Quoted By:
Throwing open your window, you jump out into your garden.
The garden remains in the same pristine condition as it has for millions of years. Jenkins, bless his soul, regularly rotates out the plants for new ones and it seems that the new environment has affected how they grow and bloom. An ethereal light emanates from the leaves of the trees, casting them with an unearthly blue hue. The flowers glow like petals made of moonlight, while others glow with the red of Mars or the purple hues of Ouranos.
You've brought magical flowers to your garden before, so while refreshing and new, they are not so shocking to you. What shocks you is the color of the sky, painted with the aurora, and the sight of the ominous black titan around which sunlight swirls.
For a moment, your mind empties as you struggle to run a few calculations in your head.
Distance, size, the metaphysical weight, all the information engraved upon its surface for your keen eyes to pick through... it can only be one thing.
"JENKINS, WHAT THE FUCK!?" you call out to your oldest companion. "WHO COLLAPSED THE TOWER!?"
Silence hangs in the air for a moment, and then you hear the whir of Jenkins' engines dashing from the house. Your favorite metallic orb rockets towards you, his visual display showing the emoticon of shock. He keeps a respectful distance, more emoticons flashing across his face before he finally accepts what he's seeing and all shock is replaced by a giant smile.
"My stars and heaven's garters, Mistress Najmi!" Jenkins sounds like he's about to cry. "You're <span class="mu-i">back</span>! You're <span class="mu-i">actually</span> back! It's not just my sensors malfunctioning again, you're <span class="mu-i">home</span>! Oh, I knew you would return one day, and what a glorious day it is!"
Jenkins shoots forward and happily nuzzles against you. A bit awkwardly, you pat him on his silvery head and say, "I haven't been gone for <span class="mu-i">that</span> long, have I? Just took a quick jaunt up the tower..."
"I say, it wasn't <span class="mu-i">quick</span>, Mistress," Jenkins said, his voice choking up. "It's been... oh dear... it seems my chronometer encountered an error trying to measure time. We keep dates in a different format now, makes calculations so much more... well, Mistress Najmi, the universe restarted! <span class="mu-i">Three times!</span> Oh, it was all I could do to shunt the Manse inside the Tower's ruins, otherwise the expansion events would have made a right mess of things!"
You look up at the black titan and the light of information swirling about its core. "Are we inside the ruins right now, or outside of them?"
Jenkins happily projects a map showing the Manse's orbit around the ruins of the Tower. "We are currently 20km outside the ruins, experiencing relative time at a rate of 70% of a viewer at arbitrary distance. Our current relative gravity is being maintained at an acceleration of 9.81 m/s^2 via gravity modulation within the grounds of the manse. It is inadvisable to leave the grounds without regulating gravity due to our proximity to the ruins."
