The announcement did not arrive with thunder. It arrived with an unnerving, absolute certainty that cut through the cosmic noise of the Core World and echoed into the deepest, furthest reaches of the Astralis Empire.
Across every imperial capital, across the bustling trade worlds, and even the isolated, stark frontier systems, the same high-frequency transmission activated simultaneously. Great sky arrays, normally reserved for meteorological projections or celebratory displays, brightened with blinding authority. City-wide holographs unfolded across the colossal towers of the Core, eclipsing the manufactured sunlight.
Even the distant observatories, calculating the movements of celestial bodies and void anomalies, paused their intricate work as the full weight of imperial authority asserted itself.
