Sunlit Worlds

The Sunlit Worlds are the Covenant's oldest worlds, often regarded as the astrographic nucleus of the Covenant Empire. Located at the heart of the Core Systems, from which the Covenant's vast Arterial Network radiates in all directions, the Sunlit Worlds are conventionally defined as ones from which the Urs system can be seen with the naked eye (though not all of the systems regarded as being among their number strictly fulfill this criteria).

Generally speaking, the Sunlit Worlds are wealthy and rich in political, cultural, and martial power. The hubs of the region are mighty sights to behold indeed; filled with great mega-engineering, worlds girdled by glittering orbital bands and sky-fortresses, vast mega-cities, floating towers and great city-towers and suspensor platforms stretching to low orbit. Most of these worlds maintain dozens of off-world holdings, and combined with their highly-settled and industrialized home systems, have populations in the tens of billions. A few dozen of the Sunlit Worlds are even capable of directly rivaling Sanghelios in economic and political power, though their relative strength has fluctuated greatly across the ages. However, it should be noted that not all of the Sunlit Worlds are quite as well-off; over the span of millennia, some worlds of former prestige and glory have faded into obscurity for various reasons, either due to the natural drift of slipspace lanes or the devastation of wars long past. There are places that are but a shadow of their former glory, as the focal points of civilization moved elsewhere or concentrated on other worlds, and once gleaming centers of civilization reduced to wastelands and ruins. Even so, several hundred of the old systems remain as thriving centers of civilization, even following the onset of the Great Schism.

Ancient
The Sunlit Worlds have a long and storied history stretching back several thousand years. Numerous colonial conflicts were fought across the region including one of the most devastating conflicts, the War of Many Banners. Some decades afterwards, the Sangheili would make contact with the San'Shyuum and trigger the War of Beginnings, which would be fought across the region.

Contemporary
As of the Tribulations, the Sunlit Worlds are a site of constant tension as many worlds seek a return to the days of the Covenant or more ambitiously, their glory days many, many generations ago. To this end, the Concord of Reconcilliation find themselves in contention with the True Communion across the region.

List of worlds and major space stations
Originally colonized roughly between 4000 and 3500 years ago, they also roughly correspond to the extent of Sangheili civilization at the time of the War of Beginnings. As such, the term is sometimes used synonymously with the pre-Covenant Sangheili sphere, though many of what are now called Sunlit Worlds were settled after the alliance's formation. The Sunlit Worlds encompass close to two thousand settled systems, with several dozen being commonly distinguished among the most renowned and powerful worlds of the Covenant.

Note: names in the following are listed according to UNSC convention; that is, treating the most commonly-used name as the primary one, and alternative names in brackets (if available). This is often a translation of the native name's meaning into Standard English, though such translations are bound to be approximate at best, and certainly divorced from their foreign cultural and historical context. There are cases in which a name's apparent meaning comes across as absurd or nonsensical due to idiomatic usage unfamiliar to the translator; in such cases the native name is usually kept as the primary one. Most native names come to the UNSC through their standard Qerenoka forms, which are the easiest to interpret and assign meanings to. In some cases, however, names in different Covenant languages or dialects, or those whose meanings have been lost to time, also become adopted in standard usage, regardless of the Covenant's own conventions (which vary between institutions); such cases are noted.


 * Zeturoka
 * Faithful Perseverance (Beledokha in Qerenoka, sometimes rendered in the dialectal form Beledokra)
 * Ghienimeno Ayma (Zhakhan for "Blood-Born"; also known by its less common Qerenoka name Luukaba)
 * Kravigitou Ajera (Zhakhan for "Father's Shout"; also known by its less common Qerenoka name Nejomuulo)
 * Mesarka (archaic term in local Ikanoro dialect that could be translated as "Flesh-borne")
 * Numinous Quietude (common translation of Qerenoka Meedoluyi)
 * Rotkhoba (Qerenoka for "Bone-borne"; also known by its local Brinnu name Pheiriosta)
 * Penaghaawi (Qerenoka for "Lamentation"; originally Qerenokized from Penacravgi, a Zhakhan name of unclear origin)
 * Tkhoshanda (Qerenoka for "Ancestral Devotion"; Troystrada, an anglicization of the local dialectal form, can also be found in some records)
 * Doro-Kelen
 * Keletan
 * Silver Beacon (Zesikiicha in Qerenoka)
 * Steadfast Pride (Kodiswola in Qerenoka)
 * Anvarul
 * Divine Equilibrium
 * Nesaroka
 * Rertot'ha
 * Ulgethon (common romanization of Ulugeton; name meaning unclear, possibly lost to time)
 * Arodaan
 * Yerakon
 * Rhialon
 * Eudolaan

Major factions
Politically, the Sunlit Worlds are generally regarded as conservative and proud. Over a half of the worlds align themselves with the Crimson League, which ties them to Sanghelios' political and cultural sphere. Yet many others have historical feuds or splits with Sanghelios, and maintain regional empires of their own. Some of these differences go as far back as the Sangheili's earliest starfaring days and the first migrant clans departed the Urs system aboard great blinkerships. Many of these early colonies had no consistent contact with the greater Sangheili civilization, and some were only brought into the Covenant decades or centuries after the Writ of Union. While the vast majority were effectively absorbed into the Covenant's mainline culture over time and virtually forgot their ancient past, a number retained their ancestral pride over their independent origins and never saw eye-to-eye with Sanghelios and its affiliates, even as those worlds' cultural hegemony dominated much of the Primeval Nucleus.

Following the collapse of the Covenant Empire, the Concord of Reconciliation gained a strong political foothold in the Sunlit Worlds thanks to the aforementioned Crimson League. Though they aren't the only Concord members in the Sunlit Worlds, with the Tiar-Shi Commonality also aligning with the Concord. Some factions did not align with the Concord at all, such as the Holy Protectors of the Divine Equilibrium who declared their neutrality.