House of Lamora
"A world without beauty is a prison without bars. We do not merely cultivate
Venus — we elevate it."
Cultivators of Civilization
House Lamora rose during a time when Venus was still regarded as inhospitable, a cursed relic of First Empire geoengineering. Founded in 311, the House first gained prominence through the management and updating of the ancient Astarte Station, the climate-regulating orbital structure that made Venus truly habitable again. Their early stewardship over Venus’s restabilization gave them both political capital and cultural credibility, which they wisely used to invest in floating habitats, orbital agro-stations, and luxury real estate. Their influence persisted even after they ceded control of Astarte Station to the Venusian Technocrats. Today, their fortune rests on their massive holdings of Calendula Veridianis, a bioengineered, nutritionally dense flower that is the base for both emergency rations and a wide spectrum of pharmaceuticals — granting House Lamora enduring financial power and planetary relevance.
Curators of Aesthetic Dominion
While their agricultural and biomedical foundations make them quietly powerful, House Lamora is far more famous for its cultural ambitions. Venus may feed the poor, but House Lamora feeds the soul. In the centuries following their rise, the House became synonymous with avant-garde expression — funding sculptors, zero-g ballerinas, neural poets, and intermedia visionaries from across Human Space. Their orbital museums, each a delicate jewel of vacuum-safe architecture, preserve not only human history and art but also alien artifacts acquired through funded expeditions. Their belief in art as a pillar of civilization is woven into their governance: tenant contracts often include mandatory education in the arts, and duels between House members are judged not only on victory, but dramatic form. The House’s refusal to operate in the volatile Wolf System — reportedly due to a personal insult traded between Zera Lamora and Marshall Immozene Gegentot — is one of the few shadows cast on their otherwise shining reputation.
Duelists, Designers, and Diplomats
House Lamora maintains its honor not through massed armies or capital fleets, but through aesthetics and precision. Their Houseguard are fewer in number but exceptionally trained, with many doubles as fashion models or dancers when not deployed. In keeping with the Pan-Solar Consortium’s anamachy tradition, Lamora heavily favors limited duels and squad-level engagements — almost always filmed and sold as serialized entertainment to fund future endeavors. Their primary rivals are corporate in nature: they frequently lock horns with Eclipse Entertainment over control of talent contracts, and regularly dispute Starlight Pharmaceuticals over the pricing and licensing of Calendula-based products. These conflicts, though rarely escalating into full-scale warfare, have given the House a reputation for elegance with teeth. In the broader aristocratic web, they are viewed as both flamboyant and disarming — a House whose indulgences conceal careful long games of influence, legacy, and control.
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