The Provisional Offices Close
Three days ago Le Council reported five installations at Level IV — Convergence [1]. Le Council is issuing this advisory to report that the convergence has concluded in the manner convergence now concludes.
U.I.P.I. Classification Update
Effective at the time of this advisory:
| Region | Prior | Current |
|---|---|---|
| Oahu, United States | Level IV — Convergence | Level V — Manifestation |
| Cuzco, Peru | Level IV — Convergence | Level V — Manifestation |
| Singapore, Singapore | Level IV — Convergence | Level V — Manifestation |
| Monaco, Monaco | Level IV — Convergence | Level V — Manifestation |
| Tehran, Iran | Level IV — Convergence | Level V — Manifestation |
Five arenas have manifested. Five rosters have resolved. Le Council has registered five teams, each of which was, until this week, a coordinate on a watch list and a source of increasingly emphatic field reports.
The Provisional Field Assessment Offices deployed to these five sites have, accordingly, completed their assessments and are closing. Le Council draws attention to this because it is the first time the word "provisional" has, in the whole of this affair, described anything accurately. Le Council wishes to enjoy this while it lasts. Le Council does not expect it to last.
The Five New Teams
Oahu Otters — The Lava Shelf
The ice appeared on volcanic rock above the Pacific. The rock was, at the time, warm. It is Le Council's understanding—supported by the assessment team and disputed by no instrument—that the lava flow stopped precisely at the boundary of the manifestation and went no further. The Almighty Ice did not stop. The two now share a shelf. Geologists contacted for comment declined to provide it.
The ice at The Lava Shelf resolved to the first of the two forms Le Council described in its prior advisory: clear to the depth, hard, and without grain. Under the Aloha designation, physicality between the teams is suppressed. Nobody fights on The Lava Shelf. The assessment team reports that nobody has tried.
The Otters are not in a hurry. The Otters have never been in a hurry.
Cuzco Crows — La Puerta del Sol
At three thousand four hundred meters, La Puerta del Sol is the highest arena in league play, and the assessment team's early reports consisted largely of the assessment team asking to be reassigned to a lower one. The ice here is of the first form. So is the altitude, which is not a form of ice, but which behaves at La Puerta del Sol as though the Ice recruited it. Visiting players fatigue at twice the ordinary rate. The Crows have never played at sea level and have expressed, through their conduct, no wish to.
The Crows will wait at the top of the stairs. They know you are coming. They know how you will feel when you arrive.
Singapore Scorpions — The Garden Dome
Le Council notes that one of the most ordered cities on earth has been given an arena in which controlled chaos occurs on a schedule. The ice is of the first form, clear and exact. The Fine designation ensures that any physical event against a visiting player is charged, immediately, to the player who committed it. The Scorpions do not exploit this. They do not need to. They sting once, in the correct place, and they do not miss.
The Scorpions are precise about everything, including you.
Monaco Moose — The Grand Circuit
The Grand Circuit seats two thousand eight hundred people, making it the smallest arena in the league by a margin Le Council's facilities office describes as "deliberate." It is also, per the same office, the single most valuable room in professional sport, on a per-seat basis, by an amount it declines to compute in public. A moose appeared in the harbor. The Almighty Ice followed. The ice is of the second form: pale, soft at the surface, feathered where it meets the boards. Under House Rules, winning wagers pay out multiplied by the goal differential. The house wins. So does whoever reads the room best.
The moose is unbothered by the wealth. The wealth is doing its best to appear unbothered by the moose.
Tehran Tigers — The Alborz Den
The Alborz Den is vast, loud, and older in spirit than the league it has joined by roughly the age of everything. The ice is of the second form, pale and dense. Under the Fortress designation, home goaltending is elevated to a degree Le Council's measurement office found difficult to accept. The office measured the net. Regulation. It measured the net again. Regulation. The Alborz Den has not been breached, and the office has stopped visiting it.
The Tigers arrived as though they had always been here. Nobody in Tehran is prepared to argue otherwise.
On the Two Forms
Le Council notes, without drawing a conclusion Le Council is not yet equipped to draw, that of the five arenas manifested this week, three took the first form and two took the second. Le Council continues to decline to name the two forms. Le Council will observe only that the split was not decided by geography, nor by climate, nor by any property the assessment teams were able to isolate, and that the ice appears to be sorting itself according to a logic it has not shared.
On the Remaining Installations
Le Council is obligated to report that the closure of five Provisional Field Assessment Offices has been accompanied by the opening of others. In the reporting period, Le Council has registered fresh, instrument-confirmed activity—classified Level III — Declaration—in the following locations, none of which currently hosts an active arena:
- Reykjavik, Iceland
- Nuuk, Greenland
- Oslo, Norway
- Kyiv, Ukraine
- Bridgetown, Barbados
- Papeete, French Polynesia
Le Council notes that this is six sites, that the prior wave was five, and that Le Council has stopped characterizing the trend as anything, because the trend has begun characterizing itself.
Closing
Five teams that did not exist a season ago will not play this season. They will watch the postseason, as the four before them watched theirs, and they will play when the ice permits. This is the order of things now. Le Council did not establish the order. Le Council is keeping the records.
The game continues.
If you have theories, Discord remains the appropriate venue. Le Council notes that the two forms have already been named, extensively, by the community, and that Le Council has read none of it, and that at least one of the proposed names is uncomfortably close.