The First Land Herald/434-04-15

Article Number: Unknown article number

Dateline: 434-04-15

NEGOTIANTS VISIT DURING LUNAR EXPERIMENT, DISCUSSION UPCOMING Traders, Moon Mages, and other interested professionals gathered on the day of Rafano's Lunar Experiment (see the Herald article of 433-10-14).  Joining him in the open air shrine of the ancient tower in Wolf Clan were the following: Sortny, Lasaia, Evivere, Hanryu, Koreberg, Aaoskar, Tiakim, Ruea, Skaen, Miralynn, Fariden, Melindrha, Garia, Perune, Miskton, Lenaea, Mistanna, Dantia, Neryndil, and Aislynn. Rafano asked his fellow guildmates to take out and invoke their tesserae as he created a Stellar Collector.  Lasaia and Evivere complied with the request, tesserae twinkling and frosting over in their hands.  Attendees watched as the Negotiants emerged from apparent nothingness, a shimmering point of crystal and light, and cast their attention over the area.   By Rafano's account, the Negotiants maintained a languid stationary rotation and viewed the area as if through the lens of a polytope.  When he glimpsed through the polytope, he saw branching equations that reduced physical phenomena to shifting abstractions and expanding polynomials.  The Negotiants paused, rearranged, and expanded as a helix that collapsed back upon itself.  The held tesserae were glowing and vibrating. Rafano modified the Stellar Collector in his hand to align with the equations shown previously by the Negotiants, superimposed with the faded symbols of the Arbiter's Stylus.  As the polytope continued to rotate around the Negotiants, twisting lines of abstraction were rendered into reality, cycling between symbol and substance.  The nearby tesserae continued to jitter as the polytope expanded wildly. The three Traders shouted in unison as they lost control of their tesserae, which flew unexpectedly through the air and slammed into the Negotiants!  The tesserae flared with light and were absorbed into the Negotiants' mass.  The Negotiants swelled slightly, streams of radiant blue and silvery-white coursing beneath their multi-faceted surfaces.  With the sound of shattering glass, they began to perform a series of incomprehensible involutions and expansions. Studded with tesserae, the Negotiants morphed into a twisted ribbon, folded upon itself.  Bright lines pulsed between the tesserae, which distributed themselves equidistantly along the single surface, interconnected in a rearranging mesh topology.  The tesserae blinked with increasing rapidity until all light extinguished, leaving the Negotiants collapsed into an opaque sphere. With a shudder, the Negotiants bristled and erupted with crystalline pseudopods, arced wildly and slammed into Rafano, encasing him entirely! Lasaia, Evivere, and others present then witnessed the form of Rafano within a translucent column, writhing as if underwater.  Rafano slowly slammed his fist against the interior, leaving a bristling handprint in the crystalline structure, which faded away as his eyes opened.  The crowd saw Rafano's eyes go wide with surprise as his embedded Avtalia Array flared with brilliance.  Suddenly, he went calm and gazed about in wonder.  After some time, the column surrounding Rafano rippled, opened, and deposited his unconscious form to the ground.   The Negotiants flared and spun rapidly, flinging glowing fragments around the area!  A chaotic whirl, their crystalline form retracted, and as suddenly as they appeared, they vanished back into the nothingness from whence they came. Rafano reported being exposed to bizarre messages and complex formulae inside the column before he was released.  His head was filled with the psychic backlash of the Negotiants' chatter, "...REACH-SPEAK-DISSECT ATTEMPTS CONTINUE ESCALATION-CLARIFICATION… INSTRUMENT NOT PLIABLE-COMPREHENSIVE-PRIME PROTOCOLS ECHOING-REBOUNDING-STATIC… REEVALUATING PARAMETERS TEMPLATE TURMAR HOSTAGE-COLLATERAL-SUBJECT PARADIGM RETUNE TO AVTALIA ARRAY..."  A voice made of glass and pure order echoed Rafano’s mind, "You seek, but there is nothing further to discuss at this time.  The terms are clear, and the boundaries defined.  Additional arrangements will come -- we enforce the dilution/spreading/spline, and the contract has been effective, the terms upheld.  We may have the authority/independence/functionality to approve of additional deals, but not at this time." Rafano received the desired effect of getting the Negotiants' attention, along with a cryptic message, but what does it all mean?  Tired from his experience within the column and overwhelmed with new information, Rafano has requested some time to collect and process his thoughts.  He will be giving a brief lecture on Lunar magic to speak about the results of his recent experiments at an upcoming Trader's Happy Hour.  The gathering will be open to all at the Dining Room of Raven's Court [OOC: Thursday, May 7th, 2020, 9pm EST]. Sincerely, Shaylynne Kendialahle Assistant Reporter of the First Land Herald

Real Date: Unknown Date

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Author(s): Shaylynne