One thousand years ago, the world ended. The Ancients covered the earth, a global civilization of such fascinating complexity as to defy imagination. Then the ancient fay-people, the Gardun-Houldu, returned, and with them the Heir of their Rings, who unleashed the Wrath of Eldarendar. And of all that civilization, eight cities alone remained. Now it is 3030 AD, and mankind has grown technological once again, learning to walk amid the stars, and Eldarendar tolerates this as long as it stays in the cities. But in the stars, they are beyond his reach, and he is worried, and the Pope is worried as well. What do the Mutopians do, when they walk among the stars? What horrors are they committing, beyond reach of God and man? Where pontiffs and magic Rings fail, professors may succeed. No one would ever suspect a flabby professor of philosophy to be the spy of Peter and of Eldarendar. Juldivere Osbaldistone finds many strange things in Mutopia, not least a secret society of warrior monks with their own space program, the refounded Order of the Temple of Solomon. Or as we know them, Knights Templars. In their flagship, the professor of philosophy penetrates the horrors of the stars, and finds there secrets he wishes he had not.