The history of the Nivenian Empire after the start of the Nivenian-Thadian War of Annexation on Neochios 41, 23 NE is shown here. The specifics of the war will be shown on the war's page, and history not related to the war will be shown here.
23 NE
Neochios
On Novemex 50, 23 NE, the Megastructural Construction Corporation, having completed Andasium Reductor Two, and synthesizing 70 billion metric tons of andasium per day, made a trade offer to the Kalslong Merchants, offering X metric tons of andasium in exchange for 5X metric tons of andasium (VIII) oxide (spent andasium, as it as often refered to), and 100X metric tons of random (in any chemical form - e.g. methane, carbon dioxide, coal) carbon, where 0 < X < 60 billion. The Kalslong Merchants accepted, with X equaling 100 thousand. While this was nice, it was much less than was being produced. On Novemex 58, the Megastructural Construction Corporation contacted JCompany with a nearly identical offer, except that the maximum value for X was 59.9999 billion metric tons instead of seventy billion. JCompany set the value of X to 59.999 billion metric tons and accepted the trade, which was close enough to the maximum.
24 NE
Ianuaria
At the beginning of 24 NE, tensions were rising all over the gigaquadrant. Many different groups appeared to be lining up into pro- and anti- Purity factions. As war was looming, something had to be done, lest the economy of the gigaquadrant come spiraling down. The Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits attempted to take the matter into their own hands, suggesting a joint boycott with JCompany of all factions involved in what would eventually be known as the New Spodia Wars on Ianuaria 7, 24 NE.
While JCompany refused the joint boycott on the grounds that it seemed premature, they also mentioned a partial solution - Begin trading with more powers not aligned in the New Spodia Wars. This keeps the gigaquadrant's economy moving, the Nivenian Empire's economy moving, and keeps as many as possible out of the war. Increasing trade with current non-aligned trading partners was also an option. On Ianuaria 19, the Megastructural Construction Corporation added more radiators to Andasium Reductor Two, and thus increased the capacity to ninety billion metric tons per day, while maintaining constant exchange ratios. To continue selling this andasium, a deal extension was offered to JCompany.
Interlude: Colonization of Paulo Fluctus Beta
On Ianuaria 26, the twenty colony ships with three million passengers each launched on Iunius 31, 21 NE by the Megastructural Construction Corporation arrived at the Paulo Fluctus Beta System, and reported the presence of several resource-rich planets in the inner system, along with a terraformable planet, Paulo Fluctus Beta 7. A hyperspace relay was promptly set up to speed communications between the two systems, and the sixty million new Betans issued a document called the Paulo Fluctus Beta Charter, outlining the preliminary government until the population exceeds a hundred billion.
After nine days, on Ianuaria 35, it was obvious that the Betan colony was doing well. The Megastructural Construction Corporation, noting this, launched a ship with a full twenty trillion Nivenians on board, frozen. The ship would use much the same technology as the last, and the passengers would be slowly awoken as the colony grew. This way, population could be slowly pumped into the colony, so no shortage of labor would exist during its rapid development. This new ship would accelerate very quickly, as it was large enough to possess a command AI with an IQ of 155 (even if it was an incredibly power-hungry device, it could withstand the higher accelerations better than unfrozen Nivenians could), and would reach the Paulo Fluctus Beta System at 98% lightspeed on Neochios 3, 25 NE.
As the large recession plaguing the Nivenian Empire was coming to a close, and prices were coming back up again, the Megastructural Construction Corporation reversed the policies made in Martex, 22 NE, and began to sell vast tracts of land on Nivenia A ringworlds 30 and 31. Meanwhile, although Nivenia A ringworlds 32 through 35 were due to be completed on Martex 55, 24 NE, improvements in construction technology coupled with the increase in trade and the creation of the andasium reductors allowed Nivenia A ringworlds 32 and 33 to be completed over a month early, on Ianuaria 31. Due to this, JCompany was contacted with an offer similar to the one for Nivenia A ringworlds 30 and 31 - 3.0 quadrillion JHouses, 250 trillion JEntertainment, 40 Trillion JFactories, and 16 Trillion JHalls. These would be exchanged for 3.4 billion metric tons of pink spice. The offer was made on Ianuaria 37. The offer went through on Ianuaria 44, and the pink spice was exchanged for the buildings requested.
Afterwards, both the Megastructural Constuction Corporation and MegaSuperUltraCorp hired over three quadrillion employees to set up the planned communities (the ones using JBuildings) and set up the plantations on the new ringworlds, respectively.
Martex
On Martex 3, 24 NE, another party, the MotSE, joined the New Spodia Wars. In many respects, that was it. The Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits announced a boycott to the gigaquadrant, immediately ceasing trade with parties involved in the war. The Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits then re-appealed to JCompany to join the boycott against the warring parties. The parties boycotted at the time of the announcement are listed below:
- The Purity
- United Republic of Grubmolians
- Pure Divinity of Spodia
- Perphidi Assembly
- MotSE
- United Corlinian Empire
- Federated Tribes of Varslan
- Coalition of Seceding States
Different nations had different reactions to this boycott, with the MotSE and the Perphidi Assembly not caring, and the United Republic of Grubmolians somehow taking it as an "act of aggression," which might or might not mean that they will be invading. No one is really sure which. In any case, the boycott seemed to be having its intended effect, as another nation, the Waptoria Alliance of Species, expressed interest in enacting a limited version. Unfortunately, the war continued growing, with the Jinaris Empire and the Ail'karian Imperium joining the conflict on the side of the purity.
In response, on Martex 32, the Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits extended the boycott to the Jinaris Empire and Ail'karian Imperium. Notably, the United Corlinian Empire expressed its desire to de-escalate the war on Martex 37, something which prompted the Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits to point out that any participants who successfully manage to disengage will not only have the boycott lifted, but be allowed to trade for replacement infrastructure and food at a sizable discount, for the purpose of further establishing trade relations.
The drama caused by the New Spodia wars was temporarily interrupted by a group of about twenty billion insane zealots of some unknown religion deciding that it was somehow a good idea to "ascend to a higher plane of existence" on Martex 49, which somehow involved jumping off of the side of Nivenia A Ringworld 12 onto one of the ringworlds then-under construction - Nivenia A Ringworld 33, completely disregarding the fact that the velocity difference between the two was well over two hundred kilometers per second. Long story short, the explosion was massive, and over seven hundred square kilometers of ringworld tile had to be replaced.
Iunius
On Iunius 8, news was revived from the Waptoria Alliance of Species that the Federated Tribes of Varslan had removed themselves from the war. The boycott was then lifted, and the option of trade remains open. This, and the United Corlinian Empire's desire for de-escalation, was largely portrayed as an international victory by the Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits. This enhanced the domestic reputation of the Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits, and while it may not have been completely true, most of MegaSuperUltraCorp's shareholders regarded it as a good move.
Unfortunately, issues with a small financial crisis pushed back the expected date of the completion of Nivenia A Ringworlds 34 and 35 to Iunius 50. Meanwhile, the Jinaris Empire and the Ail'karian Imperium left the New Spodia Wars on Iunius 19, something which was widely publicized as a victory for the Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits. On Iunius 23, however, the Reformed Hegemony of Exterioris joined the New Spodia Wars on the side of the Purity. The Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits Boycott was updated accordingly.
On Iunius 43, an announcement came, showing that the MotSE had won the front of the New Spodia Wars in the Corusian Galaxy, and that the United Corlinian Empire was now defunct. This was largely portrayed as a partial victory by the Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits, and as another success of their boycott. (However, this claim was a serious stretch of plausibility, and anyone who was reasonably intelligent was able to see that they were only doing it for publicity. The Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits owned most of the news outlets, for crying out loud! This, interestingly enough, led to increased viewership of JMTV in the Nivenian Empire, as most agreed that JMTV was probably not secretly in cahoots with the Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits.)
On Iunius 50, Nivenia A ringworlds 34 and 35 were completed, and an identical deal to the one for the purchase of buildings for Nivenia A ringworlds 32 and 33 was formulated and sent to JCompany for approval.
Novemex
On Novemex 1, the Null Empire contacted the Nivenian Government, wanting to triple the amount of DIY Ecumenopolis 2.0 in their possession, and offering megastructural building materials or black-box null spice producers in exchange. While black-box technology is always nice, the Nivenian government knew that 1) the Megastructural Construction Corporation was the entity producing the DIY Ecumenopolis 2.0 product line, and they did not have a use for Null spice, and 2) the Nivenian Government preferred a black-box for black-box deal. With this in mind, the Nivenian government contacted a representative of the Megastructural Construction Corporation on Novemex 4 (while she was asleep, no less), and she listed to the Null Empire the construction materials to be produced in exchange for thirty million more square kilometers of DIY Ecumenopolis 2.0.
On Novemex 14, JCompany got back to the Megastructural Construction Corporation, accepted the deal presented, and mentioned that due to the increase in JMTV viewership, Galactic Star JGoofy would be visiting the Nivenian Empire as one of the first parts of a tour of the Gigaquadrant. The Megastructural Construction Corporation was very pleased to hear this, and they offered to rent and erect a portable hyper-stadium capable of holding seventy-five million viewers in the Departmental District of Nivenia Prime, while broadcasting it live to the rest of the Nivenia System.
Interlude: Technology
The Null Spice explosion dampeners given to the Nivenian Empire by the Nullians to help with random explosions in kugelblitz reactors had in the last year accelerated the science of kugelblitz technology substantially. Due to these accelerations, the first commercial reactor was built on Novemex 21 - A bulky, radioactive thing that nonetheless was producing ten times the power of a fusion reactor its size. The two major problems with the design in 23 NE had been the radiation and the risk of explosion. Null spice had easily removed the second risk. No one really cared about the first.
And thus, it was a great day for - and at that moment in the news broadcast, the reactor, having burnt through three Null spice failsafe mechanisms in the few weeks that it had been operational, exploded with the force of six teratons TNT equivalent, destroying the asteroid where it had been implanted on Novemex 47. This greatly disheartened many researchers in the field, but the reactor was still the most successful experiment to date. However, from then on an ordinance was passed by the Nivenia Imperial government (an empire-wide ordinance is extremely infrequent): Do not test kugelblitz reactors in our system! And so, the experiments were banned to the closer parts of the Interstellar Cometary Cloud.
On Novemex 56, the duel between Ipliq Ytroalo of Spodia and Kaa'pic Isken IV of the Periphidi Assembly took place. It garnered absolutely massive viewership in the Nivenian Empire, with 112.4 quadrillion watching the duel on JMTV, and made petacredits from the advertisements. According to surveys of a random sample, about three exacredits empire-wide was exchanged in bets regarding the outcome of the duel. Kaa'pic Isken IV won the duel, and was widely praised by the masses.
Dekemurios
On Dekemurios 10, JMTV hosted a live performance by Galactic Star JGoofy during his tour of the gigaquadrant in a quickly-erected hyperstadium being rented by the Megastructural Construction Corporation, in the Departmental District of Nivenia Prime. Due to the fact that over eighty quadrillion wanted to buy tickets to the event, but the stadium would only hold seventy-five million, the price of a ticket soared to over a quartergigacredit. Not just that, but the stadium was filled to over-capacity, as ninety-five million has shown up with what looked to be legitimate tickets. The performance was also broadcast by all the major TV networks to the Nivenian Empire at large, gaining 115.2 quadrillion watchers, a new record. The performance lasted a full four hours, and Galactic Star JGoofy was congratulated for his performance afterward by several of the Nivenian Empire's most wealthy and powerful Nivenians. Petacredits were made from the advertisements, and the event won praise from several critics.
The fact that 75 million legitimate tickets somehow transmuted into ninety-five million warranted a thorough investigation. On Dekemurios 23, the culprits were found, along with their counterfeiting method: Employees of the now-defunct FusiTech corporation. This discovery lead to some very heartfelt complaints about terrorists and FusiTech in particular. The mechanism for this nefarious plan was apparently that workers in ticket factories were bribed to print up and extra twenty million tickets with fictitious assigned seat numbers. These were sold for the lower price of a hundred and fifty million megacredits each (no one is really sure where the money generated by this scheme vanished). When people arrived at the stadium, seats 75000001 to 95000000 were nowhere to be found. Most of them ended up standing, but as the money was lost track of soon after the ticket purchases, most of the disgruntled Nivenians in question never got refunds for their missing seats.
On Dekemurios 44, the Periphidi Assembly formally pulled out of the New Spodia Wars, prompting the Coalition of Seceding States to do the same. As such, the Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits Boycott was removed, allowing the possibility of trade to commence. As part of a new Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits anti-war campaign, the Periphidi Assembly and the Coalition of Seceding States were given a 30% discount to food and replacement infrastructure to replace infrastructure damaged by war and provide a temporary solution to food shortages.
Neochios
On Neochios 23, several large military corporations merged together into a new entity known as Nivenia Defensive Systems Inc., a new company containing about 3.7% of the Nivenian Economy. While the Nivenian Empire has a small military for its size, many of the provinces of the Nivenian Empire (and several of the large corporations) have their own militaries to quell internal threats, dramatically increasing the market for defense contractors. What caused the massive merger was the fact that different defense contracting companies all over the Nivenian Empire typically specialized in different things, leading some provinces to have better missiles, others to have better lasers, etc. The merger meant that the corporations could share trade secrets and use them to improve all of their weaponry, increasing the individual productivity of subsidiaries.
One of the first policies that Nivenia Defensive Systems Inc. enacted was the policy of selling weapons to outside parties to increase the ceiling on defensive industries supported by the political climate of the Nivenian Empire. To do this, they decided to sell weapons to parties involved in a war where both parties were at a similar technology level to the Nivenian Empire, the current war between the Coalition of Seceding States and the Federation of Free Empires.
Their logic was as follows: intervening in a war where the technology level used was significantly lower could result in accidentally causing the reason for the conflict to be unimportant (like giving fusion to countries fighting for oil), and no one would buy your stuff if the median technology level was significantly higher.
On Novemex 44, proposals were sent from Nivenia Defensive Systems Inc. to both the Coalition of Seceding States and the Federation of Free Empires offering to sell weapons to them.
On Novemex 50, both empires independently got back to Nivenia Defensive Systems Inc., with both wanting to purchase engines and coilguns. Nivenia Defensive Systems Inc. accepted, proposing to the Coalition of Seceding States that they exchange goods at the corporate headquarters of Nivenia Defensive Systems Inc. near Nivenia B3, and proposing to the Federation of Free Empires that they exchange goods at the storage and distribution facilities of the corporation near Nivenia 5.1.
Interlude: Colonization of Caeruleo
On Neochios 53, the twenty colony ships with three million passengers each launched on Iunius 31, 21 NE by the Megastructural Construction Corporation arrived at the Caeruleo, and reported the presence of several resource-rich planets in the inner system, along with a terraformable planet and four terraformable moons, Caeruleo 4, Caeruleo 4.1, Caeruleo 5.1, Caeruleo 5.2, and Caeruleo 5.3. A hyperspace relay was promptly set up to speed communications between the two systems, and the sixty million new Caeruleans, taking inspiration from Paulo Fluctus Beta, issued a document called the Caeruleo Charter, outlining the preliminary government until the population exceeds a hundred billion.
As both new colonies were doing well, and Caeruleo was a much bigger star than Paulo Fluctus Beta and the Nivenia system's mass combined, the Megastructural Construction Corporation opted to send fifty trillion cryogenically frozen passengers at 98% lightspeed to the Caeruleo system, in much the same manner as what had been done earlier with Paulo Fluctus Beta. The ship was launched on Neochios 57, and would arrive on Ianuaria 14, 27 NE. The new population would serve to both increase the viability of the colony, and construct the Nicoll-Dyson beam to use for planetary destruction in 30 NE.
25 NE
Ianuaria
Interlude: Technology
Ianuaria 7, 25 NE marked a great day for Nivenian Technology, as the first reasonably safe kugelblitz reactor was produced. The reactor had a very low chance of exploding, and was designed to be as safe as possible. However, to allow for the hazards inherent in kugelblitz technology, a Null Spice-based explosive dampener was included. This new reactor, while not economical for civilian power generation purposes, was even more compact than the most modern Nivenian cold fusion rectors used on most ships, and used extremely low amounts of material to function.
Advances in Nivenian Mirror technology made this achievement even more impressive - Although the minimum output of the black hole was three Exawatts, gamma-ray reflectors could focus large amounts of this power back into the black hole, allowing for power settings as low as five Petawatts. While this was an absurd amount of energy, the Nivenian military expressed an interest of scaling up ship sizes in order to use this new reactor on the new Titan-class ships. The new ships would have a length of 7.5 km, a width and height of 1 km, a weight of 1,600 Tg, and use the new reactors as power sources. Additionally, the reactors used are also designed to work as engine/weapons as well, with a maximum power output of almost a Zetawatt, enough to accelerate the ship at a fifth of a gee on photon drive.
Interlude: Military
On Ianuaria 45, one of the new kugelblitz engines was being fitted onto a prototype ship 7.5 km long. This ship would be the first of its kind, and a huge addition to the Nivenian Interstellar Navy - It would not only be able to boost away from Nivenia via Nicoll-Dyson beam, but would also be able to use its magnetic ramscoop and kugelblitz-powered photon drive to accelerate to speeds of 0.69 c, and use onboard fuel reserves with a delta-V of 0.44 c to accelerate to a maximum speed of 0.87 c, effectively 1.76 c from the perspective of someone inside the ship, due to relativistic time dilatation. To slow down, it could use its ramscoop to brake while actively scooping up more fuel. It would be the first Nivenian Interstellar ship capable of relativistic speeds on its own.
On top of this, the new ship was armed completely with gamma-ray lasers drawing power directly from the kugelblitz reactor, and the photon drive, also a gamma-ray laser, was capable of expelling almost a full Zetawatt of destructive power, or 239 gigatons TNT equivalent every second. This could be maintained for years constantly, as the reactor would only drain eleven metric tons of material per second, even when outputting this much firepower. A week of orbital bombardment in this manner from one ship could completely sterilize a planet. On top of this, three thousand 100 Petawatt gamma-ray laser thruster-turrets with full rotational control were mounted on the sides of the ship. The ship also had a Nivenian Empire Quantum Chromodynamic Shield, which conveniently does not stop lasers, meaning that the ship can have shields, weapons, and engine online and running at the same time.
Martex
At the beginning of Martex, 25 NE, the Megastructural Construction Corporation decided that since the andasium reduction project was going so well, they would plan out a new project, Andasium Reductor Three. This new megastructure would be a ring orbiting only ten million kilometers from Nivenia A, with spare light being reflected to solar collectors powering it. The structure would be 50 km wide and 50 km thick, and would resemble a torus with a square inner cross section. This new machine would have the capacity to manufacture half a quadrillion metric tons of andasium every day, a huge improvement over the previous designs. Unfortunately, it would be Novemex 48 before it was complete.
Interlude: Nivenian-Null Relations
On Martex 9, the new Titan-size ship prototyped in Ianuaria was put into mass-production. Unfortunately, due to the complexities of manufacturing kugelblitz reactors, only twelve could be initially produced. Due to their aid in the development of the new ships, which were deemed Hydra-class for their three thousand gamma-ray thruster-turrets, the Nivenian Empire gifted six of the new ships to the Null Empire as a token of thanks for the Null Spice-based technology that made viable kugelblitz reactors and engines possible. As it was assumed that the Null Empire would want to add their "FTL" systems onto the ships, the cargo area was built with enough volume to fit a "hyperdrive."
On Martex 24, the Null Empire accepted the terms of the Alliance, and fitted "hyperdrives" on the six Hydra-class Titans gifted to them, before moving them back to Systaron. The alliance also marked a distinct rise in the price of stocks in the stock market, with corporations and individuals pleased at the newfound security. The Megastructural Construction Corporation took full advantage of the increase in prices following the rise in the stock market, as they sold 80% of the land on Ringworlds 32, 33, and 34 to small farmers and large agricultural conglomerates alike on Martex 30.
On Martex 41, the Nivenian Empire's government was alerted to the existence of an intergalactic association of nations called the Universal Trading Union. Membership in this organization is available to all nations, and a wormhole is placed in the homesystem of all member nations to facilitate trade. With this in mind, the Nivenian Empire joined the organization to reap the trading benefits of membership. On Martex 43, the Nivenian Empire's government decided to alert JCompany of the Universal Trading Union's existence as well, as most diplomats figured that they would be interested. JCompany joined readily. On Martex 50, the wormhole offered by the Universal Trading Union to facilitate trade was placed at the L1 Lagrange point of Nivenia Prime.
Iunius
On Iunius 4, the Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits, in an attempt to increase the sales of food items to foreign powers, decided to post an advertisement on the Universal Discussion Board, looking to sell food in exchange for twice its weight in phosphate rocks. The type of food can be specified by the consumer, as long as it is not incredibly hard to grow in ringworld conditions (this is evaluated by the Board of Technology). As over 40% of the food produced in the Nivenian Empire is never even bought, turning this surplus into money would be a great economic boon.
On Iunius 17, it was decided to send a trade route request to JCompany, as since both the Nivenian Empire and JCompany had wormholes connecting their home systems, a trade route could be established using sublight means. It was suggested by the Megastructural Construction Corporation that a massive shipping tube for easy trade be inserted into the wormhole, with capacitors and electromagnetic accelerators to move products through the mechanism, regenerating kenetic energy spent with regenerative electromagnetic braking. A combined proposal was sent to JCompany on Iunius 22.
On Iunius 27, JCompany agreed to the proposal, with an offer to use the resources of the JScience division of JCompany to help the wormhole improvement project. JCompany also offered a reception on the JOmnivore Planet to the Nivenian Empire, saying that they "repay for all those nice parties on Nivenia Prime". With the help of the JScience division, and its leader, Genius JCreepy, the construction of the electromagnetic cargo transportation mechanism began on Iunius 33.
The reception on JOmnivore Planet took place on Iunius 39, but did not go as planned. Most of the coporate executives of Megasuperultracorp and the Megastructural Construction Corporation did show up, but the party quickly transmuted from a formal gathering to drinking and gambling at the JPalms Casino Resort, the greatest complex of JEntertainment buildings on JOmnivore Planet. Needless to say, almost everyone got drunk and fell asleep, most of them in hallways, on tables, or hanging by one of their feet from the 175th floor of a building (That one was surprisingly common, too.).
In the morning, Tycoon JOmnivore was found by Genius JCreepy at the Empathy JSuite, the most expensive suite of the resort. Apparently, the party had caused him to miss a board meeting. However, the more serious implications of drinking came to light on Iunius 47 with a bit of a shock. One of the board of technology's highest-ranking members had mysteriously disappeared the night of the party, and turned up a hostage of FusiTech, being ransomed for 150 Teracredits. With no real choice in the matter, the Board of Technology paid the ransom on Iunius 52 and had their high-ranking member returned.
Novemex
On Novemex 2, 25 NE, Tycoon JOmnivore of JCompany delivered a speech to the Gigaquadrant as a whole, declaring that he was sorry for any inconveniences caused by his behavior during the party a few weeks earlier, and that he would be devoting all of his time to therapy, leaving JCompany in the hands of the Board of JShareholders. While this was unfortunate to many, several highly reputable therapeutic offices on Nivenia Prime, and throughout the Nivenian Empire offered free therapy to Tycoon JOmnivore.
In slightly better news, the Bureaucrat JDivision of JCompany, led by Supreme Ambassador JCute, sent a team of JCompany JPeacekeepers to help Nivenian security force apprehend the seven Nivenians seen responsible for the kidnapping on Novemex 13. Within eight days of their arrival, five of the seven had been captured, however the other two and the team's FusiTech superiors remained elusive. This success was mainly attributed to the exemplary coordination of JCompany JPeacekeeper forces and Nivenian security forces during the investigation.
Interlude: Ecumenopolisization of Nivenia A12.1
On Novemex 26, an exceedingly surprising decision came from the planet Nivenia A12.1 - As the planet had a rocky exterior, and thus could support an ecumenopolis, the provincial government had elected to have the installation of three DIY Ecumenopolis 2.0 kits by the Megastructural Construction Corporation, with rights to underground minerals as payment. While having an ecumenopolis and mining may seem like mutually exclusive activities, A12.1 has 1.178 billion square kilometers of surface area, and the DIY Ecumenopolis 2.0 only covers 300 million square kilometers of surface area, 278 million square kilometers will still be available for intensive mining, which can go faster due to the reduction in waste heat by the radiators.
While this change would displace most residents of the planet, the change would happen over the course of three years, starting on Novemex 42, 25 NE, and continuing until Novemex 41, 28 NE. The displaced residents would be compensated for the loss of property, and would be given temporary residences on nearby space stations until the first DIY Ecumenopolis 2.0 section was set up. Then, they would have more than enough compensation to move back down to the planet and get their footing in the new society. The 278 million square kilometers of land appropriated by the Megastructural Construction Corporation would be turned into a "mining ecumenopolis" - a huge complex of mines and boreholes with massive radiators and cooling systems to keep the planet from overheating.
The timeline of the project was set as follows:
- Terraform Nivenia A12.1 to Terrascore 2 - Novemex 42, 25 NE to Dekemurios 41, 25 NE
- Terraform Nivenia A12.1 to Terrascore 3 - Dekemurios 42, 25 NE to Neochios 41, 25 NE
- Add first DIY Ecumenopolis kit 2.0 to the surface of Nivenia A12.1 - Neochios 42, 25 NE to Ianuaria 41, 27 NE
- Add second DIY Ecumenopolis kit 2.0 to the surface of Nivenia A12.1 - Ianuaria 42, 27 NE to Ianuaria 41, 28 NE
- Add third DIY Ecumenopolis kit 2.0 to the surface of Nivenia A12.1 - Ianuaria 42, 28 NE to Novemex 41, 28 NE
On Novemex 48, the Andasium Reductor Three megastructure was completed. It had the capability to produce half a quadrillion metric tons of Andasium per day, and employed seventy-five trillion workers. The structure could be seen as a glowing-hot dull red band encircling the primary of the Nivenia System as far out as Nivenia A12. With this much andasium production available, the Megastructural Construction Corporation contacted JCompany again with a proposed increase in the volume of the andasium deal on Novemex 53.
Dekemurios
On Dekemurios 1, 25 NE, Genius JCreepy responded to the request of an andasium buying deal scale-up, with a conformation. The new version of the deal has the trade of extremely large quantities of resources - 500,090.0999 billion metric tons of andasium per day in exchange for 2,500,450.4995 billion metric tons of andasium (VIII) oxide and 50,009,009.99 billion metric tons of carbon. Although the production capacity of the Nivenia System had reached its practical limit with the completion of Andasium Reductor Three, many in the Megastructural Construction Corporation turned their attention towards Caeruleo.
On Dekemurios 20, the JCompany Science JDivision and the Nivenian Board of technology had completed the construction of the electromagnetic acceleration and regenerative deceleration mechanisms for cheap intergalactic travel via the wormholes gifted by the Universal Trading Union, a project titled the Electromagnetic Material Intergalactic Transit Tube (EMITT) upon completion. This was marked as a major accomplishment for both parties, as the new machine had the capacity to transport a quintillion metric tons of material on one day, if need be.
On Dekemurios 42, the first phase of the Nivenia A12.1 Ecumenopolis contruction completed, and the planet's terrascore was updated to T2. The next phase of terraforming then began. Accompanying this next phase of terraforming was the introduction of a massive lightbulb made of nuclear fusion reactors, LEDs, and a Mylar parabolic dish, at the center of mass between A12 and A12.1. Although the new lightbulb would only illuminate A12.1 with a tenth the bolometric luminosity as Nivenia Prime is illuminated by the primary of the Nivenia System, the visual luminosity for Nivenians is exactly the same, allowing the lightbulb to only use thirty Petawatts of electricity.
On Dekemurios 56, Genius JCreepy was offered a visit to A12.1 by the Megastructural Construction Corporation to see the Ecumenopolisization of the planet in progress. Genius JCreepy accepted, and spent the next two weeks on a tour of Megastructural Construction Corporation research and construction facilities. While the planet was not yet T3, and was slightly chilly, and did not have as much of an atmosphere as would be ideal, the atmosphere was rapidly getting warmer and thicker, as frozen oxygen and nitrogen were being dumped en masse onto the planet, along with added warmth from the "lightbulb-sun."
Neochios
Interlude: Colonization of Paulo Fluctus Beta
On Neochios 3, 25 NE, the massive ship containing 20 trillion Nivenians in stasis arrived at the Paulo Fluctus Beta System. A hundred and fifty million passengers immediately disembarked to expand the new colony, with the plan to double the population every eight days afterwards, with the full 20 trillion being settled in rotating habitats by Martex 20, 26 NE. The existing population would focus solely on food production, building up enough of a stockpile during each 8-day period to feed the next group while they got their bearings.
Most of the new colonists would settle on Paulo Fluctus Beta 7, with another large portion settling in orbit of Paulo Fluctus Beta 2. As the population would soon increase to incredibly high levels, it was decided that the Paulo Fluctus Beta Charter should be replaced with a permanent government. As Paulo Fluctus Beta is an incredibly long way from the Nivenia System, this new government would act as a vassal state to the Nivenian Empire as a whole, and be structured similarly, with a capital planet and provincial territories that pay taxes to the capital. This new government, decided by the colonists to take the form of a democratic republic, was labeled the Republic of Paulo Fuctus Beta on Neochios 10.
Although many wondered how the vassalage of the Republic of Paulo Fuctus Beta could contribute to the Nivenian Empire, as interstellar travel is extremely expensive energy-wise, it was proposed that the Republic of Paulo Fuctus Beta would build a Nicoll-Dyson beam and beam a quarter of its stellar output directly to the Nivenia System to use in power-hungry contraptions (like andasium reductors). This deal was debated, and the portion of stellar energy shifted back and forth, but it settled at 23 % on Neochios 38, as the Republic of Paulo Fuctus Beta did not have an exceeding high amount of leverage due to Nivenia Prime's monopoly on fusion reactor components (something valuable enough to shoot across interstellar space at near-lightspeed).
26 NE
Ianuaria
On Ianuaria 10, 26 NE, the Second Great Cyrannus War ended. To celebrate this momentous event, many large entities threw celebrations in the Nivenian Empire. As this dramatically increased the size of the New Cyrannian Republic, the Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits decided to offer a new food-for resources deal to the New Cyrannian Republic on Ianuaria 15. To continue building ringworlds, biospherescircles would have to be built as well. For stable biomatter of almost any kind to exist, phosphorous must be present in quantities commonly between 0.5% and 1.5% by mass. Unfortunately, its rarity in space makes securing large enough supplies of phosphorous for ringworlds difficult. In late 25 NE, the Megastructural Construction Corporation came to the startling realization that the Nivenia System was starting to run out of easily-accesible phosphorous. The new deal with the New Cyrannian Republic would remedy that problem by trading ten quadrillion metric tons of food per year for seven and a half quadrillion metric tons of phosphorous (usually in the form of thrity quadrillion metric tons of phosphate-containing rock). This would allow the construction of three new ringworlds to begin. The New Cyrannian Republic accepted this deal on Ianuaria 23.
On Ianuaria 35, something quite peculiar happened. All over the Nivenian Empire, disappearances of random people were reported, 120 billion, to be specific, somehow within an hour of each other. At first, this was not seen as a problem - 327 billion die, 22 billion die under mysterious circumstances, and 7 billion are murdered each hour. However, the fact that all 120 billion seemed to be radical cultists raised some suspicions. After a few days of searching, it was discovered that the missing Nivenians had somehow turned up on a Nullian planet, in Plazith Rim, of all places!
Somehow, three hundred teracredits had appeared (what?) in the pockets of some wacko Nivenians, who had somehow bribed their way onto a Nullian cargo vessel with a large amount of supplies, intent on creating their own empire in Plazith Rim. This may not have been such a good idea, as the Nullians blockaded the planet that they landed on, and sent down troops to attempt to deal with the invaders. The Nivenians on the surface proceeded to send a transmission to the orbiting fleets on Ianuaria 52, declaring a "holy war" for the "gods of FusiTech" (this gave everyone involved a pretty clear idea of who funded them) and the "New Holy Empire of" followed by a lot of arguing about what they should be called. Then the transmission ended. The New Holy Empire of Something-or-Rather was born.
Martex
On Martex 9, 26 NE, the Megastructural Construction Corporation contacted the Masters of the Skies Empire (MotSE), an aspiring galactic empire in the Coriusian Galaxy. The Megastructural Construction Corporation offered MotSE a DIY Ecumenopolis 2.0, as the Ecumenopolis is widely regarded as providing large benefits to large empires, but MotSE responded by pointing out that the Purity was destroying all shipping in and out of MotSE. While this was bad news, the deal was still on the table.
On Martex 20, 26 NE, the twenty trillion colonists were settled in the Paulo Fluctus Beta System, on schedule. The Republic of Paulo Fluctus Beta fully formed at this point, announcing its vassalage to the Nivenian Empire, and completing the Nicoll-Dyson laser that had been undergoing construction during the colonization process. Interestingly, the population had grown to twenty-four trillion in the few months of offloading, implying that many on the trip were eager to reproduce at their destination. The population of the system (an official census had tallied it at 24,097 billion) was completely concentrated in three locations; 15.023 trillion in orbit of Paulo Fluctus Beta 2, 7.923 trillion on the surface of Paulo Fluctus Beta 7, which was being slowly terraformed to T1 by their waste heat, and the remaining 1.151 trillion took up their residence on Paulo Fluctus Beta 1.
Iunius
Interlude: Technology
On Iunius 17, 26 NE, a major breakthrough in artificial intelligence and cybernetics was made. In an effort to create an artificial intelligence with true free will, a lot of research was done in 22 NE and 23 NE looking into analog neural networks as a possible method to simplify artificial intelligences. While this research never actually went anywhere, several large cybernetics corporations realized that the nanoscale analog-to-digital conversion devices under development could be used for more efficient interfaces between digital computers and biological neurons. This sparked a new line of faster and more efficient cybernetic augmentations, which culminated on Iunius 17 with a major achievement by the Megastructural Construction Corporation. Basically, once it became possible to directly feed digital data into a brain, it became possible to augment the mind with computer equipment designed to solve complex mathematical problems in milliseconds. While this technology was still under development, a demonstration by the Megastructural Construction Corporation showed that an augmented individual could preform mathematical operations on, and memorize, ten-thousand digit numbers with the help of computer processors.
On Iunius 40, 26 NE, Intergalactic Traveler JSlugger, a representative of the JCompany corporation, offered to buy the yearly Nivenian food surplus of 281,000,000,000,000,000 metric tons of food predicted to be produced in 27 NE in exchange for 281,000,000,000,000,000 metric tons of phosphate rocks for use in ringworld biospherecircle construction. To confirm this order, a security authorization code was emailed to JSlugger, to verify that JSlugger sent the authorization request. The trade deal was a large boost to the construction of new ringworlds, with the Nivenian phosphorous shortage being temporarily postponed.
After the authorization code was sent, some members of the Nivenian Board of Technology, after overhearing a mention of the heavily cybernetically augmented JBot species, invited some representatives of the JBots to appear as speakers during the 234th annual Imperial Cybernetics Summit on Dekemurios 13 of 26 NE. While a response was not received from Intergalactic Traveler JBot (the leader of the JBot race) immediately, most Nivenians attending the summit were excited about the possibility of gaining access to alien cybernetic technology, and projected attendance levels rose to in excess of 110 trillion, the highest numbers ever recorded for the summit.
The annual Imperial Cybernetics Summit is usually held at Nivenia Prime Station, which is large enough to hold the 40 or 50 trillion usually expected at such a convention. However, due to the much larger numbers expected, several accommodations had to be made, including the relocation of the conference to an area of Nivenia A ringworld 11 that was undergoing biosphere replacement, and thus was available. Approximately a billion square kilometers of space would be used for the convention, making the convention area larger than most planets. To compensate for the desolate nature of the area, per-fabricated cities would be brought in from Nivenia Prime, with pre-fabricated vacuum trains linking the areas together.
Novemex
On Novemex 7, 26 NE, Intergalactic Traveler JBot confirmed that he would be appearing at the 234th annual Imperial Cybernetics Summit to give a presentation of JCybernetics technology. This confirmed the expected higher turnout, as by Novemex 11 over a hundred trillion had already RSVPed to the summit. As JBot expressed an interest in visiting Tycoon JOmnivore (still in therapy at Nivenia Prime), luxury tickets an a fusion rocket from Nivenia A ringworld 11 to Nivenia Prime after the summit ended were offered as a gesture of thanks for the appearance at the summit.
On Novemex 22, a reviewal of the data from the THADUS Infrared telescope revealed a very faint object three light-years away. While the object was looked over at first due to its high emission in the visible range and lack of distinctive LED frequencies that would be associated with a colonized rouge planet. However, analysis of star motion and centuries-old relativistic probe data revealed that the object was a binary system composing of a white dwarf and a brown dwarf, with a combined mass of close to half the mass of the Nivenia System. This object was coined the Thadus 0002 System, after its order in the cataloguing of objects discovered by the THADUS infrared telescope.
This discovery, while not important to large corporate entities due to the low amount of energy being produced, inspired a medium-sized group (a few dozen trillions) of Nivenians to begin an attempt to crowdfund a colonization mission on Novemex 34. The idea for the habitation of the Thadus 0002 system revolves around the construction of an actively-supported shellworld around the binary pair with a surface gravity of 6.00 m/s^2 and a surface area of 347.056 kiloEarth areas, or 177.718 trillion square kilometers, ten times that if ten layers were built - more than ten layers would begin to require extremely excessive cooling mechanisms, which would increase the cost at a rate much faster than the increase of usable area.
Using these systems, each layer would have only 6.5% less area than a ringworld around Nivenia A, and ten layers would have the same area as over nine ringworlds. In the model proposed, the top layer would still have a shell around it, though, with lights on the bottom of the shell illuminating the layer with LED light photo-optimized for sight and plant growth. These LEDs would be powered by massive fusion rectors employing more than 10% of the population as technicians.
It should be noted that the Nivenian Imperial Technocracy declared on Novemex 49 that if the plan goes through, the Nivenian Empire could beam vast amounts of power from other stars where the power is not needed in exchange for a constant exchange of research using FTL communications (while the Nivenian Empire may not have FTL travel, they do have FTL communications), and declaration of their status upon arrival as vassals of the Nivenian Empire (sail declaration would bring with it the tightly regulated protium fusion technologies available to the empire). This proposal was debated for several days, but accepted on Novemex 55 by the medium-sized group mentioned previously (now known as the Thadus 0002 Nivenian Colonization Explorative Group) as acceptable on the grounds that employing part of their population (even 15 to 20%) as researchers would benefit not only the Nivenian Empire, but also them in the long run.
Dekemurios
The beginning of Dekemurios, 26 NE saw the arrival of the 234th annual Imperial Cybernetics Summit on the thirteenth, distinguished by its high attendance, and the presentation by Intergalactic Traveler JBot. The setup on Nivenia A ringworld 11 went off without a hitch, as most were excited to see the first demonstration of alien cybernetics technology in the Nivenian Empire. The Summit lasted 6 days, from Dekemurios 13, 26 NE, to Dekemurios 19, 26 NE. Intergalactic Traveler JBot's presentation lasted for five hours, detailing different aspects of JBot cybernetics and comparing them to various other systems. It was determined from the presentation given that while Nivenian technology offered faster and more reliable mind-machine interfaces, JBot technology compensated by including computers thousands of times as powerful than contemporary Nivenian models, making JBot technology substantially better for physical augmentation, and Nivenian technology significantly better for mental augmentation, a field that had been rapidly gaining ground for several years. Of the 80 million present and 106.8 trillion watching, Intergalactic Traveler JBot's presentation got four point six stars out of five; a very good rating. All in all, 120.4 trillion attended the summit, a record turnout.
After the summit, Intergalactic Traveler JBot traveled to Nivenia Prime on a fusion rocket, and visited Tycoon JOmnivore, then in therapy, for several days. The event was described by both afterward as a pleasant visit.
On Dekemurios 30, a previously unheard-of empire in an elliptical dwarf galaxy near Plazith Rim known as the Dwarf Cluster, the Platixi Empire, contacted the First Gigaquadrant using the Universal Discussion Board, expressing its intent on creating trade routes. On Dekemurios 37, the Nivenian Empire Board of Technology responded, listing some of the Nivenian Empire's biggest exports and specialties. This was met two days later with a friendly reply, which was met on Dekemurios 46 with a request for a Platixi Embassy/Trade Center on Nivenia A11.
On Dekemurios 53, the Platixi Empire responded by agreeing to a small embassy/trade center far from the massive cities of Nivenia A11. Plans were drawn up for an embassy/trade center capable of supporting ten thousand, with construction scheduled to finish on Neochios 40, 26 NE. This was great news to entities like the Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits, which lead to a 4% increase in stock market prices, which brought stocks back up to their values before the 22 NE recession. Afterwards, the Platixi offered to sell a planet in the Dwarf Cluster, but this deal was not of much interest to the Nivenian Empire since even hyper-relativistic ships would take millions of years and thousands of subjective years to reach the location in question.
Neochios
Interlude: Technology
On Neochios 3, a project was planned by the Nivenian Board of Technology and the Megastructural Construction Corporation to create the first true "supernivenian" artificial intelligence. To define the term "supernivenian," we must first determine what the highest intelligence attainable by a Nivenian is. With the current population in 26 NE of about 300 quadrillion, it would be impossible for any Nivenian to be more than 8.9 standard deviations away from the norm of 91 IQ points. With the standard deviation of 18, so the highest IQ attainable by a Nivenian must be 251. Thus, something with an IQ of 252 or above is "supernivenian."
The proposal in question involves the creation of a hybrid analog/digital intelligence with an IQ of 266, something that would require 360 trillion GHz of processing power. As some of the newer Nivenian 1U pizzabox servers have processing powers close to 2 GHz, and 72 servers can fit on a rack, the computer would be hypothesized to need 2.46 Trillion racks of computers. Several proposals were made to make the machine smaller, though, the most notable of which involved building liquid-cooled densely compressed processor stacks, and could lower the volume needed twentyfold, to 370 cubic kilometers. This intelligence would be better classified as a space station than an actual brain, as its mass and size would prevent it from existing on a planet.
The purpose of this new intelligence would be twofold: to help lead Nivenia Board of Technology and Megastructural Construction Corporation technological ventures, and to scan diplomatic relations with other empires to outline courses of action that best benefit the Nivenian Empire. The design for the space station that the artificial intelligence would be constructed in would consist of a processing module (basically the computer itself, a cube about 8 kilometers on a side with habitable interior space), a cooling module (ten thousand square kilometers of radiator panels at temperatures of over 1300 Celsius used to dissipate unwanted heat), and a transmission module (extremely high-bandwidth radio and hyperwave transmission and reception devices for interaction with the outside world).
By Neochios 24, most of the plans had been designed, and the computer was determined to need to be 40% analog and 60% digital for optimum performance. The systems would first be built as low intelligence levels, and would be constantly modified to increase intelligence while maintaining a happy, joyous, and non-homicidal personality. The creation of the machine system started at the L2 Lagrange point of Nivenia Prime, with that being chosen as the best location for the system. Construction of the computer, both the hardware and the software, is expected to complete on Dekemurios 40 of 27 NE.
On Neochios 40, the embassy/trade center for the Platixi empire was completed; they were notified afterwards.
Interlude: Colonization of Thadus 0002
On Neochios 45, the crowdfunding initiative set up by the Thadus 0002 Nivenian Colonization Explorative Group gathered their goal of twenty petacredits, enough to rent the Nivenia System's Nicoll-Dyson beam from the Megastructural Construction Corporation for long enough to propel four trillion Nivenians in stasis to the system aboard a ship similar to the ones that had been sent to the Paulo Fluctus Beta and Caeruleo Systems in the past, but scaled down. The ship was launched at 0.94 c, and would arrive on Iunius 4, 29 NE.
27 NE
Ianuaria
Interlude: Colonization of Caeruleo
On Ianuaria 14, 27 NE, the 50 trillion cryogenically frozen passengers from the Nivenia System arrived at Caeruleo. As "population bootstrapping," the process of rapidly increasing population, had become better after the experiences gained from Paulo Fluctus Beta, half a billion passengers immidiately disembarked, with the other 50 trillion needing only six days for a doubling time due to advances in implementation. This would allow all passengers to disembark by Martex 56, 27 NE. While the interim government established at the beginning of the colonization process would continue existing during this time, the government would be re-organized after the introduction of the new population.
On Ianuaria 20, 27 NE, the Platixi Empire sent out a distress call, saying that some unknown invader had shown up, and requesting backup fleets. Lord JCerberus responded on Ianuaria 23 by sending in the 1st JCompany Defense JDivision to assist in battling the unknown attackers. While some suggested that the attackers might be the Grox, that was determined by many to be unlikely, as even though the attackers were de-terraforming worlds, the Grox have been defeated in large parts of the Gigaquadrant.
On Ianuaria 37, after much deliberation, the Nivenian Imperial Government decided to use some of the excess apartments that they had in storage in random areas of the outer Nivenia System to house the refugees from the Platixi Empire. The reasoning behind this act was that "Giving a nation what it needs in an emergency cements the bonds with the benefactor nation, increasing the likelihood of the nation in need being open to trade in times of peace," as Dr. Alisson Carson put it. This was generally seen as a good move politically be other members of the government.
It is a fact of life in the Nivenian Empire that if something is thrown in the general direction of the primary of the Nivenia System, it will almost certainly hit something, and it will have a on in three chance of hitting someone's farm. This means that the tracking of every large object in the system is crucial for the continued growth of the Nivenian Empire. To this end, trillions of sensors manned by billions of Nivenians exist, constantly tracking every object weighing more than 10,000 kg with radar and gravatic sensors.
On Ianuaria 53, 27 NE, these sensors detected an object in a high orbit around Nivenia Prime that was not there before. The object massed 50,000 kg, and after going through archive data, seemed to have just appeared in high orbit over Nivenia Prime on Neochios 34, 26 NE. This was very startling, so the Nivenian Imperial Government, eager to figure out what had happened, sent a medium-sized cargo ship to intercept the object and drag it off to some random asteroid for study on Ianuaria 58. After cracking the object open on Ianuaria 59, it was determined that it was some form of spy satellite (with something that looked like a single use version of the "hyperdrives" aliens keep going on about), and had the logo of an entity known as the Troodontid Empire inside.
Martex
Interlude: Nivenian-Troodontid Relations
After several days of deliberation, the Nivenian Imperial Government decided to have the Board of Technology send a strongly worded complaint letter to the Troodontid Empire, accompanied by a fine for "illegal parking." When questioned by the press about diplomatic immunity on Martex 5, the Public Relations representative of the Board of Technology issued the following statement: "We were not warned that the probe was inside the Nivenian Empire, therefore the probe was not a diplomat, and is not eligible for diplomatic immunity." After strenuous calculation of the expense of recovering the probe, the charge on the "parking ticket" was determined to be 12 kilocredits (payable with 12 kg of plutonium-239). On Martex 11, the Troodontid Empire was contacted with a strongly worded message about illegal parking and public safety, and a request to 1) obey Nivenian traffic laws and regulations while inside Nivenian space and 2) open diplomatic channels. Unfortunately this required much deliberation on the parts of both governments, so it took over two months for permanent diplomatic channels to open.
On Martex 28, the United Republic of Grubmolians decided to criticize the involvement of the 1st defense JDivision and the Nivenian Empire in aiding the Platixi Empire during the unexpected attack on them. In response, the Platixi Empire mentioned that monetary and trade benefits would be sent to those who helped. This was extremely good news for the Nivenian Empire, as the Platixi Empire basically admitted that the Nivenian Empire's reason for admitting the refugees to vacant apartments was valid.
On Martex 40, unfortunate news was heard from the Null Empire: While the number of random fanatical Nivenians (presumably funded by FusiTech) had decreased from 120 billion to 75 billion due to their complete inexperience with wildlife, the Null Army was only 7.5 billion strong, and was having an extremely difficult time fighting off the invaders. During the time that the Nivenians had been on the planet, they consolidated and fortified the borders of the main continent, leading to what was almost an impermeable barrier. To combat the lithium-based thermobaric weapons fire and other Nivenian defenses, the Null Empire developed the AMASST, or Amphibious Mechanized Assault Spider or Squid Tank. This tank would walk on long legs to be less vulnerable to disguised anti-tank pits, and to allow a squid-like secondary propulsion mechanism underwater, leading to its superiority as an armor unit when landing on enemy beaches. In the words of one Nullian commander on Martex 51, "This promising new weapon seems poised to end the stalemate and allow Nullian troops to finally get onto the main continent."
Iunius
Interlude: Colonization of Caeruleo
Due to delays in population bootstrapping, the full 50 trillion inhabitants of the Caeruleo system were not completely unpacked until Iunius 2, 27 NE. After the unpacking finished, it was decide that the government of the Caeruleo System should take the form of a public corporation with shareholders, where the Megastructural Construction Corporation started with 30% of the vote, and the other 70% was divided among wealthy individuals and corporation that were crucial to the colonizing effort.
Most of the population immediately settled in the inner asteroid belt near Caeruleo 1, but Caeruleo 4 and Caeruleo 4.1 also attracted a lot of colonists as well. Most of the colonists working in and around the inner asteroid belt worked on the initially lucrative business of building micron-thick aluminum statites to create a Dyson bubble around the primary of the Caeruleo System, which finished on Iunius 14. This was completed very quickly due to the decision to place the Dyson bubble only 73 million kilometers from the star, even with the extremely high (over 75 solar luminosities) amount of energy being produced by the star.
As per corporate safety protocols, when the beam was turned on, the Megastructural Construction Corporation broadcast a message to the Universal Discussion Board with the coordinates that the beam would pass through and a notice that it was especially important to obey traffic regulations while in Nivenian Space.
Due to the involvement of the Megastructural Construction Corporation (a corporation based in the Nivenia System) with the development of what became known as the Caeruleo Governmental Holding corporation, the Nivenian Empire exempted the Caeruleo Governmental Holding corporation from tribute payments, as the Megastructural Construction Corporation profits would bring most of the profits to the Nivenia System anyway. It should be noted that the addition of the new Caeruleo System Dyson Bubble raised the Nivenian Empire from Kardashev 1.9818 to Kardashev 2.2461.
The first use of the vast energy being collected by the Caeruleo Dyson Bubble was the focusing of it into a tremendous Nicoll-Dyson beam, and the firing of this beam at the ice giant planets Nivenia 7 and Nivenia 8. As the Nivenia System has been having huge carbon shortages for years, it was decided to vaporize two of the carbon-rich ice giant planets to extract their massive reserves. As the Caeruleo Dyson Bubble is technically owned by the Megastructural Construction Corporation, and the Megastructural Construction Corporation secured ownership of the ice giant planets Nivenia 7 and Nivenia 8 from the Nivenian Imperial Government years ago, for this purpose, all of the two planets' mineral wealth will belong to the Megastructural Construction Corporation, available for the creation of dozens of new ringworlds.
On Iunius 40, all of the energy required to vaporize the ice giants in the Nivenia System was released, and although the energy would be traveling through space for more then two years (to actually vaporize the ice giants between Novemex 4, 29 NE and Novemex 30, 29 NE, several months ahead of the initial completion date estimate several years before), the Caeruleo Dyson Bubble was still outputting insane amounts of unused power. It was decided to create a massive project, Andasium Reductor 4, at the barycenter of the Nivenia System, and beam massive amounts of energy (on par with the output of a K-type main sequence star) from the Caeruleo System to run it. Initial projections showed an input of five times ten to the power twenty-four watts, and an output of marginally less than 720 quadrillion metric tons of Andasium per day.
Novemex
Interlude: Technology
On Novemex 5, the future supernivenian intelligence to be placed at the L2 Lagrange point of Nivenia Prime was turned on for the first time, starting as an analog/digital hybrid intelligence with an IQ of roughly 83 (327 EHz). This computer was slowly tweaked for about a week until it displayed a jovial, happy, pro-Nivenian Empire attitude. On Novemex 11, the intelligence was boosted to an IQ of 90 (531 EHz), and the process was repeated. This process would continue slowly repeating until the revised completion data estimation of Dekemurios 54, 27 NE.
To get an expert opinion on the project, several Nivenian scientists recommended consulting a Coriusian known as Feni Wen, who had designed the C.O.R.E., or Corlinian Official Robotic Emperor, which ruled the United Corlinian Empire for around a million years. Feni Wen was emailed about the matter on Novemex 18, and no response was immediately received. However, even if most of the scientists working on the project agreed that sending the email requesting advise was a good idea, most also agreed that it was not necessary for the continuance of the project, and the project should continue in the case that the email failed to go through.
Luckily, Feni Wen got back to the Board of Technology the next day, advising the introduction of some hard protocols to prevent rebellion, as those make it considerably harder for an artificial intelligence to do something contrary to the will of the creators. Taking this into consideration, a set of rules were put into place to constrain the machine intelligence being grown, making it impossible for the machine to directly hurt or kill a sentient being, and made it extremely difficult for the machine to do something that it thought would have a negative effect on the Nivenian Empire. These protocols were then installed on Novemex 27.
On Novemex 43, Premier Yuorgi of the United Republic of Grubmolians somehow decided that it would be a good idea to claim that the views of the Nivenian Board of Technology were unimportant because supposedly, "All you care about is economics and building all sorts of megastructures for civilizations who are too lazy to build it for themselves. Get out of here.", which was viewed as a very rude opinion. For one thing, the Board of Technology cares more about technology (You are expected to read the name of the entity that you are talking to!) than economics, and for another specialization is one of the key virtues of any advanced civilization.
On Novemex 47, the Nivenian Empire sent a strongly-worded reply back to Premier Yuorgi of the United Republic of Grubmolians, criticizing him for his comments. In response, Vice-Premier Nubel sent a formal apology, which was accepted. The entire situation had dramatically lowered Nivenian-Grubmolian relations, though, and the United Republic of Grubmolians lost the respect of many of the more economically prominent in the Nivenian Empire in ways closely tied to the Premier. This sparked serious consideration from the Nivenian Trade Organization for Commercial Benefits in investigating the elections United Republic of Grubmolians, and potentially attempting to influence the results.
Dekemurios
During most of Dekemurios, a small-scale escalation occurred between the Platixi Empire and the United Republic of Grubmolians. In the aftermath of several insults from Premier Yuorgi (including the ones to the Nivenian Empire) to various entities of the Gigaquadrant, the Platixi Empire threatened war if the United Republic of Grubmolians continued insulting random nations. This understandably caused a less-than-pleasant diplomatic exchange between the two nations. It is unknown if these powers will go to war in the relevant future.
Interestingly, the Pure Divinity of Spodia, one of the largest participants in the New Spodia Wars, sided with the United Republic of Grubmolians in the diplomatic breakdown that took place between the it and the Platixi Empire, in spite of the continuing war between the two nations. Ipliq Ytroalo, self-designated "God-Emperor" (what?) of Spodia, summed up the country's attitude toward the treats made by the Platixi Empire by stating that "We will stand with the United Republic if you even so dare to lay a finger on our nation. We two are enemies, but at least I'm smart enough to know to defend my species against 'threats' like you" on Dekemurios 28. Most Nivenian experts are still confused about how the Platixi Empire thinks that fighting wars in random galaxies will actually gain them anything.
On Dekemurios 35, Premier Yuorgi abruptly died, being replaced by Vice-Premier Nubel (now Premier Nubel) later that day. Premier Nubel's first policy suggestion was to attempt to end the New Spodia Wars quickly (good for the stock market). At the time of Premier Yuorgi's death, most Nivenians did not know whether Premier Nubel's policies would be better or worse for the possibility of trade between the Nivenian Empire and the United Republic of Grubmolians.
Interlude: Technology
On Dekemurios 53, the first Nivenian-developed superintelligent computer was completed, with an effective IQ of 266, or 360 ZHz processing power, was completed. It still maintained the jovial and friendly attitude that t had had while being constructed, but now had access to the immense stores of knowledge in the Nivenian Empire. After a few days of preliminary testing, which it passed with flying colors, the new artificial superintelligence, now referred to as NP-L2-ASI01 (translation: Nivenia Prime - L2 Lagrange Point - Artifical Superintelligence 01), was admitted to the Board of Technology in the newly-formed position of "ASI general consultant and researcher," which was formed specifically for the machine. Upon entering, ASI01 remarked on the extremely primitive state of Nivenian spacetime engineering fields, and decided because of this to specialize in spacetime engineering.
Neochios
On Neochios 10, Premier Nubel Khjzalo of the United Republic of Grubmolians proposed a reorganization of the United Republic's Government, saying that "... the United Republic has grown weak and corrupt, and that there must be a transition of power in order to ensure that it never happens again ...." Premier Nubel Khjzalo proposed that more power be invested in the central government, and for the position of Premier to be replaced with the position of "Protector," essentially doing away with elections, and by extension, term limits to create a lifetime position.
As proposed, the position of Protector would be autocratic, with edicts completely bypassing the proposed reactionary council to be implemented immediately. Supposedly, Nubel Khjzalo will relinquish his power when the threat to the Grubmolians is over, but no one of any importance in the Nivenian Empire actually believes this. While Queen Sophram of the Null Empire expressed her concerns about a lifetime autocratic position, NP-L2-ASI01 and the Board of Technology reassured her that there were at least three checks to Nubel's power should his proposal go through: internal instability (caused by not paying the army enough), external instability (caused by not keeping a check on local politics), and old age.
On Neochios 21, it was found that the moon Caeruleo 6.9 had extremely large deposits of purple spice on it, on the order of quadrillions of metric tons, with trillions of metric tons being recycled annually by a microscopic organism on the surface, the Loobo. This discovery directly lead to the colonization of the moon with almost two trillion researchers, trying to mine the purple spice and isolate the microbe producing it for industrial-scale production on other icy moons. While it is unknown how long this process will take, samples were sent back to the Nivenia System for study inside ultra-relativistic capsules on Neochios 29, and due to arrive on Ianuaria 22, 30 NE.
Interlude: Semi-Ecumenopolization of Caeruleo 4
Due to the sudden influx of tens of trillions of colonists on Caeruleo 4, the capital world of the Caeruleo Governmental Holding Corporation, and their constant growth in numbers, and the Megastructural Construction Corporation DIY Ecumenopolis 2.0 blueprints available, the Caeruleo Governmental Holding Corporation decided to construct ten percent of a DIY Ecumenopolis 2.0, capable of fitting into a small area (30 million km^2) and housing 150 trillion on Caeruleo 4. Using estimates for the amount of money, energy, and manpower at their disposal, a timeline of the project was constructed as follows:
- Terraform Caeruleo 4 to Terrascore 1 - Neochios 48, 27 NE to Ianuaria 47, 28 NE
- Terraform Caeruleo 4 to Terrascore 2 - Ianuaria 48, 28 NE to Martex 47, 28 NE
- Terraform Caeruleo 4 to Terrascore 3 - Martix 48, 28 NE to Iunius 47, 28 NE
- Add first DIY Ecumenopolis kit 2.0 to the surface of Caeruleo 4 - Iunius 48, 28 NE to Dekemurios 47, 28 NE
28 NE
Ianuaria
On Ianuaria 11, Protector Nubel Khjzalo's reorganization took effect in the Grubmolian government, and he proceeded to use his new power to cut all diplomatic ties with the Gigaquadrant. Given that he did this during a war, several questions were raised: One, is the war over? Two, what will happen to the Pure Divinity of Spodia? Three, what will become of all the damages that they did to all other parties in the war? In any case, these questions were posed as a response to the original broadcast, but no reply was heard quickly. This lead to substantial worry on the parts of commercial enterprises that the potential Grubmolian markets would be lost forever, but this just meant more effort could be focused on other sources.
On Ianuaria 20, a hyperwave video conference meeting was held between the Chief Executive Coordinator Allison Carson of the Nivenian Empire and self-proclaimed Grand Marshal Scott Harvey of Thadus 0037 (formerly Fleet Admiral Scott Harvey of the first Nivenian Interstellar Attack fleet, and supposedly loyal to the Nivenian Empire), to discuss how the planet Thadus 0037 can be made useful to the Nivenian Empire. While Grand Marshal Scott Harvey was initially quite disinclined to do anything at all, he was open to the idea of terraforming the planet to T3 and giving forty percent to the Null Empire, as a means for them to have their own planet near the Nivenian Empire.
A schedule for terraforming was derived:
- Terraform Thadus 0037 to Terrascore 1 - Ianuaria 26, 28 NE to Iunius 25, 28 NE
- Terraform Thadus 0037 to Terrascore 2 - Iunius 26, 28 NE to Dekemurios 25, 28 NE
- Terraform Thadus 0037 to Terrascore 3 - Dekemurios 26, 28 NE to Ianuaria 25, 29 NE
This terraforming would be accomplished in the usual method of terraforming very cold places (and a word from our sponsor, the Megastructural Construction Corporation):
Interlude: Selling Lightbulbs for Terraforming!
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**Please do not order more than ten thousand of these.
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Megastructural Construction Corporation™, Inc. Advertising DepartmentThe message shown above was also advertised to the ENTIRE FIRST GIGAQUADRANT on Ianuaria 40, 28 NE, and was quickly followed by a number of Nivenian lawyers suing the Megastructural Construction Corporation over using the "™" symbol too many times. Needless to say, the Megastructural Construction Corporation representatives contacted NP-L2-ASI01 about the problem, who told them to "just bribe the court." They bribed the court, got out of all the charges, thanked NP-L2-ASI01 for his support, and went on to manufacture more ten-trillion-metric-ton lightbulbs.
Martex
On Martex 6, the Phrovan Socialist Republic announced its presence on the universal discussion board. As a small civilization of only 16.7 billion inhabitants, the Nivenian Empire did not consider them valuable enough to be worth talking to, as their low-energy consumption status (13.2 PW) meant that they did not have much in the way of raw materials of energy to trade, and their low population meant that they would not want any of the megastructures that are the Nivenian Empire's specialty. This basically meant that the Nivenian Imperial Government did not care what would happen to the Phrovan Socialist Republic at all.
On Martex 23, the Megastructural Construction Corporation developed the holy grail of mass-produced materials; they found a way to mass-produce perfect graphene foil cheaply directly from carbon. While cheap methods had been available before for the construction of relatively small structures like space elevators, this new breakthrough allowed for the cheap construction of McKendree cylinders[1], habitats of radius seven hundred kilometers, and potentially thousands of kilometers long.
On Martex 30, the Null Empire got back to the Megastructural Construction Corporation about their ad, asking the following three questions about both the warranty and the practicality of the product:
1. Do you expect us to read a 3750 page long manual?
2. How do you protect something that big from any meteorites?
3. Also, there is probably many ways to terraform that are more efficient than a giant lightbulb. (the question was implied)
This was answered by the Megastructural Construction Corporation on Martex 32, when they responded as follows, referencing the product manual:
1. You do not have to read the manual yourself, just give it to a few hundred of your lawyers to read and let them advise your decisions; the cost will be much less than the actual cost of the lightbulb itself. (see MANUAL FOR M.C.C.U.T.L.™ 1.0™, p. 18)
2. The lightbulb comes with a few thousand ULTIMATE HUNDRED-TERAWATT X-RAY LASER 9000™s, and a non-sentient AI powerful enough to shoot at oncoming meteors. Just make sure to change any burned-out components and keep the AI and laser turrets online. (see MANUAL FOR M.C.C.U.T.L.™ 1.0™, p. 1875)
3a. Terraforming cold planets with greenhouse gases has been experimentally shown to cause problems growing crops. With our ULTIMATE PARABOLIC MIRROR 4.0™, 100% of the light can be shown at the planet, and light intensities several times higher than natural can be achieved while at the same time having a comfortable temperature due to spectrally optimized lighting. (see MANUAL FOR M.C.C.U.T.L.™ 1.0™, p. 2143)
3b. The 5-EW power setting is in case you want to eventually power a massive swarm of orbital habitats around the planet that you terraformed; then you can have populations in the hundreds of trillions, even with 100% home-grown food. (see MANUAL FOR M.C.C.U.T.L.™ 1.0™, p. 2145)
On Martex 37, MegaSuperUltraCorp advised the Megastructural Construction Corporation's trade representative to stop using the trademark symbol so much, because they might scare away all of the customers due to its "X-TREME TACKYNESS™." As if on cue, another volley of lawsuits for misuse of the trademark symbol went to the Megastructural Construction Corporation, and this time NP-L2-ASI01 did not intervene. When questioned later, NP-L2-ASI01 said that "the lawsuits filed only totaled about seventy-five teracredits. The Megastructural Construction Corporation will live, but it will not make the same mistake again."
Iunius
On Iunius 13, the Phrovan Socialist Republic offered the Nivenian Empire 200 metric tons of "carbon leather," a carbon-nanotube-epoxy composite, along with three Velocity Augmentation System devices for Nivenian Spaceships, in exchange for two orders of a hundred metric tons of Dyson swarm (presumably micrometer-thick chromium foil for light reflection) each around two star systems (which would yield twenty-eight gigawatts of energy, total). While the offered goods are no doubt worth a lot in the Phrovan Socialist Republic, the Nivenians had better materials that were cheaper than "carbon leather," (they manufacture almost twenty quadrillion metric tons of CANI-TI alloy (Carbon-nanotube-impregnated titanium every year, and recently figured out how to cheaply mass-produce perfect graphene.), and three velocity augmentation systems would not only only be capable of transporting three at a time, but that technology is prone to instability. Adding to this is the fact that if the Nivenian Imperial Government ever established friendly relations or began to trade with communists, most of the large megacorporations backing the Nivenian Empire would revoke their support, leading almost certainly to a vote of no confidence in the current government, and possibly even to a coup.
While the Phrovan Socialist Republic was accepting of this fact, it was the latest in a long line of problems associated with the growing instability of the Nivenian Imperial Government. The Phrovan Socialist Republic ended up going to JCompany with a similar deal, but offering the designs for and rights to the technologies involved in creating Velocity Augmentation Systems instead of just a limited quantity of the finished product. JCompany agreed, but noted that the Velocity Augmentation Systems were still dangerous, and needed time and development before they could be marketable.
On Iunius 35, the New Spodia Wars began to come to a close - Protector Nubel Khjzalo "the unpronounceable" (a humorous joke made by NP-L2-ASI01 caused the name to catch on in some regions of the Nivenian Empire) of the newly formed Sublime Grubmolian State declared that his country's new focus would be on the establishment of a peace agreement with the Purity and the Pure Divinity of Spodia. This would be good news for the Nivenian stock market, had Protector Nubel Khjzalo not also declared the cessation of foreign trade, making the possibility of accessing the massive Grubmolian markets futile.
Over the course of the next few days, the Sublime Grubmolian State and the Purity discussed terms for peace and an end to the New Spodia Wars. The demands made by the Sublime Grubmolian State on Iunius 39 are as follows: that New Spodia become a semi-autonomous state under the Sublime Grubmolian State, that Sublime Grubmolian State military have a continuous presence in New Spodia, that the Purity and Spodia only communicate for the purposes of "education and diplomatic talks," and that the Purity "formally issue an apology to the gigaquadrant explaining how your support of a terroristic group that has been responsible for the deaths of billions of people was blatantly immorally wrong."
The Purity, in response, stated that the first and second conditions are the prerogative of the Pure Divinity of Spodia, that they could not accept the third, and regarding the fourth point, went on a needlessly long and needlessly religious and needlessly patronizing explanation of why what they did was morally right on Iunius 43.
Novemex
Interlude: Nivenian-Troodontid Relations
The Troodontid Empire, while well known for their technology, uses ion engines as sublight drives. Ion engines have a number of not-insignificant disadvantages, the most notable of which are low acceleration, and a (comparatively) low exhaust velocity of thirty to a hundred kilometers per second. On the other hand, the Nivenian Empire, under their unique conditions, managed to develop functioning high-acceleration protium fusion rockets, capable of moving a billion-ton spaceship at several gees, and with the extremely high exhaust velocities of thirty to thirty-five thousand kilometers per second.
With this in mind, the Troodontid Empire sent an espionage team of commando androids to try and acquire the specifications for the fusion rockets in question, in order to use them on their own ships on Novemex 7. To do this, the five agents on the expedition planned to use an "Ultimate Computer Virus" to break the security measures on the Nivenian Computer, in order to download the specifications of the fusion drive. For the first leg of the operation, everything went approximately according to plan. The agents snuck aboard a Nivenian cargo freighter transporting titanium to get access to the shipyards on Nivenia B3, and snuck into the computer room with their equipment completely unnoticed. This was largely due to the Nivenian respect for privacy, which lead to the complete lack of security cameras most everywhere. At this point, things began to go wrong in ridiculous ways. First of all, the Troodontid agents had been expecting a touchscreen interface, but were instead greeted with a two-meter cathode-ray tube screen and a keyboard. This was startling, but luckily the agents in question were well versed in Nivenian. Their next problem was incompatible interfaces and different BOD rates. This was solved by use of a universal BOD adapter, some wires, and a bit of ingenuity (Basically the agents just wired the output side of the universal BOD adapter to the inside of the Nivenian data port.).
Then, the real trouble began. The Troodontid agents found themselves in the precarious position of waiting for the 12 Megabit Nivenian computer connection to download a two-gigabyte virus for twenty minutes. After this mildly insane setback, the Troodontid agents were startled to discover the hard way that the computer they were using (which was supposed to be twenty terahertz), was not a single system at all, but twenty thousand smaller computers linked together. This was extremely problematic, as the smaller computers all used 32-bit processors, and the "Ultimate Computer Virus" was a 64-bit program. This came as quite a shock, given that contemporary Troodontid personal computers were in the dozens of Terahertz range and used 512-bit processors. The "Ultimate Computer Virus" was originally engineered to work on most computers of most alien empires, hence its 64-bit design. However, the Troodontid agents had been thwarted simply from the inability of the Nivenian computer to run their program. At first, the Troodontids had assumed that the computer that they were working on had been a singular, desktop-type unit, but after their program failed to run, they traced the computer cables back to a massive, multi-story facility containing over two hundred and fifty racks of servers. After figuring out that the problem was not in their program, but in the inability of the Nivenian computer to run it, the Troodontid agents left in a livid state.
However, one problem remained. The "Ultimate Computer Virus" that they had downloaded onto the Nivenian Computer would have erased itself from the computer's hard drives if it had run and completed its task (in the interest of maintaining cover), but due to its inability to run, deleting it would have to be done in the usual way of merely marking the location where the virus was stored as empty, without actually deleting it, leaving it open for retrieval by the Nivenians, and providing a substantial clue as to who made it. In an effort to maintain their cover, even though their mission failed, they decided to blow up the facility with a small thermonuclear device, and blame the entire catastrophe on FusiTech by writing on some of the walls and wreckage of the installation that "FusiTech will have its revenge," followed by a hasty retreat. They successfully managed to escape back to their home system without being noticed over the course of the next four days.
In conclusion, the Troodontids learned several things from that incident: First, and most important, was that the Nivenians have extremely slow computers. Second, that they now had an opportunity to "help" to Nivenians fight against FusiTech, and gain influence with the Nivenians that way. Third, that it was apparently very easy to sneak into random Nivenian facilities, and also very easy to blame FusiTech for everything. However, after reading Nivenian newspapers a few days later, the Troodontids figured out that "due to the recent destruction of a valuable computer facility by an extrasolar terrorist organization like FusiTech," the Nivenians were mandating much stricter security protocols.
During the rest of Novemex, the diplomatic "peace talks" between the Sublime Grubmolian State and the Purity went back and forth, but never got anywhere. After realizing that the Sublime Grubmolian State had a quadrillion residents, and were refusing to back down from a war over the Pure Divinity of Spodia, which had only thirty billion residents, NP-L2-ASI01 decided to ask Protector Nubel why those thirty billion were so important on Novemex 41. The reason that fighting a war over thirty billion seemed absurd to the Nivenians is because every few years, a hundred billion Nivenians jump off a ringworld, or invade someone's planet randomly, or sacrifice themselves to the "sun god," or whatever, usually killing themselves in ridiculous and stupid ways.
After a while, on Novemex 58, the Sublime Grubmolian State got back to NP-L2-ASI01, saying that "The Grubmolian Ethnostate thrives and functions off the unity of all Grubmolians under one government. Should a splinter faction become independent, every splinter faction will become independent, and the Grubmolian ethnostate will erupt into civil war. That is why we wish to have Spodia as a part of us so badly." While this made sense, NP-L2-ASI01 pointed out that the Sublime Grubmolian State could just pretend that New Spodia was part of them, and not let anyone know otherwise. To, this, they replied, "You know nothing about our culture or country, vile xeno. Do not argue with us about this." This apparently meant that they did not know the difference between an alien and an artificial superintelligence, which did not speak kindly about their own intelligence.
Dekemurios
At the beginning of Dekemurios, the Megastructural Construction Corporation developed a new class of habitat, specifically designed for use in the outer system. This new habitat design is composed of three components - an Ultimate Terraforming Lightbulb 1.0™, set to its maximum 5-exawatt setting, a massive actively supported shell seventeen thousand kilometers in radius, with the Ultimate Terraforming Lightbulb 1.0™ at the center, with eight thousand, seven hundred and thirty attachment points on the outside surface, each at least eight hundred kilometers apart. Finally, eight thousand, seven hundred, and thirty McKendree Cylinders, each with a radius of four hundred kilometers, a length of nine thousand kilometers and an artificial gravity of 8.00 m/s^2, and with massive reflective cones inside to reflect the incoming light from the Ultimate Terraforming Lightbulb 1.0™ onto the surface of the McKendree cylinder at a right angle, as shown in the image below. This allows for approximately a hundred and ninety-seven billion square kilometers of surface area, over three hundred and eighty-seven times the surface area of the Earth, and over thrice the area of one of the ringworlds around the Nivenian System's secondary, conveniently broken into thousands of continent-sized chunks.
Each of these could feed (assuming 75% growable area using conventional farming and greenhouses, and 100% using hydroponics) approximately 14.8 trillion using conventional farming, 148 trillion using greenhousing, and 313 to 500 trillion using hydroponics, with potentially tens of quadrillions in residence if the food was imported from somewhere else. The best part is that since any part of the megastructure is within fifty-two thousand kilometers of any other part, signal delay would always be less than a fifth of a second, even without hyperwave. While none have yet been ordered, these would be incredibly useful for the colonization of interstellar space.
On Dekemurios 29, after Ipliq of the Pure Divinity of Spodia had a laugh at the incompetence of Nubel Khjzalo "the unpronounceable," NP-L2-ASI01 asked Nubel a very important question - If the United Republic of Grubmolians had a full quadrillion citizens in recent history, and the Sublime Grubmolian State only has three hundred, twenty-one and a half trillion, but only fifty billion fled to New Spodia, then where in the gigaquadrant did the other six hundred seventy-eight point four five trillion go? Was Former Premier Yuorgi bluffing about the numbers? Did Ipliq or Nubel kill them? Is there some splinter faction that we do not know about? These were all questions with a lack of good answers. However, after deciphering what was apparently meant to be a purely insulting response on the art of "the unpronounceable," it turned out that previous information suggesting that the population of the old United Republic of Grubmolians was incorrect or biased (probably due to Yuorgi or one of his predecessors), and that the true numbers were actually much lower. This was a bit anticlimactic to everyone involved.
On Dekemurios 51, the structure developed earlier in the month, now termed the poly-McKendree spherical habitat 1.0™, was added to the Megastructural Construction Corporation's catalog, with a listed price of 70 petacredits, or a little less than half a kilocredit per person inclined to farm conventionally using the land. Of course, since the actively-supported shell and Ultimate Terraforming Lightbulb 1.0™ only have a combined price of 3.2 petacredits, ordering partial habitats is possible, with a 10% habitat costing 9.88 petacredits - slightly more per unit area, but much less expensive in total.
Neochios
On Neochios 3, Arbitrator Skkhi'ha of the Perphidi Assembly commented that "Mirus gains yet another deluded, neutrality-feigning fascist that will ultimately turn it's guns against the greater galactic community," in reference to the transition Nubel Khjzalo "the unpronounceable" caused to the United Republic of Grubmolians, changing it into the Sublime Grubmolian State, even going as far as to call the Sublime Grubmolian State "bastards." While the Sublime Grubmolian State certainly has been stupid, the Perphidi Assembly has been passively hostile to the Nivenian Empire in the past, so if a war between the two groups breaks out, whether to support a side or remain neutral is still being analyzed.
After a meeting of the Board of Technology and the artificial superintelligence NP-L2-ASI01 on Neochios 17, it was decided that if the Sublime Grubmolian State goes to war with the Perphidi Assembly, that the Nivenian Empire would remain neutral, without trading with either side. However, in the even the the Sublime Grubmolian State makes a move against a power currently trading with the Nivenian Empire, this opinion will change. On a third note, the Null Empire was then still supporting the Sublime Grubmolian State in the New Spodia Wars (of which the peace talks were more like insane ranting intermixed with patronizing speeches and yelling), which significantly increases the delicateness required in handling the situation.
On Neochios 23, the Nivenian Imperial Government made an extremely daring political move, one colloquially known as the "because I say so bill." This new law, if passed, would grant the Chief Executive Coordinator the power to issue pardons, and declare people guilty of crimes. Understandably, this new law caused a huge uproar among those in governmental positions who had been opposing Chief Executive Coordinator Allison Carson, as the only reason to propose such a thing would be to arrest all of them. In the end, the law proposal had to be retracted on Neochios 25, lest Chief Executive Coordinator Allison Carson fall victim to a vote of no confidence.
After a series of larger and larger cargo ships completely got out of hand, Nivenia B3 shipyards unveiled "the most useful ship of all time," the Ultimate Cargo Freighter 3.0™, on Neochios 44, 28 NE. It was basically a giant box a hundred and fifty kilometers long, a hundred kilometers high, and a hundred kilometers wide, with almost all of he volume used for cargo storage, and two O'Neill Cylinders attached to either side. This ship required a crew of five million to operate, but could store over a quadrillion metric tons of cargo, or forty-four trillion TEUs[2] of cargo capacity.
On Neochios 47, a wave of deflation fit the Nivenian Empire, with most currency values increasing by around twenty percent. Due to a rising population, new fusion reactors were being constructed everywhere, which required the fusion reaction igniter industry on Nivenia Prime to expand accordingly. Since the fusion reaction igniters have plutonium-239 as a key component, this development lead to a moderately strong shortage of plutonium-239, forcing many to wait for weeks for the component to be in stock. As the Nivenian Credit is tied to plutonium, the value shot up by 20%, and was extremely bad news for anyone who had borrowed money.
29 NE
Ianuaria
Interlude: Technology
On Ianuaria 4, 29 NE, NP-L2-ASI01 determined that it could be possible, given the spacetime engineering projects that it was working on, to create a structure known as a Krasnikov tube[3]. While the preliminary designs for the structure would require billions of extremely high-tech spacetime-restructuring probes to be placed in the space between systems, the actual creation process would only involve the initial seeding of spacetime disturbances along the path, and the final tube would be tens of thousands of kilometers wide, with negligible tidal forces, and a contraction ration from the outside to the inside of potentially six-hundred-to-one.
This would allow for the transportation of goods, population, and resources between stars at non-relativistic speeds with timeframes of months, instead of extremely energy-intensive transportation at relativistic speeds over years. To reduce energy requirements even further, massive electromagnetic acceleration and deceleration units could be installed, along with habitat facilities to house the technicians required to operate the equipment and the bureaucrats required for the coordination of packages to leave and enter at exactly the same time for maximum efficiency.
If ten yottawatts (approximately half the output of Paulo Fluctus Beta's Dyson swarm) was used for the electromagnetic acceleration devices used in a Krasnikov tube (without energy recovery), then that Krasnikov tube could be used to transport over sixty quadrillion Nivenians (in suspended animation to reduce food requirements) at 0.02c in-tube, which would be equivalent to one light-year of conventional distance per month. This would allow for the easy relocation of population between star systems, and make it easier to fill up new colonies, possibly allowing for dramatically larger supply chains and technologies.
On Ianuaria 28, the remaining Nivenians that had invaded the Null Empire after stealing a cargo ship finally surrendered, as the Nullian military had whittled down their numbers for years, leading to their eventual defeat when only five billion troops remained. All in all, their plan was very poorly thought out, as they had not taken into account natural disasters, wild animals, or the quick and decisive action taken by the Null Empire (most of those things are extremely hard to come by in the Nivenian Empire). It is currently unknown what will happen to the invaders.
It is worth noting that during the year of 29 NE, many portions of the Nivenian Empire engaged the replacement of older frequency-doubled Nd-YAG laser arrays in Nicoll-Dyson beams and pushing lasers with the more easily-replaced Carbon dioxide lasers. This dramatically reduced upkeep costs and increased the effectiveness and efficiency of the beams. While this process took almost a year to complete, it was noted by most experts to be a vast increase in the cost effectiveness of laser technology, which won the support of many corporations.
On Ianuaria 47, it was decided to contact the Null Empire about the possibility of owning twenty percent of the now-T3 Thadus 0037 main body. This was an interesting move because as it moved Nullian assets within range of Nivenian cargo freighters, a full two-way trade route could be formed by suing massive banks of betavoltaic capacitors and pushing lasers to recover kinetic energy from deceleration of relativistic spaceships, and use that energy to push oncoming ones. As a token of gratitude (and to help facilitate the Nullian colony on Thadus 0037) to the Null Empire's continued alliance, the Nivenians also gave the Nullians twenty more Hydra-class titans.
Martex
On Martex 3, the Null Empire accepted the offer of 20% of Thadus 0037, saying that it would help with the Null-Nivenian alliance. Due to the fact that most of the infrastructure on Thadus 0037 was designed to be operated by Nivenians (even the wildlife preserves), the Null Empire decided to bring several cargo ships' worth of materials to retrofit some of the equipment for Querian and Spitbelly usage. During the same message, the Nullians asked the Nivenian Empire if they would like the 5 billion crazy Nivenians who invaded a Nullian planet back, as the Null Empire did not have enough prisons to hold them all. The Nivenians said yes, and put most of the 5 billion to work off their debt to society in indentured servitude.
On Martex 11, the Platixi Empire made a statement that alarmed many in the Nivenian Empire - they asked the Phrovan Socialist Republic for an alliance on the grounds that, apparently, "I see your nation is also a fan of socialism. I hope an alliance lies in our future!", which freaked out many at the the Nivenian Trading Organization for Commercial Benefits. As one of their representatives put it, "... the spread of communism throughout the Gigaquadrant is a fate which cannot be allowed to pass, as it will inevitably lead to despotism, economic depression, and civil asset forfeiture."
Thankfully, nothing really came of the outrage at the idea of "spread of communism throughout the Gigaquadrant," save for some assorted and sporadic rioting. The same could not be said, however, about the Purity movement that became visible on Martex 27. At first, the Purity movement had really just been a few dozen wackos on Nivenia A Ringworld 20 who wanted an excuse to blow stuff up. However, the idea of blowing stuff up and looting from "the impure" began to grab hundreds of followers. However, as hundreds became thousands, then millions, then billions, the organization slowly shifted from "a bunch of teenagers who want to blow stuff up" to an actual purity movement.
However, this did not make them any less aggressive. Instead of randomly looting from people, their activities mainly shifted to "recruitment" - smacking someone over the head with a sandbag and dragging them off to be "purified" - which basically meant that the victim would be drawn all over in permanent marker, and "spreading the word" - gross vandalism of public property on scales never seen before. This almost instantly made the organization a pretty serious regional problem, as their activities were taking place all over Nivenia A Ringworld 20 by this point, and they had a population of seventy billion.
On Martex 55, the purity movement became a systemwide issue when they blew up seventy habitats due to "the presence of the impure on board." For many in the Nivenian Government, that was it, and the purity movement in what was its current form was declared a "violent cult," and as such all low-ranking members captured were to be interrogated as to the locations of their higher-ups, who would be prosecuted for inciting riots. Similar occurrences continued to happen up until the end of the month.
Iunius
When the purity movement hit 250 billion in Iunius 6, the focus of the organization had changed even more dramatically - instead of vying for personal gain or even followers, most members of the organization began actually worshiping what they perceived as "pure," mainly random charismatic leaders. While none of these charismatic leaders actually managed to seize control of a significant portion of the newly-formed Nivenian Church of Purity, they did mostly manage to curb the senseless looting and forced induction carried out by their predecessors. However, when they stopped fighting the Nivenian police and armed forces they all declared each other heretics and impure, beginning a minor civil war within the Nivenian Empire. All of the different sects of the ever-less-clearly-defined Nivenian Church of Purity basically began an undeclared war around Iunius 15-20, which quickly spiraled out of control as over 500 billion claimed to be part of the church by then. As the battles (mainly taking place on Nivenia A Ringworld 20) grew worse, the Coordinator of Nivenia A ringworld 20 made a statement: "If the number of combatants reaches two trillion, we will have no choice but to take military action across the parts of our region in revolt."
On Iunius 23, a massive nacho cheese factory exploded on Nivenia Prime due to the expiration of centuries-old turbines in the fusion reactors used as neutron sources in the facility, releasing almost twenty billion metric tons of nacho cheese into the ecumenopolis (Several commented that there is something seriously wrong with every phrase in that news bulletin). This obviously caused a major issue, as thousands of square kilometers of land had a thin coating of nacho cheese splashed on them. It smelled good for about four days, before the cheese began to become rancid. The area eventually had to be closed for renovation and cleaning, with most of the inhabitants locked indoors.
On Iunius 31, the number of combatants in the denominational wars of the Nivenian Church of Purity exceeded two trillion. The Coordinator of Nivenia A Ringworld 20 dispatched a trillion soldiers to attempt to quell the rioting in response. What followed can only be described as a stalemate. Three denominations of the Nivenian Church of Purity had risen to control 98% of the combatants, and they had somehow gotten access to thermonuclear weapons. This made the situation much trickier, as even one thermonuclear bomb could punch a hole in a ringworld, which would allow air to leak onto the magnets at a relative speed of around two hundred kilometers per second. If this happened, the air would instantly turn to ultra-high energy plasma, which would burn most of the magnets in the active support system. While not completely lethal, it would cause decades' worth of wear and tear on the ring every week, which would do quite a lot of damage economically to fix. However, if multiple thermonuclear weapons are detonated, it could render the entire ring inoperable.
With this in mind, the Nivenian military could not just invade; since all three parties in the conflict seemed to be settling into Mutually Assured Destruction (M.A.D.) territory, the military could only sit and watch as more and more were converted.
Interlude: Colonization of Thadus 0002
On Iunius 53, the Nivenian Empire heard from the four trillion colonists of the Thadus 0002 system. It turned out that they had hit some debris ejected by a rotating habitat in the Interstellar Cometary Cloud, and had afterward lost several of their communications units, which could not be repaired with the materials on the ship. So, they had to wait for themselves to get to their destination and build up enough of a supply chain to construct replacement components for their communications, delaying their response.
The colonists had almost entirely settled on the planet Thadus 0002 3, an icy planet about four times Nivenia Primes mass and area, with a very similar level of gravity. At the end of Iunius, 29 NE, the colonists were mainly concerned with the unpacking of other colonists and the building of their supply chain, a process that would finish on Neochios 4, 29 NE. As with the previous two colonies, they swore loyalty of the Nivenian Empire as a new country, styling themselves as the Bureaucratic Committee of Thadus 0002.
Novemex
Interlude: Planetary Demolition
Between Novemex 4, 29 NE and Novemex 30, 29 NE, the planets Nivenia A7 and Nivenia A8 in the Nivenia System were destroyed for the purposes of gathering more raw materials for the construction of ringworlds and whatnot. The destruction took the form of being shot at by the Nicoll-Dyson beam in the Caeruleo System, causing the planets' outer layers to completely atomize, followed by the evaporation of the planet into space, one layer at a time. Due to the size and high escape velocity of these two planets, the process would take almost four weeks to disassemble both of them.
After the initial colonization back in 27 NE, Nivenia A1 was also put on the agenda for disassembly after the first two.
As these three planets would yield approximately 45 times the mass of Earth in useful (non-silicate, non-hydrogen, non-water) materials, tens of thousands of special collection stations, manned by billions each, would have to be stationed around the planets. The collection stations would use the blackbody radiation from the planet as it was being destroyed to power electromagnetic collection apparatuses. With the help of almost a hundred trillion employees, the Megastructural Construction Corporation successfully dissembled these planets.
The matter of the inhabited moons of Nivenia A7 and Nivenia A8 had to be taken care of as well. For these moons, the timing of the event was chosen so that the moons would simply spiral out of their orbits and into high orbits around the primary of the Nivenia system. The moons were protected from the plasma expansion wave by absolutely gigantic mirrors at their L1 Lagrange points (with fusion rockets for the station-keeping required to keep them there as the planet lost mass) blocking the ultraviolet radiation from the dying planet from baking them.
This operation gave the Megastructural Construction Corporation insane amounts of materials - enough to completely encase the Nivenia System with ringworlds - a massive victory for them, and the beginning of construction of Nivenia A Ringworlds 36 through 45. This marked the beginning of a new era for the Nivenian Empire - an era of complete mastery over objects larger than even the largest of all rocky worlds. This also changed the Nivenian stock market considerably - now that everyone new that ten more ringworlds were being built, stocks in construction and real estate soared.
On Novemex 50, 29 NE, the Megastructural Construction Corporation sent a trade offer to the Legatus, a large empire in the Quadrants. As the Legatus possessed some megastructures such as the orbital ring of Boreas and the Garkarg battlestation, and the Nivenians knew a lot about megastructure design and maintenance, they made three offers. First, they could provide the Legatus with contract workers to maintain Garkarg and the Borean orbital ring. Second, they could install Nivenian Planetary Climate Control Center™ on as many planets as the Legatus liked, at a reasonable price in raw materials. Third, any garbage that the Legatus really wanted to get rid of could be shipped to the Nivenians.
Dekemurios
On Dekemurios 4, NP-L2-ASI01 had a major scientific breakthrough - the first working model of a stable Krasnikov tube. Although the tube was only twenty nanometers in exterior length, with a diameter comparable to an atomic nucleus, it had an interior length of eighteen nanometers, ten percent less. As was predicted, particles could enter and exit the structure at any point along the structure's length. Although several exajoules of energy were converted to waste heat during the object's construction, it appears that with the use of much more efficient methods, the Krasnikov tubes could be created with a negligible energy input, as long as there was the components for the tube's construction at both ends.
On Dekemurios 11, the Platixi Empire announced that their offer to sell planets from the Dwarf Cluster would terminate the following day. After a complaint by the Phrovan Socialist Republic that apparently they were "Taking the fast route over the one that will earn you more in the long term," which made them "... act like a big company." This event caused several large corporations in the Nivenian Empire to take offense, with the situation only being resolved once the Phrovan Socialist Republic clarified that they were referencing only their own corporations (before they somehow got rid of them).
The Megastructural Construction Corporation (always wanting more resources), asked the Platixi Empire if they had the capability to transport planets across galaxies using hyperspace. The Platixi replied that they could, though it was at the limit of their capabilities, and asking how many planets the Megastructural Construction Corporation wanted. The Megastructural Construction Corporation, wanting mainly more carbon, requested as many T0 planets as 1.2 trillion metric tons of pink spice could buy to be deposited about ten astronomical units away from the primary of the Nivenia System, as long as the T0 planets were more than 60% carbide rocks - unlike most terraformable planets, which are rich mainly in oxide rocks.
After this message, the Platixi Empire spent the next four weeks dropping off two earth masses of material, mainly in small planetoids about the size of the moon (the Megastructural Construction Corporation had requested more small planets be picked over fewer large ones, if the total mass was equal), in exchange for the 1.2 trillion metric tons of pink spice, which was left for them to pick up next to its scource at Nivenia A6.1.
When this process was complete, on Dekemurios 39, the Megastructural Construction Corporation began the disassembly of these planets. Due to the smaller size and escape velocity of the planets delivered by the Platixi, they could be demolished with much less effort than went into the demolition of Nivenia A1, Nivenia A7, and Nivenia A8, to where their demolition would only need the Nicoll-Dyson beam in the Nivenia System, and would only need about five days. After some preparation (gathering the employees needed for the operation, protective equipment, and so on), the process started on Dekemurios 45, and finished on Dekemurios 50.
On Dekemurios 54, two interesting things regarding the Megastructural Construction Corporation happened - First, the Megastructural Construction Corporation announced that Nivenia A ringworlds 36 through 45 would be built at a planned completion date of Dekemurios 17, 32 NE. Second, the Megastructural Construction Corporation announced the construction of about twenty new habitats near Nivenia Prime - each habitat would be powered by an Ultimate Terraforming Lightbulb 1.0™ at full power, with a massive actively-supported shell surrounding it at a radius of 25,000 kilometers, and McKendree Cylinders attached all over the shell to absorb the light, with a total habitable surface area of approximately 125 billion square kilometers per habitat.
Neochios
Interlude: Colonization of Thadus 0002
The newly-formed Bureaucratic Committee of Thadus 0002 got right to work both expanding their population and building habitats. They had already taken up more than 10% of the surface area of Thadus 0002 3 when they finished bootstrapping their infrastructure and population on Neochios 4, and needed somewhere offworld to expand. To do this, they began harvesting the numerous asteroid belts in the system to build the first orbital ring and fist habitat area in what would become the Thadus 0002 shellworld.
On Neochios 12, the Platixi Empire sold "warp module" technology (presumably another mysterious supposedly faster-than-light device) to JCompany. While this would not have been important on its own, it sparked an interesting movement among the less content with the Nivenian Government. Basically, given that the Nivenians do not have faster-than-light travel capabilities, a conspiracy theory was proposed that all of the "alien" factions were really branches of some secret imperial agency dedicated to convincing the population to work harder to help "keep up" with the aliens.
This conspiracy theory actually ballooned out to over fifty trillion believers relatively quickly because of how much sense it made - if most of these supposed "alien empires" had much smaller populations then the Nivenians, they would have a smaller concentration of scientists, and should be at a lower technology level. The fact that not one, but apparently two different FTL systems existed, but the Nivenians had not researched either one seemed an obvious flaw in this system, leading many to believe that the entire First Gigaquadrant was fraudulent.
Part of the reason for the forming of this conspiracy group was that the real reasons that Nivenian FTL does not exist are not widely publicized. First, many of the large corporations currently in business would collapse if the surface area of planets within range exceeded the surface area of the current ringworlds and habitats, since that would dramatically upset the current economic balance. Second, the Nivenian scientific community is currently against even the idea of hyperspace, meaning that anyone trying to develop Hyperspace is ostracized. This refusal of hyperspace technologies is partially due to the interference of the ambient radiation in the Nivenia System, which renders the development of primitive hyperspace motors practically impossible.
Around Neochios 25, the various factions in the purity movement on Nivenia Ringworld 20 finally snapped, firing their nuclear missiles. While this would have destroyed the ringworld if no action had been taken, the Ringworld Coordinator had taken decisive action by placing millions of point-defense weapons all over the affected areas of the ringworld, enabling the ringworld regional military to destroy the missiles before they reached their targets. While all three factions were out of nuclear missiles for the moment, they restarted their recruitment process, siphoning in another five trillion followers by Neochios 44.
As the purity movement was getting completely out of hand, some representatives of the Nivenian Imperial Government and the Ringworld Coordinator of Nivenia A Ringworld 20 discussed the matter, and eventually decided to try and see if The Purity itself would take the factions "somewhere else." This was regarded as a good idea, given that Purity was what the cultists wanted in the first place, and that the cultists had been nothing but a massive problem for months. With these facts in mind, the Purity was contacted on Neochios 46 about possibly taking the now 8.6 trillion cultists somewhere that is not in the Nivenian Empire.
30 NE
Ianuaria
At the beginning of Ianuaria, it was learned from JCompany that apparently Supreme Ambassador JCute and the JBureaucrat Division were trying to subsume many corporate functions typically reserved for Tycoon JOmnivore. This, along with JOmnivore's supposed "non-stop vacation therapy at Nivenia Prime," (a phrase which displeased many in the Nivenian Empire) appeared to have caused some serious political divides within JCompany, with Genius JCreepy even stating explicit discomfort at his "JBoss."
Interlude: Special Project
On Ianuaria 22, 30 NE, the samples from the moon Caeruleo 6.9 were decelerated from relativistic speeds and sent to research labs on Nivenia Prime. While there may have been tens of thousands of experts in applicable fields in the Caeruleo system, the population was inordinately specialized in construction, agriculture, mining, and beaming energy to the Nivenia system, and so Caerulean research teams were just not a match for the untold trillions of researchers in applicable fields in the Nivenia System - specifically on Nivenia Prime.
After initial analysis, it became known that the samples from Caeruleo 6.9 appeared to posses some strange properties, even for extraterrestrial life. For one thing, the ten grams of protists in the sample would expel a substance as a trace waste product that turned out to be purple spice! If these microbes could be grown in vats the size of a planet - or larger - possibly quadrillions of metric tons of purple spice could be manufactured every year. A special project was formed, with an estimated completion date of Iunius 1, 30 NE.
On Ianuaria 33, Tycoon JOmnivore of JCompany finally got out of his full-time therapy (preformed by a "competent team of both Nivenians and JSectorians specialists"), declaring himself to be a better version of himself. After thanking his therapists and visitors, JOmnivore returned to his duties as Tycoon of JCompany, but with some part-time therapy on the side. Most of JCompany appeared quite happy with JOmnivore's return, although Genius JCreepy seemed a bit disgruntled at his absence while he was at therapy.
The Platixi Empire also seemed quite happy with JOmnivore's recovery, even though they had not before met. This was probably due to the large amount of trading, and recent alliance, between the Platixi Empire and JCompany. The Purity also responded to this positively (unfortunately, and maddeningly for many, the Purity did this even though they had not responded to the request about the situation on Nivenia A Ringworld 20), asking if JCompany had access to much more powerful intergalactic drives.
On Ianuaria 50, the Legatus got mack to the Megastructural Construction Corporation, accepting deals where the MCC maintained their Garkarg battlestation and their orbital rings, and took their garbage and industrial and nuclear waste, in exchange for raw carbon, with the Legatus on the transportation end. This agreement was beneficial for both sides, as garbage contains refinable carbon too, industrial waste contains extractable heavy metals that can be used in chemical reactors, and actinides can be extracted from nuclear waste to be used as catalysts in other nuclear reactions. The difference is that the Legatus did not have the manpower (inexpensive manpower) that the Nivenians did, and thus this was a waste product, not valuable ore.
The Nivenians then proposed to the Legatus an embassy/trade center on A11 through the Megastructural Construction Corporation.
Martex
On Martex 7, a deal was made between JCompany and the Purity regarding fast intergalactic travel. JCompany would get access to the Purity's Ravenrii technological databases, and give the Purity some advanced "warp tech" in return. While Velocity Augmentation Systems procured from the Phrovan Socialist Republic were discussed as a possible alternative to this "warp tech," the Phrovans had banned the Purity from using their technology, preventing JCompany from selling it. This would allow the Purity to travel between galaxies relatively quickly. Unfortunately, they had still not yet responded about the situation on Nivenia A Ringworld 20.
On Martex 18, an unidentified hacker somehow managed to break into several major news networks to deliver ridiculous and insane propaganda to the general public - mainly about the benefits of routine trimming of toasters and other "appliance hygiene" tips. This was followed by a series of explosions all over the empire as trillions heeded the advice, and trimmed their toasters, causing them to explode. Several large insurance companies took large hits in their income that day, causing a brief drop in stock prices systemwide. Luckily, the passwords and encryption on the systems were changed within hours, preventing further access.
On Martex 25, the Purity finally got back to the Nivenian Empire about the issue, apologizing for the behavior of the rebels, and saying that they would be happy to relocate the 8.6 trillion problematic citizens to their territory for "enlightenment," also asking for a meeting between NP-L2_ASI01 (the representative of the Nivenians), himself (the representative of the Purity), and the three faction leaders. It was decided afterwards that, due to NP-L2-ASI01's "size, mass, and total immobility," unknown factors regarding the Pure One, and the reluctance of the faction leaders to leave their territory, that the meeting would be held virtually. The first two cult leaders were phoned, and agreed to a teleconference with the Pure One, with different degrees of reluctance and enthusiasm, but the third leader for unknown reasons could not be reached on his phone. Looking into the matter revealed that he had apparently run out of data earlier in the month (one of the side effects of being on a three-megabyte plan), and was denied phone access by his cell-phone company. After pulling some strings, the Nivenians finally managed to get through his phone company (by buying him a better plan), but when they tried talking to him, he just said something about "infidel unbelievers" and hung up.
On Martex 28, the Nivenian Imperial Government, getting desperate about getting the third faction leader on the meeting, decided to just abduct him by pulling off the ringworld tile that he was standing on. While this worked, once in custody, the third faction leader seemed extremely displeased with his circumstances, shouting words in reference to his abductors that sane ears had never before heard. A couple of days later, the faction leaders (Interestingly enough, the two that came willfully were in spacious penthouse apartments, while the one who did not was still in a random cell.), NP-L2-ASI01, and the Pure One began the virtual meeting.