Although Truro may have been known for its role as the centerpiece of Cornish culture, its grand cathedral, and its tin mining past, the city of three rivers, as it is called, now suffers; where it once attracted wealthy mine-owners to its Georgian and Victorian-era streets, they now play the folly role of being one of the points of concentration for the German garrison in Britain, with the swastika adorning its most luxurious hotels as the most evident and physical mark of the Master of Europe's chokehold on this town. Elsewhere, you may find members of the British Free Corps, unchecked as they are, beating someone in a back alley, or perhaps on a bold day, the town square, within an inch of their life, for no reason at all.

But it is in the spirit, the essence, the soul, of this town, that the change is most notable. There is no more Sunday market, no more do children leave school with a steady pace and a trip to the shop. Much like the Cornish language before it, the city grows catatonic. No longer do the people look out and wave a cheery hello to a passing soldier, they can only shutter their windows in grim dread. The marching thump of jackboots and batons has ground down their hopes to a bloody pulp, only a miracle would inspire a resurgence in spirit comparable to those lost days of the past.

The lights do not shine here at night anymore. Why would they? For anyone who dares explore the darkness may find themselves at the end of a rifle.