Blessing of a private chapel

Yesterday, I was called upon to bless a shrine. In order to be recognized as a holy place where also visitors can come to pray, private shrines need to be blessed by a member of the clergy. It is a part of the ministry that I do not get to do very often, and that makes it extra nice. 

Noble Houses or guilds or even rich commoners try to have their own side-altar in a cathedral, or their own shrine or chapel in their home. Sadly, cathedral side-altars become status symbol sometimes, a way to show off wealth or power. Major cathedrals become very crowded with these family or guild altars, and often there are multiple services going on at the same time. Before the invention of portable sound dampening fields, our cathedrals were as noisy as a Jita pachinko game hall.

Private shrines at home are more quiet (although they too can be used to brag by displaying precious relics or artwork). The shrine I had the pleasure to bless was clearly not to brag, but built for devotion. It is dedicated to Saint (and emperor) Amash-Akura, and I brought an old copy of Epitoth as a gift. The shrine sports the color of a noble House, but apart from that its main decoration is a tasteful bust of Amash-Akura. 

I have promised to keep the name of the builder and owner of the shrine private, but it is a pity really, as this would be a nice place for pilgrims to visit.

((ooc attribution: church interior, painting by Marten van Valckenborch, active period 1599-1612. Major cathedrals in north-west Europe could house well over 50 private altars, all holding at least one mass per week, so it could get crowded and loud!))

The experiment

So, back to the Cornelian Hypothesis. It states that the reduction in the number of static wormhole signatures in Sanctified Vidette is due to the fact that they are exit holes which since a couple of month ago only spawn when a capsuleer breaches the wormhole from outside Sanctified Vidette.

To test this experimentally took some time. First, I had to find a Jove observatory system. Second, it also needs to have a set of thermoelectric convertors -Drifter-adapted Sleeper technology- primed to the hyperspace signature of Sanctified Vidette rather than another former Drifter wormhole. Thirdly, it has to be in a dormant state, not yet activated.

Finding a suitable set of convertors took a while... but I finally did. I was in communication with the Navy Anchorage in Sanctified Vidette, who record and monitor all wormhole signatures in Sanctified Vidette. When I was ready to create the wormhole K162 in Sanctified Vidette, I gave the signal, and then breached the V928 wormhole - hoping not to be trapped in some hyperspace pocket universe.

It worked. At the moment that I breached the V928 in G-G78S, a new cosmic signature QKB-168 appeared in Sanctified Vidette. The signature was an unidentified wormhole exit, out of which the Indagatrix emerged. A new wormhole was created in Sanctified Vidette. The hypothesis is corroborated!

Like every good research work, this gives rise to follow-up questions. Why do we now have to breach the V928's for the exit to appear, and not before? What turned those into more "regular" wormholes than they were before? How is that linked to the appearance of other hyperspace anomalies?

To that my friends at the Navy Anchorage add "How can we use this for defense purposes?"

Inverted statics

Systems in Anoikis, including the former Drifter wormhole systems, contain so-called "static" wormholes. For our own colony Seclusion, there are two such statics, a B274 and a Z647 type wormhole. Whenever one of the two expires - either because it reaches the end of its lifetime or because more than the critical mass has passed through - a similar type wormhole automatically and immediately appears somewhere else in the system. That is why they are called statics. 

Whenever you visit Seclusion, there will always be a B274 and a Z647 present.

Also Sanctified Vidette and the other Drifter wormholes contain statics. Six regular ones, and sixty "inverted" ones. The inverted ones are very special, and to the best of my knowledge have only been seen in one other place where spacetime has been heavily re-engineered: Pochven.

As I pointed out in yesterday's log entry there is a difference between a wormhole entrance and exit. Wormholes start as an embryonic entrance, and only after a while or when breached, the exit will appear and the tunnel will be present. Now, usual statics are always entrances. They appear immediately in the probe scan window. So, when a static wormhole expires, the new one becomes visible for you to scan down immediately afterwards.

Inverted statics such as Sanctified Vidette's V928 spawn outside Sanctified Vidette. It is their exit, or K162 hole, that will be inside Sanctified Vidette. That is the inverse from usual statics.

Up till very recently the V928 holes were immediately breached by Drifters or by the thermoelectric convertor's particle beams, so the exit K162 hole immediately appeared in Sanctified Vidette. The system always contained the 60 exits except for very short times between a vanishing and respawning.

That changed around the time spacetime rifts and phased asteroid fields started to appear in New Eden, and I witnessed moments when there were much less than 60 wormhole signatures.

The hypothesis that dr. Cornelius suggested is as brilliant as it is straightforward: for an unknown reason, since a month or two the V928 now have to be scanned down and breached before the K162 appears in Sanctified Vidette. There are still always 60 statics, but since they are inverted and it now takes time (and capsuleers) to breach them, there are often less than 60 K162 signatures.

This hypothesis needed experimental proof.

Wormhole birth

To the casual traveller, a wormhole is just a tunnel between two patches of space. Both sides of the tunnel look the same.

However, like a ski resort full of girls hunting for husbands, and husbands hunting for girls, the situation is not as symmetrical as it seems.

During their formation, wormholes are directional. One side is the "entrance" and the other is termed the "exit". When they are fully formed these two ends behave the same for all practical purposes, but we keep the distinction in their labeling. The exit is always labeled "K162". The entrance can have many names, for example "B274", for our highsec static in Seclusion. You find this in the info panel for the wormhole:

The entrance label allows you to identify the type of wormhole, and get a lot of information on it. 

So, how do wormholes form? Well, first the entrance appears as a cosmic signature on your probe scan window. At that point, the K162 exit has not yet formed - there is no exit hole yet. There is only the embryonic entrance hole.

Our warp engines perturb the embryonic wormhole. If you warp to the cosmic signature then even if you do not enter, a spacetime link is created to the destination system. However, the wormhole exit is not visible yet in that system. As the link ages, there is a certain probability per unit time for it to become visible, even if you leave it alone.

Now, if you enter the nascent wormhole, and you are the first one to go through the wormhole, then at that particular moment, the exit hole will spawn visibly in the destination system. Folks there see a new signature pop up on their probe scan window at that point. That is why wormholers get really nervous when a new signature appears. It could be something that appears spontaneously - or it could be someone from another system who just breached a new wormhole and landed in your system.

I have found a diagram to explain wormhole spawn mechanics, on the galnet forums, and I am including it here for completeness' sake:

It looks complicated, but the main message is: the exit may not be visible unless someone came through, or the wormhole is already aged.

((ooc: the witty quote about the ski resort is not mine, but I did not find it back and do not know who to attribute it to...))

Good news

The alarming news from Syndicate aside, I have two pieces of great news.

The first one is that the experiment succeeded! 

As I prepared the return from Curse, following TES Valenia's reassignment due to the war, I convinced my escort to allow me to scan one more time for a suitable set of thermoelectric convertor field projectors out in space. Our way back took us anyway along several Jove observatory systems.

I did not have much confidence that we would find anything, since I have not had any success the entire week. But today turned out different! In G-G78S, among the many signatures, there was a pristine set of convertors. 

There were some pilots in system that would make the operation dangerous, were it not that they were blue, to my surprise. Three I-BLU pilots, out here in Curse. I wonder what they are doing here, but I was too excited by my find and to eager to do the planned experiment so I did not disturb them for a chat. 

I got to work, and managed to get the Sleeper projectors to work and to stabilize a wormhole connection. TES Valenia had me targeted the entire time, and was getting nervous, already regretting having consented to this ultimate attempt. I could perform the experiment and confirm the hypothesis! I am too excited right now to sort out my notes and tabulate measurements and write it all up, but will do so shortly.

The second piece of good news is that we will soon have another conversion ceremony. 

Ms. Yubari has made great progress and I think she is ready! We have many pilots among the various corporations in LUMEN that are not of the faith, but from time to time, as they get more acquainted with the faith, they decide to convert. It is always a source of great joy and celebration when they do!

Their heads on a plate

What a dark and grim place this universe is, there where the light of faith does not shine as it does within the borders of the Amarr Empire. 

The Executive General of the State's forces in Syndicate, Heika Torigo, has called for the killing on sight of those fleeing from Syndicate to the Federation. Their ships are not to be stopped, boarded, and searched for suspects to arrest. It is not "wanted, dead or alive", just a "wanted dead". Capsuleer pilots can earn billions by bringing in corpses as proof. Corpses for coin! The state, our former ally, has strayed far from the light. 

But there is also a little bit of good news. It comes from our closest ally amongst the locals, House Arnoux, one of the many governing houses and leaders in the complex patchwork of Syndicate politics. They are not fleeing. It appears the State is not targeting them or their stations at the moment. I thank God that House Arnoux are not amongst those that chose to seek refuge in the Federation. 

In stead of fleeing or blindly collaborating with the Executive General's command, Governor Evelyn Arnoux issued a very eloquent statement condemning Torigo's call to massacre the fugitives. 

I worry that this will put some strain also in our alliance, as many Caldari still strengthen our ranks, veterans from when the State and the Empire fought side by side against the terrorist rebels. At the same time, the presence of these legionnaires is also a strength: our voice may still be heard in the executive boardrooms that matter. May we plead for compassion and true justice to return.

Blitzkrieg

Browsing over the star map on my neocom today, I noticed that the Syndicate region was attributed to the State rather than the Intaki Syndicate: 

I was halfway through writing a letter of complaint about this flagrant mistake, when I was informed by mr. Firth that this was no mistake at all. What a shock! 

What will happen now to our friends among the Intaki Syndicate, especially governor Arnoux? Is she one of the many high-ranking members of the Syndicate fleeing State persecution? I do not think so, I cannot imagine that she was involved in any actions that led to the damaging of the Jita gates or embezzlement of State funds (although I am not one hundred percent sure about the latter). In addition, I cannot imagine her giving up sovereignty of Hetil Bairviit stations easily...

In the region we are also working closely with associates of Ishukone for industry and mining. I am not so sure that they will be happy with this annexation either. The other megacorporations are bound to move in aggressively and compete for the available resources. 

I hope the Empress will give us guidance soon.

Cluster politics and war

Still no luck on finding suitable gates out in Curse.

TES Valenia messaged me that we are to move our operations to a region of space that is "more relevant given the current war escalations by the Republic". A region of space where they can combine their current task with surveillance that is more important than following around a friar on his science project. 

I connected to Galnet to find out more about what was going on. The services that we held last week on Faith and Fortitude now appear on topic. The Concord agreements have broken down, perhaps in an act of sabotage - the last time this happened was when the treacherous Minmatar launched the Elder Fleet invasion. Indeed, there are again incursions of the rebels into Empire territory, but I am convinced the Navy is better prepared now.

I was also surprised to read that Silphy En Diabel has been arrested by the State. This will for sure shake up things in Syndicate, and the free Intaki there may seem more isolated than ever, enemy of both the Federation and the State. The new Federation president sees an opportunity I think, to draw them nearer by offering them some sort of amnesty, but my feeling is that the Syndicate Intaki will take that as an insult to the injustice they suffered.

For the Empire, this represents an opportunity. I hope the Empire can step in and show themselves as friends. LUMEN could play a role in that, given our strong presence there. And who knows, with the reshuffling of power structures in the Syndicate, the star of our own friendly governor Evelyn Arnoux may be on the rise if we play our cards well.

Illegal slave trade

The system of LJ-YSW in Curse is two jumps out from the Jove Observatory system Y-K50G and two jumps away from Zarzakh, the domain of the Deathless. 

Like in any system, the stations broadcast their market prices. Unwanted advertisements are a scourge also in Curse. And what does it promote in LJ-YSW? Slaves! Not the occasional misguided pilot trading a few slaves they found in space during a mission, nor a trap set by Minmatar rebels hunting slave traders. No, here is a vast and well organized slave market run by the Angel Cartel from its sarcastically named Dominions Logistics Support station. It advertises well over one third of a million slaves available for immediate sale, all year long. Prices and volumes compete with the largest slave markets of the Khanid kingdom. 

I have never seen such a thing outside the Empire, where the intent of holding slaves is benevolent. The slave status is a chrysalis in the transformation from the heathen to the faithful. The Holder guides, nurtures and protects his slaves until they are ready to be manumitted. Slavery as a means of reclamation has waxed and waned over history, and already since Heideran VII it is ebbing, as peaceful reclamation is gaining pace. 

Yet one must not forget that reclamation through slavery has shown its historical value and successes: remember that the Udorians were once reclaimed through slavery, and now we have a universally beloved and most wise Empress from Udorian descent! So, by no means Amarrian slavery can be said to hold down a people forever as the Gallente mistakenly think.

But out here in Curse, the Angel Cartel is making a perversion of it all! 

They do not care about reclaiming souls. They only have abuse in mind. They are twisting a sacred principle into a sick self-serving evil. Frankly, this makes me understand better why the Gallente hate slavery that much...

Dominions stations

The Angel Cartel has stations out here in Curse, and not only in the Heaven constellation. 

Who knows I might even be granted docking rights there? I do not plan to find out. 

I would never set foot on an Angel Cartel station.

They look somewhat like the Gallente stations, but they do not have their hedonistic vibe. The Dominions stations are dark and brooding, they feel like a trap ready to snap shut once you dock. 

I have been monitoring the Jove observatory in J7A-UR, when a mining fleet appeared. It turns out that the system has ice belts. In fact, three of the six Jove observatory systems in Curse are systems with ice belts... 

That makes exploration more challenging - with a hostile fleet around I cannot freely wander about. My cloaked escort - even if it were a match for angry Dominion miners - told me they will not lift a finger to help me. I was told that if I would get caught or killed, the Ministry would disavow any knowledge of my actions. 

So, I have to wait it out. The miners too, unhappy with the presence of an unknown foreigner in their system, wait it out. 

Angel territory

I left for Curse. It is not a very big region:

The systems with Jove observatories, suitable for the experiment, are shown in red boxes. They are somewhat apart from each other, but there are some hopefully quiet dead-end systems among them. 

However, the shortest tour of the systems - the well-known "travelling missionary problem" from mathematics and computer science - still takes a rather impractical but most of all very dangerous 26 jumps.

The blue rectangle highlights the Heaven constellation, the home systems of the first and second Jove Empires. Near the ruins left by these ancients the Angel Cartel built its own home, from which they control the rest of Curse. Coming down from the Ammatar Mandate, you enter Curse via Doril in the west. 

Unfortunately, the Jovian ancestral worlds are not on the tour of the Jove observatory systems... I am tempted to explore there, but on the other hand I do not want to stay any longer than strictly necessary in cursed Curse. If I get lucky and find a non-activated pair of thermoelectric convertor field projectors very quickly, I might still make time for a bit of archaeology on my way back to the Mandate.

Faith and Fortitude

Writing sermons is a creative process, and like all creative processes it has its highs and its lows. For priests with writer's block, the Theology Council offers help in various forms. There are hefty tomes of recorded sermons of the past, and special holochannels where preachers are vying for top spots in the popularity charts. There are also handy online and officially sanctioned sermon generators.

From time to time, the Theology Council will send out a suggested topic as well. Not on special days for which the theme is already fixed, but for regular days throughout the year. This week's suggestion is "on Faith and Fortitute".

This combination of great gifts of God help us deal with hardship. Faith gives us assurance in a positive outcome. It is more certain than hope, and does not necessarily speculate about how things will work out. Rather, Faith is the inner conviction that, despite all the hardships, things are ultimately going to be okay.

However, faith alone will not necessarily give us the strength to do what is required of us to face these hardships. For this, we need courage, endurance, strength of will, and all these constitute Fortitude.

This is a nice suggestion of a theme for a service. It does make me worry a bit (those who know me will not be surprised and say that I worry about everything). 

But this theme makes me think that the Theology Council is foreseeing hardships for our people in the near future...

Epikouria Chronicles XI

While the Indagatrix is made ready for the expedition to Curse, I took care of paperwork that had been waiting for me in Mehatoor. There was also another letter of brother Hugo.

He appears to be taking a dangerous interventionist course. 

He starts his letter with the opening passage of the Book of Gheinok the First: "And the flames of the Lord died within them. Yet one flame remained."

Dano Gheinok, first of the great prophets, found that the world in which he lived had forgotten about God and lived in sin. He was the sole flame that remained, and he decided to go away from the damned society and start a new one. Gradually he gathered fellows to join him in his quest - these became known as the conformists, and after many years in the (spiritual and actual) desert they found Amarr island and settled there.

Brother Hugo sees a parallel with Origin. To him, their society is an abomination, and the White Paladins are the one flame that remains and that gives hope. He has clearly been under increasing influence of this group...

The flame also stands for the conditions on Epikouria V, a mineral-rich lava world known to the originals as Crucifix. Life is harsh there, and the prohibition against slavery (enshrined in the Exodus Charter) has made it even harder on the formerly well-off Amarr, who no longer live in comfort but now have to toil the lava fields and metalworks themselves. The "lava belt" from Iluna to Pyrewind has become the political powerbase for the White Paladins and their supporters. 

Their political program is as hard as the iron they produce: they want to secede from the Origin Colonial Authority, rescind the Exodus Charter, re-instate a traditionalist version of Amarr law and slavery, and expel those that do not agree with them. They have very little chance to succeed at this, at least by the political and diplomatic processes of Origin. They have been whispering insurrection for a while, but would stand no chance against Origin's military force, once operated by the warclone corporation Oneieda Paradox. They remain a fringe group.

Now, to my surprise, Brother Hugo is asking me to help bring Amarrian forces and weapons to Epikouria to aid the White Paladins... I would never consider it appropriate to mingle in such foreign affairs, unless ordered to do so by proper authorities. The Empire, interested as it may be in Anoikis since the conquest of Sanctified Vidette, has no plans to start a reclamation in Epikouria, so neither have I. I have written brother Hugo a clear refusal. 

I think it will not stop him to reach out to other contacts that he may have...

Links to keep track of the letters of Brother Hugo:

I. First Contact
II. Diplomatic Talks 
III. Refugee crisis
IV. Setting up a new home station
V. Epikouria under siege
VI. Prince Seraghis visit

VII. A suspicion of heresy

VIII. Pop-up church

IX. Intercultural fair

X. White Paladins

Curse

I am still missing two regions from my atlas. The first one is Fade, and the reason is that there is no nebula visible from it, I think. That makes it hard to distinguish from Branch and Deklein, two very dark regions too. So, I need to jump through a wormhole to Fade to make sure that it does indeed lead to that region. There are not many Jovian observatories there, so the chances are not very high.

The other region that for some reason has not appeared to link to Sanctified Vidette under my recent watches is Curse. This region is the domain of the Angel Cartel, and the former homelands of the Jove, before they moved out of there to the sealed regions up north. 

Surprisingly, there are only six Jove observatories in Curse. Out of a total reported in the cluster of over 1267, this is only 0.5%, and a correspondingly low chance of the connecting to Sanctified Vidette. I probably need to be more patient. Or perhaps I do not have a correct idea of how it should look like - I think it should show the Vapor Sea nebula, and the Scalding Pass nebula, but I might be wrong. 

Curse is a region that I am allowed to target for performing my experiment. It is well outside Empire space, and the Angel Cartel is an excellent scapegoat. I do not look forward to a stay there, given the presence of the Angel Cartel. Ishta has told me horrible stories about her time in the Cartel, and I shudder merely thinking back about that. But on the other hand, the region itself is historically interesting and I might combine my visit with a tour of the former Jove homelands. And also combine the experiment with completing the atlas. 

So, I am planning an expedition to Curse, staging from Gamis in the Mandate. LUMEN's mining hinterlands are there, as the alliance has since a long time been supporting the peaceful development of the Ammatar Mandate. It might take a bit more time to set up, but that will give mr. Firth time to check this through with his people and TES Valenia, which will also need to do some preparations I think.

Boundary conditions

I have received a briefing from mr. Ivan Firth, the Indagatrix's political officer, about the experiment with the Sleeper thermoelectric convertors. The ministry allows me to perform it, but under some conditions. 

First, I have to do it in a "region of plausable deniability", meaning outside of Empire controlled space. That also mitigates the potential hyperspace fallout to the Empire itself. I have been given a list of suitable locations.

Second, I will be followed at a distance by a covert operations ship from Ministry, TES Valenia. In case something appears to go wrong during the experiment, it will obliterate the Indagatrix, and then vaporize the wreck. I have been granted the courtesy of being allowed to wake up in my medical clone should such a thing occur. 

Mr. Firth will be monitoring me not from the Indagatrix this time, but from TES Valenia. The rest of the crew is less than enthusiast to participate to this mission, so it looks like I will be piloting the frigate by myself. 

It was not me

There was distressing news from Jita, well known as the main trade hub in the Caldari State. Its jump gates experienced disastrous accidents: hyperspatial rifts opened up and damaged the gates, killing many gate personnel. 

The link with the hyperspace fluctuations that scientists recently reported near Jita was quickly made, and the initial investigation by the State points to experimentation with the (Drifter appropriated) Talocan hyperspace network done presumably by the Federation or the Intaki, either for fraud and extortion, or for sabotage. 

This caused some confusion also close to home.

The Ministry of Internal Order, through the reports of mr. Ivan Firth, the political officer on board of the Indagatrix, is aware of my intentions to experiment with the Drifter wormhole technology myself. I planned this in order to test a hypothesis on the diminished number of wormholes in Sanctified Vidette. A scientific goal: of course I do not plan terrorist attacks on Jita gates.

Nevertheless they were worried that I had made some mistake, and that the Empire might be blamed for the Jita gate incident because of my tampering with Drifter wormhole devices. A very understandable worry, so they prevented me from undocking and invited me for a conversation. 

I was a surprised that also a member of the Caldari State Police was present. Usually conversations with the Ministry are very private. 

The misunderstanding was soon cleared up, as flight records of the Indagatrix, reports of my political officer, and the surveillance records of the Ministry itself showed that I had not done any such experiment yet. I have indeed been holding off on these experiments. I have been waiting to hear back from dr. Fritte Cornelius, to see if we could coordinate our research efforts. I am very glad now that I have not done anything yet.

The Ministry was also quite interested in dr. Cornelius and where they could find him. They asked me whether he is a trade hub ganker, and the man from the Caldari State Police asked whether he is a Black Eagle. I answered to the best of my ability, vouching for his pacifist nature and track record as a scientist. 

Unfortunately I had no idea of his whereabouts. 

That is regrettable: my ignorance forced them to use more advanced conversation methods to try and help me remember anything I might have forgotten. The next few hours were not pleasant. I vaguely remember that at some point in the conversation the man from the Caldari State Police no longer wanted to be in the room, which made the interlocutors from the Ministry laugh.

But all is good that ends good, and in the end I was allowed to resume my usual business. First, I will take a day off and pay a visit to medbay as my current clone misses some teeth and some nails and has a limp. 

Thermoelectric convertor field projectors

I have been discussing the decrease in static wormhole numbers with dr. Fritte Cornelius from Signal Cartel. 

The number is not always exactly thirty, but fluctuates. There appears to be a cycle, around noon it starts out low, rising to forty and close to fifty at midnight, then it decreases back down towards the next noon. This seems to imply human interference, rather than a natural phenomenon.

Dr. Cornelius has offered an interesting hypothesis that sounds correct to me. It is best to test it before it is made public, I think. That requires some experimentation that is not very easy to perform: an attempt to generate a wormhole in Sanctified Vidette ourselves, using the Sleeper Thermoelectic Convertors in known space. 

These structures need to be scanned down. I stumbled on some abandoned ones in Sanctified Vidette; they look like this:

The bright spot is no wormhole but the magnetar in the system. You would expect a Drifter wormhole in between those two structures when they are active. Now, if we manage to power these up...

President Moreau

After a month of voting, the Gallente presidential election has concluded! 

Dr. Alix Moreau won narrowly, on a programme of unrestricted research and a promise of the bright future that this research would bring. 

President Moreau also promised more independence for the constituent worlds of the Federation that seek a greater extent of self-determination. This was a crucial strategic move, gaining the support of the Intaki autonomists. Polls before the election showed a sea of support Roden, with one isolated exception: Intaki, which pundits quickly labeled "the highsec island of dr. Moreau".

That island grew, until the map finally colored more evenly between the candidates. I think the Intaki will not be forgotten, and will fare better than under the militaristic repression of Aguard.

But the true agenda of dr. Moreau is to liberate scientific research from any moral or legal restraints. That is dangerous - as the code of Demeanor warns, "Be Watchful. Free Thought is the Begetter of Disorder". What strange inventions and hybrid creatures will dr. Moreau create? CONCORD is concerned, and chairman Sakari of the State calls it proof of "Federation insanity". 

Scientific progress always holds both promises and dangers. New findings can be used to improve the lives of countless billions or to destroy these lives. To turn planets into gardens of Eden or into burning radioactive hells. 

In the Empire, we have God and the Empress guiding us. 

But in the Federation, the situation is very frightening! Whether science is used for good or for destruction depends on which leaders the capricious and mostly ignorant citizens call upon to decide for them...

Worrisome wormhole development

While working on the wormhole atlas and collecting some more data, I noticed a worrisome development in Sanctified Vidette. I do not know if the same thing is present in the other Drifter wormholes, I have less experience with these and do not know their normal number of wormholes.

In Sanctified Vidette there are always six static wormholes to the six other classes of Anoikis system, one for each class. And there are always sixty wormholes to systems in our own cluster. As joint research with mr. Cornelius has shown before, these sixty "statics" lead ro systems picked randomly out of a uniform distribution over the 1267 systems with Jove observatories, spread out all over known space.

Today, I found that the number of wormhole connections in Sanctified Vidette has halved. The six Anoikis connections are still present, but only thirty statics to our cluster! That is way too large a discrepancy to be a statistical coincidence. 

I had the impression before that there were less, but did not pay attention to it, as I was too focused on other tasks, so I am not sure how new this anomaly is. But it must be fairly recent, no more than about a month. My new friends at the Imperial Navy anchorage in the system declined to comment. When I asked whether they think it is linked to their experiments, they told me it was inappropriate for me to consider such a thing. 

Static wormholes are supposed to be ... static. Their number is a topologically protected constant for any given system - a change in their number is unheard of. It cannot occur without there being a major disruption in hyperspace. This comes at the time when the science community is reporting hyperspace fluctuations also in our cluster, notably in the Forge region... 

Exordium

I have received more help for the wormhole atlas project, from mr. Fritte Cornelius of the Signal Cartel. These intrepid explorers have probably ventured deeper into the wormhole network than anyone else and have imaged the nebulae even more extensively! 

It is really heartwarming to see how the New Eden research community forms a network of friends that steps up to help each other. Science is a search for truths that are independent of ideology and as such this endeavor transcends borders, giving it the capacity to bring us all closer to each other.

It is in the same spirit that Exordium was established. Rumors of its existence have been going around now for a while, and the existence of this new region was finally revealed today. Around fifty new star systems have been linked up to the cluster-wide jump gate network. These are to be peaceful systems, of little strategic or industrial value, where law is enforced by concord and dominion is shared among the empires. 

May it bring hopes of peace to all of our star cluster!