The consolidation of power within the NEO-Budapest Triangle was terrifying in both speed and ruthlessness. The Osiris Ministry went from a loose band of career politicians and corrupt officials to holding absolute power within months. Even more terrifying was the speed at which the complete collapse of the Old Europa mega-corps came. Financial institutions that had lasted centuries turned to dust, all of them other than one Ultra-Corp that rose from the ashes. While the Ministry rose within months, the formation of this corporation took a matter of days.

They met in the depths of what is now the TC Headquarters, the air thick with smoke and the stench of nervous sweat pervading the darkness. Those who were once leaders of the Europa Mega-Corps, coming together to form the singular Ultra-Corp of today’s NEO-Budapest Triangle. There was no other way to survive. Blood was both physically and metaphysically on the streets. Complete economic collapse immanent. This reformation the only way the corporate elites could find to hold on to some semblance of power.

With the Lincoln Contingency implemented, the reshuffling of power took place at lightning speed. One woman forced the hand of so many powerful elites that their authority seemed nothing more than a kid’s at a lemonade stand. Ms Shockshaw rose to power, the CEO of the Tehran Corporation.

Now. under her supreme control, the Tehran Corporation aligns with the Family Gilchrist and the Osiris Ministry, and has merged their powers across the Triangle. These corporate elites lead some of the most opulent lives within NEO-Budapest, high in their ivory towers that reach into the sky and away from the deadened world where the Lizard Gang, Shroomheads and other factions roam.

Addicted to the Shroom, and fuelled by a supply from The Kings, they barely hold together the economic infrastructure of the Triangle. As with everything here, power and corruption are absolute. This tinderbox of crime will find its end, but in a world where the government and aristocratic elites reign with impunity, backed by the ruthless Peacekeepers, it is hard to predict when that end may come.