The Storm Concord is the council of Serean sky clans and ship captains. It is based on Varo-Blue, the Serean homeworld, a blue ocean world under heavy storm clouds. Its cities are high towers, sea platforms and artificial islands. Sereans dive small ships into storms to skim rare gases and chemicals, which sell well across the Drift. The Concord decides who may dive into which storms and when, splits the harvest between the clans, and settles fights between them.
Varo-Blue's cities are high towers, sea platforms, artificial islands and coastal shipyards, tied together by cables, bridges and landing pads.
The Concord meets in the Great Hall of Captains, a big open hall where clan captains argue, vote and drink.
The storm calls for the season go up on the hall doors. Every diver checks them twice.
The Captains' Council is made up of the elected heads of the strongest clans. They make the big decisions.
Harvest keepers track how much each clan skims and make sure the split is fair.
Storm watchers follow the weather and decide which storms are safe to dive, and when.
Clan delegates speak for the smaller clans and bring their complaints to the Council.
The Skyward Guard escorts dive crews and protects the harvest from raiders and syndicates.
Harvest shares. The Concord decides how much each clan and company may skim. A clan's share decides whether it eats well that season.
Dive rights. Only crews the Concord approves may dive. Crews that dive without approval lose their ships or get banished.
Storm calls. When the watchers call a storm unsafe, nobody dives. This keeps divers alive, and it also gives the Concord control over traffic.
Settling fights. Clans bring their fights over storms, territory and lost ships to the Concord. Its word is final.
Core. Almost no presence. Core companies just buy the chemicals.
Mid. Ports that trade in storm chemicals follow Concord rules. Cyrin, the storm-belt world between Varo-Blue and Mistral Gate, runs on them.
Rim. The Concord is strongest here. Mistral Gate is a violent Rim gas giant where Concord divers work next to syndicate crews that answer to nobody.
Bad seasons. When a storm season kills too many divers, the clans blame the Concord and each other.
Clan rivalries. Big clans want bigger shares. Small clans say the Captains' Council only serves the big ones.
No fleet. The Skyward Guard is small. The Concord cannot enforce its rules far from home.
Syndicates. Gangs pay divers to skim more than their share and sell the extra on the black market.
Serean chemicals go into fuel, medicine and air scrubbers. When the storm season is bad, prices go up everywhere.
Escorting a dive crew is good money. Diving without Concord approval is a good way to lose a ship.
The bars around the Great Hall are full of divers who lost friends this season. Buy a round and listen.
The Concord is respected and shaky at the same time. Most Sereans trust it to keep them alive. Some think it favors the big clans. Almost everyone agrees that without it, the storms around Varo-Blue would turn into a free-for-all.