Paralaexon
To travel the Mother’s Empire, one must leave her warm embrace.
The void, protected from Kharkun by Her Great Barrier Shield, is limited to anyone but the sister goddesses. As Mother Majora provides the life-giving soul-light, Kharkun becomes friendly to life, giving way to the Void. But as such, the Void imposes limits upon those who dwell under the Shield.
In effect, and in practice, it has been demonstrated that a limit on the speed of any one thing exists. While vast on planetary scales, this limit is puny and inadequate for traveling Her Empire, which sprawls from rim to rim and engulfs the Expanse.
Early in the history of the Empire, when Udhain yet lived, the Lesser Goddess came to him in a dream and planted within him the seeds of knowledge about what is today known as the Paralaexon.
Through the expenditure of large amounts of energy in measured, geometric ways, it is possible to elevate oneself above the Void and escape the Great Barrier Shield’s benevolent shadow. Exposed to the tendrils of Kharkun, vessels who dare this feat require not only the Mother’s blessing but also a field of protection known as the Passage Insurance Metric or PIM-Field. This field, which only comes to full strength through the crew’s soul-light, will prevent incursions.
While within the Paralaexon, the voices of the dead are believed to whisper into one’s ears. Prolonged exposure will erase the mind, as evidenced by such figures as Pamela Okrun, the Wise Empress, and Chorex of House Doppler. The latter is recorded to have had his soul dimmed and mind warped by a two-Ete stay within the Paralaexon in such horrific ways that he plunged his own duchy, the Vassal Polon, into eternal darkness through the use of atomic weapons.
Closed shutters are recommended on all windows on any vessel that enters the Paralaexon.
Paralaexon is a Marthiflex word loosely translatable into the Other Tongue as “the Conducting Giant.” In the Baranis Luger, this realm is known as the Fata Mutadin. The device aboard a vessel that allows for Paralaexon travel is called the Hoist.
Paralaexon travel allows vessels to supersede the Void’s speed limit by a great many factors. Depending on the vessel’s design and the specific implementation of the Paralaexon Hoist, a vessel may traverse the galaxy from rim to rim in as much as a decade down to just a single Ete. Note that long journeys must include regular rest stops so as to avoid the psychological effects of the Paralaexon and to relax the PIM-Field which accumulates stresses that weaken it over time.
The longest recorded journey in the Paralaexon was performed by Helicon the Wise, the great architect of Korslaw. He chose this as a method of suicide in his old age. It is theorized by cryptonicists that his vessel must have been ejected from the Paralaexon at some point, but remains were never found. The shortest stay within the Paralaexon was performed by Opleion the Younger to win the Grand Prix of Fonell-Korrum, using the first race-fighter equipped with a hoist. He reached the finishing manifold in just 13 milliseconds. This famously drew sharp criticism from the Clerisy for the frivolous use of sacred technology, leading to Opleion’s eventual exile from the Ur-Kingdom, after which he had never been seen again.