Across the five summit halls, the debate deepened.
The Keepers and their allies did not give up.
They asked for delays.
Lootwell asked for definitions.
They warned of irreversible harm.
Lootwell asked what counted as irreversible.
They invoked ancestral authority.
Lootwell asked which ancestral sites, which custodians, and which records.
They requested witness rights.
Lootwell accepted witness rights for non-invasive surveys.
They demanded route review.
Lootwell agreed to route review for named dangerous sites, but not for vague regions spanning half a continent.
They asked for time.
Lootwell asked what evidence required time to gather if the danger was already known.
Again and again, the pattern repeated.
The Keepers tried to make caution broad.
Lootwell made caution specific.
That was the true battle.
It's not whether danger existed.
Everyone admitted danger could exist.
The battle was whether danger would be used as a wall or as a map.
