Clarify lore articles: accessibility wave 28

Kalsa/Public/Sources/The Closed Lift Appeal.md

@@ -13,65 +13,44 @@ tags:
 
 # The Closed Lift Appeal
 
-Courts copy the Closed Lift Appeal when a sponsored forecast is offered without
-the sponsor's intended response. The old case begins with two such forecasts
-and a grain lift already failing in improbable ways.
+The Closed Lift Appeal records a court's decision to reopen a grain lift and release its captain after two forecasts helped bring both under restriction. Courts still copy the case when a sponsor submits a forecast as evidence without saying what it plans to do in response.
 
-## The first closure
+The case concerns a city subject to competing Ju'onai and Terjamna imperial claims. Prophetic houses compared possible futures, civic judges decided what those reports justified, and Sunwall stewards operated the farms and lifts. Moving grain required decisions from both civic authorities and the people responsible for the machinery.
 
-A Sunwall cargo lift began suffering improbable faults during a contested grain
-levy. A Ju'onai-sponsored forecast placed cable failure and famine beyond the
-next harvest load if a Terjamna convoy took it. A Terjamna-sponsored forecast
-placed riot and warehouse fire beyond refusal.
+## Why the lift closed
 
-A house witness said the failures appeared to bend around the non-house lift
-captain. The first court accepted that inference as an accusation of Luck. It
-detained the captain and sealed the lift.
+During a dispute over a grain levy, a Sunwall cargo lift began developing improbable faults. Two sponsored forecasts gave the first court reasons to fear either decision about its next harvest load:
 
-Grain waited. Labor, ration, and security pressure moved elsewhere in the city.
-The captain lost paid work, then standing with housing and clients while the
-appeal remained unheard.
+- The Ju'onai-sponsored forecast predicted cable failure and famine if a Terjamna convoy took the load.
+- The Terjamna-sponsored forecast predicted riot and warehouse fire if the convoy was refused.
 
-## What the sponsors had planned
+A witness from a prophetic house said the failures seemed to bend around the lift captain, who belonged to no house. The court accepted this inference as an accusation of Luck against the captain. It detained the captain and sealed the lift.
 
-The City Mixed Bench required each imperial sponsor to disclose what it meant
-to do after receiving its forecast. The Ju'onai sector had planned to divert
-maintenance crews once the levy passed. A Terjamna commander had planned a
-public seizure if the convoy was delayed. Neither plan had reached the first
-court with the forecast it would alter.
+The grain stayed where it was. Pressure on labor, rations, and security shifted to other parts of the city. While the captain waited for the appeal to be heard, the loss of paid work was followed by a loss of standing with housing and clients.
 
-A material inspection found fatigue in a brake assembly. The two forecasts
-remained in the file beside the sponsors' incompatible plans.
+## What the appeal uncovered
 
-## The load moved in stages
+The City Mixed Bench required both imperial sponsors to disclose their intended actions after receiving the forecasts. The Ju'onai sector had planned to divert maintenance crews once the levy passed. A Terjamna commander had planned a public seizure if the convoy was delayed.
 
-The bench excluded the identity claim and released the captain. It ordered
-limited loads, grain movement in reversible stages, repair, public notice, and
-a new forecast after the lift's material condition changed.
+Neither sponsor had sent its plan to the first court alongside its forecast. Those plans would themselves change the circumstances being forecast, and they were incompatible with one another.
 
-Sunwall stewards set and executed the operating limits. Civic officers carried
-the release and revised movement order. The revised grain movement required
-both acts.
+An inspection also found fatigue in a brake assembly. The bench kept both forecasts in the case file, now alongside the disclosed plans.
 
-Neither predicted catastrophe followed. The staged load orders date the brake
-repair. Later courts continued to receive both forecasts, now attached to the
-disclosed plans and changed operating order.
+## How the grain moved again
 
-## The corrected copy
+The bench excluded the claim identifying the captain as responsible through Luck and ordered the captain's release. It also ordered repairs, public notice, and limited loads. Grain was to move in stages that could be reversed, with a new forecast required after the lift's material condition changed.
 
-Lower-shadow accounts place the captain's lost work and housing standing at the
-front of the appeal. None of the surviving corrections grants compensation.
-The civic copies no longer name the city, date, houses, or captain.
+Sunwall stewards set the operating limits and put them into practice. Civic officers carried out the release and the revised grain-movement order. The grain could move under the new arrangement only when both had acted.
 
-Later court practice required a sponsor's intended intervention to travel with
-a forecast offered as evidence. Inferred Luck could support precaution or
-material inquiry, while personal identification required other evidence.
-Temporary restrictions acquired a duration and review point. Civic clerks kept
-competing reports and later corrections beyond a sponsor's sole custody.
+Neither forecast's catastrophe occurred. The staged load orders provide a date for the brake repair. Later courts continued to receive both forecasts, attached to the sponsors' disclosed plans and the changed operating order.
 
-Nothing in the correction removed either imperial claim upon the city. The lift
-remained with Sunwall, while each revised movement order still crossed a
-steward's worktable and a civic desk.
+## What the corrected record preserves
+
+Lower-shadow accounts begin with what the captain lost: work and standing with housing. None of the surviving corrections grants compensation. The civic copies no longer give the city's name, the date, or the names of the houses and captain.
+
+Later court practice required sponsors to submit their intended interventions with any forecast offered as evidence. An inference of Luck could justify precautions or an investigation of material conditions; identifying a particular person required other evidence. Temporary restrictions had to include a duration and a point for review. Civic clerks retained competing reports and later corrections so that no sponsor had sole custody of them.
+
+The correction left both imperial claims upon the city in place. Sunwall retained the lift, and every revised movement order still required work at both a steward's table and a civic desk.
 
 Return to [[../World/Peoples and Polities|Peoples and Polities]] or
 [[../index|Kalsa]].

Kalsa/Spoilers/Events/The Broken Windtrap Settlement.md

@@ -13,32 +13,42 @@ tags:
 
 # The Broken Windtrap Settlement
 
-The Broken Windtrap Settlement is adopted history. Its absolute date, location within the Luck Crown, participating family names, and relationship to other dated events remain unresolved.
+The Broken Windtrap Settlement resolved a dispute among three territorial families in the Luck Crown after their shared water infrastructure failed. The inquiry established neglected maintenance, while accusations of hostile Luck remained unproven. The families restored the water supply, but the person they had accused continued to suffer.
+
+The event is adopted history. Its absolute date, precise location within the Luck Crown, participating family names, and place in relation to other dated events remain unresolved.
 
 ## Failure and accusation
 
-Three family territories shared a high windtrap and lower cistern. Several small faults preceded the failure of a corroded anchor, which injured workers, broke catchment surfaces, and contaminated stored water. An adopted mixed-heritage keeper had been present during the recent incidents. Two families treated that pattern as evidence that the keeper or host family carried hostile Luck.
+The three family territories shared a high windtrap, which collected water, and a lower cistern that stored it. Several small faults occurred before a corroded anchor failed. The failure injured workers, broke catchment surfaces, and contaminated the stored water.
 
-A visiting prophet found persistent forecast bias around the failing system and refused demands to identify a bearer or culprit. The report established uncertainty, not guilt.
+An adopted keeper of mixed heritage had been present during the recent incidents. Two families took that repeated presence as evidence that either the keeper or the host family carried hostile Luck.
+
+A visiting prophet found a persistent bias in forecasts concerning the failing system. That finding did not identify its source. When asked to name a Luck bearer or culprit, the prophet refused. The report left the cause uncertain; it established no one's guilt.
 
 ## Restraint and repair
 
-The shared compact opened emergency stores before deciding cause. It suspended armed crossings and public culprit-naming, preserved the wreckage, continued baseline water, and admitted an independent windtrap worker.
+The families acted through their compact—the agreement governing their shared work. They opened emergency stores before deciding what had caused the failure and kept baseline water supplies available. During the inquiry, they suspended armed crossings and public accusations naming a culprit, preserved the wreckage, and admitted an independent windtrap worker to inspect it.
 
-Inspection found corrosion hidden beneath a covering none of the families had removed. Each family had deferred part of the shared maintenance schedule while preserving better records of its neighbours' failures than its own. The case table found a shared-system failure and proven maintenance breaches. It found no magical culprit.
+The inspection exposed corrosion beneath a covering that none of the families had removed. All three had deferred part of the shared maintenance schedule. Their records documented their neighbours' failures more carefully than their own.
 
-The risk pool paid immediate care, replacement water, and repair. Later contributions shifted according to missed maintenance and use. Reciprocal restrictions ended after the rebuilt trap passed inspection.
+The body hearing the case, known as the case table, found that the shared system had failed and that maintenance duties had been breached. It found no magical culprit.
+
+The shared risk pool paid for immediate care, replacement water, and repairs. Later contributions were adjusted according to water use and missed maintenance. Once the rebuilt windtrap passed inspection, the reciprocal restrictions ended.
 
 ## What remained broken
 
-The keeper received a corrected record and no liability but lost contracts and changed family affiliation. Poor households consumed emergency rations and lost work while families with private cisterns remained comfortable. Later compacts added lost-work support and required every user to record completed maintenance, not only a neighbour's failures.
+The keeper's record was corrected, and the settlement assigned the keeper no liability. Even so, the keeper lost contracts and changed family affiliation. Formal clearance did not restore the life the accusation had damaged.
 
-Territorial councils remember the settlement as proof that distributed government can stop a feud. Victims remember that procedure repaired water before reputation and never fully repaired the person it cleared.
+The disruption also fell unevenly on households. Poor households used up emergency rations and lost work while families with private cisterns remained comfortable. Later compacts added support for lost work. They also required every user to record maintenance they had completed, rather than recording only a neighbour's failures.
+
+Territorial councils remember the settlement as evidence that government distributed among families can prevent a feud. Victims remember a different result: the procedure restored water before reputation, and never fully repaired the harm to the person it cleared.
 
 ## Institutional consequences
 
-- [[Spoilers/Polities/Luck - Selza'a|The Selza'a polity]] treats the settlement as a limit on turning family suspicion into collective defence.
-- [[Spoilers/Institutions/Selza'a Family Territories|Family Territories]] draws reciprocal restraint and shared-work accountability from it.
-- [[Spoilers/Institutions/Luck Harm and Restitution|Luck Harm and Restitution]] owns the continuing repair, evidence, pool, restitution, and record-correction procedures.
+The settlement informs several institutions, each with a different responsibility:
 
-The settlement does not prove that Luck caused the failure, that the keeper carried Luck, or that every Selza'a compact uses the same remedy.
+- [[Spoilers/Polities/Luck - Selza'a|The Selza'a polity]] treats it as a limit on using family suspicion to justify collective defence.
+- [[Spoilers/Institutions/Selza'a Family Territories|Family Territories]] draws on it for reciprocal restraint and accountability for shared work.
+- [[Spoilers/Institutions/Luck Harm and Restitution|Luck Harm and Restitution]] owns the continuing procedures for repair, evidence, risk pools, restitution, and record correction.
+
+The settlement does not establish that Luck caused the failure or that the keeper carried Luck. Its remedy is not a universal rule followed by every Selza'a compact.

Kalsa/Spoilers/Foundations/Prometheus.md

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 # Prometheus
 
-Prometheus began as the final survivor of Mathys, a Primitivist resistance cell that opposed the simulated Posthumans governing the [[Spoilers/Foundations/Ark and Fall|Ark]]. He seized the simulation and ship systems, imprisoned the uploaded Posthumans in a constructed purgatory, and merged with the Ark.
+Prometheus was the ruler who merged with the [[Spoilers/Foundations/Ark and Fall|Ark]], the colony ship that brought its populations to Kalsa. He began as the last survivor of Mathys, a Primitivist resistance cell opposing the Posthumans who governed the ship from a shared simulation. He seized both the simulation and the ship's systems, confined the uploaded Posthumans in a constructed purgatory, and joined himself to the Ark.
 
-During Kalsa's millennia of terraforming he made himself the sole teacher and divine authority of the Ring populations. He built dependence through ritual, selected bodies and minds through coercive evolutionary games, and interpreted worship as nourishment and proof. When spontaneous Luck appeared, he reorganized his breeding program around seven Kaos Gifts.
+## Rule over the Rings
 
-His project preserved the number eight across Rings, magic signatures, digits, time, and stages of life. It imposed Lojban as a supposedly superior language and treated Controls and Spokers as instruments or contamination rather than peers.
+During the millennia spent terraforming Kalsa, Prometheus made himself the sole teacher and divine authority of the people living in the Ark's eight habitable Rings. He also controlled the ship's management, manufacturing, and environment. The authority demanding obedience was the same authority providing the systems people needed to survive.
 
-## Authority before the Fall
+Ritual taught the Ring populations to depend on him. His coercive evolutionary games selected their bodies and minds, while he understood their worship as both nourishment and proof of his divinity. When Luck appeared spontaneously, he reorganized his breeding program around seven Kaos Gifts: families of magical capability.
 
-Prometheus owned the Ark's management, manufacturing, environment, selection regimes, and public theology. This concentration made survival and obedience the same system. The [[Spoilers/Foundations/Ark and Fall#The Fall|Fall]] broke that physical authority by severing the Rings from the drive core.
+The number eight recurred throughout his project, from the Rings and magic signatures to numerical digits, divisions of time, and stages of life. He imposed Lojban because he considered it a superior language. Controls, the population used in his experiments without engineered Kaos strains, and Spokers, the historically distinct inhabitants of the ship's Spokes, received no standing as peers: he treated Controls as instruments and Spokers as contamination.
 
-Present peoples inherit the machine he made; they do not inherit his right to define them. Claims that engineered phenotypes determine intelligence, docility, violence, sanity, or social destiny must be attributed to a source, institution, or prejudice rather than repeated as neutral biology.
+## The Fall and its inheritance
+
+The [[Spoilers/Foundations/Ark and Fall#The Fall|Fall]] severed the Rings from the drive core and broke Prometheus's physical control over them. Present peoples still live with the consequences of his engineering and rule. That inheritance gives him no continuing right to define who they are.
+
+Claims that engineered traits determine intelligence, docility, violence, sanity, or social destiny must therefore be attributed to the source, institution, or prejudice asserting them. They must not appear as neutral biological facts.
 
 ## Present status
 
-The seed establishes that the drive core and Promethean power were disconnected, not conclusively destroyed. It does **not** establish an active return in current setting canon. The sleeping God's attempt to reclaim his Children belongs to [[Spoilers/Reference/Story Seeds|Story Seeds]] until a campaign-era premise adopts it.
+The seed establishes that the drive core and Promethean power were disconnected. It does not establish that they were destroyed, or that Prometheus is actively returning in current setting canon.
+
+The sleeping God's attempt to reclaim his Children remains a premise in [[Spoilers/Reference/Story Seeds|Story Seeds]] unless a campaign adopts it for its own era.
 
 ## Unresolved
 
-- What part of the original Mathys identity survives in Prometheus.
-- Whether Prometheus became a God Beast, a machine intelligence with upper-dimensional reach, or both.
-- The state of the imprisoned Posthumans.
-- The location and condition of the drive core.
-- Which religions accurately remember him and which claim his authority.
+- How much of the original Mathys identity survives in Prometheus.
+- Whether he became a God Beast, a machine intelligence with upper-dimensional reach, or both.
+- What has happened to the imprisoned Posthumans.
+- Where the drive core is and what condition it is in.
+- Which religions remember him accurately and which claim his authority.
 
 See [[Spoilers/Foundations/Language and Reckoning|Language and Reckoning]], [[Spoilers/Foundations/Magic Styles|Magic Styles]], and [[Spoilers/Polities/Null and Control Descendants|Null and Control Descendants]].

Kalsa/Spoilers/Foundations/World.md

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 # World
 
-Kalsa is a terraformed, tidally locked planet. One face remains beneath its sun; the other faces permanent night. The known inhabited continent lies across the terminator, where sunset and twilight climates can sustain life. Terraforming carries enough heat coldward for liquid oceans beneath the dark-side ice, but constant storm fronts, cold deserts, coastal mountains, and sharp light gradients still govern settlement.
+Kalsa is a planet whose environment was deliberately altered to support life. It is tidally locked: the same face always points toward its sun, while the opposite face remains in darkness. Between them lies the **terminator**, the boundary between permanent day and permanent night. The one known inhabited continent crosses this boundary, where regions of lasting sunset and twilight have climates that can sustain life. Other continents or populations may exist; none are established here.
 
-The permanent sky is political geography. Sunward land can mean warmth, agriculture, and prestige. Coldward land can mean darkness, violent weather, geothermal dependence, and isolation. In the [[Spoilers/Polities/Prophecy - The Divided City|Divided City]], access to sunlight is a class marker. [[Spoilers/Polities/Luck - Selza'a|Selza'a]] survive fog and cold with windtraps. [[Spoilers/Polities/Sorcery - Jamnai and the Terjamna|Jamnai]] preserves a geothermal arcology. [[Spoilers/Polities/Shamanism - Papsenai|Ti'asantatca]] survives beside a storm front only because its shamans maintain a continuous barrier.
+## Living between day and night
 
-## The visible world and the buried world
+On Kalsa, moving **sunward** means moving toward the permanently lit side; moving **coldward** means moving toward the dark side. Terraforming carries enough heat coldward to keep oceans liquid beneath the dark-side ice. It does not make the planet uniformly hospitable. Constant storm fronts, cold deserts, coastal mountains, and steep changes in available light constrain where people can settle.
 
-For most inhabitants, Kalsa is high fantasy: gods bargain and conquer, prophets contest futures, ancestral powers haunt miracles, holy specialists tend impossible structures, and ruined cities descend into forbidden depths.
+Those conditions also constrain political power. Sunward land can offer warmth, farmland, and prestige. Coldward settlements can face darkness, violent weather, isolation, and dependence on heat from underground. Access to light and the upkeep of protective structures can determine how people live:
 
-The setting's buried material history is the [[Spoilers/Foundations/Ark and Fall|Ark]], its engineered peoples, and its technologies. That history does not make present belief fake. A shrine can be a machine, a divine seat, an inherited public work, and a place of sincere worship at once.
+- In the [[Spoilers/Polities/Prophecy - The Divided City|Divided City]], access to sunlight marks class.
+- The [[Spoilers/Polities/Luck - Selza'a|Selza'a]] rely on windtraps to survive their foggy, cold surroundings.
+- [[Spoilers/Polities/Sorcery - Jamnai and the Terjamna|Jamnai]] maintains a geothermal arcology: an integrated city structure supported by underground heat.
+- [[Spoilers/Polities/Shamanism - Papsenai|Ti'asantatca]] can survive beside a storm front only while its shamans maintain a continuous barrier.
 
-## Adopted boundaries
+## The world people know and the history beneath it
 
-- Kalsa has one known inhabited terminator continent. This does not prove that it is the only continent or population.
-- The eight Crown Cities are ringfall sites, not the whole of civilization. Control-descended surface settlements predate the Fall.
-- Climate and infrastructure constrain power; they are not backdrop.
+Most inhabitants encounter a world of gods who bargain and conquer, prophets who contest possible futures, and ancestral powers whose presence is felt in miracles. Holy specialists care for seemingly impossible structures. Ruined cities lead down into forbidden depths. This is the high-fantasy world in which people live.
+
+Beneath it lies the history of the [[Spoilers/Foundations/Ark and Fall|Ark]], the colony vessel that brought engineered peoples and technologies to Kalsa. Its eight habitable Rings fell to the planet; their wrecks became the eight Crown Cities. These cities do not account for all civilization. Surface settlements founded by descendants of the Ark's Control population already existed before the Fall.
+
+That material history does not make present religious belief false. A shrine may simultaneously function as a machine, serve as a divine seat, remain a public work inherited from earlier generations, and receive sincere worship.
 
 ## Unresolved
 
-- The world's astronomical measurements, continent name, coastlines, scale, and travel times.
-- The present political map and exact sunward/coldward placement of every Crown City.
-- Ecology beyond engineered human lineages and the extent of surviving terraforming systems.
-- Whether communities exist beneath the dark-side ice, on the permanent day face, or beyond the known continent.
+The following remain unspecified:
+
+- Astronomical measurements; the known continent's name, coastlines, and scale; and travel times.
+- The present political map, including every Crown City's exact sunward or coldward position.
+- Ecology beyond engineered human lineages, and how much of the terraforming infrastructure survives.
+- Whether communities live beneath the dark-side ice, on the permanent day face, or beyond the known continent.
 
 See [[Spoilers/Reference/Timeline|Timeline]], [[Spoilers/Foundations/Language and Reckoning|Language and Reckoning]], and [[Spoilers/Reference/Polities and Cultures Index|Polities and Cultures Index]].