Three years after the conversion was completed, the Ember Era faced a crisis.
Three civilizations simultaneously created definitions of "eternity." The Mechanical Civilization believed eternity was the precision of endless cycles, the Psionic Civilization believed it was unchanging transcendence, and the Data Civilization believed it was the coexistence of all possible states.
None of the three definitions was wrong in itself. But when they existed simultaneously in the same star region, time began to tear apart.
By the time Harmonic Leaping Note arrived, the region had become a pot of "temporal stew." Past, present, and future existed at once-on one civilization's homeworld, its birth, prosperity, and destruction played out simultaneously.
"Stabilize them!" Harmonic Leaping Note unfurled her Thirty-Threefold Harmonics, forcibly drawing the frequencies of the three definitions closer together.
Myriad Faces and Forms split into three thousand mirrored forms, observing the points of conflict from three thousand angles. "It won't work. Their logical foundations are different-cycles, stasis, coexistence. They aren't even in the same coordinate system."
Harmonic Leaping Note gritted her teeth, the frequencies of her harmonics already pushed to their limit. She could coordinate thirty-three different definitions, but three versions of "eternity" with completely conflicting logic? She couldn't do it.
News spread throughout the Ember Era. All 370 million civilizations watched the crisis unfold.
Primordial Origin stood in the distance, the 37 billion stars on his cloak dim and lightless. "The Zero Era Obsessions said they've seen this before. Before the conversion, Source Definition monopolized the core definitions, so multiple civilizations never defined the same concept simultaneously. But now civilizations create definitions freely-conflict is inevitable."
Harmonic Leaping Note withdrew her harmonics and shook her head wearily. "I can't stabilize them. Unless..."
"Unless what?" Myriad Faces and Forms asked.
"Unless there's a set of rules for arbitrating conflicts between definitions.