Arterial Network

The Arterial Network is a formally defined collection of interlinked high-bandwidth slipspace routes connecting the regional hub worlds of the Covenant Sphere. While most of these passageways were chosen for their natural efficiency, many are further boosted by slipstream navigation beacons placed along them. The worlds and systems along the Arterial Network are typically the most politically, economically, and militarily powerful within the Covenant Empire. They are surrounded within their interstellar neighborhood by various lesser worlds, often direct vassals or tributaries to the hub world. Together, the hubs coupled with the other colonies in their region made up the primary domains that comprised the Covenant's primary units of provincial governance.

Most long-distance travel and commerce within the Holy Ecumene flows through the Arterial Network. Regional traffic typically uses various secondary or tertiary slipways located throughout individual domains; some secondary passages also bridge proximate domains together, but they are less efficient and less well-policed than the Network, potentially exposing travelers to pirates and rogue factions. Indeed, many groups within the Covenant's seedy underbelly use various sliplanes known only to themselves, or deemed too hazardous for use by regional governments due to the presence of slipspace anomalies.

Notably, various pathways of the Arterial Network have changed over the Covenant's existence, with old superhighways of interstellar commerce drifting out of sync as the natural motions of stars and other celestial objects upset the delicate gravitational balance that gives rise to them. Entire once-thriving worlds have languished as their slipspace corridors died out while new centers of trade and military might have risen in their stead.