Originally posted on the Lord Bezos Rides South newsletter series.

They have torn a great gash in the earth, and they sift from her flesh the metal of life, the lithaeum. The gigfolk swarm about the wound, their faces ghosted in white dust.  Among them, a rusty susurrus of coughing and spitting. They have the white lung; their tissues turn to metal, soon they are one with the metallvitae.

And yet they trek to Muskii Nevadia in great numbers to toil and die here. They share a dream: To lay eyes upon the Sky King.

It is said to gaze upon him is to immediately ten-ex. That those who are in his Disruption innovate and bootstrap beyond all measure. That his saintly touch has lifted many a gigfolk from crushing drudgery to the finest desert salons of Nevadia, to contract work, even investification.

Wherever the Sky King may ride upon his lithaeic steed, he is hounded by supplicants with illuminated pitch decks. He gazes not upon them and they are beaten by his Immortals.

To know his mind is impossible. It is said he sees the far future: Magical things, terrifying things, profitable things.

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As the moon rises over Muskii Nevadia, the Sky King Elon sits astride his snow-white silicon horse and surveys the lithaeic mines. Around him a retinue of bejeweled men hold an awed silence. The Sky King finishes a lamb slider, and tosses the goldcloth wrapper, which is deftly caught by a squire before it touches the desert floor. The wrapper, having been blessed by the Sky King’s naked hand, will fetch a princely sum amongst the king’s many admirers.

The Sky King belches quietly, causing a gold-robed bishop to lurch forward with a lantern-like contraption on a slender pole. The bishop wafts the device before the king to capture the sky lord’s vapors; another priceless gift from the Great Disrupter.

Waving the device away with a frown, the king opens his mouth as if to speak. In the crackling silence, a trio of scribes push forward, ready to take down his utterances in liquid gold.

“You know,” the king muses in clipped Calatin. “Why must the moon come and go each night?”

His Grand Vizier steps forward, a bespectacled and serious man in fine robes.

“Your highness,” he begins tentatively. “The rotation of the earth, and the rotations of the moon in the aether…”

Without looking at his advisor, the Sky King raises a hand, which brings the desired silence.

“Nevermind why,” continues the king. “It is my will that the moon remain fixed in the sky.”

The Sky King shifts in his saddle, still regarding the silver orb. Around him, his advisors mutter and hiss at one another. The Bishop makes the sign of the Algorithm.

The king’s voice pierces the night: “Furthermore, it is my will that the moon be somewhat…” Here he gestures a vague circular motion with a ring encrusted hand. “…Larger. That I might behold it more readily. And that it might behold me, more readily.” The Sky King snaps his finger and the Grand Vizier hurries to his side.

The vizier inclines his head. “Your highness,” he says gravely.

The king raises his voice that the entire retinue may hear his brilliance. “We will cast great ropes into the aether, and so bind the moon to the earth. Then, with a mighty winch we can bring her closer…To me.”

The vizier winces as if beset by a great pain. Meanwhile the master scribe completes a scroll, affixes it to a pigeon, which is thrown aloft, tweeting into the night’s aether.

The vizier tracks the pigeon until it is lost to the darkness.

“A grand vision, my king,” he says through a tight grimace. “But there is not rope enough in the Westlands to reach the moon. And were your majesty to ensnare an aetheric body of such magnitude, I fear the very rhythms of the earth…”

The king’s hard stare silences the vizier. Suddenly a pair of Immortals are upon the advisor and the hapless man finds himself gagged by a silk scarf.

“Vizier,” says the king. “It is tiresome to innovate amidst your constant quibbling. You will speak no more for the remainder of this fiscal quarter.”

Now the Great Disrupter turns to his retinue, and his voices carries grandly: “My servants, you know my will. Quibbling will not be tolerated. We pivot our efforts to this grand endeavor. To the capture of the moon above. That she will forever shine upon us.”

The men of the king’s retinue stir and shout, and amongst them a lusty call goes out:

“A pivot, a pivot, a pivot for the king!”

The Sky King settles in his saddle and watches the men froth and shout, and the corners of his mouth inflect in the suggestion of a smile.

By sunrise the king’s pigeons deliver the news to the Westlands, causing much mania and wildness amongst the gigfolk. And the Muskites of the Westlands turn toward Muskii Nevadia and prostrate themselves. That a sliver of the Sky King’s light might shine up on them.

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SKY KING ELON MUSK is the divine monarch of the kingdom of Muskii Nevadia. He began his life as a commoner from the Old Lands, but a series of divinely inspired Disruptions elevated him to great wealth, and divinity.

As the absolute leader of Muskii Nevadia, Sky King Elon presides over immensely profitable lithaeic mines, and a variety of enterprises. He is the inventor of the electric horse, and the patron of an aetheric laboratory concerned with catapulting objects high into the aether. Most recently, he purchased the Aviatic League, a loose network of pigeon aviaries that spans much of the Westlands.

Sky King Elon is also a major deity and prophet of the Muskite sect of the Libertine Meritocratic religion. As a religious leader, he espouses ultra orthodox Meritocratic views. His followers are much feared in the Westlands for their zealotry.  The Sky King routinely issues religious fiats, known by the Muskites as Pivots, on matters related to meritocratic fervor and profitability.

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