Blind Oracle

Keeper of Installation 04 Koah’riel (a.k.a. Blind Oracle)

Archivist's Excerpt from Dancing Lovers & Other Tripe: Lore and Lunacy of Exterior North, CVI 42.4
Cross-referenced in: Givers & Keepers: A Cobbled-Together, Hopefully-Coherent History of the “Death Benefactors,” Their Eldritch Nature, & Their Incomprehensible Endowments, CVI 42.3

The Blind Oracle is the central spiritual figure to the people of Jalóheim outside Jalós itself. The being, whatever its true nature, is believed by the people to be a spirit of sorts, something of an emissary of Jalós, who only interacts with the High Priestess of Jalós within the Temple of Jalós.

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Though the being known as "The Blind Oracle" to the people of Jalóheim, and to the High Priestess of Jalós, Tevir, is believed to be a spiritual entity, the truth is something far stranger. It calls itself "Koah’riel, Keeper of Installation 04," if asked, and seems to interact with those around it through a light-show of language and very cryptic dialect within its confines of Installation 04. There is something not only otherworldly about the being, but something out-of-body, as well, as there seems to be the crumbling remains of whatever it once was in the corner of the Installation itself. It is entirely likely that the entire religion of Jalós Zealotry originated through accidental discovery and interaction with this being on the part of the Galó settlers in The Rift, who would eventually become Clan Jalóheim. It would be the later accidental discovery of this being on the part of the soon-to-be-exiled Hana Sóholdt while evading capture that causes her to seek the The Dark Illumined Eye in Orphan Heights in the first place, effectively instigating the entire series of events that would end Confluence 42.4 in the first place. Or last place. Depends on how you think about it.
Excerpt from Entry 49: "The First Astronomer"

Of this strange place and its stranger … (occupant?) little can be said. Actually very much could be said if anybody knew what to say. Alas, nobody does, and those who do are annoyingly silent on the matter. Scattered reports from the towne of Orphan Heights in its early days make mention of the Galó from Jaloheim referring to a “Blind Oracle” of sorts, when no such belief existed prior to their settlement in the Rift, and corresponds to no known parallel in earlier Nordic folklore, fraudulent or otherwise. Furthermore, there is little to link these sparse accounts to that being encountered by two particular Orphan Heights boys generations later.

What they encountered—or believe they encountered—wholly defies reason, and so their claims were dismissed by all competent historians out of hand. What they allegedly observed was an intelligence, luminary interplay of language, and knowledge of ancient astral events that, if true, would rewrite cosmic history as known by pretty much anybody. Neat.

One could easily still dismiss the claims of the boys, though the presence of such a being would help explain the Jaloheim Clan’s choice to settle in one of the worst locations in The Expanse that otherwise makes one question their judgment, or even sanity, if not their basic competence. Still, if real, if ancient, if intelligent, if (somehow) disembodied … if indeed he ever had a body, then his existence and relation to the present Confluence would be … frustrating.

Alvin Esker & Ellery Hartchild having no blazing clue what's happening in Installation 04

Installation 04
Building / Landmark | Oct 12, 2025

Children
Eyes
Well, he is called the "Blind Oracle," isn't he?

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