Fruryrn
A bounded space that is shrinking at a measurable rate.
Its whole extent is 65,055 km across, room for one world. The space is filled with dry heat, bearable only near its cooler bodies. It holds one made object at the scale of a world: a hull, a tower, a machine, or a statue.
- Premise
- Heat fills the bounded space until it chokes on itself. Shrinking walls push the population toward the few cool spots left. Eight billion people crowd the habitable ground as the floor drops. Salvage tools repair things past their maker's original design. Herds count as wealth while the city grows around the gate. A regent rules because the rightful leader lives in exile off-world. Fibre stronger than steel wire draws strangers to this failing land. Someone tries to buy control of the gate outright now.
The Gate
The world's gate opens on Dimensional Station sector 6. It is a door a person walks through or a mouth a ship can fly into. Passage costs ten credits a head and a thousand a hull. A city has grown around it with its own speech and laws.
"The gate floor stands wide for a hundred million doors."
from Tide Tables, by Vucect
Shape and Light
Fruryrn spans 65,055 km across its entire extent. The space shrinks at a measurable rate; this change forces people toward cool bodies. Dry heat fills the void except near those cooler objects. A second, older opening stands somewhere here and leads nowhere anyone has come back from.
Light dims to fade the dry heat, yet shadows lengthen without darkening the air. Freak tides rise without a storm and sweep the coasts clean of debris. Almost every tool is salvage from something older, repaired past its maker's design. Machines built under this world's own physics run here; imported machines stall until rebuilt.
"The heat chokes on itself while the floor drops."
from Account Book of Herds, by Claunert
Who Holds It
The regent rules Fruryrn while the rightful heir remains in exile off-world. Dastact guards the sector 6 gate where strangers enter for trade or passage. Miclant controls the herds that define a family's standing within the economy. Profasti monitors the second opening near where no one returns from the other side.
No tool may be repaired past its maker's original design, and violators lose their license to work. A person cannot claim wealth in fibre grown here until they pay a tithe of ten credits per head. Freak tides do not require a storm, but no one may build above the height lightning strikes with frequency.
"The regent rules while the heir waits off-world."
from Sermon on Exile, by Savent
What Breaks
The regent loses power if the last herd leaves Miclant to join a cooler body elsewhere. Dastact fights Profasti when the city tries to buy control of the gate outright. The shrinking walls push the population toward the few cool spots left until the floor drops completely.
Living here costs a person their freedom to travel anywhere beyond the habitable ground. Time runs at the same rate as the Dimensional Station, yet the dry heat chokes on itself constantly. An arrival carrying a weapon faces a drone that removes them back to their own world.
Peoples
-
01Noproll
Compact frame with broad shoulders suited for heavy salvage work. -
02Lamint
Tall and lean with long limbs for moving quickly across the shrinking floor. -
03Fagru
Stocky build with thick limbs to withstand the dry heat of the void. -
04Lagraum
Small stature with quick movements perfect for navigating the crowded cities.