Junthor is a large terrestrial planet with a thick atmosphere of carbon dioxide and chlorine. The surface is mainly composed of aluminum with deposits of nickel. Surveyors found the ruins of a technical civilization near the equator - evidently the colony of an ancient spacefaring race. The ruins had subsided to almost nothing - merely wind-hollowed husks of arcologies and other megastructures. In the center of the ruins was a single column whose inscriptions defied translation for several centuries.