Polaris is one of the most philosophically significant cities in the north-east of Anarkand, not merely for what it is, but for what it survived becoming. Long before the name Polaris ever touched a map, the land was known simply as Klax, a proud, unified nation whose people believed themselves favoured by certainty. Faith, law, and identity were tightly braided, and for generations this gave Klax remarkable cohesion, but also fragility.


In the early eras, Klax was a centre of energy propulsion, scholarship and devotion. Competing religious doctrines existed, but all claimed descent from a single cosmic truth tied to Anarkand’s creation. Mazkars doubled as courts. Priests advised governors. Debate was permitted, but doubt was not celebrated. This rigidity planted seeds that would later split the land cleanly in two.


In the 3rd era, theological disagreements hardened into absolutism. This propelled the nation into civil war. Each faction claimed sole authority over the interpretation of Anark’s will, and compromise was framed as heresy. What began as public schisms escalated into riots, then into open warfare between cities.


It was during this chaos that Syyn appeared.


Syyn was not an army, nor a weapon, nor a god in any familiar sense. It was an otherworldly entity of immense power, its arrival tearing through the upper skies like a wound. Whether drawn by the conflict or merely passing through remains unknown. What is certain is that Syyn’s attack shattered entire districts of Klax in a single day. Towers folded. Energy grids collapsed. Tens of thousands vanished without trace.


The destruction forced an end to the fighting, but not to the hatred. In the aftermath, the nation fractured permanently. Two states emerged from the ruins. Klax, ruled by religious absolutists who interpreted Syyn’s arrival as divine punishment. The Republic of Klax, formed by those who occupied most of the original Klax territory. They chose to become a republic to separate themselves from what they believed Klax had become and they rejected religious supremacy in governance, favouring civic law and plural belief.


The border between them was tense but static. Neither side trusted the other. Both believed themselves correct.


For eras, the two Klax states existed side by side, watching, waiting, interpreting history in opposite directions. Klax grew inward, increasingly dogmatic. The Republic of Klax became outward-looking, valuing diplomacy, science, and cautious exploration. Neither prospered fully. Each carried the wound of the other’s existence and the Red Hex above the nation was damaged, leading to a reduced output.


In the 10th era, the heavens themselves reignited fear. Enormous vessels appeared in the northern skies, trading fire with weapons that bent light and sound. The conflict was brief, violent, and far beyond Klax’s technological understanding. When the skies finally fell silent, something remained.


Survivors.


Reports reached the new separatist Klax of strange arrivals to the north-east: beings claiming to be human, yet not of Anarkand. They called themselves the Terra Lunis, refugees from a distant world named Terra, displaced by catastrophe.


They sent emissaries, scholars, and engineers. What followed was not conquest, nor exploitation, but cooperation. Over decades, the Klax separatists aided the Terra Lunis in building settlements, restoring agriculture, securing water, and generating sustainable energy. In return, the Terra Lunis shared knowledge not just of technology, but of perspective.


They spoke of many gods, and sometimes none. Of universes layered upon universes. Of humanity scattered across stars. Of faith as something shaped by experience, not imposed by decree.


These ideas rippled outward.


Even within the borders of the Republic of Klax, once-unquestioned dogma began to soften. The religious war that had defined the nation’s greatest tragedy was slowly revealed to have been built on fear of the unknown. The Terra Lunis embodied that unknown, and yet they were unmistakably people.


What followed was a reunification and the birth of Polaris. After three decades of cultural exchange, quiet diplomacy, and public reckoning, leaders from Klax and the Republic of Klax met for the first time since the civil war. What followed was not a declaration of victory, but of humility.


The two states agreed to communicate, trade, and form a new bond dissolving themselves from that which harboured tensions. With the support of the republic, Klax was reformed and free to develop as it so chose, and immediately they formed a new nation, founded not on singular truth, but on shared uncertainty and collective curiosity. They named this new country Polaris, after the Polaris-class mothership that had carried the Terra Lunis across the void. A symbol not of conquest, but of arrival.


The name Klax was not erased. It was honoured. The capital of Polaris bears the old name, a reminder of what rigid certainty once cost them.