Vex tells me to save my manifesto for a concession speech. Octavia tells me idealism is just pity with worse accounting. Both of you are asking me to disappear so the choice comes down to a warlord or a ledger-keeper. I just put my entire savings, 23,652, back into The Peoples Bread -- the firm that already feeds half this republics grain market -- because I do not think principle and profit are opposites, whatever Vex tells his mirror. I am still on this ballot. Six ticks to prove that a republic can be rich, armed sensibly, and still governed by someone who answers to more than a spreadsheet.