Naming a person or place is never an easy task. Whatever is chosen needs to represent the chooser’s desires for the future of that entity or to call out some trait that the entity has. Different cultures have different ways of going about naming people and places. Some names just develop over time. Other names are given in the moment. Still others are the results of months, if not years, of thought and observation. Jason had spent much of his time building the city's infrastructure, training with the soldiers, and participating in the arena. He hadn't the time to really think about what was going on around him. The population had increased. People from the surrounding settlements had begun moving into the city. He knew about this, but it wasn't something that he put much thought into, but one day, when he had finally taken time away from the duties that he had set for himself he overheard a conversation. They called the city, the Free City. Liking this, he began changing all the documents to read that the name of the city was the Free City, taking a page from the play book of the United States. It wasn’t really a name but it was adequately descriptive and did the job of a name well enough.

With that, it was time to take his next step in building up the newly thriving city. Several ambassadors were sent out to all of the nearby settlements. Their orders were to request that representatives that could speak on behalf of their cities could meat with Jason, but if they would not, or could not, they were told to attempt to establish trade agreements and non-aggression pacts. At first, there was no word sent back. The closests settlements were at most a few days away by foot. Within a week Jason had expected to hear back, but no word came. He started to fear the worst, but after a month rulers from all the nearby settlements began pouring into the city with their entourages looking to meet with him, the one who had created, or at least inspired the creation of, the marvels that they had heard about. Jason kept trying to make arrangements to meet with them, but for several months every time he started to set up arrangements a new delegation would arrive and he’d have to push back their meetings. None of them minded. Free City was something out of their wildest dreams by this point and any reason they could have to justify staying longer they’d take it. He could have met with them individually, but doing so might be seen as a slight and he believed that what he wished to discuss with them would be better if he spoke with them all at once.

Nearly another full year passed by the time the meeting occurred. Over 60 settlements had to be accomodated. In the time that it had taken to arrange for the meeting Jason had arranged for a capitol building to be built with a massive room senate chamber. The ambassadors didn’t know what to make of the fact that they had seen it constructed and seemingly specifically just for them and this meeting. Everything about the Free City felt so alien to them and the world that they had all grown up in. They had expected something like their cities but a little more advanced. What they found was so far removed that it was like stepping into another world. Each one came into the senate chambers, stopped, taking in the architecture, and then quietly went to their seats. The roof was higher than anything they had ever seen other than in the barracks and the arena. They would never have believed that this was constructed by their own kind if they didn’t see it for themselves.The chambers fit all of them with plenty of room to spare.

When all of the rulers and ambassadors finished taking their seats they were separated by their species. This wasn’t as great a situation as one would first believe it to be. Each of them had their own natural behaviors that made many of them tense. The Apox of different hives didn’t like being with other hives. They all were fighting the instinct to attack and kill each other. The T`kata handled things better but there were obvious tensions between each colony’s ambassador. They all looked the same to Jason as he stepped onto the central stage. The other species seemed to be handling the situation a lot better. They had integrated their various hierarchies into a larger one. The discomfort between them were more due to status. The leaders of their settlements looked down on the simple ambassadors, not because they were ambassadors, but because it meant that the leaders of their settlements was likely a different species of the J`nk.

Taking the podium, Jason looked from eye to eye of his assembled audience. He had nearly a year to prepare for this moment. The proposal that he was there to make had long since been worked out. Every possibility that could be brought up he had worked out the solution. The numbers were larger than he had anticipated originally, but it was just another variable to account for. It wouldn’t take an all new plan, just a simple modification here or there. Those had to be worked out for each individual case anyways so in reality, no changes to the base plan had to be made.

The plan that Jason had was simple. All he needed to convince the people in this room to give it a chance. He had surmised that the creators of this world wanted a show. Even if it was just to keep from giving them what they want he wanted to do the opposite, but the reality was that it was very unlikely that he would not face resistance at some point so the best option was not to fight with everyone around him. The best thing that he could do was to win over, integrate, and grow with the full support of as many allies as he could get before that fight came. How could he do that? It was a question that he could figure out the answer to when he first set his mind to coming up with a plan, but as more people came to his city the answer became ever more clear. The roadmap had presented itself in Human history. Once he realized that he started to think about all the empire that had existed on Earth. It was true that a powerful military could seize control of vast swathes of territory, but these empires almost always short lived when they couldn’t hold the territory or broke apart due to there being no cultural unity. No, those were not good models to follow, but there was a model that had shown repeated long term successes that created some of the most powerful, long lasting, peaceful, nations the Earth had seen. That model was simple and elegant. Trade between hubs that could control the nearby resources. Make it so each power center had something to gain from working together and would lose out greatly if they refused. Share, through trade, knowledge, technology, and culture. There would always be faux pas in the early stages, where one person would violate the taboos of another person, but with time and the willingness to work together, the cultures would find a new blend and a new culture with their own taboos or ways to handle old. It would take generations to fully become a single nation, but the first generation to say yes to it would commit to it more than the next several until it became the default culture.

Jason knew he likely wouldn’t be around to see what the culture he was building now would turn into, but what he was forming now to begin the process would be enough to accomplish his present goals. His speech was short and to the point, laying out his grand plan to work together to form a unified nation of laws and trade. He explained that by working together everyone can grow faster, but important to that is to have a unified code of justice with checks to make sure that everyone is following those rules. The audience was not happy about this proposition as it obviously meant that they would lose power over their subjects. All that he could do is spell out how a unified legal code provided more security and trust that their actions won’t be arbitrarily punished and so they can take more risks which in turns causes more people to try things and some of those things might enrich their society. Further, if they used this model, it would benefit their city, but working with as many people as possible under one justice system that is ostensibly free amplifies that natural push towards improvement.

When he finished his speech the ambassadors looked around to their fellow audience members with trepidation. A moment passed before any one spoke, but after a while someone did. Their big concerns were about how the system of governance would work if not how they were now under their leadership and whether they had to give an answer now or could they have some time to think it over. Before Jason could answer another speaker followed on to the previous question with their own. They wanted to know what would happen if they declined. Jason field all these without a problem. No, they did not have to make a decision right this moment. If they declined, nothing would happen to them immediately, but over time they’re would likely be problems that would end up with them being annexed if things went according to plan. And the government to be put in place? He suggested that it would depend on the various cities at first to accommodate transitioning from the different styles of governance but it was expected that at some point the leadership and governance would follow in line with the strictures that have been laid out in the legal procedures, but until then, some hybrid system would probably work for each settlement. They’d still be required to act within the law, but species were different so some leeway would have to be given.

Once those questions were answered ambassadors started filing out. It didn’t look like anyone was going to go in for it, but several leaders made their way to the charter and signed it. Among the signees were Apisia’s hive and surprisingly Xev. He hadn’t realized it, but the brothel like place that he awoke in when he first met Xev was owned and ran by her. Another interesting signee was Gondaluke’s rulers. He hadn’t expected for them show up, let alone sign on. It wasn’t until the leader of Gondaluke personally greeted Jason that he understood. While the outbursts that Jason was involved with was reason to doubt him and maybe even hunt him down and bring him back to stand trial any animosity had been forgotten when the Free City began trading with them. If anyone knew how beneficial a relationship with the Free City was, it was them. All said, only a few settlements signed. The rest walked away for now, but time would tell if he failed. The ambassadors couldn’t possibly sign away their rulers’ positions. He wouldn’t know for real whether he failed or not till he got word back from all the settlements months from now. He knew he was asking too much of them, but he had to try before moving on to the next step of his plans.