Galaxy 9: Garden of Florasia

On Pétalia, the flowers are as tall as towers and glow at night. Between their petals live fairies with glass wings and thorn arrows. They used to find visitors amusing. Now they find them edible.

A buzzing rises from the corollas. Dozens of wings unfold.

The nectar of Nectaris is the sweetest in the universe, and the most dangerous. A single breath and you never want to leave. The fairies gorge on it and become frenzied.

The scent goes to your head. Your heroes are smiling too much.

Épinia is covered in brambles that grow a metre an hour. They learned to move, then to grab, then to digest. The settlers called it "the garden that eats".

The brambles unfold before you. They are hungry.

Lumenis is the brightest planet in the Garden: everything shines, even at night. So do the traps: lantern flowers lure you in and close their petals. The dryads sing to the flowers there, and the flowers obey them.

A pink light wraps around you. Too beautiful to be harmless.

Every spring, Pollenia releases a storm of golden pollen. Spring lasts all year round there. You can't see five steps ahead, and the fairies see perfectly well.

The pollen blinds you. Thorn arrows whistle through the cloud.

On Corolla, the guardian dryads heal the brambles faster than you can cut them. As long as a dryad is singing, no plant dies. The singers must be silenced first.

A crystal-clear song rises. The wounded brambles stand back up.

Rosaria is the rose at the centre of the Garden, and the Queen sits there. She gave birth to the fairies, trained the brambles, taught the dryads. She loved visitors, once. They picked her flowers. Since then, everything that enters the Garden becomes fertiliser. Her sceptre casts a lightning of pollen that turns you to stone on the spot. Her guards heal the Queen as long as they breathe. Command wants the Garden reopened to ships, whatever the cost.

The petals of the throne open. The Queen looks at you, and smiles.