transsapience-and-mind-links

Ravna and Pham Nuwen explore the Foreign Quarter of the Docks at Relay, encountering diverse alien species and experiencing the cultural and commercial complexity of the Middle Beyond. They meet a group of Skroderiders and their humanoid certificants, who reveal tensions caused by the Straumli Perversion, a mysterious and damaging cryptographic event linked to the Straumli Realm. The chapter highlights the uneasy interspecies relations and the shadow of a technological threat impacting interstellar trade and trust.