Tralakas I

Tralakas I was a gas giant that lost much of its atmosphere as it was warmed up by the local star due to its proximity. The core quickly became very hot because the dense atmosphere of a gas giant did not dissipate the heat well.

As the atmosphere of this once gas giant was stripped away, it left behind a dense core that is difficult to penetrate. Though small, it has a relatively strong gravitational field due to its density. It contains various metal ores from asteroids that the gas giant crushed over millions of years which collected in the core as dust. As such, its makeup is mostly homogenous compared to that of most planets, apart from its many layers. Because of this, any mining operations would simply extract the hard ground and crush it into a powder and separate the powder into useful ores. This process takes a lot of energy but it also yields quite a lot of ore and is not location restricted like regular strip mining is.

As a rare object, this world is also highly useful to scientists to study such gas giants. As little of its atmosphere remains, the type of gas giant this core was once a part of can be determined, so this offers valuable insight into how this type of gas giant works, particularly the processes that happen within or near its core.

As the Zikrat are now a robotic species, planets like this remain quite easy for them to explore because they no longer require an atmosphere to survive.