“Why do we travel the Prophet’s Path? This is a question raised yearly at this time, as we prepare for our Pilgrimage. Today, a year before the Millennial Celebration, which risks overshadowing the true answer with the spectacle of anniversary, I want to give as direct and clear an answer as I can imagine. When we trace the path that Logos Kantel traveled when they first came to this moon, we retell the story of their arrival, of their miracle working, and of their devotion to progression—the determination to move beyond the draw of conquest. Now, you might say, ‘Gur Sevraq, don’t we retell the stories of the prophet during nearly every service?’ And we do, we do. But a story is not a simple thing. A story can change. It will shape itself around the way we tell it, or when we do. The room a story is told in seeps into the facts of the matter. The voice of the speaker, like the line of an artist, gives form to ambiguity. And, worse, there is no pure retelling. No single great orator who might be able to capture the truth, no metaphor incapable of losing its power, no choir whose songs can always, eternally lift us… or ground us, as need be.  Nothing shapes a story more than the world we are in. It can twist meaning away from us, transport us into a world of stretched mirrors and garbled echoes. And that is why we return to the Path. Whether we walk or ride across the sands, when we travel the route that the Prophet did, we do so as a stylus into clay. We know the world writes on us. And so every year, we gather so that we might write back on it.” An Excerpt from a Sermon by Gur Sevraq, leader of the Church of the Resin Hart, circa 1422 This week on PARTIZAN: Operation Shackled Sun: Act 3: The Stories Told About the Things We Do ///Operation Dossier\\\ //Organizations\\ The Curtain of Divinity: Though Kesh is technically governed through an elaborate parliamentary democracy, the truth is that The Curtain of Divinity, a secretive organization inside of the Stel (and with agents across all of the Principality), serves as the actual power behind the throne. Knowledge of the Curtain is carefully guarded, and its membership is even further protected. Currently, the Curtain is most firmly aligned with Kesh and Nideo, and fights in an open war against the Pact of Necessary Venture and Millennium Break. The Pact of Necessary Venture: Though they trace their lineage back to an exploratory committee founded in the late 14th century of the Perfect Millenium, the Pact was not made in earnest until five years ago in 1418 PM, soon after hostilities began between Kesh and Apostolos.  Currently, the Pact has finds its greatest support from members of Columnar and Apostolos. They are in a state of open conflict against the Curtain and Millennium Break. Millennium Break: Dissidents, idealogues, rebels, and mercenaries. Even now, they agree on little, except this: It is time for a new Millennium. GLORY: With the help of advanced Columnar cloning science, the Glory Project (or simply GLORY), claims to have resurrected (and made immortal) heroes of the nation’s past called Eidolons. On Partizan, they field Kleos, Apothesa, Vervain, and the squad’s leader: Laurel, elect of Motion.  Company of the Spade: A veteran mercenary unit founded by space miners who learned how to pilot Hollows in the most dangerous of settings. They’ve been brought to Partizan to combine both types of expertise. //People\\ The Witch in Glass (she/her): A former scion of Kesh who, after knitting a bond with the adversary Perennial, came into control of the body of the Divine Past. Now scours Partizan for the lost, injured, and unsure, recruiting them into her growing city-state. A shaky ally of Millennium Break. Haunted by an old foe. Gur Sevraq (he/them): Once the Leader of the Church of the Resin Heart, now a discontinuous prophet: One self welded to the consciousness of their greatest living rival, the other a representative of everything he once opposed. Once controlled t