​The small ship jolted as Vaan pushed the thrusters, banking hard away from the quiet valley and heading straight back over the mountain peaks. In the center of the cabin, the tiny star-coin in Julian’s hand kept spitting out that bright green light, drawing lines in the air that looked like a spiderweb made of glass. The map showed the whole continent, but right in the middle of the empty Eastern Desert, a large green dot was blinking like an angry eye.​"Silas, we’re crossing the ridge now," Elena said into her headset, leaning over Julian’s shoulder to trace the glowing green lines with her finger. "What do you mean the ships are moving on their own? Vaan’s crew has the keys."​"They don't need keys, Elena!" Silas’s voice came through the speaker, full of static and loud bangs from the shipyard below. "The moment that coin started flashing, the main computers on the flagships just bypassed our boards. Fifty of those big silver vessels just lifted off the ground, and they’re sitting

​Elena didn't look at the dark ceiling or the dead coin in Julian’s hand. She looked straight at the Chief Auditor, her eyes narrowing as she stepped right up to the black iron table.​"You still don't get it, do you?" Elena said, her voice echoing in the dark vault. "You’re still trying to use the old cables. We told you, we turned the moon off ourselves yesterday because we were tired of the machinery. We don't need your frozen grid."​The Chief Auditor’s smile faltered just a bit. He tapped the black book again, but the silver wires didn't spark. They just sat there, cold and dead. "The title deed is connected to the planetary core, Ms. Vance. If the power drops, the core freezes. That is the law of the Syndicate."​"The Syndicate's iron is what's freezing," Julian said, stepping up beside her. He took the grey, dead star-coin and threw it onto the floor. It made a dull, plastic click. "We aren't using the moon's factory anymore. We grounded the whole system into the dirt of the No

​The smell of baking bread and roasted tubers filled the village square as the sun began to slip behind the hills. Thomas, the old man from the flats, was already fast asleep on a pile of soft moss by the fire, his hands still curled as if he were holding the handles of his wooden plow. The children had stopped running around, and the whole place had settled into a quiet, warm evening.​Elena sat on a low stone wall, watching Julian wash the dark valley dirt from his arms at the new water basin. The water ran clear and fast, soaking into the green turf below their feet. "Your back is going to be stiff tomorrow," she said, a small smile playing on her lips. "That plow isn't as light as a data-pad."​Julian laughed, wiping his wet hands on his shirt. "It feels good, Elena. When I was an auditor, every number I changed felt like I was just moving dust from one corner of a room to another. Today, I actually made a hole in the earth. I can see exactly what we accomplished."​Miller walked

​The next few days passed in a blur of sore muscles, calloused hands, and the honest smell of wet earth. The valley was changing its colors completely. Where there used to be miles of empty yellow dust, there was now a wide, dark patch of tilled land that looked like a giant corduroy jacket laid out across the valley floor.​Julian stood at the far end of the field, leaning heavily against the handles of a newly finished oak plow. His shirt was soaked through with sweat, and his palms were crosshatched with raw red lines from the rough wood, but he couldn’t stop staring at the ground.​"Elena! Miller! Get over here!" Julian called out, his voice echoing across the quiet furrows.​Elena dropped her wicker basket of seeds and hurried over, her boots sinking into the soft grey soil. Miller wasn't far behind, wiping his greasy neck with a tattered rag and dragging his heavy iron shovel through the dirt.​"What’s the matter, Julian?" Elena asked, wiping a stray strand of hair from her eyes

​The air grew cool and sweet as the twilight deepened over Safe-Haven. With the heavy silver flagship parked safely at the edge of the field, its massive shadow fell across the newly turned earth like a protective wall. The two Salt-Sifter hunters didn't waste any time getting to know the locals; they went straight to the old Iron-Sink well with Miller, carrying the heavy crates of glowing deep-seeds.​Julian walked down to the edge of the pit with a small lantern, though he barely needed it. The indigo moss lining the mouth of the deep well was glowing brightly, and from the bottom of the shaft, the warm artesian water reflected the light like a giant mirror.​"Alright, boys," Miller said, rolling up his sleeves. "Marrow said these things just need to sit in the current. We don't bury them, we don't fence them in. We just let them float."​The tall hunter with the wave tattoos knelt by the water’s edge, opening the crate. He took one of the soft, glowing sea-pearls and gently dropped