So revenue wise it would go up dramatically if we ended a lot of Joe’s programs to sort of aid the people and just told em to sink or swim. Though this would result in the second Kyven almost gauranteed. Then again we can just shoot that problem and call it a day. The sudden refugee surge taking advantage of these systems is what caused an overall dive in the economy. That and they’re all broke since anyone who didn’t use a solvang bank is currently fuuuucked. So they’re having to rebuild their finances from scratch in a lot of cases, however this still works out well in the future. Every month they’re less of a drain on our resources and more productive as new businesses get started up thanks to us constantly pouring resources onto them at first. Though we’re kind of unable to do that anymore so the turnaround has slowed down a bit. Though it is still taking place, bit by bit we’re stabilizing.

So for increasing revenue…we can make a whip and collar factory?

The Hasao clan’s leader is a matriarch by the name of Hasao Kia. She’s as grouchy as you’d expect an elf from Shetou to be. Though diplomatic relations are a little frozen, as I mentioned before I think they’re waiting out to see how things fall into place after the Nelta assault. They keep being ‘busy’ since they ‘have a whole city to run’.

However, they recently found out about the Vivarium’s luxury crop cloning and they’re not happy about it which has frozen diplomatic relations even further. Something to the tune of ‘why are you making coffee while people are starving to death in the streets’ sort of vibe. Though VSEC doesn’t control the Vivarium so not too much diplomatic damage as a result, it’s just a thing I thought I would mention.

Riley is on her way into Nelta territory, the problem is we don’t know exactly where the border planet near Haweh was. Aryn woke up there randomly and died still in that area, though at this point any Nelta area will do fine.

Winter has absorbed some of the excess population of Koura. So it’s getting fairly busy aboard there. It happens to also function as a mobile trade port so that’s going well for it with the Zenakan trade opening up.

Tortuga renovations fall under ‘things we can’t afford to do right now because finances’.

Sol expedition is in transit.

We have more final numbers on the Nelta fleet that is coming for us now that they’ve finished gathering up and are going to prepare to move soon. I made a handy sheet for you in our warzones pages. We also know that Rikoy and Elym will be present.

Third lance is back here as the convoy trip from Zenaka got sorted out. Just in time for the Revenants to show up again. We  found out that the Revenants never left Jamalia at least, they took out an entire squad of knights and squires who we think got really close to finding out something important about how they’re hiding in the city. Though with all the refugees dropped off recently it’s hard to tell who doesn’t belong here given we only  know the identity of one of them, and they are likely keeping much more hidden than the rest.

The knights went to deal with all this but they were already gone. Though we did find some clues of where they were hiding and what they were doing in Jamalia still before they escaped. Likely aboard a ship this time judging by the fact that a few more dead knights were found at the spaceport. So the good news is they’re kind of stuck because only I know the information they’re looking for and they haven’t gotten to me yet. The bad news is, I think they’re looking for your phylactery and or planning to send Naexi to deal with you if you show back up. They’re definitely a “cut off the head of the serpent” type of group and it is likely this is why they took Akuhiko, in search of your weak point. That being said, Aku doesn’t even know where it is so…not like he can help them with that even if he wanted to. Seriously who would look halfway across the galaxy?

We found Daesta, she’s in the far northwest and nowhere near Jamalia. I actually am impressed she got all the way out there without a shuttle. She also now has a lot of modern weapons, likely a gift from the Revenants but it is notable they aren’t closely involved with her. At least they aren’t hanging out at her base, we’d send some knights to deal with her but we had the chaos of the Revenants in Jamalia to deal with. Though we could work on that now since it…seeeems like they left this time. I suspect they found out that the Sol expedition is going on and they might be headed back to protect whatever their headquarters is.

On another note, Ki’Ralcht is now really spooky. Just her appearance alone was kinda scary but now she has a horde of demonic alien warriors under her command and she summons abyssal creatures as her go to strategy. So we might be careful where we send her after Zenaka, if she ever leaves, just because she’s likely going to have PR issues wherever she goes. Don’t ask me why she thought it was a good idea to incorporate ominous hoods into the uniforms of her lance.

As for Reika’s binding she’s currently just being wild and free since she hasn’t been free in so long. Even if Ankathi is being pushy, and making a good offer as the best divine bind she could ever hope for, you may recall that it is hard to be pushy with Reika. She’s extremely talented at telling people to fuck off and leave her alone, so I don’t think you have to worry about it. Also Reika has been Reika this entire time without a particularly helpful bind and can carry herself on pure skill so she doesn’t need a bind to do what she does best.

That being said, with her arm back she’s getting stronger than ever before. Because she can use that hand to cast while her other hand keeps doing sword stuff. She used to have to open rifts extremely quickly to make up for this problem, now she just drops smite on people at the same time as she does everything else she likes to do.

Oh hey that’s right, Alianade is a thing. Byeeee finances.

Also the pool is composed of two ichors. Also I do not eat people! I’m not a, oh fuck I already ate people didn’t I…well at least I throw them in the pool first so I don’t just bite their faces off. Though that bit of muscle attached to the thumb kind of reminds me of chicken wings. Wait what?

So basically biomass conversion is done mostly through the ichor lakes, you and I can digest it as is but pool #2’s drones don’t have very advanced digestive systems. More room was made for task based systems and the ichor breaks things down into something edible for them. Less points of failure in their design and more room for muscle and useful things. Though the Que based designs notably have the ability to digest their own food, part of the whole independence thing we were designed to have I suppose.

The infection method is an option if you just wanna scratch people with your kitty claws but that doesn’t exactly create more ichor to sustain us as much as it does a quick hack to make more drones for the swarm and cause more problems for anything fighting against us. Ideally we only use the infection method during war, and then toss all the ghouls into the pool afterwards to make proper drones.

The conversion within the ichor pools is basically a molecular breakdown and redistribution. I suppose a large part of what happens in them is just extremely advanced and automated organic alchemy. To silnians this is a developed technology more so than a random boon as a species, which might be why its so difficult to really control or work with sometimes. Instead of evolving to the bare minimum for survival of the fittest or anything, it was developed with the budget of a military nation who just kept advancing it. It is interesting though how you and I exist at all though, as we are basically the technology gone rogue. Though I don’t think the silnians ever really considered it a problem, more of a feature. As Azilath once described, if Indal comes by we are automatically added back to his synapse under his command. I would really like to research silnian history on such things but it’s really  hard to find anything about them without venturing into the silnian territory. Which is described as many to be ‘suicide’.

I mean if you wanna sit on my tail I guess you can, though Cassir keeps warning me to be careful with it. Something about it having a lot of muscle mass. She made me crush rocks with it for a few experiments. I don’t know why you wouldn’t like being pet all the time though, it’s better than the alternative of being shot because people think  you’re a stray.

The pool synapse connection does depend on proximity, when both are near me I can just link them back together after all. So you should be able to as well, though we’re still a part of Que’s design which favors independent operation. Though the sense of connection doesn’t really change much upon feeding them, I mean you can tell they’re healthier but it doesn’t radically alter their behavior. Especially not Que.

Also sapient entities are kind of up to the pool. Think of it as needing a soul to create a sapient agent, just like it needs different kinds of biomass for different kinds of features. Hence the whole needing calcium thing. Put living souls in, and then it has some options to work with. So feeding it corpses of the dead does not bode well for creating more higher level creatures like us. Obviously the Que scientists just injected me with the stuff while I was still alive and eventually just threw me in, and you jumped in yourself. Though otherwise most of the biomass you brought back are just corpses, trees, and the like. The issue with finding willing volunteers is the fine print on how we have no idea what it’s going to do or if it is even going to like them enough to turn them into a real agent of the synapse while at the same time Koura Cures is advertising the parasitic recovery method that is much more controlled and refined to be beneficial. Maybe we could go capture some pirates? There are a few more advanced drones from the second pool due to eating people aboard the Milenkosi but definitely not quite on our level. I’m not entirely sure what the criteria for a champion of the synapse is actually.

In regards to Vasia’s recent behavior, yeah she’s gone a little crazy but she’s started making progress faster. That being said she hasn’t visited me in awhile so maybe I just haven’t noticed how good or bad it is, I think I’m lower on the list of her projects at the moment.

As for psionics…I mean I get the basics you’re going over but why do I gotta study! I already spend all my time doing the advisor thing and managing the synapse for you.

Meanwhile back at Zenaka, the convoy has moved out to Somnus to start its trips back and forth for station construction on Whitetalon’s dime. 40th Day has sent out the scanner ships and a lot of Zenaka itself is at the very least warm and toasty. The unbound star covers the nearby planets in near constant sunlight, they don’t have much for a ‘night’ cycle. Though it’s not as warm as a regular star, so a lot of life forms developed their own self heating mechanisms. You won’t find many reptiles there basically.

Zenaka has prosthetic equivalents that are fairly basic, definitely not approaching the realm of cybernetics though. Also as mentioned selling people on the ichor is difficult because Koura Cures has a much easier sell. We’ve had a few crazier volunteers so we’ll see how that goes. Obviously from Zenaka, back on Koura the ichor doesn’t sell well at all since Koura Cures’ office is riiiight there.

Cult recruitment on Zenaka isn’t going too bad, though its a slow process since we’re strange aliens talking about using them as basically willing and long range mana batteries.

Seiyomi is incredibly talented at obscuring information as that is sort of his whole schtick. Though he does mention it is problematic if the Revenants already know everything about our main targets. At least the bits that they deem important for their style of assault. We may need to get people involved that they weren’t interested in picking on or newcomers altogether such as himself to maintain the misinformation. Since they definitely already understand most of the cult and Madhammer in particular. Also he’s agreed to learn the lucid rituals which ought to be hilarious. Obviously he is one of the warrior class by default, but given his specific skillset I’m trying to imagine what he can do with all that extra casting power. Also he’s not terribly specialized as a psionic or as an arcanist. He kind of just took bits and pieces from all fields just to add to his list of useful spells. So he’s not really going to be a specialist or innovator in any field, just use a really long random patchwork of a spell list. This is part of what makes it really hard to figure out what he can actually do.

Cassir reports in that militarized training is never ready, it is a lifestyle. Her example was the fact that Reika still trains daily. Though progress is being made in enabling a larger number of the cult to have basic functionality in not getting themselves killed in warzones. It has hurt recruitment efforts a bit though, hopefully that’ll swing back around.

ARC did that thing you asked them to do where they deal with wayward Nelta fleets. So we’ve lost some ships and so have they, but notably this isn’t like scaring off pirates. Nelta go into combat mode on contact and they’re an actual navy even if operating all over the place right now. We lost three battlecruisers and took down two of theirs, a handful of destroyers and starships, and then a battleship showed up to reinforce the stray Nelta patrol and rocked their shit until ARC retreated. Notably the lack of fleet diversity hurts a little when it comes to fighting the Nelta fleet.

Also we’ve sold a few of the colonies and got the rights to one of the existing colonies on the frontier, though its a crater at the moment but the planet isn’t half bad. Normal people won’t survive long on it due to the atmosphere but with proper space suits you could go mining and it does have water which is nice. Also some mildly developed life. Obviously you and I can survive in its atmosphere without any issues.

Also Vasia’s response to your message was…ruder than I am translating. But basically she is upset that she thought Ankathi was dead for centuries and it made her relax, only to realize Ankathi was still growing in whole new ways ever since her disappearance and has now achieved the status of a deity. Vasia’s is now trying to become a sahad entity in response. Which is a scary thought…cosmic Vasia. We will remember the entity she captured from beyond the rift was just terraforming it’s planets and forging new lifeforms as a hobby project. This has been proven to be achievable as multiple races, especially the Jesai, have gone from being a more limited race to a sahad entity with enough mastery of the art.

The fleet has finished arriving at Somnus and prepping and are now departed for Sol, good luck to them. It’s going to be rough.

Also the Vivarium has coffee and some other luxury crops growing successfully. Also the Makers are making things again and its making the researchers nervous to enter the enclosure.

The Nomads have returned to Somnus after a successful mission but they appear to be keeping several of the ships they hijacked. They…appear to have decided to expand their operations as we requested by creating a nomadic flotilla fleet. They’re stocking up at Somnus with the essentials for long term deployments and reconfiguring some of the ships for more civil matters. We talked with them about it and apparently afterwards their idea is to go into open space outside of the main travel ways to be extra stealthy and having a mobile base to deploy stuff from. It’s got a ways to go before they could be completely self sustaining with this flotilla of theirs but its an interesting start.

Sure, the Nelta fleet is currently moving through the frontier fighting mostly with Faelyn’s fleet. Due in part to not being able to find Moncayo, even before Guardian broke down that place was a bit difficult to locate. However, they do have the upper hand on her fleet and many of the frontier colonies have been scattered across the planets they were set up on to flee the obvious targets that were the colonies.

The bulk of their forces are still in Sol, while they currently have majority control of open space they’re having trouble fighting above SV2. The fact that its a planet filled with canyons caves and cliffs makes it a bit difficult to assault with a primarily naval based force. House Sharen’s fleet is best able to survive because of the docks at New Kaifen being underground.

Thenica is still under constant assault and though orbital control remains with Nelta, planetside remains under Sol’s control but most of the orbital cannons are defunct. Nelta has established a fortress on Thenica to try and get control of the planet but it’s currently under assault by the remnants of the planet.

The ships on the frontier are pulling back a bit to regroup with the fleet that was parked to assault Auwana and are likely going to either fuck off to deal with the other problems that keep coming up or begin the assault in abooout…I dunno maybe three months? Just guessing on that, hard to tell what their deployment strategy is.

Meanwhile back on Zenaka, the main city you landed in had a recent case of bombings taking out several turret emplacements and civilian infrastructure. Not too bad in the grand scheme of thing but I expect we can see a lot more little problems like this keep popping up with the whole drow tactic. The forces are currently spread across the planet trying to get things in order but that whole world war that this all started is still going and the Vloz are still somewhere among it all. As for the captured assets there aren’t that many, and you can blame this heavily on Madhammer’s style of operation. If it’s not in bits in pieces, they seem to believe it needs to be double tapped with tank shells. Something something, mass destruction not so good for spoils of war. Good at winning though.

When it comes to the trade idea, well the most useful thing they have is food we’d consider at least edible. As they haven’t been hit all that hard by the starvation the rest of the galaxy is having issues with. We also have a lot of tech they’d be interested in if we can set up convoys with the fleet to protect from pirates.

So in order to start building a station over Zenaka we need to get supplies together and we could probably bundle that part of the project in with the convoy idea. As well as getting Riley home. Though still the whole financial problem too. Which I’ll get to more in a moment.

Speaking of which, the Nomads took off with some more of the Vloz ships to who knows where. Actually I think they’re on the way back to Somnus nevermind.

Back home, Koura is economically starting to stabilize little by little. As more of the refugees find places to set up or at least abandon hope of going home. Quite a few holdouts are seeking to return once the war is over and don’t think they’ll be out here permanently and they’re a little less productive than everyone else. Not a particularly big problem but something the new security chief has been keeping an eye out on.

The Hasao clan, as their ethnic name might suggest, are from shetou. Specifically they’re a minor house that was underneath the Great House ruled by elves, separated during the initial invasion and winding up here as refugees out of necessity as the second invasion took place. They helped with fighting Kyven as well as many other gangs on the streets and have built up a level of repertoire with the citizens of Koura. With so many moving out to smaller towns and settlements due to overcrowding, the Hasao clan were well positioned to have the resources and word of mouth from the people to make their settlement a rather popular destination. Most people have been building small towns close to the outskirts of Koura but Hasao Tei is more of a second city. Granted it isn’t as nicely constructed with quite as much infrastructure as Koura itself and is more of a collection of small shacks spanning over the hills to the south.

Being from Shetou they’re sort of independent in their way of thinking and self governing, as indicated by their vigilante behavior. This is one of those things that gets quirky since we’re based primarily on Alnae’s values and they’re from the group that decided they’d rather live in a society where they would be constantly at odds with every other major power simply based on race instead of just sticking where things were comfortable. The financial problems around here have definitely led to an opening for them to establish themselves the way they like to do things and I have been talking with their representative for weeks now to try and iron things out.

It’s kind of hard to tell where they really fall on things. They have a strong culture about honor and justice so they’re not necessarily disagreeable but they’re a little bit used to playing the part of isolationists. I have a hunch they’re waiting for the Nelta invasion to wrap up before making any official deals or anything so they can see the potential future of the system.

The other small startup towns in the south also gravitate towards the Hasao clan since they’re the ones with people to spare for managing the area. Though they all tend to be of a mind to keep their heads down and stay out of trouble so it’s been less of a tightrope to diplomatize with them.

Also Koura Cures expanded two months ago but it is still mostly trying to refine the method behind using the parasites beneficially. However, our surveys into the Rift provide a lot more test samples since those things are all over the place in there. Profitability wise it isn’t improving that much for them since they’re mostly using the parasites to help the refugees and new colonists. This is a part of where the black hole in your finances are coming from, along with several other things that help get people settled in and such. Though it’s why Koura Cures is having slow progress as there is just a lot of work to be done with not as much time for regular research.

Contacting Echo Seven might be difficult as they’re still in Sol. At that to our list of things we’d have to do while we’re out there.

Reika is still adapting, though it’s making some waves among the knights. They’re not really used to seeing Reika with a whole extra arm, nor two eyes. That and the once missing eye is now gold colored and a little extra bright so its hard not to stare. I wonder how that is for her, she never has to remind anyone to look her in the eyes when speaking to her now but now she can’t get them to stop staring at her eyes.

Ki’Ralcht has managed to recruit some alien demons to her lance as you suggested, turns out she just hadn’t thought to do that. Some are enticed by the possibilities of joining the order even if some of them are a little bit odd. Basically the people who are liable to join aliens at the cost of their own people are the ones we, including Lancaster, manage to keep recruiting. Though I get it, before we really got space travel down there were a lot of people ready to do whatever it took to get off of Thenica just out of pure curiosity.

We’re seeing about how to get the third lance back home, with the increase in hostilities in all shapes and sizes on the frontier, unguarded ships prove to be a dangerous idea. Though with everything going on with Zenaka they could probably hitch a ride once the convoy idea gets going.

So hunting Daesta is tricky because we believe she has found some way to prevent herself from being found by Haziel. We don’t know which method she found though as there are quite a few options we know of. One of which exists on the planet already in the shape of the arcuran villages, as enchanted materials lose their connection to druid abilities. Assuming she found a way to construct things that hide her from Haziel she still has to roam carefully as stepping outside of such locations could reveal her. We’re not sure how likely it is that they know exactly how to counter Haziel but if we open up to the possibility that the Revenants are helping them it would explain a lot. I have no doubt their lot could figure out some methods since their whole thing is gathering information on their targets after all.

That all being said, the teams are out hunting around using more traditional methods. The arcane moon sort of obscures scanning tech from finding arcuran style constructions so we’re just flying around the land and having Eerihild sniff at things a lot. We’re also questioning the other merkas cities to see if they have any luck finding out how Daesta is operating and recruiting. We’re at least pretty sure that Daesta is within a specific territory due to which cities have been impacted by her recruiting. Though its a large territory as we don’t know if she would have remained close to Jamalia or moved further away from it to build up.

In other news, Bill has been taking down a lot of the street lights and replacing them with bio-luminescent plants that he came up with as his latest project. Though he’s asking if we can get any of those Koura sun stones shipped in to further his project. Apparently he’s taken it upon himself to decorate the place with more plants. Eerihild’s wolf team are working as the primary hunters to seek out Daesta or any Revenants. Sarnai and the holy knights of Ankathi are mostly tending to Reika, and Ankathi is definitely pushing Reika to bind with her now that she has a vacancy and is already one of the most experienced divine pandem wielders.

Haziel is back from her trip to the Raven II with her memory issues apparently fixed, and there has been a notable change in her demeanor. Eerihild has noted that her mother is a little more aggressive than before, apathy replaced with that somewhat feral side of her she was once famous for. This has improved the Chosen Wolves at least as now she just handed out lycanthropy to them like candy. Making Eerihild something of an alpha werewolf.

Ankathi’s following is also growing, if she does manage to recruit Reika there could be a significant shift of internal politics within the Astral Order.

I’m not sure who Rhea is and if you’re not then I’m not sure anyone is. According to the database she didn’t have any listed family, so after her death her property was just kind of left sitting around. I suppose someone should go claim that and clean it up.

Also Zanin is discontent with being left behind on Zenaka while you pull everything else out.Though she is collecting the biomass as ordered in preparation to ship them to Que.

As for food, I used to really like a certain type of mushroom from the underdark. Though lately I just have a strange craving for meat.

Also Seiyomi said he’d tag along with you for now after our finances team showed him the pay offer. Even roaming conspiracy theorists need to make a living to afford all those tinfoil hats I suppose. Though I will point out that your search for a misinformation expert might not need to look so far, Seiyomi is a trickster after all.

I’m new around here, why are the sneaky people just hiding out in the basement? We have a lead to pursue the Revenants even if just a little and the entire division is just camping out on a ship.

As for Cassir’s cybernetics, the cult enabled her. She relies on the Lucid Ritual to gain enough mana to cast in any meaningful quantity despite her cybernetics. She also has an emergency option, her cybernetics have a battery slot she can put mana batteries into if necessary though that’s a short burst option. We do know that she has the Selona brand of cybernetics which are designed as weapon platforms and he specifically has basically a city power plant in his own chassis…in the form of an alien writhing in constant agony. So she has options but they might not be the most optimal for a caster of her caliber. But the ritual circumvents the issue and lets her go crazy while still keeping the physical benefits of being a walking hunk of metal.

Vasia also reports that she taught Salied a couple new spells and has been spending time poking at her. Though Salied is now traumatized, Vasia is reported as “far worse than before”. We think reuniting with Ankathi replaced her apathy with a vicious thirst for power. She’s been torturing Salied to force her to make progress. According to the report, when Salied zoned out in the lessons as she often does, Vasia slammed her head into the floor and forced her to pay attention at the threat of continued violence until death if she didn’t stay focused. That is one of twenty six incidents that were recorded. Salied is now much quieter but getting stronger with Sahad very quickly compared to her previous progress so…results I guess?

Basically the labs report that they have lost all control of Vasia, she’s been spending a lot of time with the entity  from beyond the rift as well though no one else is allowed to enter that lab so they don’t know what she’s doing with it. It’s assumed that diplomatic relations with it will no longer be possible though.

ARC is flying around doing a ton of escort missions, also regrouping at Somnus to prepare for the trip to Sol. So give them a bit to sort that out since that’s going to be a bit of a large scale mission.

40th Day’s survey review has a particular question attached via sticky note which is asking if terraforming counts. Because none of them could really support just letting Thenica or Ash biologies loose onto the planet. I mean…I’d be fine but you know deer and stuff aren’t going to do as well.

New Horizons built the ships you asked for and the Vivarium is working on making some luxury plants.

Sure is quiet ever since we moved onto this cozy ship.

I’m back with another state of the galaxy report, that might be especially relevant since you’re planning to send a fleet to Sol.

The empires are pretty much a fractured mess. The ‘True Alnae’ led by Kaylen is now a sort of permanent military dictatorship under Kaylen as Grand Marshall but that is somewhat due to necessity. Several Alnae splinters led by former Councilors can be found across the system. The persistent threat of Nelta keeps them from reuniting and they have all become somewhat improvised governments to deal with whatever issues are closest to them that they can effect. If the war goes on too long it might become a bit more permanent as well.

Shetou was always a loose collection of houses with a very independence heavy political structure. While the shift in politics have led to the Great Houses losing a lot of their power due to a loss of contact and influence over minor and major houses beneath them, it’s kind of not that big of a surprise. They’re handling it well at least. Though this has resulted in new politics and alliances based almost solely on proximity to one another since everyone’s range of influence has been cut down dramatically.

Vloz’Khress and Song, the most unlikely of duos, are still working together though they’re primarily focused on repelling the alien threat as they are in the thick of it. Their alliance is out of pure necessity as they are both facing extinction to an alien threat as primary targets, but the fact that they’ve held together without killing each other for longer than a week is a definite shift in politics.

Sharen is mostly trying to regroup and hold what they can at SV2, which is where the bulk of their fleet was docked and has generally always been Shetou’s favorite planet to hang out on. They probably aren’t happy that House Song is on Thenica right now as usually Song is at SV2 as well and their alliance is in a state of flux due to Adin and Yasice’s deaths. Though House Song is, as always, charging into war wherever it may be.

On Thenica in particular there are thousands of smaller factions assembled from whatever groups of survivors could find each other and many are led by Phantoms or remnants of the old governments. Some are just formed out of nowhere from nothing based on, once again, proximity and necessity.

While the entirety of Sol is having it rough right now, Thenica and SR3 are pretty much constantly on fire as the main targets of the Nelta forces. However, both are guarded by some of the most formidable ground forces of Sol. One being the Valdir’s home planet and the other being our homeworld which has both Vloz and Song on it. As devastating as orbital bombardment has been, it turns out both the Shetou remnants and the Valdir are obnoxiously good at burrowing and living underground.

Tykel is fine because Nelta apparently didn’t think to target a science facility on some barren world that wasn’t doing anything. We can guess who gave them that intel that it wasn’t worth the time for now.

The Frontier is getting more chaotic as the Nelta fleets move from one planet to the next but now in a more erratic order due to the resistance they faced at Enohas and some of the skirmishes with Faelyn’s fleet that keeps popping in out of nowhere. Though her fleet has had a toll taken on it from all of this fighting.

In all I’d say Sharen now has the most naval dominance, even counting Nelta. Though they’re sort of pinned down and without the aethernet or even an improvised version of the net like we have on the frontier they can’t operate far from SV2. Leading to them having to actually scout out their own neighboring planets and moons practically from scratch. It is likely they’re holding SV2 as best they can unaware of their naval superiority and just waiting out the storm until they can safely venture out to see how everyone else is doing.

Despite the weakened fleet, Faelyn is the most powerful standing Empress since her worlds aren’t on fire right now and she technically owns us as well via the Phantom conspiracies. Speaking of which, she’s setting about to fixing up the economy now that she is aware that the Phantoms control most of the Sol territories and can resettle right back on top. Though it’ll always be a sort of loose organization that not everyone knows is such an expansive empire. The results of this given our current finances give us a few options to negotiate with everyone we owe a bunch of stuff but we’ll go over that once we get to it. With our finances slowly stabilizing its hopeful we’ll be in a better position by the time we have to do something then we are now at least.

The jydoq are doing okay since Nelta didn’t pick on them too much while they were on the way to get us though after the bombings that Arkaric organized they’re still not doing great anyways.

Nelta itself is hard to keep track of beyond the Sol territories and the ongoing war. We really only know much about their side of things due to Aryn’s little adventure, though we also know that both Daiheb and Selona have some method of accessing their side of the galaxy to keep in touch with things over there.

If everything goes roughly as we’re seeing it, specifically through knowing the machinations of the Phantoms, Nelta is going to be repelled over the next few years bit by bit. On paper to anyone who doesn’t know what Kanika is doing it looks like we’re on the verge of extinction, but we happen to know that organized communication between the Phantoms is still possible and only available to them.