[b]Bella![/b]

"The crossing?" said the Uncrowned King, holding up a glittering violet crystal necklace. "We have that managed. Lord Hades, in his wisdom, has been striving mightily to break the bounds of the underworld and these are the result: Dreamstones. Already we have witnessed aliens wielding these sacred relics as crude weaponry. When we turned our eyes to the heavens we did not expect to find such barbarism."

Their skin. It was moving. You see through the glare of the sun, the flicking at the edges of their silhouettes - they are each of them a hive. Swarms of flealike insects clinging to an armoured skeleton, leaping from one body to another in constant, controlled exchange. The heat does not bother them.

"But it is unjust to hold the secret of your homeworld from us," said the Uncrowned King. His voice was kind, but he did not know how to help your fragile body with the heat. "We who were not given the chance to learn the will of Hermes. The Gods do not belong to you alone."

[b]Ember![/b]

"Degenerate!" gasped the Star King in dismay. "Oh, we offend you! The Silver Diver, with her pockets stuffed full of pennies, says that we do not have [i]trophies [/i]to display! Oh, woe is us and our lineage in the face of such judgement!"

The Star Kings ripple with laughter. It is not condescending, they are not taking you lightly. This exchange of speeches is the very essence of interpack conflict. This is negotiation, the establishment of stakes and reputation, the exploration of what each side has to offer and has to lose. There is no higher calling for a warrior of Ceron than this; glory in such a battle builds a legend, and building a legend is how one reproduces.

"After all, to be judged by the Silver Divers, those legendary warriors who missed the troop transport leaving from Bitemark and spent the next thirty years failing to conquer it?" said the Alpha, drawing two bladed fans from her sleeve, movements taking on an oily texture. "Have you considered what you risk, little pup? If you lose here and your line might be discontinued entirely. No more chances for glory, your ancestors dying the death of obscurity. But, instead, if you kneel... well, we will let you drink from such chalices as you have never imagined."

[b]Dyssia![/b]

The Generous Knight laughed bleakly. "The Furnace Knight, who I followed, believed just that: End the experiment, break the chain, let biomancy fall out of the galaxy entirely, put the genie back in the bottle. Liquid Bronze assassinated him. He sent one of his Ikarani, and they killed him while he was pacifying some primitives - just like these. Burned a whole planet and alien armada to do so. Not his idea; the Saoshyant ordered it done."

You remember - on your homeworld, the Great Sage Ohlemi? His home was built atop a decapitated statue - that was the Furnace Knight. The Crystal Knight is a Loyalist, inheritor of the Tyrants. They sought to return society to an idealized past before the rise of biomancy, and when their technological terror failed they were swept away in the chaos. 

She extends her hand; that mortal gesture represents an atrocity of plasma and gravity. The swarming spaceships tear themselves apart as the mighty emitters haul them into a vast spread of torpedoes. They crack and break, Engines flashing with the solar flare of released suns.

"Because what the Saoshyant believes in is the completion of the Skies. The elimination of the Void. Filling the darkness between stars with oxygen; moving planets and stars closer together, building a galaxy where you can leap from world to world in a matter of hours with no ship or suit. Is it strange, to think that the leader of our society believes in its ideals? Because she does. In service to beauty, any risk is acceptable. She would accept even the extermination of the Azura if our successor species finished the great work. Even now she does not seek the annihilation of Ceron, but its indoctrination."

[b]Dolce![/b]

For all the coming storm, the final days of the Summerkind are peaceful and happy. You help make it so.

They are all going to die soon - they are already dying, generations passing every day and returning into their egg-shapes to be loaded in the vast arsenals of Liquid Bronze's motley warfleet. By the end of the month all of them will be gone into that quiescence and this colossal battleship will become a floating tomb, tended only by biomancers and Lantern servitors. 

But these are creatures who were born never expecting a retirement. All they have known all their lives was violence, and in these fading days they explore the rest the world has to offer. They invent sports - mind-bendingly complicated games, as intense a challenge for their hyperactive minds as their bodies. They invent music. They paint their tomb decks with spectacular murals, write their memoirs, meditate on the temple deck and - more than anything else - pour into your dining halls and feast on the finest foods in the galaxy. They could have learned this too, but even the full intense energy of their brilliant minds would not have bought them close to the heights of flavour you have mastered. For the first time in its history, Hestia walks the deck of the [i]Cancellation[/i]. 

"Vasilia has been praying for you," said Hestia, holding the tub of chocolate ice cream close to her chest, bear hood lowered as a concession to the temperature. "But I haven't been able to find you until now. It's been too [i]loud[/i]. But don't worry, little one - I'll keep you safe and on your way home."