Two weeks passed by since the cargo planes had started sending the necessary materials to the borders that were shared between the two countries, Esparia and Eden.
In the two subsequent weeks, nothing much had changed other than the arrival of a new batch of recruited soldiers at the island. Simultaneously, the graduating ones had left the island for their posts, starting their military service once again.
During this time, the atomic printers sent to all the military bases had been working non-stop, churning out equipment in continuous batches, ensuring that all the graduating soldiers were equipped with the gear they had trained with during their training in the VR environment.
Meanwhile, Eden had taken a humanitarian step during the negotiations and released a list of the names of the soldiers who had unfortunately died in the conflict so that their family members could start mourning earlier and not continue clinging to a false hope about their loved ones’ survival, only for it to be crushed later on.
As for the negotiations between the two nations, nothing had changed much other than the continuously escalating tensions between Eden and Esparia. The prisoner negotiations weren’t going very well since Eden wasn’t budging on demanding the remaining of the shared island border as the final condition for the release of the captured soldiers. And together with Esparia’s successful acquisition of twenty-nine aircrafts escalated the situation even further. Esparia was now using those aircrafts to breach Eden’s airspace repeatedly and forcing Eden’s air force to mobilize their aircraft in response which would be followed by those Esparian fighters returning back to their borders the moment they noticed Eden’s aircraft on their radar.
They were doing it constantly at times even reaching up to fifteen times a day for the known four aircraft of Eden or so they thought. Esparia’s tactic involved sending two fighters every time before allowing their planes to rest for maintenance while sending the next batch, this tactic served as a refreshment training for the hired pilots and at the same time, making it so that the pilots of Eden Air force were not given enough time to rest due to the constant sorties they had to make due to Esparia’s unlawful breach in their airspace, at the same time increasing their anxiety in worry that any of these sorties might as well be a real mission from Esparia where they would come in hot and just start bombing, forcing a dog fight out of them, or so was the Morgan’s intention.
Many international observers excused this as actions simply as a protest of Esparia for the release of their soldier and nothing more. However, this action of theirs acted as nothing other than a way of increasing the anger of the majority of Edenians, who demanded the government to further increase the conditions for the release of the captured soldier or if push comes to shove, they should simply duke it once again since they had won the first fight, the citizens believed they could win the second confrontation too.
Throughout the negotiations, Esparia continued to maintain the negotiations as public as possible, showcasing their commitment to securing the return of their soldiers. This strategy was a means to sustain the high morale of the remaining of their hundreds of thousands of soldiers and the trust of the citizens in the government as a means for avoiding an uprising from the inside, in case a dissatisfaction arose if they didn’t show that they cared about the captured soldiers that much and were preparing themselves for another round with Eden.
Thanks to them putting on this show, Esparia agreed to many of Eden’s demands withholding only a few of them which they argued that they couldn’t agree to.
One major sticking point being the concession of land. Esparia argued against it, citing that land concession was against the international agreements while also voicing their concerns that once the country agrees to the concessions it would just mark the start of a losing precedent. They feared that every argument or a fight between them in which Eden came out victorious would result in further land concessions and would start eroding their country’s sovereignty over time.
This decision of theirs sparked a division within Esparia.
One side being the family members of the captured soldiers, arguing that their loved ones who had already fought, risked and sacrificed their freedom for the country and now called for the nation to reciprocate by sacrificing a part of its territory for their freedom as a repayment for their commitment towards their country.
While the other side consisted of the family of the soldiers whose death had been confirmed, along with many of the citizens of the country who felt dissatisfied for losing to Eden. They believed that they could triumph over Eden in not just military might, but also many aspects, including economically and wanted their country to not agree to any deals.
Instead, they urged the country to fight with Eden once again, this time with ample preparations and win the war to avenge their loss of both life and of their pride.
With the second narrative gaining the support of most of the people in the country, it reached a point where the government was compelled to make an announcement that they would do their very best to bring their soldiers back home and had already started compensating the families of the confirmed dead, this was thanks to funds provided by the Morgans and acted as a means to make Eden seem like a greedy monster. Simultaneously, the government also announced that in case the negotiations failed, they still retained the right to declare war to fight against Eden and ensure the rescue of their soldiers.
This strategy worked since the compensation provided to the families of dead soldiers had managed to temporarily suppress their eagerness for revenge, leading to a movement which wanted the war to slightly calm down while at the same time garnering the support of both factions to the government, demonstrating that the government’s concerned for all of its citizens.
Thanks to their well-orchestrated act and the support of the Morgans, who had kept running the narrative that Eden was trying to exploit their lucky win and with the use of their massive political power, the Morgans had made a few countries to subtly condemn Eden internationally, just enough to make sure that Eden knew that the world was watching the situation but not enough where Eden would end up giving up all the war prisoners since the Morgans wanted the war to happen no matter what.
This tactic wasn’t used to intimidate Eden, but rather to increase the morale of the Esparians. As they saw that the world was having their backs, the citizens became even bolder finding themselves in the same situation as when you were having an argument with someone, then you would have someone trying to stop you, this resulting in filling you with confidence causing you to start using stronger language.
This resulted in the happening of many bad things within Esparia, such as mass arrests of citizens that were of Edenian descent, having their businesses vandalized, together with beating those known citizens of Eden who were living in Esparia. The only thing holding them back was the worry that if they kill any of them, they would lose the support of the world, which at the moment was very necessary for them. Thanks to that, other than being heavily injured, most of the Edenian citizens were rescued by the police and a few sane citizens before that threshold was crossed.
In response to their citizens now being prosecuted, Eden responded by adding the clause of having their citizens released and be compensated for the damage inflicted on their citizens who are residing in Esparia and were facing prosecution. They also demanded the reopening of the borders for the return of their citizens to their country after they had received their compensation packages for the damages they were inflicted upon during the prosecution, increasing the tensions between the two countries even further.
For those who were observing how things happened from the outside, they could see that either the negotiations would be agreed upon or they would really be duking it out against each other for the second time. And from the looks of it, it seemed that the citizens had already moved into wartime readiness as most of them wanted the war to happen, and both country’s citizens were sure that their country could win.
Edenian citizens were sure of it because they had already won the first encounter, as for the Esparian citizens, they believed their military was more powerful and their previous loss was only thanks to Eden attacking them by surprise, resulting in quite aggressive arguments between the two countries citizens on the internet.
As for the individuals who had the unfortunate circumstance of encountering each others on foreign lands, their interactions escalated beyond mere disagreements. In fact, a subset of them proceeded to engage in physical altercations, much to the amusement and disdain of onlookers who didn’t forget to record and post it, further solidifying the hate between each other.