I have no fucking clue what this is about other that they are Russian and also on another planet that is 800 years behind the modern era (most of Russia, basically).
I assume it's some kind of prison planet like in that episode of.. Blake's 7?
The story is about a group of advanced future Earth scientists pretending to be every-day people on a planet going through it's version of the Middle Ages, which has all of the same violence and religious zealotry and corruption, only they have vowed to not interfere other than just to give the people gentle pushes in the direction of progress.
You would have to read the story...basically it implies that nudging primitive worlds to become more advanced has become a kind of hobby for outsiders who think they are doing this enlightened thing, but of course it's much more complex.
to SP. That's very Iain Banks "Culture" series, where basically this incredibly advanced AI run civilization subtly mentors less advanced civilizations toward eventually also joining the Culture, and a lot of the books in the series detail the small groups of Culture citizens to carry that shepherding out.
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