From Beginnings To Transitions

Nine instalments are transitional between the great days of the Polesotechnic League and the declining Terran Empire of Dominic Flandry's time:

an external threat to Technic civilization involving a rogue planet obliges van Rijn and the members of his first trade pioneer crew to embark on urgent missions outside the Solar System;

events elsewhere in space demonstrate the degeneration of the League;

inequalities within Technic civilization and Falkayn's secret discovery of Mirkheim trigger what is potentially a massive conflict between van Rijn and Falkayn;

the Baburite seizures of both Mirkheim and Hermes signal the beginning of the end of the League;

Falkayn's grandson grows up on the planet Avalon which continues to be jointly colonised by human beings and Ythrians (two instalments);

Earth is sacked but Manuel Argos leads a slave revolt and founds the Terran Empire;

the growing Empire annexes Ansa but fails to annex Avalon while the Merseian Roidhunate is a distant but growing threat (two instalments).

That, finally, sets the scene for the Terran-Merseian conflict of Flandry's time.

So many single stories combine into one greater story. I think that the pre-Flandry periods are more involved and intricate despite filling one volume less in The Technic Civilization Saga.