Overview
Veth Prime is the capital world of the Concordat, and by most measures the political, financial, and cultural centre of the known galaxy. Its landmass has been almost entirely subsumed by city over the past eight centuries — a process locals call the Spread — leaving only the polar caps and a handful of protected heritage sites as visible reminders of the planet's natural surface.
History
Before the Concordat's founding, Veth Prime was known simply as Veth — a mid-tier industrial world in a crowded system. The Assembly's decision to relocate its permanent seat to Veth, three generations after the founding, triggered an economic transformation that is still ongoing.
The original pre-contact ruins that glow beneath the streets — the source of the Subsurface Light phenomenon — predate any known civilisation in the galaxy and remain unattributed.
Culture
Veth Prime has a reputation for cold pragmatism and political theatre in equal measure. Its population is cosmopolitan by necessity — the Assembly draws delegates and lobbyists from across the galaxy — but a distinct local identity has emerged over the centuries, characterised by a preference for negotiation over confrontation and a deep suspicion of anything that hasn't been tested by time.
Notable Locations
The Concordat Spire dominates the skyline of the capital district — a needle of composite alloy that houses the Assembly chamber, the archival vaults, and the offices of every accredited faction in the galaxy.
The Undertow Market operates in the older strata of the city, hundreds of metres below the surface, where pre-contact stonework frames stalls that have traded continuously for four hundred years.