Lore24 - Sudilitas: the Other Cults

Mar 25: These are all of the alliances that have integrated themselves into the Sudilitas political structure, but there are some that operate outside of that structure. These can prove to be nuisances, irritants, threats, or seeds of our destruction if we are not careful. 

Mar 26: the Radioactivists have a small religious cult here; while technically frowned upon and placed under observation the cult itself is not illegal. Just that the agents of the Peace Brigade track them, if only to keep the Restrorationists informed of who is a member, lest any Restorationist plans to enter the ruined city (and face its Readioactivist cults) is comprimised. 

Mar 27: If they keep to themselves, there is no issue - they can be found most nights on the battlements, keening their quiet paeans to the glow that still flickers from that massive southern ruin. Every few years a number of them leave together, taking their likely final pilgrimage to the source of the Glow. 

Mar 28: The Holy Roan Empire has agents here as well, even if I can't identify them. This Zoopremicist offshoot is always trying to feel out our intentions and defenses, and doubtless has agents inside the Ranks, much as it pains me to admit it. The Horselords are subtle and patient in ways that the Badders and other inheritors of their philosophy are not. 

Mar 29: The Red Death, while obliterated in this area years ago, may still have spores lurking among our community. Should even one of these abominable lichenthropes reveal itself the poisonous ideology could spread through pollens and pestilence, and must be burned out root and branch. 

Mar 30: There are Archivists amongst our community as well, finding the puts of irreparable junk that are too far gone for even the fulgurators and placing them in personal niches for veneration. Madmen all, but it's only when their creed pushes to disturb or deactivate RWN that they cause issues. 

Mar 31: A group of them once snuck past the guards into the lowest rooms of Sudilitas center to to accost our solitary AI saint. The clean up was horrific, and getting archivist ash off of the walls kept work crews busy for a week. One hope they have learned from the experience. 

Lore24 - Sudilitas: The Capital Guilds

Mar 18: The Capital Guilds are a relatively new alliance that practice an ancient organizing structure of guild control of various tasks. This turns out to be very helpful when it comes to training individual experts in skills and passing down knowledge. But they also integrate themselves into trade relationships, which can be helpful or frightening for the community.

Mar 19: The Capital Guilds are focused on maximizing the efficiency of action, using fiat currency to do this. I admire the efficiency on a small scale, but worry about the aggregation of power to a few based not on diplomacy, military rank, or democratic norms, but on the accumulation of imaginary resources.

Mar 20: Applicants to the Capital Guilds will be measured by various tests of skill, cunning, and phrenology (for those with skulls) and be sorted into their Merchant, Craftsman, or Guard classes. Craftsmen are then further apprenticed into various craft guilds. More common for those of you reading this are the merchant and guard classes who are sent on deals with outside communities. 

Mar 21: On these junkets the Guildmembers will be fulfilling existing arrangements (for which they will have been provided a script, or have an older Guilder as a leader); they are expected to support and complete their mission, and for the guards at the cost of their lives if need be. They will, by my reckoning, we be asked to take extraordinary risks. 

Mar 22: The guilds will rank the materials being delivered or returned with more value that the guards, certainly, and the merchants perhaps. Because the secret I impart to you now is this: you will never move up in the Guilds by fulfilling existing obligations. You must create new markets, new agreements, new deals. You must always be closing.

Mar 23: Most trips involve sending a single wagon or a small caravan to a location and back - all of which must be guarded - but canny Guildsmen will set up what they term triangle trades, and that is a sure route to guild status. And in so doing, like the Peace Brigade, they expand the soft power of Sudilitas, making literal client states. 

Mar 24: Still, most often the new applicants are sorted as guards, who are then traded cheaply (in my opinion) for the work of protecting objects traded for ephemera. And yes, I see the irony of a military man complaining about the creation of cannon fodder. But I can see the difference. 

Lore 24 - Sudilitas: the Peace Brigade

Mar 11: The Peace Brigade are now the mortar that holds the city together - otherwise we rocks would bash each other to pieces. The Brigade are looking for a few good sentients who can multi-task between diplomacy, problem solving, engineering, and combat strategy, and they will accept anyone in their alliance. Floreaux are drawn to them more than any other alliance in the area. Civilization must be protected....

Mar 12: ...Whether it likes it or not. It is strange that the Ranks and the Brigade are often at odds given that both of us seek control over areas in order to protect their inhabitants, but the Ranks are open in their means and goals, while the Brigade are sometimes not. But of course, as an officer in the Ranks I would think that, while the Brigade would see as as conquerors and themselves as ambassadors. 

Mar 13: Still, they do good work. The most common action for applicants is just to learn the task of building and maintaining cities, Sudilitas in specific. This often seems tedious but the supplicants are also the eyes, ears, and hands of the governing counsel while they live and work in every corner of the city. 

Mar 14: When sent away from the city they have to negotiate the repair and defenses of Sudilitas' greater boundaries... i.e. the Seekers territory. This is not always the easiest as many Seekers bear grudges against the Brigade for bringing in the Restorationists. Still, walls and towers and defenses are maintained. 

Mar 15: Once the applicants have done one or the other of these tasks they will be  judged and if suitable send to one of the nearby settlements to evangelize for the Brigade's ethos and services. By design none of the people sent are citizens, so none have the Right of Allegiance. 

Mar 16: This evangelism is often solving the communities problems in external threats or architectural needs. But regardless of the state of the community the Brigade will always find a reason to be there; they will always find a problem to "solve", so the Brigades can prove themselves indispensable and more responsive than the local government. 

Mar 17: If there is a real and tangible threat greater than the applicants can handle, they send word back to Sudilitas and hold the line until more Brigade forces can get there with citizens who have the Right of Allegiance. From there these people become a Sudilitas (and Brigade) client state. But as a member of the Ranks I make this sound worse than perhaps it is. It is merely not my style of conquest. 

Lore24 - Sudilitas: The Seekers

Mar 4: The Seekers outside the city have the support of those who still remain in Sudilitas boundaries... and its politic. It's a strange arrangement. Those in Sudilitas and partaking of its technology sending their petitioners to aid their (mostly Moreaux) brethren who abide by the more technophobic (and humanophobic) examples of that creed away from Sidilitas, but live under our aegis. 

Mar 5: I am of two minds on this arrangement. As a Moreaux i feel for their fear of the Restorationists and the quiet implication of our return to servitude. As a medical scientist I cannot share their position on Ancient technology. In the end, out of solidarity, I chose them as my third Patron for citizenship, which let me see close up what they ask of their applicants. 

Mar 6: The easiest are when the distant Seekers feel they face threats from Flora or Fauna that the Ranks cannot spare resources to hunt or track. Combat-ready residents might find themselves tasked to find such threats to the crops and herds and deal with them - diplomatically if the threat is a sophant, or violently if not.

Mar 7: Next easiest is when the Seekers dig up or stumble across Ancient remnants. The nature of their creed means when they do locate something they will have an applicant resolve the issue. Exactly what this means varies wildly, but the stiff backs of the Seekers means they seldom continence Restoratonists on their lands; the applicants must resolve it alone. 

Mar 8: Most common is for the Seekers to simply appoint the applicants as being a sort of Shire Reeve for a period - from 3 moons to 13, depending on which Shire - and use their status as an outside arbiter to resolve issues inside the community. The applicants become impartial reviewers and scapegoats for all manner of social conflicts, with the promise of support should they do well. 

Mar 9: For city folk thinking they will just have to plant crops for a year without technology, leaning that they are tasked with resolving the issue of the corpse of a long missing Seeker tilled up in a field, or to placate a divorce dispute that would sunder a community, or to reconcile wayward children with their parents when all are a found family of different genotypes... it is a challenge. I know it was for me.

Mar 10: It is not impossible for the Seekers still in the city, though with such a narrow commitment to the anti-technology creed it is a stretch to call them that - will use the applicant on local matters. But since inside Sudilitas the Ranks handle law enforcement, the Restorationists would deal with Ancient finds, and the Brigadiers manage household counseling. Such requests would be secret, and almost certainly criminal....

Lore 24 - Sudilitas: The Restorationists

Feb 26: The Restorationists are also always looking for sentients of clever mind and able body. The assumption that they are looking only for Fulgurators or other probers of ancient technology is a false one. They are very much as in need of courageous sentients as the Ranks, and there courage may be the greater for the lack of structure. 

Feb 27: Voyages for the Restorationists are simple in their design - take this map, go to this place, expand the map and bring back any information and artefacts you find. Once you recover, do it again. The map and your memories are key for the inquiry, to be able to always build on what is known. 

Feb 28: This is, to me, a form of madness; an unending scouting mission with no objective but to scout. I must admit that it work... sometimes. The humans and mutates most often applying for these tasks (for we Moreaux and Floreaux don't relish Restoring a world before our liberation or creation) do well. 

Feb 29: Both in the sense of improving the lives of the residents of Sudilitas and in the comforts provided by the Restorationists. They sometimes even get to keep the ancient technology they recover (officers of the Ranks often have Ancient weapons, but they are the Ranks, not ours), which is a great gift indeed. Still, they are expected to use that technology to return to the ruins....

Mar 1: The primary directions of such exploration are Southwest and East. Only the Restorationists care about the vast, rambling, Glowing shambles to the Southeast. It is home to mad Radioactivist cultists, some of whom are all but the walking dead, shambling about and harmless until they fall on you for food; others are canny sentient opponents who want to convert you to their deadly religion. 

Mar 2: This is while non-sentient creature of all sorts lurk and stalk and hunt in the incomprehensible ecosystem. The underground layers of this city have survived more than the skyward ones, but little of either is explored. The city... the labyrinth... hates you and wants to kill you before you exit with its secrets, and your only aid are the tools, maps, and supplies of those who fell ahead of you. 

Mar 3: To the East the Restorationists share an interest with the Capital Guild, but the Resorationists want access to the Ancient towers emerging from the lake. There are intact ancient arcologies, whole environments in the flattened domed spires. By all accounts they are run by Minds and Living Metal gone stark mad or using logic no Human, Mutate, Moreaux or Floreaux comes by naturally. These are "funhouses" if your idea of fun is each locale presenting a whole new riddle to survive. 

Lore 24 - Sudilitas: The Ranks of the Fit

Feb 19: Any able bodied resident can petition to join the Ranks of the Fit, as I discussed before. Moreaux are, if all suitable, made officer trainees and a group is assembled for a scouting or patrol mission to gauge their fitness. If it is successful they can request patronage missions of more complex scope (or just agree to serve if they don't wish to be citizens, though the Ranks prefer their officer corps to hold that honor). 

Feb 20: Patrol missions should be simple enough - a wide circumnavigation of the environs, delivery of supplies to the Ranks outpost inside the farms of the Moreaux Seekers. Perhaps, just perhaps, these missions are chosen with a greater than normal risk of combat to assess decision making, but they are never ones where a fight is guaranteed. 

Feb 21: Once they are assessed, Command will offer a commission to any worthy Moreaux, and places for the others. After that there are ant number of missions to either deal with natural threats to the expansion of Sudilitas' sphere of influence, or as protection against the encroaching threats I discussed earlier. 

Feb 22: The Dark Emperors are, themselves, too distant and powerful to attack en mass, but smaller units have been sent to harry their positions, steal their technology, and scout their territory. Larger ones have been used to disrupt the massing of forces in their client states; we cannot let them array too much against us. 

Feb 23: Similarly, missions should include shows of strength for the Moreaux and Mutate communities around us so they know that we are powerful allies and bad enemies. The Dark Emperors need no more proxy states closer to us, surrendering their liberty for the Carrin's hoarded technology. That would spell our end....

Feb 24: What would also spell our end is if the Badders tot he north (and by extension the rest of the Holy Roan Empire) decided to wage another crusade into our territory. The Badders do this from time to time to "hone their martial prowess" but also because Feudalism is a system that produces so many unnecessary, un-inheriting offspring that spending them on the field of battle is part of their reproductive and political strategy. 

Feb 25: We cannot hit them too hard, lest they use it as a cause to rally behind. But we cannot leave them be for they are too numerous, too unpredictable, too full of violence to not be watched, checked, prepared for. Fortunately their obvious threat helps the alliances with our sister states. The machinations of the Dark Emperors might be too subtle to spot, but the Badders are the fire that forges us into the weapon to defeat them. 

Lore 24 - Sudilitas: Citizenship

Feb 12: If residents approach the Ranks for... no, let me go back. As Residents, they have the rights to Protection, to Sustenance, to Shelter, and to Petition for Redress. But as citizens, we have the rights to Access, the right to Argument, the right to Alliances, and the right to Armament. These are "the four A's"

Feb 13: Nothing says that residents must petition for citizenship. Many don't. As long as they contribute when called and support the city they have the rights to much of what a sentient needs here. But for some, the call to serve, and by extension to command, is too great to ignore. 

Feb 14: Once you are granted, and accept, the rights and responsibilities of citizenship, you gain access to the Government Counsel, including the ability to directly meet with the five member Organizing Body of the Counsel, who set the meeting agenda. You gain the right to make open arguments at the Government Counsel's meetings, including arguing for a vote on the membership of the Organizing Body. 

Feb 15: More importantly, you have the right to form alliances that, at least until a formal decision of the Government Counsel, will commit some of Sudilitas resources to other Comms - this is of enormous import. While the rights of access and argument are personal power, the right to alliance has a vast responsibility, misuse of which can strip you of your citizenship. 

Feb 16: Finally, and least important, is you have the right to armament: to be armed with modern weapons inside Sudilitas walls (and for military officers, gunpowder weapons),  and to access the arsenal for missions or endeavors outside the city. It is in this way that the weapons of the Ancients are distributed. 

Feb 17: Of course, there are paths to greatness that do not require citizenship. Each of the Alliances have ways to mark and reward their most effective or dedicated members (though of course the Ranks are most organized). Artisans are rewarded for their expertise. Large families can bring significant resources and influence. But despite the Capital Guild's efforts, there is no way to vast fortune and power without commitment to the community. 

Feb 18: This, I think, is why those of the Ranks that stayed did so. It wasn't cowardice for not wanting to march into the incipient civil war in the wake of our glorious emperor Napoleons' death. It wasn't entirely for person honor of being unwilling to abandon the community that the emperor had promised our protection. It is the need in all of us for a community... especially for the Moreaux and the Mutants who cannot create progeny. 

Lore24: Sudilitas - Arrondissements

Feb 5: As one becomes a full citizen of Sudilitas, one must petition for, or be assigned, an arrondissement in the city where which one has authority and for which one bears responsibility. All residents are protected by the city's walls and laws, of course, and but petitions for redress or recommendations of action are made to the Governance Counsel via their citizens of their arrondissement, a form of patronage representation. There are currently 28 arrondissements, determined by population. 

Feb 6: As discussed, the construction of Sudilitas is a pair of concentric squares around RWN's tomb. The center facing rooms of the inner square are the rooms of the Governance Counsel. Originally assigned to the Peace Brigade, and then the Ranks of the Fit during the occupation, these days it has rooms for all the Alliances in the city... though the Peace Brigade has slowly taken the majority of the spaces due to their willingness to handle non-wartime logistics and social cervices. 

Feb 7: The Ranks have a small space there now, for our general and her staff, but the exterior corners or both buildings are all garrisons for the Ranks This has spread us out, but it does mean that we can, as our role as non-wartime peacekeepers, respond quickly to any threat. My own medical facilities are on the Outer Southwest Corner of the Inner Building. Of course, the Ranks also have many spaces "Inside the hill".

Feb 8: Those spaces, designed by the Ranks and now maintained by the Brigade, are a honeycomb of traps, oubliettes, secret entrances, redoubts, caches, and other defenses for the city, hidden inside the unassuming terraformed hill that hides us from the casual traveler. We should be invisible and impregnable. The west side facing the wind turbines has the most travelled concealed entrances, where forces might sneak out and harry anyone not warned off by the Dabbers illusions. 

Feb 9: The east side in contrast, has a cleverly disguised trail leading down for entrance and exits, and a ramp from the hilltop into the city that is so trapped as to be death for the attacker in wartime. The Capital Guilds maintain the arrondissements around the base of that ramp, becoming the de facto mercantile space as well as home of stables for a truly impressive menagerie of pack animals. 

Feb 10: Atop each of the buildings are the arrondissements overseen primarily by the Seekers, the gardens that help feed Sudilitas that cover all that space. Vines ripe with fruit run down the sides of each building, and their frameworks, make an ascent from the ground to the rooftops possible, if difficult. All the space is used for growing save for the windows and skylights, which are kept clear, and within are arrays of mirrors to send the light deep into the buildings. 

Feb 11: The western wall of the city contains the tunnels that lead out to the turbines, and also the most entrances to the lower levels of the outer ring (and from there the inner). It is the space around those tunnels where lie  the Fulgurator's arrondissements, while the lowest levels of the rings are Restorationaist space. Seldom touched by natural light, these rooms are habitable by arclights, and also the fans which push air through the space. When no wind turns the turbines they are close, pitch places indeed. The Restorationists claim to not care. 

Lore24: Sudilitas - How The Youth Advance

Jan 29: Becoming a full voting citizen of Sudilitas requires the applicant to be put forward by three patrons of at least two Alliances before being allowed to attempt the citizenship test. This promotes cross collaboration and a structure of debts and obligations on top of the barter that makes up our trade. (Some of us still use the cards that were imperial currency for the Ranks, but others have devalued them.)

Jan 30: The Ranks, of course, will act as patron for any Moreaux of good character provided they obtain officer training, and assist in leading actions attending campaigns on one or two occasions. For all others there is space as pandours (who might be trained as armigers) to receive similar patronage, if not commissions, on such actions or campaigns. We are so short staffed here that we outsourcing our support staff to the Peace Brigade while we maintain fighting sentients - a point of contention for us. 

Jan 31: The Peace Brigade will be patron to anyone, of course, needing clever hands, keen minds, and strong backs to maintain Sudilitas' (and the Ranks'...) infrastructure, as well as the surrounding farms - those Seekers might have walked out on us, but the Peace Brigade will not abandon them. Everything they do has an eye towards sustainable defensibility. If any adventurous youth or newcomers volunteer for it they will be sent to assist in the conversion of nearby settlements to the Brigades' mission. 

Feb 1: The Seekers both in and outside the city have the ability to promote people for citizenship (even if the Seekers outside refuse citizenship themselves...). They will usually ask for little more than aid in the planting and harvesting; if this is all you provide it will be years before they extend patronage. Faster is dealing with the odd non-sentient animal or plant threat that they want to handle internally, or a social conflict that requires neutral mediation. The Seekers remain very odd, to my eye. 

Feb 2: The Fulgurators as a pocket of the Restorationists only provide patronage after a long apprenticeship and dedication to the art. The Restorationists proper will act as patron to anyone - though Moreaux seldom apply - who is willing to brave one or two extended missions into any of the nearby ruins for lost technology. This is very risky behavior, being small unit missions into deadly terrain, but the possible rewards for Sudilitas are immense and successful ventures are feted. 

Feb 3: The Capital Guilds will support anyone willing to act as travelling merchants or guards for them and their goods. They have "tests of worth and value" that sort their patronage to "traders" (who are capable of attaining great personal wealth) and "guards" (who are less valued but still supported), and companies of these are sent to nearby communities to arrange mercantile ties... and "observe" secrets of construction or craftsmanship. These ties advance the city, but I don't like their philosophy. 

Feb 4: The whole of this structure feels rickety to me, as a military Moreaux, but the death of our glorious Emperor at the hands of 'republicans' looking to displace the Stratocracy with a "parliament of some more equal than others" - action I suspect was engineered by the Dark Emperors - has soured me on such democratic forms. Still, so far it has held, keeping the voting citizenship engaged with each other through social ties and giving youth and newcomers a path forward. 

Lore 24: Sudilitas - the threats to the city

Jan 22: Being a military man I have to expand on the threats facing Sudilitas. First and foremost are the agents of the Dark Emperors, angry at the theft of their thaumaturgy. They control the trade routes to Sudilitas from two directions, cutting us off from the Ranks of the Fit to the Southeast. 

Jan 23: To the southwest are the remains of a massive city from before the great upheaval. There are so many secrets there to be uncovered, but a cult of Radioactivists worshipping "the glow" that coats parts of those structures. To be fair, the glows are very pretty on clear nights, but the Radioactivists presenace makes our forays there even more fraught. 

Jan 24: To the north are the Badders, a kingdom in the Holy Roan Empire. Getting the Badders to embrace feudalism was the greatest coup of that offsoot of the Zoopremicists. Foisting that brand of Moreaux supremacy (which was so much better articulated by our own beloved departed emperor) was a blow to the world

Jan 25: To the east, a short distance away, lies the Great Lake. That lake holds the remains of several cities of the Ancients, which only the foolish think were originally constructed there rather than falling prey to changing coastlines. Ragged mutant and Moreaux communities lie between us and the lakes treasures of fish and artifacts; some can be traded with. Some Can't. 

Jan 26: To the west are several patches of forest, scrub, another various terrain each with pockets of true breeding Moreaux like Floops and mutants such as Gren. Our relation with these other communities vary with the seasons and the strengths of our respective harvests. Without the Ranks here our position weakens. 

Jan 27: Overhead? You have heard then of the floating city that occludes our sun for three days in the 7th moon ever year? Some cults of Archivists or trinities of Brothhood or Healers follow its path, but we have heard no stories of anyone reaching its streets or breaching its walls, and it ignores all attempts art communication. 

Jan 28: One Sleeth fulgurator of our community, Slithertongue by name, claimed that he had discovered the codes for entering that place, but demanded... DEMANDED!... that we violate the request of RWN and dig down into her ruins before he would hare those codes. We exiled him to the east, of course. Such attempt of one to demand control of all will not be tolerated. 

Lore 24: Sudilitas, the last city - the history of Sudilitas

Jan 15: I suppose a history of the city is in order. It was three or four generations ago the Seekers of the New Dawn arrived on this land and declared the land fit to farm. They built simple structures and crude walls to muster some defense against Badders and others of the Holy Roan Empire, but fared poorly until the Peace Brigade came. 

Jan 16: The two groups saw an immediate advantage in partnering, and that was when the Brigade lay the foundations of Sudilitas as we know it. The defensive advantages of the new city let them hold off the Holy Roan Empire's feudal states, and Sudilitas became the Peace Brigades headquarters in this area. 

Jan 17: Art that point the height of the visible technology was swords and spears, bows and crossbows, windmills and water wheels for grinding grain. The Seekers accepted this level of technology, but argued and bickered over the Peace Brigades new seeds and fertilizers - what would harm the mother Earth, what would not - and accepted or rejected as they would. 

Jan 18: This changed when the Orlen appeared with the Dark Emperors books of lightning science. The Orlen were Restorationists, and the Peace Brigade sided with them. This led to intense discussion and politics before the Seekers split in two, with the more traditional of them - to be fair, the Moreaux not enamored with the Restorationist creed - left to farm outside Sudilitas territory. 

Jan 19: Relations between the departed and the city remained cordial. This was critical when their territory was attacked by a mass of of Reavers, the Friends of Entropy, intent on slaughtering them all and destroying their land. All fell behind Sudilitas walls to withstand the siege.

Jan 20: Still, the Reavers might have spelled the end for all of us save for the opportune arrival of the Ranks of the Fit. The Ranks broke the siege, scattered the Reavers, and hunted them down to the last so their Ergot could not spread. We then took political control of the area, as was our right. The balance of power in Sudilitas between humans, mutant humans, and Moreaux changed again. 

Jan 21: With the death of our emperor, Napoleon Ursus, blessed be his name, the Ranks have fallen back from our most distant outposts. This has left but a Company of we Black Sheep behind as an auxiliary force. We are too few to govern with Moreax in control, so a balance exists between the Company, the Peace Brigade, the Fulgurator/Restorationists and the Seekers. For now it holds. 

Lore 24: Sudilitas, the last city - the fulgurators and their origins

Jan 8: The fulgurators draw the wind to make it lightning, which they pull into the city via underground cables. There is powers the arclights inside the depths of our structures, the pumps for our water, and the mills for our grain. The towers twist and spin always, making our life possible.

Jan 9: The tunnels between the towers and Sudilitas are maintained by the smallest of we Moreaux, and are as well defended as we can make them. There are no entrances from the towers save up through the tunnels, and the viewports from the towers are too small for any to enter. 

Jan 10: Because Sudilitas accepts everyone it can, there are families of Dabbers who have trained as fulgurators, and it is they who maintain the tunnels... and their illusioncasting helps ward off those who would damage the towers. Outcasts from their kind, heroes here.

Jan 11: Sleeth also exist among our city and our fulgurators, and their hatred of RWN is.. of concern. That they "Dab in the mud of wind turbines and arclights while the fusion core AI sits unhelpful" galls them no end. Perhaps they would have been better as historians. 

Jan 12: We are fortunate enough to have a small family of Orlen with us... one whom is also a fulgurator. He learned that skill here... but it was his father's carrying of a Carrin's tomes of lore as an entry-gift that made our fulgurators more than the desperate tinkerers they are elsewhere.

Jan 13: That entry-gift opened the doors for us all. It made Sudilitas what it is today. But it lit a fire in the fulgerators about how much there is left out there to be learned. It is why they insist constantly that we are in need explorers to the old places. 

Jan 14: But that sequence of events - the Orlen's killing a Carrin and carrying its secrets here - is what has earned us the enmity of the Dark Emperors. With the withdrawal of the Ranks of the Fit and Emperor Napoleon's protections, I fear we need more than explorers. We need HEROES. 

Lore24: Sudilitas, the last city

Jan 1: At the center of Sudilitas lies the tomb of They-Are-Gone, the ruler of the incomprehensibly ancient world of 2200, before the Great Upheaval. His tomb is watched by RWN, a robot of endless race, endless love. Some days, she will sing his praises to Pure Strain Humans who visit. 

Jan 2: By RWN's accounts, They-Are-Gone was an ever greater ruler and our own Napoleon Ursus, blessings on his name. While this is hard to fathom, the carvings she... we think she... made in the unearthed rotunda around the grave, the tomb, speak to glories unimagined. 

Jan 3: We found RWN 13 meters before the surface while building Sudilitas. She politely asked is Moureax... that is what she calls us, and Ursus' gallipots said they knew the word when the Emperor came to speak with RWN... she asked that we dig no deeper. We have heeded that request. 

Jan 4: The second lowest floor of Sudilitas is 10m below the level earth, and is the garden floor and pathways between the concentric tiers of the city. The Emperor called us 'autochthonous', our inhabitants appear to spring from the ground. The excavations that made the city form its walls. Earth is kind. 

Jan 5: The generation before us measued the space of Sudilitas and and began to dig. The earth was shifted outside, forming the illusion of the gentle hill that hides us from approach. Invisible until you crest the hill and see the defensive works of the slope into the city, and then the wall around us. 

Jan 6: Inside the city are two concentric squares of two to three story structures, built so that everywhere gets light, everywhere gets rain, with aqueducts and reservoirs to preserve the rain for the dry times for our drinking and gardens. A place of order worth protecting. Even before the lights....

Jan 7: The fulgerators of Sudilitas as legend; they are why the Emperor extended so far to protect us. The three wind turbines on the plains to our south spin day and night, driving the rebuilt ancient machines that give the city the gift of tamed lightning.