The time of departure for the Samiru had arrived. As busy as Brrsot Buttes had been with the preparations, they had to be finished before the last several star cycles, as they were set aside for reflection by the Samiru, as well as correction of any unexpected problems. Over the course of their two long occupations, some of their greatest dream masters had decided on their death to become ghost spirits, both so that they could attend this long sought after final departure, and so that they could at rare intervals observe and tell the Samiru on their new worlds how all the hard work and sacrifice on Lur had continued after they left.

On the first of these days of reflection, Lady Kaede approached both Buttes and Bizdoatl with an unusual request.

Because of my sword, I have lived many generations beyond what those of my kind would typically live. Yet only as a young girl. And while I am sworn to protect the princesses, I would also want to become an adult and live a normal life. For this reason, I would like to use the gate mechanism to make a reproduction of myself, one of which would be free of the sword and to live a normal life, and the other to continue to guard the princesses on our trip to their Samiru world.

In exchange for this, in addition to Bizdoatl's certification of the contract of the Samiru with the empire, I am authorized to enhance the contract with the royal seal. While not a guarantee, it is a well respected tradition among imperial families to honor worlds under another families' seal. This would mean that while the Samiru worlds might still eventually become part of other empires, they would keep their autonomy as a group and individually, without the need for things like royal family intermarriage, difficult since the Samiru do not have a nobility.

Agreeing to this meant that well over a star cycle of hard work, under the remote direction of Twell, and with many technician mechanica, with both Bizdoatl and Buttes using consoles, first to run many tests with different objects and then living animals. A mechanica volunteered to do a double transfer, first from the gate vault to the departure port, so that its elaborate mechanica internal diagnostics could check for any transfer errors, and the second transfer, back to the gate vault while being converted from a mechanica to a living being. He had become fascinated by Doable's stories of emotions and wonder at the energy centers and circuits of living beings, and wanted to experience what it was like, since she had expressed an interest in it as well.

The double transfers went well, but the former mechanica had to take several star cycles away from duty, staying in some quiet, darker quarters because of being overwhelmed by it all. Bizdoatl had the foresight to assign another mechanica, familiar with living being physiology, to tend to him and ensure that he consumed enough water and food, and knew how to eliminate waste.

At least Bizdoatl assumed they went well, until he woke up during his rest period with profound head pain and a very loud noise, both of which soon eased. "Adjusting" said a voice in his room, then "apologies". He was very startled. "This... is... gate." Then after another "adjusting", it said, "would you like a transfer report?"

"Yes", replied a still dazed Bizdoatl.

It had taken Bizdoatl and Buttes, with the direction of Twell, to come up with the twenty or so console settings for the mechanica transfer. But Gate showed him a visual display of at least twelve hundred or so settings they should have made, to do just those two transfers properly. Then it gave a generally good summary of what they wanted to achieve, and asked if it should correct the transfer errors in the subject so that it will not be harmed. Bizdoatl agreed. Later, he learned that the ex-mechanica in his room had been in agonizing pain and organ failure when suddenly he was normal and healthy, before passing out and going into a deep sleep, utterly exhausted.

Hoping to keep the dialogue with Gate going, Bizdoatl then asked about the Dame Kaede transfer. After a long pause it said the best results could be obtained by putting the reproduction in a virtual reality, until the original and her sword had departed Lur. Bizdoatl guessed that it had used his memory to name the world so that he would recognize it. If done just before her ship left, she would age just a few hundred star cycles in the accelerated virtual reality, roughly an Urde, but the reproduction's connection to the sword would be broken.

After Gate had displayed the substantial number of settings to be used for this purpose, it asked him if he would like to execute the transfer now, or save it for later. Later, said Bizdoatl. The he asked Gate of the appropriate means of contacting him, to which Gate replied that he should just say his name, at least to plan. But if making an actual transfer, it is safest to use a console, so you can visually check what you are doing.

Dame Kaede was very impressed by it all, after talking with Bizdoatl. But then she said that after exiting the virtual reality, the reproduction part of her needed somewhere to go, as Lur was not to her taste. Bizdoatl then asked her what she would like, and she wondered what worlds Gate might suggest to her what it thought was best. So he made an inquiry of Gate, that offered hundreds of possibilities. So she spent cycles using Gate's console viewer at world after world before settling on the one she liked the most. Gate replied that in her virtual reality, her sub-visuals would be adjusted for the new world. Were there any weapons, tools, skills, or provisions she would like to take as well?

After spending some more time looking at where on her new world she wanted to be, she then gave Bizdoatl a list of items, one of which was a communications device allowing her to contact Twell Miergo, mostly in case of emergency, figuring he could in turn contact Bizdoatl to arrange evacuation.

Gate was able to do this by replicating the device that had been implanted in Bizdoatl for that purpose, but modifying it enough to use a different channel to contact Twell alone. Dame Kaede liked the idea so much that she wanted one device in both versions of her, so she would also able to contact her other self via Twell.

The last day before the Samiru departure, Bizdoatl certified that the Samiru contract with the empire had been completed with no outstanding adjustments, and Dame Kaede used the royal seal on their ownership of the Samiru worlds. Their final meal began with a long invocation to their ghost dreamer ancestors, which were not visible except to the Samiru dream masters, who relayed the ghost blessings to all.

The day of the launch was hectic. All the Samiru ships were ready to go, except for the one carrying Dame Kaede. She would be by herself in the departure port away from anyone else for safety reasons, so that as soon as she was duplicated she could board and they would all take off, while her duplicate was transported to her world of choice with far less delay than the Urte she was expecting. Figuring that the uncivilized ones would note their departure, both Ell Redoubt and Chilena Lethe would have the great island security to maximum, and several mechanica would use Gate consoles to keep an eye on any unexpected movements among the uncivilized.

Bizdoatl expected to hear the ships depart, but they were remarkably quiet, propelled by the silent words of the Samiru teams providing the motive force. They were not very forthcoming about this, their great skill, so useful in lifting great weights, digging large tunnels, and propelling spaceships at high speed. While virtual Felideer was interested in it, as a related aspect of silence, even she expressed that it was just another tiny piece of the true unknown.

Doable had been by his side during the final departure, and said to him that now we can begin to build a world full of strong beings, travelers who can be sent throughout the galaxy to free it from the crippling chains of magic. And with that she embraced him. I could get very comfortable with this, he thought.

The next cycle, Bizdoatl made a conference with the virtual masters and command mechanica, to discuss the Samiru plan which had formed three major clusters of uncivilized in prosperous, but different regions. There were also other clusters being developed elsewhere, but these three showed the most promise yet were different enough from each other to create major cultural variation.

The first was where two rivers had created a fertile region and joined together to form a swamp and river delta. The cultural groups brought together there were nomadic animal herders, fishermen and farmers. mechanica had taught them to drain part of the swamp to get to the very fertile soil below. And they soon worked together so well that they were given the knowledge of masonry and pottery, weaving and leatherwork. Eventually they were led to discover basic metal smelting, and were taught a simple written language, to see if they would develop it. To their surprise, some of them soon showed signs of intellectualism, writing down what had previously been known only as oral knowledge.

The second was also formed around a river in a rich valley. Though it was in the northern region, it was directed by the southern outpost, as it was far to the east, so was much more agrarian in character. This was decided on because the region there was slowly drying out, and eventually this would cause a migration much further to the east. At one point the Samiru mechanica encouraged them to move a city underground, as the Samiru of the time thought it might have a civilizing effect.

The third cluster was in a unique location, a generally dry land with a giant river that would regularly flood both lower banks and its delta extensively once an Urte. This meant that after the waters abated, there would be a grand planting, harvest and storage season, then idleness for the rest of the Urte. A great opportunity to teach and guide them in any number of things.

There was a feeling at the conference that perhaps the uncivilized, who were now properly called semi-civilized, were advancing too rapidly, that it would eventually become obvious that they were being directed from an outside force. Some of their religions were even suggesting such things. So the virtual master Felideer proposed that after getting a personal registration by Gate, that Bizdoatl, after seriously building the energy in his centers and circuits, under the guidance of Dake, gesture consuming a great, but still tiny, part of the unknown in Silence, then use it to justify the rapid leaps of the semi-civilized. Reality would be changed so that an advance that had happened in a short time would appear, and have background evidence, of having come about over many Urte. Felideer assured him that the unknown was capable of rewriting an entire world's history so quickly and completely that no one would remember what it had been the cycle before.

Then, before Bizdoatl disintigrated under the force of the unknown, Gate would restore him to what he was the cycle before. Doable would be operating the primary console to do this, as she was most capable to carry out what Gate described as a considerably more complicated operation. Then she would describe in detail to him what had been accomplished, that he would possibly not remember.

The amount of dancing and other exercises he had to do to build up all those different energies was very taxing and had to be done in isolation. Then in between times, Dake had to give him intense instruction on much higher levels of gesturing, for him to gather what could be described as a world sized piece of the unknown. Only then did the thought cross his mind that this might be a major challenge to the heralds and the beings they served, whose purpose seemed to be to maintain the continuity of this reality itself.

He remembered this when he finally entered Silence only to meet what looked like his identical twin.

Without speaking, it identified itself as a herald with its mind, then said to Bizdoatl that his activities had attracted the attention of its masters, who inquired what his intentions might be. He tried to explain the purpose of Lur and its inhabitants, how it was vital to the health of the entire galaxy, how their evolution had been accelerated, perhaps too rapidly, so that a piece of the unknown was to be used to patch the reality of Lur, to justify their evolution as having taken place at a natural rate.

With very little hesitation, the herald said three things. First, that what Bizdoatl did was inoffensive and acceptable, in that they were of the realm of the inhabitants, not his herald masters. Second, that harvesting such a large piece of the unknown was far beyond his capabilities, so herald will assist him in carrying it out, to prevent damage to this world or him, personally. And third, herald is captivated by all that is going on, so would like to meet with Bizdoatl in the future outside of Silence.

Then it vanished, leaving behind what he perceived to be a small, flying, dull white ball, that he knew contained an immense amount of pure unknown. Events preceded fast from there. He was back in normal reality, the ball descended to the floor before soundlessly exploding to every corner of Lur, and then Gate snatched him.

He awoke in bed in his room, without clothing, next to an equally bare Doable. He did not wait for an explanation, but apologized, and said that we must immediately carry out a world survey to see how things have changed. This is vital and we must do it now. You need to survey the great island, and Ell and his team must perform a survey of all the other land masses and uncivilized and semi-civilized as soon as possible. Document every detail and provide it to Twell Miergo. Within half a cycle she completely understood why he was so hurried. It was like they were on another world.

To start with, the energy barrier around the great island was gone, and there were large numbers of semi-civilized but apparently peaceful scattered about on the great island. Ell reported that many other such were living in formerly uninhabited places on the land masses and on many islands. Their total numbers had jumped and they had seemingly built great edifices. Or the unknown had built them, but those living there thought they had. There were now more than a handful of cities. It had even made ruins from civilizations that had never been.

What was very surprising were the great stone edifices that had appeared. A thousand Urte or more evolution in a moment. Various mechanica were cataloguing hundreds of developed languages. And wars were breaking out, which the semi-civilized believed were just continuations of older wars. All told, while the unknown had saved them an extraordinary amount of work, just documenting it for Twell would still take Urtes. Perhaps the biggest gap that Bizdoatl noted was that even with all that development, the semi-civilized were still in need of intellectual content. As it was, they were developing elaborate mythologies of gods and demons, but little of these mythical beings interactions with the living. As such they were just descripive, not inspirational.

What was needed was any number of traditions of adventurers and explorers traveling to unknown lands seeing great sights, overcoming obstacles and achieving glory. Without a long culture of this, how could they develop into beings that could travel to a multitude of worlds and negate the bad effects of magic?

So he put in a request to Twell, to compose a great library of stories that could be spread among them, with the idea of inspiring them to not just imagine such adventures, but to want to follow in their path. Stories that would blend in with with their existing cultures and languages, to be trickled out to them over the course of many Urtes. Perhaps they will even learn to compose their own adventure tales, real and imagined.

Those of, by and for, he said, with a flash of inspiration, the Lurians. Those born of and raised on Lur.

Though they were all of a kind, Bizdoatl was impressed that the unknown had also accelerated their adaptation to the energy centers and circuits of Lur, based on the lands in which they lived, so that their individuals in one region looked different from those of other regions.

Caught up in this flood of work, Bizdoatl was surprised to get a message from Dame Kaede. She, on a Samiru world, was rather bored, a bodyguard among pacifists being a dull line of work. However, she was able to live vicariously through her reproduction, whose life had become far more entertaining. The world she had been moved to was generally enjoyable, but with enough problems for her to want to make a new sword, which while nothing compared to her sun sword, was many generations more advanced than any sword in that world, non-magical or magical, even though it was half sized for her young body. She also knew fighting techniques far beyond what their best fighters knew. She went on at length of how some group, she didn't know if they were a tribe, a religious sect, or slavers, had tried to kidnap her, or maybe just wanted to steal her sword. She hadn't had that much fun in ages, though that group were much the worse for wear after the fact. As a whim, she didn't even kill any of them, just beat them so badly that they would never attack a young girl again.

Shortly thereafter, Bizdoatl saw what he thought was a mechanica in the base, but looking rather unkempt. He was the ex-mechanica that had been converted to a living being as an experiment. While at at first it had been extremely painful, before he was corrected, it was much better now, but he, and his superior mechanica were at a loss as to what he was to do with him. He could no longer carry out his duties as a mechanica, being far less capable, but also needed frequent, almost constant maintenance. How does a living being ever get anything done?

Bizdoatl realized that the domains of mechanica and living beings are truly separate, and while this ex-mechanica liked his new life, he had much to learn. For this reason, Bizdoatl transferred him to be an assistant to the command staff for the dual purpose of teaching him how to live, and to show Doable what life may be like if she decided to become a living being herself. This put Bizdoatl in the odd predicament that in addition to a great amount of work in his assignment, and still learning non-magic himself, he would need to teach it as well to this assistant. But first of all, his previous mechanica class just used mechanica identification numbers, which were quite long, so only advanced mechanica were given proper names. And since he could no longer send or receive a large number, Bizdoatl had to select a name for him.

Initially he thought his last name should be Lurian, since his living form was created here, but that might create some confusion with the semi-civilized Lurians. So he settled on creating a family name for ex-mechanica who became living beings on Lur of Dahama, and this one's personal name as Kanda.

Kanda Dahama. The ex-mechanica liked it, and the other mechanica were put at ease as well, being able to act with him as they acted around other intelligent living beings.