Al-Dost

Al-Dost is part of the Bergunn system in Hex #0911. It has been cut off from the rest of the Sector since time immemorial, due to the Vitrine Lock. Many theorize the Lock went up some time before the Scream occurred, but any records accounting for a time frame have been lost. At the end of the summer in 3200, the Confederation of the Upright Vagrant made a breakthrough and found the key, opening the door to Al-Dost and all its treasures.

## The Legend of Al-Dost

Al-Dost was, for countless years, a planet separated from both time and the laws of the universe, a tantalizing gem unable to be seized. Clad in the scintillating shield of the Vitrine Lock, she yielded no answers as to her nature. All who visited this place did not return, in turn becoming prisoners of the Lock. All the stories of the planet within were concocted from half-truths, knowledge lost to the Scream, built up by failed attempts to shatter the Lock.

Her people, malformed by their disconnection from reality, lost their once glory and devolved into bestial caricatures of man. They have warred amongst one another under uncaring stars, the skies once open to them now uncaring to their plight, their glittering treasures buried beneath the rubble and hidden deep within the earth.

Yet someone has taken notice of these people. Now, ships emblazoned with the Vagrant main blaze through the atmosphere in halos of flame. Now, Vagrant marines march through abandoned cities, bring to heel tribes long since abandoned by the rest of humanity. Then, whenever ‘then’ was, Al-Dost must have been a place of mythos, a place of opulence and technology that would seem to men like unexplainable magic. Now, scored by ruins and malformations of the fabric of reality, it is a wasteland in recovery. Now is the time for exploration, for rediscovery, reclaiming what has been buried for so long.

And so, Al-Dost is born again, under a new flag, in a new time, with an uncertain future.

### Vitrine Devil Lock

The Vitrine Devil Lock of Al-Dost (informally referred to as the Wash) is by no means a natural affair, and has stymied the collective forces of Acheron Rho for its duration - some theorize that it came into being during the Scream. When viewed from orbit, the surface itself seems to shift and roil like water in a storm, the very curvature of the planetoid seeming to be caught in flux. Images through the Wash are blurry and distorted, never seeming to line up properly.

Until recently, attempts to land on the planet were universally thought to be impossible - once contact with the outermost layers of the optical illusion was made, sensor equipment went offline and the offending vessels ceased to exist in any identifiable quantity. Unknown to the Sector at large, some few ships managed to pass the gravitational forces and land on the world, though a return trip was never successful.

Yet, the Vagrant Fleet encountered the skeleton key to this lock in the 3 Dessau Belt - a lonely station of unknown origins arrayed with equipment that seemed to be receiving energy from the nearby black hole SQA-067-98 and had been completely abandoned. The Confederation was unable to ascertain how that energy was being turned into the impenetrable bubble of the Vitrine Lock, but it was able to learn of a sister site orbiting SQA-067-98.

Though the SQA-067-98 site was nearly invisible to conventional sensors, the Vagrant Fleet was able to use readings from the 3 Dessau site to track down its location. The team that entered into the site, despite heavy opposition by an unknown assailant, managed to take control of the station. Though not fully understanding how the two sites created the Wash, they were able to disable the field surrounding the planet of Al-Dost and continue to study the outpost and how it functioned to this day.

Whatever purpose the station fulfilled, its continued meddling with the natural laws of Al-Dost has left the planet itself anathema to baseline reality. Native Al-Dostians, who have always lived on the planet, are unable to leave as reality violently reasserts itself on any object that leaves the planet's gravity well.

#### 3 Dessau Site

Nestled and hidden amidst the detritus of the 3 Dessau asteroid belt hangs a lone station clad in forlorn metallic colors. The site was uncovered by a cataloging mission sent to the Bergunn system by the Shānite Institute of Singularity Research after a chance discovery linking rogue energy spikes coming from the station with anomalous readings the Institute had long been researching from the SQA-067-98 black hole.

Neither look nor make of the station give any indication of its age, and its architect and intended purpose remain similarly mysterious. Its constituent materials offer no indicators, even when subjected to radio-isotope related studies. This does not mean the station is not distinct, however - from its hull, various unidentifiable instruments and devices are extended on gantry arms like the corpse of some dead arachnid beast, reaching with its last vestiges of life towards the lonely world of Al-Dost on the metaphorical horizon.

Initial exploration of the facility revealed that it drew an intense amount of power from seemingly nowhere, as if its energy was being supplied by some remote method, however unlikely such a conclusion might have seemed. A cross-comparison of the energy signatures revealed an unmistakable similarity to black-body radiation emitted by black holes, matching the readings from the Shānite Institute.

Armed with this knowledge, previous information garnered from the station that had eluded translation began to make sense as the coordinates for a location orbiting a black hole. Knowing that SQA-067-98 was the closest of any such astral bodies via spike travel, a secondary expedition was financed with great haste to unravel the orbital mystery to its conclusion.

#### SQA-067-98 Site

Much to the delight of the Shānite Institute collegiate staff, the sister site of the 3 Dessau station was discovered with relative ease once her particular energy signatures were deduced. However, even with the coordinates obtained from the 3 Dessau site, and knowing the energy signature they were looking for, the expedition was unable to properly assess their prize. The material of the station proved to be unusually resistant to ship-mounted sensor arrays, and when observed with the naked eye, the particular angles and layout of the station induced a sense of unease in their oddity and configuration.

Faced with these barriers, an away team was armed and deployed to the SQA-067-98 site in order to manually assess its functions and take note of its workings. Some unfortunate event must have occurred during the course of the expedition, for a detonation within the station jettisoned large amounts of debris into orbit around the SQA singularity, and the site began to emit excessive and lethal amounts of radiation, which served to not only tear at the genetic code of those assembled, but also warp the very fabric of reality in proximity, causing horrific and unexplainable afflictions among the expedition crew.

Faced with a rapidly increasing exclusion zone, Captain Indro Rorgan called in favors owed, bringing in the Confederation of the Upright Vagrant who promptly seized control of the situation. A secondary away team was dispatched to rectify the errors of their predecessors and terminate the exclusion zone's origin, by whatever means deemed necessary. A secondary objective was to uncover what had gone wrong in the first away mission.

This goal was accomplished by unknown methods, the second team fixing the mistakes of the first and subsequently vanishing. Institute teams soon began to cleanse and pour over the site for information and retrieval of valuable technological articles. Despite their thoroughness, neither away team was recovered in any measurable quantity.

During their investigations, a method of shunting power away from the 3 Dessau facility was established, however rudimentary, and implemented. With this, the Vitrine Lock of Al-Dost was disabled, falling away from the planet like a sheen of water from a stone. As to where the immeasurable amounts of black-body radiation and power from the SQA site are being redirected to, no one can say.

#### Timeline 1st & 2nd Expeditions

**To Be Done: Detail what happened on the expeditions to 3 Dessau and SQA-067-98**

#### Jon Tallarch

Raised from a young age among the Guardian branch of the High Church, Jon Tallarch was a gifted physicist who also specialized in metadimensional research, which indirectly brought him into contact with psionic fields of study. This specialization earned Tallarch a spot on the development team of Project ARGO, further advancing his prestige and expertise in metadimensional fields and their interaction with baseline reality. This rare knowledge, combined with a relatively well-off position among the ecclesiastical hierarchy, put Tallarch in the front rank of those considered to work at the Vitrine Lock of Al-Dost.

Transferred to the custody of the Fleet in a blindfold, Tallarch remained enthusiastic about being able to work with Al-Dost’s unique temporal and spatial properties. Even though he was not the mind to open the Lock, he managed, over the course of just a few months, to develop several strains of thought as to the exploitation and usage of the unique circumstances of Al-Dost for technological advancement. Chief among his inventions was the theory of the Tallarch Effect, the codification of the methods by which an offworlder could visit and depart Al-Dost while maintaining a tether to baseline reality.

Despite his genius, his extremely promising future as a developmental scientist, and his acclimation to the Fleet, Tallarch was found dead in his study on the night of the coronation of the Tenth Emperox. Emergency personnel immediately determined it to be a suicide - the still warm thermal pistol and the state of Tallarch’s cranium left no doubt. Scattered on his desk were his various diagrams and manuscripts, topped with a single letter that reads as follows:

They know that I know
Catch me if you can

## Physical Features

### Surface Conditions

The tenuous nature of physical laws on Al-Dost leaves the body exposed to various unnatural effects, and technology begins to operate under warped parameters due to what has been dubbed the Reality Plague. It is immediately noticeable upon landing, as the planet is barren of most life. Wandering areas of massless gravitational force creep across open plains, crushing anything they come in contact with. Rivers of space where time flows in odd and confusing patterns, in certain valleys and vales, sometimes at a snail's pace or several times faster than regular (though never in reverse). In some spaces that have come to be referred to as "Burn Zones," it is especially bad - webs of coruscating energy hanging freely in the air, like some cursed aurora borealis, vaporizing flesh and steel alike.

Natives of the planet are drastically affected by these warpings due to their sustained presence and continuous exposure to the planet's shifts - offworlders experience significantly less danger from these reality shifts due to a poorly-understood principle commonly referred to as the "Tallarch Effect." The natives, without any such protections, are forced to flee in the face of strange energies they cannot hope to comprehend. Devices that might have once been able to assert authority over reality sputtered and died long ago in the rubble of once-great cities, leaving the Al-Dostians to become nomadic in nature, scampering away from the burn zones as they encroach on once clean land like a virus. In this way, the planet maintains a constant flux in which nothing remained settled or stable for long. That is, until vessels bearing the Vagrant main appeared on the horizon.

The "Tallarch Effect," in layman's terms, causes the dimensional signature of an individual to be anchored against exposure to other non-baseline realities through exposure to metadimensional energies, commonly experienced during spike drive-enabled travel. Thus, the merest act of travelling between two systems essentially "vaccinates" an individual against the Reality Plague of Al-Dost, allowing them to land on, operate upon, and leave the planet with very minor side effects. However, long-term exposure to the shifting realities of the gravity well will still have an effect on offworlders, both physical and mental. As to whether a child birthed by an offworlder within the gravity well would inherit the dimensional "vaccination" is an unknown quantity as of yet.

### Divergent Reality Integrity Phenomenon

```
Omicron-Type Reality Misconfiguration

```

The D.R.I.P, referred to by the layman as a 'reality plague,' is the overarching term for the anomalous and unusual effects that plague Al-Dost due to its separation from the baseline reality of Acheron Rho. There are two primary 'levels' on which the D.R.I.P can be experienced by individuals within the gravity well of the planet.

The more prominent of these are the enigmatic burn zones, areas in which anomalies can freely manifest and de-manifest without a standardized pattern. Such anomalies are often inimically opposed to organics stemming from the baseline reality, similar to the interaction of matter and antimatter, in a rough sense.

The secondary, less-noticed level of the D.R.I.P is the 'toxicity' that affects any and all organics within the gravity well. While offworlders can be changed and affected by this toxicity, they are able to leave the planet after exposure, due to the pervasive Tallarch Effect, and resume their lives in baseline reality, though they will most likely be 'changed' for the rest of their lives, on some base level.

However, the natives of Al-Dost have no such protection, and have seemingly lost their tether to the baseline. Upon their departure from the gravity well, their severe misconfiguration is unable to reconcile with the immutable laws of the universe, and they are subsequently annihilated by the powers that be. As to why the D.R.I.P's 'toxicity' only affects organic creatures is a question best left for the scholars.

#### Radiation Emissions

```
Alpha-Type Reality Misconfiguration

```

While radiation in of itself is not an uncommon danger, especially in the life of a spacer, the radiological emissions detected within burn zones all across Al-Dost are cast out with no apparent source. The emission patterns, concurrently, have no seeming predictability, rapidly increasing and fading with no rhyme or reason. An explorer can be safe for one moment, and be subjected to the full force of a nuclear meltdown in the next.

Researchers have concluded that this radiation is a byproduct of the warping of reality on the planetary surface, and the greater the baseline distortion is, the more extreme the radiological effects will be. This proves to be the limiting factor in most burn zone expeditions - when handling the far more extreme misconfigurations of the reality plague, sudden blasts of radiation tend to leave most would-be treasure hunters cooked in their own clothes, a few deaths more to the silent killer of the zones.

#### Mobile Gravitational Forces - "Wanderers"

```
Gamma-Type Reality Misconfiguration

```

## Wanderer Early-Warning Detection

Some cunning treasure hunters have developed a method by which they can operate in relative peace and not be caught unawares by a Wanderer. Such hunters cordon off the area in which they work with a suitably long string or ribbon, tied off to various posts so as to be suspended off the ground. If the string is suddenly drawn into a Wanderer or repulsed with force, the hunter will then be aware of the Wanderer, its relative location, and its general trajectory, leaving them able to beat a hasty retreat and live to tell the tale.

While trekking across blasted plains or rummaging through scattered ruins, the keen explorer may notice a stone shift without wind, or recognize smooth, winding furrows dug into the soil, as if some great serpent had passed by. These are the telltale signs of a 'Wanderer' - a localized gravitational force that is projected without a concurrently dense material body at the center of said force.

These forces also possess no ambient attraction, and they only pull in matter once it crosses a specified threshold. This lack of mass and ambient attraction render Wanderers entirely invisible to most forms of detection until they encounter matter, at which point one of two outcomes is produced. in some cases, the mass is drawn violently  into the center of the Wanderer under the effect of what is seemingly several thousand g's.

The matter is most usually compressed as tightly as possible and held suspended in the center of the force - the effect on the human body and its fluids is, to say the least, extremely disconcerting. The alternate outcome of the encounter with matter is that said matter will find itself unable to enter the range of the force and thus be repulsed. If an individual is merely standing in the force's path, they will be shunted aside.

If they are trapped against a wall or other such obstruction, they will be swiftly be crushed to death. Instances have been recorded in which Wanderers move with differing speeds, drastically increasing their lethality. Such forces can disable even armored vehicles at such speeds, either tossing them aside like ragdolls or crushing them into scrap metal.

#### Time Dilation Regions

```
Zeta-Type Reality Misconfigurations

```

Even the fourth dimension is beholden to the Vitrine Lock and its poison. Within the burn zones, some areas might experience their flow of time in a markedly different manner to their surroundings. It must be noted that such regions will never experience time in reverse due to some cosmic feint, so explorers may rest easy that they will not be transformed into babes by a power they will never see.

These zones are far less surprising to the practiced eye than a Wanderer - the space thus affected seems to be viewed through a certain haze, almost akin to the refraction caused by the air emanating from a hot surface. Though time always moves forwards in these regions, it can do so either with great rapidity or in a sedated manner. One might be strolling through a burn zone and suddenly advance ahead a great distance from where they once were as they pass through a region of accelerated time. Likewise, an object tossed into a region of sedated time might take several minutes to reach the ground, as it ponderously falls through the air.

While the potential application of these zones might herald great advancements in chronic manipulation, the dangers they present are far more tangible. Many cautionary tales revolve around the story of the Clock Breakers, a team of researchers devoted to try and manipulate such an anomaly. Unfortunately, they found themselves trapped within a rather extreme 'slow spot' and have not yet escaped their imprisonment. Over the course of three months, they travelled, at most, about five paces at what seems to be a full sprint. Many callous bar patrons joke that they'll likely outlive even the executives of The Trilliant Ring, though their makeshift immortality seems to be more of a personal hell than anything else.

#### Open-Air Plasma Storms

```
Omega-Type Reality Misconfiguration

```

There is no anomaly more iconic or feared than the plasma storm, roving across the burn zones like a vengeful god of scintillating colors and wanton destruction. While normally, plasma would not be able to manifest and maintain its shape in an open atmosphere, the storms defy the bounds of logic, much to the chagrin of several deceased explorers. These storms have an unfortunate tendency to annihilate anything in their path, liquefying steel with extreme heat and ionizing flesh in but an instant.

Those who have survived these acts of God have testified to the earth quaking beneath them and the sky glowing like an empowered aurora borealis. Some meteorologists have claimed that these storms move in odd patterns, seeming to chase down intruders in the burn zones. Furthermore, these storms seemingly never dissipate, and tend to congregate in the same areas time and time again. As to what might be found in such a metaphorical dragon's lair, what secrets such an inhospitable climate might possess - none can say for certain.

The most daring adventurers, those whose bar tabs are paid in advance with the grand stories they tell, speak of cities, surviving within the storms. Cities clad in liquid light, repelling the lightning and burning plasma like chaff. Cities persisting amidst the roiling waves, like a gem, polished to perfection by the violence of nature. These shells of a once great civilization stand proud like shining pillars preserved for eternity like flies in amber, forbidden to mortal men, and hidden away from their gaze.

### Al-Dostian Landscape

Al-Dost is a planetoid dominated by the tundra, with short, tough grasses crawling through valleys and over hills to scratch at the feet of imposing mountain ranges. Though temperatures might be regarded as rather cold to those more suited to core world climates, the chill is by no means forbidding, and can easily be circumnavigated by a few thick coats.

With an atmosphere breathable by humans, little else in needed in ways of protection against the weather, unless one were to venture to the expectedly frigid poles of the planet. Temperatures progress into more tolerable warmth near the equatorial regions of the planet, where an explorer might find the presence of bogs and other such wetlands, perfect cauldrons for the progression of life.

Yet, the organisms of the planet have been changed from their stay without the tether of natural laws, and it is universally agreed between biologists that the current ecological situation of Al-Dost is by no means similar to its original state. These new, unusual flora and fauna span across four predominant landmasses adrift in the planet's saltwater oceans, though even such grand events as tectonic shifts may have been influenced by the Vitrine Lock.

#### Albaldah

The largest of the continents of Al-Dost is that of Albaldah, notable for its rugged, stony coastlines, roiling surf, and an abundance of abandoned facilities left buried deep in the hearts of mountains and stone. Albaldah is sometimes referred to as the 'Continent of Clocks' due to the wending nature of time among its many valleys and jagged beaches. As to whether this is an actual abundance, or more instances have been proven on this continent than anywhere else, none can say.

Adhara

The second largest of the continents is Adhara, a place of rolling hills and multicolored grasses that scintillate in strong winds. No obvious origin for these winds have been established, as the weather patterns seem to have adopted a spontaneous nature in their manifestation - for this, Adhara is the 'Continent of Storms.' Sweeping gusts and lightning plague the open fields of this land, the bane of explorers and prospectors looking to stay dry and safe in their ramshackle tent settlements, even as they quest for old outposts that are nearly overtaken by the grasses and flora.

#### Alnitak

The last of the continents proper is Alnitak, more polar in its inclination and terrain. Snowfall obscures ancient artifacts under a blanket of white, while hunters track native tribes across the snow-covered plains that are customary of the 'Continent of Frost.' The ice under one's feet refracts colors in a fashion that dizzies the senses, causing intense nausea as the brain struggles to comprehend the patterns it witnesses in the frozen light, while plasma storms charge across the landscape alongside arctic winds, flash melting great drifts of ice on their temperamental paths.

## The Quartz Road

Connecting the island of Aldebaran and the continent of Albaldah, the Quartz Road is a large conglomeration of silt, stone, and sand that has been built up into some odd mixture of reef and sandbar, plated on the surface with a sheet of thick ice. The origin of this dredged-up construct is undeterminable, yet its direction and design are far too direct to be considered a totally natural artifice. The Road has proven to be an immensely vexing point of contention for Vagrant forces, as enraged aquatic humanoids from Aldebaran charge across the icy path with aggressive regularity, forcing a garrison to be established at the mainland end of this bridge, lest the 'fishmen' be allowed to gain a foothold beyond their island hold.

The island of Aldebaran is, in the words of one marine, 'a hell man was never meant to set foot on.' Though it stands as the fourth largest landmass on the surface of Al-Dost, the 'Fish Isle' remains, as a whole, among the deadliest places for offworlders to explore, despite its innocuous name. The presence of a gargantuan amount of aquatic humanoid creatures, both on and around the isle, makes the prospect of settling the area a distant possibility, at best.

It is estimated by the Confederation that a fourth of the planet's total native population resides in the waters surrounding Aldebaran, a legion of millions upon millions that cannot through “conventional means” be destroyed, due to the warped reality of Al-Dost. As for now, a mass quarantine has been established around Aldebaran, as infiltration teams attempt to find the last of the mythical Nine Cities that might still survive deep in the island's interior, or beneath the waves that crash into her shoreline. Until such repositories of pretech are found, no good reason can justify assaulting such a dangerous locale.

### Al-Dostian Oceans, Seas, & Rivers

#### Silver Channels

Faced with an impending campaign against the aquatic denizens of Al-Dost, many freelancer engineers, architects, and demolition experts have been brought to the Bergunn system in order to construct a solution to the plague that lies beneath the waves. Their efforts have culminated in the Silver Channels, a system of coastal forts, entrenchments, and artificial rivers that span the large continent of Albaldah. Natural waterways have had their muddy banks replaced by concrete walls and motion sensors, leaving any foe who has swam upstream a ten-foot wall of sheer concrete to scale, even as security forces are dispatched to drive them off.

Ferocious fishmen are unlikely to ever get that far anyhow, as coils of razor-sharp monowire hang taut just beneath the surface, capable of slicing through flesh and bone.The mouths and deltas of rivers have been girded with bunker systems, their guns pointed out towards the waves, awaiting the first sonorous ping of deployed sonar buoy arrays. Webs of mines and other such underwater explosives are scattered off the coasts, ever awaiting an unwary creature to blow to smithereens.

Yet the Silver Channels are not only a militaristic application. These new paths blasted out of the terrain allow prospectors and explorers to easily move between sites of salvage without having to risk overland travel. Furthermore, they can gather larger amounts of pretech and bring it right to orbital landing pads in a far more efficient transportation system than overstuffed rucksacks and backs aching from their precious cargo. These imposing veins of plasteel and concrete, slammed into the earth and stone, keep traders and prospectors assured that they only ever have to worry about terrestrial threats, rather than fearing any aquatic hordes.

#### The Creche River Valley

Early in the Al-Dost incursion, Vagrant prospectors came across a hidden watershed of two rivers, in the crux of which rested the ruins of a rather major city of Al-Dost's past, the entire area ringed by steep escarpment walls. Known now as The Creche, this area seems perfect for the development of civilization, a natural source of water and open land, protected by the nearby geography. Such an ideal location is reminiscent of the fertile lands in which mankind took its first steps into the establishment of societies, yet something is off-putting about this realm on another world.

No wind blows in The Creche, even when clouds pass by overhead. Grasses grow alongside the riverbanks, yet no creatures swim in the water or prowl alongside the cliffs. Not a single trace of any Al-Dostian tribe has been found in the valley, despite the near-perfect conditions. Ever since such discoveries were brought to light, prospectors have avoided the area like the plague, despite the presence of ruins within and a seeming lack of any tangible danger.

## Al-Dostian Biosphere

Whereas the theories of evolution have long since proven to be the measure and method by which life advances, Al-Dost has bucked the yoke of conventional theory. The wildlife of the planet are, in many cases, poorly adapted to their environments, such as boasting vibrant colors instead of natural camouflage, as a rather timid example. Animals wander across the tundra with too many limbs, malformed skeletons, or even organs that have no discernible function, the D.R.I.P twists any biological form under its influence, almost like a child seeing how far they can push a toy before it bends or breaks.

### Flora

#### Jewel Fruit

In the warmer equatorial regions of Al-Dost, one might find fruit of a most odd variety growing from seemingly normal trees. These fruits seem to bear a great resemblance to the common orange, save for the fact their outer layer is in fact a composite crystalline shell. This angular shell refracts incoming light into various rainbow hues, allowing them to be seen from a great distance by a hungry explorer. The ‘skin’ of the fruit itself is extremely durable, often resistant to ballistic assault, and is usually cracked open through significant use of concussive force, such as a sledgehammer. Once the crystal protection is removed, the flesh of the fruit within is rather delectable, a fragile candied gummy that is quite often damaged from the efforts to reach the inner layers. One should avoid these refracting groves during storms and periods of high winds, since the durable fruit can cause serious injury when they strike one’s flesh at high speeds.

#### Prospector's Beans

Taking root in the hardy tundra soil of the farther planetary reaches, a most interesting tuber has been discovered by starving prospectors. These underground plants seem to ‘reproduce’ through the onset of cancerous growths within the organism itself, which slowly gestate and expand into fully fledged tuber crops of their own. Attempts to classify such plants into different species is a virtual impossibility, due to the fact they all possess wildly different qualities and traits, save for their subterranean growth patterns and their tumorous methods of reproduction. The growths and plant itself can be consumed for a nutrient rich, if not rather bland, meal, though the human body lacks many of the enzymes to properly process the vegetation, making the act of consumption a rather unpleasant experience, in the end.

#### Snake Grass

While trudging through fields or over foothills, an explorer should not be all too surprised if something shifts underfoot. This is most likely a band of snake grass, a rampant herb that is often utilized as an anesthetic in field hospitals running low on supplies. When the strand itself is twisted, much like a wrung-out wet towel, it releases a multicolored liquid that effectively nullifies the pain response in the human brain once injected or ingested. Yet this is not the primary anomaly attributed to snake grass. These seemingly simplistic vegetation samples are also capable of ambulation, slithering along the ground in large groups, much like their namesake. Despite not possessing a nervous system, snake grasses seem to possess a migratory pattern, moving between specific locations on some endless quest for nutrients.

Some biological theorists claim the grasses actually predict the spread of the burn zones, fleeing before them like rats departing a sinking vessel. Sadly, such a theory is hard to prove, as the boundaries of a burn zone can’t be properly measured. The grass itself is harmless enough, yet a few far-ranging prospectors have been accidentally slain by large roving bands of snake grass while they slept, asphyxiated and crushed under thousands upon thousands of individual blades of grass.

#### Eyebite

Alongside the rivers of Al-Dost lies a plant that most closely resembles a stinging nettle. The excretions of these plants prove to be an irritant to exposed skin, yet they have a far more interesting effect when consumed. A baseline individual imbibing the excretion will merely remark that is tasteless, yet it stings the throat and sinuses. Yet when an individual inflicted by MES consumes the excretion, their body undergoes a rapid change, most notably a detonation of the ocular organs and severe damage to the brain and cerebral tissue. Such injuries are further complicated by the fragmentation of the skull by the detonation, which distributes bone splinters throughout the cranium.

Known as ‘eyebite’ for its effects on the ocular organs, this potent poison, though extremely effective, is by no means a surefire tool of assassination. The nettle itself is extremely rare, often indistinguishable from its neighboring vegetation. The excretion itself, once removed from the nettle, seems to possess a sort of ‘half-life’ that causes it to degrade over a relatively short period of time. And the methods by which the excretion is properly derived without dilution are rather difficult and can only be properly executed in well-equipped laboratories or facilities of that caliber. The cause of this effect is hypothesized to be the coalescence of energies from the D.R.I.P in the excretions of the nettle plant. Seeing as how metadimensional energies and the D.R.I.P interfere with one another, and psychics are products of metadimensional energies, the reaction between the two bears the chance of being extremely violent.

### Fauna

#### Pygmy Satyr

Wandering the steppes of Al-Dost is a most unusual creature that befuddles the mind and the conception of animals as a whole, despite its relatively calm temperament. This creature is the pygmy satyr, a creature that bears a great deal of resemblance to a typical goat, save for the fact it moves about in a bipedal fashion. Its gait, combined with a set of four limbs, is similar to that of a simple primate, loping about with its ‘knuckles’ to the ground, while fully able to stand on its hind hooves and move without its forward set of limbs.

Such increased locomotion is a boon to the pygmy satyr, seeing as how their primary diet are roving snake grasses and other such tough vegetation, encouraging an odd ‘endurance herbivore’ species, as it chases its plant prey across fields and hills. Many cases have been reported of marines terminating pygmy satyrs under the pretense they were native Al-Dostians, though in truth the pygmy satyr bears no genetic similarity. While they might not be as deadly as the native peoples, the pygmy satyr can still mete out grievous wounds with its horns and long, stocky forearms when threatened.

#### Cockatrice

One of the creatures of Al-Dost commonly attracted to offworlder encampments is the rather vexing scaled gull, also known to many as the cockatrice. Scavengers with an omnivorous diet, it is presumed that the scaled gull has hid in the shadows of Al-Dostian tribal villages for many generations, consuming their scraps and leftover meals. The gull itself consists of a long reptilian body, much like that of an iguana, with a razor sharp beak attached to a scaled bird’s head, accompanied by a set of leathery wings at its sides. The scaled gull is not capable of sustained flight, yet they are able to glide down and steal one’s meal if they leap from a high vantage point.

Though they are a most annoying creature, the gull is particularly useful in that they collect shiny objects for their nests, weaving their glittering trophies in between sticks and grass. This obsession makes them particularly useful as involuntary scouts for prospectors looking to find salvage among rubble and rocks, though they most often search out a shiny piece of glass or wire instead of some piece of pretech circuitry. Nevertheless, scaled gulls are sold, caged and tagged, to prospectors from near and far, looking for any possible edge over their competition.

#### Shiftclaw

Stalking small creatures and birds of prey amongst the tundra is the shiftclaw, a feline predator capable of disguising itself from any larger beasts. The shiftclaw’s defensive measures are rather similar to that of the chameleon in that it ‘shifts’ to match its immediate environment, yet unlike the chameleon, the shiftclaw changes more than just its coloration. When pursued in a mountainous environment with little vegetation, the skin of the shiftclaw might take on a quality more akin to rock, becoming dull in color, hard and brittle to the touch. If cornered against a body of water, the shiftclaw might develop, in a relatively short amount of time, webbing in between its claws and a rudimentary gill system.

It seems as if the shiftclaw, most likely by accident, is able to exploit the ‘toxicity’ of the D.R.I.P to its favor - there is no conclusion as to how this is accomplished. Such rapid adaptive traits make the shiftclaw extremely hard to find, much less catch, and the few exceptions whose elusiveness does not avail them are kept close to the chest among private collectors. However, as with most of the planet’s native life, these creatures are unable to leave the planet’s gravity well, despite the value they would surely possess in the sector beyond.

#### Red Angel

Hovering among the bogs and wetlands like some will o’ the wisp, the red angel is a translucent creature analogous to an aquatic jellyfish, hovering above the ground by a few meters at most. The angel earns its name from the contents of its see-through body - a core of burning, raging plasma that roils and lashes out like a temperamental beast. This plasmatic core seems to be the primary method by which the angel assaults its prey, casting directed bolts of plasma with which it burns unfortunate creatures caught in its path. These creatures are extremely territorial, assaulting explorers as often as their regular prey, though the red angel consumes most organics it comes across, dragging them into its burning center with its long, sinuous tentacles.

## Al-Dostian Native Populace

In a word, the native population of Al-Dost is un-human. This is not a matter of theological debate, as a priest is particularly long-winded on such affairs, yet the very biology and chemistry of the Al-Dostian exemplifies them as an exception to the baseline homo sapiens. The easiest method of classification is thusly derived from their most common monikers - the ‘beastman,’ the ‘mutant,’ the ‘man-imal.’ The natives seemingly share many traits with more bestial species of the kingdom animalia.

Furthermore, these bodily changes seem to be the byproduct of a forced genetic shift rather than an evolutionary progression, seeing as how the natural features of the Al-Dostian hinder them more often than help them in their day-to-day lives. Chief among the mutations cataloged by the Vagrant marine are extended canine teeth, thin coatings of natural materials (such as fur or scales), rearrangement of the internal organs in a nonstandard pattern, and a misshapen quadrupedal stance.

#### Additional Physical Traits

Al-Dostians are also bestowed with an anomalous skull structure that suggests their cerebral matter, on the whole, was once far more developed and evolved across the entire populace. This evolutionary regression only lends further credence to the theory that the biological circumstance of the Al-Dostian is not one crafted by the tools of Mother Nature.

Yet despite their intellectual ‘step down,’ the Al-Dost populace still retain a basic sapience, reasoning capabilities, and rudimentary social intelligence. Concurrently, most of the population finds itself in a mimicry of the earliest developmental stages of human civilization, spanning from stone tools analogous indicative of the Neolithic periods to basic metal forging and blades tools that hint of the Bronze Age, long past.

#### Mental Aptitude

This developmental track, nonetheless, is faced with a major fluctuation, in that the Al-Dostian is not capable of recognizing the significance of postech and pretech devices. There appears to be some form of mental block to these devices, after extensive tests have been performed with test subjects. While simple plug and play devices such as a grenade are seen as useful tools to the native population, a sheer rifle is just as likely to remain used as a heavy club, even after having its destructive capabilities unveiled.

This is at odds with the planetary culture of scrap-hoarding and looting from the ancient cities. While unable to grasp the utility of such incredible technology, the native population is nevertheless quite astute at picking and choosing among the most useful salvaged pieces. This remains an unexplained mystery.

#### Societies

The dominant social structure of Al-Dost is that of the tribal unit, encouraged by a culturally fragmented populace and a deficit of advanced communication and transportation techniques. For all such tribes, the names they bear are those given to them by the Vagrant marine, seeing as how the language patterns of the natives are incomprehensible to the average human. Listed below are the four largest tribal confederations and conglomerates found on and below the planetary surface. These tribes are able to exert relatively major stores of wealth and pretech salvage on their neighbors. Such salvage is often the cornerstone of inter-native conquests and campaigns, given its propensity for immense destructive power in able hands, whether wrong or right.

#### Throwbacks

Among the vastly mutated and unpredictable genetic stock of the Al-Dostian populace, there are still vestigial traces of a more humanoid past. Such traces manifest themselves as ‘doppelgängers,’ native Al-Dostians who are capable of passing off as an average human with a passing glance. Only a few of such creatures have been discovered among the many millions of Al-Dostians encountered thus far by the forward elements of the incursion. In many cases, the doppelgänger might even be mistaken for as a regular human and not slain due to their bipedal nature confusing marines accustomed to a quadrupedal or physically misshapen foe. Upon closer inspection, signs of D.R.I.P mutation reveal themselves, such as extended and sharpened digits, oversized canine teeth, or irregular growths of body fur. Though these specimens possess the same technological inhibitions of their fellows, they have been deemed as an extreme threat by incursion forces due to the ease with which they can infiltrate human settlements. Whispers ricochet between dive bars and barracks about ‘Project Dancer,’ a mysterious initiative that supposedly tracks and captures the doppelgängers that have managed to enter into settlements and encampments, so as to study the original genomes of the Al-Dostian peoples.

### Notable Tribes

#### The Stone Circles

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Anthropological Notes: Luddites, Near Renaissance, Multi-Genotype Society, Expansionists

```

Largest among the people of Al-Dost, the Stone Circles are a loose coalition of various tribes that collate and gather amongst the steep mountain ranges and cragged vales of Adhara. By virtue of being a grouping of separate tribal units, Al-Dostians of all forms can be found amidst the mines and secluded encampments of the boreal tracts - greater numbers mean greater security, after all. The region the Stone Circles have staked out as their own territory interestingly shows a distinct lack of salvage sites and urban ruins, and is in fact as far away from the nearest of the Nine Cities as possible on the continent. This has forced the Stone Circles to instead seek progress through more traditional methods, and as such they boast the primary Iron Age-analogous culture of the entire native populations, being able to craft iron blades and implements of middling quality.

Such reliance on basic metallurgy and rudimentary gathering practices seems borne of a strict taboo on the treasured relics of the planet's past, forcing the Circles' tribes into a 'Luddite' way of life. This refusal to approach anything of postech or pretech nature has allowed several smaller tribes to erect boundary perimeters around their own tribal lands of various salvaged goods from ruins, allowing them to stave off the encroachment of the Stone Circles and contain them somewhat within their mountain ranges. Though at first the prospect of removing the Stone Circles from the mountainous terrain seemed to be a daunting one, the Confederation's frontline - with access to nuclear fusion warheads designed for orbital mining - brought into practice a strategy known as 'tactical mountain removal.' Various tribal villages were crushed under explosive avalanches, the ore mines of the Stone Circles were caved in, and the valleys in which they took refuge became little more than seams of rubble, detritus, and ash.

### The Long Scales

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Anthropological Notes: Poisonous Lizardmen, Mono-Genotype Society, Stone Age, Xenophobic

```

Even in the wetlands of Al-Dost, temperatures are not high enough to produce any proper swamps. Instead, the peat bogs hugging close to the planet's rivers hold their own unique terror, hiding amidst the tall grasses. These are the people of the Long Scales, their ranks almost exclusively derived from scaled variants of the Al-Dostian people, who have discovered that their quasi-reptilian nature acts in their favor amidst the mud and vegetation of the riverbanks.

Though the tribe itself is relatively small, many Vagrant marines have sworn off of operating within the ominous marshes. The penchant of the Long Scales to coat their blades with devastating venoms and lethal toxins means that even a minor flesh wound can result in rapid death, far away from any sufficient medical assistance. This fear extends to other native tribes, who avoid the fog-wreathed quagmires like a plague in their endless migrations from the encroaching burn zones.

Due to the intense territoriality of the natives present and the lack of valuable resources or salvage within the stretches of marshland, the Confederation instead bombed the villages of the Long Scales not hidden from prying eyes, burning out the reptilian rogues with flame and shell alike.

Tentative plans to dredge up the ancestral lands of the Scales with elaborate systems of dams and trenches have been drafted up several times, yet the protection necessary for the work crews and the rabid hostility of the natives present has put such projects on hold until something of actual value is discovered within the bogs - or until the marines finally have enough of screeching lizardfolk assaulting the often undermanned and under supplied perimeter garrisons that encircle their forbidding fen homelands.

### The Chalks

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Anthropological Notes: Morlocks, Multi-Genotype Society, Isolationists

```

## Spectres

The threat of the underground tribes have proven to be unique enough that the Fleet has contracted several soldiers of fortune from the nocturnal swamps of Teuthem to fight in the pitch black of the cave systems. Known under the moniker of ‘Spectres,’ these rangers clad themselves in black and forge ahead into underground grottos on an endless hunt for their not-quite-human prey. They arm themselves with spike throwers, their lethality amplified in the enclosed caverns, and bring with them the lightspitters of Teuthem, their canine bodies tearing into ‘Chalkies’ with tooth and claw, even as they cast beams of energy from their glowing maws. Yet even though their tunnels are collapsed and their homes brought down, many marines keep an eye to the ground below, wondering as to how extensive such hypogeal threats might remain.

In the later days of the Al-Dost incursion, many bands of natives were driven into wending cave systems and burrows hidden amongst the rock terrain of the planetary surface. Marines sent to neutralize these latent threats were instead greeted with an unexpected sight - their quarry, butchered wholesale and partially consumed.

These were but the first encounters Vagrant forces had with the subterranean tribes known simply as ‘Chalkies,’ due to their stark pale skin. Attempts to formally classify the underground tribes have proven fruitless due to the lack of distinction between the populations within the cave systems. Most of these natives boast sharpened natural weapons of the limbs and mouth, alongside an abundance of photoreceptors within their ocular organs. The ‘Chalkies’ also exhibit a universal and overriding sense of heliophobia, most likely a byproduct of their lack of exposure to direct solar elements throughout their entire lives.

Combating and neutralizing these buried threats has proved to be unusually challenging for marine forces, resulting from a lack of knowledge about the layout of the subterranean networks and an inability to exploit many technological advantages such as armored support or orbital cover. In most cases, engagements with the ‘Chalkies’ are rearguard actions, detonating open entrances into their cave systems and flooding their tunnels with radioactive area-of-denial devices and flame. Many marines have discovered that due to their increased sensitivity of the eyes, employing bright, strobing lights against ‘Chalkies’ is a proven and cost-effective tactic in case one is overwhelmed or cut off from their unit.

### The Azaesians

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Anthropological Notes: Traders, Urbanites, Iron Age, Multi-Genotype Society

```

Upon initially landing on the planetary surface, Vagrant marines were greeted by a tribe of Al-Dostians who were seemingly open to conversation, though they could not understand one another. These natives were endowed with various pieces of pretech salvage and scrap which they traded to the marines present in exchange for postech explosives. Though they were the first to feel the hammer blow of the gathered marine, these peoples were amiable enough before being provoked. These natives were but a few members of the Azaesians, named as such for their primary residence in the ruins outside of the city of Azaes.

The Azaesian tribes are known for their gathered troves of pretech weaponry and devices, possessing great vaults carved into the earth, filled with veritable relics from an age long past. With their antiquated wealth, the Azaesians purportedly traded with bordering tribes, exchanging grenades and other simple explosive devices for foodstuffs and the like. These hoards of archaic technologies also made them exceptionally resistant to the onset of the Al-Dost incursion, throwing marines through the air like armored dolls and sapping the power from their weapons. It is immensely fortunate that the manifold Azaesians were unable to utilize, much less understand their entire hoarded arsenal, else the incursion might’ve ground to a halt at their doorstep.

However, these treasure vaults made them the foremost target of the Fleet, and they were crushed within the first month of the incursion, the rubble of Azaes being bombed into yet more rubble and their corpses strewn throughout the streets. To the great fortune of the Vagrant forces, it seems as if the Azaesians did not realize that their gathered pretech was the reason for their annihilation, and instead likely presumed that they were being invaded for their lands and control over Azaes, seeing as how the invaders were already equipped with all manner of postech weaponry.

Thusly, most of the standing structures still left in the city were torn down, save for the haunting towers of the ‘Skyline’ districts - towers scratching at the sky, now inhabited by little else besides ghosts and lost memories, their Hardlight constructs a monument to a bygone Age and what had been lost. The pretech vaults beneath Azaes remained ripe for plunder, a dragon’s cache of treasure and chrome, and more than enough with which the Fleet could begin making pretech of their own.

## War of Conquest

Though engaging a technologically deficient foe with a well trained military force, the Al-Dost incursion was not the rapid campaign of devastation proposed by many Fleet captains. A solid foothold was established and fortified on the planetary surface within a few months, but the pacification of Al-Dost is far from over. Even now with the Vagrant presence fully established across the planet, gunfire still echoes in the mountain passes and isolated territories;  a constant reminder that man's best laid plans rarely come to fruition.

The leaders of the Vagrant Fleet chose to forgo simply initiating a planet-scale bombing campaign and "letting God sort them out" primarily due to the presence of vast stores of pretech artifacts and technological data, relics of the planet's Golden Age. Even aided by postech targeting systems and unhindered by modern countermeasures to orbital bombardment, such tactics were deemed to be too dangerous to the accounted for troves of advanced machinery.

Disregarding the potential collateral damage, the nature of the enemy and the planet itself conspired to limit large-scale engagements and prolong the advance of the Vagrant marines. The nomadic and scattered nature of the various Al-Dostian tribal groups made overwhelming strikes ineffective. The numerical advantages of the native forces, combined with their knowledge of the local terrain, proved to place a literal wall of flesh between Vagrant marines and their objectives. Every Al-Dostian gunned down was replaced by four of their comrades. Every village burned seemed to give rise to two more, born from the refugees of their predecessors like some damnable hydra. If one tribe was killed, there were still hundreds of others scattered across the planet.

The seeming total mobilization of the planetary populace combined with their zealous nature in combat and biological advantages made the Al-Dostians capable of swarming over marine fortifications not properly prepared to withstand the onslaught. Despite their universal technological and cultural regression, the native tribes still maintain a vicious, animalistic cunning willing to exploit their vast ranks and knowledge of the environment to lure marine forces into spike pits and rock fall traps.

The most tangible obstruction to a rapid, blitz-like campaign was the effect of the Divergent Reality Integrity Phenomenon, more commonly known as D.R.I.P. or more evocatively as the Reality Plague. Rogue plasma storms could annihilate entire armored divisions. Ordinance deployed from orbit might never reach its target, caught in a zone of errant time or simply phased into metadimensional space. Massed infantry could be crushed to death in wandering zones of intense gravity or boiled from the inside out by roiling waves of radiation.

These factors combined turned the frigid, barren surface of Al-Dost into a crucible in which countless pirates lost their lives fighting for glory, blood, and wealth. The incursion was finally brought to a close in various skirmishes and isolated engagements amongst the barren mountains and solemn ruins. Monoblades were drawn and claws were raised in some of the bloodiest fighting the sector has ever seen, though few will ever tell such tales. The remote nature of both the combatants and the battlefield leaves much of the incursion's history beyond a few key flashpoints an unintentional secret told only in dive bars and barracks.

While the Vagrant Fleet boasts many a warrior, soldier of fortune, and daring captain, the blades that emerged from the forge of the Bergunn system are a new breed altogether. Many of their comrades couldn't be returned home, bodies irrevocably tainted by the Reality Plague. Their achievements were hidden, unknown to the sector at large  by the very nature of their grisly work. Their own biology has turned against them, marking them as survivors of battles waged on a distant world they could not possibly understand. Yet even as these blades stalk the sector south, their eyes speaking of untold legends, Al-Dost is not truly tamed. An uncounted amount of tribes have gone to ground, lashing out at fledgling settlements and prospectors from secret encampments.

The three most infamous of these renegade tribes are the Long Scales, lurking in the bogs with poisoned weapons; the Chalkies, lurking in their underground tunnels with an abiding hatred of those above; and the Mist Wings, who have taken to hiding in the inhospitable no-man's-land of the treacherous peaks and cold mountain ranges.

### First Contact

Contrary to popular belief, the initial meeting between the Fleet and the natives of Al-Dost was not one made in fire and blood - at least, not initially. Expecting to find a relatively advanced civilization beneath the Vitrine Lock, the crew and Captain of the VFS - *Tourist Trapped And Ransomed Back* were instead greeted with a rather surprised tribe of natives adorned in scrap metal armor and wielding crude blades. These individuals were also most assuredly not baseline homo sapiens - excessive growth of bodily fur, extended natural weapons of the hands and feet, and restructuring of facial bones to account for a muzzle, housing extended canine teeth were but a few witnessed mutations.

Supposedly, it took every bit of willpower among those present to not draw their sidearms and begin firing with abandon at the monstrous quadrupedal natives. Proper negotiations were immediately ruled out as a method of communication due to the apparent linguistic and cultural drift the natives had experienced under their imprisonment. However, despite their apparent barbarism, the natives were still able to identify advanced postech equipment, up to and including the magnetic rifles wielded with the attending ground force, matching treasures the tribal community had hoarded before.

An impromptu deal was enacted with the tribe present - a shipping crate loaded with several dozen mil-spec fragmentation grenades, still equipped with a dead man's switch contingency from a previous owner, in exchange for various technological scraps and detritus handed over by the seeming authority of the natives. Soon after the departure of the natives, the *Tourist Trap*'s crew realized that several pieces of the accumulated scrap were firing mechanisms and depleted power cells from pretech weaponry.

Just a few hours later, appreciating their newly-won boom rocks, the majority of the encountered tribe was annihilated as their prized munitions were remotely detonated from a nearby bluff, leveling most of the native village with fire and shrapnel. The ground force - now swelled in size by newly arrived Confederation marines - stormed the blast site, executed the remaining survivors, and located their various troves of pretech salvage. Plumes of smoke and dust rose into  the atmosphere, visible for miles around, becoming an unmistakable herald of the planet's future - war.

### Notable Operations

#### Operation: Point Rain

Following the initial combat with native forces, the ad-hoc diplomats retired to their landing craft to admire their newly-won technological salvage. Mere hours later, the vessel’s emergency beacon was triggered, then quickly silenced. Arriving at the site, Vagrant marines found the landing zone quite literally crawling with hundreds of Al-Dostians, looting and tearing apart the diplomat’s craft like some downed prey.

Once the natives were driven off by automatic weapon fire, the marines secured the crash site, finding only blood stains to signify the fate of the diplomatic team. Initial drone launches to scout the surrounding terrain revealed a most terrifying reality - the nearby mountains and valleys were alight with thousands of campfires and torches, various camps bearing host to armored bestial creatures, bedecked in crude armor made of scrap and plate.

A warhost many times greater than the marines thought capable of mustering was marching on the burning camp of the tribe that would come to be known as the Azaesians. Whether they meant to avenge their brethren or loot their treasures, none can say. Nevertheless, unwilling to relinquish the wreck of a Vagrant vessel, the marines entrenched themselves behind plasteel barricades and crude field fortifications, ready to weather the coming horde.

For three days and three nights, the marines were besieged from all fronts by the massed natives. Seemingly driven by a powerful bloodlust, the natives charged forwards into the firing arcs of the Vagrant forces. These warriors, brave and foolhardy, were cut down in swathes by the marine, put down in equal measure with lead and laser. With orbital landers on site, the defenders were able to quickly requisition ammunition for their emplacements and medical supplies for the wounded.

Yet not even the finest of weapons could keep up with such constant strain - firearms jammed, energy rifles overheated, and the ranks of the enemy never seemed to thin. Through the hail of conventional munitions, unusual explosives were hurled from the gloom, sapping the power from energy weapons in the hands of the marine and tossing armored figures aside like chaff in a strong breeze. More than once, the natives reached the fortifications, clambering over the sandbags and plasteel like nightmarish apparitions. Time and time again, they were driven back, forced to abandon their dead as they fled from the roar of the guns.

Finally, on the dawn of the fourth day, the tribes retreated once more, and didn’t return. The rock and soil of the surface was hidden under a layer of shrapnel and bodies, the corpses lain two deep in some spots. A few unfortunate marines were added to the death toll as cunning Al-Dostians sprang from the cover of their dead comrades with blades in hand, though they were quickly slain, all the same.

As the battlefield was slowly excavated and searched, many odd weapons were found amongst the native casualties. Handheld explosives equipped with familiar mechanisms such as fuses and safety pins were found clutched in the vice grip of dead Al-Dostians, though they seemed to boast no conventional explosive charge.

Upon sending captures of the weapons to on-hand scientific personnel in orbit, it was quickly determined that these were pretech weaponry samples, advanced grenade manufactures able to generate force from seemingly nowhere or sap the charge from powered mechanisms, though they were worn with age and a seeming lack of proper storage.

Due to the frequency with which such weapons were found amongst the ranks of the enemy, and the absence of care devoted to such weaponry, collegiate staff of the Shānite Institute determined that the natives had no method of reproducing these weapons, and they would surely have greater numbers of said devices in hiding, if they were willing to risk so much advanced weaponry on such a small invading force. With this information in hand, the Vagrant marine began to comb the planet, mile by mile, searching for more tribes and the shining treasures they possessed. Slowly, the marines were joined by explorers, independent adventurers, private researchers, and prospectors alike.

The Chrome Rush had begun, and it would tear Al-Dost apart in search of her most fabled secrets.

#### Operation: Obsidian Torch

As hostilities continued to increase between incursion forces and the agitated tribes, many realized that Vagrant vessels would need a centralized location in which to land and distribute necessary goods and supplies. Furthermore, such a site would act as a forward operations base for any beleaguered soldiery to return to after their hunting was complete.

The optimal location for this hub, after much argument, was determined to be a rather large plateau within sight of the ruined Al-Dostian city of Evaemon. The steep walls of the natural formation precluded its scaling by any but the most determined enemies, while orbital craft could simply land on the top and distribute their cargo without fear of reprisal. However, paths had to be cleared for prospectors to reach the urban ruins of Evaemon without being assaulted by tribal forces.

To reduce such possible dangers, a plan known under the moniker of ‘Operation: Obsidian Torch’ was put into effect, as the foliage leading towards the city was firebombed and burnt down to the dirt, while marine forces herded nearby tribes into further areas with the echo of the big guns and the clatter of automatic weapons fire. The ash-stained path left by this assault on the landscape came to be known as ‘Majesty’s Road,’ since prospectors returning from long days of searching would often boast they carried great treasures that would make them as kings.

However, there is a solemn nature to the path, with charred topsoil stretching for a ways in either direction, and not a sound to hear besides the crunch of gravel and the whistling of a solemn wind.

#### Operation: Solar Fortress

For several weeks, dozens of Al-Dostian tribes were chased across their homeland by the unflagging Vagrant marine. Whether by design or a cosmic feint, these disparate peoples converged in the ruins of a once great city straddling the equator of the planet. This city, simply known to the marines as ‘The Belt’ came to be the site of the largest single battle of the Al-Dost incursion. The gathered natives dug in and fortified the blasted ruins, equipping themselves with stolen firearms and setting traps along the abandoned roadways. Previously forced to utilize single-unit tactics to hound the tribes, the Vagrant marines realized they would have to temporarily adapt to a more unified chain of command in order to attain victory over this once-city.

The savior of the marine came in the form of General Jian Kun Liao, a former small time ganger from Hong Lu with a penchant for leadership. Utilizing all manners of coercion, from wild promises to outright bribery, General Liao was able to band together the various captains and marines into a single force with which to combat the entrenched tribes. With their enemy finally concentrated, the marines were able to utilize the meager armor elements brought with the incursion - eight outdated Imperial gravtanks, emblazoned with all manner of emblems and murals, stories of battle painted on their armored flanks.

Though just a few gravitic vehicles would make little difference in conventional warfare, their mounted guns bore terrifying effect against the under armored native forces. And so, the Belt was put to the torch, her refugees butchered wholesale by the indignant marine. Buildings were collapsed when the soldiers couldn’t be bothered to clear them. The sky was choked with the scent of ash and burnt flesh as the tribes attempted to flee from the city along the ancient roadways. In their desperate flight, many fell prey to their own traps as they were gunned down from both sides.

For this ruthlessness and seeming lack of emotion, General Liao earned the moniker of ‘Cold Iron,’ though many say his alcoholic tendencies became greatly exacerbated after he toured the site of his first and greatest victory.

#### Operation: Daggerwall

As the chorus of the Belt faded into memory, a majority of the known tribes of Al-Dost began to flee in earnest towards the more remote portions of the planet still left untouched by the enigmatic burn zones. While the marines couldn’t be bothered to hound after ever single tribe, they were troubled by the movement of a sizable amount of natives into the mountain range known under the designation ‘Eagle Peaks.’ These mountains were named such due to a variety of incidents occurring at the foot of the range between wandering prospectors and natives bearing more avian features than the rest of their kin.

These peaks were also host to a variety of bunkers and subterranean laboratories long since abandoned by the natives, and the potential value of such structures was not lost on Vagrant forces. Thusly, a band of marines and armed prospectors numbering a few thousand strong set off into the game paths and mountain passes of the Peaks in an altogether infamous journey that would come to be known as the ‘Lead Trail.’

Over the course of an entire month, the gathered invaders trekked across rugged and unforgiving terrain, often having to fight while exhausted from the grueling march. Both ammunition and rations had to be carefully meted out amongst the gathered combatants, as resupply was virtually impossible along the Lead Trail, besides a few rather convenient plateaus scattered amongst the towering peaks. Exhaustion and frostbite claimed many healthy fighters, while native traps ranging from rockslides to poison arrows took many more. Yet by the end of their harrowing trek, packs laden with chrome but all too low on supplies, the Lead Trail had been tamed by these gathered warriors, and they were all the wealthier for it.

Now, the mountain road serves as a convenient land route for prospectors and their ilk, semi-regular militia patrols are dispatched to keep watch over this arterial passage. The unlucky soldiers assigned to such a task, bundled tight in various coats and furs, often report sights of campfire smoke threading between two peaks, or the war cries of inhuman beasts on the periphery of their senses. Though neither hide nor hair has been seen of any tribes that might remain sequestered within hidden mountain valleys, those traveling along the Lead Trail are advised to keep an eye to their surroundings and a weapon at their side all the same.

### The Hidden War

While the roar of orbital engines and the echo of artillery resounded above ground, an entirely different campaign was waged beneath the earth itself. Led by the Teuthan soldiers of fortune known as ‘Spectres,’ several marines versed in close-quarters combat descended into the dark and cramped cave systems beneath the skin of Al-Dost in order to pacify the rather vicious tribes located in the dark corners of this geological underworld. Demolition work, counter-tunneling, flamethrowers, and toxic agents became staples of this ferocious fighting, all but unknown to those above.

Several battles took place in cramped earthen corridors in which soldiers could not even stand to their full height, often having to travel or retreat by crawling on their stomachs through claustrophobic passages bored out of the soil and stone. Many marines would often spend weeks camped beneath the earth, fortifying caverns and grottos to deny the enemy possible passage towards the surface. The combat was only complicated by the nature of the subterranean tribes to spread out over several miles of tunnels and caverns instead of lodging in a single concentrated village. The warriors of these tribes possessed great strength from their lives of tunneling and excavating, making them able to handily tear an armored marine in two if aggravated.

As the impossibility of a proper sweep through the cave systems was realized, and the idea of total demolition was denied on the possibility of further pretech troves under the purview of the hypogean Al-Dostians, it was instead decided to wage a fighting retreat from the caves. Some tunnels were collapsed, others were seeded with radioactive agents that would render them inhospitable for years to come. Many marines were dragged out of the rubble, barely alive, while countless others were left buried in the earth, their graves unmarked and forgotten.

### Ongoing Theatres

#### Aquatic Deep Seas Warfare

As the terrestrial tribes of Al-Dost are subjugated and driven back, wary eyes now turn their gaze towards the oceans of this forgotten place, and the terrors that lurk beneath the tides. Occasional reports of dead seaside prospectors and Al-Dostians crawling from the surf were initially regarded with much skepticism - surely, there were just more cunning traps and tricks from the native tribes. Yet the truth reared its ugly head when expeditionary forces finally landed on the island of Aldebaran, searching for more pretech caches and prospecting opportunities. The landmass veritably seethed with aquatic Al-Dostians, bedecked with gills, scaled flesh, and needle-sharp teeth.

The 'fishmen' of Aldebaran, seemingly enraged by the transgressions upon their isle, are only one of the forces that has been registered now swarming in the dark of the oceans, emerging on the coasts with crude blades and hate in their eyes, dragging unfortunate salvagers and colonists back into their underwater domain. Equipped with advanced aquatic operation ‘sharksuits,’ gyrojet rifles, and various other contraptions of maritime warfare, the Vagrant marine now duel with the armies of the Fish Isle amongst kelp forests and deep sea trenches alike. Bombs and torpedoes, dropped from fighter craft soaring over the azure oceans, turn entire battalions of fishmen into expansive clouds of crimson chum. These brave frogmen dive into the unknown in order to keep the surface safe, often spending weeks underwater before surfacing, the recyclers in their suits pushed to the very limit in their saltwater crusade.

Yet even with all these modern advantages, the oceanic armies do not cease. Every dead foe is replaced with ten more, clambering through the reefs without regard for their own safety, cutting themselves on jagged stones and obstructions in a tireless pursuit of the invading marine forces. Much to the dismay of the marine, preliminary studies indicate that over one fourth of the planet’s entire native population might find their home in the ranks of the thalassic soldiery. No matter how many die, the legion of the deep sea continues to march forth, their blades thirsting for the blood of land dwellers and invaders from the stars.

## Al-Dostian History

### The Cataclysm of Al-Dost

Gazing upon the ruined cities of Al-Dost, the ancient structures long abandoned by their inhabitants, it is plain to see that a disaster of an immeasurable caliber has shaken the planet to its very core. Even when studying the remains of the past, no clear evidence can be determined as to the cause of this planetary apocalypse - there are no swathes of nuclear fallout or other such indicators that would provide a clear answer to this pervasive inquiry. Without an irrefutable source of evidence as to what force manages to devastate Al-Dost and bring into being the D.R.I.P, theories of all shapes and sizes have formed around this ruined rimworld like weeds from the fertile soil of the mind.

#### Iconoclasts

The predominant theory as to the fate of Al-Dost, at least amongst the Shānite collegiate, is that of a self-imposed apocalypse. These anthropologists argue that the extensive ruins and D.R.I.P are merely byproducts of a final clash between planetary superpowers utilizing doomsday weapons beyond the current technological scope of man. By their reckoning, many of these weapons must have been biological in nature, thus causing the extreme mutations present in the native populace.

As to the Vitrine Lock, it is only obvious that a few Al-Dostians who were not planetside during the catastrophe sought to seal away the tragic fate of their people under a great and impenetrable shield, that no one else might discover their powerful technology and repeat their mistakes. Those adhering to this particular school of thought, informally known in academic circles as ‘Iconoclasts,’ are strongly in favor of halting prospectors from scouring the planet, in case they stumble across some ancient doomsday weapon from a bygone era, still active and all too deadly.

#### Predictors

A second theory, almost as popular in scholastic circles as that of the Iconoclasts, speculates that the current state of Al-Dost was not borne of conflict, but rather out of paranoia. This theory insists that a hyper-advanced society such as Al-Dost might have predicted the Scream or some similar calamity, and thus sought to protect themselves from it. The civilizations of Al-Dost unified efforts to erect a defensive measure powerful enough to deflect any apocalyptic force that might besiege the planet.

As to the devastation of the planet, the natives must not have predicted the extent to which such a safeguard would affect their own planetoid in turn, and, as a result, were trapped within an impenetrable fortress of their own devising. This would have also prevented the formation of psychics among the native population - an anomaly firmly registered during war efforts by the Confederation - theorized scholars, as a device meant to repel the Scream, which affected psychics, would likely interfere with metadimensional energies in turn.

This school of thought and its members are known as ‘Predictors,’ and they can often be found studying the defensive applications of pretech salvage brought back to Shān, while also combing through ancient data sources to see if any discoveries regarding the nature of the Scream can be sussed out from the foresight of long-dead scientists.

#### Theologians

The third chief theory - derided by scholars as a theory for crackpots and conspiracy theorists - claims that it was the Empire itself that destroyed the peoples of this sovereign planet. A majority of pre-Scream technology has been lost to the travails of time, it is argued that the possibility that Imperial forces could have smote the Al-Dostians without there being a historical record of the event or reasons therefore. Such a sudden technological deficit would also explain why the Vitrine Lock could not later be opened when the Bergunn system was rediscovered - the Empire had lost the knowledge and thus the key to the defensive system they had installed.

This final school and its members are listed as ‘Theologians,’ since their lengthy debates as to why the Empire would assault Al-Dost often stray into the realm of religion. There is much internal disagreement as to whether a separate, technologically-advanced political entity in the sector would be recognized as an ‘unholy state of blasphemers and hedonists’ by the High Church of old. While this knowledge holds little value to an Empire largely embroiled in the galactic affairs of politics and statesmanship, it provides an outlet for those collegiate of the Shānite Institute who were unfortunate enough to not study in fields practical to space piracy, such as engineering or interstellar cartography.

#### The Truth

**\*\*Important Note: This is Meta-Narrative, not information revealed in universe!!!\*\***

An indeterminate amount of time ago, though before the psychic catastrophe known as ‘The Scream,’ there existed on the remote world of Al-Dost a thriving human civilization that possessed technology that pushed the boundaries of science at that time. Many wonders were known across the Sector before the Scream, but none greater than those of Al-Dost. Yet it was not the Scream that destroyed such hidden opulence and technological magnificence. Rather, the people of Al-Dost aspired to godhood, and were aided in this venture by a rogue member of the Guild who sought to uplift the planetary populace to a similar ascendant state.

This rogue agent was discovered and ousted by their fellow Guild members, cast out from their ranks to Al-Dost, stripped of their power but unable to die, forced to walk eternally among the destruction their act had wrought. For daring to try and assume such power, the punishment for the people of Al-Dost was thus: They would be devolved to that which the Guild reckoned them as mere beasts parroting their betters, chained in their minds and on their planet for eternity, unable to ever ascend again to the great heights from which they had been cast down. Their civilization was devastated, their very planet sealed away under the Vitrine Devil Lock.

The Cataclysm of Al-Dost was a mystery to the sector even when it occurred. When the Scream tore through Acheron Rho, what little knowledge there was, was lost. None save the 'rogue god" and the Guild themselves truly know what happened. Not even the Al-Dostians recall their past, entombed in minds that can barely rise beyond the Bronze Age. Some terrifying logs might exist on ancient dataslates in the Nine Cities, awaiting discovery and decryption. Perhaps the Guild prefers it to remain a mystery forever - after all, the best kept secrets are those that cannot be told.

### Lost Expeditions

**Under Construction and looking for Collaboration with other factions**

## Al-Dostian Cities & Regions

### The Nine Cities

Judging by the studies conducted by independent anthropologists, the Nine Cities were the great urban centers of Al-Dost, serving as hubs of both technological and cultural progression. Each city must have been large enough to be considered nation-states in their own right, for they expand outwards in miles and miles of collapsed structures, twisted metal, and ashen debris. Yet not all of these cities are reduced to nothing - at the epicenters of such devastation stand imposing citadels, clad in bright light that does not give to the touch. These are the fortresses of Hardlight, the last Al-Dostian creations to survive their calamity. The natives regard their glowing walls as taboo, and avoid the fortifications like the devil’s work. The corridors and rooms within these bastions are empty of all life, home only to dust and concrete, monuments to a once great people.

#### Gadeiros

The city of Gadeiros stands on the coast of Adhara, waves sloshing between collapsed waterfront towers. Further out into the deeps, habitat bubbles and tunnels of glass run across algae beds in a network that must have once captured the eye in its glittering glory, now shattered and flooded in its entirety. Many craft lay sunken in the harbor, being plundered by prospectors armed with gyrojet rifles and breathing masks, hoping to find glittering treasures in waterlogged cargo holds, like mariners of old. Yet all is not serene in this waterfront landmark - the echoes of gunfire clatter up and down the streets with regularity, as the campaign for the oceans of Al-Dost is waged on this city’s doorstep.

#### Ampheres

Among the labs and records recovered from the grand cities, there is a supposed ninth metropolis, mentioned time and time again by decrypted data logs. This is Ampheres, the military hub of Al-Dost, where armored craft hovered down the streets in countless parades while engineers devised evermore cunning methods of warfare. Many speculate that Ampheres lies on or near the isle of Aldebaran, though the hostility of the amphibious natives that call the isle their home has made verifying this hypothesis impossible to date.

#### Evaemon

Located among the sheer cliffs and plateaus of Adhara, the city of Evaemon is one of the three ‘forge cities’ of Al-Dost, named as such for the grand Hardlight forges that dominate their skylines. These grand artifices consist of four spires - two point skywards, most likely exhaust expulsion towers, while the other two angle inwards towards a point. When operational, these spires were apparently capable of crafting any machinery, design, or device imaginable, whether it was space station components or an entire frigate, all through the miracle of white-hot Hardlight. The powerful forge of Evaemon lays dormant, as with its sister cities, yet the spires still offer an awe-inspiring view from the nearby offworlder city of Liao’s Landing.

#### Mneseus

The second of the forge cities is Mneseus, laying at an equidistant position between the cities of Evaemon and Azaes, on the continent of Altinak. Mneseus seems to have been a city of the arts, with sculptors using the powers of burning Hardlight forges to craft intricately detailed sculptures and public works. As of now, only some of these works have survived, yet the pieces that remain buried under ash and dirt still hold a great value among private collector circles, as they have retained much of their perfected beauty.

#### Autochthon

Amidst the silence of the city of Autochthon, metallic servitors march about without orders to guide them, forever powered by pretech reactors. This was the ‘City of the Machine,’ famed for its creations in artificial constructs and a workforce of shining chrome. The city itself is composed of sharp, angular geometries, with every street corner being a practice in precision. Mapping of the city has revealed that the entire megalopolis, its every building and street, was constructed in a supermassive spirograph, a monument to architecture and mathematics now laid to rest.

The Servitors themselves come in several different forms including maintenance and security models. It appears they do not recognize the native population as human and will kill on sight any native intruders into the city, although the Vagrant explorers have faced little threat from these automated protectors, save in several zones and buildings where non-authorized personnel are eliminated on sight. While destroying these automatons is possible with great degree of effort, they appear to be quickly replaced by some form of unknown production. Expeditions to the city are quite promising and several insertions into restricted zones have yielded interesting findings despite having all been eventually rebuffed by the city’s defenses.

#### Elasippos

The city of Elasippos spans a canyon nearly a mile wide, a massive web of arching bridges, with the rest of its structures lining the canyon walls and running along its base. Below the residential areas, massive boreholes extend to the very mantle of Al-Dost, where extensive energy tapping systems must have once powered the entire city, though they only keep the mantle containment shielding in check now that the inhabitants above have departed. In the various valleys surrounding the canyon of Elasippos, stations and bunkers equipped with various weather measuring implements jut out of the sedimentary rock, yet they also boast arrays of advanced technology that scientists hypothesize might have once been utilized to remotely influence the very weather of Al-Dost, her cloud patterns and storms. Nowadays, the arrays seemed to have degraded in their monitoring, and Elasippos is constantly buffeted by storms and lightning, the decrepit streets made slick with rainwater.

#### Mestor

While it may boast a great wealth of pretech, prospectors dare not approach Mestor, the City of The Creche. No wind sweeps through its streets, no footprints are marked in the collected dust along the streets or within its buildings, and even the roar of the two mighty rivers it stands between barely travel up the winding streets. To many, Mestor is a bad omen of significant portent, one that should not be disturbed by the step of man. Some do speak of material transference technology housed within the laboratories of the silent city - machinations capable of replicating genuine foodstuffs from the very air. A shame, then, that none wish to risk themselves to see if such legends bear truth.

#### Azaes

Azaes was the first of the Nine Cities visited by incursion forces, and the last of the three grand forge cities. Among the ruins of Azaes, the Vagrant marine waged some of their first conflicts against the native tribes, battling for the excavated pretech vaults buried underneath the rubble-filled streets. While the bulk of Azaesians have been defeated and driven from their homes, pockets of resistance remain scattered throughout the city. The safety of perspective prospectors is enough in doubt that palisade forts have sprung up in different regions of the City, processing hubs for those that venture into the city to return with riches. These encampments rest in the shadow of the Skyline, a district of spires and towers that rise so far that they seem to extend into the heavens themselves. Without mobility aids such as elevators, it has taken exploration teams around 24 hours to complete a full circuit of one of said towers, marching up and down enough flights of stairs to make a xenological historian wet themselves.

#### Diaprepes

Amidst the snow of the continent of Alnitak, the city of Diaprepes, a place of miracles, is blanketed by fields of white and prisons of ice. Diaprepes was once the medical capital of Al-Dost, with patients visiting from every corner of the planet for pretech remedies and medicines. In ancient clinical labs, rows of Osiris tanks that once held shimmering blue liquids, able to heal even the most grievous of wounds in but a few hours, yet now they lie empty and dormant. Automated doctoring systems cut and seal flesh with a precision that would put any surgeon to shame. Even the hot baths and saunas of Diaprepes were said to hold healing qualities, and the waterborne healing compounds once distributed to the bathing houses only reinforced this superstition.

### The Belt

Built upon the exact equatorial line of Al-Dost, The Belt was once a minor urban center situated upon a natural crossroads, the cityscape planted amongst vast fields of tundra grasses, studded by granite kopjes breaking the otherwise-even skyline. Already rendered into a ruin by the ravages of time, The Belt was further reduced by the combat actions of the Vagrant marine during the aptly named ‘Battle of the Belt.’ For days after the fierce fighting had concluded, bodies were still found under feet of accumulated stone and ash, duly noted and packaged for incineration. Plumes of cloying smoke stretched from horizon to horizon, as ancient pretech power sources once buried within the city’s core burned on endlessly, spitting out dozens of sieverts of radiation into the surrounding metropolis. Volunteer fire brigades descended into this gullet of hell, risking life and limb to decommission these ancient reactors before they could spread their poison even further. Their deaths have made them legends, and the carved likenesses of the brigadiers, men and women willing to risk their lives for something greater than material wealth and power, are commonly worn as talismans of luck and good fortune among the more sentimental prospectors and marines of the Al-Dost incursion.

### Rouge Croÿ

Among the first weeks of the Al-Dost incursion, as firefights still flared in the streets of Azaes and the word of the planet’s state of flux was still being bandied about in hushed tones, there existed a band of prospectors who left far in advance of their peers, trying to cut into the pretech salvage they had heard so much about, buried beneath mere inches of metal and mortar. This small force of hopeful souls, numbering about one hundred strong, established a bivouac of barbed wire and frayed tents on the fringes of the city of Mneseus - Rouge Croÿ, the first Vagrant settlement of Al-Dost. The prosperity and success this colony might have experienced in its fleeting days is unknown, and it is entirely possible that the inhabitants reaped great benefits as the first to strike the soil of this rimworld in search of its treasures.

All that is known for certain about Rouge Croÿ is its sudden and complete disappearance - smugglers making the trip between Al-Dost and Shān left for the three week round trip and returned to find not a soul still wandered through the camp, the only sign of any habitation being loose odds and ends scattered. No bodies were found, no blood trails offered convenient clues, and for all intents and purposes, the inhabitants of Rouge Croÿ disappeared in their entirety. The disappearance of this fledgling colony reinforced the notion that not only the beastmen of Al-Dost threatened colonists and prospectors looking to make a payday. Even now, prospectors commonly refuse to travel alone, whether hiking to distant salvage sites or stumbling home from a dive bar, as the thought of being whisked away by forces unknown is a sobering experience for most.

### Liao's Landing

Situated atop a steep plateau overlooking the Al-Dostian city of Evaemon, Liao’s Landing is the de facto administrative capital of the planetary incursion. Due to the difficulty of communication across distances caused by the D.R.I.P, many basic management functions have to take place in one location instead of spread out across the planetary surface. For this reason, all manners of businesses and contractors find roost at Liao’s Landing, servicing prospectors and pirates alike. Couriers run messages and supplies to distant salvaging encampments, while suppliers equip eager prospectors with power drills and magnetic rifles.

Every contrivance of pleasure, running from alcohol and gambling to houses of flesh, is found amid the canvas walls of this tent city, as those returning from long journeys, running hot on credits from good hauls, enjoy rest and relaxation before setting out once more into the tundra. Amidst numerous auction houses, private collectors lurk in the rafters - eagerly paying a premium over what independent Shānite research labs are willing, or even able, to finance - swooping down upon the most precious artifacts that arrive at the Landing, luxury goods from an opulent civilization long since past.

### Burn Zone: Aleph

Among the various fluctuations of reality that pervade Al-Dost, the creeping burn zones that spread across the landscape, the raging storms of plasma annihilating all they touch, there is one area that is forbidden to all visitors, whether they are serf or noble, poor or rich. This is Burn Zone Aleph, a seething maelstrom of incomprehensible energies and anomalous occurrences, the impossible made manifest. Unlike other burn zones, Aleph is stationary, seemingly anchored, lashing out in waves of hard radiation and destructive power, yet never moving its borders. As such, a perimeter has been established around the entirety of the burn zone, though there is a distance of fifty miles between the perimeter and the edge of Aleph itself. Trespassers are blindfolded and sent back to Liao’s Landing in the backs of cargo vehicles, while those who scale the perimeter fences are terminated with ruthless precision. To the uninitiated, this may seem like there is some secret to be hidden in Aleph, an enigma of great portent that must be hidden at all costs.

In actuality, the swift death these guards provide is an unnecessary mercy, for those bodies recovered from Aleph’s clutches are always found gripped in a final rictus of pain and horror. None have survived the wrath of Aleph - even to stare directly into the zone is to invite nausea and pain, as the brain fails to comprehend what it registers with the senses. Despite empty-glass rumors and hearsay that the lost city of Ampheres might hide within Aleph, every marine and prospector hopes otherwise. Between taking up arms against the endless aquatic menace of Aldebaran or choosing to venture into Burn Zone Aleph, most would gladly sling their rifles over their shoulders and march into the deeps.

## Mount Golgotha Special Project Site

Several times a month, unmarked transport convoys depart from Liao’s Landing, stocked with mag-locked crates of all shapes and sizes, manned by masked soldiers equipped with military-grade weaponry. These convoys travel along dirt roads and game trails, progressing ever further from offworlder civilization. Eventually, they reach a concrete tunnel bored into the heart of a mountain, unmarked and seemingly empty. Once within, these vehicles are lowered into pitch black by cargo elevators, descending towards one of the largest research laboratories in the Sector South - the Mount Golgotha Special Project Site.

The Mount Golgotha Special Project Site is the processing and reverse-engineering hub of the Al-Dost incursion. While private collectors purchase prized artifacts for personal usage, those relics brought to Mount Golgotha are tested on and experimented with so as to be replicated for usage offworld. Naturally, such an important complex is under constant guard from Al-Dostians and curious prospectors alike, with masked gunmen patrolling every hallway and corridor of the underground complex. Advanced pretech artifices, from weapons and armor to medicine and cybernetics, flow from the fortified gates of Golgotha. Even further below the earth, teams of researchers seek to exploit the D.R.I.P for further technological advancement beyond reverse engineering achievements of the past, creating new technological marvels from that which should not exist.

### Rumors surrounding Mount Golgotha

#### Tunnel 001

A persistent rumor spoken of in hushed voices says that located further below the Mount Golgotha primary facility, lodged deep within the continental crust of Adhara, is a far smaller complex, composed of reinforced concrete layered on top of graphene-based armors, all surrounded by several meters of lithified bedrock. The only entrance is a lone cargo elevator, needing clearance from both the main and subsidiary complex in order to activate. Once the lift lowers, one is deposited into a perfectly straight hallway, with armed patrols marching back and forth along its one-kilometer length. Quad rotary autocannons, weapons capable of downing a small frigate, sweep their steel gaze back and forth across the corridor. These are only the visible security measures - electrified floor plates, nerve gas dispensers, and various other contraptions are installed in this protracted killbox, all harshly illuminated under blinding fluorescent light. As to what lies at the end of this hallway, none can say, and any who know are unwilling to discuss on the matter.

#### Medical Examination Report 0016-32A-e3

Within the third month of the incursion, an unnamed prospector stabbed three individuals within a saloon at Liao’s Landing. Throughout the incident and his subsequent detainment, the prospector continually wailed that he was being controlled by greater powers, and said powers had replaced his insides with buzzing things.’ Due to the very real danger of a D.R.I.P mutation, the prospector was taken in by a local clinic and subjected to biopsy surgery. The official autopsy reports that the prospector’s internal organs had shifted about within his chest cavity, and even smaller, half-formed duplicates of organs already present had begun to gestate and grow alongside their counterparts.

Despite the surprisingly open-and-shut nature of the case as D.R.I.P mutation, more cases of an unnervingly similar nature have begun to materialize across the encampments of the planet. Some even say that maybe the man was, in fact, filled to the brim with flying insects, and the reality of the situation was kept silent due to the hysteria that might have resulted from such a discovery. Either way, many of the individuals who are afflicted by such maladies are often visited by masked gunmen, and escorted from their homes into unmarked gravcars. After all, such a development as spontaneous generation of living creatures is of great interest to the laboratory personnel of Mount Golgotha.

## Unexplained Phenomena & Sightings

### Pr0m3th3u$

Among the soldiery and salvage crews on leave, there are tall tales of a figure who wanders the tundras and burn zones alike. A figure who looks like a man from a distance, save for the great antlers that extend from their head like some crown of bleached bone. A figure who forever wanders, cursed with some great burden to carry, or a Sisyphean task to fulfill, perhaps. It is said they walk among the Al-Dostian tribes and weep openly. It is said they came from Burn Zone Aleph, leaving a trail of fire. Many things are said of them, none can be confirmed. The Horned King walks onward, the storytellers say, and none have garnered an audience with the majesty, as of yet.

### Hauntings in the Nine Cities

When lurking in the ruins of long dead civilizations, it isn’t unexpected for one to be afflicted with thoughts of apprehension and unease. Some swear that apparitions of Hardlight whisper the names of the dead. Others assert that they are followed by phantom footsteps, a phantom presence making no noise but leaving boot prints in the layers of dust and ash that cake the Nine Cities. Even if one does not believe the countless fibers of superstition woven into the emerging prospector culture of Al-Dost, there is a haunting aspect to the empty homes of Al-Dost, these cities that might have once been vibrant with life, now nothing but silence and slag.

### Dreams of Vasari

Addled by lack of water and food, a group of prospectors salvaging six days out from Evaemon stumble back to Liao's Landing, speaking a story of lust and miracles. Of a tribe of humanoids, far within the hidden vales of the mountains, who entreat and care for those who find themselves lost among the peaks. According to the tales, these Al-Dostian natives appear almost human, felinoid features enhancing an exotic beauty and otherworldly grace, casting off the barbarism of their fellow tribes. Such a tale seems too good to be true, and it likely is, as even after several expeditions mounted to return to the site mentioned in the tales, no evidence has ever been found to support the spurious claims made by the half-dead prospectors. After several were found dead of exposure in the mountains, most have written off these claims as fever dreams.

### Reported: Mass Hallucinations

Barracks erupting in the dead of night with the fevered screams of prospectors. Streets lined with the sleep-deprived, terrified to go to sleep every night, the bags under their eyes their accentuating the mile-long stares. Nightmares and hysteria have swept across prospector camps ever more often, sending salvagers into comatose states and mass hysteria.

In select instances, these salvagers have even reported 'shared' experiences, as they experience the same horrors every night, all held under a spell of fright. Stimulant sales have increased drastically as a result, as many try their hardest to avoid the world of sleep as a whole.

## Planetary Tags

### Anthropomorphs

The locals were originally human, but at some point became anthropomorphic, either as an ancient furry colony, a group of animal-worshiping sectarians, or gengineers who just happened to find animal elements most convenient for surviving on the world. Depending on the skill of the original gengineers, their feral forms may or may not work as well as their original human bodies, or may come with drawbacks inherited from their animal elements.

#### Enemies:

* Anthro-supremacist local
* Native driven by feral urges
* Outside exploiter who sees the locals as subhuman creatures

#### Friends:

* Fascinated genetic researcher
* Diplomat trained to deal with normals
* Local needing outside help

#### Complications:

* The locals consider their shapes a curse from their foolish ancestors
* Society is ordered according to animal forms
* The locals view normal humans as repulsive or inferior

#### Things:

* Pretech gengineering tech
* A "cure" that may not be wanted
* Sacred feral totem

#### Places:

* Shrine to a feral deity
* Nature reserve suited to an animal type
* Living site built to take advantage of animal traits

### Shackled World

This world is being systematically contained by an outside power. Some ancient autonomous defense grid, robot law enforcement, alien artifact, or other force is preventing the locals from developing certain technology, or using certain devices, or perhaps from developing interstellar flight. This limit may or may not apply to offworlders; in the former case, the PCs may have to figure out a way to beat the shackles simply to escape the world.

#### Enemies:

* Passionless jailer-AI
* Paranoid military grid AI
* Robot overlord
* Enigmatic alien master

#### Friends:

* Struggling local researcher
* Offworlder trapped here
* Scientist with a plan to break the chains

#### Complications:

* The shackles come off for certain brief windows of time
* The locals think the shackles are imposed by god
* An outside power greatly profits from the shackles
* The rulers are exempt from the shackles

#### Things:

* Keycode to bypass the shackle
* Tech shielded from the shackle
* Exportable version of the shackle that can affect other worlds

#### Places:

* Grim high-tech control center
* Factory full of workaround tech
* Temple to the power or entity that imposed the shackle

### Gas Giant Mine

#### Airy Mine

Occupation: Miserable gas-miner slaves or serfs

Situation: Pirates secretly fuel there

### Space Stations

#### Kita 7

Occupation: Freeze-dried ancient corpses

Situation: Black market for the elite

#### Magadi 1

Occupation: Deranged but brilliant scientist

Situation: Systems breaking down