They should totally just be trading cards!

I chuckle aloud as I request that on the interface, letting it obligingly shift over. The bios will be a bit harder to read in depth but oh well, can always expand those out.

There's a preliminary filter, of course - though it's not like there's a sufficient dearth of people to look through that there's no reason for those not to be generated and customized to fit - though there's still a couple dozen cascading down the page, zoomed in and out for different levels of emphasis and 'fittingness', presumably. 

I wave my hand and pull up a first card - Amaya, apparently. 

Her hair is deep black, complimented by the gloss of her pale slightly gaunt skin, and the image of her has a soft-black cloak cascading over her shoulders, almost hiding the glint of the polished-grey inset in her shoulders, her eyes glistening with the same sheen as her steel. The contrast is stark - enough for me to mostly dismiss any instinct to think of her as simply a goth going for a more dramatic impression. 

She's a 'magesmith' apparently, a worker with mystical cybernetics, golems and all manner of things wrought in metal. She got educated in one of the lower labourer's teaching tenements after she landed their from a pump-and-dump from some wealthy traveller that the Galaxia doesn't have any further details for me on. She grew up under-provisioned and mostly unloved, which really didn't help the fact that being transgender isn't exactly the most supported thing in the slums where having enough to survive in a world of giants is paramount. Probably some of the disdain from the rest of the people there was from the fact that she probably - and indeed did -end up having some special talent that let her claw out of the place - a skill for conjury and metalwork that landed her an apprenticeship in one of the better districts with an abusive 'master' at the art. She made her way out of that hole, eventually, and found a chance to come here to get a chance to find some greener pastures, and reading between the lines the medical package was likely up there for her for much the same reason it was for me. 

The statistics look good too - she seems like a genius in terms of g, her magical potential and present abilities look solid, she even has a good amount of resources and street-knowledge, though the rest looks more average for the crew. It doesn't look like her soul is particularly inclined for mythical ascension and she has some sort of complicated mostly negative interaction with the light that gives her a middle-high score on that, though conjecturally she'll probably take to the arts of the Summer Empire's mages rather readily, which is a pretty good plus, though the details are apparently fuzzier, probably due to magitech parity between the organizations and compounding error sources from the enhancements that'll apply there. 

Looking through the personality summary is reasonably reassuring, too - she's high Neuroticism and Conscientiousness and low on the rest of the five factors, but that's fine - expect she's probably skittish in ways that'd be painfully familiar, and if those magical ratings are any indicator the fact that there's not more messes in her history makes it seem like she's fine on discretion and keeping things clean. 

It's hard to judge too much without meeting her, but I expect she's rated this highly on the list for a reason - she seems eminently like the sort of person that I could get to know and learn inside and out well enough. 

...And there's no biographical information about her sexual or romantic inclinations, so whatever comes of that will be a surprise, it seems. 

I bury that thought in the back of my head to come back to later, flushing slightly, and move on down the list.

The second option is pretty well rated too - they're named 'Lumen', apparently - which fits for the profile pic of nothing more then a blur of light.

Apparently created by some esoteric hologram experiment in the "Selenian Republic", they ended up with sapience, a perfectly adequate soul, and source of information to internalize, but no real emotional development, and ended up starting their journey towards getting something more traditional setup from the ambient emotions and concepts of connection to the ones around them - a fascination with the properties of Light. They've been working in optics and visual effects for years and years, picking up all sorts of technical expertise around illusion and elemental light magic, alongside the more physicalist things. They're here for getting access to Creation's keyhole and to play around with that, more or less. 

Personality wise...

Looks fairly congenial - calm and a bit distant, straightforward and happy to be direct and sharing thoroughly, with the five factor fuzzed out for not really being applicable. 

As one might imagine, they have an exceptionally high affinity for the light, though they're a bit lacking in the rest of the areas - a lack of resources to offer beyond their own, given the expense of the trip, not super impressive raw g though more then enough for technical work within a wide variety of engineering fields, middling magical potential, and a lack of anything too concrete to do with myth or classical magic. 

Iron'd probably find them fun to host, though I think that they'd be a little besides the point for the moment? Keeping things clean nad smooth for that sort of mindset can be... awkward, even if it's something that's still relatively instinctive.

And a few more - the ratings seem to trail off after this regardless. 

Alena's sharp - her hair is a brilliant red, her cheeks are sharp, her skin glows a healthy olive, and her eyes sparkle with boundless firmness. A heraldry of an ouroboros wrought in rust-red fabric dons her shirt, and a glowing seal rests upon her forehead. 

She's a knight from Labradoris, it seems - she ran into a blessed beast associated with immortality on the periphery, and ended up serving perfectly well there - though something about the self-consuming nature of the power made her apparently rather... unreceptive to the further fruits of the land, which seems like became something of a pain point around some of the force-reconfigurations her lord preferred - emphasizing mobility over the strength and durability that her augmentations emphasized. The bio mostly describes a passive frustration at being pushed out of missions and opportunities, though not generally anything more then a simple frustration and dissatisfaction that seems to not have weighed her down too much in what she has been able to do. 

Still, she seems rather impressive - her martial skill is apparently quite impressive, as is her skill at passing such things on, her magical potential and power are quite solid, and she's apparently hoping that she can spot herself a new banner and a new method of empowerment. Her affinity for the Light seems solid, and she has if anything a suspiciously high projected affinity for the arts of the Summer Empire, given her honorable nature and lack of more esosteric or academic skills. She has a high Openness, Concientiousness, Agreeableness, and Extraversion as well as a low Neuroticism.

She seems like she'd be an excellent recruit and comrade, though I can't comment too much on what we'd have to relate to. It's likely that some relatively straightforward application of Emergence and/or Mythos could fix her ills, so that's quite a plus as well. 

- I notice the absurdly oversized bars on the card for "The Cosmic Titan Dragon Tenshi, the Wise and Wealthy One" and take a moment to go through the almost rote thought processes go through the fact that yes, a being like that would be very helpful to have on my side, yes, it'd arguably be braver and perhaps more impressive to go and entreat with such a being now, no that doesn't mean that it intrinsically makes sense, or that I'm other wise presentable in the sort of way required, that they are surely here for their own reasons and that if a being like that wishes to reach out on their own terms, that I'm more then willing to accept speaking with them at any time I'm not otherwise preoccupied with serious business, and that I would have the expectation that I'd be of considerably more interest and give a greater return on investment of their time in the case that I have the opportunity to gain my own power - which is of course not to say that it meaningfully compares to what they themselves have, and that I'm well aware of the priviledge of getting to embark on  a ship carrying such an entity. 

I sigh and smile. 

I'm aware that's a frustrating thing, but having the complete version is rather helpful. 

Besides, there's no point not thinking it through once it came up. 

Yes, yes. 

I stretch out, and curl up tightly into bed for a while. Probably this kind of time isn't too expensive to distend, and it does help keep things clear after... jolts. 

Last few for the mo. 

Enna's a fairly mature humanoid woman - probably in her 30s or so. There's a few different portraits to poke through, ranging from a soft lavender skinned tiefling look with sharp platinum-gold hair to a very neutral white woman with brown hair down to her shoulders and soft brown eyes. "Neutral" describes her dress sense too - mostly going for a plain black suit with a proper white-undershirt. 

She's apparently an early retiree from the Demon of Law's service - apparently he pays his servants handsomely when they execute his will well, and that comes with a good benefits package that lets them do things even this extravagant, with some work. She did work in requisitions across a bunch of projects, and is an exceptionally skilled clerical - I snort at the fact that I'm using it that way - mage, working with contracts, messaging and administration of her papers, though apparently the fact that she got an office in the High Tower has other implications for the sort of things that she'll be able to pull off, eventually, though do get the sense that she didn't exactly get the proper ascent experience out of that.

Personality wise, she seems pretty Open and Agreeable, very professional, with the sort of neuroticism and conscientiousness you'd expect from a successful early retiree. She's moderately extraverted too, which points towards her being the sort of person who's happy to be helpful around the office. 

She sounds useful, but most of that'll probably be through working with the classic, rather then anything that flows from what I have right now, though for all I know she's perfectly adequate as a conversational partner. 

The rest is about as I'd expect - no real affinity for light, a pretty solid affinity for mythical empowerment, perfectly good magical potential and a fine g. 

Liara's some sort of Fey trickster that I don't especially want to engage with 'til we get at an adequate mastery of Purity - including thinking too much about her. 

Beyond that... 

Oh Serai looks rather interesting. 

She reads like a reasonably classical fantasy adventurer, from the leather armor to the unreasonably good quality teeth, corded muscles, and messy roan hair that's remarkably untangled, to even the bizzare backholster of a violin right beside an oversized yet slim sword. 

She's some sort of bardic warrior, apparently, from a realm of fantasy. She got swept up in an adventurer's quest when tying to pull a long con on them, and picked up quite the variety of abilities from that - some song-sorcery, a sublime sense of proper place and importance, alongside some stealth and physical augmentations, though the drinking habit she picked up seems... not exactly ideal. 

The ratings are as I'd expect again - E, O, and A are relatively high amongst the ocean model, and a lack of C and N are acceptable enough - she seems to operate quite passably on her own. Her magic is fairly developed to it's potential already, though her compatibility with Mythos seems excellent enough to likely remediate that flaw with some work. She's not technically inclined or especially tactically brilliant, but she's cunning, at least, and that counts for a lot. 

Besides, I expect there to be plenty of times where she'd be a wonderful person to chat with, considering. 

I glance through the rest of the ones presented - often there's a perfectly usable statistic or two, but the angle isn't quite there - there's a few technical savants who's skills mostly aren't in my alley at the moment, a wide variety of mages and mentalists of a couple of different sorts with advantages that aren't particularly synergetic with the earlier plans of ours, and assorted more professional interests that are more or less here as a more traditional mingling-and-resting business vacation - which isn't exactly the right place to have an otherwise normal person coming in and asking for one's life story and time, though by Summer I expect I'll have a handful of takers there as well. 

So what ought we actually do with this, then? 

We were thinking of an invite, yes? 

Might as well talk through our options there.

I'm personally inclined simply to go with Amaya? She seems like a person that'd be quite open to a discussion, and the rest are louder characters, by in large. 

Lumen seems like they'd be a reasonably quiet and polite guest, but they're not the sort to eat, I'd presume?

I'm not too sure, here, to be honest - they seemed a bit on the novelty seeking side. 

- Ah you know what, drafting a fancy letter is the proper way to invite a cute girl to dinner. 

There: 

...Isn't that a bit much? 

It's nothing unreasonable, and I doubt such a whim would pop up if it'd be horrid. 

We should likely relax some, all things considered. 

...I hope so.

I give her some more of the headpats she deserves as I start fussing at setting the table - this doesn't seem quite as much a sitting table affair, so I'll bump it up - a proper mahogany table, with lots of polish, tall crystal glasses, shiny porcelain plates, a finely woven place mats for each of our spots. The chairs can be really anything - though I go for a simple few-spoked wooden affair that I'm most used to in this sort of restaurant environment, making sure that there's plenty of space to vary the tuck of the seat beneath the lip of the table before sitting down myself. 

Singular candles might be a bit gauche, so I avoid that - the computer suggests some floating light orbs that look rather pretty and cast an excellently white wash along the space, which is nice. 

I catch myself smoothing out the table covers and ordering silvered cutlery before I take the nudges - from the rest of us and the computer chiming due to an alert telling us of her imminent arrival - and relax, a little. 

It'll be fine.

At that, a knocking resounds at the door once more. 

I brush my hair back, and walk over to escort her in. 

"Hello? I was shown here by the computer due to the Guest of Honor's invitation?"

I take a deep breath, studying her. 

She's wearing much the same outfit - though it looks... snuger, her top wrapped around her like a shawl. It's thick and warm, the sort of thing that I know can feel so much righter when you feel so cold inside. Twined around her arms is the same metal as her shoulder - perhaps it's some kind of reinforcement? It also looks like her hands are those of a fragile flower - which implies she's gotten a little further with those then the rest of whatever her processed wound up being. 

"That's us, yes. Care to come in? There's... quite a bit to explain." 

"I imagine."