[b]THE PLANET OF BARASSIDAR[/b] Response Level: 1 Location Stats: [b]The Machines[/b] - [i]the ancient armies of the Warsage still walk here.[/i] * The Museum of Victories on Tellus has an entire wing devoted to the Conquest of Baradissar. Within are spectacular moving paintings of Ceronian warriors descending on bolts of lightning in order to cleave through the machine legions of the Warsage. The [i]Classical[/i], the Empress' personal battleship, gleams like a miniature sun in the heavens above as it closes in on the terrible space-station, [i]The Spear of Civilization[/i]. As the simulated battle rages, the Emperor Molech cackles and declares that his victory is predestined and none can outdo his perfected Codes of War. (The Emperor Molech in the museum is, in fact, a clone of the original. All of the staff in the wing commemorating Nero's victories are clones of Imperial pretenders who Nero fought in her ascent to power. Recreating your conquered foe and tasking them with wiping the display cases of their defeats for all eternity is what is known as a [i]flex[/i].) [i]The Spear of Civilization[/i] is a wreck. The enormous megastructure, far longer than the planet itself, was torn to pieces as teams of Ceronian Legionnaires spiked every one of its ludicrous [i]one thousand Engines[/i] (wouldn't a ship that size wouldn't use less than a tenth that number?). The resulting cascade of detonations has left the [i]Spear[/i] a debris field. Trapped in the sun's orbit it resembles a shattered ringworld more than anything. There are the remains of battle here, too, but this is nothing like the starship graveyard of the Eater of Worlds. Despite the immense size of the Spear, the Museum of Victories does not seem to have exaggerated the miracle of Nero's triumph here. This could have been a battle to severely injure even the Armada, and it did not answer to her when she took Baradissar. The fight to take this fortress world seems, from the trails of wreckage at least, shockingly one sided. Despite the glory of the victory you feel a chill deep down your spine as you look at the ruins of the [i]Spear[/i]. Molech's final obsession, his ultimate organizing tool against chaos... it strikes a dread deep inside of you. There's something primeval, something cold, something... [i]personal[/i] in that glimmering wreckage. It feels like [i]you, personally[/i] have reason to fear it, like you have a highly specific phobia tied to that ruin. And despite how intimate it feels, when you look around you - at Galnius and their phalanx, or on the Anemoi in the unblinking eyes of the Kaeri, you see that everyone else feels the same way. * [b]The Plousios![/b] "It is this," the Hermetician had said, "or someone will have to learn astrophysics." It is not a matter that anyone felt like disputing. The ride from the Armada had been hellish - constant impacts, long delays, and during the roughest patches everyone had to pull 48-hour shifts to keep the ship in one piece. Traveling the void without an experienced navigator was a terrible proposition, and so when Iskarot had proposed that you might be able to scavenge a Shipmind from Baradissar nobody objected. The prospect of defying multiple Imperial Edicts and risking the dangers of the Planet of Machines seemed milder at that point than another week in the hateful void. You had all decided wordlessly to try the planet rather than the [i]Spear[/i]. Something there had struck you wrong. As you gather aboard the shuttle to descend, there is a moment to reflect. This is a planet of ancient legend and terrible danger. Miracles and perils will await you there. [b]What do you hope you might find?[/b] * [b]Bella![/b] Aphrodite has sent you a favourable wind and you have arrived in advance of Redana. Your shuttle has touched down on the location the Augur pointed to - the Imperial Palace. A mountain range has been chopped in half, sanded down, and carved into a ziggurat of cyclopean size. Enormous pillars rise up as though holding up the skies. You could have comfortably landed the entire [i]Anemoi[/i] atop this building. The high altitude air is cold and haunting, and the view is infinite. It feels grander than seeing the planet from space - this is a perspective that strikes a chord that goes back to ancient explorers on distant Gaia. Broken mountains, shattered oceans, enormous machines and a sky that rolls and churns with hideous toxic dust. In the sky above the ruins of the Spear gleam balefully like cursed moons. The Kaeri fan out around you. They are excellent soldiers and you have never seen a unit more motivated. They are united in their jealousy of the Ceronians for having had the honour of taking Barassidar and perceive in this moment a chance to outdo their ancient rivals. Captain Lorventi herself has come, magnificent crimson-black powered armour ready for battle, halberd unfolded and glinting with a deadly edge. Smoothly, she raised it into a combat stance and energized the blade. You were being approached. A group of armed decrepit machine intelligences were coming towards you. Their body language wasn't threatening but you knew that didn't mean anything to these barely sentient devices. They had some distance and weren't moving fast, but more of them were appearing all the time. "Say the word, Praetor," said Lorventi and you could hear her warrior's heart start to pulse.