The Twelve Worlds

The Twelve Worlds is a satellite system in the Urth Galaxy and home to all known human life.

The Twelve Worlds consists of the super massive gas giant, Kolossal, and its twelve inhabited moons which are commonly referred to as Worlds. The Asteroid Ring encircles the Worlds, and the Dekker-Viggo Radiation belt prevents any life forms from entering or exiting the Twelve Worlds system.

## General Information

Due to gravitational and electromagnetic effects, the orbits of the Twelve Worlds orbiting Kolossal are erratic and unpredictable. This unpredictability is an example of the 3-body problem. Even the most advanced computers simulations cannot accurately predict the orbits of the Worlds for more than ten days.

None of the Worlds orbit in a perfect circle around Kolossal, and none orbit on the same plane. Because of this, the Twelve Worlds orbit Kolossal at various angles and speeds, constantly changing as they interact with the gravity and magnetospheres of other Worlds.

Although the positions of the Worlds shifts and changes, each World has an average orbital distance from Kolossal, and thus can be given positions. For instance, the World with the closest average orbital distance is Larhanna, thus it is considered to be the 1st World orbiting Kolossal and given the position of number 1, while Alkar has the furthest orbital distance and is thus considered the 12th world of the Twelve Worlds.

These positions will change month to month or sometimes more frequently. There will be periods of time when Alkar is closer to Kolossal than Ikon or Moebius or Tycho, thus making it the 8th or 9th closest World to Kolossal, and there will be times that Larhanna is further away from Kolossal than Cyclopia. But this never lasts for more than a few weeks. Over the course of a Kolossal year, Alkar will be the furthest of all the Worlds and Larhanna will be the closest of all the Worlds.

The Twelve Worlds is sectioned into eight Octants. Kolossal is in the direct center, and the first Octant is always facing the sun. These Octants help keep track of the location of the Worlds as they orbit erratically. There are also 5 orbital bands(orbitals). There is the orbital encircling Kolossal. Then the 1st 2nd and 3rd orbitals encompass the space where the Twelve Worlds orbit. And the asteroid belt is the final orbital.

All of the Worlds have a day night cycle between 23 and 25 hours, but years vary greatly due to the constantly changing speeds that at which the Worlds orbit Kolossal. Due to this, the Worlds have standardized an orbital calendar year based on the orbit of Kolossal around the sun, which is known as Swan. It takes approximately 999 days for Kolossal to orbit its sun.

All Twelve worlds are highly tectonically active due to the constant tidal forces from Kolossal and the other Worlds. Because of this the continents on the Twelve Worlds move around one meter every year on average.

This means that maps can completely change in the course of a few centuries as landmasses break apart to form new landmasses, or collide to become larger landmasses. Landmasses also sink or rise from the ocean, although this process takes much longer.

## Demographics

There are countless ethnicities and races in the Twelve Worlds, but only two species of organic lifeforms; humans and elves.

Humans inhabit all Worlds and Kolossal and make up the vast majority of life. Elves do not inhabit all Twelve Worlds and are less prevalent on each World, this is largely due to the fact that Elves reproduce much slower and tend to be nomadic for large portions of their lifespan.

Elves are humanoid, and virtually identical to humans with two main exception; one, all elves have pointed ears, and two, elves have either purple, blue, or green skin, while human skin is various shades of brown or white.

## The Worlds

### Kolossal

Kolossal is the center of the Twelve Worlds. It is the super massive gas giant that all the Worlds orbit. Kolossal has a circumference of 500,000 km and is the largest planet in the known universe.

Being a gas giant, Kolossal has no terrestrial land, but Kolossal has thousands of large, habitable landmasses and continents that are suspended in the goldilocks region of the gas giant’s atmosphere where the air pressure and temperature is at levels suitable for human life and there is enough oxygen to breath. These landmasses are suspended in the air by electromagnetic forces repelling the lodestones within the rock that the landmasses are made of.

Humans are the only lifeform on Kolossal that is incapable of flight, a fact that is confounding to biologist and philosophers alike.

Kolossal has an orbital habitat called Goliath. Goliath is a group of 26 hexagonal habitats that are tethered together by semi-rigid coupling cables. Each has gravimetric generator providing gravity and an atmospheric envelope. The largest hexagon is 7.4 mill sq.km.

Goliath was discovered, not built, and is the chief evidence for intelligent life predating humanity in the Twelve Worlds.

### Larhanna

Larhanna is a terrestrial World that orbits the closest to Kolossal. The gas giant is almost always present in the day or night sky on the surface.

### Cyclopea

Cyclopea is the largest World orbiting Kolossal, and on average the second closest. It is the only world to have no oceans, although it is not waterless. Rivers and lakes dot the surface of the World, although only 19-21% of the surface is covered by water depending on rainfall. Most of the World is mountainous.

Cyclopea has two moons, Cython, its largest moon, and Cydreia, its most populous moon.

### Avalonia

Avalonia is a terrestrial world and the third World orbiting Kolossal. The World is known for its immense bio-diversity and is home to the largest animals and therion in the Twelve Worlds.

Avalonia has a moon called Lemuria, which is the largest moon in the Twelve Worlds.

### Jacinto

Jacinto is a World covered in forests, jungles, swamps, and grasslands. There are no deserts on Jacinto. Nearly every square kilometer is covered by grassland or some form of forest. Even the oceans are filled with kelp forests and floating expanses of algae. Because of all the plant life, Jacinto’s sky has a greenish tint.

### Sagamatra

Sagamatra is the coldest of all the Worlds. The atmosphere is made of 20% oxygen, 21% nitrogen, and 59% matra, a gas unique to Sagamatra that retains almost no heat from the sun, so most places north or south of the equator are very cold and snowy.

Winters on Sagamatra last longer than anywhere else in the Twelve Worlds.  95% of the population of Sagamatra lived within 2500 km of the equator.

### Halcyon

Halcyon is the sixth World and is by far the wealthiest. Most of its wealth comes from the fact that it has the most stable orbit of all the Worlds and is roughly in the middle of the Twelve Worlds, giving it a trade advantage. It is known as a trade hub and financial center in the Twelve Worlds.

Halcyon has an inhabited space elevator called Gracious, also referred to as High Lucre. The space elevator originally was built to facilitate faster trade, but soon became a large city with a population of over ten million. It is the richest city in all the Twelve Worlds.

### Mu

Mu is a water World and the smallest of the Twelve Worlds. 91% of Mu is covered in water. There are no continents on the World, only islands and the entire populations either lives on islands or lives nomadically on large ships.

Mu has a planetary ring made of ice, which is often considered its second ocean.

### Rahm

Rahm is the eighth World and is known for its abundance of volcanoes and geysers. Its landscape is a combination of harsh badlands mixed with lush jungles and pockets of hyper-fertile volcanic soils.

Rahm has a moon called Kassam. Kassam is the only airless moon in the Twelve Worlds, although there are many dome cities and habitats on the surface.

### Tycho

Tycho the second largest and most populous of all the Worlds with a population of 3.7 billion. Tycho also has a blue-silver atmosphere.

### Moebius

Moebius is the tenth World and third largest World. It has been known for centuries as the most just World of them all, placing a high value of law and order and is the origin of Sentinel.

### Ikon

Ikon is the eleventh World and most land is covered by hilly savannas and grasslands that are interspersed with small forests and jungles. The expansive grasslands are easily cultivated into farmland and Ikon is sometimes referred to as the breadbasket of the Twelve Worlds.

Ikon has one moon called Monad. Monad is the most populous moon in the Twelve Worlds.

### Alkar

Alkar is the twelfth World and is the hottest most arid of all the Worlds. Only 58.2 % of its surface covered by water, and most landmasses are covered in desert or hot arid shrubland. Although the geopolitical environment of the Twelve Worlds is constantly changing, most scholars consider Alkar to be the most militarily powerful World, although the militaries of Alkar spend most of their time fighting each other.

### Minor Worlds

There are Seven minor worlds orbiting Kolossal. These minor worlds are too small to be considered planets or worlds, but too large to be considered asteroids. Due to their low mass, they are pushed and pulled by gradational and electromagnetic forces, making their orbits extremely erratic.

1.     Madrasa – The most populous of the minor worlds.

2.     Skjorndral- The largest of the minor worlds with a surface area of 22 million sq.km

3.     Petaline – A minor world at the center of the asteroid cluster Garden, orbiting above/zenith Kolossal. From the surface, hundreds of asteroids are visible floating in space night and day.

4.     Draeton ― An airless, rocky minor world with substantial mining value.

5.     Gamada ― A minor world covered in small lakes and forests and is considered one of the most beautiful places in the Twelve Worlds.

6.     Vyntra - also known as Inferno or fireball, is a superhot minor world with an average surface temperature of over 400°. Most life and human settlements are underground, in naturally occurring caves or pit habitats.

7.     Falgar – An ice planet with a thin atmosphere of nitrogen and methane.

### The Asteroid Ring

The Asteroid Ring is a ring of large asteroids that encircle the Twelve Worlds and marks the limit of the Twelve Worlds. The Asteroid Ring is over two million kilometers thick and five million kilometers high. There are estimated to be more than a five hundred million asteroids in the ring, over a hundred million of them are estimated to be over five kilometers long and mass greater than one million tons.

Although it is considered a ring, the asteroids surround Kolossal completely, but are just denser at the equator of the gas giant, forming a ring like structure around Kolossal.

These asteroids often shoot through the Twelve Worlds, being pulled by passing Worlds or pushed by solar winds. Most of these asteroids crash into the atmosphere’s of the Worlds, doing little harm.

After space travel was invented, the Asteroid Ring started to be colonized.

### Dekker-Viggo Radiation Belt

Beyond the Asteroid Ring is the Dekker-Viggo Radiation belt. The radiation belt is actually the magnetosphere of Kolossal and completely encapsulates the gas giant. The radiation from the magnetosphere is so powerful that no living thing can pass through it and live. Because of this, even though the people of the Twelve Worlds can travel through space to other Worlds, no one has ever been able to leave the Twelve Worlds Satellite System via spaceship. The only way to get in or out of the Twelve Worlds is via Stargate (although, no one knows who made the stargates or how and travel through them is severely limited).