Aerior
Aerior is a fairly cold planet in the Hiragas system, Arkan, though still habitable.
It was inhabited by a civilization called the Defence Union before it fell. Its atmosphere was fairly thick and thus retained much heat within it, allowing life despite the larger orbital radius. It is the 4th planet in the system. It also has a high geological activity as a result of its strong magnetosphere and a rapidly changing mantle. Despite this it still has many intact wreckages underground and HF archaeologists still scan them to this day in order to determine more about civilizations that fell due to the Arkan space animal incursions. The largest known wreckage is a part of a space elevator counterweight station which was one of the Union's greatest hopes of fighting off the animals. Other parts of space elevators have been found all over the planet. The HF has managed to recover a number of unique technologies, such as a (surprisingly) mostly intact space elevator main cannon, which is large enough to rival the size of a Starlight photon cannon at size 20. The caliber is over 10 m in width. The HF has learned a number of combat station (e.g. defence platform) design principles from the Defence Union's extensively well-tested defence stations. They have also learned lessons from various massive ground fortresses they used to help defend their planet.
The HF has managed to mostly pacify almost all of the fauna in Arkan and have set up large research bases. Though the search for a way to continue the zagar species continues, the ethics committee largely limits sapient bioengineering. However, it may be justified under the goals of species preservation. Though they have the technology to bring them back, the HF does not have copies of the Zagar genome, and many scientists (especially suons) continue efforts to find them.
Other than the deep and partially decayed ruins, there are little signs of previous civilization on this world, but the HF has come to presume any planet with life in Arkan once had a civilization. The ancestors of the modern Harkas seem to have caused a lot of damage.
The average surface temperature of Aerior is closer to the freezing point of water, at about 5 degrees Celsius. This can mean that oceans easily freeze. Even during winter, large clusters of ice can form in addition to much smaller clusters of ice that are almost impossible for objects in the water to avoid. If the local species relied on water too heavily, they might die of hypothermia. As such, they will drink the water but rely on a different chemical within the Aerioran waters as a chemical solvent. Actual water is removed from the body as to not freeze and damage the creature drinking water. Some species have evolved to hibernate through long periods of snowfall as water supplies can be reduced during this time. Like most Arkanian planets, Aerior has a high biodiversity as well, especially taking into account the seasonal variation.
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