewis illegitimate. Nicholas and her movement sprung into action, with protestors taking to the streets and workers striking across the nation.

Blue Month would be a month long demonstration against the government, with the army and militia skirmishing in the background inconclusively. The TUC and Lewis during this month fought incessantly, one order being given and cancelled out by the other, refusing to give either the upper hand while in a national crisis. Nicholas's Syndicalist movement had reached Ravenhaf and the Trade Council was practically besieged by protestors. As anger became fear for the TUC, Lewis finally threw her lot in with the protestors and signed over governmental control to Nicholas in an act of spite. The TUC capitulated shortly after, disbanding and fleeing to avoid the protest turning into a riot. Nicholas's provisional government was formed shortly after.

The provisional government set elections for three months from the successful conclusion of Blue Month and began to work out how to implement these broad ideas into a functional system. After much debate between leading protestors (some of which would go on to found parties) and Nicholas, a series of referendums were organised to be held.

The first referendum was the role of unions in the political sphere. While every citizen was formally involved in a union, the question was whether that these unions would go on to elect representatives to lead them or if it would be geographically sited and the unions would instead elect their representatives to the NIB. Syndicalists were expected to carry this vote, but to the surprise of many, it was chosen that representatives would be elected geographically by a very close vote. 

The next was on the status of rightwing parties - a divisive split in the country. While most of Nicholas's syndicalists viewed them as tyrannical (not forgetting the days of King-General Claude), the growing opposition party to Nicholas (which would go on to become Labour) fought for allowing them to participate in the election. Labour's campaigning did not succeed, leading to the old, reactionary parties being banned (Nationalist, Tory, and Liberal). However, in a minor win for Labour, the Progressive Party (a social democrat orientated party) was allowed to participate with a significant amount in favour.

The third referendum was finally on aspects of the new constitution - term limits, local rule, and so on and so forth. By the end, a new constitution was drafted up. The Constitution of Arkmunster is a simplistic and relatively flexible document, as it was meant to be, defining clearly the political structure. The Assembly is a 100 member organisation, with staggered terms (a three year term with 33, 33, and 34 being elected every year in succession). The popular vote will elect the President, on an independent ballot from the Assembly and serve a five year term. The National Industrial Board will be made up of representatives from each local city or county based union (a step above industrial unions, a step below regional unions) and serve a two year term. It clearly defined the powers of the President to prevent the flaw of Constitutionalism and remained vague on the purposes of the Assembly and NIB. The Assembly was the political branch meant to 'organise the state and rule it' whereas the NIB was 'to build nad make an economically prosperous Arkmunster'. When these two interests collided, the NIB and Assembly would hold a joint-session to hash out a bill collectively.

It also contained a series of guaranteed rights, such as universal voting, universal union membership, and a wide swath of civil rights including LGBT and racial rights, free speech, and freedom of religion. Passed by a referendum by the public, the final act was to create a judicial system. Electing to work without the framework of unions, a judge would be elected regionally by all unions from a member of the Legal Union to serve as a local judge/judges, with the regional unions to elect (with all people in the region voting) the People's Court which would rule on more controversial rulings. This would be passed as well by popular referendum, and the provisional government would be dissolved.

Democracy in Arkmunster

The election was held without issue despite rumours of army interference, which granted the first ever purely democratic government in Arkmunster (or Auchendale). Ellie Nicholas, with wide popular support for her part in Blue Month, was elected as the first President with her party expected to coalition with Labour to form a significant majority in the Assembly. Instead, in a move Nicholas would call 'dismaying', the Syndicalist Party was unable to form a coalition. Labour refused, believing that they could make a ruling party by themselves and the Syndicalist Party was unwilling to work with the Progressives.

Labour, instead, did form a ruling coalition between both wings of it, and the Justice Party, giving them control over the Assembly. In closed doors, the words exchanged between Nicholas and Assembly Leader Wilkinson were less then civil. Despite this, legislation proceeded as normal. A series of bills were drafted and brought to the floor - mostly Syndicalist and Labour manifestos that were believed to stand good odds of passing the Assembly and being signed by the President. Three days before this planned voting session was to begin, however, disaster finally rocked the nation. Officer Frederick Bell, known associate of the late Manschel, had assembled loyal regiments of the army under him to disperse the 'illegitimate' government and replace it with the successor of Manschel's government. For the second time, there was a March on Ravenhaf. Hoping to take the Assembly and President (residing in the renamed Trade Council building) by surprise and control the government, Officer Bell began his march, but encountered civilian militias who had heavily barricaded the planned route Bell was to take. The Battle of Ravenhaf began as Bell ordered his troops to fire upon the militias, who in return fired back. In the heat of the fight, it's unclear when or who killed Bell. But as his army retreated from the devastated buildings, Bell lay dead in his command post, slumped over the radio he was using to listen to the battle. With no leader, the army scattered (fearing correctly that they'd be tried as traitors) and became slightly scruffy looking civilians or joined up with the terrorists.

Sent reeling by the attempted coup, Nicholas held an emergency meeting. As arguments raged about the correct course of action - calling for a potentialy destabilising election to forming a national coalition, the long round of talks ended. The current ruling coalition agreed to dissolve and in a series of deals, the Syndicalist Party got their coalition. However, significant promises had to be made and Labour proved unhappy, believing that if a snap election was called for a public mandate, the country would be significantly more stable (and perhaps with them in charge).

The Syndicalist Party was joined with the Justice Party, Trade Council Party, and Progressive Party to form a slim majority. Leaping into action, a flurry of action came out of the Assembly. The army was to be significantly defunded and several officers 'convinced' into retirement. These funds were then pushed into environmentalist programs (an area heavily agreed by both the Justice and Progressive parties), creating the Environmental Protection Agency. This bill came as a result of the first joint session between the NIB (dominated by the Syndicalist party) and Assembly, leading to caps on carbon production, environmental protection laws, national parks, and an attempt to encourage tourism to Arkmunster's national parks.

From there, Positive Socialism entered the floor. A widereaching plan to promote technological progress as part of an effort to engage peacefully with capitalist nations (of course, by selling them technological products such as electronics and planes) was expected to pass. Agreed upon by every party but the Progressives, this bill failed by the shock of many. Labour voted no in hopes that this would force the Syndicalists tocall a snap election and the Progressives refused to deal with it without significant modifications. Sent reeling, Nicholas wasn't quite willing to call for a snap election, and pushed forwards.

The Reform Bill, an unsatisfactory compromise, sought to fund cottage industries across Arkmunster and pass limited parts of the Positive Socialism bill. In exchange, moves to a market socialist economy were made. Extraneous services (entertainment exclusively covered in this bill) would be done in a free market way, providing currency for work to be exchanged for movies, music, restaurants, and other such things. While it opened Arkmunster's dead, dead, dead entertainment industry (the only thing that could be classified as entertainment that was doing well in Arkmunster was video games and books), it thoroughly humiliated the Syndicalist and Justice parties who began to view Nicholas as the enemy and began to lean heavily upon her to call for a snap election. Two more bills would pass, authorising funds to be used to rebuild affected areas of the Second March on Ravenhaf and one to build a national observatory, Nicholas finally threw in the towel. The ruling coalition found itself too ideologically contested to succeed even in matters of a crisis, and she reluctantly called for snap elections. Resigning from her post at the same time, leaving the Presidency open as well.

As the nation gears up for a new election so quickly, instability still lingers. Emboldened terrorists strike from their hideouts, the question of the military at large hangs over everyone's head, and attempts to rebuild a democratic society struggling to survive it's infancy, Arkmunster's days as a democracy may be numbered. Only time will tell.