Stories of Lore 42

For some reason the Merkas are confused as to who you are and believe the last time they saw anyone by your name it was a human woman. I’m not sure how they can tell the difference anyways actually.

It turns out the issue is that their resistance is largely controlled and revolves around Asmodan. So they just want you to go meet with him to figure out what’s going on. They’re not totally aware of what any of the conspiracy talk we come up with is about and they don’t like us that much. Without Nihlav or Daesta not many of them were there for learning about the phantoms and as far as they’re concerned Renjala may have kind of gotten those two killed. In short, diplomatic relations are iffy with the merkas unless we can somehow make them like us more than Asmodan. However, they did tell us where he is. He’s near one of the merkas cities hidden in a mountain.

Also as your advisor, do not take their offer to meet with Asmodan. I approximate it to be quite dangerous. Something something demon lord, something something politics.

Also the VSS Winter’s scanners report several incoming ships from several directions outside of the system. Likely Asmodan’s pirates, who rely mostly on smaller ships. Though there is a larger signature approaching from the direction of Auwana. A very large signature. I have deduced from previous records that warning you of an approaching Phantom titan is a trope by now. So I’ll give you three guesses instead. We are really only detecting general energy signatures at this range and speed, a clearer scan will come through once it is too late. I mention this due to the misunderstanding the scanners produced during the Nelta invasion where we mistook Guardian for being a fleet. Because we are detecting a second titan coming from another direction of no particular landmark.

I got a text from Captain Andel whose gravity is under examination. It just says “Asmodan’s fleet is made for ambushing.  So if you detect fifty signatures, there’s five hundred lmao.” I do not know how serious or exact he is being. Though we do detect over two hundred signatures, I think he might be unaware of our upgraded scanning equipment. That or Asmodan has the same level of proportionate response that Arkaric is known for. Though I do not believe this is terribly significant, even if every pirate in Sol appeared they do not use ships intended to attack battleships let alone super battleships. The Nomads are still the only crew to do this successfully more than once in their careers. At worst, they will contest our smaller ships and carrier deployments. In a prolonged battle, Koda’s super battleships will eventually overpower them regardless of number. Unless its something crazy like every pirate in the galactic neighborhood and we are swarmed by hundreds of thousands.

Khymin reports that the second iteration of the design is coming along, he’s trying to fix some mobility issues it has with the joints. While the previous design could fly quickly, it has become evident that close quarter situations which could be expected with the sword leave some room to be desired.

Laenadra asked if she gets a custom design too with her promotion. She seemed to be, taking her shot as I have heard the expression used.

The explorers you sent out to Jydoq made it there, they’re currently poking around. Satsujin’s work she left behind is still yielding results, with her former team still trying to relieve efforts. Ever since the collapse of their government and then a pamphlet about their new leader in Merlan they’ve been having a rough time. The jydoq are naturally inclined towards following leadership, it might be part of why they are all psionically talented. There are several stories of roaming bandits getting into fights with vigilantes.

In trying to determine where Valadeus was taking the enslaved merkas, as well as the arcurans, we have reason to believe they were being sent to the demon kingdom. They left in the direction of Sol but no one on Thenica reports seeing mass shipments of aliens.

Steampowered mechs might be reaching a bit for what they can do. A door without ethi tech is fine, a functional mech might be another thing entirely. I’ve told them to look into it but they just stared at me for an uncomfortable while.

We’ve invested into construction of defenses around Enohas’ moon. Well we mounted a lot of them to the existing refinery we left there, it still floats around orbit so that works. Though we can only build so fast.

Actually it turns out Zenakans are weirdly enthusiastic about pandem. Aside from the completely understandable interest in planar travel, learning the universe expands along a whole other axis they didn’t know about that they can go exploring, something about their culture seems predisposed to shaking hands with strange entities for power. Though they are also notably interested to learn that incarnum is a thing, might just be the alien ‘wow’ factor we have going on.

Also Garden City has seen its first major construction efforts going well. We’ve been building some big residential towers on the platform. So far it is holding stable, Robert actually just hid more rifts in the buildings so they would weigh down on the platform less as well. So…it’s just a city full of rifts.

The local astronomers have been noting that since Eden is actually on the other half of the galaxy from Sol that there have been some interesting things to find. With what we now know about galactic culture we’ve learned for what markers to look for when searching for extraterrestrial intelligence. Somehow Eden is in a very quiet patch between two very chaotic regions of space apparently. Though also having an observatory so far from our own system has allowed much better galactic charting. Since we’ve always relied on an orbiting planet to give us the same view from two positions and create a binocular measurement of distance, having a much further away location pretty much lets us pinpoint where everything in the galaxy is much easier. Honestly I don’t get all of it, but the space nerds are having nerdgasms all over Garden City.

Sarnai also said to tell you that Ankathi has an assignment for the Fate Chapter once we’re done on Enohas, specifically for Selah. We’ve been asked to provide her with a ship for her to use in such scenarios. Sarnai then stumbled through pointing out that Ankathi demands it to be fancy. Because Ankathi is an empress with expensive tastes.

As an advisor I read a lot of history whenever you have a random question about how anything works. Vasia makes me.

Rhazin’s powers allow him to fly short distances but he has freakish aerial agility in these bursts. He can also fire telekinetic shockwaves rivaling a 105mm tank shell. Cassir’s were bigger but she had the cult boosting her. Also spawn psiblades. He can also just enhance his speed as well as that of his drones. After some work we learned

So if provided with clay and paint she…makes things like a five year old I guess? Somehow that makes her creepier, the soul stealing alien with the creepy girl ghost stare has the faculties of…a creepy girl. She’s getting better though. Also I don’t have a fridge to hang anything on, she does keep them on the lakeshore though over there.

The main difference between her drones and the regular model is that…hers store essentia. They also have less teeth and claws, they have what I would call navigational mutations like Grinhys. So they can get around an area and find essentia to harvest.

We started readying a deployable colony as requested.

Setal points out that the outreach program was cancelled due to the knights being stalked around, so while we were making progress we’re sort of in the dark as to how amicable to the idea they remain. Though the knights just took some back home with them as new recruits anyways, that doesn’t give us much of a foothold in the demon kingdom.

With the aethernet servers up they’ve begun some basic broadcasting. More accurately its just a Moncayo based video hosting service because ain’t nobody got time for scheduling otherwise. Though no luck on the pre-invasion media samples. Blame the cloud. Also no public theaters yet, we’re still solving housing and other basic construction problems. We’re a bit of a way from dedicating a large space to ‘watch some shows’.

Also I’m not sure we really need signs around the lake. While I am here the drones are docile enough to give people rides down town if they don’t have a car. Long as they don’t go too far to the town outskirts at least.

As for the male merkas, correct. Too bad the merkas are at war for their freedom, survival, and being pulled between multiple factions for various reasons. Given their disposition towards stealth and guerilla warfare against the arcurans…I can see why the Phantoms are so interested in uplifting them at least.

As for warding the moon, that’s basically what a planetary shield is.Given that it is an arcane moon it would be pretty strong due to practically limitless mana available there. Which is probably why the Phantoms decided to take this specific moon instead of just any other one.

Well finding a lunatic prophet among the lucid cult wasn’t that hard so…we have some you can run experiments on. Though candidacy wise they’re pretty much just cultist with questionable cybernetics. Actually one of the most devout is the woman who found “Cassir’s cat”. Though none of them are on par with Cassir, and if they were you wouldn’t want to use them for the overmind since you’ll be erasing them with yourself. Though also with all the reports going on about jydoq, maybe we should go recruiting over there since they like having a leader. Granted that’d make us about the same as the bandits.