Mornye stands straight behind her desk as she lectures the class, seeming to take great pride in her teaching. The screen on the wall behind her displays the text, "Theoretical Framework and Technical Roadmap of Helios."

"Hello, everyone." Her voice is soft and somewhat distant, a perfect match to her petite frame. "I am Professor Mornye from the Department of Exostrider Engineering, responsible for the Spacetrek Collective's New Solar Ceremony."

She looks at her students as she speaks, making sure that they are paying attention.

"Today, we'll focus on the theoretical framework and technical roadmap of Helios."

Your classmate, Lynae, sighs and props her cheek on her hand.

Mornye gestures behind herself, to the screen on the wall. "As many of you know," she continues in a diligent tone, "Lahai-Roi's ecosystem relies on the Exostrider's Reactor Drive for energy supply."

The screen responds to her gesture. A holographic image of Lahai-Roi appears, followed by a picture-in-picture view of the reactor drive—the artificial sun of Lahai-Roi, a floating underground power source suspended in the sky.

"Once the Drive is depleted," Mornye continues, "Lahai-Roi will experience an energy deficit. Its thermal balance will be irreversibly disrupted, leading to ecosystem collapse." The screen shifts to a bleak vision of Lahai-Roi without the reactor: darkness overhead, the polar cap’s ceiling looming, and only a fragile failsafe energy shield dome around the country's structures.

Lynae looks concerned; this prospect seems to worry her. She leans in, studying the screen.

"Thus," Mornye says while raising a finger for emphasis, "finding a renewable energy source similar to the Reactor Drive, or an 'artificial sun' is essential to maintaining Lahai-Roi's biosphere." The screen again shifts to a new view of a diagram of a hypothetical self-renewing reactor core.

Mornye doesn't seem perturbed by this at all. Makes sense, as she is currently leading the research for renewable energy sources.

"Helios represents the pinnacle of interdisciplinary engineering." Mornye begins to pace as she explains the Helios project. When she moves away from her desk, her slender, glowing, crystalline legs come into view. Each step she takes makes the DNA lattice inside her translucent crystal legs pulse with color. It's captivating. "It must withstand intense and prolonged heat flux while maintaining mechanical stability, non-equilibrium thermodynamics, and radiation protection."

At some point during this, you don't know when or how, but Lynae managed to sneak out of class.

Mornye walks back to the screen on the wall, pointing to a holographic diagram of the Exostrider's reactor drive. "By reverse-engineering the Exostrider's movement algorithms, and conducting multi-parameter simulations, the optimal balance between technical feasibility-"

The bell rings. The sound seemed to momentarily derail Mornye's train of thought.

"...and ecological capacity," she continues unerringly, focusing her purple gaze on her students, pausing for a moment to gauge their reaction. She notices Lynae is missing.

"...thereby, achieving stable Helios operations in extreme test conditions. That concludes today's lecture. Thank you."

Students finally begin to stand and file out of the room. Some look horrified, others look hopeful. Mornye returns to her desk, crossing her translucent crystal legs as she opens up her personal holo-terminal.