The Recording Instrument event would spawn a hidden star system containing a Fallen Planet, and generate the "Skyfaring Mouse Thieves" archaeological site on that planet. Once the excavation was complete, a hostile Riftclaw Dragon would spawn directly in the system.
As the major financial backer behind the Curator Enclave, Xi Yan naturally received the Curators' full support. The immortal Grand Curator Wànjī Ascendant sent Xi Yan vast amounts of archaeological records, greatly improving the Empire's archaeological capabilities.
The Skyfaring Mouse Thieves archaeological site was swiftly excavated.
A society of mammals obsessed with scavenging and hoarding junk had existed on this Fallen Planet. They looked very much like mice.
They had lived in the ruins of an Ecumenopolis. Although the gigantic metropolis that had once blotted out the sky had collapsed and crumbled, it had still made an excellent nest for these mice and their primitive society.
The labyrinthine city was littered with garbage. Towering buildings pieced together from all manner of scrap teetered precariously. Everywhere they looked, trinkets, ornaments, and handicrafts lay piled into mountains.
These little creatures could not produce anything themselves, but they were proficient in space travel. They had probably stolen plenty of useful things from outsiders, along with plenty of useless ones.
Collapsed buildings, crashed spacecraft, heaps of melted garbage, and little ornaments burned to ash all indicated that the Fallen Planet's original inhabitants had been forced to flee their home during a battle against a powerful enemy.
Bodies bearing the military insignia of another nation suggested that this might have been an internal conflict between the local mice and mice from another planet.
The mice had attempted to evacuate, but without success, because they had refused to abandon their cherished ornaments. Many had died in their haste to retrieve items of little value.
One artifact,