Spotlight on:

“PoCk pOCk... POck poCK”

The Fluffle Queendom of The Beautiful Darkness is a colossal, safe nation, ruled by Kiki The Glorious with an iron fist, and remarkable for its absence of drug laws. Its hard-nosed, cynical population of 5.422 billion are ruled with an iron fist by the dictatorship government, which ensures that no-one outside the party gets too rich. In their personal lives, however, citizens are relatively unoppressed; it remains to be seen whether this is because the government genuinely cares about its people, or if it hasn't gotten around to stamping out civil rights yet.

It is difficult to tell where the omnipresent, corrupt, socially-minded government stops and the rest of society begins, but it is effectively ruled by the Department of Defence, with areas such as Religion & Spirituality and Social Welfare receiving almost no funds by comparison. The average income tax rate is 72%, and even higher for the wealthy. The private sector is almost wholly made up of enterprising fourteen-year-old boys selling lemonade on the sidewalk, although the government is looking at stamping this out.

The nation's new foreign policy of 'very disproportionate retribution' has its neighbors on edge, people are now classified as male, female, or genderqueer, waste is frequently shipped to other countries, and pocky plants are considered a delicacy. Crime -- especially youth-related -- is totally unknown, thanks to the all-pervasive police force. The Beautiful Darkness's national animal is the pocky plant, which is also the nation's favorite main course, its national religion is The Order of Kiki Doom, and its currency is the pocky stick.

The Beautiful Darkness is ranked 5th in the region and 51,557th in the world for Largest Arms Manufacturing Sector.