Travels of Dr. Trench: Sakuyan
Dr Tamara Trench's Guide to the Realms and Peoples of the United Empire: The Preatorium of Sakuya-Hime
Founding of Sakuya-Hime and the Power of the MtM-Interface:
Ever since humanity first discovered them, diamonds have been a sign of wealth and prestige and not even FTL travel could carry humanity out of its love for the rocks. The mass-production of laboratory grown diamonds would sate much of the appetite, but this only meant that natural or "True Diamonds" became even more sought after by those who could afford them and no strain of diamond was as sought after as Pink Diamond.
Pink diamonds are the rarest of all diamond colours, to the extent that even the constant expansion of human space in the Age of Expansion could sate the need for natural pink diamonds, with only a handful of worlds being able to profitably support pink diamond mine operations.
One of these handful of worlds is Sakuya-Hime. When it was first discovered it was largely ignored, an extremely volcanically active planet, with a thick, toxic atmosphere which barely allowed any life to exist. But when a survey drone discovered a deposit of pink diamond, all such shortcomings could be forgiven.
The Kagoshima Mineral and Gemstone Corporation (KMGC) would establish a settlement to administer the mining and surveying operation and build several hundred bases across the planet to house the mining crews. But these mining crews wouldn't be the normal type, no, the environment was far too hostile for that, so in order to feed the eternal diamond hunger, cutting-edge tech was needed.
Enter the Mind to Machine Interface, a revolutionary piece of tech developed by the Empyrean Technologies Corporation, which allows the user to temporarily upload their minds to a mechanical body. Sakuya-Hime would be the testbed for the tech, its miners serving as lab rats.
While the tech would prove to have a slow yet steady decaying effect on the human mind, it was still effective in boosting productivity and lowering deaths to an acceptable amount, making it an undisputed success.
The Sakuyan people would suffer under both the boot of corporate rule and the deadly environment of their new home, yet would, like on all planets, manage to develop their own culture and customs. One difference with the Sakuyans however, is the divided way they walked.
The Sakuyans were never a single, unified group, split between City Sakuyans living in the planet's only city of Ninigi and Ashland Sakuyans living in the various mining bases, them, in turn divided based on whichever of the hundreds of bases they originated from. Still, even as the hostile atmosphere made for little contact between these groups, they managed to work together in relative harmony, the Ashland Sakuyans extracting and transporting the diamonds and the City Sakuyans shaping and exporting them.
Development of Sakuya-Hime and invention of the Volcano Wanderers:
Humanity's grasp over the galaxy grew even wider and its wealth grew ever greater. Pink diamonds flowed like a river out of Sakuya-Hime and into the wider galaxy. But more mines were needed to sate even a fraction of the demand.
The problem with expansion was that the largest deposits were found, not in the black mountains and ash deserts, but in the volcano lands, a place the robotic suits couldn't even traverse. But in the face of human ingenuity, nature would never prove an insurmountable obstacle. Once more, KMGC and Empyrean would work together, this time to design a new generation of MtM compatible robots. What they designed was the Volcano Wanderers.
Until this point, the mining robots used had been largely human in size and form, this having proven to reduce the mental decay MtM using humans experienced. For the Volcano Wanderers, this rule was thrown out in the name of efficiency. These new robotic bodies would be more like giant mechs, a horizontally long frame with long, flexible legs would allow for not only easy movement across the hostile planet, but their great size would even allow them to function as transport vehicles.
KMGC and Empyrean had once again brought about a breakthrough in human-centric machinery and an explosion in productivity followed, making the Volcano Wanderers design and implementation more than worth it.
The Volcano Wanderers proliferation across the planet's mining bases did however lead to an increase in cases of Machine Psychosis. Machine Psychosis was the name for the endpoint of mental decay that MtM workers experienced, in which an individual's mind couldn't handle changing between their human and robot body anymore, leading to erratic behaviour, organ failure and eventual death. The huge differences between the human body and the Volcano Walkers only sped up this process.
This proved especially bad for Ashland Sakuyan society, as the MtM workers were held in high regard and often served as community leaders. With their leaders more erratic and unstable than ever before, Ashland Sakuyan society as a whole grew more unstable and the transhumanist ideas so common among MtM workers grew more and more common.
But while the Ashland Sakuyans suffered through the last days of the Age of Expansion, the City Sakuyans thrived, as the productivity increase brought by the Volcano Wanderers brought about a golden age for the city. Ninigi became a regional trade centre, its finely crafted diamonds renowned across the galaxy
Troubles of Sakuya-Hime and the Hegemony of the MtM Interfaces:
The Age of Troubles was harsh for Sakuya-Hime. The destruction of KMGC during the Burning of Luyten and the takeover of Empyrean by the Kheproni left Sakuya-Hime without a suzerain, ripe for picking. Still, the planet wasn't defenceless. In the early days of the Age of Troubles, Ninigi had constructed impressive defences for the city, from shield arrays to massive land-to-space artillery.
So when the first enemy, the Nippan Federation, came to Sakuya-Hime, their first assault was completely crushed. The RenTech Corporate Dominion likewise tried attacking the city with its fleet and was likewise handed a crushing defeat.
But while the City Sakuyans fought for their new-found independence, change was stirring in the ashlands. The breakdown of interstellar trade meant a breakdown in the traditional Ashland Sakuyan way of life, in which diamonds were sold in exchange for basic necessities, such as food and water. It did not take many years until chaos and famine gripped the ashlands.
While there were attempts to restart trade with Ninigi and the wider galaxy, all but a handful of groups were turned away as the decline in trade left Ninigi similarly (but not as extremely) lacking in basic necessities.
Each mining base attempted to deal with this new age in different ways. Some resorted to cannibalism to stretch out their food stores, mass population cullings were not unheard off and other similarly brutal actions grew common. But a handful of bases walked a different road.
While inside of a Volcano Wanderer, the MtM worker didn't need to either eat, drink or sleep, meaning they could survive indefinitely in these harsh conditions. All the Wanderers needed was electricity for their batteries, but easily accessible geothermal energy made that a non-problem. The only problem was Machine Psychosis, but these bases all, independently of each other realised, if an MtM user simply didn't go back to their organic body, they wouldn't be afflicted by Machine Psychosis. It was a radical idea, to permanently abandon their human forms, but in these times it had to be done.
The first to do it were the regular MtM workers, the leaders of the bases. Their transformation allowed for these bases to further stretch their supplies, but everyone knew, as long as humans of flesh and blood remained, the stores would run out, sooner or later.
While the need to transition their populations into machine forms was obvious, no single base had enough Volcano Wanderers to outfit an entire base's population. So another hard decision was made, to go out and gather more Wanderer robots from other bases.
The Ashland Sakuyans who had transitioned ventured out into the ashlands to find more robots to be able to save their friends and families from starvation. Many bases had by now entirely died out, making the collection of their robots relatively easy. More desperate Sakuyans resorted to attacking other bases, stealing their Volcano Wanderers. As the first handful of bases carried out these kinds of expeditions, the concept of an entirely machine population as a way to survive spread. Soon more bases joined this giant competition for survival.
After this age of consolidation, known among the Sakuyans as "The Great Reduction", there remained only 82 Ashland Sakuyan societies left, they the only ones having managed to transition their entire populations.
At about the same time the Nippans returned to Sakuya-Hime, once more to try and the planet for themselves. This time however, they had a plan. While Ninigi was a formidable fortress for any enemy fleet, the Nippans would try to secretly land a small force in the ashlands, to attack the city from the ground, while their fleet attempted another landing.
This expeditionary force would find itself quickly reduced by the hostile environment, but did manage to survive, all thanks to the Ashland Sakuyans. When the Ashland Sakuyans were informed of the invaders mission, they surprised the Nippans by demanding to join in the attack on Ninigi. The Ashland Sakuyans had over the ages grown to despise their city-living cousins and wished to punish them by allying with the Nippans.
The Nippan force managed to organise a massive alliance of Ashlander clans (The Nippans called them clans due to the groups family structures and the name stuck around even after the Nippans left) in their assault on Ninigi, inflicting a decisive defeat on the City Sakuyans. In the aftermath the Nippans occupied the city, while also properly restarting the diamond trade which had been dormant for so long.
The Ashland Sakuyans forms were perfectly designed to harvest the pink diamonds and the Nippan Federation was large enough at the time to make for a suitably big market. So, in exchange for their loyalty and a restart of diamond mining, the Nippans gave the Ashland Sakuyans extensive autonomy and an equitable deal in the diamond trade.
This status quo would continue for the rest of the Age of Troubles. While the instability of the wider galaxy meant that the city would change hands, as regional polities rose and fell, the Ashland Sakuyans were largely isolated from such conflicts. Whoever wanted their share of the diamond trade had just to occupy Ninigi and make a deal with the clans, meaning that any loss of life fell on the City Sakuyans, something the Ashland Sakuyans were completely fine with.
The City Sakuyans as a culture would never really recover from their loss of independence. They would become second class citizens in their own city, slowly being replaced by citizens of whatever power happened to own the city at the time.
Unification of Sakuya-Hime and the Introduction of the SBTs:
When a previously unknown fleet entered the system, the Sakuyans could be forgiven for thinking it just another invasion fleet by some regional power. When the Stellarch's fleet arrived above Ninigi, they had merely threatened an invasion by their overwhelming fleet for the local leader to surrender the city. The Stellarch could have stopped there, like so many before, but they instead decided to descend to the planet and journey into the Ashlands.
The Ashland Sakuyan clans had continued living separately in their clans, only gathering together in temporary alliances when the time called for it. But the Stellarch wished to unify the Ashland Sakuyans like they had unified so much of humanity already, but whenever the Stellarch met with any of the clan chiefs (known as Uji) and told them of their wish, the Uji all asked the same question, why would they agree to it? And to these merchants of the Ashland the Stellarch had one offer which they could not refuse.
The Ashland Sakuyans had, ever since the Great Reduction, been a purely mechanical people, without the ability to reproduce and while their bodies made them ageless and hard to kill, their population did still shrink and they had no way of making children.
So to solve this, the Stellarch offered to give them the knowledge of the Standard Biological Templates(1), a cloning technology which could produce entirely new life, in exchange for them uniting under one leader, appointed by the Stellarch. With the potential that the SBTs represented, the Ashlanders agreed. Using the SBTs the Ashland Sakuyans were able to build cloning vats in their bases, growing humans who could then be uploaded into newly built Volcano Wanderers.
The Ashland Sakuyans had long since moved away from any desire to return to bodies of flesh and blood, having come to see their mechanical bodies as almost divine manifestations of mankind's ingenuity and willpower. But until the Stellarch gave them this final tool by which they could become a complete society, they had been in a slow decay.
With joy in their (figurative) hearts, all 82 Uji of the Ashland Sakuyans swore undying loyalty to the Stellarch. From among these 82, the Stellarch elevated one to become Praetor of Sakuya-Hime, the Stellarch's representative on the ashen planet.
"Dear Diary, I cannot wait to get off this bloody planet.
I do not mean to imply that the people were in any way unkind or that I didn't enjoy learning of the Sakuyans history and culture, but the planet is far too warm for anyone to be truly comfortable.
Well, let's begin the story somewhere fitting, how about the beginning?
I arrived to Sakuya-Hime five days ago. To be specific, I arrived to Ninigi, the planet's only city and spaceport. It's not an especially beautiful city, since it is constantly covered in several layers of ash and dust, making the city a landscape of greys and blacks. Quite fitting seeing as the surrounding ash desert is about the same colour.
But not everything in Ninigi was bad. My contact and host on Sakuya-Hima was one Director Hannah M. Howard, one of my fellow countrymen. We both left our home planet to travel the galaxy, me to write the book you're currently reading, she to participate in the galactic diamond trade.
It felt like meeting family and we got along very well. The food I was served tasted as if it was cooked by my own cooks back home. For such a small city, Ninigi is very diverse, meaning the access to ingredients even from my distant homeland was easily available.
I spent two days at her townhouse, learning the history of the city from her and several of her staff, who were native Sakuyans (Specifically City-Sakuyans. If you've read the chapter this excerpt should be placed below, you can probably guess why the distinction is so important to them). I didn't venture outside as much as I might have wished, the climate truly is horrible and the climate suits you need to use are a hassle to get in and out of.
On my third day I began my journey into the Ashlands. A clan of Ashland Sakuyans had arrived to sell their goods in the city and were gracious enough to allow me to travel with them (for only a small fee, which was well worth it).
I travelled in a sealed container made specifically to allow the Ashlanders to carry us smaller humans around, it even had windows, though I will admit that the environment was kinda repetitive. (2)
We finally arrived at one of their bases. It was way bigger than what I assumed a mining base would have been, though in hindsight it feels quite obvious. The Volcano Wanderers aren't small and the bases have probably been expanded to fit them all.
One thing I found even more surprising though was that there were a few flesh and blood humans walking around too. Apparently the Ashland Sakuyans reproduce via cloning. When someone wants to have a child or the clan just needs more people, they purchase biological material (usually blood) from one of a handful of specialists in Ninigi, slot it into the material into a cloning vat and then wait until the kid is finished.
The children are kept flesh and blood until they're about 15 years old, which is when they are uploaded into a Volcano Wanderer. It's an interesting society and it was even more interesting to live with them for a couple of days. The children asked me a bunch of questions about life outside of the bases. One child even asked why I haven't gone into a robot seeing as I'm so old (one of the adults, who I assumed to be one of the child's parents scolded him for that and told him to apologise. It was a weird yet kinda cute exchange). I did also get the chance to ask my own questions and I learnt a lot about the history of the Ashlands and the Ashland Sakuyans, both from oral stories and from their massive collection of documents (they take preserving their history very seriously).
On the third day I was escorted back to Ninigi, but not before I bought a souvenir. Sakuya-Himan Pink Diamonds are renowned across the United Empire and really bloody expensive. I should know, I own several pieces of jewellery with such diamonds. But anyhow, I had the honour of buying a couple of raw uncut pink diamonds directly from the Sakuyan who mined it. It wasn't cheap, but I didn't regret buying them for even a second.
Anyhow, when I got back to Ninigi, I spent one last night with Director Howard. During the goodbye dinner I gifted her one of the diamonds I had bought as thanks for her hospitality (She made a joke about us "not being that close"... I definitely didn't find it funny).
The next day I got on the ship and am currently procrastinating organising my scientific notes, while on the way to the next system."
-Excerpt from the Personal Diary of Dr Tamara Trench
Footnotes:
(1) The Stellarch had before their arrival to Sakuya-Hime, met and integrated the United Kingdoms of Hallon, who are the original developers of the Standard Biological Templates. They had provided the Stellarch the schematics for the SBT vats and its associated technology.
(2) I learnt from Director Howard that I wasn't the first non-Ashlander to visit one of the Ashland bases, though most people who visit are merchants or lapidarists.
I actually managed to get this out before midnight, which is neat. Hyperfixations are great!
Another exotic planet and people Tamara has visited, though probably not one she plans on visiting again anytime soon, even if the diamonds are very nice.
We also learn some more about the author, like the fact the good doctor isn't exactly strapped for cash.
Speaking of diamonds, I do wonder how much of the House Iris Separatists GDP goes to just buying Sakuya-Hime diamonds. It's a luxury and a damn good looking one at that.
Next chapter will probably be Khepron. I've mentioned it several times and have some plans for it already (like hot AI women), though I probably not have it out tomorrow. I've been writing a lot these last few days and I don't know when the muses will decide to punish me for my hubris.
Anyhow, cheers to Dr Trench and her mission to bankrupt the galaxy's students by forcing them to buy the latest edition of her book, EVERY. YEAR.
Edit: Btw, if you wanna get an rough understanding on how the Volcano Wanderers look, google "robot police dogs". They look a bit like that, except with more flexible joints and an actual head.
/Royalist
-[X] [Primary Technology] Robotic Form. The body is but a machine using biology, meaning that a machine of mathematics is can only be superior in comparison.
--[X] Form extended. Linking flesh to machine until they are one and the same means that one could replace almost all of themselves, at which point one must ask if they are still them.
-[X] [Technology] Mech Walker. The stars are filled with a variety of terrain not conducive to mere treads and wheels, in which case the walker becomes a preferred vehicle.
--[X] Terrain freedom. The walker has evolved to the most extreme conditions, even including the vacuum of space itself, reaching extreme speeds through a variety of means.
-[X] [Technology] Clone Experts. From artificial growth vats comes more life, refined and optimized in a way that cannot be found through natural biology.
--[X] Life anew. The vats are artificial wombs in which genetic material is remixed to bring about wholly new life, one that varies from the donors.
-[X] [Pillar] Merchant Guilds. Exchanging goods and services is sacred to the people, and those who dare seek grand profit in the vastness of the stars revered appropriately.
-[X] [Pillar] Machine Cult. The purity of the machine shall stand when the temple of flesh fails, for it is divine.
--[X] Form extended. Linking flesh to machine until they are one and the same means that one could replace almost all of themselves, at which point one must ask if they are still them.
-[X] [Technology] Mech Walker. The stars are filled with a variety of terrain not conducive to mere treads and wheels, in which case the walker becomes a preferred vehicle.
--[X] Terrain freedom. The walker has evolved to the most extreme conditions, even including the vacuum of space itself, reaching extreme speeds through a variety of means.
-[X] [Technology] Clone Experts. From artificial growth vats comes more life, refined and optimized in a way that cannot be found through natural biology.
--[X] Life anew. The vats are artificial wombs in which genetic material is remixed to bring about wholly new life, one that varies from the donors.
-[X] [Pillar] Merchant Guilds. Exchanging goods and services is sacred to the people, and those who dare seek grand profit in the vastness of the stars revered appropriately.
-[X] [Pillar] Machine Cult. The purity of the machine shall stand when the temple of flesh fails, for it is divine.
Founding of Sakuya-Hime and the Power of the MtM-Interface:
Ever since humanity first discovered them, diamonds have been a sign of wealth and prestige and not even FTL travel could carry humanity out of its love for the rocks. The mass-production of laboratory grown diamonds would sate much of the appetite, but this only meant that natural or "True Diamonds" became even more sought after by those who could afford them and no strain of diamond was as sought after as Pink Diamond.
Pink diamonds are the rarest of all diamond colours, to the extent that even the constant expansion of human space in the Age of Expansion could sate the need for natural pink diamonds, with only a handful of worlds being able to profitably support pink diamond mine operations.
One of these handful of worlds is Sakuya-Hime. When it was first discovered it was largely ignored, an extremely volcanically active planet, with a thick, toxic atmosphere which barely allowed any life to exist. But when a survey drone discovered a deposit of pink diamond, all such shortcomings could be forgiven.
The Kagoshima Mineral and Gemstone Corporation (KMGC) would establish a settlement to administer the mining and surveying operation and build several hundred bases across the planet to house the mining crews. But these mining crews wouldn't be the normal type, no, the environment was far too hostile for that, so in order to feed the eternal diamond hunger, cutting-edge tech was needed.
Enter the Mind to Machine Interface, a revolutionary piece of tech developed by the Empyrean Technologies Corporation, which allows the user to temporarily upload their minds to a mechanical body. Sakuya-Hime would be the testbed for the tech, its miners serving as lab rats.
While the tech would prove to have a slow yet steady decaying effect on the human mind, it was still effective in boosting productivity and lowering deaths to an acceptable amount, making it an undisputed success.
The Sakuyan people would suffer under both the boot of corporate rule and the deadly environment of their new home, yet would, like on all planets, manage to develop their own culture and customs. One difference with the Sakuyans however, is the divided way they walked.
The Sakuyans were never a single, unified group, split between City Sakuyans living in the planet's only city of Ninigi and Ashland Sakuyans living in the various mining bases, them, in turn divided based on whichever of the hundreds of bases they originated from. Still, even as the hostile atmosphere made for little contact between these groups, they managed to work together in relative harmony, the Ashland Sakuyans extracting and transporting the diamonds and the City Sakuyans shaping and exporting them.
Development of Sakuya-Hime and invention of the Volcano Wanderers:
Humanity's grasp over the galaxy grew even wider and its wealth grew ever greater. Pink diamonds flowed like a river out of Sakuya-Hime and into the wider galaxy. But more mines were needed to sate even a fraction of the demand.
The problem with expansion was that the largest deposits were found, not in the black mountains and ash deserts, but in the volcano lands, a place the robotic suits couldn't even traverse. But in the face of human ingenuity, nature would never prove an insurmountable obstacle. Once more, KMGC and Empyrean would work together, this time to design a new generation of MtM compatible robots. What they designed was the Volcano Wanderers.
Until this point, the mining robots used had been largely human in size and form, this having proven to reduce the mental decay MtM using humans experienced. For the Volcano Wanderers, this rule was thrown out in the name of efficiency. These new robotic bodies would be more like giant mechs, a horizontally long frame with long, flexible legs would allow for not only easy movement across the hostile planet, but their great size would even allow them to function as transport vehicles.
KMGC and Empyrean had once again brought about a breakthrough in human-centric machinery and an explosion in productivity followed, making the Volcano Wanderers design and implementation more than worth it.
The Volcano Wanderers proliferation across the planet's mining bases did however lead to an increase in cases of Machine Psychosis. Machine Psychosis was the name for the endpoint of mental decay that MtM workers experienced, in which an individual's mind couldn't handle changing between their human and robot body anymore, leading to erratic behaviour, organ failure and eventual death. The huge differences between the human body and the Volcano Walkers only sped up this process.
This proved especially bad for Ashland Sakuyan society, as the MtM workers were held in high regard and often served as community leaders. With their leaders more erratic and unstable than ever before, Ashland Sakuyan society as a whole grew more unstable and the transhumanist ideas so common among MtM workers grew more and more common.
But while the Ashland Sakuyans suffered through the last days of the Age of Expansion, the City Sakuyans thrived, as the productivity increase brought by the Volcano Wanderers brought about a golden age for the city. Ninigi became a regional trade centre, its finely crafted diamonds renowned across the galaxy
Troubles of Sakuya-Hime and the Hegemony of the MtM Interfaces:
The Age of Troubles was harsh for Sakuya-Hime. The destruction of KMGC during the Burning of Luyten and the takeover of Empyrean by the Kheproni left Sakuya-Hime without a suzerain, ripe for picking. Still, the planet wasn't defenceless. In the early days of the Age of Troubles, Ninigi had constructed impressive defences for the city, from shield arrays to massive land-to-space artillery.
So when the first enemy, the Nippan Federation, came to Sakuya-Hime, their first assault was completely crushed. The RenTech Corporate Dominion likewise tried attacking the city with its fleet and was likewise handed a crushing defeat.
But while the City Sakuyans fought for their new-found independence, change was stirring in the ashlands. The breakdown of interstellar trade meant a breakdown in the traditional Ashland Sakuyan way of life, in which diamonds were sold in exchange for basic necessities, such as food and water. It did not take many years until chaos and famine gripped the ashlands.
While there were attempts to restart trade with Ninigi and the wider galaxy, all but a handful of groups were turned away as the decline in trade left Ninigi similarly (but not as extremely) lacking in basic necessities.
Each mining base attempted to deal with this new age in different ways. Some resorted to cannibalism to stretch out their food stores, mass population cullings were not unheard off and other similarly brutal actions grew common. But a handful of bases walked a different road.
While inside of a Volcano Wanderer, the MtM worker didn't need to either eat, drink or sleep, meaning they could survive indefinitely in these harsh conditions. All the Wanderers needed was electricity for their batteries, but easily accessible geothermal energy made that a non-problem. The only problem was Machine Psychosis, but these bases all, independently of each other realised, if an MtM user simply didn't go back to their organic body, they wouldn't be afflicted by Machine Psychosis. It was a radical idea, to permanently abandon their human forms, but in these times it had to be done.
The first to do it were the regular MtM workers, the leaders of the bases. Their transformation allowed for these bases to further stretch their supplies, but everyone knew, as long as humans of flesh and blood remained, the stores would run out, sooner or later.
While the need to transition their populations into machine forms was obvious, no single base had enough Volcano Wanderers to outfit an entire base's population. So another hard decision was made, to go out and gather more Wanderer robots from other bases.
The Ashland Sakuyans who had transitioned ventured out into the ashlands to find more robots to be able to save their friends and families from starvation. Many bases had by now entirely died out, making the collection of their robots relatively easy. More desperate Sakuyans resorted to attacking other bases, stealing their Volcano Wanderers. As the first handful of bases carried out these kinds of expeditions, the concept of an entirely machine population as a way to survive spread. Soon more bases joined this giant competition for survival.
After this age of consolidation, known among the Sakuyans as "The Great Reduction", there remained only 82 Ashland Sakuyan societies left, they the only ones having managed to transition their entire populations.
At about the same time the Nippans returned to Sakuya-Hime, once more to try and the planet for themselves. This time however, they had a plan. While Ninigi was a formidable fortress for any enemy fleet, the Nippans would try to secretly land a small force in the ashlands, to attack the city from the ground, while their fleet attempted another landing.
This expeditionary force would find itself quickly reduced by the hostile environment, but did manage to survive, all thanks to the Ashland Sakuyans. When the Ashland Sakuyans were informed of the invaders mission, they surprised the Nippans by demanding to join in the attack on Ninigi. The Ashland Sakuyans had over the ages grown to despise their city-living cousins and wished to punish them by allying with the Nippans.
The Nippan force managed to organise a massive alliance of Ashlander clans (The Nippans called them clans due to the groups family structures and the name stuck around even after the Nippans left) in their assault on Ninigi, inflicting a decisive defeat on the City Sakuyans. In the aftermath the Nippans occupied the city, while also properly restarting the diamond trade which had been dormant for so long.
The Ashland Sakuyans forms were perfectly designed to harvest the pink diamonds and the Nippan Federation was large enough at the time to make for a suitably big market. So, in exchange for their loyalty and a restart of diamond mining, the Nippans gave the Ashland Sakuyans extensive autonomy and an equitable deal in the diamond trade.
This status quo would continue for the rest of the Age of Troubles. While the instability of the wider galaxy meant that the city would change hands, as regional polities rose and fell, the Ashland Sakuyans were largely isolated from such conflicts. Whoever wanted their share of the diamond trade had just to occupy Ninigi and make a deal with the clans, meaning that any loss of life fell on the City Sakuyans, something the Ashland Sakuyans were completely fine with.
The City Sakuyans as a culture would never really recover from their loss of independence. They would become second class citizens in their own city, slowly being replaced by citizens of whatever power happened to own the city at the time.
Unification of Sakuya-Hime and the Introduction of the SBTs:
When a previously unknown fleet entered the system, the Sakuyans could be forgiven for thinking it just another invasion fleet by some regional power. When the Stellarch's fleet arrived above Ninigi, they had merely threatened an invasion by their overwhelming fleet for the local leader to surrender the city. The Stellarch could have stopped there, like so many before, but they instead decided to descend to the planet and journey into the Ashlands.
The Ashland Sakuyan clans had continued living separately in their clans, only gathering together in temporary alliances when the time called for it. But the Stellarch wished to unify the Ashland Sakuyans like they had unified so much of humanity already, but whenever the Stellarch met with any of the clan chiefs (known as Uji) and told them of their wish, the Uji all asked the same question, why would they agree to it? And to these merchants of the Ashland the Stellarch had one offer which they could not refuse.
The Ashland Sakuyans had, ever since the Great Reduction, been a purely mechanical people, without the ability to reproduce and while their bodies made them ageless and hard to kill, their population did still shrink and they had no way of making children.
So to solve this, the Stellarch offered to give them the knowledge of the Standard Biological Templates(1), a cloning technology which could produce entirely new life, in exchange for them uniting under one leader, appointed by the Stellarch. With the potential that the SBTs represented, the Ashlanders agreed. Using the SBTs the Ashland Sakuyans were able to build cloning vats in their bases, growing humans who could then be uploaded into newly built Volcano Wanderers.
The Ashland Sakuyans had long since moved away from any desire to return to bodies of flesh and blood, having come to see their mechanical bodies as almost divine manifestations of mankind's ingenuity and willpower. But until the Stellarch gave them this final tool by which they could become a complete society, they had been in a slow decay.
With joy in their (figurative) hearts, all 82 Uji of the Ashland Sakuyans swore undying loyalty to the Stellarch. From among these 82, the Stellarch elevated one to become Praetor of Sakuya-Hime, the Stellarch's representative on the ashen planet.
"Dear Diary, I cannot wait to get off this bloody planet.
I do not mean to imply that the people were in any way unkind or that I didn't enjoy learning of the Sakuyans history and culture, but the planet is far too warm for anyone to be truly comfortable.
Well, let's begin the story somewhere fitting, how about the beginning?
I arrived to Sakuya-Hime five days ago. To be specific, I arrived to Ninigi, the planet's only city and spaceport. It's not an especially beautiful city, since it is constantly covered in several layers of ash and dust, making the city a landscape of greys and blacks. Quite fitting seeing as the surrounding ash desert is about the same colour.
But not everything in Ninigi was bad. My contact and host on Sakuya-Hima was one Director Hannah M. Howard, one of my fellow countrymen. We both left our home planet to travel the galaxy, me to write the book you're currently reading, she to participate in the galactic diamond trade.
It felt like meeting family and we got along very well. The food I was served tasted as if it was cooked by my own cooks back home. For such a small city, Ninigi is very diverse, meaning the access to ingredients even from my distant homeland was easily available.
I spent two days at her townhouse, learning the history of the city from her and several of her staff, who were native Sakuyans (Specifically City-Sakuyans. If you've read the chapter this excerpt should be placed below, you can probably guess why the distinction is so important to them). I didn't venture outside as much as I might have wished, the climate truly is horrible and the climate suits you need to use are a hassle to get in and out of.
On my third day I began my journey into the Ashlands. A clan of Ashland Sakuyans had arrived to sell their goods in the city and were gracious enough to allow me to travel with them (for only a small fee, which was well worth it).
I travelled in a sealed container made specifically to allow the Ashlanders to carry us smaller humans around, it even had windows, though I will admit that the environment was kinda repetitive. (2)
We finally arrived at one of their bases. It was way bigger than what I assumed a mining base would have been, though in hindsight it feels quite obvious. The Volcano Wanderers aren't small and the bases have probably been expanded to fit them all.
One thing I found even more surprising though was that there were a few flesh and blood humans walking around too. Apparently the Ashland Sakuyans reproduce via cloning. When someone wants to have a child or the clan just needs more people, they purchase biological material (usually blood) from one of a handful of specialists in Ninigi, slot it into the material into a cloning vat and then wait until the kid is finished.
The children are kept flesh and blood until they're about 15 years old, which is when they are uploaded into a Volcano Wanderer. It's an interesting society and it was even more interesting to live with them for a couple of days. The children asked me a bunch of questions about life outside of the bases. One child even asked why I haven't gone into a robot seeing as I'm so old (one of the adults, who I assumed to be one of the child's parents scolded him for that and told him to apologise. It was a weird yet kinda cute exchange). I did also get the chance to ask my own questions and I learnt a lot about the history of the Ashlands and the Ashland Sakuyans, both from oral stories and from their massive collection of documents (they take preserving their history very seriously).
On the third day I was escorted back to Ninigi, but not before I bought a souvenir. Sakuya-Himan Pink Diamonds are renowned across the United Empire and really bloody expensive. I should know, I own several pieces of jewellery with such diamonds. But anyhow, I had the honour of buying a couple of raw uncut pink diamonds directly from the Sakuyan who mined it. It wasn't cheap, but I didn't regret buying them for even a second.
Anyhow, when I got back to Ninigi, I spent one last night with Director Howard. During the goodbye dinner I gifted her one of the diamonds I had bought as thanks for her hospitality (She made a joke about us "not being that close"... I definitely didn't find it funny).
The next day I got on the ship and am currently procrastinating organising my scientific notes, while on the way to the next system."
-Excerpt from the Personal Diary of Dr Tamara Trench
Footnotes:
(1) The Stellarch had before their arrival to Sakuya-Hime, met and integrated the United Kingdoms of Hallon, who are the original developers of the Standard Biological Templates. They had provided the Stellarch the schematics for the SBT vats and its associated technology.
(2) I learnt from Director Howard that I wasn't the first non-Ashlander to visit one of the Ashland bases, though most people who visit are merchants or lapidarists.
I actually managed to get this out before midnight, which is neat. Hyperfixations are great!
Another exotic planet and people Tamara has visited, though probably not one she plans on visiting again anytime soon, even if the diamonds are very nice.
We also learn some more about the author, like the fact the good doctor isn't exactly strapped for cash.
Speaking of diamonds, I do wonder how much of the House Iris Separatists GDP goes to just buying Sakuya-Hime diamonds. It's a luxury and a damn good looking one at that.
Next chapter will probably be Khepron. I've mentioned it several times and have some plans for it already (
Anyhow, cheers to Dr Trench and her mission to bankrupt the galaxy's students by forcing them to buy the latest edition of her book, EVERY. YEAR.
Edit: Btw, if you wanna get an rough understanding on how the Volcano Wanderers look, google "robot police dogs". They look a bit like that, except with more flexible joints and an actual head.
/Royalist
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