At dusk, a man in blue clothes walked into a small alley with a panicked look and knocked on a courtyard door.
“Oh, God bless, Tom, you actually weren’t caught!
Quick, come in, this is no place to talk!” After saying that, he let the man in blue inside, stuck his head out to look around, and then closed the door.
“Don’t worry, Coulomb, I came here secretly; no one knows!” Tom said after catching his breath.
“Oh, that’s good.
The Sofia police have gone mad, arresting rebels everywhere!
Wasn’t your newspaper office shut down?
I heard many people were arrested.
I thought you were caught too.
It’s great to see you’re okay.
May God bless you!” Coulomb said excitedly.
“Don’t even mention it; I think only God knows what’s going on!
The police suddenly shut down the newspaper and took the editor-in-chief away.
I happened to be out for an interview, so I escaped!” Tom explained.
“Oh, God bless you!
But how have you been living these past few days?” Coulomb continued to ask.
“Hiding at home, of course!
You know, even if there’s a problem, a small fry like me isn’t qualified to be on a most-wanted list.
I’ve mostly been forgotten.”
“I came to see you tonight just to get some news.
Coulomb, you’re my best friend and you work for the Government; you must know what’s happening!” Tom spoke self-deprecatingly at first, then looked at Coulomb expectantly.
Coulomb gave a bitter smile and lowered his voice, saying, “I’m not very clear either.
The higher-ups suddenly ordered the arrest of the Opposition Party!
Many newspapers were shut down.
I suspect it’s related to your reports from a while ago!”
“By the way, you’d better hide a bit longer and wait until the heat dies down before coming out!
There are too many people being arrested right now; the police don’t have time for you yet.
Leave Sofia tomorrow and go hide in your hometown in the countryside!”
Tom jumped up in excitement, saying in disbelief, “Oh, God!
How is that possible?”
…Since the Stambolov Cabinet took action, Bulgaria had entered a “Period of Silence,” and Sofia had been under martial law for over a month.
Police were constantly deployed, shutting down newspapers and printing plants everywhere, setting up roadblocks in streets and alleys, and inspecting newspapers being transported to various places.
There were many others like Tom, fish caught in the crossfire.
As long as one wasn’t caught on the spot, they were basically forgotten afterward.
Sofia’s prisons were already overcrowded.
Faced with the Government’s arbitrary actions, the public was furious but dared not speak out.
Members of the Opposition Party who escaped the net were forced into underground activities.
What Ferdinand hadn’t expected was that the Stambolov Cabinet would act so decisively this time, leaving the Opposition Party with no power to resist.
The Government quickly arrested the opposition and seized a large amount of property and goods, totaling as much as 100 million lev.
Combined with the previous loans, the funds needed for the Five-Year Plan were gathered in such a comedic fashion.
Ferdinand didn’t know whether to be happy or worried.
A thought suddenly sprouted: why not just let the cabinet continue to cause trouble?
But he immediately dismissed this terrifying idea.
If the cabinet kept going, who knew when they would reach the limit of the people’s endurance?
If the situation spiraled out of control and a civil war broke out, followed by a wave of foreign invasion, who the hell could stop it besides God!
Although the plan was going smoothly, Stambolov was still having a massive headache.
Many within the Liberal Party expressed their dissatisfaction with the matter, putting a lot of pressure on him.
Externally, he could be decisive and ruthless, but facing his own people, he had to offer appeasement.
Because so many people were implicated, there was a constant stream of people pleading for mercy to Stambolov.
As for the man specifically in charge, Yunas, he was now the spokesperson for the executioners.
However, the powerful Yunas didn’t care; he had already surpassed the other three in the cabinet and was the number two figure, second only to Prime Minister Stambolov.
At a new cabinet meeting, Michael spoke up: “Your Excellency Prime Minister,
The enemies have been mostly cleaned up.
Is it time to end martial law now?
The country needs to return to a normal state!”
“Mr.
Michael, the enemies are mostly cleaned up, but there are still fish that escaped the net.
We must redouble our efforts to find them all and eliminate them!” Yunas retorted sharply.
“Minister Yunas, you’ve already arrested over twenty thousand people, which is nearly one percent of our population.
Do you still want to continue?” Wilson said angrily.
“But they are all enemies, aren’t they?
Don’t just look at the bad side; there’s a good side too!
Although the impact on the economy is significant, haven’t we already gathered the funds needed for our Five-Year Plan?
We’ve cleared out a bunch of national parasites, solved the financial crisis, and gained a batch of free laborers.
Stambolov knew that the argument among them also involved their respective interests.
By now, they were no longer hot-blooded patriots; under the corruption of power, they had begun to transition into politicians in a short time.
Under emergency policies, the impact on economic development was secondary; the main issue was that it weakened the voice of the Ministry of Economy and the Ministry of Industry in the Government, so Michael and Wilson had to oppose it.
Yunas and Sovell were exactly the opposite.
In the current situation, they held the power.
Once things returned to normal, they would inevitably have to make way for national development, and their influence would be greatly reduced.
For their own interests, they needed to extend this period.
Stambolov was powerless to stop this.
Although he was a politician himself, it didn’t mean he liked politicians.
He spoke up to stop them:
“Alright, stop arguing!
The purge work has been done quite well, which is worth acknowledging!
Similarly, you know that this state cannot continue indefinitely!”
“I’ll give you one more month to catch all those rats, then lift martial law and return the country to a normal state!”
…By the end of 1888, the martial law in Bulgaria was finally lifted.
No one expected that just as Sofia ended the restriction, the Opposition Party created another piece of big news.
On Christmas Day 1889, Stambolov was attacked at the entrance of his official residence.
Stambolov narrowly escaped, but three of his attendants died on the spot, and several others were injured.
More importantly, after the shooting, five assassins—except for one body left behind—actually managed to escape.
Prime Minister Stambolov was furious; someone was going to be in trouble again.
At the same time, other high-ranking Government officials were also visited.
Minister of Defense Sovell was one of the unlucky ones, hit by three bullets and undergoing emergency treatment.
One of the shots happened to hit his testicles, effectively ruining him.
Even more bizarre was the Minister of Finance, Hristo Belchev.
This shell of a minister, who had little presence in the Government, encountered a shootout between police and assassins on his way home.
He was run over by a spooked carriage and died heroically.
In the original timeline, Hristo Belchev was also an unlucky fellow.
In March 1891, he was mistakenly killed by an assassin who took him for Stambolov.
Now, due to Ferdinand’s butterfly effect, he had received his ‘lunch box’ early.
This night was called “Bloody Christmas Eve” by later generations.
Dozens of high-ranking officials were attacked simultaneously, resulting in over a hundred casualties and direct economic losses of hundreds of thousands of lev.
The peace of Christmas Eve was shattered.
Sofia’s military and police were fully deployed, searching the entire city and causing total chaos.