Humanity, which was still stumbling on the edge of the stars a few hundred years ago, is now the overlord of the Federation with territory spanning thousands of stars. This miraculous rise is all due to a set of "contracting mechanisms" that subvert cognition - power splitting and interest binding, allowing countless forces to rush into the wave of interstellar development. In the huge body of the Federation, companies, chaebols, and nobles are intertwined, and the "supreme chaebol" is the starry scepter hanging above everyone's head, holding the economic lifeline and military power. Their orders are the laws of the sector, and their interests are the Federation's course. But the shadow has never dissipated. The restoration ambitions of the old aristocrats and the emerging plutocrats are all waiting for the moment to overturn the chessboard.
