A week later.
Aron was going at it with Rina in one of the mansions built for him in the universal simulation, their tenth round of the day. That had been a frequent activity over the past week, since Aron had spent most of his time with her doing many different things... including skinship. And since there was no pain in the simulation, they constantly did it as if they were trying to make up for all of the time they had lived without it.
They had become completely addicted to each other.
Everything had happened after they'd clarified their relationship the moment Rina had woken up, as Aron didn't want to delay the conversation. He had seen many movies where any kind of delay at all would result in the main character losing their chance, so he went for it. And it seemed that she'd seen the same movies, since she had wanted to have 'The Talk' as soon as she woke up as well. Thus, they had officially started dating; it was a first for both of them.
In the
The rest of the month, the citizens of Eden had wide smiles on their faces whenever they remembered the announcement, and speculation on who would win the bid ran rampant.Together with that, a few opposition parties had already been formed and announced their candidacy for president. Leading the officially formed parties were the other revolutionary leaders, who were very jealous of Alexander's position. They each trusted that they had enough support to win, between their followers and the recognition they had as leaders of the revolution against Adolf. This belief stemmed from believing that Alexander just got lucky and was missed when they got arrested as he was the leader with the fewest direct followers, after all.Although many people would have thought that forming an alliance would make it a bit easier for them to win the election, that wasn't an easy thing to do. Not many people would give up their opportunity to grasp power when they had it, something an alliance would requi
"Even after being enhanced, I still can't handle you.... What the hell did they inject you with?" Rina asked as she crawled away from Aron, still feeling the aftereffects of their last battle. She still couldn't believe the stamina of that man."Mine was made specifically for me, not for general use. So it was specifically tuned for my body," he answered as Rina moved to his side and laid her head on his chest."I need to talk to you about something," she said after catching her breath. A certain calm washed over her as Aron ran his hand up and down her spine; she quite enjoyed it."Is it about returning home?" he asked, as he knew it was bound to come."Yes. I need to finish dealing with my brother now that enough time has passed. He should be fully assured that I'm still looking for evidence of the attacker, so now's a good time for me to surprise him and end this farce once and for all. Then I'll take my place as the family head in waiting, which should allow me to be of more help
As Aron's jet was carrying Rina on its final approach to LaGuardia airport, she was looking out of the window, not tired of the view at all.Although the Rothschilds could afford such a massive plane, they wouldn't use it as a personal jet; the upkeep needed to have it continuously flight ready was massive. And for a family that already had more than ten private planes and could afford to charter any aircraft from any airline in America at a moment's notice, it didn't make sense to buy them.The landing was as smooth as it was in Eden, and the unloading proceeded apace. Rina disembarked the plane, got in one of the cars, and left without wasting too much time. She even bypassed the security screening again, having already handled it at the immigration checkpoint at the airport in Eden.No Rothschild would ever have to stand in the long lines at immigration like normal people.As the convoy was driving back to her house, she passed the location where
Aron was in his uniform, inspecting the fourth batch of graduating Esparian soldiers. They stood at attention in front of him as he passed through them.It had become a tradition for him to inspect each batch of graduates. Every man had had a dream of being the general of a massive army at one point in their lives, and Aron had actually accomplished it. Thus, he didn't skimp on the pomp and circumstance at all.As he walked through their formation, he couldn't help but smile when he remembered the reaction of the first batch of Esparian soldiers who woke up and found themselves in VR for training.When the knowledge of what was going to happen to them had been assimilated into their minds (Athena had determined that explaining it in words was a waste of time, so she had begun using direct assimilation instead), the expressions on their faces were truly something to behold. They even had goosebumps all over their virtual bodies when they came to the realization o
Without caring about what Arieh was feeling, Nova continued playing the recorded phone call between Charlotte and Terry.Then it moved to video footage of Terry meeting the leaders of the different groups he had hired to ambush Rina. Unfortunately, there was no sound, but that was covered by the phone calls between him and their teams explaining the mission he was hiring them to do. Those recordings were accompanied by detailed transaction records of weapon purchases that he made to sufficiently arm them.The recording soon moved on to the day Rina had been being driven from the Rothschild compound to the airport and showed that whenever the convoy deviated from the planned route, it was because an ambush was awaiting them. The ambush sites were shown as still images, with names and headshots linked to each individual shown in the images. They were matched to different 'dark' mercenary groups, those that were unafraid to get their hands bloody... as long as the price was right. Each o
A month later, with a month to go before the presidential election, the candidates were campaigning with all their might. Their parties each had their own platforms and were trying to sway people to vote for them, and in their minds, things were going very well; nearly all of their rallies were filled with cheering citizens.But all of the momentum they thought they had managed to build was crushed by a single announcement from the presidential palace."We interrupt this regularly scheduled program for a breaking news report," an announcer said as the show on the television was interrupted by them to make an emergency announcement."A team of researchers dispatched to Esparia in search of natural resources and minerals has discovered a large oil deposit in the Exclusive Economic Zone of Esparia."The deposits are in different places, but based on preliminary results, it's suspected that the fields combined equal the one discovered earlier in Eden. More details are to come as the preli
A month later.89.97%....That was the percentage of people who voted for Alexander in the presidential election, which didn't come as a surprise to anyone who lived in Eden. The man was a living legend who won by that much without even actively campaigning, but rather by letting his work speak for itself.To celebrate his win, he announced a celebration rally to be held a week from the day the election result was announced....A massive crowd was gathered in one of the open fields in the city of Edenia and soldiers were everywhere, dressed in their finery with holstered pistols at their sides. They were the ones responsible for controlling the crowd of attendees at the celebration rally and ensuring the safety of the newly elected president. He would soon arrive, so they were doing their final checks, making sure that nothing dangerous was hidden in the crowd.Not too long after that, a convoy of black cars arrived with a certain level of fanfare.The security team came out of the l
The day after Alexander's speech and announcement, all parties that had been involved in the bidding went crazy. Including those spectating "experts", of course.Many of them complained about why the country had decided to trust an inexperienced company that had never been involved in the oil industry to drill the reserves.Others that had watched Alexander's speech understood that he wanted to develop a domestic industry and chose a local company, Connect, as a way to kickstart their domestic growth. Even though they weren't an oil company, at least they had some kind of "drilling" experience... for whatever it mattered. Drilling for oil had nothing in common with drilling tunnels, after all.The parties led by candidates that lost their presidential bid (the most popular of which having only received 2.45% of the votes) tried using that to sling mud at Alexander and paint him as corrupt and Connect as a company that bribed him. They insinuated that Connect wouldn't even be doing the