Sm̥tósrómos

Image of one of the larger 600 meter wide cuts into the ice sheet, image decrypted and intercepted from a Wolgos areal survey transmission by Arvorian intelligence.

Sm̥tósrómos translated to the "gentle field", is a large 276 km wide, gently sloping plain that forms part of the "Néykwthéwdhos" ice cap mega glacier. The plain is flanked by the semi-circular Méytsihḗrgwos mountains, which the glacier breaches. The edge of the site is 245 kilometres from the closed city of H2stḗrtérm̥n, located at the foot of the Wl̥kwós Dhr̥ghós volcanically active mountain.

The site is only known to outsiders from spy satellite survey images, which have imaged three 600-meter-wide triangular man-made depressions made into the ice cap, depressions with immense 5-story high steps leading into its centre with ramps for access. They have been cut into the ice cap close to the edge of the site and at the foot of the low-lying Méytsihḗrgwos mountains between the sites, forming a circular arrangement that follows the perimeter of the site. There are 57 similar but much smaller cuts averaging 80 meters across. Subsequent spy satellite surveys have detected faint radiological signals and heat signals emanating from the triangular constructs and from what appear to be tunnel networks cut into the ice sheet itself.

To date, the Wolgos government has not conclusively resolved the nature of this black site, which has an exclusion zone of 645 kilometres around it. The Wolgos hint that its purpose is radio astronomy, an immense muon detector, a mass geological survey, a radiological disposal site and other purposes.

Radio communication from the site is encrypted, and what has been gleaned from accidentally intercepted low-encryption communications is cryptic and usually in highly stylised poetic prose. Documents relating to the site that intelligence agencies have recovered are also cryptic and wholly in poetic and highly obfuscated prose.

Intercepted and decrypted communications from the site

""The Garden sleeps beneath its silken frost,

The root-deep heart of the great bloom lies unshaken; At five fathoms' depth, the petals of the slumbering bud breathe softly, Its perfume mingles with the quiet rhythms of the earth’s whispered dance.

The shadowed sap flows faintly, carrying no song of spring’s upheaval"

"The First Circle hums faintly with tempered light,

Its unseen rivers flow unbroken through the veiled frost. The pulse of the web, crafted by hands of silence, Holds steady,

woven into the ice like stars in a frozen sky."

"Beneath the white pelt of the snowbound woods, the prey lies hidden;

The black sinew of its form rests beneath the weight of time, Awaiting the strike of the huntsman’s sharpened blade. Above, the forest breathes in tides of wind, its branches whispering,

Yet the balance remains undisturbed within the still, frozen glade."

"Three stars of the forge stand steadfast in their orbits,

Forged in fire and crowned with chains of gravity’s might. Their cores burn faintly, bound by laws unseen, Their radiance hums a fleeting hymn to the silent dark.

No wayward body strikes their path, no force disturbs their timeless vigil."

"The seams of the rock hold their quiet accord, The bones of the deep bow to the will of the hammers.

Sixty wardens stand in their frozen vigil, Bound to the great Circle to sing ruin when the hand demands.

Through the shadowed halls of foreseen fates, echoes rise: Three hundred and fifty-two peaks of unfathomable wrath Shall carve the dome of the deep into fractured shards.

The crown of the ancient titan shall shatter beneath its own weight, And the womb of Gotha shall birth a storm of despair."