The Baran Alkhana
With the settlement and exploitation of the Crystaleon, the House Opiioris had plunged the Empire into an era of commerce. Her Empire, a Trading Empire. The Crystal Road was charted and established between the Crystaleon and the Ur-Kingdom, but expansionist tendencies did not stop there. The Empire expanded like the branches on a tree along the three roads. To the galactic south, the Austropophic, to the north, the Flourishing and toward the Crystaleon, the Crystal Road. The galactic east, where nothing of much interest could be found, resisted settlement the longest. But by the time of Emperor Exegor Udhain, the eastern expansion shook the Empire to its core. Reports were first received on the eve of a new Ete on Norfodl, containing the disturbing and confusing news that something had been found out there, something that was not of the Mother’s Empire. A large-scale scouting mission soon brought to light the existence of a second star nation, small and puny compared to the Nuclear Empire. While recognizably human, the inhabitants spoke a foreign tongue and behaved in foreign, heretical ways.
Soon, the language of these people was decoded and came to be known as the Baranis Luger, whereby the article ‘the’ is crucial to avoid diplomatic faux pas. While largely culturally impenetrable, over millennia, an understanding of their nation has crystallized. Called by them the Baran Alkhana, much of the enlightened Empire refers to it as the Aldebaran Empire. But make no mistake, this nation is not Empire. The Baran Alkhana practices a peculiar and heretical political ideology whereby leaders, called Alkhans, are determined by majority approval.
Much, if not all, of the Baran Alkhana follow several strands of the most perverse heresy. While too vile to be rendered within this document entirely, let it be known that they reject the Mother Goddess and her lesser sister. When conferring or dealing with Baranians, be sure to fortify your soul-light and shield yourself at Majora’s side for they will talk of gods and machines and migration. Let them not weaken your spirit! If possible, contact is to be avoided.
Many times, the Nuclear Empire has waged wars of enlightenment. However, Baranian technology appears to have developed along a specific niche. Baranian colonies and ships are almost always protected by crypto-mechanical force projections, a technology they heretically refer to as ‘shields,’ so as to mock the Mother’s Great Barrier. Combat with Baranian forces is to be avoided.
Little is known of their history, even now. All attempts to uncover it, and to uncover which core world they originated from, will lead through labyrinths of blasphemous babbling that obfuscates their true origins. It is known that their home world is called Baranis and it is said to orbit as star called Aldebaran in their tongue. Also within their borders lies the luminary body Besteron which is referred to by them as Polaris. This is where the Alkhana’s main void vessel production capacity appears to be located.
Surrounding the Alkhana is the Greater Taurus Expanse. A lawless, faithless, violent place. The Expanse is home to a large-scale Clerical effort to bring order and instill the teachings of the Udhar Discipline. Within the Expanse, sister fights sister and brother fights brother, for the absence of soul-light makes way for avarice. The Expanse, if possible, is to be avoided.