The gray cloud cover above Grain-Star Twelve rippled like the surface of an agitated lake.
Without warning or engine roar, the clouds parted.
The Sovereign Aurora phased smoothly out of fifth-dimensional subspace, followed by the Ancient Star-Whale Patriarch and ten thousand Star-Whale Kings! Their sleek, iridescent bodies cast massive, protective shadows across the planetary sky, deflecting the harsh orbital radiation with their shimmering golden dorsal runes.
Down on the main tarmac of Spaceport Alpha, cold autumn rain was pouring down.
Standing in the mud were two million sunburnt spirit-farmers, their calloused hands trembling, their shirts soaked through. At the head of the crowd stood Planetary Elder Gu Feng, known across the sector as Old Harvest.
Old Harvest was a frail, stooped man of eighty years, wearing a patched burlap smock. His face was weathered like cracked riverbed clay, lined with decades of hard labor under two blazing suns.
Above his graying head, his moral integrity score shone with deep, unyielding jade light: 96/100.
Standing on a raised hovering pavilion across from the farmers was Commissioner Garrick.
