Terra fell from the sky. A spaceship with over 40 billion capacity crashed to the ground as passengers attempted to flee before it was too late. Soon, it hit its lowest point. Leaving passengers and observers astonished at how something so mighty could fall so quickly.

Amongst the ashes of Terra, a community was left covered in shrapnel as the captain (Do Kwon) and his team fled the scene to build another ship. Using the scraps of metal and unstable coins, this community attempted to forge some kind of new beginning.

At the start, the community was divided. Individuals put forward proposals to fix the ship, to get it back flying, but no one could agree. That was until a community member named Vegas stepped up with proposal 3568.

Proposal 3568

Proposal 3568 offers to implement a 1.2% tax/burn on all transactions (buy-sell) until the total supply equals 10 billion LUNC — this requires exchanges to agree to apply the tax. After that, the mechanism is disabled, and the total supply can never be changed.

Vegas said, "I know it is not the solution. I know that it is not the only thing that we have to do to make [Terra] work again, other stuff has to be done. "

This proposal was in response to the Terra community wanting tokens to be burnt. Some people would step forward and say they'll burn their Terra, and others would point fingers at others offering up their tokens.

"In my head, doing that (individually burning) will not solve the problem. It's just a couple of people burning — even burning a billion is nothing." Vegas told me, "without a system you will not do much. That is why I made the proposal like I did."

The vote passed with 168 million votes. One Reddit user, 80worf80, said, "now you need someone with a brain to implement the change. Maybe the "team" is on it lol".

"This gave hope to the community." Vegas told me, "we quickly realized that we needed to invest more people, more time, and more resources to make this a reality."

Terra Rebels Unite

Vegas then began to assemble a team of volunteers, a team he initially called "The Strong 27". It comprised of 27 people reaching out to lawyers, developers, etc. that would be needed to implement proposal 3568 and finally get Terra back in the air.

During the formation of The Strong 27, Vegas started meeting with other groups that had the same aim — get Luna Classic back in the air. He met with Ape Terra, the group he thought was the most organized at the time and proposed they work together.

"I fell in love with their love for the chain," Vegas said. "We quickly saw that our goals were aligned and after a couple of days, Terra Rebels was created. I want to say Terra Rebels was not created by myself, I was not the founder [...] but I think I was the glue that brought everyone together."

A previously divided community had united — in the form of Terra Rebels. The burn was the first goal in sight, but they also had eyes to re-establish governance, re-enable staking, and more.

However, not everyone was convinced by the formation of Terra Rebels. The same Reddit user, 80worf80 said, "[there's a] team of charlatans that set up shop in the husk of Luna 1.0's corpse. They got a discord, lots of talk and no github lol".

To be fair to 80worf80, that comment was made months ago, but Terra Rebels have made a ton of progress. They currently have an official GitHub, a whitepaper, Twitter, and a Discord of 5,814 members.

One of the hardest groups to get on board was the validators. Vegas says that the crash cut the total amount of Terra validators from 134 to 79. And, for those who don't know, validators are essential to running a blockchain — if there are no validators, the entire chain will halt.

"When I did the proposal we lost some validators. I just asked them to basically trust me on this." Vegas told me, "for the last two or three months, they were losing money. So I have to say a big thank you to them. [...] The validators were the first ones to keep this boat afloat."

Why save Terra anyways?

Sure, it's great that these guys grouped together to help fix Terra, but why bother? Why not put this manpower into an untarnished, already stable chain?

"It's about the principle, it's about the rest of the crypto market, it's about having new investors not be afraid," Vegas said. "I have a colleague of mine that lost £100,000 in Terra. You know what he did after that? He deleted all his accounts in crypto. He said 'I'm never going to invest in crypto again'. And, that hurts me."

I'm sure we all know of people who have been stung by a crypto crash and never returned. Or even people who have never got involved with the space because of FUD calling crypto a scam. When Terra fell, I had an influx of people who didn't know the second thing about crypto ask about what was going on. A crypto crash is more than just crypto news.

Vegas and the Terra Rebels want to turn this cautionary tale into something more triumphant.

"We didn't see the coin as dead. We saw it as an opportunity." Vegas said, "we saw a coin that was listed on massive exchanges. We saw a coin that has a lot of technology. We saw a coin that is a beautiful, beautiful coin, and that it can be revived."

Is Change Coming?

Well, actually, yeah! August 26th will see V21 (since rebranded to V22) implemented by Terra validators.

The update will see delegation and staking re-enabled, new validators able to join the network, and a tax mechanism added to the code (Vegas' 3568 proposal). Although, the tax code will "lie dormant" until there is a community vote on the exact parameters.

The community has been working tirelessly to get this ship back up and running. V21 is their first sign that the ship may fly again, an engine splutter, a few lights flicker. But the fight is far from over. As Edward Kim says in his medium post, outlining V21, "let us not be blind to the risks and challenges that still lie ahead."

The team has a long and hard journey ahead of them — V21 is just the start. I say good luck to 'em — it's a noble mission they've set out on. Be sure to wear your seatbelts, double-check the parachutes, and keep your eyes peeled for any incoming danger.

I just hope they succeed, so we don't have to add another project to the crypto graveyard.

Check out writer Ryan S. Gladwin's website, follow him on Twitter, and of course, subscribe to the weekly Hedgehog newsletter!