Halo: Cryptum

Template:Ratings Template:Under Construction Template:Book Info Halo: Cryptum is the first novel in the upcoming Forerunner Saga by Greg Bear. The novel explores the events leading up to the Forerunner-Flood War and the shared history of humans and Forerunners.

It was released on January 4, 2011.

Plot synopsis

The story follows Bornstellar Makes Eternal Lasting, a young Forerunner Manipular who refuses to follow in his father's footsteps and become a Builder. Bornstellar's rebellion forces his father to send him to live with the Miners; one of the lowest classes of Forerunner society. After living with the Miners on Edom in the Sol system for some time, he is inspired by his ancilla to hunt for artifacts left by the Precursors—beings of extraordinary power that preceded the Forerunner civilization. Bornstellar escapes to Erde-Tyrene, where he crosses paths with two humans - Chakas and Riser, who guide him on his search for Precursor artifacts. In the Djamonkin Crater, they find an artifact that is revealed to be a Cryptum—a mysterious object created by a Forerunner Warrior-Servant group known as the Prometheans. Bornstellar opens the Cryptum and finds that it belongs to an ancient Forerunner military leader.

Characters

Forerunners

• Bornstellar Makes Eternal Lasting
• Bornstellar's father
• Confirmer
• Didact
• Faber
• Glory of a Far Dawn
• Librarian
• Splendid Dust of Ancient Suns

Humans

• Chakas
• Morning Riser

Artificial intelligences

• 05-032 Mendicant Bias

Glossary

Halo Waypoint provided a glossary of nouns used in Halo: Cryptum over a week to make sure readers understood the meaning of the words used.

• Supreme Mantle Court - a rare holding of the court by the Council to discuss matters of extreme importance and significance.
• Phylarch of Builders - A leader within the Builder rate who was particularly notorious for his role in reinstating the Warrior-Servants in response to a great threat
• The Capital - The centre of the Forerunner Ecumene, a repository of twenty thousand years of Forerunner knowledge and wisdom which housed trillions of ancilla and served as home to roughly one hundred thousand Forerunners, mostly Builders high of rate and the Council.
• The Metarchy- An unimaginably vast network used by ancilla, ultimately coordinated by a single metarch-level intelligence who reports directly to the chief councilor.
• Mendicant Bias - A tremendously powerful Contender-class ancilla designed to coordinate control of the Halo installations under authorization of the Council and the Master Builder.
• Plasma jockey - A colloquial term by Builders for stellar-class Engineers equipped with third-class ancilla, their role is to tame young stars for future use.
• Ghibalb - The natal Forerunner planet, once a beautiful paradise, now a desolate and radiation-scortched cinder due to early Forerunner mistakes in stellar engineering.
• The College of Strategic Defense of the Mantle - Often simply referred to as the "War College", it was a school for warrior Forerunners at which the Didact had once taught and where he acquired his final name.
• Jagon - An older Forerunner language, though not as old as Digon.
• Metarch - A hyper-advanced level of ancilla in the exclusive service of the Council, with less than five in existence at any given time.
• Council Security - A team designated to protect the Council.
• Master Builder - A title given to the chief of the Builder rate and of all the guilds; considered to be the most powerful Forerunner throughout all the Ecumene.
• Pheru - A highly-valued human pet which originally came from the planet of Faun Hakkor.
• Huragok - Techno-organic Builder servant-tools which float above the ground.
• Mutations - The careful act of customized biological maturation of a Forerunner to new forms and/or rates which is typically performed between two to five times over the course of a lifetime. The process determines a Forerunner's place within his or her family, Maniple or guild and is always patterned after the mutation's mentor, typically but not always one's parent.
  • Brevent mutations - Risky, ad-hoc mutations which can be successful, like traditional mutations, but can often introduce complications since they are less practiced and honed.
• Kasna - An intoxicating green San 'Shyuum beverage.
• Builder Security - Forerunners of the Builder rate who conduct secutity and combat matters for the Builders.
• Janjur Qom - A primary-treaty planet and the largest of the San 'Shyuum quarantine worlds.
• Builders - The highest and most powerful rate among Forerunners, led by the Master Builder.
• The Council - A collection of at least five hundred representatives from various Forerunner rates across the ecumene.
• San 'Shyuum - A peaceful species, interested in their own betterment through science. Noted for their profound sensuality.
• Halo - An enormous ring-shaped, wide-effect neural-disruption weapon considered to be the final defense against the Flood.
• The Confirmer - An aged Promethian commander assigned by the Council to guard and protect the San 'Shyuum.
• The Timeless One - A mysterious creature which was once held within the arena of Charum Hakkor.
• Faun Hakkor - A neighboring planet to Charum Hakkor and one which the humans had once occupied.
• Ben Nauk - A neighboring planet to Charum Hakkor and Faul Hakkor, also occupied by the humans.
• Geas - A generations-long genetic command which can nudge or persuade individuals or generations into a planned destiny.
• Prometheans - A noble class of Warrior-Servant Forerunner rate from the distant past.
• Cryptum - Also referred to as a "Warrior Keep", a sealed structure where a Warrior-Servant would enter a self-imposed exile, hibernating in a meditative state of contemplative transcendence called "timeless xankara."
• Synchrons - A nexus of great forces and personalities; a point when one's life dramatically changes.
• Digon - An ancient language used almost exclusively by Warrior-Servants.
• Wisdom of Harbou/Strength of Lang - Two forces that hold the millennial seal on the Didact's Cryptum, barring entry to all but a Forerunner.
• The Didact - A banished Promethean warrior who once served as the protector of the entire Forerunner Ecumene.
• Charum Hakkor - An important planet which was once a Precursor hub world and the site of a great Forerunner war.
• The Mantle - A belief system held by the Forerunners in which they are required to protect and promote life.
• Living Time - The joy of life's interaction with the Cosmos and the foundation for the Mantle itself.
• Maniple - A specific division within a Forerunner family or guild defined by one's function.
• Daowa-maad - A human saying for a concept regarding the roll and tug of the universe on a being.
• Baffler - A Forerunner-designed camouflage technique employing geometric distortions.
• Dazzler - A Forerunner-designed camouflage technique that causes visual and auditory delusions.
• War Sphinxes - Flight-capable combat machines which were employed by the Forerunner Warrior-Servants in battle; roughly ten meters tall and twenty meters long.
• Durance - A receptable which can maintain the "reduced essence" of a Forerunner after the moment of physical death.
• The Librarian - The greatest and most prestigious Lifeworker, there have been only three to reach this rank in all of Forerunner history.
• Chamanune - A variety of the human species on Ede-Tyrene; bronze-skinned and predominately hairless.
• Hamanune - A smaller, diminutive variety of the human species roughly half the size of the chamanune and commonly known as Florians.
• K'tamanune - A hisky, ocher-skinned northern species of human living in frigid climates.
• B'ashamanune - An equatorial variety of skinny and lithe humans living in Erde-Tyrene's grasslands.
• Organon - A possibly mythical device believed to be capable of reactivating all Precursor artifacts.
• Marontik - The largest human community on Erde-Tyrene.
• Djamonkin Augh - A ring-shaped island known locally as "Big Man's Water," believed to be a Precursor site located on Erde-Tyrene.
• Ecumene - The Forerunner empire which was composed of three million fertile worlds.
• The Domain - The central network of Forerunner intelligence and a repository of combined civilizational thought and experience, often connected to Forerunner individuals via their armor.
• Ancilla - A highly-advanced but purpose-scaled AI housed in Forerunner armor, machines, buildings and ships.
• Manipular - A Forerunner's initial and simplest physical form; the form prior to one's first mutation.
• Edom - A red, desert world which serves as a home to Forerunner miners.
• Erde-Tyrene - Neighboring Edom, a blue-green planet presently occuped by humans.
• Rate - The Forerunner society is structured by "rates" of varying societal function and cultural importance: Builders (highest rate), Miners, Lifeworkers, Warrior-Servants and Engineers.
• Precursor - A civilization which preceded the Forerunners, leaving behind indestructible and inscrutable remnants of their way of life.

Trivia

• Greg Bear had stated at the Emerald City Comic Con that the novel's working title was "Antediluvian". The title was later changed.
• Illustrated by Sparth, the cover of the novel depicts two small figures, possibly Forerunners or humans, standing on a ledge overlooking a large Forerunner structure. Given the different heights of the two, it is possible that these two figures are either the Didact and Bornstellar or Chakas and Riser.
• A preview of the novel containing the first two chapters was released online on December 22, 2010.

Gallery

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  Final jacket artwork, including a synopsis of the novel's premise.

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  A high-resolution version of the cover art. Note the two figures in the foreground.

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  A wallpaper version of the cover.