Hi everyone, and welcome to this week's public update!

Development-wise, there isn't a lot to tell, rendering continues, with a couple more scenes completed over the weekend. Supporters are already being treated to regular previews, but for the time being, I'll have to post any public ones I want to share to Deviantart as there are currently almost no SFW ones! Once again, this is a very naked update! Up top is the one and only one Ive got, in which we see Abbie return to Jessica's house ready for the final battle!

So for today, I'm going to make a short lore post for any of you that are interested in the background fluff, and for today's subject, I have chosen Fivaviana's rulers, the Kisimi Noble Family.

Rise of the Nobility

In the first era, roughly 600 years ago, the Sapphorian "Citizens Council" was dissolved in disarray after a group of wealthy families, (that would go on to become the Nobility,) engineered its downfall. Having resolved to work together to take over Sapphory for themselves, they next needed to set up an alternative system of government to the one that they had just finished convincing the populace had failed.

The largest and most powerful of these families, the Schiede, (Shy-ae-da) put forward their Matriarch, Isabella, who became the first Queen of Sapphory, though not before there had been much wrangling between the families. While this was eventually obviated by Isabella's marriage to Princess Cecily of Okonrin, which united the two largest families and resulted in the birth of the Schiede-Rinta dynasty which endures to this day, the contributions of the Kisimi family, their closest allies were never forgotten.

The Kisimi Matriarch, Seraphina, a close friend of Queen Isabella, was granted the rule of the most important province outside of the capital, the port of Fivaviana, which even in that time was already hugely important to Sapphorian trade. Meanwhile, her daughter Mariella Kisimi, who would eventually go on to replace her, was the country's foremost diplomat, and having worked for the Citizens Council, immediately put her skills to work for the Nobility, negotiating with the outside world through the United Nations to prevent an invasion of Sapphory.

Today, Kisimi Mansion is the centre of Fivaviana's government. All important affairs of state, from tribute collection, to marriages, slave registrations and even licences for sex work are handled here.

The current Matriarch of the family is Clementine Kisimi. She is considered a middle-of-the-road tyrant by her subjects, neither as liberal as her grandmother nor as authoritarian as her mother. Like her ancient ancestor, she is also a close personal friend of the monarch, Princess Selina Schiede-Rinta, as they went to school together. (Nobles attend special private schools where all of the teachers are themselves members of the Nobility, as it would be unthinkable for Noble girls to be disciplined by commoners.)

The Governess has six daughters, Mercedes (29), Francesca (28), Meredith (26), Tabitha (23), Constance (21) and Cordelia (19) whom you've already met. Each of them is a vicious, highborn brat and must be handled extremely carefully if encountered. As is often the case with the younger generation of the Nobility, they are born-to-rule and see others as beneath them.

Like all of the Noble houses, the Kisimi clan own vast tracts of land and legions of slaves. They are the largest controller of ground rents in Fivaviana and a major shareholder in the Mulligan Corporation, Scarlett Raine's employer. Their true wealth is measured however, not in money but in power and influence: Their long-standing alliance with the Royal Family has ensured that the Governess of Fivaviana is always among the first of the Queen's Courtiers, and this is unlikely ever to change.

I hope you've enjoyed this snippet of the background lore of Missy, I'll see you next time!

Trinian

Hello everyone. With the mini-update still in progress, this week we'll have a lore post, and today we'll look a little more closely at life on the other side of the tracks. (Well... on the other side of Fallulah Park.)

Like most rich nations, Sapphory has a large middle class. With so many of the menial tasks done by slaves, most Sapphorians in the cities are quite prosperous. The middle class covers, at the lower end, residents of Lady Flower and Honeypot, all the way up to the beautiful and prosperous Lady Gardens, and even some parts of the as-yet unseen area of Mount Pleasant, where the very wealthy and much of the aristocracy can be found.

Most residents of Lady Gardens come from some form of inherited wealth, though hard-working women who climb to the top of their chosen career path can also make it here in mid-life. Many have links to the nobility in some form, perhaps being tangentially related through marriage.

Girls born to Lady Gardens parents aren't quite as born-to-rule arrogant as their peers in the minor nobility, but they generally consider themselves well above girls from the rest of the city. They grow up in large houses, generally get anything they want, and in many cases even have slaves, who've had to do their bidding for as long as they can remember. Many lose their virginity to the family slave once they reach the age of 18, as the slave is not allowed to refuse.

Most popular girls come from Lady Gardens. Because the most important prerequisite for joining them is having the right haughty temperament and superiority complex, it is something that comes most naturally to girls born into wealth and privilege. However, the same is true of the bad girls, with those like Jessica and Poppy who have the largest sense of entitlement, rising naturally to the top.

It is expected that Lady Gardens girls will go on to great things, and assumed that they will go to university. Most mothers can afford private tuition for their offspring, but even those who do not embrace this generally find that most things in life come easily to them - Jessica, for example, does not try hard in school, and often has the maid do her work for her, yet will almost certainly easily get into a good university by sheer dint of her upbringing.

For any Lady Gardens girl, however, the ultimate prize is ascension to the nobility, and the only way to do this is through marriage. The real value of living in this beautiful, leafy part of Sapphory City is not the large, luxurious houses, the increased security or even the slaves and status, though all of those things are important - it is access to power.

The most reliable way to gain access to the nobility is by working at or around the palace, and the senior Royal staff are disproportionately drawn from Lady Gardens and Mount Pleasant. A woman wealthy or high-status enough may even be able to get into one of the opulent parties thrown by a noble, and it is here that she will have the greatest chance of being noticed.

Any girl who can pull this off joins the elite of Sapphory. She becomes immune to most laws and exempt from tribute, as well as gaining an untouchable status and the power to do almost anything she wants. She need fear no one save the Princess. (Selina is herself distantly descended from the slave girl that Queen Justine married several hundred years ago.)

The thought of any of the Lady Gardens girls we've met so far achieving such power is... well...

I hope you've enjoyed this lore post. For me, it's back to the mini-update. Have a great week!

Trinian