Ratz1882
Zirion is their home, the only one they can remember. Their colonial ship and the first city were abandoned long ago. Since then, with rifles and dwindling technology, the humans have spread across the lush planet, pushing its primitive inhabitants to the brink of extinction.
In the past, the original Zirion race left behind a human child merged with the Flow, the pulse of the planet. Known as Sybil, she was a milestone for humankind, fusing human DNA with the planet's life force, able to withstand the dangerous pollen tides and predict the dangers hiding in the shadows of the jagged peaks. But centuries of shizms, civil wars and raids left the Sybil Protocol in tatters. Now only the expendable or sickly children undergo the procedure, a far cry from once perfected formula, leaving some of the survivors disfigured and exiled.
Rhea is one of the last "Flowers", a human hybrid working as a scout for the Bastion, the self-proclaimed capital ruled by the Trinity Council. Shunned as a strange necessity, she tries to uncover the secret of the rapid changes on Zirion that endanger the human population. The planet itself is turning frenzied with hunger. The gravitational anomalies cause fear and apocalyptic predictions.
While the Trinity Council tighten its grasp over the population, Rhea and her team seek a solution in the ruins of the old species that once lived on the planet. Uncovering secrets of the aliens who mysteriously vanished, averting extinction, she will have to answer a universal question:
Is there a price too high for survival? And who should pay it?
ONC 2026 Prompt used:
93. Buried beneath the ruins lies an artifact that whispers memories of an ancient being. The first memory it reveals is a warning and it's meant for you.