By the time Eurostate emerged formally from the political ruins of post-pandemic Europe, the criminalization of permanent love had already reshaped the emotional landscape of the continent. Relationships became fluid, attachment became cautious and intimacy became regulated. The system did not eliminate desire. Human beings continued to seek connection, affection, and pleasure. But those desires now unfolded within a carefully engineered framework designed to prevent the catastrophic emotional shocks that had once destabilized society.
To the architects of the system, this arrangement represented a triumph of rational governance. They had taken one of humanity's oldest and most unpredictable forces and transformed it into something manageable. Or so they believed.
What they did not yet understand was that love, like language, possesses a remarkable ability to escape control. And in the world that Eurostate was about to create—a world where words themselves had become weapons—escaped emotions could prove far more dangerous than anyone imagined.