Azurullya

Íá! Xenscara! Azure are her waves, scalding are her stars! The fringes, the deep, the crimson and the blue!
Aau! Charybdis! Chaos takes his place, hides where bounty lives! The glory, the struggle, the ship-flares burn anew!
Rrhlayh! Qhaanlokh! The sky torn with its fabric, harboring evil! The flying tents, the demon-speakers, the world is under siege!
Ayah, Azurullya. Unholy as it was, astray now it shan't go. The temples, our God, in chains this realm is freed.

Azurullya is Cosmoria's largest and furthest satellite, a galaxy in its own right with enough stars to rival an arm of its parent. Home to three native species and a selection of those descended from an ancient Aylathiyan exodus, the region has a turbulent history of collaboration, warfare, magic, technology, and theopolitics. It is currently under the total control of the Theocracy of Silverstar, the single largest civilization in the modern universe.

Roughly the same size as Florathel's Tchernaya and any of Aylathiya's major spirals, Azurullya is one of the denser regions in terms of star count per area. It is also the youngest proper region of Cosmoria, only forming about 3.3 billion years ago.

Aberrance

Azurullya's greatest constant that separates it from Cosmoria proper is Aberrance, a catch-all term for objects, locations, and people that seem to defy known physics. While broadly classed as sustained noospheric disturbances, the scale of many of the more well-known Aberrations is unique to Azurullya.

Aberrance shapes much of life in Azurullya, particularly in regards to system formation, habitability, and technologies both utilizing and countering their effects.

Hypertryptine Abundance

Element 129, the mythride known as hypertryptine, is just about the rarest substance in mainspace Cosmoria. While it is one of the more stable mythrides, the only processes to create it are beta decay of tairanium (Tm) or electron capture in eestium (Ee), both of which are much more difficult to cause than other forms of decay. Alpha decay of perditium (Pe) would theoretically be viable, but its specialized omicron decay and microscopic half-life makes production nigh-impossible.

Azurullya, in contrast to the natural universe, is awash in hypertryptine. Its properties are not only testable, but usable for commercial and industrial processes. In such vast quantities, the bulk of elemental hypertryptine is contained in the cores of the galaxy's stars. Hypertryptine's inverse-thaumic refraction of energy distorts spacetime around itself, and in the million-degree boilers at the center of stars, it has the net effect of extending those stars' lifespans.

Save Rhen and Dexotrau, which had the lowest Ht-content in their formation and have reached the end of their natural lifespans, all of Azurullya's stars can be projected to burn for the time of a star two stellar spectra below themselves. Unistus, an A-class star, is expected to burn for the same time as a mid-G star would. The exception to this is Tryptan, which has absorbed enough hypertryptine to fully alter its hue and has time dilation on par with black holes.

Torratolys Shards

The Torratolys was formerly a Sphaera-class Aberration, a comet that reshaped terrain and biota it encountered seemingly at random. The extent of its work is unknown, but it likely had very few instances of its terraforming before colliding with the planet Entroph. The Torratolys shattered in its atmosphere, and now strewn across the planet are the remnant shards.

Each shard of the Torratolys carries a more specialized "ideal state", though whether this manifests as an organic biome or an inorganic alteration of climate and terrain varies. The ways in which they can change Entroph's local climate are extremely limited per shard, but collectively the power of the Torratolys would be endless.

Dexotrau's Infinite Starquake

The star Dexotrau has some level of inherent Aberrance to it, though this only became apparent upon the star's death. Among the highest mass stars in Azurullya, Dexotrau received very little hypertryptine during the system's formation. Its red giant phase brought its system nearly to ruin, though it did not last for long.

Upon supernova, or what would become its supernova, Dexotrau froze on a macroscopic scale. The shockwave reached the orbit of Grakkal before ceasing, the star torn like a bubble mid-popping. The sound still rings out when entering the sphere where it stopped, and the planets that were broken refuse to reform. Its Aberrance is a strange sort of time-locking, where greater events never seem to finish, but smaller scale motions like orbits and rotations remain untouched.

Singularity Complex

The Singularity Complex is an Aberrant structure, likely made by the Womb of Chaos, that makes the Perdition system extremely valuable. Placed in orbit of the moon Coboll, it originally orbited Pherran with a self-righting trajectory. Under the right conditions and trajectory through it, the Complex resonates spatially and forms a wavelike distortion in spacetime, launching it out of the ring forward until it dissipates. Ships tuned to the resonance of the wakes can "catch" them and be propelled faster than engines would normally allow.

Accessing the Singularity Complex internally and taking control of its functions was the technological hurdle passed by the Xherari when they first took to the stars. Its usage since has made Perdition the definitive hub for transport of all sorts of goods, as a trip from the system is significantly shorter by virtue of the Singularity Complex's distortions.

Estrebyss

Estrebyss, were it just regular matter and not an Aberration, would likely be a red dwarf star. Its creation process is abnormal even for Aberrations, too large to have been made by the Womb of Chaos. Likely made directly by Azurade as an experiment, it now stands as another dangerous object too large to do much about.

Womb of Chaos

The creator of most other Aberrations, made directly by Azurade Herself alongside Aurumios Laeschaude. Meant to embody creation, it connected to Azurade's vast mind and facilitated the pulling of obscure ideals into the physical universe. Azurade neglected it for a long time, but a collision with a wandering rogue world seemed to "wake up" the remnant thought energy that had collected in it, prompting the inconsistent creation of "ideas" as new Aberrations released into its immediate vicinity. The Womb of Chaos is similar in appearance to a small azure star, and its incalculable positive and negative value has given the question of whether to throw it into Aurumios an indefinite delay.

Deagami Nebulis/Cerulean Kings

A series of seven Esoteria given sentience and formed into powerful Spirits by Azurade. Their bridges to the physical universe gave them diffuse nebulaform bodies, which inflicted their plane's concept upon all that remained within. Their presence has significantly impacted several key systems, most notably the unshakeable worlds of Rhen and the bizarre geology of Sperxai's worlds. In the 8900s, Moonmoon led a campaign to condense and collect the Deagami Nebulis into a more condensed form, allowing them to actually act on the universe. The individuals who were once these aberrant Esoteria are now known as the Cerulean Kings, one of whom is the god-icon of Alecisism.

Historically, almost every star in Azurullya has passed through at least one of the Deagami Nebulis at some point. While some of their effects have been minimal, the accumulation of these transits is a likely cause for some of the non-Aberrant anomalies in orbital, rotational, or compositional data of the systems.

Xeo Raqovia

Xeo Raqovia is an Aberration classed under the Sapprensa category, for those few Aberrations with a definite intelligence and will of their own beyond basic functioning. This clade includes the Cerulean Kings. Xeo Raqovia itself is a particularly willful one, having been a prominent figure in Xherari history and religion for many centuries before the arrival of the Aylathiyans during their great Exodus. It is currently a semi-political figure, granted joint standing with its chosen Avatar of the Machine as a necessary component of the Theocracy's scientific sector.

Xeo Raqovia despises Moonmoon and the state of Azurullya. Having personally witnessed dozens of planetary-scale battles and the deaths of billions, it is one of the few individuals long-lived enough to see through the carefully plotted utopic complacency Moonmoon has planted in the people of the galaxy. However, unable to truly act on its own besides the choosing of an Avatar who can rarely hear its thoughts, it has been unable to take action.

Governance

Azurullya as a region has been contiguous in its governance since the 6800s, and remained continuous as a united state up until the localist Duchy movement of the 8900s. It is definitively the largest modern empire in the universe, containing more stars than the Triumvirate Civilization did at the peak of their expansion.

Theocracy

Azurullya's government is the Theocracy of Silverstar, an Alecisist monarchic theocracy controlled primarily by the Empire Priest Moonmoon. As the name and titles suggest, transparency about their methods is important to the state as a priming sort of anti-propaganda. The core tenets of the Theocracy's law are bound to the core philosophies and compacts outlined in Alecisist doctrines. As a theocracy, the ToS requires Alecisism to be practiced by every one of its citizens. Though the faith is monolatric and some regional variation occurs, it is a necessary component of Azurulleyan life under Moonmoon.

Unorthodox expressions of Alecisist belief are permitted, as well as reverence of figures from former religions that have been syncretized and subsumed into the faith. However, the crime/sin of idolatry for elevating these figures to the same status as the Cerulean Kings is legally punished with extreme prejudice.

The organization of the government only loosely follows the organization of the church, with spiritual leaders often not the best candidates for managing logistics and politicians rarely being fit to serve as a religious authority. The most important "secular" branches of the Theocracy's government are related to information harvesting and propaganda drafts. Officially, they are public assessors and a press division, and even they do not see the truth of their role.

Moonmoon's millennia-long rule has been fueled and strengthened by his background in philosophy and rhetoric, as well as his ability to think of states and their publics in the long-term shifting battleground they are. The histories are taught from a semi-revisionist perspective, the speeches hide their truths with too-blatant honesty of other things, and the message of unity and peace and expansion and improvement is a binding force that subtly portrays all opposition to the theocratic government or faith in Alecis as promoting violence and decay.

The few times ambassadors from greater Cosmoria set foot in Azurullya, they have described the region as a settling horror, the government of the one-eyed king taking the eyes of his subjects and telling them they could simply never see. They describe communication with the Alecisist subjects as nigh-impossible, and Moonmoon's guard as ever-careful that they don't step too far off his path.

Divisional Powers

Since the 8900s, Azurullya's systems have been divided into seven regional Duchies, to allow more rapid action for governance within smaller regions. These duchies are under the supervision of a Cerulean King each, and their populations and relative powers vary wildly. A noted flaw with the duchy system is the failure to delegate rogue planets, which have a reputation for terrible living conditions and a statistical anomaly of rebel cells.

The Duchy of Ghesr-Ís is the duchy under the Duke Enveil Dreamhaze Azurade, and contains the systems Rredúl, Unistus, and Sperxai. With over seventy billion people in these systems, Ghesr-Ís is the most populous duchy, with potential to be the most politically powerful. The majority of its population is Ski'pec.

The Duchy of Rhinlak'kheim is the duchy under the Lord Pirithon Viritacloud Azurade, and is the smallest and only single-star duchy, limited to the Rhen system. Rhinlak'kheim accounts for only a third of a percent of Azurullya's total population, with less than sixty million residents. Still notable for the power harnessable from a neutron star and being the sole habitat of the Ryleiths, the duchy is one of the slowest-developing.

The Duchy of Aonticoros is the duchy under the Sovereign Valkar Nullheart Azurade, and contains the systems Promekea, Múkha, and Tryptan. Tryptan is a throwaway star deemed uninhabitable, but Valkar is charged with the occasional responsibility of monitoring its damned crew. Múkha, being a T-class brown dwarf, has a fairly low population, making Promekea the great majority of representation for Aonticoros. With over six billion people, this duchy accounts for about three and a half percent of Azurullya's population.

The Duchy of Yakhsmas-Ur is the duchy under Sir Crescepion Nightmarelunen Azurade, and contains the systems Dexotrau, Estrebyss, and Syythauíím. In a similar position to Aonticoros, Yakhsmas-Ur has an uninhabitable throwaway system and a T-class brown dwarf, though its most populous star is also troublesome. Dexotrau's system is heavily damaged and hard to inhabit, and so those under Crescepion's rule have worse living conditions on average than most. With about a hundred and twenty six million residents, Yakhsmas-Ur is the second smallest duchy and accounts for less than a percent of Azurullya's people.

The Duchy of Oh-Semashk is the duchy under the Lady Doheniski Wondertsuki Azurade, and contains the systems Hhassún, Aeris, and Perdition. Oh-Semashk is one of the most productive and developed duchies, though its population is only about twelve billion, almost seven percent of Azurullya's population. Much of the duchy's population is Xherari.

The Duchy of Lauga Vayn is the duchy under the Lady Haranae Auramest Azurade, and contains the systems Axilarys and Elkandor. Despite not containing any homeworlds, Lauga Vayn enjoys high productivity and a wealth of development, being the third most populous duchy in Azurullya. This duchy was chosen specifically not to include Perdition to complicate information and trade networks between prominent Xherari worlds. Lauga Vayn is notable for extensive study into thaumaturgy.

The Duchy of Hastaer-Elgh is the duchy under the God-Sovereign Silverstar Ravenfogg Azurade, and contains the ever-critical systems Gwerddon and Aurumios Laeschaude. Chosen for Silverstar's connection to the faith of the Theocracy and the systems that Emperor-Priest Moonmoon spends the most time in, Hastaer-Elgh contains most of the most prestigious institutions in the galaxy, and has a relatively cosmopolitan mix of species. With time and progress on the Aurumios Laeschaude terraforming process, it may one day outclass the other duchies by orders of magnitude, but it is currently the second most populous one with sixty six billion residents.

Astrography

Azurullya contains twenty-seven stars, arranged into a total of sixteen proper systems (Estrebyss excluded from this count, as it has no satellites).

Aeris

Aeris is a brown dwarf, though it is nearly hot and bright enough to be called a main sequence star. Its blood-red light shines on five planets, two of which have a landable surface. Datxha, the innermost planet, and Fetcya, the outermost, are relatively small but gaseous bodies that supply the system with various gaseous materials.

Aeris' system was initially looked past by the Ski'pec on their expansion across the galaxy, despite it being one of the few systems with cool enough bodies to support them. The Xherari, during their own interstellar golden age, saw the system as a new set of challenges to experiment with and counter. Tidally locked worlds and extreme day-length planets, the spectra and magnetic radiation of brown dwarfs, and the extreme cold of its worlds were all parameters that could inspire new technologies.

Currently, Aeris hosts the oldest of many habitat designs by the late Avatar Raeyo meant to make life on a world with conditions comparable to the most extreme polar climates of any world possible. Its population is majority Xherari and Ski'pec, with cohabitable cities separated into insulated atmospheric districts by temperature and composition.

Aurumios Laeschaude

Aurumios Laeschaude is the name for the system centered on Aurumios, Azurullya's central black hole. Around Aurumios are nine evenly-spaced and co-orbital stars, blue subdwarfs with high metal impurities in each. Their extreme luminosity and the gravitational drag of the system would make it an immense waste of anything but energy harvesting, were it not for the belts.

Coincidentally, or perhaps intentionally done at some point by Azurade before spaceflight was achieved in Azurullya, Aurumios Laeschaude hosts a system of ninety-six planets, arranged evenly into two belts. The planets are named for various minor figures in Aylathiya's history. The inner Hydric Belt has worlds all capable of supporting liquid water, should atmospheric modulation be applied. The outer Alkanic Belt's worlds are in the theoretical range for liquid ethane and methane to coexist, perfect for the Ski'pec. With such immense land value to be had, the system may one day be the most valuable in the galaxy.

The intense ionizing radiation from Aurumios Laeschaude, both stellar and from the accretion disk, poses the greatest threat to the system's few inhabitants. Orbital shielding, as well as absorptive haze layers being introduced to the atmospheres, are the main terraforming technologies needed to clear a planet for colonization. So far, only four planets have been successfully inhabited.

Axilarys

Axilarys is the prize jewel system of the Xherari, the system that kicked off their age of Aexan Charybdya and made their developments of large-scale hypertryptine technologies possible. Boasting seven planets, the majority of which are easily built upon with habitable accommodations, and a broad spectrum eminent of a G-type star, Axilarys' system has great potential for growth and development still, even after thousands of years of habitation.

Given this potential, it would be wrong to say Axilarys' history is entirely peaceful. It was the site of the first and the bloodiest conquests of the Theocracy of Silverstar, and for centuries at least one of its bodies was contested between Moonmoon's rule and the Axilaryn intermunicipal unions under Vuerraxhanti. The system spent decades recovering from war after it was finally acquired by the Theocracy.

The majority population of the system remains Xherari, but the aggregated Aylathiyan species rival their demographics together. Annwn, unofficial capital of the system, holds the greatest portion of its people. The planet was initially settled for ecological research, as its grounds were one of five planets in the galaxy to natively produce life through abiogenesis. Its biology has since integrated with the wider Pherranite-Aylathiyan spheres, and likewise been integrated into other Azurulleyan worlds.

Axilarys' major boon is its density of both raw hypertryptine and the infrastructure to mine and process it. This wealth of the mythride heavily contributed to its relative productivity and bargaining power, easily giving even one of its planets the same worth as the whole Hhassún system. Even though most of it had to be rebuilt at least once following Vuerraxhanti-Alecisist conflicts, the industry extends to just about every body orbiting the star.

Dexotrau

Dexotrau is a unique and unclassifiable star, in a transition state that otherwise lasts for too few seconds to have a name. Half-exploded and with a shredded balloon appearance, the star is simultaneously a red giant and a pulsar, centering the exotic system that orbits it. The permanent lock in this pre-supernova state is caused by its aberrance, the nature of which makes the Dexotrau system one of the most stable and predictable.

Despite the looming crimson radiation and the ghastly appearance of the star, its system of planets remains quite normal. The inner two planets have been somewhat fractured and now lie within an asteroid field known as the Carbon Ring, a boiling mess of carbonized debris. Its third through fifth planets are theoretically capable of being terraformed, though each of them have Aberration-related and natural troubles with doing so.

Dexotrau is an example of the deceptive simplicity of many Aberrations, as the mechanics of its Infinite Starquake have complex consistencies with regards to the matter orbiting it. The source of its aberrance, its effects on people, and any potential ways to harness its false-timelocked state are all still unknown and under study by anomalists.

Elkandor

Elkandor is Azurullya's wettest system, hosting three worlds with deep planetary oceans out of its total five. The star itself is one of Azurullya's most active, only outdone by the unfathomably flare-prone Promekea. Its original standing as a low-priority system for Xherari has since been elevated by the Theocracy's initiatives in Aurumios Laeschaude, another eternal frontier of development similar to Axilarys.

Many of Aurumios' planets in its inner belt are prime candidates for habitation, save for a lack of water. The overabundance of water in Elkandor's orbit gave the hellishly pressurized and mostly unsettlable worlds Ifraenn, Pheodonn, and Hjeter new value as resource deposits. As their oceans and excess atmospheres are drained over millennia, they will eventually become livable worlds similar to their neighboring planets, and in the process will make dozens of new worlds habitable around Aurumios. The attitude of frontiering, improving on the wastelands of both too little and too much water to gain access to new lands for exploitation, is prominent around Elkandor.

Elkandor's most populated planet, Arcvos, presents gravitational challenges for the Xherari who originally settled it. Aylathiyan diaspora species, particularly the Civese, find the planet's gravity much more sufficient. The system as a whole still has a strong Xherari presence, though their densest areas are on the lower-gravity world Samfis and the moon Phaexhos.

Estrebyss

Estrebyss is only marginally classified as a star. It is an Aberration of the Sphaera class, which includes other stars like Tryptan and Dexotrau, but unlike them it does not function as a star by way of nuclear fusion. Estrebyss has the mass of a small dim star like Elkandor, but emits wildly inconsistent and quickly changing spectra of radiation, usually an off-white from random frequencies but always containing levels of ionizing radiation beyond even Aurumios. Up-close study is impossible, as any instruments exposed enough to study the Aberration are inevitably destroyed.

Estrebyss has a loose oort cloud of irradiated matter, hovering just far enough that heavy duty starship radiation shielding is enough to harvest a small amount. Of the systems, it is by far the least productive.

Estrebyss' assignment to Crescepion Nightmarelunen Azurade as part of the Duchy of Yakhsmas-Ur would appear to be a punishment. It is the only star-like object in the galaxy with no satellites, and monitoring its output and potential danger to other systems is about the only engagement it gets within the politics of Azurullya.

Gwerddon

Gwerddon is an orange dwarf star, the calmer of Azurullya's two. Its three-planet system is the birthplace of the Theocracy of Silverstar, which has since claimed the entire galaxy for itself. As the current capital system of the Theocracy, it boasts a massive population centered on its main habitable world, Oaliun. The system itself is the closest to Azurullya's core, discounting Aurumios Laeschaude.

Oaliun's moon Hammurabi has a high population as well, followed closely by the moons of the outer planet Delos. The grandest temples to Silverstar and the core theological universities have been built on these moons, where lower gravity and more available space allow better construction opportunities. Many of these are personally visited by Moonmoon at various times of the year, with the Alecisist god and municipal ruler of Gwerddon also traveling.

Gwerddon's pre-Theocracy development was fledgling at best, an attempt by the Xherari in slower progress than their expansions through Promekea, Axilarys, and Elkandor. Their name for the star was Antiphoros, though it and all its planet names were supplanted by Azurulleyan-Aylathiyan proto-Laytongue when the Alecicists arrived and took up residence in the system.

Hhassún

Hhassún is a brown dwarf star, the third-dimmest stellar body in the galaxy. The system has a tough and thriving population of Ski'pec, being the site of their greatest technological achievement. The inner two planets, Rrotla and Rreikha, have been fully terraformed to temperatures and atmospheric/oceanic compositions similar to Smohera, their homeworld. Though the tidal locking and nonexistent tectonics of Rrotla give significant challenge, the planet's surface is widely inhabited. And as Rreikha's heavy ice caps and eight day long rotation period present powerfully challenging weather patterns, it too has vast populations.

The system itself has a wealth of resources, with the slow-cooked ices of its further planets being refinable into a plethora of organic compounds for soil production and biological industry. But Hhassún is a stable system, one not given the same opportunities for grown that Aeris has and outshined by the current value of Perdition. In the Duchy of Oh-Semashk, which contains the system, it is the most easily looked over.

Hhassún's exclusion is furthered by the species disparity between it and the other systems in its duchy. While Aeris and Perdition are dominated by high populations of Aylathiyan species and Xherari, Hhassún carries an almost entirely Ski'pec demographic. Its cultural relevance to their pre-Theocracy history is the only thing truly keeping the government's eye on them, as Oh-Semaskh's main purpose is to keep the Perditionite people loyal.

Múkha

Múkha is a brown dwarf, the second-dimmest star in the Galaxy, and Azurullya's darkest bastion of civilization. As the final site of Scenth Au'rrat's terraforming projects, it holds on to a flicker of civilization against the dominant ideals of the star being among the dregs of the universe. It is lucky to be under the unswerving management of Sovereign Valkar Nullheart, whose debilitating impartiality grants it equitable consideration to Promekea.

Múkha's planet Éikhopan is the only heavily populated body in the system, carrying over 90% of the system's total numbers. The planet itself is a cruel mirror to Hhassún's Rrotla, with tectonic activity scouring the lands and seas and its oceans fueling a powerful sunward storm. With most metal extraction efforts going into the support of what little population remains around the dim crimson glow of the star, its economy is very dependent on imports to make any significant changes.

One might look at Múkha's stability and see opportunity similar to Hhassún. Truthfully, the initial settlers must have seen the same. Its orbit would make it a wonderful transit hub, had the Xherari not made their system carry that role within two centuries of initial terraforming efforts. Its worlds could have been havens for Smoheran life, had Rredúl and Hhassún not already filled those niches with better prospects and more defensible positions. Múkha remains eternally the last, the least, and the forgotten among the tamed systems.

Perdition

Perdition, a bright white star slightly tinted by its hypertryptine and mythril impurities, is the home star to the Xherari and the second-closest star system to Azurullya's core. Despite the star itself having a high incidence of hypertryptine, the system beyond it is extremely poor in the mythride. The star's activity cycle is highly variable over a regular period of six years.

Perdition has three planets, only one of which has any significant habitation. Frauden, the innermost planet, is a helium-dominated hot small gas giant. Its counterpart, Nifleden, is a similarly poor gas giant, neither of which has major moons. Entroph, the middle planet, is the sole source of wealth and development. Its moon system, considered borderline Aberrant in its density and arrangement, has a vast collection of metals and unique environments. While unclear which of the bodies in the Entroph system initiated life first, the moons Pherran, Mahuerran, Aulotum, and Entroph itself share a common origin.

Perdition is riddled with Aberrations, hosting three of the most prominent ones in Azurullya's political environment: the Torratolys which shattered on Entroph's lands and tempted the power of instant terraformation, the Singularity Complex which makes the system the greatest gateway in the galaxy, and Xeo Raqovia, who represents the old rebellious contingent of Xherari culture and the greatest obstacle to Moonmoon's hold on the species.

Promekea

Promekea is the most active star in the galaxy, sending out erratic flares more often than even the flare star Elkandor. Despite this, it was one of the five systems in Azurullya to produce life, with a carbon-based biosphere originating on its planet Gladyrus. Despite its proximity to Sperxai and the side of Azurullya the Ski'pec explored, it remained uninhabited until the Xherari visited it during Aexan Charybdya. Its outermost and coldest planet Surymus remains much too hot for Ski'pec habitation.

Promekea's major planets Gladyrus and Mykenes collectively hold a majority of the system's population, with the former having a high contingent of Aylathiyans. The gravity on Gladyrus is uncomfortably high, which alongside initial Xherari developments gave the planet a fashion culture emphasizing bracing structures. Mykenes, contrasting this, has physiology-altering low gravity. The Mykenite Promekeans have spread their population to the many moons of the system, following old traditions brought over from Perdition.

The system as a whole is the most productive in its duchy, with plenty of room for diverse research and manufacturing jobs. With such a wide range of gravities matched only by Axilarys, specific studies into interplanetary comfort technologies makes up a large portion of the system's scientific lobby.

Rhen

Rhen is Azurullya's only properly dead star, a neutron star not held in infancy like Dexotrau. The system is technically a binary star system, with its largest satellite being the extremely dim early-Y brown dwarf P'hauthtos. P'hauthtos is generally classified as a planet, with Rhen's deep historical exposure to the plane Viritacloud giving its bodies unintuitive properties such as low-density stability and resistance to macro-scale forces.

Rhen is the home system of the Ryleiths, hailing from P'hauthtos' moon Rylehkastra. Their people have not developed technology capable of travel beyond the surface of their world, and have posed aggressive resistance to any efforts to establish rapport with their species. The system's "purpose" in the eyes of the Theocracy's government is the monitoring of the Ryleiths as they culturally and technologically evolve.

Rhen's system is the single system contained within the Duchy of Rhinlak'kheim, ruled over by the Cerulean King whose presence warped the system enough for it to survive the star's supernova two and a half billion years ago. It has some of the lowest populations in the galaxy, limited to sparse settlements on the system's icy moons and slow space-station development.

Rredúl

Rredúl was the second extra-Sperxaian system settled by the Ski'pec, the site of their first experiments with cooler stars for habitation. Hosting six planets, half of them being gas giants with sizeable moon systems, Rredúl should by all rights be one of the most developed Ski'pec systems in the entire galaxy. But several factors have prevented this immense sprawl. The terraformation of its innermost planet Slautyr has proven to be a psychological barrier to expanding through the rest of the system, and the violently inconsistent flares makes inhabiting airless worlds difficult at best and impossible at worst. The gravities of all moons but Hhokýn's Félfe are physiology-alteringly low.

The flares of Waitsyn and Baabul proved to be an insurmountable issue for the early efforts of the Scenth visionaries. Slautyr, the most populated planet in the system at over ten billion residents, is a hellishly harsh world due to botched terraforming. The other two terrestrial planets both have decent magnetospheres and more distance from the stars, but their robustness only works for large-scale habitation with the help of technology and reinforced domiciles. While technology has gotten better and most bodies have growing populations, the system remains one of the poorest by design.

Under the rulership of Enveil Dreamhaze Azurade, Rredúl has been slotted into the role of a "sacred failure", given esotericist sectary beliefs that their system is a site of great tribulation and past sins, the necessary sacrifice for the glory of Hhassún and Múkha, for the spread and expansion of the Ski'pec throughout the rest of Azurullya. These ideals, dangerous and yet not entirely forbidden, are the seeds of what Enveil hopes will be a cultural revolution amongst the Ski'pec.

The nobility of struggle and suffering remains a prominent trait amongst Rredúlite local cultures, with Slautyr being an almost venerated site in its testament to the challenge. Eternally too liveable to warrant fortified domes but too inhospitable to ever be truly settled on its surface, its lands are a site of pilgrimage for many Ski'pec of Ghesr-Ís seeking thaumic enlightenment.

Sperxai

Sperxai is the second-hottest main sequence star in Azurullya and the home system to the Ski'pec, the first Azurulleyan species to develop space travel. Once the definitive "Land of the Ski'pec", modern Sperxai has a thriving multi-species population. As a hotter star, its inner three planets are to hot to support liquid methane, a component of the mixed-solvent needed for Smoheran life to thrive. Some temperature-controlled outposts on Ferslarze and Maeghyrze exist, but the Ski'pec mostly remain in the outer reaches, including Smohera and its moons and the loose debris belt beyond it.

Sperxai has a medium density of hypertryptine, enough to jump-start the interstellar travel of the Ski'pec long before the Xherari and Ryleiths had figured out basic architecture. The star itself is likely to be the next of Azurullya's to die, only having about half a billion years left before leaving the main sequence.

Politically, Sperxai suffers from a complete assimilation of its identity into the Theocracy. Enveil's attempts at cultural revivals have been discouraged or outright resisted by the wider church authorities, and as Smohera is the host world of Azurullya's magus-factory university, the Grand Institute of Thaumic Dogma, its loyalty to Moonmoon is a high strategic priority.

Syythauíím

Syythauíím is the dimmest star in all Azurullya, except to the sore and sorry residents who would insist that P'hauthtos count itself as a star to cope with the night-dark days they must endure. Only three of its four planets have surfaces that can even be landed on, with its innermost Fiaante boiled into a lava world by its eccentric orbit. In the realm of gravity, its planets are at least close to Smohera's and Pherran's, though this is cold comfort against the unyielding gelidity of its failed core.

No terraforming effort will lend results. The projections for best-case scenarios on Elhhemor, the warmest of the icy spheres, would not be viable for even a slight subsolar region habitable to the Ski'pec. Regardless, the system has forty-two million residents of the least social, most spiteful, or most desperate inclinations. Their belligerence is barely acknowledged, elevating them slightly above the rogue planets of Azurullya in terms of relevance.

Their municipal Duke, Crescepion Nightmarelunen Azurade, has worked hard to find any economically viable use for the system. Cold-calculation and astronomical observation, two fringe fields in a computer-saturated and thoroughly explored region, are the only springs of usable data that can be sold as a lie of productivity.

Tryptan

Tryptan is not an Aberration by itself, but its density of absorbed hypertryptine gives it a constant aura similar to one, and thus it is placed in the Sphaera class of Aberrations alongside other bodies such as Dexotrau and Estrebyss. The star is dyed mint with the crystals boiling away at its core, and in consequence Tryptan is subject to extreme time dilation. Its sole planet, Herlacyning, experiences something near 1,400,000:1 time dilation from this, appearing to rotate once (from an outside frame of reference) every twenty-six hundred years. The star itself experiences an estimated factor of billions of times more dilation.

Tryptan has the lowest non-zero population of any system in Azurullya. With just over fifteen hundred people sent on the initial expedition crew to the system's planet, it is unlikely that they will be able to complete preparations and return for another few millennia. The messages to them about the time dilation were decrypted long ago, but they are still in the initial phase of time grief and panic expected of such a situation. It is the job of Valkar Nullheart Azurade to monitor their communications out to the wider galaxy.

Unistus

Unistus was the first and greatest colony of the Ski'pec beyond their own system, and remains the hottest main sequence star in the galaxy. Remarkably similar to Sperxai in both spectrum and stability, it was a prime candidate for the first projects of Scenth Au'rrat. the pride poured into the efforts to terraform Vaevus and Yurara resound through thousands of years of time, still giving them the title of the "garden worlds" of the species.

Unistus' history is one of uncompromising pride and love for their culture. Seeing themselves as the successors to the Pan-Smoheran emergent culture, they diverged from the localist remnants of Sperxai while still preserving a vast collection of their old traditions and stories. This strong sense of personal identity came into conflict with the syncretic poison of the early Theocracy, and the Unistii League was quick to announce its hostility towards them during the early expansions beyond Gwerddon. Amicable relations with the Xherari and the establishment of their colonies on Tahtmine was done primarily to resist the Aylathiyan expansion.

The star system was the very last to fall into the clutches of Moonmoon's faith and law, taken by a creeping Alecisist movement brought in by a few of the immigrated Xherari, which ultimately dissolved the staunchly anti-Theocracy Unistii League. In the modern day, they are the subjects of Enveil's most concentrated historical efforts, aimed to give the distant system a truly rejuvenated pre-Theocracy Ski'pec culture.

History

Creation

The creation of Azurullya was a move of calculated desperation by Azurade, done to avoid ruining greater Cosmoria any more than Her experiments already had. Using an immense amount of metapotential, She warped the dance of the Monad itself to bring forth a galaxy's worth of matter and ideals, set spinning around Her main creation: Aurumios, a parallel study and object to the first dead star, the black hole Obsidian. Her motions here set the celestial vapors spinning, beginning the cascade that would create the region's star systems.

The Womb of Chaos was made by Azurade to aid Her experimenting process, a fulcrum upon which She brought ousic ideals into the universe as new Aberrations, hypotheses for an "eternity formula".

Antiquity

The stars accumulated varying amounts of hypertryptine in their cores, extending their lifespans significantly at a proportionally little loss of time dilation on their surfaces. This was a much better deal then Azurade originally realized, as life would not need to directly stand on a star to benefit from its long-lived radiance.

Rhen, once a star hotter and more massive than even Unistus, absorbed very little hypertryptine, and underwent a supernova explosion over two billion years ago. The primitive single-celled life that existed on Rylehkastra at that point only withstood the blast with the aid of the Viritacloud's influence. Four other systems produced life as well, with Perdition's own spreading between the tight moon system of Entroph and Sperxai's having the most dissonant chemistry.

Around fifty million years ago, Dexotrau underwent its own supernova, locking itself into the Infinite Starquake state it remains in today. Had it not been stopped by its Aberration, it likely would have rendered much of Azurullya sterile.

Scenth Au'rrat

The Ski'pec of Smohera were the first of Azurullya's species to achieve sapience, personhood, and the technology needed for space travel. Their brief age of interlunar travel and inner-system exploration ended with hybrid thaumic-hypertryptine gravity engines, allowing much more efficient transit to other stars with a travel time of only a few months. This interstellar age coincided with a growing understanding of just how uninhabitable the galaxy was to them, with very few bodies having the narrow temperature range they needed for liquid solvents.

Scenth was a political ideology and loose terraformation movement, shortened from Scenathíír Anteth, which roughly translated to "Carve out a beachhead". The prevalence of this movement, initially focusing on Sperxai's sister-star Unistus, created a long period of system-wandering and terraforming efforts throughout the systems with bodies cold enough to be used. The brown dwarfs and the Rredúl system make up almost all of these efforts, with sparse imports to Rhen for the sake of changing Ekhnokastra being the only continually active remnant of Scenth Au'rrat in the modern day.

The period of interstellar travel fractured Ski'pec cultures back into localist populations, loosely-allied tribes and scientific or thaumic organizations that only resembled a cohesive structure. From the 3100s to the 5500s, the Ski'pec had total unrestricted access to the skies of Azurullya. But of course, as they mapped Aberrance and worked to expand their knowledge, a certain Aberration in a system the Ski'pec ignored was raising a species of its own to rival them.

Aexan Charybdya

The late 5400s saw the Xherari leave their home system for the first time, scrapping together the little hypertryptine they could into the engine for the V1 Pecyuos and sending it out to the Axilarys system. The return trip brought dozens of times the hypertryptine back to Pherran, which constituted more cargo missions. By the year 5500, Aexan Charybdya had begun; an age of exploration and frontiering by the second species to escape their atmosphere now rivaled the Ski'pec's own.

Axilarys, Dexotrau, Promekea, and more were directly searched through by the Xherari. They stuck mostly to the hotter planets, ones with liquid water on some of their bodies. Eventually the ship-flares and Aberrance and garbled messages caught by each others' instruments led the Xherari and Ski'pec to meeting, though, and under the diplomacy of the pioneering Avatar who had started the age, the two chartered the worlds of Azurullya between themselves.

Frost-line settlements were the first attempts at cohabitation, swiftly followed by the official aid routines to Aeris. Data was shared and official designations were decided between the Eka-Xenadin and Slitarú names for each object. Aexan Charybdya was not just about the Xherari's own expansion; it was the beginning of a framework for interspecies civilization throughout the galaxy.

Arrival of Aylathiyans

Following the Anthrovian Civil War and the declaration of Esoteric Magi as illegal on punishment of death, the Alecisist prophet Moonmoon led his faithful and many other thaumic esotericists out of Aylathiya to escape the Triumvirate's burgeoning military might. Their exodus destination was distant Azurullya, and settling was a game of tribulation and survival moreso than a peaceable movement. Many of the Aylathiyan magi had lived most of their lives oppressed or at war, and the fervor required to successfully break away from and escape the region did not make for a peaceful colony. In 6108 CE, they finally arrived in the azure galaxy.

Oaliun, then called Laiverran by the Xherari who chartered it, was the world the fleet landed on and settled. Their claiming of the planet, then the entire system was begrudgingly accepted by the polities controlling land claims, but the public opinion of the Alecicists started low and only continued to drop. Their culture became ever more homogenous, ever more closed off, and ever more dedicated to temples and philosophy and building, building, building to some end.

The Ski'pec had significantly less trouble with the newcomers, as their frost-line charter divides would not be affected by more species on the water side of it. In the beginning, they were willing to open up trade and development lines to worlds the Xherari had not capitalized on. Cultural tensions existed, of course, but the perceived divide of solvent and best-interest colonization prevented much political action on their front.

Pan-Azurulleya

The Theocracy had growing tensions with the Xherari across the galaxy, coming to a head when they began to send their own aid efforts to the development of Aeris' worlds. In the 6240s, accidents and suspected attacks on Alecisist resource ships and depots had scrap traced back to the moon Faestir. Enough identifying material was left in the shrapnel to deduce that the moon was harboring groups of anti-Aylathiyan extremists, and in response Moonmoon unleashed his growing military force on it. This first blitz killed millions of civilians and lay a Silverian claim on the body, rapidly followed by a similar conquest of the planet Eiddilwch in the same system. The brief Axilaryn-Silverian War raged for almost forty years, the Theocracy holding onto their claims and sowing Alecisist ideals in their people until Vuerraxhanti, the generalist Xherari authority, negotiated peace terms. Annwn, Axilarys' most valuable planet, was to be fully cleared of the Theocracy's people and the system locked into a non-aggression pact for fifty years. In exchange, they were officially ceded Faestir, Eiddilwch, and Dexotrau's planet Keriyal.

Their efforts to expand were highly diplomatic for the next few decades, focusing on the moons of the Ski'pec dominated systems Rredúl and Sperxai. Unistus began to drift politically from this movement at this time, their personal sympathies directed more towards the Xherari. Their foremost thinkers at the time placed little emphasis on political peacemaking, insisting instead that justice must be protected for their native Azurulleyan allies.

In 6325, the building Silverian military forces broke the Axilaryn peace treaty early and invaded the binary planets Gwaed and Tywod. Efforts to take Mykenes by soft-power also succeeded around this time, and they broke away from the rest of the system to support the Theocracy. Their breach of the treaty was immediately reprimanded, and for threat of being thrown out of Sperxai entirely the Alecisists were strongarmed into an indefinite non-aggression pact with the entire Axilarys system. A year later, Silverian population centers on Tahtmine were bombed from orbit and an exclusion pact was signed to allow them safe extraction from Unistus.

While the efforts to take Axilarys were successfully halted, the pattern of building tensions and cultural divides before attacking "terrorists" continued, building the Theocracy's territory until they had even standing with the other Azurulleyan nations. Their development opportunities came with preachers, and they always seemed to have an excuse for aggressions. Vuerraxhanti became more and more hostile to the Theocracy, to the point that they rarely needed to fabricate it anymore.

In 6456, the Tracta Argenta declared Sperxai a full ally to the Theocracy for a decade as a sign of goodwill. After a decade of uneventful but economically beneficial collaboration, the revisit of the charter unified the governments under a shared banner, briefly making the Diunity of Azure Magi.

The new Diunity claimed the low-population and Ski'pec systems, including Dexotrau, Tryptan, Rhen (save Rylehkastra, which still remains an exclusion zone), Dexotrau, Estrebyss, Syythauíím, and Rredúl. In only a few years, the Theocracy's sphere of influence covered half the galaxy, and Vuerraxhanti became desperate to seal an alliance against them. Throughout the 6490s, Elkandor's colonies joined the Diunity as well, having no interest in being invaded by two thirds of the galaxy against them. The Avatar of the Machine at the time failed to keep their pride in independence, and with the pressure of a rapidly accelerating warfront chose to pass on Xeo Raqovia to her student.

With the welcoming of the Xherari in Elkandor and Promekea who gave in to avoid more bloodshed, the shared Alecisist identity that had been planted took over and the Theocracy rebranded itself yet again. Few Xherari were magi, after all. And then Axilarys was garrisoned and bombed, Annwn held in place by an immense blockade that mirrored the Triumvirate garrisons on Aegyn that Moonmoon once resisted.

Campaigns through Promekea left Perdition alone in its ability to be the Xherari's uncontested space, though an alliance with the Unistii League against the growing Silverian authority briefly gave them security. Vuerraxhanti and the Unistii League collectively declared the Theocracy a foreign anti-Azurulleyan enemy state and opened whatever mutual aid to one another that they could.

The counterattack against the Annwn garrison failed spectacularly, leading to the bloodiest battle in the Theocracy's history. Three billion people perished in the resource wars and famines, the bombings and land invasions, before they finally gave in and were subsumed into the Theocracy's territory. Over the next century, territories held stable, a pattern that the historians and strategists knew made for Moonmoon's building of a new wave of invading forces. And in the 6640s, pressure on Perdition led to their surrender.

A mass exodus for Tahtmine gave Unistus its place as the final bastion of pre-Silverian cultures. Unistus fell as well, though through a slow decay and cultural exchange rather than open warfare. The Unistii League dissolved in 6769, and over the next few decades its fractured states became more and more Alecisist. In 6808, Rylehkastra alone was left without a Silverian presence, unilaterally valued as a non-interference study of a moon. They had expanded across all of Azurullya, and the galaxy now flew only one banner.

Pax Azurulleya

Two millennia of peace, rebuilding, development, and cultural drift followed, the systems no longer bound by their local governments and cultural divides. Alecisism reigned supreme, worship of other varieties subsumed as subordinate spirits to Silverstar. No wars raged within the galaxy at all, save for the few thousand-man squabbles between Ryleith troops.

Pax Azurulleya was a time of stagnation from some historians' perspectives, engineered as such to throw off the violent cultural shifts that were propagated by the church. Azurulleyan life in the 6800s and the 8800s changed immensely; new traditions of pilgrimage and resource exchange inspired by Alecisist ideas and myths emerged and became dominant practices, institutions for science and thaumaturgy and philosophy were intertwined irrevocably with religion, and Alecisist doctrine itself was continually updated with new publications from Moonmoon.

Formation of Duchies

The campaign to collapse the Deagami Nebulis to prevent them from harming more of Azurullya led to the unexpected liberation of the Cerulean Kings, including Silverstar, the prime deity of the galaxy's state religion. The 8900s had a brief period of tumult with the arrival of the gods of Alecisism and some of the old Ski'pec pagan religions. These incredibly powerful spirits required some sort of role to keep them in line, and so for their prevalence in the region's culture Moonmoon decided to formulate the Duchies.

Enveil Dreamhaze Azurade, having a collective memory of the millennia Moonmoon had washed under the rug with cultural reforms and propaganda, demanded first choice of systems in exchange for any sort of collaboration; the deal was later skinned as giving priority to the oldest of the Kings.

The duchy system injected some much-needed variety into the economy and culture of the Theocracy, with the different regions having much clearer goals of imports, exports, logistics and local identity. A few of the duchies have additional specialized duties known by their presiding Cerulean King, such as the monitoring of Tryptan's lost crew or the quelling of rebellious political attitudes.

Modern Life

Life in Azurullya is in some ways better than it ever has been. Total unity across the galaxy with free travel for all, the terrors of the Deagami Nebulis now refactored into reasonable people, and enough cohesive wealth and long-term goals to support billions of ambitious lives. But many systems still do struggle against their environments, and the cultures that existed before Alecisist movements supplanted all of them are actively suppressed.

For the natives, it may seem like an imperfect utopia struggling against nature and the free-roaming Aberrations, but it is a tightrope act of propaganda and public relations maintained by its priesthood to keep the people complacent. The local roles of the Cerulean Kings are an attempt to use them as pawns and keep their dangerous influence on tight leashes. The old pioneering spirit of unlocking unknown potential is gone, replaced instead by a bucket list of logistics problems that will be solved, eventually.

For foreigners, Azurullya is one of the worst places in the universe. One cannot so much as breathe without being scrutinized for heterodox thought, and the Aberrance present most everywhere weighs heavier on those not used to it. Distant, absurdly powerful, and controlled through invisible lines of rhetoric, the galaxy represents the past much more than the modern movements towards rule by the people: a true and unrivaled Overlord state.