Noble Houses of the Terran Empire A realm governed by imperial lords by the grace of the Celestial, chosen through the exalted Celestial Illumina's church chapter Calhall. Each house rules according to its own devices, bound only by imperial tithe and law. The five high Noble Houses of Trantor are forever engaged in a great game for power and stern rivals at that, but in the face of an external threat have shown unbreakable unity. Ever since the Lighthouse War, the high cou

Sovereign Realms of Gondwana Celestial Glaive Palatinate - Martial Order of the Crown granted lands and tithes by Cambria and Trantor to wage unbound war against the Eternal Empire and Hegemony. Hallowed Calhall of the Church Illumina - Citadel of imperial law and records serving as Gondwana's tether to the Crown. Vulpecula Ascendant Federation - Elusive watchers and peacekeepers created by an archon clade of Cambria.

Star Systems in Gondwana are ordered by their level of development, population, and interstellar importance. On imperial and unionist charts, these orders are designated descriptively. Equivalent administrative titles do exist in most factions, but do not necessarily apply to those outside the Twin Civilization. First Order of Systems To the First Order are counted systems shaping the fortunes of many hundred worlds beyond. Their unsurpassed significance is earned with age,

The basis of human technomancy are the feral nanite progeny of von-Neumann machines. Predating even the earliest human expansion, self-replicating probes from Terra spread throughout Known Space. Countless instances of mechanical evolution produced all manner of robotic wonders, but none so often as the feral swarms with near unlimited potential. Over time, machine cities and automaton worlds grew rare, but the microscopic mechanisms remain ever-present. Wether in shimmering

The nature of space in Gondwana is commonly described in terms of planetside geography: a starscape of mountains, plains and rivers shaped by the gravity of celestial objects and phenomena. Unlike landscapes planetside, stellar geography extends in three dimensions, its features always relative to the gravitically dominant body. Capturing the starscape in all its intricacy is the ceaseless work of stellar cartographers and astronomers, filling countless libraries. Cosmic dus

Seeded by progenitors more than a hundred millennia ago, life of terran origin permeates known space. Along ancient leylines of the first expansion, verdant planetary biopsheres abound, as exotic and varied as the worlds they were planted on. Experimental efforts of splintered human strands elevated some into space, growing asteroid gardens and sun-drinking swarms. Most voidborne life is far younger, however, dating back twenty thousand years to the Witchspace War. Millennia

Gravitic phenomena are ever in motion and not always stable. From sudden quakes to bleeding rifts, all manner of eruptions of energy and exotic particles occur on the astronomical scale. Such changes to the gravitic starscape are highly disruptive and only partially predictable. Certain hotspots and recurring patterns are known dangers and follow cycles of seasons, opening and closing trading lanes in spans from days to years. But other dangers arrive with no forewarning. Und

Open Plains Space is never truly barren, especially where humans have dwelt for nigh one thousand centuries. Rogue worlds and les ser stars, wisps of ice and matter have long been by the union seeded or turned into imperial islands of civilization. In comparison to denser regions, the civilized presence on the open plains is minuscule. Even so, there remain crucial if fragile bridges between the higher worlds. Waystations and lighthouses mark navigable paths, as the apparent