Earl, slowly making his way back from the outer rim halfway to the far side of the center where he was thrown by the warp
that sent him across to Camollard, and possessing valuable information from the Origianl People, was stranded on cattle raising planet Teralde. The only work available was knife fighting so he helped some stranded low-towners steal and butcher some beef. As luck would have it, the beef they killed was an expensive prize bull, and the owner, Tien Harada, was furious. Tien suspected another Owner trying to drive him bankrupt, but inspector Ibius Avarot disagreed. One of Earl’s followers sold stolen meat and was discovered. Earl was arrested and faced execution, but an Owner, the aged and dying Usan Labia, insisted he be placed in her custody pending full investigation.
Usan introduced Earl to Sufan Noyoka, an Owner who had lost his herd and spent years off-world engaged in mysterious research. She also introduced him to Pacula Harada, Tien’s sister, who had lost her husband to a strange disease and then her daughter, Culpea, mysteriously on an outing on Sufan’s ranch. Pacula would do anything to find her daughter, Usan to regain health and youth and Sufan to recover his fortune. Sufan had found the way to travel to the legendary “ghost” world of Balhadorha where there were said to be immense riches. Earl was suspicious having, himself, come from the legendary "treasure world" of Earth and knowling it in fact to be an impoverished, barren wilderness, but, facing charges of interstellar cattle rustling (with
in vivos flaying as punishment), had no choice but to join the expedition.
Cyber Khai arrived on Teralde and, discovering Earl’s presence ordered Avarot to hold him, but Sufan, Earl and the others managed instead to escape in Sufan’s private ship. There, in addition to the crew, they were joined by Mark Cognez, a genius at solving difficult problems. Sufan directed them to Chamelard, a cold world where there was a laboratory he had commissioned to create a slave to help him reach Balhadorha. The laboratory told him (almost certainly on Cyclan orders) that Sufan had not paid the whole price and asked for a few days to check the records. Earl and the others kidnapped the slave, a blind young woman named Embira with the ability to "see" energy fields, and they headed for an intensely high energy
star forming cloud called the Hichen Cloud. As they approached Hichen Cloud they were pursued by Khai in a Cyclan ship. Embira quickly developed an attachment to Earl. Entering the cloud, they relied on Embira’s abilities to navigate the distorted, violent energy fields and arrived at a trinary star with Balhadohra at the center.
Balhadohra was covered in jungle with a single circular white city. They landed nearby and found the planet bereft of animal life. They were unable to find a gate into the city and tried explosives and other methods which cost two of the crew their lives. Finally Embira told them she had "seen" an invisible door and through it they entered the city. The city was a vast spiral maze of many small rooms centered on a spire. Marek decided the treasure must be under the spire. The party worked its way for many hours through this maze arriving at last at a central room containing a mist. Usan, near death and desperate to achieve their goal so they could return and she could receive treatment, tied a rope around her waist and entered the mist.
The rope went limp and came back untied. Earl, in turn, bound to the rope, went in after her. While in the mist he was met by his lost love, Kalin, who embraced him. After a time he realized that it could not be her and the scenery around him changed to that of Earth, not the ruined Earth of his youth but the beautiful Earth of the ancient past. Just as he began to get used to the idea that it was indeed Earth he saw Embira who had come for him. She led him out of the mist and collapsed in shock. Earl told the others the mist concealed a
symbiote that gave any that entered waking dreams of their fondest wishes but since they ate nothing, they soon died, to be consumed by the symbiote.
Earl led them out onto the roof of the city and with ropes they made it down the walls. There Earl told Marek and Pacula that like Usan, they had actually achieved their desires. Marek, a new family to replace the one he had lost to the Cyclan and Pacula learned from Earl that Embira was actually Culpea, kidnapped by Surfan and taken to the lab. Surfan, thus discovered, laser in hand, tried to immobilize Earl – he had intended to take Earl back when his expedition was finished and deliver him to the Cycan but in a moment of inattention, Earl killed him. They rode the ship back through the Hychen cloud and went their separate ways.