After all that has happened, all the horrors and wonders you have seen in the five nights of Calibration, you return home to Lotus, return home to the seat of your power upon Zephyr’s broad wings. You find your city still safe, still sanctuary against the horrors that have beset the Blessed Isle. Alighting, you find the city lit by torches against the night, patrolled by double and triple-watches, armed men led by the Mighty. At your presence they halt and salute, raising their swords in patriotic zeal. The captain of the brigade, a Mighty well-skilled in the ways of arrows and bowmanship, speaks to you, telling how Captain Transval has awaited your return with anxious expectation throughout the five days’ darkness. Watcher, Yomiko, and Zephyr go to attend on their Dragon-Blooded general and second-in-command; Ivory Eyes, however, takes her mother to Bronzeheart’s sanctuary, that she might rest and recuperate within her daughter’s home.

Within the mansion that now stands as Lotus’s head executive offices, the three God-Kings find Captain Transval in his own chambers, accompanied by Jubilant Dawn, a number of Mighty savants, and a handful of spirits summoned up by Ivory Eyes. The Dragon-Blood’s joy to see you returned is all too readily apparent on his face. He leaps up from his seat with passion suited to his aspect, and launches in to a lengthy story. In your absence, it would seem that attacks on the Mighty–and on all the enlightened citizenry of Lotus–have only intensified. Assassins or assailants have leapt out of every shadow, it seems, and many of the Mighty have only escaped through undeserved luck. Transval explains at length the precautions he has taken, the heightened watches and the curfews, the careful safeguarding of the Mighty. He seems almost apologetic for the liberties he has taken in command, but everything in his deeds speaks to his best judgment.

And so it is that, as you once more settle upon your thrones, the issue of the Mighty-hunting cults takes precedence. While all of the God-Kings take up their power against them–Yomiko speaking harsh sermons against the illicit and invidious cults, Zephyr patrolling the streets in full and furious force, Ivory Eyes binding spirits to the defense of the Mighty–it is Watcher and his Exodus Syndicate who bring the greatest force against them. Every night for the next season, the Lawgiver and his sworn agents stalk the streets of Lotus, shadowing the patrols of Mighty that keep watch by night. On the very first night, it is Forya who spots the man stalking the watch patrol, slinking alongside them in the parallel allies. The murderous villain is brought down before he even hears the swish of Watcher’s boomerang, laid flat by a single blow. He is the first of what will become dozens that fill the cells of Lotus’s prisons, captured and brought to justice by the Exodus Syndicate.

Within a month, the attacks have halted. Watcher cannot help but admire what he has done, the successes of his Exodus Sydnicate–not a single Mighty has fallen, nor even been attacked, before his agents have moved in to apprehend the cultists who would raise up arms against the chosen heroes of Lotus. Now, there are none bold enough to risk defying the Nightbringer–and now, Watcher can carry his justice to them. Yomiko’s persuasions and Zephyr’s intimidation turn many of the cultists captured and imprisoned, and those who do not accede to such gentle ministrations find themselves in the hands of Watcher. Soon, the Lord Nightbringer has found out each and every cult cell in Lotus. In one single, coordinated assault, his Exodus Syndicate sweeps through Lotus, arresting each and every cultist, filling Lotus’s cells with dozens, hundreds of the Mighty-hunters. Watcher’s truth-seeking ears are soon satisfied by their confessions, lacking only one final detail–the head of the cults. Each and every prisoner protests utter ignorance of the cult’s true leader, and they all speak truthfully. But whoever has fomented this attack on Lotus has been broken of his every advantage, his followers and lackeys imprisoned. He is alone now, whatever he plots or plans.

But more disturbing still is what Watcher finds on the night of the mass arrests, as he personally brings in more than half of the cultists. Though most accede instantly to his appearance, surrendering en masse, there are some who fight–and though they are brought down easily, they lash out at the Solar with skill they should not have, skill they could not have. They fight with an excellency of swordsmanship that is rightful gift only of the Solar Exalted–and, to Watcher’s horror, an excellency that belonged to the Mighty he found dead at the hands of the cults. Somehow, they have stolen the power granted by Rising Echo unto his chosen, and no interrogation or persuasion can convince them to reveal how it was done. They speak only of the blessings of the Shining One, and break down into senseless gibbering if pressed further. Worthless. Watcher keeps a strict watch on the enlightened prisoners, devising penal protocols and uniquely inescapable prisons for their sole benefit. But for whatever mystery remains unresolved, the crisis is past. Those who would plot against Lotus and its heroes have met Watcher’s justice.

And as Watcher brings his law to Lotus, so too does Ivory Eyes bring her wonders. Far-Flung Petal, her wyld-shaping collective deep in the Bordermarches of Chaos, finally begins operations–and within days, it has changed the face of Lotus. Every city, every society in Creation rests upon the backs of farmers and laborers, those who provide the bare necessities of life. Lotus, no more. Within mere days, Far-Flung Petal has wrought enough of food from the chaos of the Wyld to feed every citizen of Lotus for years. And in days to come, the wonders grow only greater. Every want and need, every good and luxury is shaped from inchoate nothingness within Petal’s bounds, and they are barred to none. Within months, every citizen of Lotus commands all he could ever want, living in wealth to match the most opulent the Realm could offer. Poverty vanishes, for there is no need of it–without any scarcity, without a limit to what riches can be divided amongst society, there is nothing to limit all from freely sharing their wealth, benefitting from the benefices of the God-Kings.

Lotus is transformed. No more must anyone work for pay, or to keep themselves fed. Men and women now work solely for the good of their fellow citizens, and for the glory of Lotus. Ivory Eyes offers enlightenment to all who take up this endeavor, granting an education in both mortal and magical arts to all who ask for it. Soon, every citizen is literate and educated to match the most pampered scion of the Dynasty, and almost all have mastered the arts of essence, guided to enlightenment under the God-Kings’ tutelage. Petal offers these newly-enlightened mortals the artifice and implements of First Age civilization. A geomantic power grid supplies all inhabitants with magical lighting, heating, communications, and sanitation. Everyday wonders proliferate, from the transperfect domestic utensil to the thousand comforts lounge, letting the lowliest of Lotus’s people live in all the splendor of the Era of Dreams. The Dragon Rail offers travel to any, letting any citizen speed across Creation with ease and comfort. Under this magical renaissance, Lotus booms, six hundred thousand men and women living within a city built to rival the greatest cities of Creation, putting Nexus, Gem, even the Imperial City to shame. The towers of Lotus, wrought by thaumaturgy and sorcery, surpass all others, hundreds upon hundreds of feet high. Honeycombed within them are the laboratories of mage-scientists and thaumaturges, the sanctums of sorcerers, the workshops of artificers, the studios of enlightened artists, and the workplaces of a hundred hundred other refined and glorious professions. The governance of Lotus is now conducted from a splendid pleasure dome wrought over Ivory Eyes’ caldera-manse, an opal dome built in homage to that of the Incarnae themselves.

Heaven and Creation stir over the blossoming of Lotus, and the rebirth of the First Age that comes with it. Whispering Heaven, newly appointed to the post of Captain of the Division of Endings, also finds himself promoted to Head of the Convention on Lotus, a subdivision of the Convention on Essence-Wielders that consists of nine-tenths of that convention’s personnel. Lotus’s almost universally enlightened populace surpasses that of any other city or nation within the world, perhaps even exceeding any other Direction. Though the Sidereal keeps offices in both Yu-Shan and Lotus, he only rarely enters into Creation, caught up in the bureaucracy of Heaven. The Gold Faction founded by Ayesha Ura only last year has blossomed, swallowing up recruits swayed by the God-Kings’ words at the Calibration Trial. Wun Ja, Goddess of the Shining Metropolis, is an almost daily visitor to Lotus, walking its streets as if she very a common peasant and handing out blessings to all who draw her fancy. She becomes a regular coffeehouse companion of O-Mochi and O-Mizuchi, the three gods conspiring and conversing at all hours of the day. O-Mochi is proud to boast a second title now. With Petal shaping all the food that Lotus could ever need, the fields of Lotus are left to the herd of yeddim that now numbers in the hundreds, the educated beasts eating rice by the bushel as the rewards of their labor. Heaven, taking notice of O-Mochi’s role in the rise of Lotus, has seen fit to bless him with the dual titles of God of Wild Rice and God of Domesticated Beasts, and his power has grown commensurately. He is content, though, to idle the streets of Lotus, laughing to see its people well-fed and well-ruled.

Throughout the East, Lotus is a thing of wonder and legend. Yomiko and Zephyr travel through all the nations that surround them, borne in one of the magical chariots restored to order by Ivory Eyes. They come to the trade-city of Nexus, the theocracy of Great Forks, the warring states of Halta and Linowan, the flying mountain of Megatalpa, the strange republic of Chaya, the great mausoleum of Sijan, and even to those bordermarches held by the Arczekh Horde. To all they come openly as friends, speaking of the wonders of Lotus, the glories of the Exalted, and their generosity to all allies. Zephyr serves as diplomat and ambassador, winning over treaties and alliances, while Yomiko comes as a priestess first and foremost, winning hearts and minds for Lotus. Soon all the wares of Nexus are opened to Lotus, and it is not uncommon to see Haltan beastmen walking the streets of Lotus, or sapient ata-beasts discussing philosophy in salons, or Megatalpan hawks crossing the skies. The morticians of Sijan even venture out to the Exalted City itself for a dual purpose, constructing two funerary monuments. One is a tomb of black glass, shot through with veins of gold, a mausoleum to receive the body of Iulus. Its twin, towering just as high, is a golden cenotaph inscribed with all the prayers of the Unconquered Sun, a monument and memorial for Rising Echo.

But it is not only the nations of the Threshold and the Far East that bind themselves to Lotus in alliance. Yomiko and Zephyr travel to the Blessed Isle, to the Realm itself, and there they walk openly as Exalted. Roseblack announces a grand summit, a meeting of reconciliation and renewal to be held on the heights of the Imperial Mountain itself. There, Yomiko and Zephyr meet with Roseblack, dressed in the full regalia of the Dragon-Blooded Empress, the heads of the Realm’s Great Houses, and the Mouth of Peace, the head of the Immaculate Order. Five days and nights the council goes on, words spoken both in peace and in hatred. In the end, a treaty is reached, the Five Petals Accord. And it is monumental. The Empress and the Great Houses proclaim the treaty unto all the Dragon-Blooded Host and the mortal peoples of the Realm, decreeing an end to the millennial persecution of the Celestial Exalted. The Solar Exalted and Lunar Exalted are recognized as legitimate chosen of the gods, and the doctrines of the Immaculate Order officially repudiated on the matter of the Anathema. The treaty extends the full protection of Imperial Law to all Exalted, and by this, ends the Wyld Hunt. To strike down a Lawgiver is no more an act of righteousness, but murder. Despite the protests of the Mouth of Peace, and of one particularly eloquent if nondescript Immaculate, the Empress revokes all approval of the Immaculate Order, ceases all Imperial funding of it, and condemns those who have let hatred blind them. The treaty is one of peace, not only between the Realm and Lotus, but between the Terrestrial Exalted and the Celestial Exalted.

But it is not only a treaty. Zephyr and Yomiko walk among the Dynasts of the Realm, speaking with them as individuals. In teahouses, palaces, academies, manses, the God-Kings invite the Dragon-Blooded to speak with them, and those who do find old hatreds worn away. Though there are still those who cling to Immaculate Doctrine, or reject the God-Kings out of hatred for the new Empress who speaks their endorsement, those who come to them are greater by an order of magnitude. Yomiko and Zephyr win over the hearts and minds of the Dragon-Blooded Host each by each, and it is monumental. For ages the Realm has built itself upon the overthrow of the Celestial Exalted, the supremacy of the Dragon-Blooded Host. Now, they have come to see just how human the Celestial Exalted can be, just how glorious the Solars and Lunars are. None who speak with Yomiko and Zephyr could condemn them as Anathema, and nevermore shall think so simply of the Chosen of the Sun and Moon. The Dragon-Blooded Host, the children of Usurpers, have redeemed themselves of their forefathers sins.

And so it is that when the Flower of the East, flagship of Lotus, crosses over the skies of the Imperial City, it is too the sound of ten thousand dragons rejoicing. For seasons the silver desert that mars the Blessed Isle has stood unswayed, a blight upon all Creation, the triumph of Cecelyne. And now the God-Kings come to conquer her. The airship, attended upon by a coterie of air elementals summoned and bound by Ivory Eyes, comes to a halt above the demonic wastes, hovering fixed in the air. And down from it falls the very strength of Lunar, the spirit shape of Zephyr. The mighty tyrant lizard descends with a jade statue in its grasps, one of the five icons of Ivory Eyes that will be the fundament of the sorceress’s magic, the spell by which Cecelyne will be repelled. He sets it down on the edge of the silver desert, then wings back to the ship in the shape of a giant hawk. Three more statues he bears down, setting them in a ring around the wasteland with his tyrant lizard strength in full. The final monument of jade he sets down in the heart of the Imperial City, setting the arc of the ring wide enough to encompass all of the Yozi’s extrusion. With thousands of Dynasts looking on, with Empress Roseblack and Ayesha Ura watching from the flight deck of the Flower of the East, the moment draws nigh. All the Blessed Isle awaits Ivory Eyes.