Do these people in the Vale all communicate with deep-space pigeons or horseback messengers?
Today I received another message that took a very long time to get to me. This time it is a royal missive! From king Basil Vulpine, supreme ruler of the Grassbladians, no less.
Hi Theodosius,
apologies for the tardy reply but life has been busy. For reasons I haven't had a chance to look up yet your alliance is red to us. Normally we wouldn't provide temporary blue standings anyway but I figured I'd make you aware of the additional wrinkle.
This being Null-Sec you are of course free to be a free spirited explorer anyway so long as you don't mind people potentially chasing you and sending you back to your clone bay.
Best Wishes,
Basil Vulpine
He is surprisingly informal with me. This shows the prestige one has, as an Amarrian cleric, in the outer worlds. So, apparently LUMEN is red to the Grassbladians. No wonder the peasants were afraid of me. Now, curiously, the Grassbladians appeared neutral to me, so I wondered where all this fear and trepidation comes from. I must ask Lord Pitoojee or Amicia Cora from the diplomatic corps if I see them. Meanwhile, I wanted to reassure king Vulpine that the Imperial fleet is not bearing down on his realm, so I started a letter,
Your Sublime Royal Highness, King of the Grassbladians, Illustrious sovereign of the 88G-M4 constellation, Lord of FMBR-8, Duke of FH-TTC and Khan of MQ-O27,
but then I remembered the other Grassbladians told me he prefered to be addressed as Basil. Perhaps he is an egalitarian, and this is the perverting result of being closer to the influence sphere of the Federation than that of the Empire. Or it is related to "Basileus", an ancient word for king. Anyhow, I decided to start with
Dear Basil,
It sounds wrong to address a king, even a barbarian king, in this way.
Thanks for your answer! I have already completed my exploration of 88G-M4. The view of the Jove nebula is very nice! I also enjoyed a few pleasant conversations while exploring, please give my greetings to Dr. Rebot.
I do hope this will be understood as I meant it: a compliment. Hopefully it is not interpreted as an act of treason by dr. Rebot, leading to him being hanged, drawn and quartered.
Members of your corporation showed as neutral to me, so I hope in the future relations between our alliances will improve!
As a token of rapprochement, I have left a gift of Pax Amarrias (books) in a jetcan in front of your Astrahus in JZV-F4 when I returned back to the Empire now already a while ago. If you need more, let me know.
Kind regards,
Brother Theodosius Savnar
See? Proselytizing and diplomacy can go hand in hand.
