THE QUANTUM INTELLIGENCER

Society was much diverted by the unseasonably tense soirée at Cipherwell Hall, the new cryptographic salon of the Blockstream Circle, where Lord Kudinov and Sir Nick of the Hashward Line presented their radical proposal: a return to the ancient, unyielding discipline of hash-based signatures. It is said the air grew thin when mention was made of the pre-2012 holdings—the ancestral wallets, untouched and perilously exposed. We are given to understand that a certain unclaimed fortune, rumoured to belong to the reclusive S—i N—o, worth near £600 million in modern reckoning, hangs in the balance, its security predicated on assumptions now trembling before quantum possibility. The gathering treated the matter with the decorum of a state funeral, though more than one guest was observed whispering near the orrery, gesturing toward the stars as if calculating doom. No announcement was made, but the departure of Lady Quantrell in her midnight-blue phaeton, without taking leave, suggested the matter is far from settled. An understanding, perhaps, must be reached before the next lunar audit. —Ada H. Pemberley Dispatch from The Prepared E0