The party headed down to the underworld, and eventually arrived at some building. The Pheonix destroyed it, leaving the party vulnerable during Calibration (some treaty or something, imposing external penalties). The Deathlord who owned it just wanted to chat though. The party all went to a nice dinner, and discovered that the Sidereal teaching methods had left flaws in their techniques. The deathlords offered to blow those away, and everyone took them up on it. Then they met the Empress and found out she was something new and weird. Later, she showed them how to operate the Imperial Manse. The sidereals tried to stop them, disabling Pheonox's control of Lap and many of his devices and subverting many of Wren's armies. They also finished the Deliberative's arena.

Immediately following the events of ROTD, Glorious Wren laid claim to the Blessed Isle. Her distrust of her fellows does not allow her to do anything else. She participates in the Solar Deliberative, but claims the entirety of the Blessed Isle including the Imperial Manse as personal territories. She claims the title “Shogun” and rules through the Empress. The Empress is guided by Wren's will, but will not grant access to the Imperial Manse, and will not turn it against anyone off of the Isle.

Ebon Jade Dusk Child is furious, and vows to take back her birthright. She returns to the south and raises vast armies, eventually conquering the Mandate of Heaven. She also allies herself with the Lintha, giving her control of the southern seas. Eventually, she befriends Infernals, who provide her with sufficient demonic air cover to prevent invasion that way. The price is freeing a number of first circle demons, who now roam freely through the south.

Mask of Winters continues building strenth in the southeast. He expands his territories south and east, but does not approach Lookshy.

Wren's associations anger The Bull of the North, who declares him persona non-grata, and backs it with a large force of warstriders. It is not clear where he got so many. Sidereals are advising him, trying to use him to destroy the deliberative.

Shannon, frustrated with the infighting retires to an island in the southwest and immerses herself in trying to cure the Great Curse. She captures Tactys as a test subject. She succeeds in finding several useful techniques, but is uninterested in sharing. As a side effect of her research, she permanently lowers her max limit to two. She also succeeds in extracting Tactys' exaltation by mutating him away from anything human, but is unable to reproduce the effect.

Pheonix retains only minor, scattered territories. He spreads the Adamant Order and retains free passage everywhere. Crushing Soul of Bronze headed to the northwest and attempts to found an empire. He attempts to capture the Phoenix and imprison him in a specially designed manse. The phoenix shoved the manse and surrounding area into the deep wyld, then narrated Ken into a mental prison and spun time incredibly far down. Reality fractured diagonally out there, creating a long bay of Chaos in the northeast of creation. Since then, he has been more paranoid, but has carte blanche from the rest of the original party.

Child - Infernals Yurgen Kaneko - Sidereals Mask of Winters - Duh. Fair folk assault in the northeast north turns insular? Shannon moves west for privacy - sidereal and bioethics