The unmanned kiosk prominently displays a tome that calls itself "Her Peoples and you." The bookshelves stand adjacent to it and are filled with copies of the same tome meticulously translated into every language that a client of The Nexus would speak.
Qora
Her Imperial Matriarchy and Her Union of Dominion States (Literal Translation)
The Imperial Matriarchy of Qora (Modified Translation)
A2 Client of Species Qorsikan
Statistics
Population According To Last Census:
Qorsikan: 1E4,951,JJ6,26C
Capital: Qorsika
Official Language:
Simplified Qorsikan
Traditional Qorsikan
Demonym: Qorsikan
Government
Limited Theocratic Elected Monarchy
Scion To Her Imperial Highness
Kleo Neferanzus Azu
Her Regent to the Qorsikan Dominion
N/A
Imperial Diet
College of Electors
College of Lords
College of Imperial Stars
College of Delegation Slaves
Qorsikan Home System
Name: Qorsika
Spectral Class: O5 Magnetar
Mathematik
Qorsikan: Base 20
Her Imperial Matriarchy and Her Union of Dominion States (Literal Translation)
The Imperial Matriarchy of Qora (Modified Translation)
A2 Client of Species Qorsikan
Statistics
Population According To Last Census:
Qorsikan: 1E4,951,JJ6,26C
Capital: Qorsika
Official Language:
Simplified Qorsikan
Traditional Qorsikan
Demonym: Qorsikan
Government
Limited Theocratic Elected Monarchy
Scion To Her Imperial Highness
Kleo Neferanzus Azu
Her Regent to the Qorsikan Dominion
N/A
Imperial Diet
College of Electors
College of Lords
College of Imperial Stars
College of Delegation Slaves
Qorsikan Home System
Name: Qorsika
Spectral Class: O5 Magnetar
Mathematik
Qorsikan: Base 20
-Kleo Neferanzus Azu
Her Scion, Her Servant, Our Empress
It is this glorious litany that has to beget us such hope. This is the maxim that I endeavour to channel my thoughts and deeds; and despite as I have failed to beseech, erred, misinterpreted, and mistaken, that I have been guided back with Her words. Back into Her grace. Now Her Will guides the hand of Her humble scribe so that they may teach the alien of Her ways and Her loving embrace.
Her rise into being Her undisputed scion for Her People, our peoples have lost hope. The stars themselves seem to have faded as the worlds we have settled amongst the worlds she has gifted us. Although we have received great abundance our hope faltered. She promised us that she may return to us centuries ago but she has yet come. With Her Litany, we arose to seek Her out. She has given us a great life so that we may. She has given us the means to sail amongst the stars. She has gifted us Her warmth and we hear Her words out amongst the stars. We seek Her out as we obey Her commandments.
Amongst the guiding light, we have those among us who live in darkness. They hear Her words and they loathe it. They laugh at their inky thrones in their dark shadows and they plot the downfall of Her People. They rip and tear Her worlds asunder with dark powers. We have sought these out and brought them to bear Her light and Her forgiveness. Even my brethren have been infected by their poisonous words and through hubris, or folly, or quiet despair, have turned away from Her guiding light and wisdom, seeking solace in dubious whispers from unknown places.
The rebellious [faction] rage, and damn, and burn. Destroying the great works made in Her name. The [faction] lose themselves in their former luminance. The [faction] cloister themselves in all manner of shadows and dark places. The [faction] blind themselves to the great evils that lie beyond in the darkness amongst the depraved works that they deem good. I am none of these but a humble county cleric. Raised in Her word and Her wisdom. Spreading Her word and enlightening all that I can. Inspiring the hopeless and informing the witless. I endeavour to shine Her light so that all may see lest their despair take root in them and they offer their lives and bodies eagerly to uncouth and seductive subsistence.
The guilds, amongst the most hateful of aliens, readily uphold the false gods that they may profit on the self-destruction of Her People that they seduce. Their god, for untold masses, has flocked, is the hateful and wretched name that we have learned to call Technomancy. Their servants have infiltrated untold worlds and stalk amongst untold people lulling them into inaction and iniquity. Their priests substitute Her litanies with their mumblings of physics and subliminal cabals of mathematics deriding Her peoples as insignificant. Replacing Her divine works with a melange of soulless automatons promising strange and unnatural power. In place of the heavenly virtues she has shown us, they offer idleness and hubris that has brought down the states and empires we've once shared Her home with.
Now, these vices aren't the greatest threat to Her peoples. At worst the technomancers and their works not only sway Her People but they insidiously and slowly kill Her People as readily as daemons that stalk the darkness between the stars, all of which is very well documented. Cunning demons disguise themselves as products as these technomancers. Certes, those immoral enough to seek wrongful dominance amongst Her People care little whether their strength comes from Her or the ancient daemons that she has saved us from long ago. Daemons that are born and live to seduce and enslave the greater amongst Her People.
And so I offer this compendium to describe Her state but to also serve as a lesson and a warning. Herein recorded therein are my unworthy observations as well as the commonplace smattering of lore and dreadful superstition. I have occasionally inserted parenthetical notes as well lest the reader grows beguiled by the poisonous words of heretical works whose I cite solely as an example and warning.
So now as the reader carries onward may Her will wed Her wisdom with my hand. Let this not come into the claws of those for whom it serves as mere titillation or temptation towards further study in the profanity she adjures. Let those who ignorantly descend into darkness, and let the illuminated grow wiser in the ways of evil so that they may readily cleanse it from our midst.
May she guide you to eternity.
Cleric-Scribe Anulsis
The Nexus Gate
-Unknown
In any work dealing with the black emptiness that is technomancy, how can the scrupulous scribe not begin with the greatest purveyor? They call themselves The Owners of The Nexus and they do well not to show their true form. Instead of revealing themselves, as well as their lies, and to lay them all bear they prefer to create a perversion of all that is holy. They invade other worlds and planes and in a sick hollow shell, they disguise themselves amongst those who they encounter. They lure them in with their lies and their hatred to all life to slowly kill them from within.
It has been rumoured that it was their doing that the suns have been dying as traces of their meddling has been found across Her home. Alas, despite myself I cannot help but wonder at this rumour. It can be no denying that where the Owners are concerned with the faith of Her People ebb. Their minds drain and ooze out of their eyes as they witness the lies and fallacies that these aliens peddle. Yet the doubters cry and shriek "How can we bear to face such as these; how can we be ought but slugs before them? Shivering and shrivelling in the cold and yet blazing light of their supremacy." Indeed The Nexus itself does not merely wrack our avatars with their daemonic-science. Their very presence in Her Home defiles and taints everything in their presence. They are an affront to our souls and our destiny.
I do not shrink away from The Owners and their deformed masses that dare call to represent us. From their lacquered clothes and malformed countenances. Nor from their flaming spears or their soulless stares. They are not of Her People. It is clear that their very presence violates Her preordained mission to protect all those from the horrors that lurk in the void. Their true nature is unsurmisable, and just as the "unsurpassable" riddle from early antiquity has been overcome with the sword so shall these faceless beasts be overcome. They are inscrutable as the chimaera who delude and plagued us with self-doubt before they have been cast down to the depths of the great sea. Foolish is the one who tries to emulate their hollow ways and fathom their errant ways.
Few iconoclasts are more dangerous than the apostates who would have Her People today and worship The Owners; who would cast Her beloved manifestos as reeds upon their alien pyres? "The Owners are older than we are," they blather. "The Owners are the chosen," they howl. "Gaze upon them and upon how they have the means to brush us aside like motes of dust. We must approach them humbly, as errant pupils to a teacher, so that we may learn from them, emulate them, and become old and wise as they have."
Old and wise? Should we become their slaves and offer them newborns so that they may prune their gardens and clear their paths from debris? There is no race they have encountered that they will call their equals. Remember the first words they have given us on our first meeting with their unscrupulous kind: "No." Let it not be forgotten that they denied us their aid in our quest to seek Her out.
Most of Her People, awed into quiescence by The Owners' puppetry and light shows, accept their accompanying hauteur as irrefutable proof of superiority. I view it as a weakness, or shame, or perhaps even worse.
Her Scion and Her Greatest Followers are confident Her doctrine does not hide away their great works. Indeed, The Owners puff, spit and boast themselves lest we march into their dens and discover their display as a feint. They tell us that it is a necessary evil where only the strongest amongst us are sent to deal with their impiety to protect those with the weaker faith. It is certes clear to the densest of bureaucrats that The Owners are ill at ease with the mere thought of Her People viewing their unvaunted wonders. And so they vye to cow us with a few pyrotechnic victories against levies on backwater worlds. In Her wisdom, She has built a great fortress around the breach which they have torn through our world to deny them further passage into the hearts and souls of Her People. None of Her people is lassitudinous, save for those paralyzed with doubts and fears.
Or is the riddle of The Nexus and its owners a darker and insidious one? Does the deformed visage of The Owners conceal, not weakness, but strength sent from the abyss of the void? Certes The Owners do not act malignant as, shall I say, the Daemons She has managed to have left stranded on a certain broken world (it is best not to mention here as they are rather common knowledge); but the demons in the void come in many guises and serve many purposes. Most of learned are aware that the primal source of The Owners come from occult artefacts. What shape and form these artefacts take are best left unknown as it is oft thought that these are of unnatural power and would seduce even the greatest amongst us in the simplest of ease.
And in truth if The Owners are so righteous as their demeanour indicates, why have we not been allowed to parley with their leaders? Yea, we have seen them but they refuse to parley on our terms. She has to deal with their emissaries and their so-called "Advocate" class agrees to sully their digits with us. They designate a section of their preposterously built world for the purpose. But what do all these blinds screen? It is widely a widely known secret, if I may use the expression, that the advocates are but the merest figureheads for echelons of administrators as yet unknown to us
I have claimed that The Owners have more nefarious intents for us and are merely biding their time. Waiting for Her People to be sufficiently weak that Her People would just insist on bowing down to their soldiers as they burn the homes of Her People to ashes. It is not unknown, that a mere fifty stellar cycles ago, as soon as The Nexus and their Illusive Owners have made contact everyone in the area has fallen to a near-death sickness. Certes, that is the reason why that great fortress was built around that tear. The Nexus itself is an existential threat to Her People through their very existence. In Her magnanimity, she has taken the burden of quarantining herself upon their world and only speaks to us through the gifts She has given us from beyond the tear.
Wicked, or weak, or perhaps both? I do not profess to understand The Nexus and its owners. I do, however, understand what needs to be done. In this age of hope and plentitude, we must not grow complacent. When foes shamble between the stars to batter the gates of Her Homes we who stand guard at Her Throne cannot ill afford to lose vigilance. We must not allow The Owners to create more tears in Her homes wherever they please weaving their snares in places unseen. We must address The Nexus not from a position of humility, but one of strength, and bid them come to us on our terms and in a manner we deem appropriate. Above all in Her terms.
But now, it seems, having solved half the riddle of The Nexus Her People must stay on their guard. For now, we maintain neutrality. I vow nought but ill can come from this, and exhort my brethren to hasten our search for Her amongst the stars, the better that we can seek Her guidance in this and scrutinize this lurker without, and, should it prove cancerous, excise it completely so that it may not contaminate others who may benefit from Her Wisdom.
Her Scion
"It is through Her guiding light that we are protected. It is by Her Scion that she keeps the light's glow on us."
-The Scriptures
Her Holiness is self-explanatory, though it is imperative that those who wish to know her Her and Her Laws to start with Her Scion. Her Will made manifest within our realm and chosen to guide Her People during Her Absence. In Her Infinite Wisdom, She has chosen one to continue Her Legacy in Her stead and parted with many great relics with the next more magnificent than the last. An undying flower. great pearl as large as a man's skull gilded in a great many gems and jewels. A sword that can cut both heaven and mountain with ease. Her greatest gift was that she imparted a part of herself into her chosen scion.
Her Scion, blessed with her powers were to give birth to her successor who may also become Scion. No other may take her throne as we, as Her People, were not fit to rule ourselves. We need, nay, desire her rulership and guidance. When Her Scion leaves the mortal coil to join her in the afterlife one of Her children is to take up her crown, gilded in such finery and magnificence that Her brilliance fills any room She enters.
Although to secure Her Bloodline She oft requires many heirs to ensure that Her Line is unbroken. Her further gracing us with Her wisdom she has created the lesser thrones of Regent and that through Tribunal of faith in Her so that the greatest amongst Her Children may become Her Scion. Again by decree, Her Scion may only be female to imitate Her Holy Visage.
For every new Scion that is elected into the position, Her lineage must be traced back to Her and from Her, we all come from. From beneath Her liberating shield, we are protected from the evils of this hostile universe with dangers so hideous we dare not imagine their dark scope. May Her guiding light forever keep us from the darkness and the demons at bay.
Regency
"It is not only Her duty to do Her Will, but also your duty to do as She commands."
-Ju Mei, Her Second Scion
Many accounts are describing the kind of character She was when She lived among us as there are stars in the sky. Architect of peace or brutal warlord? A stern judge or tyrant? Hero or monster? A thousand histories grace the Great Library that has been built in her honour and I can attest that no two tell the same story.
However, you believe She was as she lived amongst our kind her departure sent our people spiralling aimlessly and out of control, like a war vessel damaged by cannon fire a mere generation after her departure. The Scion she has elected had borne many children in Her name and no sooner after Her death the hungry scions of her death circled in, eyes gleaming and tongues lolling like feral scavengers, homing in on powers of their bestial counterparts trail the scent of blood.
And thus the peace of centuries once again erupted into many long years of flame and blood. Every pupil knows the rest. Many houses have risen and fallen into ruin and ignominy. Each attempting to control Her seat of our peoples by having their patron sit upon it bearing Her seal and Her holy war gear. As soon as the guilds rose they violently declared their sovereignty, and we, Her humble servants, tried and continue to do the best we can to mitigate the damage to an already weary people.
Finally, simple attrition succeeded where diplomancy has failed. The barbarians of the old world still swept across the borders to loot and burn, and the increasing number of holdings fell to poorly led raiders simply because no forces could be spared to defend them. As no house was equal to Her powers of rulership they were to bend the knee and to Her and Her Servants with those who will take rulership to be elected by a tribunal of politically significant electors as well as those who would be blessed with the tasks of fulfilling Her wishes.
Those who were blessed by Her to do Her will was dubbed Regent and in those early days, there were as few as three. They each had to rule in accustom fashion from Her Throne. She who was elected Regent may do as they wish, but never would she reign for longer than 10 years, at the end which she would abdicate and a new successor was chosen to be Regent to Her Scion and they would never hold office again.
And so the sceptres, those symbols representing one or more electoral votes, were manufactured and distributed. Each party of political stature, regardless, it seems, of equivalent moral structure, was presented with this tool. Every 10 years the vote would be cast, and the chosen candidate would ascend the seat of absolute (in theory) government for a decade.
Of course, greedy nobles would not suffer themselves to be barred from such an arena. The even-handed division of sceptres among the original 12 houses and with the founding of a new political house had an equal number of sceptres manufactured for them with Her Servants carefully inspecting each sceptre for forgery. Since the 12 original houses were given custody over sceptres the intrigues began almost immediately, and have not ceased since.
Alas, too many imperial warriors had succumbed to the vices and military luxuries proffered by the guilds, and so a certain allotment of sceptres went to the lords of Leagueheim. Thankfully, internal squabbling among the guilds often stymied any individual Gildemeister's sordid aims, and so the guild often abstained from voting or used its influence only to block the rise of a candidate detrimental to its goals.
Wisely, if surprisingly, Her Servants, as well as Her Scion Herself, were deemed worthy to exert some measure of control over Her People's secular destiny, and so they hold several sceptres.
► footnote
She would be dead within the fortnight.
And so, in lieu of a contender strong enough to unite Her Children by dint of might, The Regency continues, decade after weary decade. Because all parties of power vote, none can agree on any candidate of real magnetism or magnitude: and so the Regency is but a puppet show of weak diplomats and figureheads without any real purpose or power. I am no lover of tyranny, but I would almost wish a despot, so long as said tyrant proved subservient to Her Will, upon Her Throne. At our borders our enemies array themselves, and they are many. I aver that a chilly peace would be preferable to these centuries of endless war.
Imperial Diet
"My enemies are many. My equals are none.
In the shade of fruit trees, they said the Peninsulae could never be conquered.
In the land of Kings and Republics, they said they could never be humbled.
In the realm between continents, they said the daemons of the oceans can never be tamed.
Now they say nothing. They fear me like a force of nature. A dealer of Retribution and Death. I am her Scion! I rule as Empress! And my words are backed by Her Mandate!"–Scion Amidirus, After the Reunification Wars
Long after Her departure into the starry heavens Her People grew prosperous and spread. In their prosperity, they grew in great numbers and founding great cities, but they too grew in their hubris. Yea, a great deal of them thought them believed Her Laws and Her Codes to be of an inferior breed. They grew haughty in their decadence and depravity. In their filth and malevolence that soon brought them to arms in countless conflicts with each other and Her People. There were far too many of Her People spread too great a distance across the world for Her Scion to watch over. Even Her Sword and Shield conspired against Her and Her Scion. Certes, they have failed in the long term as they have assassinated and replaced mere puppets on Her Glorious Throne.
Through many long and bloody years of conflict bred by their immorality and craven hedonism, they were brought back under Her guiding light. Across great amber plains, through the ruby roofed forests and the great azure oceans, Her people have spread and needed to be brought back under Her guiding light. In this long and just Holy War Her Scion, Amidirus the Blood Handed, put forth a magnanimous proposal. She called it, "The Imperial Diet." I shall attempt to explain Her Diet thusly to the best of my abilities to one less versed in the more traditional vernacular of Her Words.
The Members of Her Estates, now elevated to a nobler and gentler stock, shall take upon the holy work of instituting Her Laws in a method that She may find equal to her magnanimity and forthcoming. This institution is to be made up of smaller organizations that are to be named "Colleges." Segregating them are by the station from greatest to least with the consideration that even the greatest and most powerful of Her Servants are not Omnipresent just as She was not. The Colleges, with their denominations and their officers, are as follows.
College of Electors
As our dear reader may Recall, I have gone over the Regency and the role of the Electors in that capacity. It is here that this is expanded further to more than electing a Regent to act in times of great crisis and peril without risking the life of Her Scion. The Electors, if the reader is given such providence to meet one, carry Scepters gilded and emblazoned with Her Heraldry as well as their own. Often mistaken as "Staves of Office," which certes is a disgusting misnomer, is their palpable symbol of power. In more recent years they jurisdiction over entire sectors and, should they deign, down to more local affairs. Certes, if you are to encounter one in your visitations to Her Lands it is best to gift extend the greatest respects you are capable.
College of Lords
The College of lords. Lordships from the greatest of Planetary Governors to the lowliest of Mayors and Thanes. Strong in number, but often discordant in their interpretation of Her Word. They maintain their benches whom, which one of their numbers is regularly elected, and temporarily act as an Elector for their given duration to the station. Originally they acted in a more noble sense. Bringing Her Words and enlightening all those who hear to the betterment of their livelihood. Now, look at how they have fallen. Yea, they have fallen far and content themselves with splitting themselves into arbitrary factions of petty and worldly doctrines. Yea, they're too busy squabbling and mewling amongst themselves that they aren't considered great or trustworthy enough to be looking for the long term welfare of Her People. Certes, they know this to be true as they divide their benches with the lords they appoint with their Orders.
Yea, they have raised great armies to conduct war and strife amongst each other over petty resources and territory. Over simple thoughts and beliefs on how their secular world should be run. They've spent so much attention in raising them truly and properly of Her Teachings that they have completely forgotten to enlighten their lesser brethren. For as much wealth they display in lavish affairs of state and dress they continue to neglect in guiding Her People. They are continually under the constant watch of their Superiors and straightened out. Yea, they are even regularly replaced with more fitting and pious candidates of more righteous blood.
Free Imperial Polities
Just as in those ancient days where travel is long and power waxed and waned the further one reached from Her Throne some outposts were much needed and sought after. Lorded over by future candidates to the title of Scion. Directly answering to Her Scion and none other these cities are often sought after. Yea, the pious seek to reside in these great cities of truth and enlightenment. Yea, the lesser lords, and nobles grow in jealousy and disdain as these centres of piety grow in strength and size and often sought out to take these lands by force, but not before being grievously rebuked by the faithful. But oftentimes, in Her Benevolence, she pardons the foolhardy attempts at power after a reaffirmation in their loyalty with a bending of the knee.
Yea, Her Imperial Highness is oft shown in Her Benevolence and Magnanimity. In this she allows these Imperial Estates to run things as they wish following the laws She has passed down. The abundance of these Freed Cities is as great as Her Scion's heirs. Every colonized world and star has several Freed Cities within their borders both acting as the beacon of enlightenment they have always been and as a safe harbour if She, or those in her stead, ever call on the local Lords.
In ensuring that there is always a direct descendant, and one to preside over the Free Estates, to Her Original Scion those of that descent tend licentiousness. Yea, to ensure that the greatest stock may thrive she seeks to maintain a polyandric relationship. It is not of my station to criticize Her Scions, both current and previous, though it should be noted that the more promiscuous having hundreds of Paramours. I dare not fathom the number of Paramours she keeps aboard The Nexus. I do fear that most of them have died due to the inhospitable environment aboard the Nexus and she may have stricken herself to celibacy in mourning.
Delegation of Slaves
The Delegation of Slaves. The Newest Delegation as aliens has submitted themselves to Her Divine Will. Being given equal rights as Her People, the alien species and their factions who have willingly bent the knee have been given the same powers and privileges of the Diets I have explained before except for the College of Imperial Stars. Their benches among the colleges are distributed as best as they can be by their species' tradition and culture. Though they are only separate by articles they work in the same way as their Qorsikan counterparts with equal variations of piety and depravity throughout. Yea, as alien as they are they all willingly and fervently serve Her. Even if their more queer titles are that of 'president' and 'Prime Minister.'
