The Focus

The placeCopy Anchor Link

At Sagittarius A* lies the shadow of a supermassive black hole in an orange ring of hot gas, as the Event Horizon Telescope saw it. The S stars race around it on stretched orbits — near the hole, in minutes. The shadow is circled by a ring of colossal lenses in bronze frames, and it is dimming. At the edge of the ring stands the Focus: a heart in the middle, three wings with berths at their ends and the Great Lens turned to the shadow.

Three berthsCopy Anchor Link

Each wing opens only to a ship of its own road:

Berth	How to get there
Star	a starship with Interstellar Drive III: the shadow image is the navigation record of the place, jump from the Interstellar map
Dark	a void ship with Spindle Keel III: fly it into the fold of the Loom — with the shadow image read, the fold parts
Fiery	a depth ship with Crucible Jacket III: dive into the well of the Crucible — with the shadow image it turns bright

The berth console at the gates of a wing knows those who came to this berth in a ship of its road and opens the gates. A void ship and a depth ship go home through the gap by their berth (the veil of the fold, the hot ring) — to their own space; a starship goes home by jump or emergency beacon.

The way to Sagittarius is long, but Drive III has a price ceiling: a far jump never costs more than 5.8 buckets of fuel, so any starship makes it one way on a full tank — even the Swift with its 6 (only just: fill it to the brim). Bring canisters in the hold (or a beacon) for the way back; a 12-bucket tank makes it there and back.

The wingsCopy Anchor Link

• Star — a dome of stars: four constellations on the walls, the ones you sought in the telescope. Hold the button and lead your sight from star to star along their lines, as in the telescope. All traced — the shutters of the lens crumble.
• Dark — a hall of seams: the void leaks from two niches in the walls — these false seams are sewn up (sight along the seam with the button held; the leak burns and pushes back). Both sewn — the cloth with the true seam opens: tear it.
• Fire — a forge: three ringing anvils, each with its own time. Strike one and it rings; hit its time three times and it sings and burns. All three burning — the seals crumble.

Each hall has its own mark: a star of light hangs under the eye in the star dome, a rip in the wall of the dark hall shows the shadow, and a ladle of melt hangs on chains in the middle of the forge.

Beyond the trial is the lens of the wing. Press it: it gathers the light, and you receive its light. The lens answers only those who came to its wing in a ship of its road — every player lights their own three lenses. A lectern by the lens holds a record. With Jade, the tooltip on a lens tells whether it will give you its light: “Will give you its light”, “Already burns for you” or “Will not give you its light” — and a ship of which road it waits for.

The heartCopy Anchor Link

On the walk around the heart, by the sealed door, stands the Heart Console. The heart wakes when you have lit all three lenses and brought the toll — 128 each of Stardust, Void Shard and Deep Ember. Once awake, the heart also knows those who light their three lenses later — without the toll.

What waits in the heartCopy Anchor Link

Behind the door of the Heart is an antechamber: the niche of the last tablet and the trunk of the core. Two flights of stairs lead up to the arena under a crown of bronze ribs — toward the shadow. In the core at the middle of the arena something stirs and waits.

The master of the FocusCopy Anchor Link

The Starless is a giant cut out of the dark, with swallowed stars inside. It rises from the core in the floor of the arena — a circle more than forty blocks across under a crown through which the shadow of Sagittarius A* shows in its ring of gas — when the core is pressed by someone who has lit the three lenses with their own hands. The first call is free (the toll was paid to wake the heart); calling it again costs 8 Shadow Clot and 32 each of Stardust, Void Shard and Deep Ember. It has 1000 health and four shapes. Each yields to a movement one of the roads has already taught you:

“Barely reach” means a small share: in Eclipse outside the beam 12% of a blow gets through, in Swallowed Stars 10%, in Heartbeat out of time 20% (a hit for 20 takes 1.7, 1.4 and 3 instead of 18.7 — it has 8 armor). While it changes shape — two seconds — it cannot be hurt at all.

As it rises it knocks the mirrors askew — setting them beforehand does not help. While the fight goes on, the stairwells in the arena floor are shut with lens glass; if there is no player in the arena for a minute, it goes to rest, the stairwells open, and the fight starts over.

The arena has four obelisks of star vault — its gaze does not reach behind them — and four daises by the wall: the wave along the floor does not reach a dais. Its claws and its gaze carry cold: your step drags and frost creeps over your eyes, but the Heart itself is warm — this cold cannot kill, and a Heating Unit all but shrugs it off.

After the victory the stair hatches open, the lamps of the Heart burn again, and the niche in the antechamber gives up the last tablet. The arena and the antechamber are warm even without a Heating Unit: the chill is left only on the open berths.

RewardsCopy Anchor Link

• Swallowed Star — the heart of the Starless: for everyone who fought and defeats it for the first time; from the body — in half of the fights.
• Star in the Palm is forged in the zero-g forge of your station around the heart: the star leaves your palm and circles you, burning whatever it touches, and Shades of Hunger threefold.

• From the body — Shadow Clot and Stardust.