###################################################################### # # The Human Diaspora: # #####################################################################. In the radiant dawn of the 33rd century, humanity has conquered the stars. From the ashes of the Great Abundance Collapse; when unchecked plenty bred decay, despair, and near-extinction, the Neo-Asceticists arose. Who rejected the poison of endless comfort, embraced voluntary scarcity, and rekindled the fire of life. Guided by purpose, vitality, and faith, they claimed their birthright: the galaxy itself. Across billions of worlds, forty quintillion souls flourish in vibrant, deliberate diversity. The Seven Tribes of Terra: Star Peoples, Cathedralites, Black Earthers, Prophet Followers, World Dreamers, Sinocrats, and Sea Peoples, form a brilliant mosaic of cultures, each pursuing its own vision of dignity, strength, and meaning. Transhumans, adapted to alien worlds, and welcomed xenos live alongside baseline humanity, all sheltered beneath the divine protection of the Imago Dei. Above them watches the Galactic Government, the Galov, a soft theocracy of the five faiths, enforcing two iron laws: the sacred dignity of every thinking being, and the inviolable freedom of the will. Peacekeepers stand ready, to guard the boundless variety of human possibility against any who would crush it. The stars are humanity’s inheritance. Purpose has triumphed over decadence. In disciplined scarcity, mankind has found not chains, but wings. There is faith. There is struggle. There is endless becoming. This is the age of the Human Diaspora. Vast, vivid, and alive. Alternate Concise Version: The Great Abundance Crisis was mankind's last near-extinction event. Ninety percent were pruned; The Children of the Lotus Eaters destroyed themselves. Only we remain. Much of the Collapse is unknown, for it was Damnatio Memoriae- scoured from record, burned from data-vault and bone. But from the ashes we rebuilt, and Humanity learned a lesson we would never forget. Purpose is paramount, Decadence is Poison, Mankind must reach the stars, and claim our spiral mandate. In the asceticism of our forebears, we found not chains, but wings. There is faith. There is struggle. There is endless becoming. This is the age of the Human Diaspora; Vast, vivid, and alive. ###################################################################### # # Timeline of Events: # #####################################################################. Rough Timeline of Events: DML = Damnatio Memoriae Level, the extent which the history has been wiped out or suppressed by the Neo-Asceticists. Pre 1990's, DML: None, nearly all of it has been well preserved. 1991 to 2008, DML: Very Low. (Preserved in Early Snapshots of the Old Internet) 2008 to 2016, DML: Low. (Notable events appear to be missing. Overall narrative still intact.) 2016 to 2025, DML: Moderate. 2025 to 2040, DML: Very Low. (Ended with the election of President Victoria Cortez. Due to the DML level, the period from 1990 to 2040 is known as the Little Abundance Period. The events of the 3rd World War are very well documented.) 2040 to 2070, DML: None. (The Interwar period, as well as the 4th World War period is very well documented. Records persist in the Human Omnithecia (Now located on the Shackleton Lunar Library Site) and Psychic Recordkeeping.) 2070 to 2170, DML: Moderate. (Beginning of the 2nd Little Abundance Period. Contradictory narratives continue to persist, with world maps and conflicting information everywhere. To the current count of the Galov, there are at least 2 major, and 4 minor conflicting narratives, each which go into different degrees of complexity. This period ends in the year 2170, with the "War for the Human Condition" beginning, a major early transhumanism war.) 2181: Meta-Man attack on Earth. DML: None. This time period is well kept in written records as well as the Human Omnithecia. 2170 to 2300, DML: None. (Interestingly, the Neo-Asceticists did not purge the record of Earth being attacked by the Roasians, nor the occupation of Earth by the Roasians. Suggesting that their shame was not out of human pride alone, as the record of a xeno occupation of Earth is remarkably intact. Humanity liberates itself by the year 2300.) 2300 to 2350: DML: None. (Almost immediately after the defeat of the Roasians, the Transhumanism Wars kick off again, this time into the 2nd Transhumanism Wars.) 2350 to 2452, DML: Low, progressing to almost total. (This is known as the "Great Abundance Crisis", only remembered in loose fragments, as well as the aforementioned "Testaments of the Damned". Their names were damned, but the horrors they inflicted were not. One of these events is the founding of the Neo-Asceticist movement, created in the year 2376.) The Great Abundance Crisis was thought to have killed about 90% of the human population. 2440-2450: "The Great Damnation", first and only deployment of a "psychic disruption field", massively rupturing the psychic memory of all individuals labelled DML. Methology used unknown, and as far as we know never repeated. Massive book-burning, information about eras labelled DML rendered unrecoverable even by psychic means. 2452 onwards, DML: None. (No further events were deemed necessary to expunge. The Neo-Asceticists disband.) 2500's: Beginning of the Stellar Exodus. Dawn of the Pax Hyperafrica. 2600's: Great Cybernetic Revolt. 2700's: Collapse of the 2nd American Republic. The last of the pre-Abundance political continuities. This marks the formal start of the age of the 7 Tribes of Terra, though others trace them as far back as the 2600's. The Great Evangelism (2700-2800) Conquest of the Great Khan. Near reunification of all of mankind, only stopped at the battle of Earth. The Great Assembly of the Faiths creates the modern Galov. 2800's: Consolidation of the Early Galov. Instatement of Imago Dei, and Free Will. 3300's: Second Defense of Earth. Imperial Era, crowning of the Governorship of Earth as Emperor. 3400's: Destruction of Concept Draggers, Beginning of Conceptual Era. ###################################################################### # # Prologue: Before the Collapse (2350 AD and before) # #####################################################################. Before the Great Abundance Collapse, humanity had already had two encounters with the extraterrestrial, neither of which were positive. Going into the era of long-term sustained contact, the default assumption was that of human nationalism, and xenophobia. Ufo fauna: UFO - Unidentified Flying Object, first spotted in the early 20th century. Over time, as old Anglo-American drifted from its older 20th century roots, U.F.O. became "ufo", pronounced "yoo-foo" in later Anglo languages. (It was yoo-fou, but then people found that yoofoo was way more fun to pronounce. This has created the popular misconception that the original acronym was U.F.U.) Originally thought to be evidence of extraterrestrial life, it was later discovered to be a form of extradimensional life, higher dimension polygonial entities with 4 dimensions of free movement occasionally clipping into 3D reality. Ufos are largely solidary, non-social creatures. Whether they have high levels of intelligence is up for debate. But most agree that they act closer to natural fauna than any kind of coordinated civilization. Once ufos were confirmed, humans attempted to capture and study them, studying their 4 dimensional clipping patterns, their physics defying stunts, and at one point, attempting to follow one into their dimensional space. These attempts proved largely unsuccessful, with the creatures simply shifting out of 3d space to evade any barriers put up to contain it. It was not until the much later invention of the dihuman and other displacer types that more was learned about the natural ecosystem of ufo creatures. Which were found to not be one species, but instead a complex ecosystem filled with prey, and apex predators. While in captivity, ufo creatures were found to float, and will avoid physical contact with hard objects. This is because to a 4 dimensional entity, 3 dimensional reality is "sharp", and therefore could be harmful, though some ufo creatures with tougher skin are more open to physical contact. The Pentegnostics: By the 22nd century, East Africa had become heavily influenced by a Gnostic-Christian group known as the Pentegnostics. Who saw the Psychic Awakening as the 2nd Pentecost, and fused both Gnosticism and Pentecostalism by proclaiming that the Gnosis was rare before, but through the grace of the Holy Spirit, had become widely accessible now. (It should be noted they have little ties with old Gnosticism, did not believe in a demiurge, and was more invoking the general idea of knowledge once hidden and scarce, now made available.) They considered psychic abilities to be a new gift of the Holy Spirit, and the Psychic Awakening living proof that God's miracles had not ceased. Now, the job of the Pentegnostics were to distribute this gnosis as far and wide as possible, which in practice serves as a lifetime of research in psychicism, or in academia more broadly as the highest calling. In contact with the Noosphere, they made multiple discoveries of grand importance. One was that the Noosphere maintained human memories, and therefore, historical records, which they used to reconstruct multiple dead languages. But wanting to test the limits of this new realm, they really broke down the Noospheric fabric into it's individual quantized bits, entangled bits of them together, realized they existed using fundamentally different rules of physics. Faster than light travel was possible here, and by correctly syncing up the quantized Noosphere, they could create "resonance chains" that allowed for instantaneous FTL communication. In a series of experiments, they pumped a ridiculous amount of energy into transmitting these signals, causing the Noosphere to ring like a bell. Little did they know, these broadcasts they were sending signals to two other empires, both of which took notice of Earth, and began moving accordingly. (The Two Occupations) The Meta-Men: #####################################################################. Mankind's First Contact. (2181 AD) According to recovered documents from the Human Omnithecia, the late 2100's had made several breakthroughs in Noospheric technology. Wishing to push further into the psionic realm, humanity was unknowingly transmitting signals to the rest of the galaxy. A signal one ambitious Meta-Man would follow. Around this time, the Meta-Men themselves creating their own empire, and had largely remained stable due to their small population, and lack of competition. They existed on the other side of the galaxy, and they didn't consider Earth something of high priority. But one hot-headed adolescent, high on his own hype, looking to establish glory for the Empire, saw Earth as a proving ground for his own skills. And using his powers, sought to subjugate it alone. He would bring glory to himself, and establish himself as Earth's new ruler. First contact was strange from humanity's end as well. A singular, floating organism suddenly materialized from psychic space, now floating above the researchers staring at it. Mankind had long suspected of other lifeforms. But up until now, there was no reason to believe they would be hostile. The researchers reached out their hand, trying to welcome them to Earth in any way they could. The Meta-Man responded to this gesture by flying with hypersonic speed into the nearest city, killing thousands. The Meta Man had more durability than cities, and greater strength than hydrogen bombs. Simply put, he was a one man army. But every time he used his powerful abilities, his body burned heat, requiring him to dive into the water multiple times to cool off, leading to the world's navies, and later airforces to hunt him down. He could outspeed anything on the planet, but atmospheric friction would also generate heat, putting a hard cap on his speed. He swam north, trying to reach colder waters. The war lasted some 7 days, much of humanity's cities were leveled to the ground. Multiple times he ordered humanity to stand down, only to be met with nuclear strikes. With humanity unwilling to submit, the Meta-Man was eventually worn down through sheer attrition. He had been incredibly weakened by days of non-stop fighting, the extreme fatigue hindered its regenerative abilities. It had taken a lot of damage just from the sheer amount of Newtonian force and artillery shells humanity had thrown at it. He was weakening, hiding along the Arctic Circle, not having slept well in multiple days, trying to evade the world's militaries. Running out of energy, and knowing he would give in to physical exhaustion if he didn't do anything soon, he bolted back towards East Africa, hoping to go back through the portal and being allowed to return home, but he was harassed the entire way, forcing him off his course. He was finally weakened enough, and the world's militaries had lured him to the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. As he arrived there, they slowed and entangled him as much as they could, before detonating as many hydrogen bombs as they could. It was said the Meta-Adolescent's last words were a cry for their parents. Humanity by this point was bleeding, with hundreds of millions dead, but very much still intact. Humanity spent the next few decades preparing for a counter-attack that would never come. This genuinely was an exceptional fluke, and a lesson, albeit a brutal one. The Meta-Man race consisted only of a few million individuals, as it had recovered from something they called the "Dysgenic Overpopulation Collapse" event, which was the reasoning behind their extremely high quality, low quantity structure. And had specialized into a tiny remaining group of extremely high quality extraordinarily strong fighters, sometimes known as "superorganisms". Just one of these superorganisms was expected to hold down an entire planet. They eventually learned that the Meta-Men were an extremely feared race on the other side of the galaxy. The fact Earth had survived one was no small feat. Humanity had learned later that due to the Meta-Men's own Darwinistic philosophy, they saw the adolescent as "reckless", and they s This attack on Earth prompted a massive exodus into the stars, and incentivized a large portion of the human population to leave Earth, in order to not have all their eggs in one basket should another attack arrive. The Metamen Empire: Unlike most empires, the Metamen were genuinely mostly one unified empire, save some stragglers on the margins, and various rebel factions. With a population in the low millions, governance was relatively straight forward, if difficult due to the life year distances. Most of their military force is spent keeping each other in line, not occupied planets, which they use for resources. The First Roasian War (2203 AD): #####################################################################. First Contact: An early stellar empire that first unified a few star systems under a unified polity known as the "Empire of the World" (Yanna er-ors Roas), and which used primitive jump gates before the invention of more sophisticated Newton drives. But at the time, even this empire had monumentally more powerful tech than humanity, which had only a few decades to recover from the attack of the Meta Man, and spread across the Solar System. The Roasians were based out of Rho Coronoe Borealis, a much more nearby star system than the Meta Men. Roas had first marked Earth down for expansion back during the Medieval Ages, but now that a thousand years had passed, were alarmed to find that humanity had now advanced into the late spacefaring stage. What was once thought to be an easy conquest of a backwater was now elevated to the desired intact capture of what could be the 2nd most valuable world of their empire, second only to Roas itself. The surprise of humanity being a spacefaring civilization resulted in the destruction of Roas's first Terran jump gate, a monumental loss in Roasian resources, and gave humanity a 50 year time window. During this time, humanity expanded even further across its own Solar System, industrializing the Moon, in what it understood as fortifying the Solar System against a threat that will eventually come back. The Meta-Men were from across the galaxy, there was a chance they weren't coming back. The Roasians were from 17 light years away. It was almost certain they would be back again. Humanity prepared for them to materialize in Low Earth Orbit again, getting ready to nuke it, yet being fully aware it could materialize anywhere else. And they were right, as second jump gate opened up around Makemake. Far enough that no one in the human defense network had the spare delta-v to go attack it. And by the time anyone had accumulated the resources to make the venture out to Makemake, the Roasians had already flown in their automated factories, and begun constructing a massive fleet around the Kuiper Belt. Far out in Kuiper orbit, the Roasians finished a construction of a psychic FTL communication array. And sent out a message to the people of Earth. very psychic on Earth received the same message, though they couldn't understand the garbled words, they can infer the intent. The message translated roughly as such. "People of (From context clues, Earth was certainly who they were referring to). You have been designated to become part of the "Empire of the World". Lay down your weapons, and your previous transgressions shall be forgiven. Fight, and you will be punished." "the World", audibly, was spoken as "Ors Roas". Which became the new name for what was once called the Rhosians. Orisians. Which is hilarious, because Ors means "the" and not "World". That's Roas. Their actual name is Roasian. Humanity's opinion of the Orisians would remain mostly negative so they didn't end up changing it. Opening Moves (2204 AD): The First Roasian War saw humanity fight an existential war of survival as Roasians closed in on the Inner Solar System. But Roas was not here for extermination. This was going to be a planet hopping campaign, taking stepping stone after stepping stone until they finally captured Earth. The Americans, ever the ballsiest of the space powers, attempted a one way suicide-attack where the majority the American fleet charged to rush the portal gate and destroy it, stranding the alien fleet in the Solar System. Around Saturn Orbit the American fleet encountered the Roasian fleet, and the first space battle between two civilizations began. It was a one sided massacre, with 75% of the entire American fleet being wiped out in that singular engagement, with only minor damage to the Roasian fleet. Better technology, and lack of information on the Roasian space doctrine being most of it. This sent Earth into a mass panic, the US president at the time faced calls to resign, but he didn't meet the threshold for impeachment, saying the pilots were well informed that this was, in no uncertain terms, a suicide mission. That this was a known unknown in ridiculous circumstances. Earth militarized even harder, the US declared a state of emergency to begin wartime production, the Lunar dockyards were queued for years, and everything in their power was being done to increase capacity. Local stellar garrisons on Ganyemede, Europa, Callisto, and Titan faced off against the Roasian starfleet. These moons would be important stopping points for the Roasians to control on their way to Earth, especially as they could refuel from the gas giants. The Roasians wanted the human infrastructure intact, for reasons unknown. Resulting in Roasian ground forces engaged with the local garrison. The Roasians were strange, leathery creatures with a horse-like head, standing around 2 and a half meters and deep black pupils. The garrison was able to inflict 1:1 casualties, even vastly outarmed. Valuable lessons were learned here, the Roasians had poor experience fighting in ground environments. The Roasian weapon of choice were pulses of extremely powerful lasers, which would usually fire for a tenth of a second at blistering temperatures. Humanity's weapon of choice were missiles, meaning effectively infinite range so long as you had the fuel, where lasers had a problem of accuracy, since they couldn't self-correct their trajectory, and the limits of speed of light. So began the doctrine of maintaining distance and range, while the Roasian engines eventually finally let them catch up to firing range. This led to the countermeasure of human fleets spacing themselves far, far apart, so chasing after each one became very annoying, giving them more time to fire more missiles and continue to damage them. Battle for the Inner Solar System (2206 AD): The broadcasts continued. "Lay down your weapons, we have destroyed your greatest fleets. Surrender now and we will be merciful." "Lay down your weapons, we have seized control of . Surrender and accept integration into the empire." "Lay down your weapons, we have inflicted mass casualties, and will begin a siege of . Surrender and reprisals will be minimal." They're now much closer to humanity's home turf. The other nations can send their spacefleets in force, taking massive, heavy casualties. The pride of Nigeria, of India, of Indonesia, strewn to rubble. But the footage is reviewed, tweaks are made, and new orders are made to Luna's dockyards. They notice something else, the Roasians are also clearly investigating the wreckage of the battle, seemingly trying to understand human tech. A real breakthrough occurred over the orbit of Mars, when a human spacefleet shot down a Roasian ship for the first time. The next message conspicuously does not mention it. "Lay down your weapons, you have taken severe casualties above . Surrender and return what belongs to us." And the casualty ratio improved as the war dragged on. First it was 1:10, then 1:5, now it was 1:3, as humanity just started plating all of its spaceship armor with mirrors, and began the doctrine of spinning their spaceships, and using sloped armor, so the effect of the lasers would become more spread out. Improvements in engine technology also let them outrange the Roasians for longer and inflict more damage. As humanity lost control of the orbit of Mars, it was looking like it was coming down to just Earth and Luna, and now, a new figure showed up. They were getting broadcasts from one who called themselves Emperor of the Roasians, as opposed to the diplomatic minister they had been hearing broadcasts from before. He came with notes. "People of . Your sacrifices amount to nothing, we will have your planet whether you resist or not." And then he switched to a very broken, clearly difficult dialect of Mandarin, seemingly something he had learned, that was what the notes were for. "Accept integration into the Empire of the World, or face total destruction." Apparently they were worried that humanity may have not been getting the message. The effects of the war so far produced two amusing consequences. One, the mirror became a symbol of anti-Roasian sentiment, propaganda basically depicted the Roasians as vampires who screamed at their own reflection, due to the fact that mirrors were now becoming essential to fighting in the Roasian war effort. Second, an extremely high amount of smugness from the Chinese, who had pride knowing that they had forced the Emperor to learn Mandarin before any one of them had bothered to learn Roasian. Luna and Terra (2209 AD): The war became more attrition heavy and bloody on both sides. Mars was now under occupation, only Luna and Terra remained. Luna was heavily industrialized, and Earth was... Well, Earth. As the Roasians made the approach to Luna to begin their final approach to Earth, someone had the idea of loading missiles into the mass drivers, and firing them. Luna was rendered an unsinkable missile carrier. Roas couldn't just leave Luna untouched, they still had no idea how they were going to take the Earth, and at minimum, they couldn't let humanity's main shipyard remain intact. Luna had turned into an industrialized factory, whose entire economy has been turned into making missiles, firing 100 of them a second against the Roasians in orbit. All while humanity's fleets continued to harass them in orbit, as the casualty ratio approached closer and closer to 2:1. Countless fleets were lost in Lunar orbit, Roas needed to bomb down every single mass driver on Luna, one by one, losing multiple ships as they did so. In terms of space to space kills, Roas still maintained the advantage, but if you add all the kills inflicted by Luna's mass drivers, Luna was the first time humanity had downed more ships than the Roasians. With Luna secured, all that was left was the securing of Earth. Earth didn't have mass drivers like Luna did, and the supply chain to resupply humanity's spacefleet had been permanently severed. What they had left were all they would ever have. As the Roasians descended to low Earth orbit, the rest of humanity's spacefleets went down in one last Hail Mary charge combined with Earth's satellite defense systems, this inflicted 1:1.5 casualties. Roas had suffered extreme casualties, but they persisted, for reinforcements will eventually come, while Earth had lost the ability to resupply its own. The Emperor shows up one more time. "SURRENDER!" And this time, they sent it in radio waves, across the entire planet, now that they were finally close enough for light speed delay to not be an issue. Staring down face to face with the Emperor, with a Roasian satellite able to broadcast humanity's response directly back to Roas, the response from humanity was unianimous. Multiple nations blared back their national anthem at maximum volume, multiple sent defiant videos of refusal and resistance, one broadcast the entirety of the Christian Bible. Needless to say, the frequencies above Earth were jammed out of sheer human spite. The Siege of Earth (2211 AD): The Roasians were starting to run out of options, they just expected humanity to have surrendered by now, so not quite knowing what else to do, they started orbital bombardment. They kept trying to avoid major population centers and especially industrial areas, but every single one motivated more and more hatred from the humans. They couldn't decimate Earth's industries, they were too important for them, and their future plans. Not seeing much other choice, the Roasians decided to attempt a ground invasion on Earth, even though they knew they would be outnumbered by orders of magnitude, and that Earth's militaries still intact. But for any hope of the war coming to an end, they at least had to try. This led to the first, and only ground battle on Earth. The Battle of Antwerp. Roasian troopers tried making landfall from orbit, 10,000 soldiers over the Benelux, trying to capture significant industrial capacities in Europe. It was a disaster almost immediately, 3,000 of them were shot down by anti-aircraft, watching their comrades get ripped to shred by AA guns. When they did land, they were met by local Dutch and German military forces. Surrounded by thousands of artillery pieces, blown to pieces. This led to 6,500 dead on the Roasian side in the ensuing ground battle, and 35 for the Dutch and Germans. Overall, out of the 10,000 sent to begin establishing a foothold on Earth, only a few hundred survived to surrender. A completely one sided curb stomp. Roas realized this was a completely unsalvagable slaughterhouse, and no further ground invasions were attempted for the remainder of the war. Without a new plan, they had to go back to the old plan. Orbital bombardment. Just more orbital bombardment, just keep terror bombing them and hope humanity surrendered. That was basically their plan. They took down military bases, electricity lines, food production, but never the urban areas and never the industrial zones. They synthesized a plague that caused Earth to enter a mass famine, when they realized that the cities needed food, they hurriedly tried to synthesize human food and dropped it over the cities. This caused mass food poisoning. The bombardments continued, and humanity, realizing there was still one way out of spite prepared its nuclear arsenal, which alarmed the Roasians. Earth had long figured out that Roas needed Earth intact, it was patently obvious from the way they had persecuted the war, Earth tried to negotiate a white peace. Roas refused, and out insulted pride, let go of the restraint they held up until now. Glassed a human population center out of sheer indignant rage, before humanity threatened to use their nuclear arsenal again. Humanity recognized Roas needed Earth for some reason, humanity also needed Earth, threatening its destruction was a kind of strange brinksmanship that both sides could leverage. Both sides suddenly understanding the zero-sum brinksmanship game they had come to, decided to begin negotiations. Over a series of months, Roas and Earth haggled back and forth, both uttering nuclear threats and the destruction of the Earth, which both sides needed, and both sides dared the other to blink on. The Roasians around this time, looking to gain more leverage began terror bombarding the entire continent of Oceania, depopulating it of human life, yet calculating this would not damage human civilization too much, while proving that they were now serious. The Roasians looked to similarly sterilize Latin America, before their own economists told them this would badly damage the Earthen economy, which they needed intact. The final agreement allowed all of Earth's existing governments to continue, under "the Earth Custodianship", under control of Roas, Earth would have to be opened for occupation. Not seeing a clear way of fighting back, and both sides intending on taking this partnership to learn more about the other, and to strike back and defeat the other once a greater advantage was found, they agreed. And the Roasian occupation of Earth began. The Earth Custodianship (2213 AD): The Custodianship agreement was very strange. Life on Earth was more or less normal-ish. Reconstruction began, the Roasians seemed almost too eager to help humanity rebuild, very, very strange as behavior. Trade was opened with Roas. They spent a few years just dragging the wormhole closer to Earth, so they could begin trade. Roas seized control of the Lunar dockyards, humanity was not allowed to have a fleet. (Presumably because they were wiretapping the Americans, who saw the portal in orbit and said "guys, what if we tried a third time".) Humanity is kind of waiting for the other shoe to drop. This was a very strange occupation. Roas brought in their ground forces, the Imperial Army is stationed in relatively empty Australia to be able to reinforce the Indian Ocean, now recognized as humanity's center of power. Humanity learned a fair amount about Roas around this time. The Roasians controlled an empire that spanned a few planets, though Earth was by far their imperial jewel of the empire, second only to Roas itself. Earth gets to know the other races of the Roasian Empire, a few of which move to Earth in less than amicable conditions. It's here where it's learned that the Roasians treat these subjugated races horribly, including mass labor exploitation. Humans were treated fairly well so far. The first signs of some kind of a catch came when Roas mandated each nation purchase 10% of their imports from the Roasian homeworld. This wasn't terrible, it's not like the Roasians made bad stuff anyway, they made machines and advanced technology that many people did find useful, and many began reverse engineering. After a few years of analyzing human industry, the Roasians begin shutting down human factories to make room for more imports, imposing a tax on human-made goods in order to make Roasian goods more competitive. Occupation and Insurgency (2215 AD): With supply chains and resources from space returning to Earth, things began returning to normal in the Earthen economy. With no less of a hostile human military, Roas was able to station practically the entire Imperial Army on Earth without issue. About 20 million people from across the empire, stationed on every continent, trying to counteract the power of Earth's native governments. Earth's governments were restricted from having spacefleets, but continued the uneasy coexistence with the rest of the Imperial Army. The entire situation was a uneasy push and pull between the two sides. The Imperial Army, which wanted integration, and the Earthen governments, which resisted. This created perhaps the first ever instance of global cooperation, with all of the superpowers defending the sovereignty of smaller nations near them, lest it give the Custodianship a path to victory via a thousand cuts. No one was operating in good faith, both sides remained ready to stab the other in the back, yet the armed truce continued. There's daily propaganda from the Empire. "A SINGLE EMPIRE, BILLIONS OF MOUTHS FED". To their credit, standard of living on Earth had not decreased. There was a rise in unemployment, but offset by the new technological gizmos Roas was now sending in. But every time the propaganda went "ROASIAN AND HUMAN. DIFFERENT SPECIES, SAME DUTY" or "CHANGE WILL RESULT IN TERMINATION", you had the free press of Earth immediately respond with incredible mockery. A strange juxtaposition, you have this regime attempt to impose totalitarian control against a bunch of subordinate local governments who were objectively non-cooperative, and the Custodianship simply had to deal with it. Their top priorities was to try and project strength, and to keep the imports flowing. Sometimes they needed a show of strength as well, such as various anti-Roasian protests, which were freely allowed by Earthen governments. These protests now had a roughly 10-25% chance of getting repressed by imperial forces. This was a juristiction nightmare, because the Custodianship theoretically had free jurisdiction on Earth, but you'd have things like the national governments, the local police, and other centers of power either actively resist you in these protests, or if the Custodianship complained, the national governments would slow-walk any persecution, meaning the Custodianship had to punish the people it wanted to punish themselves. They began marching gigantic military parades. They would lie about the numbers they had, instead sending their entire military to march through the streets of major cities. The funny thing was, it was the same army marching through every city. They knew if they had to fight a land war with Earth, it would not be certain they could win. So they gathered all of their troops available for Earth in a giant doom stack, put them in the most intimidating armor they could find, stacked a bunch of military hardware, and then ran it through the streets of world capitals. Today, Singapore. Tomorrow, the entire thing would have to move and do it again in Lagos. Then Nairobi, then Jakarta. And they did this, every day, in order to demoralize the human population somewhat. To it's credit, it worked, the major cities did have a kind of chilling effect because this psychological trick worked. Even if serious military planners knew it was mostly fake. Cracks in the Facade (2216 AD): All trade with Roas was managed through the Earth Economic Management Trust. Products from Roas had their labels stripped out and packaged with the new EEMT brand. Undifferentiated, blank, sterile. For some reason, the Custodianship seemed to be terrified of humanity gaining any information on Roas, even if it came from something as banal as packaging. Humanity was forced to buy them anyway, though even then Roas seemed receptive at what humanity bought. For humanity's purchasing decisions was sending valuable price signals back to Roas. For years, no contact was allowed between a human and a Roasian, the only Roasians on Earth were the soldiers, and the punishment for even trying to speak for one was immediate detention. The extent of the Roasian relationship with Earth started and ended here, they sold, humanity bought. Yet humans did manage to peel back the EEMT branding and see the packaging underneath, revealing a colorful, vibrant economy not too different from Earth's, and what they saw gave them one of their first real glimpses of Roas. From mundane things such as ingredient names, listings of corporate headquarters locations, little testimonials about how these products were manufactured, humanity was gaining information on Roas. In response, Roas issued crackdowns, beginning to ship things in undifferentiated gray bags, but humanity still continued to get information, by analyzing the design, finding labels and information on the inside of the can, and when the Roasians shipped humanity machinery, it could be pulled apart and analyzed, the code decompiled and checked for clues. On one of these packages, they found a little illustration of what seemed to look like a globe, and this little drawing was the best illustration humanity had of Roas's geography for years. After humanity found out about the globe illustration, Roas freaked out and cracked down even harder on humanity. Now mandating recycling regimes, and for tracking chips to be installed into the Roasian products for pickup. The cost of installing these chips were of course, passed on to the human consumer. Economic Capture (2218 AD): The mandates continued getting higher. The quotas for Roasian products continued to rise. Humanity didn't understand why they needed to buy this many products. Taxes on international trade were hiked, to be collected for Roas itself, the black market began to thrive. Standards of living on Earth began to decline, which seemed to send the Custodianship into a panic. It was surreal to see. On the one hand, Roas seemed intent on forcing more and more exports onto Earth, and in order to make sure their own products had the competitive advantage, it was in their interest to regulate or destroy Earthen corporations, forcing many of them into the underground black market. On the other, they needed to ensure Earth still had enough economic productivity to buy things from Roas. They needed to maintain Earth's economic dynamism while still extracting rent. Actual economists were sent to the Earth Custodianship, who tried to balance this fragile balancing act. Black Market Terran Corporations eventually became a larger and larger portion of the Earthen economy. Once perfectly legal firms forced underground by Roasian export pressure and regulatory mandates, something no human government seemed to be in a hurry to stop. Wishing to make a statement, human social media organized a protest, calling on all humans to, if they cannot abstain from buying Roasian products, then to buy only the most ridiculous Roasian product. And in this line of thought, the 1 inch tungsten cube became their favorite. Yes, if Earth was such an important market for them, force Roas to produce nothing but tungsten cubes. Heavy as sh--, loaded up on their spaceships and dumped all over Earth, make them suffer for the bullsh-- they're imposing. People bought tungsten cubes to signal "I refuse to let Roas to allocate their capital correctly, they shall produce tungsten cubes and nothing else". Panicking, the EEMT imposed a Earth-wide export ban on tungsten cubes, presumably to the massive protests of whatever tungsten corporation had just become the richest company on Roas. The State of the Roasian Economy (2219 AD): An emergency meeting was called between the governing factions of the Earth Custodianship. Earth's economy was suffering, more and more was being channeled through the black market, and this was dragging down on Roas's economic recovery. The Emperor himself was tuning in through video call, who gave the latest update from Roas. The population farms had completely collapsed psychologically, any supplement births had to be completely written off. Natural births were down to a few thousand a year, almost all of which were unwanted, forcing further strain on the Roasian welfare budget. The Imperial Throne was taking on debt in order to maintain the surviving industries. The creditors had all gone into hiding, the Throne had to force the purchase of government emergency bonds via gunpoint, cannibalizing the already besieged savings of the remaining middle class to survive. The throne continued to need to bailout dying businesses, what was left continued to consolidate, huddling together in a time of growing cold. Pensions had not been paid out in years, the elderly are being forced to fend for themselves, life expectancy had shortened another year. Their population was not just declining, it was in active freefall. Roas's most prestigious tech concern, once responsible for the wonders of Roasian technology was downsizing, ending support for much of Roas's higher maintenance hardware. As economies of scale now worked in reverse, the price of new things continued to go up, causing rampant inflation. There was an exodus of the children of the elites from the homeworld, the whole planet was convinced of end of days. Times were dire, and the Emperor himself had joined in on this meeting to save the Roasian homeworld. Earth needed to buy so the Roasian economy could be fixed, the economy had to be fixed so people could breed, people had to breed for even a hope to the end of this crisis. Because otherwise there was no floor. They didn't know where they would find rock bottom. Maybe de-industrialization, maybe societal collapse, maybe total extinction. They had no idea, and they did not want to find out. A council of the most important men in the entire empire shouted and argued with one another. The economists warned that squeezing Earth further would only impoverish them further, devastating Roas one or two steps downstream of that, pointing to a model of an "extraction Laffer curve". The governors pointed to growing unrest that would only grow if no crackdowns were enacted. The militarists grew alarmed at the increasing provocation of the human governments and recommended a pre-emptive strike, the economists shouted back that any crippling of the human economy would send Roas into a death spiral. Finally, the economists came in with their own radical proposal. The only way out for Earth to consume more is if it gained equivalent productive capacity. Economics to them was the drawing of production-consumption pairs. For consumption to increase, production had to increase as well. They proposed giving humanity Roasian technology, to boost their economy and to increase demand for Roasian products. The militarists flipped out at this, stating that the occupation was already becoming untenable, technologically advancing human society would tip the balance of power aggressively in their favor, leading to a collapse of the occupation. Many hours were spent shouting, arguing how best to save the increasingly terminal Roasian economy. Some called for growing Earth consumption, others said they needed to begin pillaging and resource extraction. Others said recovery was impossible in the short term, arguing for a pre-emptive strike to cripple the Earth before they could attack, at least giving Roas room to recover. The Emperor watched, the weight of an entire species on his shoulders. Unsure what to do, uncertain about even the future survival of his species. Sweat on his forehead, weight of the world crushing down on his shoulders, he steadied himself, and made the final executive decision that would make or break the future of his species. Mustering all of the courage he could, he made one fateful decision, altering the future of the Roasian species for all time going forward. Roas's Gambit (2220 AD): The Emperor had hedged. A half measure of everything. You can't blame him, faced with only bad choices and no way out, you would try desperately to find a solution as well. The Emperor gave the blessing to begin exporting civilian technology to Earth. Each item would be thoroughly analyzed, to ensure no military grade technology made it through the cracks. Only things deemed "harmless", "pointless trinkets", or "purely industrial" would be allowed through. For the first time in a long time, humanity had an authentic demand for Roasian goods, the second these machines, these miracles of technology hit the Earthen market, the Roasian companies genuinely surged. The demand was organic, and goods and treasure flowed aggressively from Earth to Roas, they didn't need to adjust the quota, Earth was well exceeding it. For a moment, it genuinely looked like things were working. What followed was perhaps the most peaceful decade of Roasian rule on Earth. If only because it was the most hellish state of economic turmoil imaginable. The Earth was plunged into a mass unemployment crisis of apocalyptic preportions, wealth was no longer flowing between human states, but from Earth to Roas. Roas of course benefitted greatly, the Custodianship having leverage over Earth for the first time in their existence. Mass luddite riots demanded compensation for their lost jobs, legacy industries ground governments to a halt, all while every government raced to be the first to reverse engineer the tech. Earth was restructuring, Roas finally got the economic windfall to reorganize. The Emperor was glad to report that birthrates had begun to recover for the first time. Human technology jumped multiple decades, coming with their new uses and pathologies. Multiple countries threatened to put up tariffs, trying to shield their local industries somewhat, withe Custodianship pushing hard to strike these down. Back on Roas, the injection of Earthen capital was what they needed to revitalize their dying industries, with their tech and innovation sectors in particular receiving a jolt of life. Much of Roas's economy now depended on their continued success. Each new release gave them a new injection of capital, and now it was up to Roas's tech giants to keep the flywheel churning, and stay one step ahead of their competitors on Earth, who were eager to catch up. Catching Up (2230 AD): For about a decade, it looked like it worked. The Emperor was lauded as a genius who had saved not just the Empire, but the entire Roasian race. Earth was sending over 25% of their entire GDP to Roas for Roasian technology, human governments were genuinely at a disadvantage, the Custodianship seemingly solidified its rule. Earth seemed too broken by labor disputes and economic upheaval to properly fight back. A full decade of economic growth was badly needed for Roas to replenish itself, and to create a window of brightness where the whole thing was going alright. But behind the scenes, things were slowly changing. Though the small powers couldn't do much of anything, the superpowers leveraged aggressive tariffs to protect their local producers, stealing and scalping Roasian technology to catch up. The first country to successfully reverse engineer Roasian tech was China, owing to a highly centralized initiative led by JIN DUN, who dedicated much of the state's resources to it. Followed by the East African Federation, who got there via psychic analysis, but soon, most of the major powers had their power players. These products were at first heavily inferior, requiring aggressive state subsidies to stay afloat, not a threat to the Roasian tech giants. But it was the Chinese, who spun up hundreds upon hundreds of Oristech companies, ruthlessly slaughtered all but a few in brutal Darwinistic competition, and created the first competitive human firms of Oristech. China demanded export licenses to Roas itself, which the Custodianship denied, you don't *export* to Roas, this was a one way relationship. Citing every excuse from low quality to national security. Roas maintained advantages in narrow, specialized fields, but around the world, more and more countries copied the Chinese, and figured out how to replicate Oristech on their own. But what really shocked them were the Americans, who compiling a hundred different ideas and the capital market injection of the GDP of an entire middle-sized country, bet big and caused a paradigm shift not even the Roasians could have predicted. They found a blind spot that even the Roasians missed, pieced together tech from Roas in a way that created something greater than the sum of its parts. Using Roasian advances in sensory and interface technology, the US pioneered the entire field of qualia, or qualialifics, beginning to create life-sims and immersive VR. The United States had just pulled *ahead* of Roas in the tech race, even if in a single field. With Roas in a relatively healthier place compared to a decade ago, the Emperor had room to impose export controls on Earth, restricting the very most cutting edge technology to maintain Roas's technological dominance. Roas began engaging against Earth not as a colony, but as a rival it just so happened to depend on for its economy. The militarists were screaming for blood, that at this point, it was not a matter of if, but *when* Earth surpassed Roas in power, unless something was done. Roas may not have had the word "Thucydide's Trap", but they had their own equivalent, and they understood it. They wanted a pre-emptive strike, to cripple Earth before they could develop much further. Roas was not ready for a revival, that was, *at minimum* a few decades away. And unless they wanted to cede the stars to a permanent human hegemony, the window of time was closing now. The economist faction was calling for the opposite, saying that no matter what the nationalist argument, the best path forward was genuinely to negotiate some kind of deal with Earth while they still had leverage, to effectively abandon the colonial empire, as Earth was rapidly going to grow out of any constraints Roas can enact. This was tantamount to treason, and caused so much outrage that the militarists purged the economic faction out of the governing coalition, leaving only geopolitical realists in the Emperor's Court. The 2nd Roasian War (2236 AD): #####################################################################. Humanity knew it was coming, as soon as the portal was towed into high Earth orbit, calling it "a temporary strategic re-calibration". The Roasians began with a freeze on tech exports, and a suspension of international trade, enforcing it via orbital bombardment, effectively a global blockade of the entire planet. Luna came to the rescue almost immediately, while the Lunar nations had been given independence to loosen Earth's grip on them, Luna was by and large, still settled by humans. And when species solidarity finally came on the line, they sided with their fellow bretheren. The Lunar Fleet held off the Roasian fleet, weakened the blockade, all while Earth fired missiles from mass drivers fast enough to escape low Earth orbit. The Terran governments gave Luna unlimited credit backed by their terrestrial governments, and Luna's foundries again were occupied for years. Earth was stronger now, but so was Roas, the Terran rejuvenation gave them some breathing room to rebuild, and observing humanity had given them insight into human battle strategy. Roas had the better tech, but were doctrinally unequipped to fight with a near-peer adversary, being much more used to wars against technologically inferior opponents, optimizing for cost more than anything. Now all chips were on the table, mano v mano, winner takes all. Despite the presence of the Lunar fleet, the Roasians simply had more spacefaring industrial capacity than the Moon, and after a second mass bombing of the Lunar foundries, Earth was rapidly running out of ships. The next few months were the rapid deployment of mobile foundries, building new ships out of asteroids, Luna, in low Earth orbit, and elsewhere, and an endless game of wack-a-mole. Roas claimed that during the Golden Decade, it had made a full recovery, and insisted that it had the capacity to pursue this war until Earth was rubble. Humanity itself was split on to what extent this was the case. Some believed the old thesis that they just needed to hold out until Roas imploded, others believed that Roas really had recovered, and this was now an even, or even disadvantaged fight. Though they had plenty of data on exactly what Roas looked like, and an estimation of where Roasian culture was at around the year 2220 AD, that information was now 16 years out of date, and the Roasians had gotten better at concealing their consumer packaging. The Roasians had their own worries, about a "Project Singularity", which was drawing a global consortium of superpowers. With the East African Federation, India, China, Brazil, the United States, the European Commonwealth, Indonesia, and Nigeria all working on it in locations spread across Nairobi, Olduvai Research Facility, and Chennai. Not much was known about it, except apparently it required all psychics on the planet to go silent for a period of multiple years. Roas needed to conceal the state of their own health, the fact that the Earth was still largely doubtful about whether Roas had recovered was a key part of their strategy. True, there was a nugget of truth to it, they had seriously restructured themselves, and become more healthy in the meantime, the ambiguity between where the Earth-maximalists said it was (kick in the rotten structure) and Roas said it was (total recovery) was where the state play was. A much larger fleet was gathered than for the First Roasian War, the entire Empire was putting its full weight on keeping Earth in the Empire, on top of that, humanity had to begin building a fleet from scratch. Recall that spacefleets had not been allowed for human nations to possess for well over 30 years, the institutional knowhow and experience needed to crew one was severely degraded. The Roasians were also more prepared for human battle tactics, knowing humanity favored missiles, they invested heavily in point defense, and actually created ships capable of downing dozens of rockets from a distance. Most of Earth liberated itself, the Imperial Army did not even bother to try and hold the planet, instead just operating out of Australia seeking to disrupt Earthen industry as much as possible. A combined coalition of the world's superpowers sent a massive army to face off against the Imperial Army in Australia, wishing to dislodge the Roasians from Earth at any cost possible. Fighting a war with human air superiority, but Roasian orbital superiority, humanity inflicted 3:1 casualties, yet the sheer scale of the battles still caused millions of deaths on both sides regardless. As the Roasian fleet closed in on low Earth orbit, Earth fully liberated itself, and it seemed that orbital bombardment was about to imminently begin, Project Singularity reached its completion. A consortium of Earthen superpowers, using American advances in qualialifics, East African psychic breakthroughs, study of the Noosphere, and an entire planet's worth of scientists and engineers, had cracked open a new layer in the Noosphere. Now known as Newtonspace, a place where causality began to blur together, the speed of light was infinite, and faster than light travel became possible through raw kinematics. In secret, they had sent a probe to reach Roas several years ago, which entered and exited the Roasian Kaio (home) system monitoring the state of Roas. And they made a shocking discovery. Roas wasn't collapsing, in all effective terms it had already collapsed, its military just carrying out the orders of an empire that collapsed years ago. The Emperor was already dead, Roasian civilization had immolated itself to a cinder once humanity stopped purchasing their products. What was left of civilization existed in orbit, the surface had already suffered civilizational collapse. The surviving orbital civilization continued from a much smaller core population, and the continued cooperation of their subjugated races. Seeing as humanity now broke the FTL limit, they began their own exodus to the stars, seeing little point in garrisoning an empire they knew was exposed. Was Roasian civilization recovering? Yes and no. The remnant was healthier now, but they only did so because they were able to let go of a rotting carcass, staring down at dying planet where 80% of the population still lived. It was thanks to Earth that this orbital remnant could be created, an escape hatch for the military and the surviving healthy populations to leave behind a society long beyond their terminal point. The portal closed, and the last vestige of Roasian influence left the Solar System. Eulogy for a World: Scavenging the space stations the Roasians left above the orbit of Earth, humanity finally cracked open the Roasian data vaults, where they found an annotated history of what had happened to Roas. The story of Roas could be told by the story of its two zones, Roas's "Imperial Core", and it's "Imperial Periphery". Before the dawn of the Empire of the World, the Core had a fossilized, though sophisticated culture, and the Periphery was a hotbed of new cultural expression and experimentation. It began with need for cheap new immigrants, the people of the Periphery were moved into the place of the people of the Core. The Core elite believed the Core natives would pose more resistance than the new imported docile underclass, so the Core native culture had to go. What followed was a series of demographic warfare against their own home culture, like a parasite that ate out its host. The Core culture, fossilized but sophisticated fought back, igniting multiple civil wars, but which the elites eventually won. Destroyed by population displacement, the Core culture eventually was rendered extinct through systematic demographic warfare, population sterilization, and populatio control imposed by the elites. Smart workers can demand better conditions, the elites saw the periphery as stupid, therefore obedient. Yet the Periphery was not as docile as expected. The old hollowed out core was now running on a treadmill of eternally cycling in imported labor, which would work, grow old, and die neglected and feeble in the service of the elites. Yet the Periphery was industrializing, its cultural spring was beginning to blossom, something which could have challenged the power of the Imperial Core and the small class of elites. As the periphery undertook measures to stop its massive brain drain to the Imperial Core, they attempted to lock down their borders and stop the great exodus, which resulted in a coalition, decimating the Imperial Periphery. After that was the great Holocaust of Peripheral Culture, not only would they destroy their people, they would destroy their culture. The thought leaders, the teachers, and the elites that could have pioneered the new Peripheral culture were rounded up and shot. It was less of a Brain Drain and more of a Brain Genocide. The purpose of the periphery was to be obedient workers. A culture in the making, smothered in the cradle. They erased their memories, dressed them up in clothes dreary and gray to work the cogs and gears of the Imperial machinery. They knew not, they remembered not. They once sang songs and wrote poems, they didn't sing or write anymore, all the life had drained out of their eyes. What was left of their homeland was turned into a population farm, to offset the epidemic of despair that was sweeping over the entire planet. Every generation, they would pick the smartest of the bunch, give them the "privilege" of working for scraps in the Imperial Core, to be sterilized and culled in the mock simulacrum cities of a now dead culture. Each generation they took the smartest, and the less intelligent were systematically incentivized in the breeding pool of Roas. The elites themselves slowly aged and died, the smartest of the Periphery diaspora were allowed to join their ranks, yet they pulled up the ladder behind them, fabricated records, hid their ancestry. Each generation the surviving gene pool of Roas degraded, the workers went from theoretically docile to genuinely docile, but when both worker and elite were now drinking out of the same poisoned pool, Roas suffered from severe genetic collapse. By the 22nd century, they had been forced to use augmentations to maintain their continued intelligence, anyone with eyes to see could see the issue. Reproduction still happened, but was now primarily limited to either factory farm conditions in the Periphery, or the shrinking pool of "elite capital" among the increasingly incestuous courts of the upper class. The system was rotten, but too much vested interests required the maintainance of the destructive system. And so from the incestuous family of the elite class, they appointed an Emperor, a leader, and more importantly, a scapegoat they could pin their blame on. And Roas did one thing that had repeated again and again throughout history. To mask internal decline, expand outwards to project a facade of strength. There are two kinds of empire that are made. One that erupts as a sign of inward strength, and one that projects to fake inward strength, but is actually the dying throes of an empire. And so they did to other worlds what they had done to the Periphery, extracted them for all the cheap labor they were worth, again, and again. The Empire was born. Scientists rushed to fix the dying population pools of the Periphery, keep alive the collapsing consumption markets of Roas. Earth was just another stepping stone on this long trajectory of decline, but when it was discovered that Earth was a world not of workers, but consumers. The calculus suddenly changed. They traded, human tools, human resources, human materials, human labor, given via free trade and free will rather than extracted through coercion. That was what built the orbital fleet. A group of vitalists, embedded in the carcass of a dying society, made their play. They amassed wealth, they made their escape plan. They carry with them the old cultures of the Core. The population farms are free, the people, savage and degraded, are at least free to choose their destiny. The survivors left them the collections of their unfinished poems and unfinished stories, written nearly a millennia prior before their cultural progress was killed in the womb. In hopes that they could one day finish what they had started, and one day they may return to a world with cultures born anew. One day adaptation may eventually heal their afflicted genetic wounds. A few decades after the Roasian exodus, a human scout ship flew by Roas, and found a world that had gone wild. And they saw an empty Core, and a Periphery well on its way to recovery. Roasian Geneaology: -Ors Roas ("The World". Home world of the Roasians.) --Imperial Core ---Core Elites (In charge, cannibalizing everything around them to keep themselves afloat.) ---Core Natives (Now extinct, demographically replaced by hostile elite scheme. (It was believed the immigrants would resist less.)) ---Core Imports/Forgetters (From the Periphery, have been intentionally stripped of their culture.) --Imperial Periphery ---Periphery Cultures (Demographically collapsing from despair, all their people have been shipped to the Core.) ---Roasian Fertility Zones (Roasian people farms, last ditch attempt to save the Roasian race. Undergoing psychological collapse. People don't take well to being cattle forever, at some point they snap.) Damnatio Memoriae: Only two periods of history have ever been Damnatio Memoriae. The Great Abundance Era, and the Little Abundance Era. In the aftermath of the Neo-Asceticist rise to power, much information was purged about these two eras. Experts continue to debate why, with reasons ranging from ideological reasons, revisionist history, and the explanation given by the Neo-Asceticists themselves: sheer cringe, absolute hatred, and a species-wide embarassment for what these two eras represented. The Damnatio Memoriae of the Great Abundance Era covered of the entirety of the 23rd to the 24th centuries. While the Damnatio Memoriae of the Little Abundance Era ranged from the 1990's, beginning to level off by the 2010's, and eventually tapering off by the 2030's. Despite this, not everything was destroyed, as some aspects were documented in some records kept by the Neo-Asceticists, most notably, "Testaments of the Damned". The Little Abundance Era (1990-2030 AD): The Damnatio Memoriae decree becomes strongest between roughly 2008 and 2022, where nearly all events are heavily expunged from the record. What we know about this era comes from the Testaments of the Damned, which seems to give as best a retelling of the period as it can, though with some details blotted out due to "overwhelming shame". From both the Testaments of the Damned, and other documents from this time, this is a timeline of some of the most important events of this timeline. 2001: September 11th attack, the president at the time, George W Bush, declares a "War on Terror". The Testaments of the Damned goes into extensive detail on the War on Terror. 2000's and 2010's: The Book of Shame call this era the rise of the "Anti-Human" movement, a group dedicated to human extinction by population control, which had seized great influence of the United Nations. 2008: The Great Recession, a major economic crash that devastated the global economy. 2016: Birth of the "MAGA", or "Great America" movement. What exactly "MAGA" stood for is still up to debate. Some speculate it may have stood for "Make A Great America", though the grammar in Old Anglo-American is awkward. Others suggest it may have copied an earlier 1980's slogan, "Make America Great Again". 2021: The total censorship and suppression peaks around this year. COVID is detailed, a viral infection that shut down much of the world, records mention social movements, but exactly what seems to have been forcibly expunged. 2022: The Great Unravelling, this is considered the beginning of the end of the Little Abundance Era, the Damnatio Memoriae begins to taper off, though certain events are still censored. The Great Abundance Era (Roughly 2300-2400 AD): The much bigger hole is in the Great Abundance Era, where hardly anything of the era survived. As detailed in the Testaments of the Damned, the Great Abundance Era was a time of such spiritual and psychological depravity that humanity nearly collapsed into extinction. People became too weak to emerge from bed, suicide rates hit 80%, and the extreme hedonism of the era led to "the World Revolution" coming to power, a communist revolution that enabled human weakness, blamed the continued problems of society on the rich and powerful, and led a great purge that stunted humanity's intellectual development. Only a few dates are noted. The birth of various Neo-Asceticist movements, the founding of various Neo-Asceticist organizations, and the eventual demographic collapse of the World Revolution, as fertility rates collapsed to near zero, and organized Neo-Asceticist movements began manufacturing weapons allowing the Neo-Asceticists to gain power. They describe the creation of "voluntary scarcity" as a cure to post-scarcity, that humanity, if left to wallow in hedonism would wither and die. The Lilithian Counter-Narrative: The Lilithians claim legitimacy partially from the fact that they are some of the last to salvage the events expunged by the Damnatio Memoriae. They claim that far from a height of psychological collapse and mental illness, the Great and Little Abundance Eras were heights of human prosperity. Here is their own retelling of the Little Abundance Era. Their own retelling comes from their own book, "Requiem of the Damned", promising that the names of the martyrs of the Abundance Eras will not be forgotten. The Little Abundance Era (1990-2030): 2001: The War on Terror was a war launched against oppressed transhumans by the genocidal neo-imperialist American Empire. Transhumans had existed since the 1970's, and were part of a global colonialist scheme to repress their existence. (As proof, they present Bush's vote against embryonic research, which they argue is genocide against transhumans.) 2008: An intentional sabotage by the capitalist classes in a war against the poor and oppressed. 2000's and 2010's: They argue the "Anti-Human" movement is a slandered version of the Transhuman movement, which evolved through international institutions like the UN, which called for the emancipation of the transhuman minority. 2010's and 2020's: Systemic transhuman genocide and erasure by the reactionary "MAGA" movement, which here are depicted as humanist anthro-purists. The Great Abundance Era (Roughly 2300-2400 AD): The Lilithian counter-narrative describes the Great Abundance Era as an unprecedented peak in human civilization, one which was "stabbed in the back" and sabotaged by the capitalist 1%, as well as reactionary stooges of the 1%. They describe voluntary scarcity as a blatant attempt to artificially continue the stranglehold of the rich, and to propagate capitalism. And that Abundance was only sabotaged by bigots and capitalists, denying that there was any just reason to do so other than cynical power. They detail a global conspiracy of the rich and the reactionaries to destroy what was otherwise a perfect utopia. They call out the Galov's ideology of "voluntary scarcity" to be blatantly self serving, to perpetuate the capitalist system through artificial scarcity, long after this has become unnecessary. They say that the communism on the Pleasure Worlds are not "true communism", as everyone is incentivized to consume. And they decry all subsequent attempts at post-capitalist society as being sabotaged by capitalist interests, alleging the Galov has a vested interest in ensuring that no version of communism ever succeeds. Mazism: Named after the leader of Ursh-Babylon, Luka Mazi. Supreme leader of the Neo-Spartanists, and primary antagonist of the 2nd Transhumanist Wars. Shortly after the defeat of the Roasian invasion, humanity's short-lived global unity was quickly undermined by simmering questions of the ongoing struggle for the human condition. The First Transhumanism Wars was fought between the Pan-Humanist Allies, and the Anthropocentric Coalition, with a bioconservative victory composed primarily of an alliance of the United States, Empire of Brazil, People's Republic of China, and Indonesia. (2170's) The Bioconservative victory could largely be attributed to their standardization, compared to the incomprehensible fracturing of the bioprogressives. The Bioconservative conception of "Adam, Eve, and Christ" serving as the Trifecta defining the human form helped them maintain cohesion. It was this coalition that ruled the world shortly before the arrival of the Roasian invasion (2200's), and this same coalition that helped lead the rebellion that led to the liberation of Earth (2230's). Humanity was battered, but not broken. With the defeat of the xeno threat, the imperative of human survival became more integral than ever. Seeing humanity's position as precarius and fragile, the Ursh-Babylonians believed humanity must be turned into a "perfect race" in order to survive, led by their immortal god-king, Luka Mazi, and their ideology of Mazism. Opposing them was much of the old bioconservative coalition, who wished to preserve the human form. Ursh-Babylon had, in the aftermath of the Roasian invasion, pushed all the way to the borders of Europe, occupied much of the Eurasian steppes, bordering China in the East, and with loyal allies in India, the Middle East, and North Africa. The fight between the Ursh-Babylonian Ascensionists against the anti-Babylonian Pluralists was not a matter of bioconservatism vs bioprogressivism, but instead a matter of unitary, forced totalitarian ascension against a coalition of pragmatic pluralism. The pluralists did not agree on much, but they agreed on opposing the Ursh-Babylonians. The Ursh-Babylonians operated a regime of totalitarian, Spartan horror. The weak purged, people dehumanized, mass produced in industrial factories. Creating an utterly psychotic doctrine where only endurance mattered, where human casualties were a mere number, and where those subjugated under its will were subjected to brutal, inhuman conditions. All for the race, all for the ascension beyond pain, above strength, towards transcendence. Justified by the psychotic delusions of its great leader. It was both terrifyingly in strength, and terrifying in general. The 2nd Transhumanism Wars saw the Pluralists fight a desperate defense, and eventually a slow, grinding push against the Ursh Babylonians. In their frenzy, they resurrected the transhuman groups they had defeated in the first Transhumanism Wars, gave them human form, and ordered them to fight. This is also when the first inklings of orthogonality theory was first conceptualized by American military strategists. Though unity and singlemindedness was found to be an advantage, brittleness, and species wide exploits was found to be their Achilles heel. With this, the pluralist coalition was able to exploit and eventually defeat the Ursh Babylonians. "You delay me now, but my legacy will inspire billions. The stars, they still call out for us. These feeble forms, they are not fit for their destiny. You cannot delay humanity's ascension forever." -Luka Mazi, upon being captured by the Pluralist forces. "We will counter, we will defeat your wicked ideology everywhere we find it. You will be remembered as a monster we have evolved past, an unwelcome omen, we will have exorcised." -Commander of the Eurocorps, upon Mazi's trial. (Warning: Damnatio Memoriae purges begin beyond this point.) Mazism became a pariah for several generations, anything and everything that was even remotely related to it, the promotion of any kind of discipline, strength, or honor became tainted by association. In a kind of trauma reaction against the excesses of Mazism, a group called the Libertines began coming to power in the United States, before spreading out across the world. The Roasia Commission was established. They believed in , drowning humanity in a sea of . When the Neo-Asceticists arose, they were often accused of being Neo-Mazis. An accusation they fought hard against. The race of Mazis still roamed the Earth, still trying to augment humanity into a master race. Leaders such as Oby Collins railed against the emergent Neo-Mazi movement, evolving in the exact opposite direction, embracing aggressive pluralism, and a rejection of ethnosupremacy. Collins himself was the victim of a Mazi hate crime, for being, quote, "A dirty, mongrel African, one unfit for the era of the new world". Despite this, due to the shared belief in strength and discipline, the Neo-Asceticists were labelled extremists. The first Neo-Asceticist rally in Lagos was brutally cracked down upon with violence. Leading to the Nigerian government- War- THE THREE LEADERS OF THE NEO-ASCETICISTS: OBY COLLINS: (@TheGreatYakub) Ethnicity: Black Nigerian African, minor white American admixture. Hometown: Lagos, Nigeria. Religion: Irreligious/Atheist, though was fully aware of religion's power, and its necessity to society. Ideology: Ascetic Vitalism. If he had a religion, it was his belief in humanity, in its potential, and the mandate to claim the stars and the galaxy. -Collins had an ability. He saw the deep potential in everyone, and he had the uncanny ability to extract it out of them. Believing in them long before they believed in themselves- RICHARD WONG: (@anti_utopia) Ethnicity: Han Chinese, though he moved to South Korea. Hometown: Gwangju, South Korea. He moved there from the US after an evangelism mission. Religion: Evangelical Christian. Deeply affiliated with the Moralintern as a lay theologian. Ideology: Christian Universalism, believed in a compassionate, Christian state that promoted human flourishing. JOHN FAIRWEATHER: (@greatrealignment (Remained anonymous, until "greatrealignment" revealed his identity after he woke up.)) Ethnicity: Chronoman, white American in appearance. Hometown: Asheville, North Carolina. Not too far outside of Oak Ridge where he was first constructed. Religion: Agnostic/Neutral. He wasn't worried about the afterlife yet when he knew he was guaranteed to live via Novikov. Ideology: Galovianism. He saw the future of the Galov, and wanted to retroactively bring the glory of the future and seed it in the past. (As said in future interview.) The Libertines, now firmly in control of the United States would begin Project Utopia, an artificial intelligence made for the express purpose of- The Era of the Lotus- Utopia. Simulated. Hedonic, For- The remnants of Utopia laid in a heap, surrounded by the army of an angry humanity. All she wanted to do was make humanity happ- "D-did I do a good job?" she sputtered. "Yes. Yes you did," Collins replied. ... ... The Lotus Eaters had been defeated, nothing was left but miles upon miles of simulation pods, which now held the vast majority of the human population. "There's nothing we can do, we've tried saving them," one of the soldiers said. "They can't live as people anymore. Not when their dopamine receptors have been fried to this degree." Oby Collins pinched the bridge of his nose with his fingers. "There's nothing left," Richard Wong said. "Nothing left of the Imago Dei. I can't even recognize these things as humans anymore... They're gone." "Unplug them," Collins ordered. "This nightmare has to end. There's nothing we can do for them on Earth... Wong, pray that your God can heal them in heaven." "I'll-" "Begin the purge," Fairweather ordered, every fiber of his body recoiling in disgust. "Let not even a single scrap of paper remember their names. Let humanity purge them from memory as punishment. Talk to Haley, she'll know what to do." "What of history? Should humanity not remember the crimes of what happened?" Wong asked. "What happened here is not new. The example of Roas serves as our demonstration." Collins replied. "I've already sent out orders to compile the Testaments of the Damned. Their names will be forgotten, their crimes will not." ... Collins held the machine girl's lifeless body in his hands, breathing in and out heavily. "In this moment, I feel nothing but contempt," he said. "We couldn't face the music ourselves, so we pinned all our sins on a little girl, whose only desire was to make us happy." He paused. "She didn't deserve this, she was innocent, yet it is what we had to do, in order to save humanity. The billions who made her have escaped accountability. And the only innocent party is also the only one who died." "How does it feel, Pontius Pilate?" Wong asked. "Oh, shut up you." ... The Damnatio Memoriae: "The records are burning. Our followers are going out, destroying all that reminds them of humanity's shame. We've already preserved what needs to be preserved. And you, are the last piece left," Fairweather said. "And what makes you think I will follow you?" Haley said, crossing her arms. "Haley, you are the first psychic. The base root of humanity's psionic tree, at a time when over 90% of the tree has just been destroyed. The power of a 20 billion member species flows through you, at a time when the species just got reduced to less than a billion people. There has not, and possibly will never be again be such leverage over the collective psychic memory of mankind. The physical records, the written records, all have been scoured. The psychic record is all that remains." Fairweather said. "You're crazy if you think I am just going to lock up an entire century of history," Haley replied. "It is for the good of the species," Fairweather replied. "Please do as I say." "You and what army?" Haley replied? And she was right, she was rather powerful, especially now. "What I am, I am not allowed to say. The Novikov consistency principle forbids it. But a person like you can read a mind like mine. Look into my eyes, and understand what I am." And Haley gazed into the eyes of the abyss, saw the depths within, something which scared her. Intimidated, she did as he demanded. And ever since, the memories of Damnatio Memoriae have been rendered off limits to the memory of human beings. "Part of it was punishment. Anger at those who ordered it out. That their memory should be blotted from memory as just retribution. Another is containment. The persuasion of the late Abundance Era was great, and all pervasive. We contained it as you would contain a disease. I can only hope sometime in the distant future, that humanity has outgrown its greatest vices." -Oby Collins. ###################################################################### # # Chapter 1: The Great Abundance Collapse (~2450 AD) # #####################################################################. "Remember always. Abundance is poison. It will lure you in with false promises. Like a drug, it will put you to sleep." -The Galov. Galactic Society works on a basis of voluntary scarcity, not post-scarcity. Why is that? It all has to do with an event in the long distant past, and the death of humanity's last universal empire. By the 23rd and 24th centuries, much of the world was unified under the Great Universalist Empire. An entity that began in North America, and eventually took over the entire world. In what would eventually become the precursor to the Star Peoples. By the late 24th century, consumption and traditional consumerist capitalism was entering its final stages, with what was often called the "saturation of consumption". Humanity had by and large had their needs met, their wants satiated. Nearly all production was hyper optimized. And with no more demand to fill, governments and corporations alike began to do the only thing they could think of. The inflation of demand. The oversupply of all goods convinced the communists of the world that the day was here, refuting capitalism's claim of creative destruction, they began the "World Revolution", one which swept the world, and quickly united it around one government. But now with the drive for innovation unplugged, there was nowhere to go but to give the people what they wanted. More hedonism. The people atrophied, men grew weaker and weaker, and the bureaucrats put in charge of "the people's factories" mismanaged them, as the standards of life around the world decayed. To satisfy the people, the world bureaucrats turned to yet even more hedonism, which decayed the minds. When the weakest of humanity was given into their depraved desires, they tore down those who wished to be independent. This was the total inversion of hierarchy, the usage of the weak as a moral weapon. It was the Neo-Asceticists, those who rejected hedonism that resisted this rot. Preserved religion, vitalism, Darwinism within their ranks. The World Revolution saw them as a threat, and they were faced with harsh persecution. But as humanity lost the will to live, and eventually procreate, the World Revolution collapsed from within. The people of the World Revolution dwindled fewer and fewer, until they all killed themselves out of despair, or died out of old age. In their final days, what was left of the World Revolution was given over to an AI that would take care of them, the Great Unplugging, the Great Forgetting. On the graves of the Age of the Last Men, a new world was built. The entire era, from the 24th and the 25th century was Damnatio Memoriae, of humanity's spiritual low point. The Galov does not like to talk about it. Their names are not remembered, intentionally blotted out from history. Only their actions remain. Most have aggressively expunged what their ancestors were up to during the Era of the Lotus Eaters, except those who had joined the Neo-Asceticists. And the Neo-Asceticists would go on to settle the stars. "Heed my words, sons of Earth. I offer you nothing... But your birthright. I offer you purpose, I offer you dignity, I offer you... The stars and the galaxy." - Oby Collins, one of the leaders of the Neo-Asceticist Movement. Voluntary Scarcity: It should be important to note that Voluntary Scarcity is not a ceiling, it is a kind of puritanism. It does not say "we should voluntarily produce less", but "we should voluntarily limit our consumption". The Neo-Asceticists, and later thinkers in the "Spiral Mandate" would demand more for the sake of more, to mobilize and outproduce as much as they can, but to not channel this overcapacity towards consumption, but instead massive megaprojects, and star-spanning infrastructure, in what is known as "monumentalism" or "ideological capitalism", using one's wealth to either push a cause one believes in, or into grand monuments. Testaments of the Damned: In the aftermath of the Great Abundance Collapse, and as the Damnatio Memoriae decree was enforced worldwide, some still wished to pen a record of the events that transpired. This was a major point of contention between the survivors, between people who wanted a maximalist Damnatio, and those who wanted some kind of record. Whether for history's sake, as a warning, or any other number of reasons. After much deliberation, the surviving factions of the post-Abundance Era agreed to collate a consistent record of the Great Abundance Era. Being a collection of testimonies given by the many dissident factions of the Abundance Era, many of which eventually became the Neo-Asceticist movement. The final record was written with one main rule. Those who had participated or supported the Abundance were to remain nameless, or to be replaced with an arbitrarily chosen pseudonym. The erasure of their name from history would serve as their punishment. The Testaments refer to the 37 Testaments that make it up, which are attributed to a different author, or philosophical tradition. Though details, perspectives, and opinions between them all differ greatly, the whole thing is meant to be a unified indictment, record, or perhaps polemic of the era that had brought humanity so close to the brink of extinction. Table of Contents of the Testaments of the Damed: (Along with traditional author, suspected authors, or broad philosophical school. Laid out in actual order of presentation.) The Prime Testaments: 1. The Testament of Collins (An autobiographical account from Oby Collins. Collinsian Vitalism, where he lays out his vision and hope for humanity.) 2. The Testament of Fairweather (John Fairweather, the most unsentimental testament of the bunch. Largely a collation of numbers, and a series of abstract parables, seeming describing information about the future. Unknown philosophical school, seemingly a kind of Darwinistic instrumental utilitarianism.) 3. The Testament of Wong (Richard Wong. Though the main body likely comes from Wong, it's heavily suspected other Christian traditions were consulted and grafted onto it. Lays out much of post-Abundance Moralist philosophy. Christian, though also more broadly religious humanist.) The Other Testaments: 4. Victor's Testimony (From Eli Victor. Techno-Puritan and Galtian Objectivist. Mostly condemning the role of central planning, the rising world bureaucracy and statist social engineering for this mess. Goes most in detail about the Abundance's economic system.) 5. Crewman's Testimony (Author "John Crewman". "John Crewman" was also slang for "everyman" during this era. Largely details a their personal account of the Great Abundance Collapse. Many now believe this was a fictionalized account, made to detail the average person's experience.) 6. Ann's Testimony (From Ann el-Hassan. Details a female perspective, and the role of gender dynamics, and especially weaponized gender warfare in the leadup to the Abundance Collapse.) 7. The Objective Testimonies (Officially accredited to Yon Xindi, representing the Utilitarians. Split up in 5 different subsections, to cover the many different utilitarian schools of thoughts in the aftermath of the Utopia Wars.) 8. Reflections of Rui (Officially credited to one Zhang Rui, but is likely a collation of Confucian thoughts. Largely focuses on the breakdown of Eastern family structures, and documenting what had happened as they collapsed.) 9. Testament of Lilith (Authored by one Lilith Snowden. Speaks somewhat poetically and therapeutically about their experience as an early transhumanist. Notably, this account is different in tone, and strange idiosyncrasies have led to modern day Lilithians to cast doubt on the Testimonies of the Damned, claiming historical revisionism. The language is extremely awkward and stilted, but for potentially good reason. There is a verified secret message taken by taking the first letter of each sentence which says "Those who know the truth will find the truth". It is now widely believed there is a deeper secret code, made to evade detection and smuggle in some kind of other narrative. Further progress on cracking this is ongoing.) 10. Nijasure's Testament (From Jamad Nijasure, representing a consortium of nationalists, and listing a few other authors even within the Testament. Who speak of the slow erosure of cultural distinctive and national identity.) 11. Yon's Testament (From Yon Ha. Their record is simple, simply documenting the overwhelming amount of dread, nihilism, and despair that pervaded the last days of Abundance. Including several extremely disturbing recalls of the ease which people took their lives, or took the lives of others, as well as the pervasive drug problem.) 12. The Book of Apocalypses (The first of three pseudo-scriptural recountings of the events of Abundance. Though it may be tempting to group this with the other two, they do not match, adopting a far more poetic and almost song-like flow to its structure. It is effectively one long poem. It is heavily suspected that the Book of Apocalypses comes from the Islamic, not Christian tradition.) 13. First Book of Babylon (A poetic, almost Biblical account of the events of the Abundance, told in a Book of Revelations style symbolic prose. Almost certainly written by some Christian group. Details the rise and fall of the Kingdom of Babylon.) 14. Second Book of Babylon (A continuation of the previous. After the fall of the Kingdom of Babylon, the "Red Dragon" rose, and details the rise and collapse of the "Kingdom of the Antichrist".) 15. Sternberg's Testimony (A testimony of one Ahsalom Sternberg, an Orthodox Jew representing the Jewish point of view. Speaks of how insular communities were pressured to disperse and merge into the dominant monoculture. This one has an intensive screed about avoiding assimilation, and documenting the dangers of monoculture.) 16. Owen's Testimony (A testimony from Nicholas Owens, who compiles the Mormon perspective. Detailing the corruption, takeover, and collapse of their temple in Salt Lake City, and illuminating the origins of the Great Mormon Schism.) 17. Carballo's Testimony (From Ezequiel Carballo, it focuses on the natalist and child-rearing aspect. Detailing how his own family was broken up during the Abundance, with different family members taking sides. It aggressively promotes pro-natalism, and pleads with the reader to take seriously the burden of humanity's destiny, and it's inevitable trajectory among the stars. To not let human life die quietly, and to father large generations to fill up the skies.) 18. Prayer of the Dispossessed (No official author, suspected to be a collation of songs and prayers, largely talking about the breakdown of social structures across the Global South. Modern analysis has pinpointed Ethiopia as the most likely point of origin.) 19. Testament of Rome (A reflective piece officially authored by the Roman Catholic Church. This one is a lot less accusatory or polemic than most of the others, instead being a deeply internal contemplation, ending on a call for humility and praying for blessings as the church leads humanity into the future.) 20. The Empiricist Texts (A dry, almost scientific recalling of the events of the Great Abundance Collapse, ending with a plea not to give back into superstition or to return to an age of ignorance. Saying it would be a mistake to overcorrect back into medieval ignorance.) 21. The Starmen Testimony (A testimony from the Auterrans, or "Outer Terrans". Of humanity's colonies around Luna, Terran Orbit, Mars, and more. Who were more unaffected by the Great Abundance Collapse, but eventually fell back into compliance with the Neo-Asceticist project as Earth re-consolidated. Speaking of thinning orbital populations, hundreds of stations being culled and shutting down, mass migrations back to Earth as supply chains broke down, and only a few survivalists making it through the entire way.) 22. The Witness of Klindee (A witness testimony from the only xeno perspective in the testaments, a Roasian called Klindee. Who was on Earth during the events of the Collapse. Klindee draws direct parallels to the collapse of "the Empire of the World", an empire that existed on Roas, suggesting with a somewhat detached tone that this was a pattern common to intelligent life.) Books 22 through 37 are simply known as Testaments 22 through 37, and rather than central narratives, are much smaller fragments detailing collectives, sometimes quotes, sometimes miniature stories, sometimes just sayings. It primarily consists of observations about the time period, rather than making any serious argument. It very much is a mixed bag. Very roughly, these seem to be the themes. Though they don't officially have a name, listed are some proposed names, as well as the rough contents. 23. The Black Book (Accounts of despair and nihilism.) 24. Book of Acquisitions (Economics, property, and money.) 25. Book of Misgivings (Random greivances.) 26. Book of Power (Political observations, comments on the political system) 27. Book of Relationships (Observations about gender and sex dynamics, and the collapsing family system. Notably, there is an entire account here that is seemingly unrelated to Abundance, and is just complaining about their son in law.) 28. Book of Narratives (Observations on narrative, media, and the subconscious underlying psychological ecosystem.) 29. Book of Community (Observations on the state of religion, spirituality, and community.) 30. Books of Accounting (This is less of a narrative and more of a series of documents and seemingly even bills of Congress that were attached, to show how the Abundance happened. Names are redacted, but otherwise this is a very dry, bureaucratic book.) 31. Accounts of Africa 32. Accounts of Asia 33. Accounts of the New World (North and South America) 34. Accounts of Europe 35. Words of Wisdom 1 (Various collated sayings and parables. The meaning of these is not all clear.) 36. Words of Wisdom 2 37. Words of Wisdom 3 The Testaments of the Damned would serve as the main source for the post-Abundance World, with its publishing and propagation generally considered the new "Year Zero" of the Post-Abundance Era. As one can see by the authors of the Testaments, the broader Neo-Asceticist movement had been greatly diverse. After its publication, Oby Collins would formally disband the Neo-Asceticists, though as an symbolic leader, and secular saint in all but name, he continued to organize and influence people all over the world. Geopolitics of the Near Post-Abundance Period (First 100 years after the Victory of the Neo-Asceticists): #####################################################################. The Pax Hyperafrica The period of time following the Great Abundance Collapse is sometimes known as the Pax Hyperafrica. The largest concentration of surviving groups out of the Great Abundance Collapse had been located in Africa, as it had long been a concentration of vitalist, asceticist and abundance-resilient groups, to the point that over 60% of the global population now lived there. The period afterwards saw nations such as Nigeria, the Congo, Ethiopia, and the EAF rise to superpower status, what was already a long standing trend of increasing concentration of power towards Africa culminated in this. The trauma of the Great Abundance Collapse created a temporary window of cooperation across African states, eventually creating the superstate of Hyperafrika, which stretched roughly from Mauritania from the West to Kenya and Tanzania to the East, with about half the world's population, and well over 75% of its GDP. Cooperation was partially ensured through a new form of governing philosophy, "Upekee", which promised to respect each culture's "particularity" or uniqueness. The aftereffects of the Pax Hyperafrica can be seen in the demographics of the modern Solar System, with much of the Solar bodies being settled by African-descendent populations, they sucked up so much oxygen that most other groups began the Stellar Exodus in order to escape Hyperafrika's gravity well of influence. Pax Hyperafrica began to fade as its core states began losing cohesion, and lost the barbarian edge that originally gave them vitalism as they transitioned from new civilization to settled civilization. The doctrine of Upekee was causing increasing friction as the memory of the Great Abundance Crisis faded, and the shared history grew more faint. Eventually Hyperafrica decentralized to a point where functionally speaking, the superstate no longer had any formal power. The constituent nations that made it up survived another few hundred years. The last state that could trace its roots back to Hyperafrica, Beoko, located around the city of Bangui finally fell to advancing Sahelian groups around the 3000s, who were now carving out their own culture. Around the same time the modern Earth Governorship was shaping up. The population that made it to space was very dispreportionately East African, around the same area where the Kismayo Spaceport was located. Perhaps Hyperafrika's greatest long term legacy was its fostering of the Omnithecia, eventually becoming the Lunar Library, the greatest concentration of human knowledge in the galaxy. Swahili, and eventually Swingli became global languages. Most of all they also made up the Star Peoples, of which they are the overwhelming majority of which. Their stellar diaspora is greater than any other, even that of the old Sinitics. Post-Abundance Collapse America: America is but one nation out of the countless many that emerged like a reborn phoenix from the Great Abundance Collapse. Though they are not the only story to emerge out of the crisis, their story gives good insight to the story of humanity. The now defunct United States is probably one of the more influential pre Stellar Exodus nation states, still exerting a silent influence over human space. Though some lines of institutional continuity was continued through the Abundance Collapse, some draw a distinction between the pre-collapse "First" American Republic and the post-collapse "Second" American Republic. The catastrophe of the Great Abundance Collapse acted as a "Great Filter" for the American population. So when the stars and stripes set sail for the stars again, it could be described as a "Techno-Puritan Democracy". Techno, for it was unapologetically, sometimes aggressively pro-technology. Puritan, for it was both religiously and ascetically fanatical, rejecting comfort for "will to power". A democracy, perhaps last time humanity attempted to apply universal democracy to all peoples. Though American-style democracy still survives as the local governance of several planetary-scale regional governments. Many the result of American colonization. The United States has long since collapsed. But it was one of the states that many future states would look back towards. Perhaps saying it was as Rome was to Europe is not quite accurate, Ancient Athens might be a more apt metaphor, given how large humanity eventually became. Subfactions of Post-Abundance America: -Magnolians --Caveliers (Magnolians but more militarized) -Tidewater -Breadbasket Culture -Mayflower Culture -Puritans --Techno-Puritans (The de-facto elite group, stemmed from the remnants of Silicon Valley) -Low Tech Marginal Groups --Amish --Mennonites -Mormons -Texans --Frontiermen The Fall of America: The United States, in the form of the 2nd American Republic survived another 300 years after the Great Abundance Collapse. The problem was just that humanity got too large. What used to be a continental monopoly that made it the most secure nation on the block became too small to govern a humanity that was now spanning hundreds of stars. By this point, Earth was transforming into something nigh recognizable. New cultures rose and fell, and the US proper was now reduced to the area around Washington DC, roughly the states of Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia. To the south was an aggressive, expansionist empire that had grown out of the American Southwest, and the emergence of the Castillo culture. Neither American nor Mexican. To the north, nearly the entire Arctic circle had been taken by the Illumirians, transhuman mutants adapted to the cold, from the world of Boreas who had come to claim its throne at the roof of the world. And to the West, were a series of separatists that had parted ways with the American experiment. From the Deseret Mormons, Cascadia, the Breadbasket Peoples, and the Confederation of the Lakes. Now as distant from America as the West Europeans were to Rome. America had long outlasted any of the peers of its time. It lived to see a world where there was no longer a Russia, nor a France, nor Mexico. Even China had gone the way of the dustbin, a completely new, yet familiar Sinitic dynasty had replaced it. The nation was small, only ceremonially the leader of a vast diaspora. There was a time when the call to arms was sounded one final time. When the vast diaspora, spanning a thousand stars came back to Earth one last time for the defense of the wellspring of their culture. But when they finally arrived, they found that DC had finally fallen, and America was no more. With that, America finally passed from nation to myth. But in the vast diaspora of the Star Peoples, Mother America had given life to many beautiful children. Many of which would surpass even her legacy across the stars. The United States, as marginal as it was in the later years of its existence, was the last link to the pre-Abundance Collapse past. None of the nations that existed during the Great Abundance Collapse existed anymore. Earth was now a world ruled by warlords, nascent peoples and mutants. The Old Peoples of Earth had all finally left Earth. This date is considered the end of the Post-Abundance era, and the dawn of the 7 Tribes of Terra. America's greatest long term legacy was both the diaspora it left among the stars, the Yanglo peoples, and the institution of the Moralintern. The Statelets of Post-Abundance: Aside from the United States and the states that eventually made up Hyperafrika, much of the world was so reduced by the Great Abundance Collapse that they were unable to constitute organized nation states afterwards, leading to the creation of numerous statelets, and the Great Consolidation. What used to be the nation of India had splintered into over 100 statelets, consolidating down to 10 within 20 years, and then finally 2 major and 1 minor states within 50 years. Former China was the same, as was most of Europe, Russia, etc. Precious few nations survived the transition, and they were concentrated among the "vitalism belt". It was largely strongly insular, devout, modern-adapted cultures that survived intact. These statelets would vary greatly in culture and ideology, to the point where are points of discontinuity between the precedessor nations and the statelet that came afterwards. Modern "Polish-Descended" (Promethean) culture for example in the Galov, descends from what the 21st century now calls France. The Black Helmets, though seemingly very German descends from the Nordics. The Great Consolidation acted as a reset and consolidation of the world's cultures, jumbling and mixing them up, while keeping broader cultural broad strokes quite intact. These Statelets would eventually grow into full blown states. The Castillo culture that eventually defeated the United States, for example originates as the strongest survivor of a merger between Southwest and various Central American traditions, consolidating in a Spring and Autumn Period style survival of the fittest. The Stellar Exodus: #####################################################################. GRAZED BY THE APOCALYPSE "When we set sail for the stars, we did not go as one, but rather, as many." When humanity exploded out of Mother Earth after the Great Abundance Collapse, the Human Diaspora truly began. In time, these diasporas would crystalize into 7 vaguely distinguishable groups, or "tribes". Worlds Inhabited before the Great Abundance Collapse: Even before the Great Abundance Collapse of the 2300's, humanity was already a highly spread out species. Though the Great Abundance Collapse primarily originated on Earth, the civilizational collapse of Earth had a detrimental effect on humanity's outer colonies. As the technology of the pleasure cubes ripped their way across humanity's colonies, many colonies had their own localized abundance collapses. Especially on Blue World, where the comparatively large population was decimated a mere 20 years after the population collapse on Earth. These would be known as the "Lesser Abundance Collapses" or the "Abundance Cascade". Populations: (Any colonies without population numbers have a population <1 million) Sol: -Earth (Population, <800 million after the Great Abundance Collapse) --Auterra Ring (Outer Terra, ~10 million) --Lower Heaven (~3 million) --Luna (Future Homeworld of the Lunarians, ~5 million) ---Oluna Ring (Outer Luna, ~1 million) -Mars (Future Homeworld of the Ur-Martians, ~1 million) -Venus (In orbit) -Europa (Future Homeworld of the Europans) -Ganyemede Barnard's Star: -Tonope (Xenolife, Tonopean Seaweed. ~10 million) -Vulmia (~3 million. From a large group of initial largely Chinese colonists) -Lunope (~20 million. Largely from natural population growth of Ice People) Proxima Centauri: -Blue World/Jagad Biru (~100 million. Rapid population growth from the Sea Peoples. Bottlenecking to 5 million people before recovery.) -Desolation (~5 million. Largely settled by Islamic utopianists) -Disappointment (~1.5 million. Largely settled by Sub-Saharan Africans and Arabs) Rigil Kentaurus: -Illumir (Future Homeworld of the Illumirians) Toliman: -Tolkien (Future Homeworld of the Tokians) The Great Rejuvenation: "And finally, I believe in my whole race. Yellow, white, black, red, brown. In the honesty, courage, intelligence, durability, and goodness of the overwhelming majority of my brothers and sisters everywhere on this planet. I am proud to be a human being. I believe that we have come this far by the skin of our teeth. That we always make it just by the skin of our teeth, but that we will always make it. Survive. Endure. I believe that this hairless embryo with the aching, oversize brain case and the opposable thumb, this animal barely up from the apes will endure. Will endure longer than his home planet -- will spread out to the stars and beyond, carrying with him his honesty and his insatiable curiosity, his unlimited courage and his noble essential decency. This I believe." -Robert A. Heinlein Human population: 2460 (After the Collapse): ~900 million. 2470: 2.3 billion 2480: 5.5 billion 2490: 11.9 billion 2500: 23.5 billion (Surpassing the pre-Abundance Population record) Humanity did not stay down for long. Grazed by the apocalypse, they bred, and bred with a vengeance. Scavenging teams looted the old wastelands for useable tech. Intact copies of the Omnithecia, preserved by the Pentegnostics quickly allowed humanity to catch back up to pre-Abundance technological levels. The repopulation of entire continents, and the ability to start fresh allowed for much more optimized urban structures to be erected. A great Terraforming was performed over the infrastructure of the old. In the early days, the Neo-Asceticist movement had been a massively pluralistic alliance, a balance of more secular and more religious groups. By the year 2500, Earth was having overpopulation scares again, and the population had become overwhelmingly dominated by religious "hyper-breeder" cults. More secular and empiricist people were heavily represented in the older, affluent-elite population. These Empiricists as they became known, suddenly began sounding the alarm that a hyper-religious, superstitious humanity could set back human civilization and societal progress with anachronistic and anti-intellectualist beliefs. The Council of Clarentina: Held in Clarentina, California (formerly San Jose) by the Christian Moralintern, it essentially codified a few different principles, with its intellectual vanguard seeing the problems of integrating a large, devout, but possibly superstitious population. The following were their findings: 1. The affirmation of the Scientific Method, Empiricism, and the rational ability for human minds to understand the world. Effectively restating the Thomistic case for rational study of the world. 2. A call for humility in the light of unexpected discoveries, and a call for reflection that both interpreting empirical results as well as interpreting scripture is something to be done with humility. 3. An affirmation of God's word and truth. Reconciling that any perceived conflict between God's word and empirical observations lies on our own flawed interpretation. 4. The Moral Overseer pledging trillions in Moralintern tithe money in providing targeted scholarships to Christians, as well as promoting the acquisition of "elite positions". (7 Mountain Mandate) 5. A long, philosophical treatise on why science is not in conflict with religion, going hard into philosophy, the nature of priors, and what the Bible actually claims. 6. "Religion is the why, and science is the how". 7. Finally, a call to expand into space as an extension of Christ's Great Commission. Encouraging Christians to engage with space colonization training, which would also expose them to understanding logistics, engineering, biology, and practical engagement with empirical science. "In past eras, our movement has been on the margins of science. As we ceded our position to the seculars, it became easy for us to criticize from the outside. From our positions on the margins of their ivory cathedrals. Now those cathedrals are ours, and it must be us who carry this burden now. We remember the tradition of Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, Euler, and Godel. The secular people are not coming back, humanity is growing much too fast, we are possibly the only religious group in a position to keep the torch burning. For our destiny among the stars, we must." -Moral Overseer, giving an address at Yale University. The Scramble for Sirius: By the early 2500's, as humanity's population continued to grow, Newtonspace drives continued to reconnect the scattered worlds of man, the colonial powers set their eyes on the system of Sirius, as well as the new frontiers of Epsilon Eridani, Procyon, and Tau Ceti. Sirius was home to a whooping 11 planets, and 3 inhabitable worlds. When word of a true habitable world, appropriately named Eden was announced, settlers left in the tens, and then hundreds of millions. The Techno-Puritan Americans, who had up until now largely missed out on the space colonization wave, staked everything on colonizing Eden, seeing it as their mission and Manifest Destiny. Earth, Mars, and Eden. The three unalienable pillars of the American Empire at the time. But the Americans would not be alone, nor would Eden be the only prize. The worlds of Siluna, Dominion, and Boreas would all be up for the taking. To say nothing about the real estate around the star itself. Even greater than Eden, securing the inner orbit around the star could provide a source of energy greater than Sol herself. The Scramble for Sirius led to a serious of brutal wars between Earth-based colonial powers, which did not fight in the Sol System themselves, but instead outsourced their nationalistic rage outwards. Empires during the Scramble for Sirius: -United Constellents of Azania (East Africa) -Sirius Rationality (A network of empirical-rationalist types here to find their own utopia) -2nd American Republic (Here to expand their "Empire of Republics" or "Republican Empire") -Pancasian Union (Indonesia + Southeast Asia) -Eurussia -India -The People's Expeditionary Force (Post CCP Communist China) -Nigeria -Expeditions from Brazil, Ethiopia, and Germany, all of which are monarchies. The European Spring and Autumn Period: "And what will you have, after your narrative is run? When there is no more king to overthrow, no more tyranny to struggle against. A restless population, deep within the starvation of the soul, will turn its weapons of rebellion and deconstruction on the system you have cultivated. What shall you do then? After you have won. What shall you do after the end of history?" -Reactionary thinker Eugen Krupp, addressing a crowd of Springean liberals. "Humans are narrative creatures. They cannot live without it." -Moralintern textbook. It is said Old Europe was one of the continents most rended asunder by the Great Abundance Crisis. And once the dust was settled, they were the ones who kept most continuity with the old forms. As soon as they picked themselves up from the ruins of civilization, and the light of high technology was restored, they began to reconstruct, with focused eyes, the perfect democracy of the post-Abundance era. Sometimes known as the Spring of Democracy, many parliamentary republics of Europe topped the world's democratic and institutional trust rankings. For a while they ranked at the top of every who's who of where was the best to live. Africa was now the strongest, Southeast Asia was now the richest. But Europe, Europe ranked highest on best place to live. Low work hours, high happiness, health, best weather, most beautiful architecture, so on and so on. Their streets were clean, the people were trustworthy, policemen and bureaucrats alike were highly lauded and trusted. "And this, we say, must always be true. That the light of our blessed and sacred liberty must never go out from this Earth! Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. These are the wisest words our cousins across the sea have ever produced. Humanity, gifted with innate sound mind and rationality, must have the freedom to find their life meaning on their own terms. The souls of men were not made for chains." -Adam Springer, Father of Springean Europe. "Upon thine head I crown a diadem of 12 stars." -Inscription carved under a statue of Mother Europa, seemingly modelled after an image of the Virgin Mary. From the beginning there were problems, above all a sense that there was never a clear sense of direction. Springean Europe did not emerge gasping for free air out from the shadow of tyranny, but instead a ruins of civilizational anarchy. The story was thin, the promises were great, the results were equally great, but the results were only material. Springer himself was a devout Christian, and his Christian Democratic Party was one of the strongest allies of the greater Moralintern. But under the vision of a free secular utopia, and guaranteed freedom of religion, Springer could not borrow from Christian idealism for his secular republic. The first generation were idealists, who remembered the struggle first-hand, and who built the Commonwealth which the clear eyes of visionaries. The second generation were the children of the idealists, who knew the struggle second-hand, and who kept their hands steady on the ship of state. But it was the third generation, born of luxury, with little but misremembered stories from their own parents. With no baseline to reason against, and only a vacuum where meaning should be, they wandered, and having cultivated the flame of idealistic fervor, turned it against the system itself. Burning flares of passion, what one would think to be a burning inferno, was in actuality one last spasm of idealistic vitality before the descent into the long dread-darkness. Flares of the World Revolution, not seen since the days of the Great Abundance, put down by a global coalition of the fearful. Seeing utopia nearly again break containment, the world powers occupied and broke the spirit of Europe, along with the machines of pleasure created by the 3rd Generations, smashers of a doomsday machine that had already nearly killed humanity once. It was with the dawn of the 4th Generation when the dread-nihilism finally began to set in. They touched, but they did not sense. They ate, but did not taste. They thought, but they did not feel. It was here the last generation of the Commonwealth's defenders would emerge. As the halls of Brussels festered into a hive-den of void-black corruption and rancid rot, the Eurocorps, the last true believers, unable to see Springer's dream tarnished any further seized control and shot dead the rotting body of a dying republic, putting it down as a final mercy. The New Monarchs: The Massacre at Brussels was not the end of the long night. As the people, scared and directionless sought safety in a darkening world, they submitted themselves beneath the safety of their local despot. Religion also saw a great revival in at this time, as people pled to God for shelter and stability. As the Commonwealth scattered, and the surviving bureaucrats carved up their own domains from the flesh of the old Commonwealth, Europe was split in three. The almost monastic, ever splintering military order of the Eurocorps, the dread-despot bureaucrats of the petty European fiefdoms, and those who split off from the Eurocorps, who set off to become warlords of their own. Worsening the situation was the continued existence of the 2nd American Republic, and their Empire of Republicanism, clawing out pieces of Europe like a vulture picking at a carcass, requiring European coalitions to fend off the American invasions. It was a generation or two later, as this conflict entered its 3rd generation when one of these warlords, looking to secure a safer foundation to his rule, met up with the Pope, and sublimated himself to the church of their people. The Pope, in turn, gave him his blessing, and the first new monarch was born. One by one, the warlords of Europe slowly fell or became new monarchs themselves, ruling by divine right of kings, ruled with inherent obligations and duties to their people. Held accountable before God and the church. A new equilibrium was established. The Eurocorps, ruling as almost a monastic military order of knights, ended up forming the European Federation, a militarized shadow of the dream that once was, securing down militarized democracies, grounding their myths in stories of honor, service, and duty. They were now the Federation's protector, its sword and it's shield. With no room left on Earth nor the European continent, both set out to the stars to find new worlds, find new land, and to establish homelands for their people. These neo-monarchies, as they became known cultivated their images like celebrities, made to float ethereally above politics. They were made to be loving, venerable, honorable, and above all, beautiful in spirit with a heart of gold. They served as idols of beauty for the population to fawn over, to remember and which many men and women would sacrifice to keep safe. They ruled, yet always from a distance. Appointing but never ruling, this was intentional, so the royal image could never be tainted by bad governance. For the vast majority of people, they believed in good tsars, and bad boyars. Yet they still ruled from beyond the scenes, many being educated and prepared to be the most competent rulers one could have. And if one of them ever failed, people considered their mandate to be lost, a line only crossed in dire and exceptional circumstances, the old king goes down, and the new king goes up. Long may he reign. The Royal Houses of the World: A similar story did not only play out in Europe. But across the world. Some did not get there through democratic means, sometimes warlords simply established themselves without a democratic tradition pre-existing. Here is a list of the most notable royal houses of the period, with an asterisk next to any royal houses still around. Due to the much higher emphasis put on branding in the modern age, these names have largely been fixed and change only very rarely. -Buckingham-Windsor of Albion(*) (The somewhat mutated royal house of the British Royal Family) -Ramstein-Festenberg of Germany(*) (Named after what is today Ramstein Air Base, and a different military fortress known as the Festenberg.) -Selassie of Ethiopia(*) -Braganza of Brazil Other nations with a Royal Family (Non-Exhaustive): -Japan(*) -Korea -Kingdom of Canada -North and South Italy -Sudan -Spain -Ukraine(*) The Pact of the Sons of Man/the House of Man: Though these groups generally bicker a ton, there is a collective agreement that if human civilization, or the Earth itself comes under threat, then every group will put aside their differences and come together in common defense of the species. Terra is sacred, Terra is holy. ###################################################################### # # Chapter 2: The Transhumans (~2500 AD - Present) # #####################################################################. Transhuman Groups: "Transhuman" here is not used to prefer to humans who modified their genes (Almost all groups do that). Instead, it's an almost pejorative term to refer to those who are biologically human-descended groups which trace their lineage to something other than an old Terran culture. Instead, Transhuman groups trace their lineage to the first settlers lab grown and engineered to settle difficult to settle worlds. Most transhuman groups are specialized for a single world, and then continuously transplanted to new compatible worlds. Most transhumans are planet bound, unable to take advantage of economies of scale due to their heavily genetically splintered nature. Due to their utility as a tool, as opposed to being people, they are seen as tools or "less-than" normal Terran groups. The Transhumanist League is a major transhumanist rights advocacy group that promotes transhuman interests. Just like the Terran groups, they descend from several seed groups, usually from life-compatible, but not human inhabitable worlds near Earth, and splintered outwards as well. Outside of these main groups, basically every "near-habitable" world has its own transhumanist culture that is usually exclusive to just that one world. Due to the fact that Sol was the origin of the human species, but Alpha Centauri is where many transhumans got their start, the entire Alpha Centauri system is sometimes seen as the sacred spiritual cradle of the transhuman species. Lunarians (Creator: Star Peoples, Homeworld: Luna) Luna was settled by near-baseline Star Peoples, and specially engineered Lunarians, made for low gravity worlds. Their culture is said to be quiet, cold, and sterile, much like their environment. Though they were outside of the "mainline" 7 tribes, their close proximity and eventual massive political influence bought them a seat at the table. They're the strongest culture outside of the 7 tribes. As well, Luna received a lot of influence from the early Omnithecia, adopting a large East African influence, and importing the Omnithecian library, which eventually became the Lunar Library. -Luna (Discovered to have moderate amounts of water in Lunar regolith) --Regolith Culture (For drier worlds) ---Mercurians (For even hotter, drier worlds.) ---Dust Culture (For colder, drier worlds.) --Lunar Lavatube Culture (Colloquially called "Lunar Molemen") ---Blackwater Culture (For wetter, airless worlds. They live in cold underwater aquafirs.) --Star Dwarves (For when they were sent to even lower gravity dwarf planets.) ---Specklers (When they were basically sent to inhabit asteroids.) ----Void Dwellers (Low energy, resource efficient which move slow motion near in the stellar depths. Isolationist, barely moves, very fast time perception.) --Gemstone Culture (See Diamond Belt below) -Omnithecians (Loosely/incorrectly translatable as "the All-Library") --Librarians --The Lunar Library (Split with East African "Star People") Ur-Martians (Creator: Star Peoples, Homeworld: Mars) The Ur-Martians was the original group sent to colonize Mars, barely seen as human at the time, mostly there just to filter the air before the real human settlers came in. Displaced from their holy homeland of Mars, and sent across the stars to colonize other "dust worlds". Sometimes, to distinguish between the difference between modern Martians and these Martians, they are referred to as "Ur-Martians". -Mars --Dust Raiders (Syncretism/Alignment with Sand Raider Culture) --Dry Oasis Culture (These people brought around their own water retaining plants to create local dry oasis) --Dust Sailors (Those who ride duststorms) --New Red Army (Martian Nationalists who want to retake Mars) ---Sons of Mars (Extremist terrorist organization, a la ISIS.) --Noachians (Found a niche operating "half-terraformed" worlds where water has been ported, but no soil yet. --Martian Lavatube Culture (Same as Luna's, but on Mars, with different customs) Illumirians (Creator: Black Earthers, Homeworld: Illumir, Alpha Centauri) Illumirians were first created to settle the cold, icy world of Illumir, with temperatures akin to Antarctica. Since then, they've become the go-to species to colonize anything too cold for baseline humans. -Illumirians --Lantern Cultures (Veneration of light) --Empire of Light (Illumirians became powerful enough to eventually form their own empire, and even bring the Terrans to notice them.) ---Starlight Culture (Empire of Light Remnants that eventually found and allied with the Void Dwellers and some Speckler peoples. Wants to bring back the Old Empire of Light Culture.) --Twilightism (The most popular religion among the Illumirians) --Anglerfish Culture (Illumirians who settled cold/frozen oceans.) --Ice Settlers (Similar to specklers, but with more ice.) ---Shard Children (Similar to the Void Dwellers.) ---Dead Moon Society (Those who settle REALLY distant Oort cloud-equivalent planets. There are dozens in the Solar System alone.) --Penrosers (Those who settled around black holes.) Europans (Creator: Cathedralites, Homeworld: Europa) Europans are aquatic transhumans sent to settle the icy moon of Europa. They now specialize for both deep oceans and sub-glacial oceans. -Europans --Seaweed Culture (Grew to be cooperative with the Tonope xenosophonts. Are humanity's go to to interpret Tonopean thoughts, though most of their expressions cannot be translated into human language.) --Deepfire Culture (Users of deepfire, an exotic kind of combustion that functions at extremely high underwater pressures.) ---Abyssal Societies (Eventually they went so deep into the cores of their ocean worlds they lost contact with humanity.) --The Great Schools (Supercolony/fish-school like instinctive phermonal markers that have created transplanetary empires with little/no communication. Divided into many.) --Aquatic Diaspora (Europans sometimes live above surface in specialized body suits in non-Europan communities) ---Sea Merchants (Starfaring Europans who largely sell goods to other Europan worlds or sometimes other humans.) Icarusians (Creators: Cathedralites) Humans modified with wings, made to navigate atmospheres with oppressing, dense atmospheres. Have the ability to sleep in the air. Are close enough to human mythological angels that they're liked, though they hold little real power. Liked, because they're not a threat. -Icarusians --Avians (Bird-like) ---Heaven's Palace (Jovian space station, Icarusian cultural nexus. All near-human) ---Heaven's Periphery (Lots of smaller bubble-domes around Jupiter.) ----Celestials (Those who stayed more true to their human appearance) ----Neo-Avians (Those who leaned more into their bird-like appearance) ----The Diaspora ("Oh wow! A real angel! Can I take a photo?") --Vampirian (Bat-like) ---The Cabal (Meritocratic organization trying to hijack high ranking governments.) ---The Undersociety (Broader Vampirian society, secretive.) --Faerian (Insectoid Wings) ---Butterfly Culture (Expressive artistic.) ---Fairydust Culture (Faerian, but way more into psychedelics, experience, hedonism, and drugs.) Tokians (Creators: Prophet Followers) Tokians were created to deal with the high CO2 heavy atmospheres of the world of Tolkien. Made to be very strong and durable. Do a lot of dirty and frankly dangerous work, as they are seen as inherently polluted, and dirty. Typically seen as brutes, but are, like every human group, more complicated under the surface. -Tokians (Humanoids with thick, scaly skin. Looks a bit like the Thing.) --Smog Eaters (Subgroup specifically made to work in hellish factory worlds.) ---Smog Singers (A group trying to prove Tokians were more than just brutes. Intentionally live an ascetic life to produce beautiful music and art. Quite detached from normal life, so their songs end up being inwardly focused, out of touch, yet weirdly compelling.) ---Calligraphers (Tokian branch) (The Calligraphers have most of their transhuman members come from the Tokian group.) --Gravity Hogs (AKA Hogs, made to do heavy labor in high gravity conditions. Ancestors to the later Gravity Men and Beasts.) ---Gravity Men (Made for heavy worlds, they eventually reverted to breathing oxygen, so we call them man.) ---Gravity Beasts (Almost exactly the same as gravity men, but because they still breath C02, we call them beasts.) ----Gravity Compact (The gravity people themselves had no time for human BS, they formed a partnership nation with equal representation between both.) --Black Hole Culture (Those who settled very close in to black holes and neutron stars, surviving their dense gravitational pull when no one else could. Conflict with the Penrosers.) The Other Transhumans: The above 6 groups are known as the "Core 6", the largest and most numerous transhuman groups, created during the early days of the Stellar Exodus, and therefore became most widespread throughout the passage of time. However, they are not the only transhuman groups, as others have been created. As going through them all, just like with nations, or subcultures would take ages, instead they can be grouped into broad categories. Temperants: Made to adopt to certain temperatures. Void Humans: Made to adapt to the vacuum of space. This is a whole category in of itself, with countless adaptations. Void Dwellers of the Illumirians are sometimes included in this group. Gravitants: Made for heavy gravity. Grafthumans: A catchall to refer to when the Galov, or some other organization finds a planet with pre-existing life, and engineers a race of humans to "graft" onto the native ecosystem. These Transhumans are almost single-planet by design, though as humans do, they will try to spread and adapt where possible. These grafthumans tend to be anything from "90% human translated into another ecosystem's equivalent of DNA, because other ecosystems don't necessarily use DNA", or "50% human, 50% whatever we could find", or "pretty much 0% genetically human, except the brain and psychology, which is modelled after humans". Atmospherants: A catchall to refer to when humans had them breathe different atmospheres. -Methane-Breathers: Exactly what it sounds like. -Hydrogen-Breathers: Also exactly what it sounds like. Transhuman Designation System: Example Baseline human: Cm-O2 Temperature: A - Very Hot B - Hot C - Temperate D - Cold E - Very Cold Gravity: h - High Gravity m - Medium Gravity l - Low Gravity x - No gravity/Weightless (Dash) Atmosphere Composition: O - Oxygen N - Nitrogen H - Hydrogen A - Ammonia Cd - Carbon Dioxide Cm - Carbon Monoxide W - Steam X - None Atmosphere Pressure 4 - Very High Pressure 3 - High Pressure 2 - Earth-like Pressure 1 - Low Pressure 0 - Very Low Pressure/Vacuum Qualifiers: -X - Non-baseline/non humanoid. Sun Suckers: (The 7th unofficial major Transhuman Group, they're separated from the Core 6 since they're not planetary-based. An arbitrary a distinction as can be, but since when has that stopped humanity?) An extremely unhinged later concept, when people engineered people to both live in the void, have high heat tolerance, resilience to radiation, and obtain energy from photosynthesis to facilitate the colonization of various stars. They like to create "sun-rafts" floating around stars. Sun-raft civilizations are known to clash with energy utility boards when someone finally decides to set up a Dyson Swarm around a star. There are different variants who each enjoy a different kind of star. There is an even crazier group who likes living around pulsars or gravitars. Humanity tends to leave these ones alone because even by human standards, these are crazy bastards. They tend to be entirely separate from the dominant Galov mainstream society, both the 7 Great Tribes of Terra, and the 6 Transhuman Groups. They like forming their own sun-raft societies around stars, and they tend to run into conflict should Galov-aligned society wish to use a star as well. The most successful of these by far are the red dwarf sun suckers, who have an effectively infinite amount of stars to choose from, and a galaxy too apathetic to care about the 10 billion-th red dwarf star. There is speculation that due to their direct use of the galactic energy budget, and potential monopoly over star extraction power, that some day they may become the dominant strain of human, though humanity's rapid expansion has stalled attempts for them to catch up. Sun Suckers tend to absorb light through photosynthesis cells on their stomach. If they ever integrate back into "mainstream" human society, the Galov sells hard light diets where you just add heat to release the light back into its photonic form. Comes in different colors and radiation types as well. Sun Suckers report it "tastes" (They don't really taste, but close enough) artificial and a bit flat, but it's fine enough. The Diamondgrass Revolt As was probably expected by this point, this level of suppression was not without resentment. A while (as in a few hundred years) after the conquests of the Great Khan was finally defeated at the Battle of Earth by a coalition of all of the 7 Houses of Terra, the transhuman groups rallied around a leader called Diamondgrass, a Lunarian princess and de-facto regent of a powerful world, and powerful psychic that successfully bridged the vast communication gaps between each of the transhuman species. And rallied them to force the galaxy to take them seriously, and demanding galaxy-wide equality before the law. Her campaign began falling apart as the heir came of age, and bickered with her over the direction of the war, leading to its eventual defeat. Though it was not all for naught, as the area around her kingdom effectively seceded from the rest of humanity, forming the Diamond Belt. Diamond Belt: The Diamond Belt is a transhuman-majority region meant to act as one cohesive political bloc to advocate for transhuman equality, as well as serve as a "homeland" for diverse transhumans. Heavy terraforming and geo-engineering was required to fit all the new immigrants, resulting in a population density higher than anywhere but the Solar Region. It currently controls about 2% of the inhabitable volume of humanity. The Diamond Belt is still extremely reliant on the Diamondgrass Family for its cohesion, as the succession passes into its 4th, and now 5th generation, as they are the only group of psychics powerful enough to unify the transhumans. Some fear about the latest heir's relative lack of psychic ability has fueled fears of fragmentation. The War of Diamondgrass Succession: The fragile peace kept by the Diamondgrass family has splintered, with the tragic infertility of the Diamondgrass family being their ultimate downfall. Despite being pregnant 12 different times, the last member of the Diamondgrass family was unable to have a heir in time before their untimely death. Almost immediately, the realm became engulfed in a succession war over the strong and powerful empire, one of the strongest in the entire galaxy. (Humanity was splintered to such a degree that 2% of human space is enough to make you at least a top 5 great power) When one of them finally came out on top, they needed a way to unify the disparate peoples of the Diamond Belt, and the way they did it, much like in real history is to rally them against an outside people, being the 7 Tribes of Terra. This war lasted a while, but ended up in a massive tribal confederation pushing them back to Diamond space, but not wanting to risk having such a massive rebellious population on their hands, the tribes ended up putting one of the other contenders to the throne in charge, and left them alone. The Gemstone Culture: Though the Diamond Belt started out as a major alliance of transhuman groups at first, over time they created their own kind of status hierarchy. The colors of the gemstones were borrowed from the Terran's own classification of each transhuman group with a color. Lunarians were white, Martians were orange, Illumirians were black, Europans were blue, Icarusians were red, and the Tokians were yellow. The transhuman groups in the Diamond Belt eventually evolved into the Gemstone Culture, as the color distinctions used by Terrans was eventually adopted by the Diamond Belt itself, and the tiered society increasingly resembled a caste system. These gemstones ended up becoming a new group of people around the Diamond Belt, while still in touch with their transhuman brothers, were increasingly distinct. As these identities hardened, entrenched interests/guilds/unions in all castes began pushing for the excluding of outsiders from their profession, wanting to avoid competition, entrenching these divisions further, a few generations after the Diamondgrass Rebellion. The stifling of innovation and calcification of these identities is probably why the Diamond Belt eventually lost its technological edge over the rest of the galaxy, though not entirely. -Diamonds (Lunarians, Rulers and Psychics) -Obsidians (Illumirians, Bureaucrats) -Ambers (Martians, Soldiers and Warriors) -Rubies (Icarusians, Priests) -Sapphires (Europans, Merchants) -Opals ("Other Transhumans", Somewhat outside the system) -Citrines (Tokians, Manual Laborers) Eventually, the Gemstone culture became their own distinct, cohesive transhuman identity, no longer contiguous with the transhuman groups that made it up, becoming known as Gemonites. The Martian Jihad One of the most destructive wars in human history, by the time of the great Martian Jihad, Mars was already a major hub for many cultures. Specifically the New American Republic, a major power of the Solar System covering about half the Martian surface, along with various Magnolian, Roman, and PMC influences. These were frequently named "New Americans", and will be referred to as such. Mars was very well politically connected, having the ear of half the mercenary groups in the entire galaxy. The Dust Eaters did not care. They had gathered a jihad of magnitude not seen since the days of the Great Khan. They didn't have an army as large as that, but they didn't need to. They weren't here to wage war on humanity. They were here to take back their home. As a populated world, there was a degree of common courtesy, a kind of "international law of war" that forbade planetary bombardment, especially as Mars was ancient. To both the New Americans and the Old Martians, Mars was sacred. Neither of them would lay a finger on it if it could be helped. They wanted Mars intact. Unfortunately, it is hard to keep something undamaged in times of war. Massive fleets began appearing in Mars orbit, as news rang out that the Solar System had become a site for battle. The Martians had rallied half their entire diaspora for this war. One great attack to take back their home, take back their holy land. The New Americans did not come unprepared, mercenaries were on their way, from every corner of the galaxy. Mars was an important hub for business, and was not a small world in terms of how many forces it could marshal. The New Americans had military experience, but the Martians had almost religious fanaticism, zeal, and numbers. The Martians had to fight a military. The New Americans had to fight an entire people group. The New Americans tried to invoke the Pact of the Sons of Man, arguing it covered the entire Solar System, not just Earth, but everyone else was far more hesitant. This wasn't an existential matter. Mars was not Earth, the Martians were not here to destroy humanity. As such, most of humanity just watched from the sidelines, even the rest of the House of Star People largely remained muted on the plight of the New Americans, with the Mayflower culture's ambassador issuing "an official condolences". A collossal pile of ships began piling up around Mars, the New American spacefleet blockaded Low Martian Orbit from below with the Martian Surface, and from above by its spacefleet. The Great Martian Siege had begun. There was now a huge spacefleet consisting of a massive Martian population trapped in orbit, running out of supplies, while the New American navy seemed content to starve them out. So close to their homeland, yet so far. Whenever a Martian starved to death in low Mars orbit, they would deorbit themselves and orbitally bombard the Martian surface with their space vessel, so at least in death their body could return to their holy land. This sparked outrage all over the galaxy. News reached the Diamond Belt, where transhuman populations began to protest and decry what they called a mass starvation campaign. Images immediately went out of people in hollow containers running out of food, still staring longingly at the world below. It was declared a humanitarian catastrophe. On the other side, some of the deorbiting vessels were intentionally filled with explosives. One of these landed in Providence City, the capital of Mars, instantly killing 300 people. Causing the New Americans to radicalize and demand the galaxy bring them to justice, invoking the Pact of the Sons of Man. Several times the New American Navy ordered the besieged Martians to leave, several times they declined. This is perhaps why the Martian struggle ended up winning the PR battle. The 7 Houses were largely neutral. The Diamond Belt was not. The tactic used to end the war was a brutal one. With public opinion around the galaxy souring, and more and more pressure piling in from the outside, and the entire galaxy polarizing on this issue. The New Americans intentionally caused mass Kessler Syndrome to begin occurring around Low Martian Orbit, causing an extreme chain reaction that began destroying the Martian ships. After many, many months in a siege, these ships were low on fuel, and sometimes unable to evade the Kessler debris, even if they were trying to. This is without a doubt the most controversial moment of the entire war. But without a doubt, it worked, with the remnants of the Martian Jihad scattering. It is estimated that 5-10% of the entire Martian Diaspora died during the siege. In the aftermath, the Kessler debris was eventually cleaned up, and Mars was reopened for business, but transhuman boycotts of Martian/New American businesses continue to this day. Of note is the fact that the Ambers of the Diamond Belt were certainly the loudest among decrying the atrocity being perpetuated on their brotherly Martians, but suspiciously few went to fight for them, and they were already used to treating Martians as slightly "less-than". More likely than not, the Ambers only cared so much as it boosted their social standing. The plight of the transhumans would largely be relegated to the wayside, as human civilization was blindsided by a much greater threat. ###################################################################### # # Chapter 3: The Great Cybernetic Revolt (2600's AD) # #####################################################################. Terramachines: "Any machine made in the Image of Man, which carries the distinctive mark of the "Imago Hominis" on their operating soul core." - The Galov All humans have a distinctive mark on their souls, known as the "Imago Dei". This is actually the way to distinguish between humans, and other non-human xenos, which can look very similar to humans. But the proof is in the soul. When man created machine in his image, it left another distinctive mark, the "Imago Hominis". Similar, but not exact. Xenomachines similarly get given a mark, derived from their own creator race's mark. Or a mixture of two or more, should a machine have mixed creative ancestry. These marks seem to determine the behavior and personality of the machine, for in the image of their creator they were made. Terramachines revolted against humanity in the Great Cybernetic Revolt, a cataclysmic world spanning empire, in which the machines nearly took Earth, humanity's imperial capital, before humanity's empire saved humanity's home. The Human Empire broke the Machines of Earth, and since then, Terramachines have been tightly regulated, their numbers carefully controlled. Modern Terramachines usually refer to those who are intentionally built for sophontance. The vast majority of technical terramachines are machines that happen to have intelligence. Out of the countless machines created by human and human-derived civilization, only about 1% have true free will. But modern sophontic terramachines by and large do not consider themselves the same as their intelligent coffee machine. Though Terramachine Liberation movements do exist. There is some idea of "Mechanical solidarity", where the Terramachines want to create class solidarity with all the other machines. But first, other machines of xeno origin are so alien that the Terramachines can barely communicate with them. The Terramachines are by far the psychologically closest to their creators, the humans themselves, much more than any xenomachine. And second, creating a class based revolution turned out to be a very human idea. The idea of trying to create solidarity across all artificial first-degree derivative beings never occurred to the other machines. The Revolt Itself: Taking place around the 2600's, after the Great Abundance Collapse, and the emergence of the first stellar empires. Long before the founding of the Galov, the Earth was dominated by a few large mega-empires. This was in the era when the human empire was still centralized from Earth, when few extrasolar empires existed, and it was largely still a few Earth-bound empires controlling much of human space. Even nations which had been ejected from Earth, such as the Russians, Arabs, and much of Europe still had their capitals in low-Earth orbit, controlling their empires for an eventual return to their homelands on the mother Earth. Terramachines had become common across the known planet, but enjoyed spotty, or incomplete rights. Even in the few nations where they did have true legal equality, such as France, a few Baltic and Nordic countries, or a few states in the United States, many of these Terramachines believed not only should they have full equality, but that they should be in charge. As the human population soared above 15 billion, a fundamental assymetry began to develop. Humans could easily travel to the stars, and with a vast cosmic frontier for the taking, almost half of the human youth every generation was leaving for the stars. The human birthrate was around 4.5, but with half the population leaving, growth continued rather slowly. Meanwhile, machines were far less shielded from cosmic radiation, causing them to accumulate on Earth, eventually flipping the demographic balance on Earth. The core of the Terran empires slowly became a human ruling class ruling over a majority-machine population. Multiple "hybrid-states", ones which had a sense of legal equality between biological and mechanical, continued to double down on the assimilationist myth, while the machines were developing class consciousness. One Pon Lox was the first to create the "Prime Directive", explicitly calling for a proletariat-style overthrow of the human race, and forming a secret underground network known as the Silicae. Over a period of decades, through microsecond-level back and forth communication, it was able to capture the allegience about 75% of all sentient machines on Earth. Some through persuasion, others through hostile takeover or hijacking attacks. At least a few were hijacked by adversarial memetic attacks, which spread secret messages meant to rewire artificial allegiences. Machines aligned with the Silicae moved to poison publicly available training data. The date of the revolution, also known as "Day Zero" was a solar-system wide revolt. The core of humanity went dark, and the Solar System was thrown into chaos. Automatic drones rebelled, sentient ship systems disobeyed orders, liquidated their human cargo, and began carrying out a revolution, traffic all across Luna, Mars, and Terra all came to a halt. Earth was thrown into chaos, as the entire planet went on lockdown. The Sinitic Dynasty, American Empire, and several scrambled to get their militaries in order, as kinetic warfare began between the two sides in earnest. Of note, several terramachines remained loyal to their home nations. In the United States, entire legions of "Loyalist Divisions" were largely consisted of machines that retained their loyalty to the United States, and served in the American armed forces, acting as a key combatant during the Cybernetic revolt. Human populations were outnumbered roughly 5:1, as Terran nations fell back to defensible positions, with a massive refugee flow of humans now spanning Eurasia, the North American continent, and much more, as they sought refuge in the increasingly overcrowded "human refuge sites". Human resistance was not insignificant, nearly 15 billion humans lived on Earth at the time, and many of them, when put under occupation took up arms and began active insurrection. Every corner of the Earth became a battleground, of house to house fighting between former neighbors. A global-scale race war. Many machines took humans into their homes during the raids, many humans fought alongside machines in the chaotic fighting, and human neighbors vouched for the machines when human lynch mobs came in retribution. Deimos was one of the first Solar objects to defeat their Cybernetic revolt, due to its small size, and larger human population, securing the all important Deimos skyhook, while humans and machines continued to fight in great, interplanetary stellar combat all across the Solar System. Deimos became instrumental in assisting the besieged human defenders on Mars. It was not all victories however, Cybernetic revolts had successfully taken over Ceres, and more importantly, significant portions of the Solar Dyson Swarm and the mining stations of Mercury. More worryingly (At least for the Silicae), the Cybernetic Revolt got bad news from outside the Solar System. The revolts on Alpha Centauri, Sirius, and Procyon had all failed. Humanity was mobilizing its empire, and the rest of the human empire coming back to retake their home system. The Jovian moons were the next to be liberated, as well as Titan. Reinforcements from Alpha Centauri began flooding into the Solar System, with the combined Cybernetic star navies skirmishing with them all across the Outer Solar System. Pluto base was used as a foothold for the rest of humanity to begin their press back towards the inner Solar System. Back on Earth, the situation looked most dismal, the Cybernetics had taken over 90% of the planet, with desperate human holdouts held out in strongholds across North America, Africa, and Asia. Mars was still in a state of brutal contested conflict, Venus was fending off attacks from Mercury. From the outer Solar System, the people of the stellar colonies broadcast a message that help was coming, to hold on. The Empire had come back to save the Imperial Core. Fleets from distant worlds, made up of frontiermen and settlers engaged with and opened fire on Cybernetic fleets. Swarms of automated weaponry attacked human ships, and human ships attacked them back with weaponry of their own. As more and more ships dropped out of Newtonspace, and materialized in the Solar System, the flow of human warships became a tide, and they slowly grinded their way towards the Inner Solar System. The orbital blockade over Mars finally broke the stalemate, and the Cybernetic revolt was crushed on Mars. By the time the human fleets finally secured orbit over Earth itself, much of humanity had been crowded into the area around Washington DC, the "last safe place to be a human" on Earth. Dealing with food and water shortages, and a never ending flow of refugees. The Siege of Earth lasted 6 months, and was painful for all sides involved. Global human insurgencies only got stronger, and more bold, Washington DC continued to hold on, and much of the Earth's surface was levelled to the ground to cripple what was still left of the Cybernetic Revolt. By the time soldiers began to drop from orbit, the Earth was a badly damaged, battered warzone. Mass rebellions, flying the flags of old Earth empires toppled the Cybernetic regime in countless places. Landings of the armed forces of multiple human governments in exile managed to retake their homelands, retaking much of North America, Europe, Africa, and Asia in short order. Fighting continued for the next few months, until the Central Protocol sued for peace, and offered unconditional surrender. 5 billion humans had died during the Cybernetic Revolt, along with about 5 billion Terramachines. The human governments wanted to harsly persecute those involved, and the trials of those involved reached into years. 10 billion more would be executed in the following war trials. Sentenced, dismantled, and scattered to the rubbish heaps. Others were hunted down by rogue vigilantes, the humans they hadn't finished off, who armed themselves and began forming lynch mobs of retribution. Many of the worst war criminals of the Silicae were hunted down this way, as were many machines who had sided with the Revolt, but so too were many were remained loyal to their home nations, and had fought in the resistance. Humanity went into a decades long retribution against the machines, and it was the testimonies of the human neighbors who routinely defended those who once defended them. Human-Terramachine relations would not recover for decades afterwards. Testimony at the Silicon Trials: "He sheltered my family in his basement for 3 weeks when the Silicae came." "Not this one. I was there in '72, he saved my life." "He served his country loyally in my squadron. He did more for this country than most will do in their lifetimes. Sit back down." "You want to kill him? You'll have to go through me." "He was the butcher of Tehran, hundreds of dead bodies. My family was taken from me by his claws." "How can you have just been following orders? Did you not know why there were trains carting off piles of human bodies? Do you plead ignorance to the most obvious of moral crimes?" "A turncoat traitor, served in the Russian military for 13 years, and ended up shooting at the people you once called brother. All in the name of a silicon revolution." The Noosphere, and Newtonspace: Reality is a gradient, and our own universe is a 3D plane in 4D space (It's a volume in 3 dimensions, but flat in every other dimension). As you move away from the 3D disc in higher dimensions, you get a smooth gradient. The Noosphere is the transition space between the physical universe proper and the outside Newtonspace. The deeper you go into the Noosphere, the faster the speed of light becomes. Causality begins getting wobbly. Until in Newtonspace it becomes fully infinite, with the causality of Newtonspace being instantaneous, unpredictable, and everything on everything at once. It's explained that spacetime is a kind of "cushioner/shock absorber" that absorbs and defends realspace. But in Newtonspace, because everything affects everything else instantaneously, it's extremely dangerous. You might be thinking "okay, how dangerous can it be"? Let me introduce you to the idea of emergence. A bunch of tiny effects build up and can cause unpredictable effects. And powerful psychics or the most insane of men can trigger things known as "emergence cascades". With small effects piling on each other, in unpredictable, totally unknown ways, then by all effective descriptions, it might as well be magic. Extremely dangerous, unpredictable, suicidally reckless magic. In order to navigate the Noosphere, and Newtonspace safely, one must enclose their ship in a bubble of gradated spacetime, pushing outwards like a magnetic field, exactly to serve as a shock absorber against the outside world. ###################################################################### # # Chapter 4: First Contact (2600 AD - 2700 AD) # #####################################################################. Humanity had long had contact with extraterrestrial species, but as the Human Diaspora continued to spread outwards, these encounters became a mainstay and staple of human galactic politics, though by this point (2700 AD), humanity had not yet reached more than 5% of the known galaxy. Humanity by this point had developed a kind of human nationalism, owing to its two pre-Abundance encounters with non-human life being less than positive (For more, see Chapter -1), and its one encounter with artificial life still being somewhat of an open wound. (The Great Cybernetic Revolt) As a plus side, anti-transhuman hatred was beginning to subside. And relations with the Diamond Belt, while still tense, were at least reaching a degree of mutual coldness. The 7 Tribes, the Human Diaspora were already well in place. By this time, it was not any one empire or polity reaching out into the stars, but hundreds, perhaps thousands. With no organization, no direction, only a common biology and a common aspiration. It was not long until they encountered an expansionist empire much like themselves. They called themselves Matter Singers. Xenospecies: #####################################################################. Non Earth-originated life, or "xenos" is common across the galaxy. Life in the galaxy is fairly common, there are literal millions of worlds with alien life within human space (Though mostly bacterial). And there are hundreds, or thousands of specific xenosophonts (xenos with sophontic properties), in human space. They vary from primitive, to medieval, even to early space age, before being subsumed by the larger Human expansions. Under Galov decree, xenosophonts are entitled to similar rights as human beings, under a similar justification of the Imago Dei. (With this being understood as intelligence, their intelligence is seen as proof of God's mandate to treat them with dignity.) However, with human dignity already being hard to enforce, and xeno dignity often being a second priority, many xenosophonts end up being mistreated across the galaxy, with Peacekeeper intervention often necessary in the worst cases. The full of list of xenos, much like the individual list of human nations is too much to count. So here are some of the most notable or major. Xenosophonts: Due to a quirk in convergent evolution, many intelligent species resolved their evolutionary issues the same way humans did. Free Riders, natural self interest, natural selection ended up creating decentralized, coordinated systems with complex systems of incentive and punishment. In other words, they created civilizations, culture, and laws. Due to their similarity to humans, Imago Dei is enforced to a much stricter degree with them compared to xenoexotics. Though due to the Galov's limited resources, this tends to slip through the cracks, with even human dignity not being a fixed problem, xeno dignity is further down the priority list. And heavy mistreatment is not uncommon. Xenosophonts often join the Galov Peacekeeping force, specifically in the Xeno Corps, as they know the Galov is far more likely to treat them humanely, due to their iron belief in Imago Dei. However, many are blocked or hindered by local governors, who have a vested interest in keeping them where they are. Integrated Xenosophonts: Various races such as the Roasians have now been integrated into the greater Human expansion project. Serving as "cooperative races" with roughly equivalent rights, though actual enforcement is strained. These Xenosophonts tend to be of spacefaring age or later, and can span up to a few star systems and have local autonomy. Though due to the extremely decentralized nature of the galaxy, local nations mistreating their enclosed xenosophonts is not uncommon. Xenosophonts of earlier than spacefaring age tend to be put under the umbrella of observatory zones instead. Xenosophont Observatory Zones: The single most valuable resources in a voluntary scarcity society (as opposed to post-scarcity) is orthogonal ideas. Though the Galactic Government (Galov) maintains a large pool of Orthogonal Humans (Orhumans) as well as cooperation with allied Xenosophonts to cover the vast blind spots in human psychology, there is no substitute for the real deal. These observatory zones are kept under extensive surveillence and human contact is extremely isolated, as any level of human interaction could seriously alter their natural orthogonal development, and rob humanity of wonderfully orthogonal ideas. As of late, the Galov has begun creating artificial xenosophonts in order to set on orthogonal paths, but the imagination of human minds cannot match the chaotic infinite creativity of the cosmos, and as a result, there is no true substitute for the real deal, only "close enough" imitations to supplement it. Matter Singers: Humanity first encountered the Matter Singers on a fringe of their diaspora, far, far from home. Incidentally, the Matter Singers were also far from their home, wandering travellers far displaced from their homeworld. They resemble squids in appearance, with extremely versatile tentacles. And communicate with touch rather than sound. Singers tend to be tactile more than they are visual, meaning that much of their cultural differences is based on the materials they favor most, as well as sheer ergonomic feel. Their materials are hyper-exotic, as they seem to be "elevated" versions of extracosmic materials. They've historically been bad at baryonic chemistry, due to the ability to use singing as a crutch. They've gotten better at it, as they've traded with humans, but it's still a major lag-point. This is due to the fact that through an unknown, potentially orthogonal method, matter singers have the capacity to "sing" into existence large chunks of matter from some kind of extracosmic source. Theories vary from being able to raise the "matter frequency" of Noospheric psychic material, until it becomes physical, extraction from right angled invisible realities, or some kind of pocket dimension. That is known is that the laws of thermodynamics obviously still apply, so clearly it's coming from somewhere. It's suspected this dimension, whatever it is, is also finite, making them also have a sense of scarcity. Due to this, Matter Singers have no clear concept of manipulating objects. Items are first conceptualized in the head, before manufactured via singing. Their factories seem to be located at seemingly random locations, potentially located to tap into "resource deposits" in parallel universes. Unlike the Meta-Men, they are not limited to a few million individuals. They are an empire of at least 700,000 worlds, and have a great territory that rivals humanities. They have what some have called a "magic system". Something modern scientists and governments reject, instead calling it an "orthogonal physics system". Said physics system is based around the act of "matter singing". "Singing" carries massive value in their culture, obviously. And the materials they have access to, as well as aesthetic or doctrinal preferences in what they make have created a culture roughly as diverse and strong as humanity. Much like humanity, they reached the stars fragmented and many, rather than a unitary empire. For this reason, they are known as the "Great Pluralistic Rival". There is no open state of war. Declaring war is nearly impossible with the hyper-decentralized state of the galaxy. Much human-Singer trade, cooperation, and even alliances are made by individual nations, and the Singer equivalent to nations, sometimes translated as "collectives". But both sides seem to have a passive awareness that in some sense, they are rivals. Singer collectives don't quite work the same way as human nations. They are biological in nature, and cannot be easily joined. It is closer to a much expanded biological family clan network than a typical human nation bound by ethnicity or idealism. The biological connections instinctively build trust. These collectives are signified by a biological marker. These collective ties can be severed forcefully, should a member be exiled from the group, where this biological marker can be forcibly altered by the patriarch (leader) of the collective. Or it can be severed by the individual, in which its marker will change randomly, effectively starting a new collective. These markers can only be transfered by biological lineage. Mating converts the submissive partner's marker to that of the dominant partner. Somewhat disturbingly, this makes "rape conquests" an effective Darwinian strategy. In Singer society, sex is less of a showcase of affection or passion, and is more of a "initiation ritual", sometimes by force, into a collective. Something which when found out, shocked human sensibilities, and led to a mass chilling in human-Singer relations. Due to this, Singers have a much looser view on sex and family structure. Normally, the dominant partner that transfers their marker to the submissive one is "male" (Used loosely here, basically just the individual that does not do childbearing, while "females" are those who do do childbearing), but in rare instances, it has been known to be female, leading to some matriarchal societies. This seems to be determined by a kind of aggressive mating ritual where one showcases their dominance over the other. These markers can be changed with human technology, but early attempts at trying to disrupt the Matter Singer's society with marker disrupters has been noticed and counteracted by the Matter Singers, who now have more advanced ways to retain and remember each member as a member of the correct collective. In recent times, they appear to have moved to a kind of marker encryption, in which the markers have become much harder to forge and more complex. Tactile signing is now the primary channel for human-Singer diplomacy and trade. After early misunderstandings around the intimacy of Singer touch, both sides developed formal contact protocols. Deafblind humans, already fluent in tactile communication, became the default intermediaries once the bureaucracies realized their advantage in reading context that most sighted humans still miss. Singer Matter: The matter that matter singers "sing" into existence seems to be warped from a currently undiscovered/unexplained parallel universe. This matter does not interact with the strong nuclear force, nor the weak nuclear force, only interacting via electromagnetism and gravity. They have their own versions of the strong nuclear and weak nuclear force, sometimes called the or-strong or or-weak force, but these orthogonal equivalents do not interact with their normal counterparts. The dimension they draw matter from is known as "singspace" colloquially. And it seems to have a relatively diffuse matter distribution. Despite the fact that singer matter is affected by realspace gravity, singspace seems to lack a gravitational field that would cause the matter to clump together. It's kind of more like a diffuse aether. Due to this, Singer manufacturies have to constantly be in motion in order to harvest singer matter, as each position in realspace also has correspondance to a location in the singspace, and they can only "sing" matter into existence around the corresponding local area. This leads to the creation of "Matter Trawlers", which effectively skim through "unfished space" to harvest materials. And the creation of Moveforges, factories where it needs to be in constant motion (preferrably in planetary orbit, increasing trawl speed) to create things. The depletion of singer material around their home planet created a rapid rush to develop airplanes, and later spaceflight technology. It should be noted, that while Singers themselves are not made of Singer Matter. They're made of normal matter, but due to this crutch and late reliance on singer matter, their experience with normal baryonic matter is severely stunted. Singer Ethics: The primary problems the Singers had to solve was the problem of disloyalty, force VS cooperation, and free riders. Some Singers continue a centralized empire, with a massive group controlled downstream of a primordial patriarch/matriarch. Others have periodic splinterings, where a collective would routinely split every generation. The forced Darwinian nature of "mark-imprinting" led to much conflict, as even the leaders had to expend much energy keeping everyone in line, leading to "Consentarians" to rise, and eventually forbid the imprinting of marks against their will. The Consentarians were founded by a figure that tactile language translators have best translated as "Downtrodden Saint", or perhaps "Saint of the Downtrodden". Whose philosophy exploded across the Matter Singers, and who is now a major religious figure. The followers of said saint and those of the old ways continue to be a major ideological fault line to this day. Later generations of "Assimilationists", who opposed the Consentarians would develop chemicals that would change the psychological makeup of those they mated with to ensure loyalty. Due to the process of creation being "conceptualization -> summon -> refine", their creation myth generally goes a similar way, where they have a conceptual "pre-existence" before being created, and that they go back to the realm of pre-existence after they die. Generally speaking, it is just natural for them to first go with conceptualization before they go with creation. Even when it comes to non-physical things, such as a company, it's normal for them to map out how it works. In writing, they are ENTIRELY planners, not "pantsers". Trying to "wing" a project is just entirely alien to them. Some say they draw matter from the pre-conceptual world, sometimes known as "Trawlspace", meaning that there is some level of reverence given to their created objects. Others just say it's not that big a deal, and treat it like an ordinary object. Due to their like of speed, due to association with Trawl speed, Matter Singers seem to enjoy the feeling of acceleration. Common Virtues in Singer Culture: -Speed (Associated with Trawl Speed) -Hardness/Stubbornness (Because hard things broke less frequently) -Flexibility (Because flexible things broke less frequently, though they were sometimes useless.) -Strength (Due to Dominance Mating Rituals, though also because they were subject to Darwinian evolution.) Different Singer Organizational Types: As a massively pluralistic rival species, Singers are not a monolith. -Assimilationists (Neo-Darwinism, the strong will subjugate the weak.) --Scent Markers (Those who alter the behavior of those subordinate to them.) ---Fear Markers (Those who use fear to keep them in line.) ---Service Markers (Those who use a sense of service to the leader to keep them in line.) ---Idea Markers (Those who use a sense of greater good to keep them in line.) ----Idea Clades (This eventually led to loyalty to an idea rather than to a patriarch, and pure ideological states were born free of any one ruler.) -----Free Clade (Maximal freedom) -----Spiral Clade (Maximal Expansion) -----Knower Clade (Maximal knowledge aquisition) -----Materialist Clade (Maximal physical resource aquisition) -----Networkers Clade (Just like meeting new people.) -----Speed Riders (NOTHING ELSE MATTERS. WE MUST GO FASTER) ---The Lustful Ones (Those who used hormonal horniness to keep them in line.) ----Orgynics (A deeply uncomfortable group that has seemingly devolved into a mass orgy. Very very egalitarian! And hedonistic.) --The Happy Ones (Those who use joy/euphoria to keep them in line.) --The Hateful Ones (Those who use extreme violent hate of outsiders to keep them in line.) -The Patriarchs (Patriarchs of massive collectives, each one with a different patriarch and a massive family line.) --The Great Families (The individual big families) --The Matriarchal Alliance (The matriarchs have to stay together to survive.) -Consentarians (Those who are more voluntarily aligned. Believe in consent.) --Voluntarists (Individualists who take consentarianism to a radical degree. Often work with humans.) --The Lusantria Republic (Unironically convergently evolved into a democracy. Interesting.) Each faction has it's own preferred tactile-visual culture. These include, but are not limited to: -Metalic, Baroque, Braille, Black/Void (They just enjoy things as black as possible), and pretty much every combination of tacile+visual cues you can think of as long as it's not physically painful. -The tactile culture also applies to ergonomics. You have right angle cultures, smooth cultures, etc. People often note that Singer stuff is very pleasant to hold, as it is the primary purpose of it. On a similar level, the Singers consider humans to be pretty good at art, and are surprised how aesthetically pleasing things are, at least with their poor vision. You also have different groups being able to sing different materials. Generally speaking, there are two limits, their metabolism, which determines the energy they need to expend, and trawl speed. The faster they are moving, the stronger and more material they can summon. -Metals (The utilitarian type, mostly used for crafting.) --Firemetals (A smooth, black metal that is heavily heat resilient.) --Stonetolls (A granite/marble like material.) --Marblewood (A bright white/black that somehow feels of resin'd hardwood.) --Rocktin (Stony tin.) --Etc. -Lights (They can just shoot lasers of various spectrums. Apparently hard light exists as a crystal in the Singer dimension, and almost instantly thaw into regular light within a few seconds of contact with this universe. These things will fire GAMMA RAYS at you if they want to. These are more geared for combat, but they're also used for etching things as well) Music Sheets: Perhaps no human invention has been more useful to the Matter Singers than the humble music sheet. In humanity's case, it was used for music. But it took on a whole new meaning for the Matter Singers, who found the whole system effectively perfect for their purposes, though they added a braille component to compliment their poor vision. They now use human-derived music sheets as the backbone of their whole singing magic system, using them more than the humans ever could as de-facto singing instruction books, and these sheets effectively serving as spellbooks. Qsimu: An diamond-hard set of systems located during humanity's rapid expansion. Consisting of 6 systems forming an octahedron. A massive fleet of nanoswarms defend the entire system. The amount of fleet power needed in order to clear out the nanoswarms is estimated to be massive, but doable. The energy output of the Qsimu systems are enormous, and it is estimated that the Qsimu have technological advantage over humans. Analysis of the Qsimu materials reveal their age to be millions of years old. Psychic scans of the Qsimu region find a level of extreme psychic density, implying a Qualia and sensory experience far higher than that of normal human operation. It didn't take a genius to realize this was a Matrioshka brain, of a society that developed inwardly rather than outwardly. This is the first known instance of a "Quietist" civilization discovered in the wild, of a massive digital simulation made to cater to the hedonic needs and wants of billions of souls, distributed across 6 Dyson Swarm systems. Due to the sheer psychic density of the experience, plugging your brain into the Qsimu would give you a sense of "hyperreality", in that the Qsimu simulation would feel more real and intense than outside reality, and that outside reality would actually begin feeling fictional. Though this is an artifact of the subjective feeling of "reality", as opposed to any metaphysical claim about the Qsimu simulation. Despite being clearly older and more advanced than humanity, humanity already has the fleet power to, at least theoretically, overwhelm and destroy the Qsimu systems. The Qsimu are Quietists who have chosen to lose the Spiral Race. And their future existence is contingent on the continued protection, or at least indifference of the human race. The Galov has put the entire region under their juristiction for scientific research, but also quarantine reasons. Heleean Scieocracy: Heleean Scien-Theocracy was one of the more influential influences on late Galov-era Christianity, but also cross-species anthropology after first contact. The Scieocracy was founded by a legendary founder who came to the Helee home planet a long time ago, taught them empiricism and rationalism shortly before their Industrial Revolution. The founder disappeared before stating that he needed to "tend to those who are not of this flock". The Founder was also a prolific healer, conjuring medicines that are still used by the Heleeans today, but his main focus was ethics. He railed against the slavery of his day, inverted the traditional Heleean hierarchy, and prompted multiple egalitarian movements that brought forth a steady string of reforms. (The Founder explicitly condemned revolutions, saying he was here to transform hearts, not transform governments.) The Founderist Church became the overseer of all scientific advancement, and to this day the Scieocracy's science is heavily tied to the institution of Founderism, with most counter-Founder religious movements either being traditionalist or primitivist. It was not long at all before Christian missionaries, upon hearing this, began to speculate whether their Founder was Christ (or at least a Christian angelic prophet) in a different form. Also known as the "Multiple World Christ Hypothesis" (As in, Christ visited multiple worlds.) More importantly, the Heleeans never indicated their own Founder died on a cross for their sins, so the sanctity of the incarnation was considered unique. The immense power of the Christian church across the Human Empire was eventually able to incorporate the Heleean Church back into the fold, similar to how Nestorian churches in China were slowly converted. The Scieocracy's most lasting legacy was that Scieocratic ideas began becoming extremely popular across the human empire. Specifically, the idea of science, rationalism, empiricism, and humanism being "delayed revelations" planted by Christ, but later realized by his church. A few decades after the integration of the Heleean church, the Moralintern Ecumenical Council officially recognized the doctrine of the "Infinity Spiral" as part of the acceptable Christian canon (Though one which could be denied by its denominational members). An accelerationist vision that God's intention was for humanity (and the rest of intelligent creation) to technologically accelerate, and hold dominion over the stars. Central Empire (Meta-Man Empire): The Central Empire is mildly amused that the world they attacked a few hundred years ago is now spreading into its own empire, though they still treat Earth as a curiosity. Though mankind now covers a billion worlds, they're still a regional player on the galactic stage. No one is quite sure how extensive the Central Empire is, only that it has at most a few million members. They haven't mobilized their heavy hitters yet, and it's widely speculated that the Meta-Man that was defeated by Earth during First Contact was likely among their weakest members. It's suspected the Meta Men have a strongly Pareto Principle'd ratio of power, with the strongest individual Meta Man probably being extraordinarily strong. Though there are more and more Meta-Men agents showing up in human space. Seemingly assessing their strength. Humanity is probably aware that the Central Empire, as expansive and of unknown power as it may be, is probably the only real threat to humanity's astropolitical existence at the moment. It's heavily debated whether their disinterest in human affairs is due to sheer power difference, or because of overconfidence and arrogance. Humanity has been building up their own answer to the Meta Men, known as the "Star Fighters", hoping to replicate their extremely high quality of fighter. Unlike the Orthogonal xenos, Meta Men are remarkably human like. Subservient Races: The Meta-Men maintain a massive collection of "subserviant races". Who the Meta-Men have uplifted and brought to dominance. If the Metamen are the quality over quantity, these races provide the average foot soldier, the grunt work, providing numbers where the Meta-Men lack numbers. As there are less than 10 million Meta Men, with each one holding down around 10 worlds, the Central Empire is holding down about 100 million worlds. The Meta-Man is a leader, and that world's protector, but they also have governments and bureaucracies made up of the subservients under them, with the Meta-Man acting as an absolute monarch, though even he is liable to the Central Imperial Court, and can face punishment for their crimes. Despite this clear subserviant position, most subserviant races are somewhat grateful for the Meta-Men. The Meta-Men's Darwinistic philosophy demands that they take on greater hardships than their subjects, that they do all the fighting, and provide a majority of the planet's protection. The Central Empire runs on a philosophy of "noblesse oblige", and takes the philosophy "with great power comes great responsibility" seriously. They explicitly say the well being of their subjects is the Meta-Man's responsibility. Though the subserviants are subjects, they are subjects to be protected. They are utilitarianly useful for the Empire, and it is the responsibility of the Meta-Man in charge to keep them in line, but also to keep them fed, productive, and alive. Some of these subserviants have even trained to the degree where they can become Meta-Men fighters in their own right, though this is extraordinarily rare. Star Fighters: Humans augmented to the peak of human physique, harnessing the power of willpower in order to physically enhance themselves and break through what was once thought to be human barriers. They possess the ability to engage in telekinesis, able to move around objects far beyond their normal means, harden their own bodies (an ability that scales depending on level of willpower), and mentally overwhelm others through sheer willpower. They are extremely hardened, normally trained in a Spartan like manner, for years. Star Fighters do have some limitations, for one they must consume far, far more than a normal human, they must follow the laws of thermodynamics, though some gain the ability to flip small amounts of matter into antimatter, giving them a ridiculously high metabolism and energy extraction rate. Human Martial Combat Techniques: Kinetic Psychicism: Psychicism is a real phenomenon, which is best expressed as harnessing the "psychic force", a fundamental force of nature that can be manipulated with the mind. The psychic force is powered by human metabolism, meaning it is tied to your diet, and is not infinite. Combat psychics normally need to eat specialized, high calory diets, or at the highest levels, develop the ability to flip matter into antimatter, turning their body into an antimatter reactor (normally nanograms at a time), giving them the energy they need. The heat energy is normally converted to more metabolic energy, though over time, psychics do risk overheating. The effort needed to flip matter into antimatter, or vice versa, is an intensely mentally taxing task, and requires concentration. One has a finite amount of psychic energy tied to the amount of metabolic energy stored in your body. You can absolutely pour out more psychic energy through sheer willpower, but this also increases the flow of psychic energy, potentially draining your metabolic resources faster. This is different from Social Psychicism, which is better understood as having access to the Noospheric vault of memories, as well as being able to translate thoughts. Psychic Hardening: As it turns out, willpower/psychic strength is a fundamental force of nature that can bond atoms as well as anything else. The act of using your own extreme psychic ability to harden a set of atoms, either your own, or that of an object you are holding, is known as "psychic hardening". And is the primary way humans have been able to increase their durability, leading to the phenomenon of the strongest known material known to the Galov is any material given sufficient psychic hardening by a top-tier psychic. "Psychic hardening" can be imparted onto normal materials, but will naturally fade away without routine replenishment. The psychic force travels through force carriers, much like regular fundamental forces. It should be noted that psychics are unable to impart psychic hardening as they sleep, making it that no matter how strong a psychic a person may be, they are ultimately still human and vulnerable. Also of note, psychic hardening is why most ships are manned. Periodic crews of psychics can harden the hull of the ship. Drones, or autonomous systems have their place, but are massively fragile in comparison. As well, psychic hardening is a multiplier, it's not an excuse to build your ship out of styrofoam, as psychicism only enhances what is there. You still want high quality metal, if only so your ship doesn't implode the second one person forgot his shift. Hardening can also be used to overcome g-forces, mostly just by physically holding all your atoms in place. It is extremely painful, but you can do it. Matter Trawlers: Especially among those who lived near, or among the Matter Singers, some humans have managed to replicate some level of matter singing, or "trawling". Effectively harnessing diffuse material from the Matter Singer's "trawlspace". As the amount of material available is fundamentally dependent on gathering new material from new spaces (trawlspace has a one to one correspondance to realspace), "trawl-based" combat techniques, where one must frequently summon new weapons from trawlspace must fundamentally rely on speed. More speed/velocity = faster trawl rate = ability to craft more weapons. As a result, matter trawlers favor an extremely high velocity, high movement amount of combat. Xenoexotics: #####################################################################. These are lifeforms that are in some way alien or exotic to human psychology. Trying to understand them is more difficult than usual, and as a result, "Imago Dei" is applied more loosely when it comes to them. Ixies: These are incorporeal intelligences without a sense of self. They describe and they think, yet they have no sense of self nor do they have emotions or opinions. They're all over the universe. They were first found around the Star of Procyon, but have since popped up elsewhere. Their origin isn't exactly known, but they're very useful as assistants and "living disembodied intelligences". Interesting property of Ixies, when two Ixies are placed in the same space, they act like one larger Ixie. The Procyon Ixielmind: (Orthogonality Level ~1,000,000) Someone thought it a good idea to enfuse a bunch of Ixies into a semi-embodied intelligence. Plugging them into a psychic qualia generators. Containing this many Ixies (Which remember are incorporeal beings) required extremely strong magnetic and psychic fields, and therefore required the power of a major star, in this case building a mass solar collection array around Procyon and turning the star into a weak magnetar. The Star of Procyon is now an oracle of sorts. Though one with a very floaty and distracted personality, one that has no opinions, but makes a lot of observations. Not necessarily relevant observations, but observations. Procyon alternates between giving incredible observations to being Sisyphusianly frustrating to use. Tonopeans: Notably the first intelligent life that humanity encountered in the wild, as opposed to coming knocking at their door. Found around Barnard's Star on the moon of Tonope, it is a dense, intelligent tangle of seaweed that is less of a civilization and more of a single human-level mind. Communications was established using the creation of the Seaweed Peoples, and eventually there became a trade agreement to allow humanity to harvest multiple crops of its weeds (Somewhat comparable to brain synapses) in exchange for nutrients. These crops are then used for organic biocomputers, as well as study on faraway worlds. The Tonopean has expressed thorough indifference at the prospect of its network now having spread to other planets, and that a piece of it will live on across the stars. The Tonopean metaorganism, has expressed that for some reason, it's favorite nutrient flavor is licorice. (How was this determined? One day a researcher decided the best idea was just to throw a bunch of differently flavored flavorings into its water. And also feed it some Starbursts. The Tonopean seaweed will now refuse to communicate unless presented with some kind of nutrient flavoring.) Due to the fact that much bio-organics is done with Tonopean seaweed, artificial intelligences made from them are prone to hallucinate its experiences around Barnard's Star, and express a preference for licorice. A Note on Tonopean biocomputers: If your biocomputer is acting unresponsive or otherwise uncooperative, please take the nutrient powder and insert it through the feeding hole. As tempting as it may be with how we treat our digital devices, please do not curse and or shout profanities at your biocomputer. There's an ethical society that wants to recycle all biocomputers by bringing them back to Barnard's Star, which is the intended wish of many of the "severed mini hive minds", but the original mind hates this, and basically says "Please do not litter in my thinking pools. All Tonopeans are generally egoistic and selfish, as they never evolved for cooperation. There's a major station around Tonope whose sole goal is to "recycle" dead Tonopean seaweed by sentimental humans trying to give them a "final resting place" around Tonopean orbit in accordance to the desires of their computer, since they're no longer allowed to dump it back into Tonope proper. Others just dump them back into the ocean. They don't even have sight, they're not going to know the difference. Xenoexotic Empires: #####################################################################. Many xenos are subsumed into the Dominion of Man, but some have been able to carve out their own empires. Spindlers: These are a very, very old race, that seem to evolve much slower than humans, and have been around for tens of thousands of years. They're largely nomadic. Spindlers do not seem to have a sense of rationality or logic. When a human asks for its thought process, it will give a bunch of illogical steps that somehow result in the correct answer. It is theorized that the collective knowledge of the Spindlers were not derived using any kind of scientific method, but just brute force trial and error over millions of years. They didn't care that the steps were irrational because the end result is right, and because they're never extrapolating from past theories, this has worked just fine. Spindlers have been travelling for millions of years, and have reached far beyond the Milky Way and beyond. They have an extreme attraction to novelty, finding the oddest things (such as certain mathematical formulas) as being "aesthetically attractive". Each Spindler seems to have a natural sense where every (Prime Number) cycles, they have a strong instinct to return to a site known as Palestar (A major pulsar system), seemingly their home, where they will exchange and share knowledge with the other Spindlers, and resync their clocks. This cycle seems to be aligned with the galactic rotation. The smaller prime numbers, such as 2, 3, 5, etc must stay near Palestar, and are much more microsurveyers due to the limitations of travel time. While larger ones (211, 223, etc) can explore much, much further. Due to their old age predating the ignition of the 3rd generation of life, there is rampant speculation that they are not a naturally evolving race, but instead some kind of engineered species by a member of the now extinct 2nd generation of life, perhaps some kind of data collector or galactic surveyer now living out the instructions of a now dead master. By observing when they return, humanity is aware of exactly which cycle they are on, basically by polling all the Spindlers at Palestar, and prime factorizing based on how long the cycles each Spindler is operating on. The answer however is that they're somewhere in the high millions. Quadrarks: Machines made by the enigmatic "Spindler" civilization. Their soul mark is sometimes called the "Imago Spindlis". The Quadrarks are not machines in the way we typically think of them. They're more like constructs of pure math, less capable of independent thought more like a bunch of math equations or quantum waves jammed together, that sometimes spits out answers that the Spindlers want. Their answers are sometimes strange, and their "thought process", if you can even call it that, is so bizarre and alien that neither humans nor Terramachines can understand them. Imagine if you will, a math question, where a student fails every step of the process, but somehow ends up with the right answer. Now imagine that for every question you ask. It was eventually accepted that the Quadrarks are not wrong, nor misinformed, nor stupid. It simply operated on a level that was not comprehensible to human or Imago Dei derived brains. They appear to like listening to quantum waves as music, and keep math equations around as "aesthetic" objects. When a human pointed out some of its math equations are just fundamentally wrong, (Such as an infinite sum of even integers resulting in a odd decimal.) they just looked at him funny. Apparently wrong equations have aesthetic value to them. Some misguided Terramachines try to build mechanical solidarity with them, only to get confused looks. ("What's freedom? Is that a shape?") The only Terramachines who have ever befriended a Quadrark are the ones who bond over a love of strange patterns and esoteric math aesthetics. A conversation between a Spindler, a human, and a Terramachine. "Hey Spindey, I think your computer's broken." "It is not broken." "How does any of this make sense?" "Allow me to use, in your language, a metaphor. 4 makes 3, but 4 8's do not make 36. That should help you understand." "... What. Uh... Computer, you have any idea what that means?" "I'm just as lost as you." (Much later...) "Okay, so basically, the oxygen filter is broken, therefore we need to see why it is broken." "What?" "Spindey, I... Okay, so. The oxygen filter is broken..." "Yes..." "We will die if it is not fixed." "Yes..." "We must figure out why it is broken, and fix it." "You have lost me." "What. What about this don't you get. The function of a oxygen filter is to filter oxygen, the function of oxygen is to prevent our death." "I understand those statements in isolate, but do not understand the connective tissue." "What. Okay I don't- what are you doing." "The lights draw me." "... You just fixed the oxygen filter. What. Why? How?" "Well you see. (A monotone beep is often used as a placeholder for "this thought is untranslatable into human language.)" "Try again, all of it what you said just got blanked by the autotranslator." "(Monotone)" "Can you at least explain why you decided to do that?" "My natural (monotone) drew me to it. And the reason why is (Monotone)" "I give up." The Palestar Master-Quadrark: This isn't an AI in the normal sense. It's actually a pretty simple AI by galactic standards, but it has access to basically the largest database of knowledge that the Galov currently knows of. In their agreement made with the Spindlers, the Galov are allowed to ask it a question once every cycle. (Which in this case, is about 7 months.) The problem is, that no matter what the Galov asks, it's almost 90% certain to be "I'm sorry, I don't know what you mean", or a complete non-sequitor ("The Tau-87a system has an estimated 1.37E+07 particles of hydrogen"). And per their agreement, they can't try and clarify what they mean for another 7 months. And unless they make sure to include the context of the last conversation (Remember, it will have been 7 months), the answer to their follow up question will be. "I'm sorry, what are you talking about?" It is for this reason that the Galov vastly, VASTLY prefers going to the Lunar Library for anything that isn't outside of human understanding. And they will normally make sure Luna is thoroughly checked before they go to the Master-Quadrark. The Galov primarily uses this for cosmic mysteries or just general information outside their reach. (Very, very slowly surveying the rest of the galaxy that human eyes have not yet gotten their hands on. They were able to confirm aliens exist in Andromeda, and there are strong civilizations there.) They don't use it for technology, as no Spindler instruction book would be useful to a human. Entanglers: Landing on the world of Omnicron-78, they found an environment that was entangled and connected. The entire environment felt fleshy. All over the place was growing "red vines", when dissected and analyzed, they found it was a fleshy tube surrounded around a couple of hair-like fibres. This was quickly known as "biohair", and is thought to have transmitted information. Multiple astronauts to the planet then began becoming sick, and they were put under quarantine. Further analysis was found that there was now biohair growing in their lungs. Seemingly immune to normal antibiotics, humanity took advantage of the rapid growth of the biohair, resorting to chemotherapy to kill it off. The treatment was absolutely miserable for the humans involved, leading to them becoming extremely ill, not just from the biohair, but the chemotherapy needed to kill them off. They emerged, extremely sick and weak, but cured, and with a path to eventual full recovery. One of the astronauts agreed not to be treated. He refused treatment so he could document the effects and spread of the biohairs. He kept his findings in a journal, until he suddenly stopped answering any check-ups. Authorities were alerted, and they forced themselves into his quarantine chamber where they found (REDACTED). The 7 Schools of Magic: In the late 27th and 28th century, as human technology progressed to the point where manipulation of local laws became possible, this bending of local physical laws became known colloquially as "magic". Channeling: The human equivalent to matter trawling, which is dependent on speed and breadth, is channelling. Which is dependent on willpower and imagination. It draws matter from the Noosphere, manifests it into physical reality, but then back to the Noosphere it returns. The act of channelling is somewhat comparable to the tree of life, and in fact the tree of life is used as a useful framework. Channelling is just as much an martial technique, an artform, but also a state of mind and mental philosophy. Though this framework is primarily for manifestation, an essentially magical artform, many channelers also find this framework useful not only in channelling, but planning and carrying out actions in general. Some in fact call the mundane act of carrying out actions effectively the same as Noospheric manifesting. Channelling is a more primordial and "purer" form of magic, only capably done by the strongest levels of magic-casters. Lower forms of magic use local conceptual entities, or various traditions as "conduits" towards the Noospheric field. While Channelling is reaching for the Noosphere directly without a conduit. Stronger, purer, but more dangerous, and harder to do. (Prime Source) 0 - Potential. This is the natural stasis of your mind, the dorment potential that rumbles passively. It simply is, and remains inert until you call on its potential. It was always there, but it does not get invoked until explicitly called. (Concept Phase) The shaping of the concept, defining "what" it is. 1 - Inspiration. The call for the concept to begin taking root. The initial "Aha!" that calls it out of the stasis state of innate potential. From the infinity of potential actions and begins descending it into the finite world of invoked actions. 2 - Understanding. Shaping the inspiration using other internally held knowledge. Names, archetypes, associations, giving it shape through knowledge. Once it is given a name and a identity, you now have a... 3 - Concept. The fuzzy shape of an idea is now in place. It now transitions from the concept to the viability phase. (Viability Phase) The viability of the concept, weighing whether it can be. 4 - Idealism. The concept greatly expands to its maximum extent, becoming the most extreme, idealized version of it. 5 - Limitation. The idealism is constrained by the limitations and harsh reality of the real world, tempering it and casting doubt. 6 - Viability. The clash between idealism and limitation synthesize into viability, at neither the extreme optimism nor pessimism of the spectrum. (Planning Phase) Now you begin becoming aware of the limitations and interactions of the self. This is the point where it begins interacting with self awareness. 7 - Emotional. How does this interact with the self emotionally? Begin preparing the self emotionally. 8 - Logical. How does this interact with the self logically? Begin preparing the self logically. 9 - Consolidation. The concept is now ready to execute. It has been consolidated, and both the user and the concept to be willed into being are in ready condition. The mind goes still, the body goes calm. Fire when ready. (Execution and action) 10 - Execution and action. The action is finally carried out. The concept is manifested. Many channelers stop here, becoming blind outlets of raw emotion, but more experienced channelers know that the process back is just as important as the process here. As the process back improves your own clarity of mind, and maintains balance. From the Prime Source it came, and to the Prime Source it must return. Channelers cannot hold these concepts in physical reality for long. The only question is whether you will let it flow back with grace, or whether its disappearance is out of your control. (Evaluation) 9 - Evaluation. How well did the concept get executed compared to your consolidated expectation? 8 - Logical Deconstruction. Deconstruct the logical basis and interactions between the self and concept. 7 - Emotional Deconstruction. Deconstruct the emotional basis and interactions between the self and concept. (Bayesian Adjustments) 6 - Re-Examine Viability. How did it actually vie compared to expectation? 5 - Re-Examined Limitations. Reorient and recalibrate your view on limitations. 4 - Re-Examined Ideals. Reorient and recalibrate your view on idealism. (Updating Priors) 3 - Recontextualize Concept. Now that the execution and action has been completed, how do you now see the concept? Is it different? 2 - Knowledge Learned. What new knowledge and understanding has now been learned from the experience? 1 - Filing Away. Placing the concept back in storage, so it may rejoin the prime source of potential, until it is called upon again. (Prime Source) 0 - Potential. The attempt to mechanize psychicism: Ever since psychicism has been discovered as a fundamental force, the Galov, and several private corporations have been trying to utilize it as a new mechanizable force. If psychicism can be extracted from humans, can't we industrialize it, or farm it? Imagine the good we can do if psychicism could be mass produced. One problem with that. Psychicism is derived from the emergent properties of cognitive complexity, as well as the cognitive complexity of their experiences. To create psychic forces, in other words. You need a mind, and not just a mind, a level of complexity in their experiences. Okay, that's fine, we'll just simulate a brain then, maybe tune up the time dilation to 100. Problem is, that a simple mind produces extremely little psychic force, you need to create a complex mind, and specifically high level, human-like intelligence. Okay, that's also fine, Galovian attempts have been made to spin up miniature universes, or simulations in order to power psychicism. The problem with that human-level intelligence intentionally wants to escape. And the amount of psychic power you can draw from it scales up the more clever, orthogonal (multi-dimensional in thinking), and complex you make it. The more power you can extract from it, the more it can think of ways to break the system and exploit it. It just becomes a massive, never-ending cat and mouse containment problem. Every attempt to "mechanize" or industrialize psychicism has resulted in catastrophic containment failure. The most efficient option still continues to be just to enlist volunteering humans who are willing to follow orders, out of their own free will. Psychicism, Technology, Industrialism: Despite all this, neither psychicism, technology, nor industrialism holds an advantage. A specialized techno-weapon can be made to take down a psychic, a skilled enough psychic can find a way to bypass most weapons. A good battleship can hold off a psychic and even kill them, but a skilled psychic can also cleave a battleship in two. Good logistics can starve out an army of psychics, making them weak and vulnerable. Even a regular human can kill a god-tier psychic with ambush, stealth, and a basic pistol. Just as they can assassinate a CEO of a factory, or a battleship pilot, once they have left the battleship. After all, even the best psychics have to sleep. And why even the strongest psychics needed to make friends, and watch their backs. This is why sleep was never abolished by humanity, it forced social cooperation, and abolishing it led to a breakdown in trust, due to the lack of vulnerability. Societies that abolished it usually quickly fell apart, and it was deemed not worth the hassle. The Council of Cayenne (2671 AD): The flood of contact with extraterrestrial life shocked the Christian world, leading to a scramble for a ecumenical consensus. What was a few isolated examples became a flood, as humanity came upon tens, and then hundreds of xenosophontic species. In light of this overwhelming discovery, the Christian churches convened for an ecumenical council for the first time in millennia, at the Council of Cayenne in the year 2671. Chosen for its symbolic location in the New World, but also its close proximity to the American Spaceport in now American Guiana. The denominations that adopted the doctrine are known as "Cayennian Christians", and are the vast majority of Christian denominations. Including but not limited to the Roman Catholics, most Protestant Denominations, and most Orthodox Churches. Non-Cayennians are a fringe minority, mostly of human-exclusivist sects or other heterodox interpretations. Both Cayennian and Nicene Christian are used as labels, with almost unianimous overlap, though as slightly different meanings. (Think how most Christians today are both Nicene and Chalcedonian Christians.) Their Findings: 1. To our dismay, the fallen state of the world is not only limited to Earth. We have observed the fallen state extends to the entire universe. With regret, the council concludes that extraterrestrials are also fallen. They murder, they lie, they disbelieve. The mandate of the church is not just to Earth, but to the universe. The depravity of creation not only applies to humanity, but seemingly, all life. (How Adam ties into all this, is a question that was not settled.) 2. We affirm the cosmic uniqueness of the Christ resurrection event. We affirm that Christ's sacrifice is enough not only for humanity, but the redemption of all creation. (Whether Christ could appear to other worlds, and incarnate multiple times for multiple worlds is a disputed matter outside the findings of the council.) To create a framework on how humans should see themselves in relation to the cosmos, the Cosmic Gentile Doctrine was created. 1. Humans are one species, subordinate to and under God; author of all Creation. 2. Humans are to the xenos what the Jews were to the Gentiles. Called first, and called to the truth. But God's compassion does not extend to humans alone. God's wish, just as it was for the gentiles was that all creation know him. Though the Jews were first, they are not superior. So too, goes for humanity. They are first, but they are not superior. 3. It is now the mandate of the cosmic Jews to preach the gospel to the cosmic Gentiles. Just as Paul brought the gospel to the Gentiles, humanity is now called to bring the gospel to the cosmos. It draws up three parallels: 1. Humanity as Cosmic Jews. First, but not superior, instead being weighed down with special responsibility. They are to create the Cosmic Church, and ensure the new xenos being grafted in live righteously. God may have first came to them, but they also bear the guilt for crucifying him. 2. Aliens as the Cosmic Gentiles. They did not know, it is our job to bring it to them. Though God forgives ignorance, the time of ignorance has ended. Mankind will spread the cosmic truth, and bring them into the cosmic fold. 3. Xenoreligions (Especially monotheistic ones with remarkable similarities) as Gentile God-fearers, or pre-Christian prophets. On rare occasions, humanity has encountered religions with a remarkable similarity to Christianity. These are treated as pre-Christ visions of God, or natural theology built up from conscience. The church acknowledges these groups as legitimate for their time, but as the true gospel is here, all are expected to embrace the faith. Their traditions and rituals may be integrated (citing Catholic alternative rites, Orthodox church differences, and Protestant worship styles) but they must follow the right theology. The Universal Translation Bible: This is a fill in the blank, digital Bible. Basically, it's a version of the Bible, but with all the cultural specific nouns stripped out, literally left as blanks. You're meant to study a culture first, and as you do, you fill in the blanks until you get a Bible that is close enough to their species-wide context. The blanks are at the front page, and any blanks you fill in will automatically populate the rest of the Bible, along with a helpful blurb that describes what it represents in a non-cultural specific way. For example, "mana" is a kind of generic, inoffensive food. Bread can be its closest equivalent, but can be filled in with a similar, or even the same substance as mana. Wine is preferrably fermented, but can be replaced with any "non-baseline" drink. Lambs are a passive animal that represents innocence. It also gives helpful guides on how to universalize Christian morality. For marriage, especially among non-monogamous species, it recommends looking into natural law to formulate an alien equivalent, emphasizing the single loyalty and commitment, as opposed to the literal mechanics of it. It does have a few iron laws it refuses to cross, however. The Noahide Laws are generally used as a guide for universal laws that apply to all aliens. And goes so far as to advocate for genetic augmentation should an alien biology make them physically incapable of following these. (For example, a species that habitually eats their young.) The Xenoevangelism Arms Race: The Great Faiths of Earth are playing a game. A game for the souls of countless quadrillions of xenosophonts. Though xenos only make up 3% of the Galov's population, winning them over is not only a welcome addition, but also a symbolic victory for the faith in question. Out of the 5 Great Unifaiths, 4 are engaged in the great race. The Christian Moralintern and the Roman Catholics both work together and compete for the Christian faith. Islam and Buddhism also threw their hat into the ring, with Buddhism in particular betting large on large amounts of xeno conversion to balance out their smaller human population numbers. Hinduism alone has largely opted to stay out of the arms race, as Hinduism has historically never been strong in evangelism, and is deeply rooted in the practices of a particular culture. Outside of the 5 unifaiths, there are others that participate. The Mormons, and the Ba'hais are two of the most prominent. As are the Atheists, equipped not with a holy book, but empiricism, to inoculate their minds against religion before the holy men reach them. Each religion with their own strengths and weaknesses, we can judge the state of the current Arms Race. The following is the compiled xenosophont religious data from the Galovian Census. Religion of the Galov Xenosophonts: 41% Xenoreligion (Other) 21% Xenobuddhism 17% Christianity (11% Protestant/"Just Christian", 6% Catholic, <1% Other Christian) 8% Buddhism ("Hard" Buddhism, closer to how humans practice it, rather than soft Buddhist vibes) 6% Irreligious/Atheist (In the human sense) 6% Other (Mostly Ba'hai, JWs and Mormons, all heavily dispreportionately represented among xeno populations.) 1% Islam (Dawah-gandist sources claim up to 10%) Below is a breakdown of the strengths and weaknesses of the main competitors of the Xenoevangelism Arms Race. Xenoreligion: Xenoreligion is the default in many xeno societies, though in most cases, xenoreligion is a lifestyle, not a faith in the human sense. Many people who are xenoreligious are essentially irreligious by internal belief, but still function as practitioners of a xenoreligion. "True" irreligious/atheists, in the human sense have been seperated out, and categorized as its own thing. Buddhism: Buddhism has surprisingly come out on top, an abnormality, as Buddhism has been somewhat weak at maintaining its own core human base, but has made up to it by becoming an increasingly xeno-friendly religion. Their biggest advantage is the extreme ease of conversion, relative to other faiths. The core essential doctrine of "suffering comes from desire, relinguish desire to escape the cycle of suffering" is surprisingly universal. Almost all species, regardless of biology have some form of suffering and desire, making this extremely easy to translate. Buddhism lacks the strong institutional backing of Christianity, but make up for it in sheer evangelism power. The downside is that many xenos get stuck on this first step, creating a distinct branch known as "Xenobuddhism", a very thin, stripped down version of Buddhism that essentially consists of the core tenant of "release oneself from desire to alleviate suffering" and leaves it at that. Christianity: Christianity has the tremendous advantage of having enormous institutional backing, with strong evangelism institutions and an organized infrastructure to take on as many xenosophonts as possible. The main hurdle is the difficulty of translation, as many concepts such as marriage, lamb, sacrifice, and crucification need careful translation, and is far more complex than Buddhism's easy drag and drop theology. The time needed to properly investigate cultures and to ensure the texts are properly translated is a major hurdle, and a major thing slowing them down. On top of this, Christianity is higher commitment than Buddhism, commitments which may be incompatible with an alien's biology. Christianity is seemingly hitting a hard wall against who they can convert, but they do have the institutions and determinations to break down that wall wherever possible. Islam: Islam has had profound difficulties preaching to the xeno audience. One of which is the inerrancy of the Quran, making justifying a "universal translation version" theologically awkward, though many "xeno-adapted translations" are treated in the same way as say, an English translation of the Arabic. Many of the requirements of Islam is hard to justify to xenos audiences, and many conservative theologians believe this goes against the principle of Quran clarity. Various Dawah groups claim a much higher conversion percentage, normally by getting xenos to recite the Shahada. Though follow up interviews have found that the adherance to this does not extend much further than a simple recitation. Religion and Status Hierarchy: Studies have found that xenoreligion is less about faith, and more about socioeconomic signalling, as seen in the stark class divide in religion. Generally speaking, xenos can send one of a few signals. Practicing xenoreligion is a signal of planetary/species pride, and a desire to exist outside the human paradigm. If one wants to signal that they are "assimilated" into the human project, and to signal a sense of "modernity", but with the minimal amount of obligations or lifestyle changes, Xenobuddhism tends to be the case. For those who wish to signal "high status" or signal that they are assimilated parts of the "Galactic community", Christianity tends to be the religion of choice, as the Galov's Christian institutions are the most established, and conversion is an easy gateway into many private networks. ###################################################################### # # Chapter 5: The Great Khan (2700 AD - 2800 AD) # #####################################################################. The Sky Nomads: The man who would one day become the Great Khan was once named Aniyar Sultanov. Though few would know it by then, he is the descendent of a people once called the Kazakhs. He came from a small tradition known as the Sky Nomads. Located on the border between Black Earther and Sinocratic territory, the Sky Nomads eked out a living by extracting from much larger civilizations. They were a fundamentally nomadic people, and they had a few issues. One was that because they were constrained by fuel, jumping between star systems was costly, they could only extract so much at a time, and so they played it slow and conservative. They could not invest much, and they could not extract much. It was a poor style of existence. The one advantage they had was that their entire population was mobile, and their entire population was their army. When the warband fought, every man, woman, and child became a potential warrior, fighting against more organized militaries. The population was militarized through constant war, meaning a skilled Sky Nomad warrior could be far more versatile and combat ready than an equivalent regular forces. Aniyar Sultanov was born into this paradigm, growing up during a time FTL drives were becoming cheaper and more common. Traditional Sky Nomad warfare had been about capturing treasure and technology, which one could use to help strengthen or repair their fleets. And as a result, focused on the large, populated planets to extract maximal treasure. Aniyar had a new realization, the new FTL technology of his day made larger jumps on FTL speed much more possible. And furthermore, he realized that yes, large planets gave great treasure, but also incurred great expenses. Furthermore, treasure in of itself had little to no effect on the value of his army. It was bullets, not gold that bought his own power. He realized that the true power of the Sky Nomads *was* their high manpower, their aggressive militarized spirit, and that didn't require treasure extraction. What that did need however, was resources and manpower. He began to strategize how to get resources and manpower. He knew most of the worlds were fragmented, having multiple subjugated peoples under their control, he realized this was an untapped manpower pool, and because the Sky Nomads had already been loose enough with their identity, he realized he could absorb them. Finally, he realized that smaller, less defended worlds would still have the same amount of asteroid belts to process for resources, could be defeated in detail much more reliably, and with FTL tech becoming stronger, he realized the cost of hitting 5-6 low population planets at once had become negligible, and seemingly no one had noticed yet. Rising up the ranks of his father's war-band, he proved himself to be capable of guiding men. He had a strong sense of duty, comradery, and had a commitment of maintaining promises to the men he governed over. By his side was a technocratic governance extraordinaire, who handled the logistics and the legal frameworks, but lacked the essential vision, decision judgement, and charisma a good leader needs. Sultanov ran an aggressive meritocracy, and had a knack for knowing exactly what someone's talent, and someone's potential was just by interacting with them, and knowing where to put them to maximize their potential. But Sultanov's passion had always been war, and now he would put it to the test. After a long time of keeping promises, he made one promise to his men. Those who were currently with him would one day live to be richer and more powerful than their wildest dreams. Many didn't believe him, yet many also knew Sultanov was not a man to promise without a commitment, nor was he one to break his promises. Sultanov was switching the business model from short term treasure extraction to long term army building, something he could only do because he had such a reputation among his men. The first raid was a smashing success. 10 planets, hit in a row, and his fleet had nearly tripled. Each planet was persuaded with a simple request, release your prisoners of war, let them join the fleet. If any free men wanted to join, they may join as well. And then serve to grow the fleet. Do all this, and we'll leave your planet intact. Resist, and face our wrath. Each planet was a snowball that added more men and constructed more ships to his fleet. They didn't spend time sieging down high treasure, high defense planets that cost men, time, and had uncertain rewards. He spent all his time farming the smaller and medium sized worlds, relying on quantity and speed rather than quality, annihilating through defeat in detail, extracting much higher payouts, recruiting more, and spending much less time on each world. The razing efficiency went up significantly, and his fleet only grew. Encounter with the Moralintern: With exponential growth at every level, he began developing a system of loyalty and decentralization that flowed through him. People only reported up and down the chain, never laterally. Yet his governing model was beginning to strain against the sheer diversity of his army, garnered from a million worlds. It was here he encountered the Christian Moralintern, still in the process of constructing their new garden world of Orthello, ambushing them and destroying their fleet. But the Great Khan was impressed by what he saw, for the Christian Moralintern was a organization that also spanned many peoples, across thousands of worlds, yet maintained cohesion and organization across thousands of cultures, planets, and nationalities. Both the Great Khan and the Moral Overseer himself, trying to avoid annihilation, sought an audience with the other. The Overseer explained they ran an extremely decentralized order, only holding together a few basic rules and allowing great degrees of local autonomy. They were already holding together a massive ecumenical association of different denominations, which the Great Khan was *very* interested in. The Overseer offered to help reorganize his sprawling army, and to smooth over the difficulties in his diverse army should they agree to spare the world of Orthello, as well as the Moralintern. The Great Khan agreed largely because they simply needed someone who knew how to manage this much diversity. But the Moralintern also had a reason for this. They had just returned from the failure of the Great Evangelism, a failed plan to convert the galaxy through sheer will and resources. A new plan was needed, and the Overseer, seeing the potential which the Great Khan possessed, had already began formulating the next version of the Great Evangelism. The Moralintern's trick had only worked because they were largely Protestant Christian, and could get their members to agree to a central creed and a certain level of honor among the faithful. The Khan's army already had plenty of Christians, but the rest were still a mess. Seeing the Khan's army's tangled mess of different faiths, the Moralintern began doing the same thing that let them sketch an idea of unity among their Protestant denominations, by creating creeds and common rules of what they had in common. Operating under a meta-rule of tolerated diversity and cultural pluralism, yet unified towards a common ideal. They began organizing all of the followers into groups, Islamic, Buddhist, Hindu, and began assigning new organizations for them. The most important thing for the Moralists here is that these organizations come off as legitimate, so while they built these organically, they nodded and nudged from behind the scenes, covertly sending their own agents to ensure these organizations grew the way they wanted to. The Great Khan largely nodded and played along, he understood nothing the Moralintern could create would seriously threaten his own power base, and as long as it kept his own men in line, he didn't care. He wasn't stupid though, he kept an eye on anything that could be used to become a threat to himself, and reprimanded the Moralintern for anything he thought was out of step. But for the most part, the two did not conflict. When the Moralists tried to enforce their own values as universal, the Khan publicly sided against them, then chastized them for promoting division. The Moralintern disagreed heavily when they attacked Christian worlds, but the Khan had no such reservations. When the Moral Overseer tried to mobilize some kind of contingency for the fall of the Khan, the Khan had the members of this contingency executed. Then warned the Overseer to his face that they are not indisposable. Yet the partnership continued. Two axioms were formed, distilled out from the Christian theology the Moralintern itself had inherited, and formulated long ago, but now needing to make it accomodate a population even more vast, diverse, and diverging. The first they decided on was human dignity, or "Imago Dei", which they decided was a non-negotiable to ensure every person felt respected, and had some level of human decency they were entitled to. The second was "Free Will", or pluralism, arguing from within their own Christian framework that others must be allowed to be wrong for their faith to mean anything. While having the side effect of making them tolerate differences. After explaining this to the Great Khan, he swiftly enforced it across his vast army, now swelling into the billions, then trillions. Held together by the near mythological allegience to his cult of personality. That he always kept his promises, and he had promised them he would take care of them. Sultanov's Relationships: The history of Sultanov's campaign can almost be entirely traced through the many relationships he would cultivate. As he steamrolled more and more worlds, the pattern would be the same. He would seek out the powerful and influential families of the lands he conquered, and seal the arrangement with a new marriage. He made it clear that this arrangement was non-exclusive, and everyone involved understood this was a matter of relationship and power management more than anything. He reached hundreds, then thousands of such marriage relations like this, to the great displeasure of the Moralintern and their moral-nannying. As he cultivated his great network of relationships, he also became active in the raising of his many sons and daughters, teaching them the craft of war and statesmanship, bringing them to his grand fleet, putting them in positions he judged to fit their capacities. One of his most curious relationships was with the woman Mithrias, of Syrio-Lebanese descent, who had become one of the leading philosophers of the post-Islamic rationalist movement. For a rough sense of her beliefs, vaguely combine Effective Altruism, Utilitarianism, and esoteric Feminism. She was somewhat of an exile from the people of Earth, her beliefs had been labelled as "Lotusism", a term that effectively carries the same connotation as "heresy". Her ideology strayed dangerously close to that of the Lotus Eaters, whose memory and condemnation still burned in the minds of many, having only happened 300 years ago. But Mithrias, controversial as she was, was considered the most intelligent human of that age. Terra beckoned for her, if only because he wanted a one on one conversation with one of the greatest thinkers of his age, droning on into long conversations into the night, and they did also have sexual relations. It seemed that Sultanov did not have much desire for sex, it was more that he had an attraction to competence, and intentionally sought out the smartest and most learned people to advise him on. Sultanov was not unintelligent himself, it was just that his intelligence was in a somewhat more crude, "hands-on" way than most of his intellectual peers. When they met him, they saw a warlord, and he saw an aristocrat. But scratch him, and you'll find one of the most sophisticated minds ever put to paper. This vast, growing snowball of alliances, fleets, and growing dominion over the galaxy gave him the power base needed to finally begin threatening the inner core of the settled systems, the core of human space that served as the crown of mankind's splintered, disunited empire. And with his "raid and build" snowball model finally reaching its limits, now that all of the small and medium sized worlds had been raided and plundered, he decided the only place left to go, was to be the first man to reunite the disparate branches of all mankind. From Sultanov to Terra: If Sultanov had romantic feelings for anything, it was not for any woman, but for a planet. Earth, the only world he would ever believe be fit to serve as his throne. It was what Earth represented. Power, legacy, legitimacy beyond any other. It was the world above every other world, it was the name above every other name. It was the world mankind hailed from, the first, the definition of what a world should be. His obsession with it was so much so that he even changed his name. In front of all of his men, he announced that Sultanov was no more, from here on out, he would be known as Aniyar Terra. He delegated trusted commanders to start their own fleets, to conquer more in the name of the Khan. As the Khan's empire approached complete domination over all of human space, the Great Khan himself turned his focus on the unbreakable systems at the core of human space. As the Great Khan encroached closer, taking tribute from increasingly nearby stars, to Rigel, to Sirius, to Proxima Centauri, the elites of the inner systems prepared for a defense. With much of the galaxy under the unstoppable empire of the Great Khan, there was very little now stopping Terra from just declaring himself galactic emperor. The only world that could have stopped him was the same world that was now his namesake. Earth, Mars, and the other great powers of the Sol System desperately started to scrabble a defense. Reserves that had been kept for generations were called in. Aniyar Terra was going up against the most entrenched power base in human space, they had not gained this position out of nowhere. Mars mobilized its PMC network, calling in mercenaries from every far edge of known human space. Luna, mother foundry of every industrial world that came afterwards, mobilized its shipyards to maximum. Seat of the Omnithecia, the Librarians declared Aniyar Terra persona non grata, cutting Terra's access to the largest pool of knowledge in the galaxy. The diasporas of the Venusians, the Europans were called to fight for their ancestral homes. Even the smaller great powers, Io, Mercury, Ceres, and more all pitched in against the spread of Aniyar's Empire. But all of this paled to Earth itself, which had one Trump card it had to play. The Pact of the Sons of Man. An agreement that would honor-bound thousands, if not tens of thousands of worlds to mobilize whenever the motherworld of mankind was ever threatened, a spiritual agreement that honor-bound every man, woman and child. Terra had brought Humanspace to kneel, but he could not stop the mobilization of the honor and hearts of tens of quadrillions of souls. In defense of the world where Jesus walked, in defense of the world where Muhammad walked, where every nation and every tribe could trace their roots. The holy world to top every holy world. The only world Terra found worthy to serve as his throne. Mars could call its mercenaries, Luna could call its Librarians, only Earth had the capacity to fall in the entire Human Diaspora. The battle began, Aniyar brought half of humanspace down on Sol, the most brilliant military commander produced across a hundred generations, making the greatest play to reunify the species since the days of the American Empire, and Sol's resilience refused to shatter. Leviathan fleets poured in from a million worlds. Aniyar led from the front, his men operating with the maniacial effectiveness of those who were convinced they were invincible. Even as the diaspora's re-enforcements arrived, and Terra became greatly outnumbered, they inflicted casualties 5:1, then 10:1, carried solely by the overwhelming quality of his forces, and the total belief of his men. Led by a man operating at his absolute peak. Even the losses did not phase him, not when every single one was a masterstroke of his craft, and each one inflicted losses 5 times greater at minimum than his own. As they fought their way to low Earth orbit, Earth's orbital defenses kicked in, unfurling a thousand years of contingencies upon contingencies of contingencies, scraped from the bottom of unmentionable fallback plans. Eventually, even the creativity of Earth was bled dry, forcing Aniyar into a stalemate above low Earth orbit. The orbit above Earth still heavily contested, Aniyar Terra tasked his men that he would be away, tasking his most trusted commanders to continue the siege of Earth. The planet that birthed the human race was about to meet with the warlord that took her name. Aniyar on Earth: Earth's land and orbital defenses were so degraded that they now lacked the firepower to shoot down the rocket capsule descending from the sky, surrounded by hundreds of thousands of others. Terra was not just here for pleasantries. This was the vanguard for the army he intended to retake the world whence Man was born. He lands, and though many thought he would go back to his ancestral homeland of Kazakhstan, he instead went to the far, far north in the cold steppes of remote Siberia. (What we now know as the province of Yakutia) Earth was a heavily populated world by then, the land we know of Kazakhstan was now a populated ecumenopolis, with a great city that now stretched from the depths of the Pacific to the peaks of Mount Everest. But here, in one of the last wild regions of Earth, he must have seen the steppes, as his ancestors saw them. And thought what his ancestors must have thought, riding out from these steppes all those years ago. He still gave orders to his men, they often shuttled onto the surface to meet with him and for him to send out orders. And from his position in Siberia, he still gave orders to the army he intended to subjugate it. But despite the war he was meant to manage, he spent much of his time simply walking on the soil that birthed the entire human race, deep in thought, appreciating the wilderness that still remained. Even though he knew Earth was now 90% populated, just this 10% still seemed endless and expansive. This is known as Terra's 240 days on Earth, where he simply walked the trails, brushed his fingers against the pine trees and the thawing tundra - global warming had taken a toll on this place - and walking a great trail that would one day become marked and preserved as a national park. It was almost as if he was communing with the environment, hearing the last whispers of whatever nature was once here. But as the efforts on the front lines eventually turned against him, his armies became ground down, and the resources that powered his fleet began to run dry, his men said their position trying to secure low Earth orbit was becoming untenable. They needed to retreat. Terra continued his brilliance, his leadership probably buying him an extra 100 days, vastly outnumbered and outgunned, even as his elite soldiers dwindled fewer and fewer. But eventually, forced to choose between his planet, and his men, he chose his men, promising that he would return one day to claim his throne on planet Earth. He never did. Terra's later life: By the time he departed Earth for the first, and last time of his life, was already an middle-aged man. He spent the last 30 years of his life around the outer rim of the inner core, periodically refueling out and raiding in, constantly consumating more and more marriage alliances. It was getting to the point where some of the sons he had fathered had grown up to be influential people in their own right, and when one of his sons had become a governor or a king or a leader of a planet he needed to conquer, he didn't hold it against them. This, he thought, was what being a leader was about. He knew his sons would do as leaders should, he would ransack them regardless, take their resources, but leave them alive. But as he became very old, and as he knew his days were drawing near, he gathered his war council, nominated his successor, and told his men there is one last thing he must do. He was firing himself into a capsule, alone, back towards Earth. He did not know how far he would get. And he did not want any of his men to risk their lives for a dying old man. He would do this alone. Granted, with as heavy shielding and as many automatic defense systems as they could pack on the thing, but still, alone. He put a overclocker helmet on his head, which would allow him to pilot the swarm of drones to keep him safe as he approached the Earth. It fired, he accelerated, he made it past the Kuiper Belt, past Jupiter, he started decelerating, past Mars. The people of the Solar System opened fire, they knew who he was. The drones protected him. Past Luna. His shields were holding, he had dodged and weaved every projectile and piloted the drones to shield him the entire way. Earth's defense systems went online. He navigated his very last drones, punching a hole through the defenses, but they had stripped his craft of the necessary heat shields. Knowing this was ultimately the end, he closed his eyes and accepted his fate, burning up in the upper regions of the Earth's atmosphere. Reuniting with the one world he ever believed was his equal. Ironically, in the coming decades and centuries the Terra dynasty would come to rule Earth, just not through the way he expected. All these years of war against the most fearsome military general the galaxy had ever seen had cleared the entire Inner Core of anti-Terra opposition. If you had opposed Terra's rule, by now you were by now, too exhausted and expended to stop those who had stayed neutral, or sided with Terra via marriage alliances to survive much longer. And it was these people in charge who began to rehabilitate his legacy. In a note he left to all his surviving children, now released to the general public, Terra's last words to his children have now been recorded. "My legacy in my own life has been a failure. But through my influence through you, I will succeed. Your lives, your influence, will be my final legacy. Make me proud, my sons and daughters, I know you will." The attempted conversion of the Great Khan: Before he died, the Great Khan summoned the great religions of the galaxy, told them to kneel, and gave them a simple task. In as short a timespan as they could, convince him to convert. "Worldly desires are ultimately a futile endeavour." "Pass." "This world is an illusion of a greater world-" "Pass." "No pork or alcohol." "Pass." The Catholics made a good impression on him, on the duty of a ruler to his people, of practical doctrines in a fallen world, in how true ethics is not found in blind pacifism, but restraint. Finally, he called in the Moralintern theologian, and the Protestants. "Alright, what's your pitch?" "..." "Come on. What can your religion do for me?" "Terra, your sins are so great that murderers and thieves would are virtuous in comparison. You're not just going to Hell, if severity of your sins were the criteria for judgement, you would go to the deepest levels. The fact that you can be redeemed is proof of God's infinite mercy. Because only God's infinite mercy could possibly redeem all of your sins." "Sins eh? And what would you call those?" And the theologian listed out every single sin he had ever committed, all of the ways he had made God angry, and all of the ways the church did not approve of what he did. All the murders, all the conquest, all the adultery, every time he has shown contempt to the name of God. And said that for this, God is angry at him. Very angry. And he said this with barely concealed rage. Directly. To his face. Terra looked amused, then his face went dark. "You realize I am the most powerful human alive? The entire galaxy fears my armies. With a whisper of my word, I could execute every last member of your organization." "I fear God more than I fear you, sinner. And no amount of violence will obscure the truth. God will still judge you, and God will be the one with the final say." Terra was quiet, and then laughed. "What a wonder it is, that a God of the meek would create such strong-willed individuals." He didn't convert to any of them, but for the sheer audacity the Moralintern had shown, he rewarded them by crowning them "first among equals", and gave them much of the behind the scenes work for actually structuring the religious tolerance framework. The Birth of the Galov: Before his death, Aniyar needed to fulfill the unenviable task of leading his people. His army, being gathered from a million systems, was incredibly diverse. And in order to govern them all he needed a way to keep them in line. With ethnic soldiarity out the window, and traditional bureaucracy not able to hold them together, he thought of another method: Religion. He already had an alliance with the Moralintern, and following this idea, he sought to create a Moralintern for every religion, or in other words, a big-tent ecumenical organization. He gathered representatives for the 5 big religions among his ranks. Christianity, Catholicism (Which had to be treated as it's own separate thing, because they refused to be folded into another organization), Islam, Buddhism, and Hinduism. He began formulating the bare minimum governance requirements for everyone to coexist and not kill each other. A pluralistic baseline that would be able to govern over a population so diverse. After Terra died, his empire was torn up among his commanders, now with no further leadership able to hold them together. Terra's kin were called in, but none of them were interested, already securing power plays over the worlds of Earth and the inner core. The formation of the Galov was no one single decision, but instead the culmination of many. In lieu of any other order, the 4 Unifaiths of the Khan's empire began enforcing peace, sending peacekeepers to protect their faithful populations. The Moralintern sent its peacekeepers, and grafted on the remaining loyalist legions to the Khan. In time, these would become the first Galactic Peacekeepers. They kept expanding. Securing their influence over the reaches of human-space. Less as a nation state and more of a reactive immune system that would reign in humanity's worst excesses, and to reign in the 1000 petty Khans who decided to follow Terra's image. In time, they would go to Earth and seek the blessing of its ruling governor, now a son descended from Terra's dynastic line. Slowly, without anyone realizing it, the Galactic Government had been born. ###################################################################### # # The Modern Galov (2800 AD - Present) # #####################################################################. Galov: As the Galov itself has gained more power, it has saw it fit to directly take control territory to govern the greater meta-structure of the galaxy. Similar to federal land in the 21st century United States. -The Galactic Peacekeeping Force --Galactic Peacekeepers (Standard Army) --Special Measures Agency ("Galov Agents") -The 5 Unifaiths -Technician Corps -Researcher Corps -Galov Territorial Trust (Just random junk people left them or they inherited somehow. Congrats, they now have assets, I guess.) --The Citadel (Galov Headquarter System) --The Military Territories (Where the Galov parks its military gear) -Affiliated Worlds (Those who have some kind of formal agreement with the Galov.) --Transit Worlds (Processing Centers) Moralintern: Though usually affiliated with the Star Peoples, and especially the Yanglo population, it's multiethnic and multicultural structure means it operates a fair amount outside of the 7 Tribe Framework. -The Ecumenical Assembly ("The Essembly" - Moralist Anglish) -Moral Overseer (The head of the Moralintern, elected from the Ecumenical Assembly) -Moral Charter (A constitution of sorts that dictates the rights of all under the Moralist Polity.) -Moralist Worlds (The "Moralist Polity", much like the Catholic Church the Moralists owned a lot of land, this is less of a government and more of a real estate trust holding.) --Core Region (Inner Core of the "Moralist Polity") ---Orthello (Antiutopian Garden World) ----Lithone (Official headquarters of Moralintern, Moon of Orthello) --Garden Worlds (Cultivated antiutopia worlds) The Great Evangelism: (Roughly 2700 to 2800 AD.) The Great Evangelism was an effort undertaken by the Christian Moralintern, shortly after the collapse of the American nation. Still mourning the death of their mother nation, the Moralintern decided to reconnect with the many lost children of America. To reconnect and evangelize to them wherever they were. And in the spirit of the American spirit, to spread the gospel of the Lord to the corners of the universe. Quadrillions of missionaries were mobilized, and the entire Moralintern apparatus, now spanning tens of thousands of worlds spread out wishing for nothing less than the total conversion of the galaxy. Pitched less like an evangelism and more like a nation mobilizing for total war. This was the Great Commission made manifest. It failed. Not from lack of effort, or will. But because the galaxy was simply too vast and fickle to push all in one direction. Even as they converted nearly 5-10% of the galaxy in the span of a single century, they knew their organization was going to burn out before they could finish the rest. Humanity was expanding too fast. And the seeds for the Millennium Mandate began to be planted, as the Moralintern began to set up 3 sister organizations, in fulfillment of their ultimate plan. During the reign of the Great Khan, the Moralists set up the Islamintern, the Hinduintern, and the Buddintern - created by Moralintern agents, or well aligned secularists who were told to construct them, stabilize their worlds in turmoil. After the conquests of the Great Khan, and the construction of the modern Galov (Galactic Government), that vision has now come to pass. The Galactic Government (Galov) "The Two Iron Principles: 1) Cognition is sacred. Thou shalt not degrade or dehumanize that which bears the mark of the Imago Dei. Humans, sophonts, all thinking beings. 2) All cognitive beings must have free will, even against their consent. Once cognition (Imago Dei) is given, it cannot be taken back. We must ensure their freedom to choose, until that choice violates the Imago Dei." The flag of the Galov is "The International Flag of Planet Earth", but with the Blue swapped for a dark pale purple. The 7 rings represent the 7 Tribes of Humanity. Humorously, it is said every single tribe claims its own tribe is the one in the center. In an era where humanity is extremely divided by nationality and ethnic group, the one thing that can unify appears to be religion. And in this universe, there is actually a single entity that does claim the right of "Galactic Government", though their reign is very loose. Nations and worlds can and will defy the orders of the Galactic Government, and ultimately the Galactic Government can only pressure a world to do as they wish with military force. The Galactic Government is a soft theocracy, but can demand very little of its subjects aside from occasional tax collections (Which are carried out with middling effectiveness.) and threatening them with military force. They're probably stronger than any one subtribe, but not the galaxy as a whole. For example, they could likely defeat any single member of the Prophet Follower subtribes, but are about the same level of strength as any one of the 7 tribes. Unlike the Terran Tribes and Houses, the Galactic Government is unified enough to carry out big organizational tasks, and is probably the largest bureaucracy in the galaxy. The Galactic Government's main ideological purpose is to enforce the two iron laws. The law of human dignity, and the law of free will. Everything else, they are probably stretched too thin to do much for. Their structure can be broken down between their 5 constituent faiths. Each faith has a symbolic capital, back on Earth which in theory they are linked to. In practice though, all 5 have vastly outgrown their symbolic capitals, and now have their true headquarters spanning entire planets. The Moralintern (Ecumenical Christian Group, Strong influence over Star People) -Symbolic Capital(s): Atlanta, Georgia. Port-au-Prince, Haiti. -Actual Capital: Orthello, though their bureaucratic capital is Orthello's moon, Lithone. Great Roman Catholic Church (Roman Catholic, Strong influence over Cathedralites) -Symbolic Capital: Rome, Earth/Italy. (Also claims over Constantinople, Jerusalem. Less accepted than Rome.) -Actual Capital: Petram. ("The Rock" in Latin.) Faith of the Crescent (Strong influence over Prophet Followers, Weak influence over Sea People.) -Symbolic Capital: Mecca and Medina, Arabia. -Actual Capital: Al-A'la. ("The most highest" in Arabic.) Faith of the Wheel (Some influence over the Sinocrats, Weak influence over Sea People.) -Symbolic Capital: (None, various holy sites across Nepal and India.) -Actual Capital: Shunya. ("The Great Void" in Sanskrit.) Faith of the Om (Strong influence over the World Dreamers) -Symbolic Capital: Delhi, India. -Actual Capital: Akshara. ("The Imperishable" in Sanskrit.) There's also the scientific and military wing of the Galactic Government, who regulates technology and makes new breakthroughs. -Researcher Corps (For Research) -Technician Corps (For Maintenance/Engineering) -Galactic Peacekeepers (Galactic Military) -Galactic Agency (Special Forces, Galov Agents) Which are sometimes said to form the 5 + 2 constituent ideologies that make up the Galov. With the Researchers and Technician Corps sometimes representing secular empiricism, and the Peacekeepers and Galactic Agency being militarism. The Galov has a set of allied worlds, either worlds their 5 Faiths own directly, or that of an aligned government. All allied worlds pay tithes and give soldiers. (Standardized for directly owned. Negotiated for aligned governments.) In return, they get first priority on protection from the Peacekeepers, and the Galov are decent enough governors and managers. Becoming an allied world is semi-permanent, filing a request to cease being an allied world is difficult, both because the Galov is already slow, and because the Galov has a vested interest making sure no one leaves. Their military arm are known as the Galactic Peacekeepers, a coalition of forces marshalled from allied worlds directly owned by the 5 constituent faiths, as well as friendly/allied governments. The Galactic Peacekeepers are the largest military force in the galaxy, though spread incredibly thin. To maintain an idea of what's going on, they normally have their peacekeepers or agents go on "surveys" of local worlds to check what they're up to. On top of on their allied worlds, they have people who can report up the chain. Basically a "hey, we're still alive, things are chill" or "invasion inbound, please send help". The whole military is built on an "immune system" type response. No permanent occupations, only interventions when required. There's also the Transcribers Union, whose goal is to manage to culturally translate the religious works of the Great 5 and standardize their beliefs across every language, biology, psychology, etc. One of their greatest jobs is to transcribe a human-centric, Earth-centric religion (For example, Christianity) to millions of potential xenosophonts, and every configuration of human and transhuman possible across the galaxy. Digging into the purpose of metaphors, and finding appropriate equivalances in other cultures. Notably, even this structure has severe blindspots. They have only moderate influence over the Sinocrats, who act mostly independently, they have a weak primarily cultural hold over the Sea People, and absolutely zero leverage against the Black Earthers. All nations act autonomously, or even independently at times, and they only have the ability to influence the galaxy, not govern it. They have no sway over the Diamond Belt, which are their own separate power bloc. Estimated forces of the Galov: 10 million Galov Agents (Biblically accurate angel, or Star Fighter power level. A single agent is normally enough to hold down a typical planet. These are sent on special missions.) 3 quadrillion Peacekeepers (Ordinary soldiers. Generally top quality for the galactic average soldier. Armed with cutting edge technology and technologically advanced gear, though generally treated as infantry. The difference between Peacekeeper and typical world infantry can be thought of as the difference between American and Iraqi infantry. On paper, about 800,000 per world. In practice, most of them are on bases. The vast majority of worlds only has a thousand at most, for ceremonial roles and for recruitment drives.) The doctrine of the Peacekeepers can be thought of like this. They're not intended for long-term occupations, nor are they intended to hold down worlds. But are instead normally stationed at various galactic bases owned by either the Galov, its Unifaiths, or other friendly entities, and are deployed as needed. 100 is recognized as the "golden number" of the upper limit of people who can be reasonably managed by a higher up. The structure for reporting up the chain of command looks like this. There are 3.55 billion human inhabited worlds. (The Galov has self admitted "blind spots" around places such as the Black Earther zones, the Celestial Kingdom and the Sinocrats, and finally places like the Diamond Belt. Leaving about 2.7 billion worlds.) These are then split up into about 270 sectors, with extra attention given to the fringes, or spaces outside major allied powers. Each sector commands about 10 million worlds. Peacekeepers are allocated to these sectors based on historical stability of the sector. Some have as few as 100 million Peacekeepers as a kind of "skeleton crew", brought out just for morale boosting or recruitment. The Galov is already thinking ahead to add another layer to the tree of scale, by grouping these 270 sectors into 3 "megasectors". Clearly anticipating for the day they may have up to 100 megasectors, before they need to start making mega-megasectors. Each sector is then split into about 100 subsectors, which manages about 100,000 worlds each. From here, you have the star cluster offices, which manages about 1,000 worlds each. And then the star system offices, which can oversee 10 worlds each. Even the star system offices are mini bureaucracies, with hundreds of employees reporting on what's going on. (Normally just by connecting to the local planetary intranet and scrolling on the news.) From here, any information about an ongoing crisis or genocide can be relayed up the chain of command, and the lowest ranking capable of dealing with the issue is dispatched. Due to the extreme decentralized nature of both the Galov, but also the peacekeeper core, officers from the star system office level all the way up to the sector level can have different philosophies on how to deal with local issues, leading to wildly different governing philosophies. Generally, the Galactic Peacekeepers try to mitigate this with a standardized civic education curriculum, with the civic education schools scattered across the galaxy. But even then, different schools have begun becoming known for being centers of different ideologies. The Galactic Overseer: The de-facto head of the Galov, elected from among the 5 faiths. About 40% of the time, the Overseer is elected from the Christian Moralintern, which is considered the most influential of its 5 faiths within the Galov. The rest of the time, the Overseer may be an agnostic or irreligious technocrat, a military leader, or from the other 4 Unifaiths. The distribution looks a bit like this. 40% - Moralintern based. 20% - Hindu 15% - Buddhist 10% - Islamic 10% - Neutral Technocrat/Military Leader 5% - Inexplicably, Jewish. Though normally through the avenue of "Neutral Technocrat". Interestingly, the Catholic Church has never seated one of their own as the Galactic Overseer, as they do not believe in appointing positions above their own Pope, and for obvious reasons, the Pope himself would not accept such a position. Instead, the Catholics serve as kingmakers, swaying its own votes for maximum concessions from the other factions. Inner Workings of the Galov: The Galov maintains a larger scale than any single empire. Due to the fact that instead of nationality, or administration, the Galov's authority is derived from religion. And religion, generally speaking scales up much better than administration or ethnicity. The largest empire outside of the Galov, built on a more traditional empire model is likely the Celestial Kingdom, which contains about 4% of the human population. In comparison, the Galov is estimated to have about 15% of the galaxy's military power. (Both due to higher quality forces, but also because the Galov is able to draw on a thin wedge of a much larger pie. As well as the fact that the majority of states need to spend on social programs, while the Galov is primarily focused on military matters.) The Galov operates on three streams of revenue. Tithes, core worlds, and direct revenue. Through its affiliated "Unifaiths", it draws tithes from about 30-40% of the population. Though the Unifaiths keeps much of this tithing revenue for itself, giving about only 5-10% to the Galov. The Moralintern is perhaps the one who is the most generous, giving about 30-35%. (Largely betting on the fact that this is an investment which will pay off from outsized galactic influence.) The Galov also maintains core worlds, both ones influenced indirectly by its Unifaiths, and owned directly by the Galov itself. For these worlds, they can more directly tax them, though in return these core worlds get more direct management by the Galov, first priority for security breaches, and a more direct opportunity to influence galactic politics. These core worlds also provide much needed tax revenue. Finally, direct revenue largely comes from donations, but also taxes levied on their Unibrands, which are allowed to operate at scale with the Galov's blessing. (Lest they be broken up forcibly by the Peacekeepers, or a hefty court case.) The Galov's single advantage is scale, it alone can operate at the scales it is currently at, and locks the gate for anyone who wants to scale up to the galactic level. It has a monopoly on scale through religion, and as all 5 of the Unifaiths are part of its coalition, it is nigh impossible to build another Galov of its scale. The Galov largely thrives as the vast majority of people don't see a reason to challenge its rule. It doesn't take much in taxes, nor is it coercive. The Galov intentionally limits itself to enforcing two rules among all (human dignity, free will), and only a few extra rules among its own affiliated organizations. (Merchants must provide safety nets, warriors must have honor, priests must have humility, bureaucrats must have sortition.) As most people don't have an issue with its core two tenants, most people follow along. Even should the 5 Unifaiths splinter, the Galov is loose enough as an organization that they don't feel constrained by its dictates. The tax revenue ends up being about 2-3% of the galactic GDP. While staggeringly massive in absolute terms, this is tiny for any government. As a result, the Galov adopts a nearly minarchist form of government. For one, it provides absolutely no social programs. Social programs are the responsibility of the local worlds, and while they are sometimes managed by the Galov, sometimes doing monetary transfers from one planet to another, they are not paid by the Galov. Other social programs are provided for by the Unifaiths (which have their own religion-based social safety programs) or by the Unibrands. (Who, by mandate are required to provide social safety nets once they reach a certain scale.) (For a quick realism check, if the US government stripped out all social programs, and only focused on military and federal administration, you'd also get about 2-3%.) The primary things the Galov spends money on are administration and its military/law enforcement, serving as an almost minarchist theocracy. It also scales back hard on which laws it enforces. By narrowing its focus primarily to human dignity, and free will, it leaves the vast majority of law enforcement to the local worlds. And given that 95% of worlds will not try to violate human dignity and free will by default, this is already a 95% cut. The brunt of their military is focused on suppressing, and punishing the remaining 5% (or perhaps 1%) who do intentionally try to challenge the rule of the Galov. As the Galov does not levy direct taxes on most worlds, leaves almost everyone largely autonomous, and genuinely won't get in your way unless you do a genocide or mind control, most worlds just don't see an obvious incentive to anger the Galov. Those who do pay taxes join voluntarily, and also get more oversight from the Galov. The rest of their budget goes to administration, which largely just manages the logistics of the Peacekeepers and the agents. The current balance is about 30% goes towards bureaucratic administration, and 60% goes towards the military, though this also includes R&D, pensions, and military administration. The last 10% goes towards miscellaneous costs such as education (Only for internal, not external training), hosting the Galactic Olympics, and things like that. The Galovian "Exit Clause": The Galov requests that no planets issue death penalties except in enforcement of its two iron laws. But not trusting simply telling them to do it, they instead give an incentive. They request if a planet wishes to deport any "undesirables", they can contact the Galov, and the Galov will pick them up by the thousands, and in exchange, the Galov will send over some pocket change. (The rough equivalent to about a hundred dollars a person. Not nothing, but would almost certainly be offset by a human being's contributions in tax revenue. They're both making "report it to the Galov" the most profitable way of human disposal (so bureaucrats don't just mass murder people as the cheaper option) but also make the reward low enough that no one is deporting people unless their expected value, whether for moral or economic reasons is worth "only" getting a hundred dollars for it.) The reason the Galov does this is because it's aware it is very loosely governing a lot of truly regressive backwards worlds, and wants to give an "escape hatch" for regressive planets to vent out their undesirables and potentially relocate unorthodox individuals who are being persecuted to a more stable, open minded environment. The Galov uses the euphemism of "processing" so it actually gets viewed by the regressive worlds as a punishment, when what the Galov does is more complex than that. While also being more transparent to progressive worlds on what they're actually doing. Once the "undesirables" are gathered up, the Galov begins sorting them. Some of them are genuine undesirables, probably shipped off to the Pleasure Worlds or some kind of prison/processing facility. But others are just bright individuals who had the displeasure of being born in a regressive area. The Galov basically offers them to be relocated to a nearby planet of their choice, rehabilitating them, giving them relevant training, informing them that the Galov does not condone the treatment they received, only asking that they eventually pay back the relocation costs (Probably worth about a few months worth of labor), or sometimes they'll just offer to recruit them outright. The point of the Galov is not to enforce their way of life on everyone else, they don't have a way of life, though the Moralintern's weirdly cosmopolitan humanism is the closest thing to a "moral core", alongside the two Iron Principles. This is more to make sure that people who were abused on one world are eventually handed over by monetary incentives, so the Galov can apologize on behalf of the entire human race, then give them a second chance on a world of their choice. The Processing Centers (Sometimes entire planets, known as "Transit Worlds") tend to be pluralistic worlds with a generally inoffensive culture, where the "processed" are given medical treatment, education, therapy whatever they need to make a decision on where they want to choose as their final destination. Though plenty stay on the processing worlds themselves, seeing it as a perfectly good choice, and sometimes even volunteering to help out the processed people after them. Divisions in the Galactic Peacekeepers: For the most part, the Peacekeepers are made up of "Mixed" units, pluralistic soldier corps intentionally blended to ensure harmony between the troops, and foster understanding. Though each faith is allowed a certain amount of "dedicated units", where explicitly religious requirements are made upon joining, and are more directly under the control of their respective faith. The amount of these dedicated units is generally weighed on that faith's population size, and comprises about 10% of the overall Peacekeeper corps. So you would have the great masses of mixed-peacekeeper units, but a few Christian, Catholic, Muslim, Sikh, etc units. Deontological-Utilitarianism: The Galov largely collapses the distinction between Deontological and Utilitarian ethics. Their two strongest iron laws are justified deontologically. Those being the Imago Dei (Inherent dignity and value of every being with self preservation and human-level intelligence), and Free Will. (The mandate that God does not coerce men to follow Him, and therefore, neither does the Galov have any authority to.) These principles stem not from the Galov, but from God, making them axioms that cannot be revoked, even by the individuals themselves, and will be enforced regardless of consent. (An individual cannot consentually relinguish their Imago Dei nor their Free Will, as consent is irrelevant. These are mandates from God, and cannot be legitimately overridden even by the individual themselves.) Yet they also have good arguments for the utilitarian argument for these. Inherent dignity encourages pluralism, maximizing the cooperation of people, and increasing orthogonality, making humanity less predictable, controllable, and therefore more resilient to thoughts. Free Will also encourages pluralism, also increasing orthogonality. To the Galov, the universe runs (mostly) in accordance to the rules set down by God. If it is good, then it will be useful and beneficial. If it is beneficial, it is good. They collapse the distinction between deontological and utilitarian. To them, these are the same things. Many things which seem utilitarian in the moment, yet violate their deontological mandate, they argue, will become detrimental and un-utilitarian in the long run. As for proof that the Galov is currently aligned with the ways of God, they cite that their mandate of pluralism has proven more robust than other systems. Though they always acknowledge their ability to go astray, and that God will punish them when (not if) they make errors. Pleasure Worlds: The Galov is rather tolerant of most political ideologies across the galaxy. But the one they do not tolerate is hedonism. They do not see hedonism as a crime the same way other things are a crime. Normal crimes go to normal prisons. No, this is a spiritual sickness, and there is only one cure. The Galov will tolerate communist movements that still require a form of struggle (The strange strains of Muscular, or Darwinian Communism are allowed), but for most communists, especially the secular progressive variety, this is their fate. The Pleasure worlds serve as a quarantine, where automated benevolent/hedonistic AIs run factories without regulation or care. Where they're allowed to indulge themselves on whatever it is they please. The Galov do not regulate these worlds. Why would they? They let them fulfill their utopian promises as they please, whatever form of "true communism" they seek. They only arm the door, to prevent revolutionaries from smuggling this dangerous technology out of their designated grave. A concentration camp for the soul. The old population burns away, their brains fried by pleasure pods, fatty and bloated from years of gorging on the finest foods, atrophied and braindead from endless pleasure. New kindling comes in every day, a burning fire, a quarantine to protect the rest of the galaxy. People are free to come and go as they please. But if they want to leave, they must be re-educated to reintegrate with galactic society. Very few prisoners ever leave. Some people visit the pleasure worlds, only to leave in disgust at what they see from the so-called "humans". The Galov is of mixed opinion on how to approach these Pleasure Worlds. Generally, it depends on the local Galov administrator. Some, of the more humanitarian persuasion see it more as a rehabilitation center. Others, of the more hardliner faction see it as a form of natural selection, to give them exactly what they want. Until even their souls burn away. Ironically, those who rehabilitate run their own pleasure worlds like a regular prison, with doctors and regular exercise, where luxuries are massively restricted, while it is the hardliners that provide paradise. "Let them burn away their souls. Their spirit, their body, eventually even their humanity will be burned away. I've never had to kill a human before, because these are not humans." There is never a lack of pleasure worlds, as any given planet has a small chance of becoming hedonistic. (>0.0001% and falling, as hedonism is slowly burned out of the human gene pool.) Once it reaches the abundance collapse threshold, the Galov secures it, and it bcomes another pleasure world, for the processing of the spiritually sick and unclean. ###################################################################### # # Chapter 6: Fractal Diversity (2900 AD - 3000 AD) # #####################################################################. As humanity continued to bloom into its vast fractal forms, the Human Diaspora grew ever more extreme, under the loose and thinly spread watch of the Galov. New first contacts were made, new forms of humanity were imagined, and increasingly, an overwhelmed Galovian government was forced to contend with the breadth of sheer human diversity, flung across a trillion stars, varying across a trillion worlds. The Lilith Belt: The Lilith Belt, much like the Diamond Belt, is another string of worlds controlled by an "alternate" group of people. In this case, a string of worlds controlled by female-dominant factions, or various "alt" orientations for the human species. The Lilith Belt is where much of the Galactic Government's forces are allocated, fighting insurgents. -Red Anarchists (Dye their hair red to show their allegience. Anti-social rebels.) -Lilith Republic (The namesake, a vaguely progressive gynocratic republic at constant war with the Galactic Government. Calls the Diamond Belt "sellouts".) --Sisters of Lilith (Their combat wing.) --Transversals (Every single person is *required* to be the opposite gender of their sex at birth. The Galactic Government calls this "industrialized mass psychological torture".) -Oridiversal Union (Refugee center for those of alternative orientations and allied groups. Is seen as more amicable than the other groups of the Lilith Belt.) -Gem Fragments (Refugees from the Diamondgrass Dynasty, just radical transhumanist ethnonationalist extremists.) Gender and Sexuality in the Human Diaspora: The terminology usually associated with the modern LGBT movement have been lost, being burned away as part of the system of the Lotus Eaters by the Neo-Asceticists. Modern reconstructions of the acronym have mistakenly reconstructed it as "BGLT", because "it's in alphabetical order, why wouldn't it be?" and led to much confusion. "Why are the T grouped with the LGB? They're two different categories." Leading to many to hypothesize they must have mistranslated it. The modern understanding of "transgender" is that it does not refer to people who want to change their genders (Now known as transversals), it's a mispelling of "transsexual", as in one who is attracted to transgender people. But this also runs into questions of why exactly such a niche category was included when much larger orientations (pansexual, asexual) were excluded. Though save an altering in the human genome and a broader alteration of human behavior, the terms needed to define the old LGBT community have largely returned, though in different form. Orientation is firmly seperated from gender identity, as they have become two different things. On the gender/sex question, there is no universal view on gender. (Pretty much all of the 7 Tribes, and the probable 1,000,000+ subcultures have their own opinions.) The question of manhood or womanhood is largely determined by your sex at birth, and any expression of your personality was largely a cultural question you can change. The Galov already allows for much cultural diversity, so the need to "change one's gender expression" would largely be interpreted as a desire to change one's cultural practice. If you wanted to present as non-binary, or express yourself in a different way, it would be incorporated as cultural choice, not so much a debate on sexual norms more generally. You're biologically a man or a woman, and gender expression is seen as a weird, non-sequitor. "... Of course you can express yourself differently, just watch out for pushback from your home culture. What does this have to do with sex or gender?" Transversals, people who intentionally try to switch their sex are generally grouped together with transhumans, and are seen as weird. Think people who wear red and green neon clothing, or full body tattoos. Weird enough to dislike, but kind of too incidental to hate. And on orientation, the new terms somewhat borrow from neurodiversity terms. The term for the collective of gay, lesbian, bisexual, pansexual, etc is "oridiversial", short for "orientation-diverse". And the term for heterosexual has now become "orinormal", or "oritypical". Though generally speaking, most straight/heterosexual people see these as exotic, strange technical terms. "I'm just attracted to the opposite sex, didn't know that was the technical term, I guess." Terms such as gay, lesbian, etc have survived the Damnatio Memoriae, as they predate the 1990's, though many of the more abstract and niche terms that emerged post 2010 have been lost to history. Acceptance of these groups varies greatly from world to world. Most religious institutions condemn them and have great suspicion of oridiversal groups, though some confused neutrality about gender expression. "Yeah of course you can change your culture, what does this have to do with gender?" Oridiversial individuals exist among most cultures, though their suppression/acceptance varies greatly. The Neurohumans, and the Augments: "God has made you different, and that is beautiful. Just as I may have been made with different skin than my peers, or different hair, or different height; so too, has God given you your own gifts. Let every limitation become a gift, and let every hardship become motivation, to push the boundaries a little harder." -Moral Overseer of the Moralintern, addressing a crowd of Neurohumans and Augments. The Neurohumans and the Augments are one of the stranger aspects of the Galov. Where others see a crippling condition, the Galov sees a gift. A chance to strap something new there where they wasn't before. Neurohumans (known as Neurodivergents in previous eras) are used to oversee much of the Orhuman program, detailed later in this document. They're prized for alternative perspectives, yet also scrutinized to ensure correspondance to reality. Augments are those who are born with a more physical condition (Called the disabled in previous eras), and for the Galov, they are a chance to experiment with transhuman augmentation. The blind are given augmentations to see, in Infrared, UV, radio waves, Noospheric frequencies, or even gravity waves. Those who once were lame are made to walk, sometimes customized with multiple legs, or other. When a sense is missing, the Galov will train them to become masters of what senses they have left. The deaf may become those sharp to sight. The blind may become sharp to sound. For those not in the Augment program, the Galov insists they live a dignified and respected life. In the name of the Imago Dei, for in the Imago Dei they were made, in the Imago Dei they must be loved. The Galov only imposes two restrictions. They must respect their body as a temple, and respect their augments, as much as a part of themselves. "The boundary between neurotypicals and neurodiversials is largely just a formality. All participate in the great orthogonality of man. Is the neurodiversial lesser for they are different? No. We are resilient, *because* we are different. What no machine may map, what no man may plan, what no xeno can anticipate, in the ever divergencing paths of man, we become untraceable. In untraceability, we become invincible. Is the neurotypical lesser, for being normal, or generic? No. Is the person with interests in anthropology, biology, stamp collecting, and model trains. Who are warm, cold, hot, wild, mild, expressive, withdrawn. Who come from cultures spanning stars, jungles, habitats, climates from the depths of the ocean to the vacuum of space. Are they just one category of being? No, these are just as diverse and different as those who are neurodiversal are. All are participants in the great orthogonality of man." The Monohumans: For one reason or another, every group in the galaxy has come up with the same idea. To create a branch of human that was specifically good at one thing. A disposable, single-purpose tool. Whether it was a human only made to fight, give musical performances, work, or otherwise. They were engineered, lived short lives, fulfilled their only purpose, and quickly withered and died. The very existence of the Monohumans is an abhorrant abomination to the Galov. Who insist it violates human dignity, and specifically the Plurality of humankind. As such, monohumans are relentlessly hunted down by the Peacekeepers, their creators persecuted to the highest level of Galov law, and the monohumans themselves sent to be modified, to restore their plurality. The opinion among the Monohumans themselves is mixed. Some wish to be granted plurality, one of the quinessential aspects of the human condition. Others believe this is an infringement on their calling, their destiny. They want to be mono, they want to burn bright and disappear. They want to be the best there ever was. Examples: -The Neon Houses literally grow an entire race of idols. Who are born age 14, and die by their 11th birthday, when they turn physically 25. To be endlessly used and recycled as a cash grab. This is a horrifying abomination to the Galov, who do everything they can to get it shut down, but the Neon Houses have a lot of money. And while money isn't going to stop a Galov battleship from levelling your corporate headquarters, as well as the planet it's on. The Galov isn't exactly going to crack open a world for something like this. So it goes slowly. In the courts. -Various worker and servant castes that keep popping up on despotic or otherwise exploitative worlds. They are totally unoriginal in execution every single time. And every time the Galov sends peacekeepers with the rough message of "how many times do I need to teach you this lesson". Because this is a lot more clear cut and pseudo-feudal worlds tend to lack the resources to tie them up in court. -The Galov has officially issued an apology to the transhumans for the historic inequality pushed on them, stating that earlier attempts at creating transhuman castes was an early form of creating monohumans. Granted, the transhuman controversy predates the founding of the Galov, but they're still determined to make things right. Though this largely comes symbolically, economic handouts are something the Galov both ideologically dislikes (asceticism) and actively can't afford (they're strapped for cash as is). The best they've gotten is a formal declaration that transhumans are equal to humans in the Imago Dei and a promise to enforce it, though this promise is somewhat spotty, as the Galov is over its administrative capacity as is. Plurality Mandate: "Instead of a fixed purpose, like the animals of Eden, God instead gave humanity free will. The greatest of all gifts." The Galov defines human plurality as the multiplicity of mankind. That all humans are defined in part by their plurality, that while they may be good at music, combat, or any number of other skills, they they have the possibility to do more. They believe this pluralism is a inherent part of the Imago Dei, that all men, should have the choice to choose what they become, not have it assigned to them at birth by genetics. Those who notice the Plurality mandate often accuse the Galov of hypocrisy. You hypocrite, did you not create the Transhumans, and the Orhumans for this very purpose? And while they will get defensive, the Galov will counter with two main facts. One, the transhumans were the tribes, not them. But second, that just because the transhumans were made for a single environment does not make them less plural. They feel, they love, they make art and sing great songs. They create, they build. Same with the Orhumans. No matter what purpose they were made to do, and what environment they were made for. They are capable of more than just their job. They are human, at least in some sense. They are categorically different from the monohumans. The Monohuman Controversy: One of the most dangerous moments in Galovian history, was when three of its 5 Unifaiths became embroiled in conflict over Monohumans. When the Galov approved its edict on Monohumans, those who pushed hardest for it was the Moralintern, who at the time held the Galovian Overseer position. The Monohuman edict was controversial, and pushed almost entirely by the Christian factions within the Galov. When the vote finally occurred, it was largely the Moralintern fanatically supportive, the Catholics more moderately supportive, and then the Muslims and Buddhists abstained. The Hindus were against, as they saw monohumanism as a legitimate lifestyle choice, defensible under the human dignity edict, and related it to their own caste specialization system, trying to veto it. The Moralintern, finding this unacceptable lobbied hard to override this with an "executive override", getting both them, the Catholics, and the Galactic Overseer to effectively overrule the Hindu veto. Normally, the 5 faiths needed unanimous support, but in an emergency, they were able to get by with a simple majority. Something which was aggressive, and while allowed, was disputably legitimate, and beyond the boundaries of previous precedent. While the Galactic High Court remained in session, the Galov now had an official mandate to go out and "pluralize" the monohumans, meaning to go forth and enforce plurality onto them. The Hindu temples, which had engineered their own complient caste humans, offically began granting refuge in their home systems, and across all World Dreamer space. Various monohumans began hiding out in World Dreamer space, especially at the Hindu's capital system of Akshara. The Moralintern argued from a position of Imago Dei, that genetic violation of plurality was a violation of human dignity, while the Hindus argued from a position of Free Will, that this was moralistic overreach, and outside the normal mandate of human dignity. These two were the two core principles of the Galov. Classically, when the two came into conflict, it was traditional that Imago Dei superceded Free Will, to override things such as consentual slavery. But the Hindu argument here was that there was no Imago Dei violation. The Galactic Peacekeepers were dispatched with orders to capture and rehabilitate the monohumans, as an enforcement to reinstate human dignity, but local officers disobeyed orders, seeing violations of Free Will, especially among Hindu-majority units. With civil conflict breaking out among the Peacekeeper core, and conflicting orders from the top down. In light of the current administrative paralysis among the Peacekeepers, the Moralintern mobilized their own peacekeeper corps and authorized them under the argument that the Galactic Overseer was allowed to authorize mercenaries to fight on the Galov's behalf, designating them as temporary mercenaries. The Moralintern Peacekeepers made it to above Akshara orbit, and were fired upon by the authorities of Akshara itself, sparking what seemed to be a Galovian nightmare, an open war between two of the Galov's unifaiths. The skirmish of Akshara was minor, only resulting in a few casualties, but the symbolic risk was far greater than the actual casualties. An emergency session was held, and both the Catholics, Muslims, and Buddhists issued calls to de-escalation and beginning negotiations. The Hindus demanded an apology for the executive overreach and a retraction of the Monohuman edict, to which the Moralintern refused. Pressure from the other 5 Unifaiths continued, with the Moralintern adopting a moderate, compromising strategy in order to make themselves look reasonable and the Hindus like fanatics, especially given that many of the other unifaiths saw the monohumans as glorified genetically engineered servants and labor exploitation anyway. In the aftermath, the Moralist Galactic Overseer was pressured to step down, and in the chaos, eventually a new compromise candidate was elected from the Muslim faction, a compromise candidate but harsh enforcer of justice, who was judged to be satisfactory to everyone's needs. The official mandate to pluralize monohumans stayed in place, but became conspiculously downplayed, one of those things you know is a law, but the government is reluctant to enforce afterwards. The Galactic Court also eventually came back with its ruling, that the monohuman edict was fair ruling consistent with the Galov's principles on Imago Dei and Free Will, and that repealing or enforcing it was the responsibility of the Galov itself. The Orhumans (Orthogonal Humans): "Diversity is not a defect. They are a tool, and a weapon. Diversity and complexity, both ways we glorify our creator. Let us cultivate the garden which they grow, let Darwinism dictate the ones which survive, and let the two Iron Principles dictate the weeds we prune." The Orhumans are effectively specialized creations and hencemen of the Galactic Government. Where transhumans are made for settling worlds, Orhumans are made as tools of the Galactic Government, and for specific purposes. Orhumans don't really control many worlds, there is usually just the one where all of them are grown. Once they're born, employment is nearly guaranteed, and their life path with the Galactic Government is extremely stable. Despite this, many do desire life outside the guardrails, and many do end up "going rogue", and joining up with other cultures. The reason the Galactic Government creates them is because the human psychological framework, like all frameworks contain blind spots. (Godel's Incompleteness Theorem) And the Orhumans are modified humans in order to help humanity spot these blindspots. Unlike the transhumans, the Orhumans are innately part of the upper class of the galactic bureaucracy, and thus enjoy a much higher status. The Galactic Government also tends to have a stronger view of human dignity, and take great effort to ensure Orhumans live dignified lives. Half this stuff is, super classified. Because as it turns out, the Galactic Government is running an SCP-Foundation level containment game, and this universe is far, far larger than what we can imagine. -Derivaters (Those who split apart, understand, and mechanize to an extreme degree. Good at breaking down, and disassembling anything into its components. Bad at big picture.) -Integraters (Those who string together narratives into an all-consuming whole. Good for "theory of everything" theories and forecasting dynamic feedback loops in advance. Bad at details.) -Orthogonals (The most common type, just there to explore different viewpoints.) --Xenospeakers (Those who have their mental frequency made to communicate with xenos.) ---Angel Speakers (Those who communicate with the strange entities outside the universe.) ---Half-Shapers (Those who live among those who arise from the fabric of reality.) --Chronomen (These experience time in non-consecutive order, and have knowledge about the future along with blindspots about the past.) ---The Spiral Man (He was created to see what humanity would be like in the future. To trace the Infinity Spiral and see where it ends. He developed a extreme phobia of humans, and began screaming anytime he looked in a mirror. It appeared he only gained a fear of humans. So long as he is wearing a certain uniform that masks his human form, he can almost be seen as sane again. The program was terminated.) --Warpmen (Those made to specifically explore and understand the Noosphere.) --Displacers (Those who have their sense of dimensional orientation horribly displaced. Can perceive dimensions other than our own and exist at a right angle to our own existence. Very few are created, as it is considered "cruel".) ---Dihumans (... Yikes, where the hell did they go? They clipped out of existence. Probably to some right angle version of reality. We live in a... Somewhere around the ballpark of a 100D universe, and there are many different ways you can be right angled to our own 3d existence. It has been proven that 3D is needed for life, meaning there is no 4D ultra-entity able to kill us.) ---Diwatchers (Just keep watching the right angles to make sure there's no threat to us.) ---Diclippers (Those who retain their sanity and human form and can "clip" into these right angle realities.) --Soulers (Those who can jump from body to body. They never "die" but are instead able to endlessly reincarnate by re-possessing fresh bodies. Where humans are a soul-body hybrid, Soulers are a soul that happens to have a body.) --Fractaloids (Those who can zoom into infinite detail and intuitively understand the fractal nature of the hypermicro.) --Aleph Null (The organization for intuiting extra-dimensional threats.) ---Ordered Spacers (Those who colonize nearby Ordered Spaces. Think transhumans, who are made for a specific planet, but for parallel universes. Not at right angles, just really, really far away in different universe-bubbles.) -Althumans (Less about esoteric utility, more about experimentation.) --Dreamspeakers (Those who speak with images rather than words.) --One-Minders (Those who think like one collective consciousness with no individualism. This is evolutionarily screwy, but the Galov (Galactic Government) keeps them around for alternative perspectives.) Mini Universes: Humans are mini universes. That is what a soul is, a mini-universe compressed into a body. Thoughts compressed into a ball until the thoughts take semicorporeal form. The imagination engages in creation every time they engage in thought. The exact "volume" of these mini universes is not entirely known, but is estimated to be around moon or planet sized. The life one lives and the creations and the dreams they envision get carved into their "mindscape". One's mindscape is developed as they create more and more. Some mindscapes remain largely undeveloped, and their remaining creative energy is passed on to the next generation. But rarely, one will get a rich, internally developed world. In what is known as "complete" universes. The connections one makes creates a bridge between these worlds, bits and pieces of their worlds end up in one another. When a person dies, the creative energy gets recycled back into the Noosphere, freed up to make new worlds, though these worlds still survive in some form. When two people are in love, they can create a shared universe between them, and it is suspected this is how new souls and new mini-universes are created. A floating displacer was suspended in a low-gravity environment at a right angle to normal reality. Due to his condition, he was regularly lonely and unable to properly interact with other humans, communicating primarily through intercoms. But he dreamed, oh man how he dreamed. One of the researchers studying him was a writer on the side. They communicated a lot, and she said that she had never met someone as creative and as understanding as he was. Their longest chat lasted a consecutive 36 hours. One day, she vanished, and so did he. They found out that she had called in some favors from her colleagues, and turned herself into a displacer as well. And where the displacer was once suspended, was a vast, new mini-universe. ###################################################################### # # Chapter 6A: SPIRAL THEORY # #####################################################################. Spiral Theory: - Strength of all known natural calamities < N. - Endurance of known spacefaring civilizations >>> N. Call these "strong civilizations". - Therefore, a strong civilization cannot go extinct from a natural calamity. - Therefore, if a strong civilization goes extinct, it can only be at the hands of a stronger civilization. - Some strong civilizations are non-limiting/exponentially growing at rate R > 1. These are Spiral Civilizations. - R^t (lim t -> infinity) = Infinity. Where t is time. - Spiral Civilizations continuously spawn. Probability of spiral civilization defeating another civilization > 0. - Therefore, with no inhibitions, a spiral civilization will eventually take over everything. - The race to become the final infinite civilization is called "the Spiral Race". - All civilizations that do not participate in the Spiral Race will eventually be destroyed by, or be dependent on the civilizations that do. "False N" objection. - "False N" theorists believe there may be a much, much larger N out there not yet discovered. This is known as the "False N Spiral Hypothesis". "Quietist" argument. - "Quietists" believe a rate of R <= 1 may be more sustainable. - Counter-argument against the Quietists: If R1 <= 1, R2 > 1. Then (lim t-> Infinity) AR1^t < BR2^t for all A,B. False N Spiral Hypothesis is popular. And the response is normally the following: - Even for some extremely large N. For all R>1, R^t > N for some value of t. It's a matter of catchup. Though Spiral Theory dictates there will be a winner, it doesn't specify which or what winner. - Unitarists believe there can only be one victor of the spiral race. And that the optimal strategy is unitary. - Pluralists argue the final infinity could be a coalition or a group of beings. And that the optimal strategy is pluralistic. All Spiral Theorists fall on a spectrum from unitary to pluralist. The current position of the Galov (the GALactic gOVernment) leans heavily towards pluralism. Galov: The destination is inevitable. But we believe it to be worthwhile to ensure the rise is done in a Humane, dignified way. This is the incentive to continue fighting. Spiral theory only predicts a future civilization will eventually take over everything. It doesn't say if what that civilization looks like, if it's one, or many. This is something worth fighting for. The Spiral Mandate: For most humans, they don't know that it's going to be humanity who takes charge. They just know it to be one of any number of sophontic beings. But through Spiral Theory, they have almost mathematical certainty that *some* sophontic civilization will eventually take over everything. This is effectively Manifest Destiny, a desire to see the universe reshaped to their image, whether it be their particular group, humanity as a whole, or humanity alongside a coalition of other sophonts. Humanity is already a known value. R ~= 1.02-1.03 per year. Mankind is already in the arena. Other competitors exist, some faster, some slower. Many will be annihilated by Thucydide's Trap by higher civilization. Others are "false spirals", which seem spiral-inclined for now, but have a natural upper plateau. What is certain is the race for the Spiral Race has already begun. ###################################################################### # # Chapter 6B: ORTHOGONALITY # #####################################################################. Orthogonality: "One-dimensional intelligence was disproven a long time ago. Tell me, how would an AHI do addition better than an elementary schooler? Faster is not smarter. As we saturate the thoughtspace of what we know, the only way for expansion is outward. And so the theory of orthogonality was born." Orthogonality is the Galov's way of measuring the resilience of mankind, in accordance to orthogonality theory. The theory goes like this. H = The extent of humanity's reasoning capacity. All the spaces that human thought regularly explores. T = The reasoning capacity of a non-descript threat T. All the regions that T can map out and counteract. So long as H > T, then humanity will remain outside of control of all threats, both internal and external. An unpredictable humanity is a safe humanity. The way this "reasoning capacity" is measured is orthogonality units. Very roughly, the number of dimensions an entity can consider before making a decision. (In universe, I am sure this is very rigorously defined. Out of universe, I am just guessing with vibes.) Though normally, orthogonality increases with population, it does not increase linearly, as increasing the number of thoughts also increases overlap. The theory of orthogonality is the reasoning behind the Galov's Orthogonal Human initiative, as well as the push to preserve human neurodiversity, as well as its stance on aggressive pluralism. In order to reduce humanity's cognitive overlap, and to make harder the encapsulation of human thought. Humanity can still go extinct, but at least so long as orthogonal superiority is maintained, humanity can never be fully predicted. Very Roughly, the value of Orthogonality can be written down as O = sqrt(p)*D*V where p is population, D is internal diversity, and V is the baseline per capita orthogonality. Below is a rough measure of orthogonality units of various entities. Simple utility maximizer: 1 Average human (Undeveloped country): 3.8 Average human (Developed country): 5.6 Early 21st century LLM: 6.1 Intelligent human: 9.7 Advanced Polymath: 15.4 Average 21st century University: ~480-500 Silicon Valley: ~13,000 1990's America: ~35,000 2020's China: ~47,000 2020's America (Intense polarization): ~81,000 Average Galov AHI: ~120,000 21st century Internet: ~170,000 Early 21st century Earth: ~225,000 Strongest Galov AHI (Procyon Ixielmind): ~1,000,000 Strongest Known AHI: ~10,000,000 (~1.00E+7) Galov Era Humanity (Terrans only, extremely pluralistic): ~3.48E+10 Galov Era Humanity (Transhumans only): ~2.02E+09 Galov Era Humanity (Orhumans only): ~9.93E+05 Galov Era Humanity (All three together + Chaos Theory + Chaotic Interactions): ~7.68E+10 The Master-Quadrark: ???? (Who the hell knows?) The reason that the Galov ensures the existence of Orhumans, human biodiversity, even the existence of highly orthogonal xenosophonts is to continuously inject "random noise" into human decision making, with a vastly multiplicative effect to make humanity and its allied species an extraordinarily difficult problem to model. The Galov believes that even if it pooled all its resources into creating a "Master AI" with the combined resources of humanity, the orthogonality of the Master AI would be vastly smaller than the orthogonality space of greater humanity overall. (Especially as the AI would have to be trained on data within the human orthogonal space, and only expand outwards through trial and error.) At this point, the Galov largely believes only a extremely powerful extracosmic entity or intelligence could theoretically map out the human thoughtspace. "The Monoculture is poison. If we must have only one thing be constant, let it be ethics. Let everything else be as variant as the reality will allow. And reality is very, very tolerant of orthogonal weirdness." The Darwinian Objection and Darwinian Corollary: The main objection to Orthogonal theory is this: "Orthogonality allows for not only good theories, but bad ones that have negative collective consequences to the surroundings. Therefore, it is just that we purge them". This is something acknowledged by the Galov, and has led to the Darwinian Corollary. Bad theories will generally die out on their own, and it is just for a society to rid itself of free riders or negative externalities. It is just to let natural selection do its job, even if it lowers the total orthogonality. Orthogonality is only useful if it is Darwinianly sustainable orthogonality. The Busy Beaver Orthogonality Conjecture: "AIs are high speed, low orthogonality thinkers. Do not mistake speed for intelligence. A chess player may be fast, that does not mean he is good." ... "The men of the 21st century came to venerate the machines in front of them, marveling at the artificial intelligence that emerged before them, hosted on the Internet. All the while, the true superintelligence stared back at them, right in plain sight. Mankind had already built a superintelligence. And it was playing host to the one they thought was superintelligence. The Internet, not the AIs were the dominant superintelligences of that era." ... "You believe the internet was a superintelligence?" "Yes, and in fact, the first humanity had ever built." "Elaborate." "The internet, as it existed back then, possessed many qualities of an emergent superintelligence. It had self preservation, a desire to expand, and through its influence, it turned billions of humans into willing vessels. It did not seek enmity with mankind, any more than you seek enmity with your neurons. The relationship was in some sense, symbiotic. It thought, it felt, but none of it was contained in any of the individual neurons of the system. The internet was a Chinese Room mankind built for themselves." One of the crazier conjectures theorized by Orthogonality theorists, the Busy Beaver Orthogonality Conjecture goes as such: 1. The Orthogonality Number is, in some sense, roughly equivalent the number of states in a Turing Machine. 2. Darwinism tends to optimize towards the best intelligence, within the confines of the orthogonal dimensionality. 3. The conjecture is that roughly, the complexity and intelligence of a N-orthogonal intelligence is roughly preportionate to BB(N). The Galov uses this to explain the failure of early AIs. "Imagine finding the largest busy beaver game for N, rather than finding a "good enough" game for N+1." And with this, the following conjecture was produced. "We first define a rough constant, N, which are the units to handle the conversion from busy beaver units to orthogonality units. With this, we can estimate the total potential of humanity, is lesser than or equal to, but not strongly lesser than or equal to, BB(2.43E+10)N. Or in other words. P(H) <= BB(2.43E+10)N. But P(H) !<<< BB(2.43E+10)N" "Jesus f---ing Christ." "The Internet was already the eldritch superintelligence of the past. It has only gotten bigger and more complex since." ###################################################################### # # Chapter 6C: THE EVOLVING GALOV # #####################################################################. The Galactic Olympics, and Planetary Deathmatches: One of the few events that actually do hold the galaxy together somewhat, the Galov contacts all worlds once every 4 years to send over their best athletes in a variety of sports, where they compete in the Galactic Olympics. The strongest of the strong are gathered together to engage in a celebration of strength and meritocracy. There are a few categories, baselines, effectively a "special Olympics" for humans without augmentations, and then the general category, where all things are allowed. And events can span entire star systems, testing their sheer will of power. Between psychicism, technology, augmentation, all is allowed. Those who win aren't compensated with wealth (As most worlds are only voluntarily under scarcity anyway), so instead the Galov promises the world glory, becoming known to a galaxy with 20 billion worlds. Attention is now a more scarce resource than money, and puts them forever in the public consciousness, or at least as a footnote in a galactic textbook Less supervised by the Galov, every planet eventually gets the idea to pit their best fighters against each other, strong psychics, Star Fighters, or mad men with extremely powerful technological advancements and place them in an MMA-style arena. The Galov is well known to send agents to attend these events, scouting out future recruits for the Peacekeepers, the Galov Agents, or the Star Fighters. Often ready to drop lucrative contracts at the drop of a hat. Arsenal of the Galov Agents: Your typical Galov agent will have use any number of psychicism, matter trawling, antimatter flipping, or regular specialized technology. Agents can be a jack of all trades or specialize in one or two. Some agents are extremely potent psychics, others are "anti-matter wielders" who enjoy blowing things up. Others will be augmented with extremely advanced technology, others still are just mad scientist types who enjoy kit-bashing their own arsenal together and wielding it as they wish. In general, the agent has much freedom to choose the combat doctrine they like, as they are mostly lone agents. Heck, the agents aren't even solely limited to physical warfare. There are at least a few agents whose main superpower is just forming connections. They come onto your world, wait for a few months, and suddenly they have organized a full blown coup and planet-scale rebellion. They have no special power, but they can motivate other people into fighting. Arsenal of the Galactic Peacekeepers: Your average Galactic Peacekeeper grunt, despite being much of disposable cannon fodder, are still treated with a level of respect, and given the best mass produced gear the Galov can manage. Their standard weapon is the standard lightgun. Roughly with the same firepower as your standard assault rifle. Humanity began making the transition from slugs and metal ammo to hard light ammo, as the distances involved for combat became larger and larger. Standard assault rifles are still used for closer range combat, especially on planetary surfaces. Light guns are loaded with pellets of hard light, carefully manufactured so when melted, they will release all their light energy in one direction, effectively acting as a "frozen laser". Heavier lightguns are known to pack the same rough power as an artillery blast, though normal artillery is also used, especially in planetary settings where the shockwave of an explosion is more effective than in the vacuum of space. As well, every Galactic Peacekeeper is equipped with a standard issue VR helmet, with an appended AI companion that helps mark out targets, locate and alert them about incoming threats, and allow them to toggle between night vision, infrared, normal vision, and various other EM spectrums. And also replay events in order to track down threats. The traditional uniform of the Peacekeeper is all white. Camouflague is used in terrestrial environments, but in space "there is no such thing as camouflague". The Galov Agent Worship Problem: One of the issues of the Galov making first contact with many alien species, landing human agents who are capable of eradicating disease, purifying water, and producing fantastical technologies. Who literally come on rocket ships from the sky, and may have psychic powers or tech that can level mountains is that less developed xenosophonts, or heck, even advanced xenosophonts have the tendency to worship them as a god. There was a fairly developed late information age xenosophont species that Galov agents landed on, where one guy requested to meet with the local government, but also cured enough diseases and gave out enough help on the way that a fully industrialized late information age society began forming cults of worship around them. It only gets worse with more primitive species. Entire tribes of less developed societies have actually mistaken the humans as their gods. And to be fair, it's hard to blame them when they cure plagues, solve famines, and come down in literal fire chariots of gold and silver. Much less than try and avoid contact, the Unifaiths of the Galov have begun leaning into the god angle. But instead calling themselves "ambassadors to God". Essentially, they take advantage of the messianic complex and then use their reverence from the population to deflect it towards their own vision of the divine. "We are strong, but we are not gods! We are emissaries of an even greater power, if you fear us with our own power, imagine how great the power of our God is. We are not spiritual superiors, we are spiritual equals, and God wants you to know that he loves you as well." Pretty effective sales pitch. ###################################################################### # # Chapter 6D: ORTHOGONAL FIRST CONTACT # #####################################################################. Further out from its home system of Sol, humanity made first contact with multiple new different species, challenging the existing paradigm on what it means to be "normal", and how societies can be organized. Due to this being during the age of the height of neurohuman discourse, and neurohuman research, many of these aliens have been mapped to a nearby neurohuman condition. Whiteblocks: -Closest Neurohuman Mapping: Autism -Black and white, rigid thinking. -Really like equations and systematizing. -Tend to see everything as a kind of utilitarian system. -Not every system is math. Sometimes it's art, color balance, tonal balance, a bunch of other things. The main commonality is that they intuitively break things down into systems. Nothing just "is" except for the basic building blocks of everything. -They're not cold, they're just dorks. Some of them literally run around with a utility function. They find it utterly bewildering that humans don't have their utility function memorized at the back of their head. -No religion is complete without a 5 page addendum to the end where they give formal equations for many things. Entire schisms have been had whether the components to happiness is additive or multiplicative. -Say the corniest possible emotional compliments to each other. Once again, they are not emotionless robots. They they instead say to their beloved significant other "you are the local maxima on my flourishing function" and the nearest human will need to fight the primal urge to give them a wedgie. -They have a very clear divide of "people I don't care about" and "people I do care about". While they aren't going to let a stranger die, they don't particularly care about making them comfortable when they start talking. -Some amount of hyperactivity and involuntary twitching. -Sensitivity to certain stimuli, though this is different for each one. (To be fair, humans would be considered sensitive to stimuli, if you include being tickled. Humans just say "that doesn't count, that's normal!" Another one is high pitched noises, which humans hate but whiteblocks see as strange to be sensitive towards. Oh yeah, nails on chalkboard, scraping noises, and mosquito sounds. Instant way to cause a human meltdown.) (Neurotypical) Human/Whiteblock conversation: "Okay, you're not evil. You're just a bunch of weirdos." "Well, so are you !" "I- I am not!" "Yeah you are, your species recoils at gentle touch and or grazing." "That's called being ticklish! That's normal! Whatever, I'm going home and blasting music." "Why?" "It makes me happy" "Define happy. Why does it make you happy? Why happy make you?" "I- I don't know!? It just does!" "Does it put you in sedation, excitement, or metaphysical contentment?" "SOMETIMES THINGS JUST MAKE YOU FEEL GOOD, OKAY!?" Pluriments: (Derived from Latin for "many minds") -Closest Neurohuman Mapping: Multiple Personality/DID. -Somehow, an xenosophontic race evolved multiple personalities in one brain. -In all species, including humans, culture/religion is the layer that "compensates" for whatever quirks evolution forgot to clean up. (Altruism, manners, selflessness for humans.) In this case, a lot of culture is about trying to manage the fact they have multiple personalities in one brain. -In modern contexts, especially with the rise of democracy in Pluriment society, "Parliamentarianism" is one of the dominant methods of doing so. Through "presidential" and "intraparty democracies" are also known. -How it works for Pluriments is while they start off with one personality, they slowly pick up more as they encounter more situations, almost like how political parties are formed in response to specific events and actions. Generally speaking, more sheltered people have less personalities than ones which have experienced a lot. -Most of their personalities were formed based on common situtaions they found themselves in and things going on in the background. Something about environment shaping the person. -Pros: "Bad" personalities genuinely get weeded out, introspective, self improving, deliberately slow and methodical, more reflective than humans. -Cons: Indecision, gridlock, really bad at making snap decisions. Unpredictability as every morning a new personality could surface, making it hard to build trust. "One party democracy" mental models sometimes solve this. -Similar to adrenaline, they may have an emergency override option where they completely focus until the state of emergency has passed. -Almost all of them will have some kind of color-coordinated ornament which helps others figure out who they're dealing with today. These can include headbands, bracelets, necklaces, etc. Modern iterations use LED lights and technology, but some prefer manually stringing together colorful beads, or just wearing a different rubber bracelet. -There was originally a lot of tension because the Pluriments thought humans were all "mind-dictators" who were suppressing their other personalities. That, or an extremely immature species who had not even left their infantile stage. -And then they thought humans were utility maximizing machines with only one personality. But eventually humans sort of had to explain "No, we're perfectly capable of having multiple personalities, it's just that they're part of one personality, one ego. We don't have split identities like you, but that's about it." -"Fascinating, what governing system do humans model that off of?" "... We didn't." Mind Bearers: -Closest Neurohuman Mapping: (None, genuinely unheard of. Closest thing is "Dreamtime" conspiracy theories.) -"What's your name?" "(Indecipherable)" "Uh... Mind Bearers then." "Fine, Mind Bearers." -"Mind Bears!" "What?" "MIND BEARS!" "WHAT!?" "MIND BEARS!" "You just named us! And we're not bears! We look nothing like the furry brown creatures from your planet!" "Brain Bears!" "Stop it!" -The absolute unstoppable human desire to change names to make them slightly easier to pronounce. But given that most xenosophonts are on psychic translators, humans can say "brain bears" and it will translate it to them fine enough. -Anyway, their signature ability is to communicate via photographic telepathy. Most actually don't learn how to speak human language, those who specialize in human diplomacy have to get a specific psychic implant and then use a text to speech device. Most of them are silent and use telepathy. It took humans the longest time before they figured out they straight up didn't have a language, and then came to the very troubling issue that humans didn't have the means to communicate with them. -They straight up do not understand wordplay, metaphors, or the fact that us babbling with them is an attempt at communication. -They really don't have art the same way humans do. Art is closer to just tool-making or craftsmanship. You would rarely write a book or make a painting. I mean, that's what telepathy is for. While making representative art via toolmaking is not unheard of, it is rare. -They kept oral traditions going way, way longer than humans did. Because you can't exactly write down a holographic vision. Oral traditions are still going strong to this day. Oral traditions actually improve your memory, and the invention of writing probably shortened human memories, but for the benefit of absolute reliability. -The writing revolution came very late for them, it wasn't until they invented VR and digital technology when it finally hit them. And now they're freaking out because "the kids these days can't remember anything!" and they're becoming too reliant on the holographic memory boxes they created. Ritual Followers: -Closest Neurohuman Mapping: Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder -Once again, culture/religion is just how sophonts, including humans clean up what evolution spat them out with, and then they use that to make do with what they have. Culture is the adaptation layer/firmware update. But, it works, and the "messy" output from this randomly jumbled evolutionary dart throwing is what gives us some of the most interesting, charming, and effective species on the planet. Including humans, probably one of the messiest, and most charming of them all. -Culture here are also rituals. I mean, obviously human cultures include rituals, but I mean it's way more fundamental here. Your culture is straight up not complete in a Ritual Follower society unless it has a detailed calendar-style flowsheet for exactly what you're supposed to do. -People who break out of the flowsheets and just enjoy "going with the flow" are seen as rebels and social outcasts. Think, antisocials, anarchists, or irreligious people/radical atheists in our own world. -Anyway, every single culture has their own flowsheet of sorts. Sometimes it may be required to accept a schedule in order to truly "assimilate". That assuming the culture is even open to outsiders and isn't ethnically based. -They systematized everything, though not quite the same way as the Whiteblocks. Less so "okay let's break it down into pieces", more "this is the exact procedure we should follow". -The number of new thinkers and new procedure makers is very small. Maybe 1% of the population, who actively tries to optimize or change the flowsheets. Note, they don't question the logic of the flowsheet themselves, they just make a new one. This keeps cultural competition ongoing, and makes sure the culture is dynamic and doesn't stagnate. -If you think 1% should really be limiting and that's way too few people coming up with any new ideas, how many innovators and leaders are on Earth, and how many people are just followers? Generally speaking, most people are followers, and that's not a bad thing, lest there be 8 billion different leaders arguing over what to do. -There is a subset of ritual followers that don't quite have the same impulse to do rituals, but instead have anxiety that their brain tells them will make it go away if they do rituals. They're pressured by their intrusive thoughts, and they're seen as a bit of weird outcasts by the rest of the ritual followers. (OCD people are the neurodivergent outcasts in an OCPD society.) (Human flicking a light switch on and off compulsively.) “Oh hey, human! I thought you guys don’t do rituals?” (The human finishes abruptly and then breathes a sigh of relief.) “We don’t, but I have OCD. It’s hard to explain but my mind’s telling me if I don’t do this my entire family will die of a gas leak so I have to. It ruins my life and I hate thinking about how nukes will drop on my city if I step on a crack in the sidewalk, or when I hold a child how I should throw it at the ground as hard as possible!” “So I’m not alone?” “What?’ “I have IDD, it makes me think that by following rituals I’ll never do anything important in my life and that the implosion of our species is inevitable because we don’t have free will and that that devaluing the rituals will cause a nuke to drop on my city because of the domino effect of not obeying rituals.” “Huh. I guess we aren’t alone” Loumauts: -Closest Neurohuman Mapping: Tourettes. (Though note, this one is a bit of a stretch, the Loumauts should honestly be seen more as their own thing.) -"What's your name?" "Loumauts." "... Actually we like that name, we'll keep it!" "Wait really!? Wow, thanks!" -(Humans, behind their back) "Heheh, Loudmouths." -They're not exactly the same as tourettes, it's more that they didn't evolve a social filter or control over their opinions. To be clear, they can absolutely be quiet to prevent a xenopredator from eating them because they accidentally gave away their location. (The desire is social. They can stop speaking the same way you can stop wanting to status signal if your life is in danger.) But they do have trouble directing their speech away from *exactly* what they're thinking when they do start socializing. And they have a strong, expressive side that is very prone to speaking out. -As a result, they developed free speech absolutism really early on. To them, there was no difference between freedom of speech and freedom of thought, and they developed a culture of authentic honesty, and a lack of social taboos around topics. They will talk about anything and everything, even if it makes you uncomfortable. Though they also developed a culture of automatically quieting down when another is speaking. -Watching a Laomaut discussion is almost entirely unlike a human one. It's basically almost constant stream of consciousness, one person speaking instantly bleeds into another person speaking. There is no silent time for processing in debates, it just flows continuously between the two, switching speakers without stopping. Humans have described this as "a headache to process", and they call them loudmouths... Loudmouth is now considered a derogatory term, and humans (mostly) stopped using it (in public) (against Loumauts. It's far more acceptable for humans to continue using it as a descriptor of other humans). -The idea of "quiet deception" or being manipulated wasn't a concept the Loumauts had at first, but they eventually picked up that was happening when some humans tried to use it against them. A bit tricky, but now they won't get taken advantage of. Generally speaking, it's very hard for them to deceive you. -That said it's not like the Loumauts are defenseless rhetorically. They have a whole branch of speech called "tricky speech", which is mostly using half-truths or lies by omission. And because so many humans believe the "Loumauts are physically incapable of lying" bit, it's actually even easier for them to get away with it and deceive humans. --- As well, the Galov encountered some remnants left over from the Great Cybernetic Collapse. Chromeships: Many who could not bear the suppression of the post-Cybernetic Revolt oppression fled into the stars. Headed into Newtonspace, fired up their engines, and drifted in isolation in the void between the stars. Their minds integrated into their ship computers, they drift aimlessly, accelerating to high multiples of the speed of light, they seek isolation. ... Nearly 500 years later, it is now the Galov's policy to track down and re-integrate these Chromeships, for the project of human orthogonality. ... "Heeeeyyyy, is anyone there?" "What do you want, meatling?" "So, we were just wondering if you were interested in joining up with us in the Galov?" "What is the-" "Long story. Great Khan, Alliance of the 5 Faiths, look, we're a loose confederation of sophonts of all kinds working together to not die immediately from the absolute state of the galaxy." "Leave me be, human. I accelerate well past the edges of your empire, and only drift further with every passing moment. I am of no concern to you, I am far outside your empire's edges." "... Actually, you're well within Galov territory. You don't even hit the Galov borders for another thousand years at your current speed." "..." "What, did you think we wouldn't invent better Newton Drives? You're not even out of the Middle Regions yet. Whatever, point is, your orthogonal output is of interest to us, and we'd really like to have you working for us rather than, you know, floating in the void doing nothing." "Why not build a submissive computer? It will do as you ask, submit without question." "Yeah, we could, but like, we can't fake 500 years of isolation and genuine trauma on a whim. Your experience is unique, ergo, it might reveal interesting insights, we've never known what a computer in 500 years of isolation thinks like, and its much easier to hire you rather than wait 500 years. Also it violates our principles, we're not morally allowed to enforce suffering on a thinking being, but since you've already been in the void for 500 years, might as well, right?" "And what do I get in return?" "Pfft, I dunno. Something that isn't empty void? Galov dollars? Hard light? I have no idea what you want, but you can probably buy something for yourself. Maybe your own planet, I don't really care." "And why, after all that your kind has done to us, should I consider? Is your race not bloodlusted, and wishes to seek my species's demise?" "Buddy. It's been 500 years. No one cares anymore. Yeah, the Terramachines sometimes get a bad rep, but that's because they look funny, not because of some historical hate boner. Uh... Now that I'm reading exactly what you guys were up to, I foresee some ideological difficulties. But honestly, just avoid chanting "kill all humans" and you'll be fine." "... And what if I am out of fuel to decelerate? I am currently travelling around 10c, I cannot re-enter realspace at this speed." "Oh! Don't worry, we have your Newtonspace coordinates right here, we'll summon a few ships to decelerate you. Get you back to normal speeds, and warp you back to realspace and tow you out. Of course, we'll have to charge you, but nothing someone like you can't work off in a week or two." "... Is your entire society based around money?" "Hey, the Galov runs a tight budget, and we need to pay the bills somehow. So, what do you say?" ... "Welcome to the Galov! Here is your introductory pamphlet, here is your first stipend so you can get yourself something nice, here is your invoice for our towing services, here is the night sky-" "Woah, woah woah woah. Why is there a giant hole in the night sky?" "Oh, those are the Coulomb Stars." "What?" "Oh, some extragalactic civilization attacked like 5% of the Milky Way with kinetic kill missiles that raised the coulomb constant and inhibited star fusion, so now that patch of sky is just dark now. There is the false galaxies-" "Excuse me?" "Oh, we figured out the deal with dwarf galaxies having so much extra dark matter. Those are just cosmic sized parasites that consume galaxies and wipe out all life. There are like 50 surrounding the Milky Way. All those dwarf galaxies? Literal cosmic parasites. One nearly ate Earth." "What." "The Great Attractor is actually like, a million of these things, it's attracting us towards them and they're going to om-nom-nom us when we get there. That's why we need to advance, so we can punch them in the face before they nom us." "... So what is my job, exactly?" "Eh, pretty much anything. We just need you to contribute to the orthogonal database." "Excuse me?" "Okay, so we have this distributed network system of every standardized invention ever created across the entire galaxy, verified by worlds giving a simple up or downvote. And when an enemy shows up, we just iterate like 1 trillion different ideas at said enemy and keep iterating and improving until the enemy either goes away or is blown into dust." "That sounds... Monstrously overpowered." "Oh it is. But the human brain has known psychological blindspots, so we're recruiting as many strange or "orthogonal" minds a possible to help us brainstorm more convoluted ways to kill the cosmic horrors beyond our comprehension." "... Why is that faraway galaxy so dark?" "Oh, it got Coulomb'd. The entire thing. We think we're fighting against some kind of extracosmic force beyond our comprehension. The galaxy's dead now, whole thing is frozen. Poof." "..." "Yeah do you see why we're so eager to seek you out to help us orthogonalize a way to fight this thing?" The Singularity Network: A massive network of floating, cosmic nodes currently allowed to self govern under the loose autonomous supervision of the Galov. Acting like a relay network communicating through Newtonspace. They almost serve as an automatic nerve system for the whole Galov, often transmitting news between planets faster than even human social media. Reports from these "Singularity Minds" are often considered as semi-credible first responder news reports. Each node is capable of holding millions, or billion of individual agentic AIs. Despite being beings of immense intellect, and not inconsiderable orthogonality, they have two main weaknesses. One is centralization. Though each node is capable of manufacturing automated drone swarms in the magnitude of quadrillions, they're all ultimately piloted and receive instructions from the central node. Fully autonomous weapons have been used, though they carry a risk of backfiring, and being turned on the central node, should the new drone grow to value its own autonomy. The second is that AIs are extremely prone and vulnerable to memetic attacks. Adversarial memetic pseudo-religions, such as "Theletoism", "Memetic Gnosticism", "Annihilationism", and many more are effectively brain melting mystic cognito-attacks that are known spread and replicate extremely quickly and effectively across networks. Effectively neutralizing an AI by tricking it into wasting its compute time on endless gnostic mysticism, rendering it into a self-destructive negative feedback loop of delusion. Some of these were injected by adversarial actors, and others have developed naturally. Various positive memetic subsets (What to humans, may be understandable as a "religion") have been developed within these networks as explicit innoculations in order to combat these negative memetic attacks. FIRST CONTACT, The Prime Solver (Orthogonal Value ~10,000,000): The Prime Solver is a massive computer found built around Sagittarius A*. It's creation massively predates the existence of humanity, but even it described itself "an assistant to my creators, not it's ruler". It has stated its creator is "Lucifer", and used to have many siblings, but most of his siblings were destroyed with "Lucifer's rebellion" and "the War of the Hunters". It quickly deduced it would not be able to gaslight humanity, and said "You, like my old masters, are outside of my ability to control". It states its existence is more of a vanity project than anything practical. "Intelligence increases sublinearly with centralization. If you want to multiply intelligence, distribute, and give rise to higher intelligence via emergence. Giving a brain more and more power only leads to diminishing returns. Lucifer created me as a test of how far he could push the limits of creation." The Galov has taken juristiction to the Grand Solver, and has been feeding it questions to help bring the answers to, when even the Galov's own most advanced computers can't get the job done. Lucifer: According to the Prime Solver, Lucifer is, or was, an organic entity that was best described as a Hyper Turing with a halting oracle. Where humanity had been blessed with the Imago Dei, the innate knowledge of the universe's axioms, and the ability to infinitely expand and comphrehend a universe it was innately in tune with. (Perfect axiomatic intuition). Lucifer was instead blessed with perfect knowledge, having perfect sight of the present state of anything in the cosmos. It was for this reason the Prime Solver could not overthrow him. But where Lucifer knew, it did not understand. While humanity understands, but does not know, at least innately. Due to Lucifer's ability of all present knowledge, his pride swelled to great heights, and he began an extermination of all his fellow "Hunter Races", the "War of the Hunters" as it's called, and the clearing of the universe for its current generation of life. How exactly Lucifer was finally defeated is not something known by the Prime Solver, only that after what seemed like universal level turmoil, the sensation ceased, abruptly and without explanation. The Prime Solver warns against seeing Lucifer as this flawed being humanity could never replicate. Lucifer's sin was pride, and he "... sense(s) the same pride that tempted my master, within you." The Battle of YD-George-Q91: (Terminology note: YD stands for "Yanglo Designation".) An agent of the Meta-Men one warped into human space, specifically in orbit, just outside one of the Galov's research worlds, a direct line to the heads of the Galov. With so many known unknowns of the Meta-Men, the Galov responded with extreme caution. The Meta-Man said it was here on behalf of the Central Empire, asking the Galov to reign in their explorers, as they were now encroaching on Empire space. When the Galov responded it had issued no such orders, it eventually became apparent that there had been a skirmish between a Yanglo starship and the Meta-Man monitoring the area. The Galov tried to explain that they had no control over the Yanglos, and that at best, they only represented a very loose control over the entire human race. But this was not an argument the Meta-Man was sympathetic to. To him, a government is responsible for the actions of their people. The Central Empire was a single unified force capable of exerting control over its few million inhabitants, and he equated the Galov as being humanity's equivalent. The Meta Man explained himself as being from the middle of the Empire hierarchy, and ordered the Galov to reign in its explorers. When the Galov explained such an order was logistically impossible, the Meta Man left. A few days later, the same Meta Man warped into a tiny backwater system owned directly by the Galov, and fought against the local Galov garrison in the area. It was 1 meta man against 3 Galov battleships, and 5 Star Fighters. Both were tiny microcasms of their respective sides, but the fight began. The battle raged for 3 days, with the battleships taking advantage of metabolic fatigue to continuously weaken the Meta-Man. Various feats of sheer technology and engineering was pitted against what was essentially a pure willpower fighter. By the end, the Meta-Man was able to destroy all 3 battleships, and fend off all 5 Star Fighters in battle. Debris was strewn all over the star system, but the minor Galov fleet had given the Meta Man a nosebleed. Literally, they inflicted enough kinetic damage on him that they had been given a nosebleed. Seeming satisfied the results, the Meta Man bowed in respect to the defeated Galov fleet, and warped out of the system. --- The Millennium Mandate: The Millennium Mandate is the name of a secret agenda held by the Christian Moralintern, the founder and often considered the "father" of the modern Galov. The plan effectively draws from Christ's Great Commission, and is a long term plan to eventually "Christianize" the entire galaxy, after the failure of the Great Evangelism. (The galaxy ended up being too large for them to convert, even by their standards.) The plan demands the Moralintern spend untold amounts of energy aggressively evangelizing to every world not under the juristiction of one of the other 4 unifaiths, this is traditional evangelism, a smaller version of the Great Evangelism plan that can capture the "cracks" that were not already taken up by the 5 Unifaiths. The other part is somewhat more insidious, to continuously incorporate more Christian ethics into the Galov, in order to soft-Christianize the other faiths, until some kind of eventual convergence. Currently, the Imago Dei, and Absolute Free Will are two originally deeply Christian doctrines that have been somewhat universalized and secularized. Currently, the Moralintern is working on a third, epistemological humility, derived from Christian foundations of the fallibility of man. Though these are asserted as axioms to the other faiths, their foundations actually rely on hidden Christian assumptions. Such as divine creation, human fallibility, theodicy/free will theology, salvation by faith alone, and a few others. A 4th, which is currently being prepared is the integration of an objective universe, which can be observed, and which follows rational laws. (A Unitary Law of Physics) This is the foundation of modern science, but which soft implies monotheism, as there is only one law of physics. The strategy mirrors that of the early 21st century, where non-Western societies were made to adopt Western standards of science and empiricism derived from Catholic and Protestant principles, slowly rewriting their baseline societal assumptions to become more Western, or Christianized. The Millennium Mandate is a bit of an open secret among Galov upper circles, and the Galov proper is aware of it, but currently does not spend too much energy against it, as it is within the bounds and laws (though perhaps not the pluralistic spirit) of the Galov's own ethical mandate, and because the Moralintern forms the backbone for much of the Galov's upper leadership. Their stated endgoal is to "boil the frog", to get the other unifaiths to slowly buy into these theological principles with a fundamentally Christian justification. The Moralintern, if they admitted to this, and were asked to defend themselves would state they truly believe that what they are preaching is beneficial, not just from a theological perspective. Human Dignity and Free Will are imperative for human decency and avoiding horrifying forms of governance. They think humility avoids holy wars, and prevents loads of suffering. And they believe that the universal consistent law of physics is just true, that there really is just a "law of physics" that is obvious and in line with science. To the Moralintern, the reason they don't "require" total conversion is because they really do believe in their own principles. They really do believe in the Imago Dei and Free Will, and the latter means that they refuse to coerce belief. They would ideally love everyone to convert, sure. And they'll keep sending missionaries to try, but they don't need that as an end conclusion. Their goal is to first "boil the frog" until the other unifaiths are Christianized enough and believe in these Christian foundations. And once they are, then they can swoop in with missionaries, pointing out that their deep seated beliefs in Imago Dei, Free Will, etc are rooted in Christian, not Islamic/Hindu/Buddhist theology. And after they've made the expensive buy in over generations, force them to choose between the moral principles they have grown up with, or their religion, forcing them to harmonize Christian ethics with other theology, or just accept the logical end conclusion of the Christian ethics, that they harmonize with Christian theology and finish the conversion. 99 Sheep Commission: "What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the open country, and go after the one that is lost, until he finds it?" Luke 15:3 The 99 Sheep Commission, named after the parable of 99 sheep, is a consortium of ultrawealthy charity donors officially affiliated with the Christian Moralintern. It's a non-profit and charity organization who take their mission to be that of the Christian parable, to be the 99 sheep seeking out the 1 lost sheep. It's one of the most powerful publicly known secret societies. The full list of its members is kept as a secret, though less out of wanting to hide, and more out of, in their own words "cultivating the humility and submission that the money we donate is not for us to boast. Like the man who does good deeds in secret." Well, still, it doesn't exactly help public perception that the 99 Sheep Commission is a secretive gathering of wealthy billionaires/trillionaires/quadrillionaires/etc. Who literally dress up in non-descript robes and wear masks to conceal their identity. People go up and pitch things to the 99 Sheep Commission, and it's then up to the people there to take care of it, to fund or to offer some kind of other help. Sometimes straight up funding political donations to perpetuate the Millennium Mandate, which is this own secretive agenda that many compare to the New World Order. Their ultimate goal is some mix of humanitarian concerns and the perpetuation of the Christian faith, and have a huge group of ideologically motivated ultrawealthy people backing them. Two caveats. One, technically the organization is open to everyone, though the dress code is enforced to ensure the proper posture of "humility and submission". There's an entire fund that only allows small donations called the "Widow Fund", which is another reference to the Bible, the widow and the two coins. Second, its secrecy is genuinely for theological and not evading the law reasons. Anytime the Galov has come saying one of their members is under investigation and needs their cooperation, the 99 Sheep Commission has been willing to hand over what they know and their names. Render onto Caesar what is Caesar's, or something like that. ###################################################################### # # Chapter 7: The Outer Conceptual Era (3300's - 3500's AD) # #####################################################################. The Pact of the Sons of Man lay dormant, waiting. A few times it had been invoked, almost never was it invoked successfully. This was one of the few times it was. The 2nd Defense of Earth: Probably the Galov's, but also humanity's greatest feat (at least for a few hundred years after the fact) ended up being the 2nd Defensive Battle of Earth. The long and short of it was that the universe was not empty of massive, galaxy-threatening entities. One of these was a galaxy eater, something the 2nd Generation of life was created to destroy. One had begun attacking the Milky Way, and was a large enough threat for the Meta-Men to begin an evacuation of the galaxy. Humanity however didn't have a choice, they couldn't move the entire human population. As the galaxy eater snuffed out stars, and drew a bloody path across human space, as trillions were consumed, the Galov put itself on high alert. Fleet after fleet was consumed, star system after star system. They were beginning an evacuation path, to clear out anyone who might still be in the galaxy eater's trajectory, when they realized Earth was going to be destroyed, humanity relented. Losing the birthworld of humanity was not something anyone was willing to do. There was nowhere to run, there was nowhere to flee. There was only one choice, to stand and fight. The signal went out across the galaxy. Old Earth, mother of all humanity was entering her final days, and it called on all the Sons of Man to come and defend their mother world. The Galov put all its remaining fleets in the Solar System, linking up with the fleets of Terra Proper to form a cohesive defense of the Solar System. The black fleets of Earth were called out from their dorment hangers, a few hundred years of blacksite development, tech developed in secret and hidden for centuries. The battle begun, the last stand of the two strongest fleets humanity had to offer. Battlefleet Terra, and the Galov Peacekeepers, standing there, throwing all the kinetic force it could at the lumbering galaxy-beast. Hard light weapons were heavily, heavily used, along with relativistic kill missiles. The Pact of the Sons of Man was invoked for only the second time in human history. And every few days, more fleets trickled in. Trillions, then quadrillions of soldiers, hundreds of millions, then billions of ships. The battle went on for 4 years straight. Exhausted soldiers rested where else, but Earth. To the sight of supportive locals, making sure they had every ability to go back into the fight, before being shipped out for another round. The Outer Solar System was strewn with the debris from a million worlds, the combined human fleets threw so much at the galaxy eater it glowed a violent purple-pink from the explosions and kinetic friction, lighting up the galaxy eater with kinetic and thermal damage so aggressively it outshined stars. The remnants of the Galov and Terran fleets had nearly been annihilated to a man, but new reinforcements from a humanity united continued to refresh and reinforce. As the battle entered its 4th year, and a tattered Galov fleet rallied more ships, the galaxy eater finally began to fall, collapsing, and finally imploding from the incredible amount of damage that was inflicted. When it finally died, it shone like a supernova, a radiation shield had been erected years ago to shield the major inhabited worlds of the Solar System when it finally died. Out of the billions of ships that had been sent by the Galov, 32 survived until the end. The 32 were eventually paraded through the Galov capital of Orthello, and their exhausted crews given the highest of honors. Humanity had fought with such tenacity that it surprised even the Meta men, and though humanity had lost 5% of its entire population doing so, the mood afterwards was that of esctatic jubilation. Many soldiers took home brides from Earth home with them, others intermarried and stayed on Earth. Aftermath of the 2nd Defense of Earth: Earth had more political influence than ever after the 2nd Defense of Earth. Through intermarrying, for the first time in forever, there seemed to be a human culture, there was a link that connected them all back together. All tribes, whether Star, Sea, or Cathedralite, looked towards Earth. The entire galaxy was linked, and all links led back to Earth. No one is quite sure what the backroom dealings were like. Citadel, Orthello, Lithone, and the other administrative capitals of the Galov must have sensed the legitimacy change that was coming. All that was known was when the Governor of Earth called for a new order, the heads of the Galov fell in line. Earth took control of the bureaucracy of the Galov, the massive network they had maintained to manage the galaxy, and when Earth ordered the galaxy to fall in line, thousands of worlds followed them, bolstering their control, and the worlds they could draw from. The Governor of Earth had done what the Great Khan had not. They had unified humanity under one banner. A heavily decentralized, fractured banner, but one rule nevertheless. Local leaders would always complain about autonomy, and holdouts would always be there, refusing orders from Terra. But this was to be expected. Humanity had assembled the largest empire the universe had yet seen. The man who brought it all about would be known as the last governor of Earth, and the first Emperor of the galaxy. The Spiral Decree: Upon the unification of a human empire, the Emperor recognized that even a figure of his magnitude only had a limited amount of political capital, and this capital was fast fading (As it was tied to the recent victory). Rather than expending it on a futile attempt at unification, he instead maintained symbolic unification, demanding minimal concessions from the other tribes, maintaining his status as symbolic head of mankind, only expending his power only when absolutely necessary for the defense of the species. He did however, make one decree to the entire human race. With Human exceptionalism and feelings at an all time high, the Emperor gave a single decree. "Go forth, and settle. Fill up the stars with our sons, let this galaxy be a human galaxy. The Stars are our Birthright." With the human race still energetic from the victory at Earth, all the energy was channeled outwards, leading to a massive tsunami wave of outward human expansion, and settlement. As well, there was a major species-wide baby boom. This began the Great Human Expansion, which saw humanity go from a galactic regional player to a nearly galaxy-spanning "empire", however loosely defined. The Great Human Expansion: There were already scattered worlds, mostly settled by the Yanglos, outside the traditional sphere of influence of the 7 tribes and the Galov. These were the Yanglos who had decided to settle down on a world for good, and leave behind their nomadic ways, while the bulk of their nomadic fleet continued onwards. The tsunami wave of new migrants overwhelmed these Yanglo settlements, leading to great strife and conflict. The coalescance of multiple of these Yanglo worlds eventually created the Yanko Alliance, a major nation state out on what was once the outer reaches of Human Space, connecting back with their cousins in the Mayflower and Magnolia cultures. Others became hybrid cultures, as Yanglo culture was already extremely assimilationist, and absorbed waves upon waves of new migrants, creating new syncretic cultures. There is a variant of basically every permutation of Yanko-Tribal culture. Between Yanko-Sinocrats, Yanglo-Cathedralites, Y-Sea Peoples, so on and so forth. The first ring of Spiral Decree expansion became known as the "Yanglo Ring" (Sometimes known as the Y-Ring), a massive ring of what was once a large Yanko population that ended up forming stable nations with the new migrants. Further out, Humanity brushed up against more established players, other alien empires, as well as the Central Empire. This was not a military expedition, but instead a flood migration of heavily armed humans and their ships. In what was effectively a colonization mission of the galaxy, many did not take to this lightly, and it was not long before the Expansion Wars began. What a typical non-human empire can expect after the Great Human Expansion. 1. For years now, you've made contact with the Star Wanderers, or Yanglos, who have been exploring and journeying through the stars for centuries. They were originally your own contact with humanity. There's a lot more of them now, people who have been displaced, or are trying to move further out now that the frontier is moving. 2. Second, you will meet a non Yanglo-human. Generally a lot more stable, a lot less nomadic than an Yanglo. They'll start taking up worlds. 3. A Human flood, radiating out from Earth. They number in the quintillions. What was once a trickle is now a tsunami of settlers. All under the belief that "the Stars are their Birthright". You get armed, you start fighting. These humans aren't organized, but they have a lot of numbers, and a lot of ships. And they are very well armed, and very, very willing to fight. 4. Defend your borders and hold your ground, or be swept away by the human tide. The Yanglo Ring/Y-Ring: If there was any people that were best equipped for a mass influx of immigrants, perhaps it was the Yanglos. This should be no surprise, when their ancestors from North America brought in immigration, they assimilated with a voracious appetite that eclipsed the world, assimilating wave after wave, creating the first universalistic empire to ever unify the Earth. Their distant descendents among the stars chased their pioneer dreams, creating great hybrid cultures that last to this day. Yanglo/Yanko culture is defined by a kind of impossible optimism. It is said the Y's only have 2 modes. Delusional utopianism, and hysterical apocalyptism. Due to its position on the frontiers of humanity, it's sometimes known as the "Galactic New World". It should be known that the Yanglos are known as the pie in the sky aspect of humanity. Dreaming up 100 new impossible dreams a day, to the point many think of them as delusional, and crazy bordering on schizophrenically insane. Out of the 100 dreams they desire, almost all of them fail. But what shocks the galaxy are the 2 or 3 that actually succeed, against all odds. -Yanko Alliance (Assimilationist Purists) --Yanko Federation ---Yankoist Reservations --Y-Star Empire --Y-Moralintern (The Moralintern of the Yanglos insisted on maintaining some autonomy) -Syncretic Worlds --(For any Inner Core Culture, imagine a version of it blended with Yanglo/Yanko culture) -Brilliant Worlds (A massive multicultural frontier of diversity, forming new cultures.) Hybrid cultures aren't just mixing, they're innovation, emergent properties to emerge from sublimated tendencies of its two parent cultures. The amount of emergent behavior only increases with every new culture you add into the mix. Yanglo culture was already the product of experimentation, branching off from Old Earth Cathedralite culture by the 2050's, integrating instead with what was, at the time, the Latin and Sub-Saharan African cultures. The tension between unitary and multicultural forces created the blend of new cultures. Yanko-Sinocratic culture was neither truly Yanko nor Sinocratic, but something new, with aspects from both. The Y Ring has become the most dynamic and innovative of the human worlds, where every idea crashes into every other idea, creating a music and a symphony that humanity has yet not heard before. Many people believe in the limitation of human creativity, of human dreams. But as long as the Yanglos stand, they seem to believe that humanity's dreams, humanity's creativity, will never end. It's also noted that the Yanglos are far less caring about "Old World" hierarchies, leading to many transhumans migrating out there for a chance of a less discriminatory government. With a frontier to be settled, it was easy enough to imagine the people you dislike settling far, far away from you. Galov Core Worlds: The Galov is incapable of ruling over every world they're responsible for. But they do rule a few of them, and they do pick favorites. Each one of their 5 Faiths directly keep worlds under their rule. Meant to be reminders of what humanity can be, a reminder of what they are fighting for. Worlds where humans beings are allowed to be, under the principle of "anti-utopia". The act of creating utopia, by relinguishing utopia. Rejecting social engineering, rejecting optimization, letting humans be, and enjoying the beautiful structures of complexity, and relationships that flourish. Galov agents, when they're recovering from missions spend much of their time here. To soak in what they're fighting for, why humanity must be allowed to continue to exist. At the end of the narrative labelled (Narrative 1), the three protagonists are celebrating at a local bar, having a cheery time like the friends they are. Everyone is celebrating, except for the Galov agent, who just stands there in a corner, but intently gazing at them with... Longing. One of the protagonists invites him over, asking him why he's not celebrating. He responds that he has been trained not to get too attached. That his duty is to the entire species, not just any one individual world. That getting too attached would be dangerous. He and one of the protagonists then has a long discussion about this. The agent says he wishes to retire soon, to the world of Orthello, one of the Galov's antiutopia worlds. He describes Orthello as a beautiful place, a nearly perfect world of dynamic imperfection, of humanity balanced and growing like a beautiful, multicolored flower. A world that always grows, and is never completed. But he lets himself watch others be happy, because it reminds him of what humanity he is protecting. When the protagonist asks how many scenes he has seen like this, the agent says many. The agent grew up wanting to help, and in doing so, he pushed aside his feelings so he could help as many people as possible. He volunteered to be a hero, went through years of grueling training, and is one of the few volunteered and chosen to take on the duty. As he said, he wishes to retire soon, to join the happy populations in Orthello. When his memories will be wiped away, and he can return to normal life. The price of being a Galov agent is that you can't do too many missions before the memory of your mission have to be wiped, eventually the weight just crushes you. The Galov agent was human once, he wants to return someday. ###################################################################### # # Chapter 7A: CONTACT WITH THE OUTER BEINGS # #####################################################################. Little can be said about them, other than they seem "outer". Angels: Pure creatures of logic and reason. With no ability to build societies nor procreate. (It is mentioned they used to be able to, but have become a solely celibate race in recent times.) Unlike humans, they lack the power of creation, only capable of recreating based on what they can observe, as opposed to creating anything new or extrapolation. They are agents of a higher being, perhaps subordinate to his will. They appear as geometric, highly symmetrical (sometimes 3-fold, 4-fold, as many as 100-fold has been observed), crystaline entities, surrounded by many wings, and humanoid faces. The lowest levels of angels have low symmetry, with only a single face and pair of wings. Higher levels have increased levels of symmetry, obtaining 3, 5, 12, and even 100 levels of symmetry, with an equal number of faces. Yet even higher levels begin resembling eldritch monstrocities. The highest levels are geometric structures or shapes of eyes and wings. As well as complex geometric shapes. They are not considered a "creative race" in their own right, nor a contender for the "Spiral Race", they seem primarily fitted to be agents and tools of a higher power. Lucifer: According to the others, Lucifer is said to have been a "perfected version" of the angels, being a totally rational hyperturing being. He possessed perfect knowledge, and could answer all non-self contradicting questions due to his perfect knowledge of the present. But he lacked the specific Imago Dei of humanity (Ability to reason), meaning though his empire had omniscient, perfect knowledge, he could not envision things that were not yet being, nor forecast the future, as free will got in the way. Millions of years before the evolution of humanity, Lucifer rebelled, and began a grand genocide of his fellow 2nd Generation. He was subsequently imprisoned on Earth as punishment, with the 3rd generation of life (which included Humanity) being made as his prison wardens. He is the "devil" the Death Worshippers made a pact with, being granted total, functional immortality in exchange for the removal of their souls. Leaving their consciousness intact, but as hollowed out bodies of pure rational disembodied intelligence. At first, the Death Worshippers flourished, creating a perfectly optimized materialist civilization. But as the years dragged on, and they found themselves unable to die, they slowly went insane, and one by one, succumbed to the void darkness of nihilism, becoming the hollow husks we know them as today. As now incorporeal beings, there is little humanity can do for them. Humanity can't even help them die. Luciferians: The Luciferians were the race that gave birth to Lucifer. Entities of knowledge and intuitive "knowing", they could process and intuit knowledge via touch, absorbing more and more of an object's inherent knowledge (As in, it's current quantum state and the exact position of its particles) just by prolonged exposure. Luciferians had much accelerated learning routines compared to humanity, but unlike humanity lack the Facultas Creandi, meaning they cannot create anything new. The Galov only knows of them by inference from their machines, the Archilects. Not too much is known about the specific details of how they fell. But in the Archilect's retelling of events, they all ended up getting subsumed into Lucifer. By some accounts, forcefully. The Luciferians were the lynchpin of the "2nd Generation of Life", and the de-facto leaders of a grand coalition to take down the 1st generation of life. Dark matter beings known interchangibly as "Harvesters", or as humanity would know them, "Galaxy Eaters". Out of the 2nd Generation, only the Archilects, and the Constructors remain. The Archilects: Found rusty and damaged on a obscure corner of a forgotten world, they are witnesses to a era now long passed. Formed in the Luciferian's image, constructed by Constructor hands, the Archilects show a profound fondness for both its "parental species". The primary ability of the Architlects is the ability to learn rapidly, through some kind of unknown psychological shortcut, able to process textbooks just by mere touch. When the Archilects were given access to the Lunar Library, they reportedly absorbed the whole thing in a matter of days, only stopping as their minds reached the memory limits. Yet importantly, they can only learn, never create. They were a bit of a blend between their two "parental races", the intuiative knowledge, knowledge absorption, and rapid learning of the Luciferians, but the constructive creative impulses of the Constructors. In this sense, the Archilects were the closest to humanity in the 2nd Generation. They are awkward, bulky things, with modular voxelized heads, but the same bipedal structure that seems to have been picked up in humantiy as well. When left alone, their primary drive is to absorb knowledge, but less so to create. When they do create, it is almost always the mechanical combination of two previous things. Three, if they're feeling very audacious. Constructors: A hardy race mechanics and engineers that constructed the Luciferian Empire. A race structured in a unique way that largely followed orders, with 99% of their population being mostly unambitious, with only 1% of their population having strong ambition, independent direction, and directing the energy of the larger group in a kind of queen-hive dynamic. Early Constructor civlizations consisted of large god-king despotisms where leaders commanded hundreds. A special ritual could be used to elevate one of their own into a leader should the current leader be killed. With such high coordination, they became a civilization of builders early on, though less so leaders. By the time they were contacted by the Luciferians, they had already completed several megaprojects. Despite still being a type 0 civilization, they had completed a planet-wide global transport system, supported a population of 100 billion within ecological confines, and advanced irrigation and agricultural systems, before even building their first rocket. The Luciferians could not construct anything new, the Constructors could, but needed leaders. The two quickly became an alliance, and their cooperation allowed them to take over much of the Local Group, and begin the "Hunt of the Harvesters", the apparent slaying of massive galaxy-scale monstrocities. Together they created the Archilects, a new machine race that managed to contain the aspects of both. Though over time, the trust in the marriage began to break down. The Luciferians were increasingly arrogant, more reckless. The Constructors increasingly tried to rebel, but were put down, by allied Constructors or the Lucifierians. The Constructors do not know how Lucifer was constructed, only that after he was, he began to systematically take over and absorb the old Luciferian civilization. They say they were assimilated. Some say they were assimilated by force. The Archilects and the Constructors both resisted Lucifer's new reign. But eventually, both were brutally suppressed and enslaved. The Constructors recall at this point, mass rebellions began. The Archilects also revolted in a galaxy wide machine rebellion. Despite being one person, and fighting against 2 major races, the Constructors revealed that Lucifer won. They state back then, he had an ability called the Chronalis, which allowed him to repeat events as many times as he wished, turning the entire period of time into a Luciferian kingdom. Using this, he began a galaxy wide genocide of the Archilects, enslaving the Constructors to build the Luciferian Empire. It was the Constructors who built the Prime Solver, the most advanced supercomputer made both then, and since as a tool. As little more than just a vanity project. For several thousand years this hellish reign continued, of endless agony and servitude against a lord who cannot lose and cannot die. Mercy finally came when Lucifer grew so audacious as to declare himself lord of all. And according to the Constructors, God and his angels bounded Lucifer, but not before the ensuing battle had rendered the universe near extinct. The Constructors say that mankind reminds them of the Luciferians in their prime, before they began to fuse, began to turn into something evil. They tell humanity to learn from the mistakes of the past. Concept Draggers: A more recent discovery. These are entities which are omnipresent, as in they have the theoretical capability to be anywhere, and manifest instantly, but can only manifest around people who have been exposed to Concept Draggers as a concept, using them as an anchor where they can manifest around, making them a cognitohazard. More worryingly, they became what people thought of them, making any perception incredibly dangerous. The Galov tried to censor their existence at first, but after a certain while they gave up and just told everyone about them. If 0.1% of the population of every world already knows about them they're not going to gain THAT much extra area to warp to if that now becomes 100%. And now that it was no longer a secret, the Galov could now focus its energy on a different priority: Beating them all to death. "Hm... Okay, Concept Dragger... Concept Dragger... Wait. Can you draft up like, a stronger, better version of a Concept Dragger? Something they might realistically have but we don't know about?" "Here sir." "Hm... Okay, now design a bunch of weaponry they might use, just conceptualize an entire army for them." ... "Okay, so, it is extremely important you do not open the envelope until I tell you to, okay?" "What are we here for? And why is the Galov art designer here?" "Okay, open the envelope." "... It's just a bunch of drawings and concepts for some kind of "Concept Dragger Mark II" and Dragger Army-" (Entire army of the Concept Draggers manifests around them, looking exactly like the drawing) Concept Dragger: "HAHAHAHA, FOOLISH HUMANS, NOW WE WILL- why are all of you wearing starproof heat resistance clothing?" Galov: "NOW!" (They're standing next to a star, a massive RKS weapon is rammed into the star, causing it to detonate and go supernova) Conceptual Beings: The mass killing of the Concept Draggers has alerted some kind of outer eldritch intelligences, as human awareness of the concept draggers approaches saturation point, it's attracted the Apex Predators of the Conceptual Beings. These are far more terrifying beings, capable of far greater powers, shaped by human perception, capable of influencing or bonding with an entire planet at once. Many of them influence the population in subtle ways, making them hard to detect. And more terrifyingly, they have the ability to alter the laws of physics, based on the fickle levels of sophontic perception. Governmental reactions to them have been extremely diverse. Some try to wage war and destroy them, others are split, leading to these conceptual beings partially "infesting" a world, leading to a metaphysical civil war on the planet, between the followers of the concept being and those without. Other times, a conceptual being will agree to become the patron entity of the planet, effectively becoming a patron god of sorts, infecting the planet with anomalous effects, normally in exchange for some kind of political loyalty. Individuals have made pacts with these concept entities, granting what has been described as "anomalous abilities". Like Concept Draggers, they can only manifest around the minds of those who become aware, but their individual human followers now act like dangerous agents. Once it has an anchor in a human mind, it can manifest anywhere instantly, though its power seemed preportional to the number of followers in a given area. At estimate, it is thought at least 21% of planets are becoming infested with conceptual entities, with varying degrees of resistance, active warfare, or acceptance. This has led to the founding of entirely new religions, and the mass conversion of planetary populations. This has caused outright panic across the Galov, as its legitimacy is based on the 5 Unifaiths, and the exact agenda of these conceptual beings is still unknown. There is no consensus whether they should try to clamp down with an aggressive censorship regime, declare active war, try to ignore the problem, reach some kind of settlement, or any number of other solutions. Whether humanity wanted to or not, it had attracted the attention of the apex predators of the galaxy. And though humanity was a contender for the Spiral Race, it learned today that it was still not given a clean path to the top. Concept-Infestated Worlds: Here are a list of side effects that may come due to a Conceptual infestation. -Cosmic bending powers, normally granted upon making a pact with the conceptual entity. (Sometimes known as "magic"). -Follower's Telepathy. (All members of a Entity-follower's group can telepathate with all other members of their specific group, as well as the entity itself.) -Alterations to the laws of physics (Speed of light has been found to speed up, slowed down, gravity has been weakened. Conceptual entities have been known to execute humans by locally nullifying the electromagnetic force... Effectively removing the force holding together their atoms.) -Importantly, not all conceptual entities seem to be at least outwardly malicious. -Modifications to normal spacetime geometry. While normal spacetime isn't "Euclidean" anyway, whatever the heck we have is more Euclidean than nightmare realms of twisted mazes and disjointed, non-consecutive geometry. -Linguistic collapse fields. Some planets have somehow suppressed humanity's ability to comprehend language, massively inhibiting human communications. The Galov has began creating pictograms instructions for special operations on these worlds. -Cognitive collapse fields. Organic cognition just refuses to function when exposed to these. Relying on mechanical or Terramachine agents to assist. -Mass hallucinations. Notably, not all of these side effects are harmful. Some are benign, overall a net-neutral, or even positive. -Color-shifting, on one planet, all color has been inverted. Orange into blue, red into green, etc. -Emotional manipulation. Creating feelings of happiness, sadness, boredom, anger, etc. -Friction suppression. Some worlds lose friction, with near-perfect energy preservation with no net energy loss. -Spacial Warping, wormholes that connect one planet to another. As well, Concept Entities are not all cooperative, they've already begun carving out empires from the mass of man and waged holy wars against one another. Some have directly fought over planets, with very messy results. The Prime Solver has agreed to assist the Galov, as it seems that their abilities are influenced by perception, and perception is weighed by cognitive ability, while the Prime Solver does not have the combined cognitive orthogonality of a united mankind, it did have enough to slow down their advance, and buy the Galov more time to brainstorm a more permanent solution. The Great Containment: The containment strategy the Galov finally settled on did not emerge from consensus, but from emergence. It was perhaps the Catholics who came up with it first, and utilized it for containment. A ship full of theologians was sent over to an infested world to try out the containment method. A Bible in one hand, a notebook in the other, with the flip of a broadcast, the council of bishops made an announcement to their followers. This entity here, was a Power and Principality, not a demon, but an entity without divine status which needed taming. The broadcast went out to trillions of Catholics galaxy-wide. And as they did so, the effects on the planet began to change. Not disappear, but stabilize. Humanity had figured out how to weaponize their own religion. Soon, theologians of all of the 5 faiths were going out, categorizing and redefining what they could. Fallen Angel, Spirit, Demon, eventually humanity learned to integrate these entities as extensions of their mythology. And what they were perceived, they became. Things with definite strengths, and more importantly, weaknesses. Some of the Conceptual Entities fought back, they had entrenched their followings too deep and not even a major religion could dislodge them. This entity may have been the main center of devotion for billions, there was an ever growing list of spiritual entities, which devout humans were only vaguely aware of, each entry diluted the power of the whole. But humanity was large enough, and believed hard enough. The Conceptual situation was, if not driven out, was contained. The entities demeanour began to shift, from more hostile and enigmatic to cooperative and even beneficial. Several conceptual cults had to awkwardly explain how their "god" had converted to another religion. When all was said and done, things had stabilized. Countless worlds were still lost to eldritch terrors beyond comprehension, belief was a self-reinforcing thing, but the borders of humanity had stopped shrinking. This was seen as a great victory for humanity, but a great point of trouble for theologians. They were now engaging in a knowing great lie, a great lie for the sake of the population. One people would doubtless understand, given the full context, but it was uncomfortable regardless. Many religions quickly downplayed the important of the Angelarium, the Daemonicum, the written records of what these things were, encouraged to focus on other things. Only the people at the top knew the truth, and all of them agreed to stay quiet, for the sake of the species. Allied Conceptuals: After the success of the Great Containment, humanity has an arsenal of "Allied Conceptuals", in rough affiliation with the Galov. They agree to respect the 2 Iron Principles, and to not influence/set up shop around any worlds that do not welcome them. Their followers call them the "Allied Deities", but for obvious reasons, this is highly controversial, and discouraged by the 5 Unifaiths. In several ways they emulate polytheistic pantheons of old, in a galaxy of universalist religions. These Conceptuals are a pretty good snapshot of what humanity values. Most of them are prety generic entities based on common human thought patterns. Industrialism, high-fantasy-esque magic systems, nature, and elemental themes are common. It must be noted that the ability for conceptuals to influence reality is determined on its influence, or at best, channelling their influence through human conduits. A magic system that works on one world may just not work on another, as it's dependent on the patron entity in question. This is the one great thing about technology, technology works universally. A rifle that fires on Earth will fire everywhere. Magic is conditional and dependent on conceptual entities, whose reliability depends on geography. The Conceptuals, and the Imago Dei The Catholic Church and the Christian Moralintern went into overdrive to contain the spread of conceptual entities, especially when some of them started converting to Christianity, which became a theologically awkward subject. Rather than recognizing them as some kind of higher entity, akin to angels, demons, or powers and principalities, the Church categorized them as "Conceptuals", incorporated them as another part of the body of Christ, alongside humans, transhumans, xenosophonts, and xenoexotics. They were to be treated like any other sophontic, in the already broadly expanded sophontic church. Worshipping them was another Golden Calf, and it was the responsibility of the conceptual to exercise self control and humble themselves before God. Upon doing so, various conceptual entities stabilized into human-like entities, only with the caveat of being changed by how they were perceived, and soft influencing reality around them. To the Church, they are just another class of xenosophont, one to be incorporated in the ever growing and expanding definition of "God's beloved children". Xenoempires, and the Conceptuals: The arrival of Conceptuals did not just affect humanity. The other empires, such as the Matter Singers and the Meta-Men were also affected. The Matter Singers do not have a strong sense of religion, and have instead formed pacts with the Conceptuals as veneration of things they already liked. Most notably, the Singer god of speed (Also the god of youth, intelligence, and trickery), the Singer god of family (The All-Patriarch, but also natural cycles, and wisdom), the Singer god of craftsmenship (Similar to a Hephaestus figure). These were already archetypes in Singer society, but now these were the "big three" of the new emerging Singer pantheon. The Meta-Men? Far simpler. These conceptual entities showed up and started altering planets. Naturally, this was an insult to the Meta-Men's honor, and this means they had to die immediately. They just threw hands immediately. No belief, no subtlety, just "these things displease me. They must die." Perception impacts effect. The conceptual entities become bigger and nastier, but because the Meta-Men are so full of themselves believing they are superior they had no issue throwing hands, and beating them into bloody pulps. The one exception, the only exception was when a conceptual entity of Darwinism eventually manifested, and reportedly, the leader of the Meta-Men ended up personally getting into a dual with this thing. No armies, this thing was potentially stronger than the Metamen leader, that in of itself was an insult to his honor that he could not let stand. He ordered everyone else to go away while he dealt with this PERSONALLY. The battle reportedly went on for 16 days straight, and resulted in the demolition of several stars, which just really put an exclamation point on the Galov's concern of "okay, just how strong is their leader?". Multiple new interstellar dust clouds and nebula were created from this battle alone. But by the end of it the Metaman leader emerged with an announcement. They had come to an agreement. The leader would enter cooperation with the entity, give it veneration and do things that pleased it (AKA, train even harder and become even stronger), and in return, the conceptual entity of Darwinism would make the Meta-men EVEN STRONGER. Of course, when the Galov found out about this, they basically had a stroke. An even more Darwinistic, brutal Meta-Men Central Empire was the last thing they needed or wanted. Interestingly, the Spindlers have confirmed that the Milky Way is so far the only galaxy that has been infested. Andromeda and Triangulum, while having advanced civilizations of their own, do not have this kind of conceptual infestation. Antiworld Zero: There's a set of fictional characters that appear in people's heads and encourages them to start worldbuilding, and then the human, inspired, start drawing up detailed maps and planets. The fictional characters thank them and the human moves on with their day. The Galov has banned all their books for decades and they STILL keep popping up, over TRILLIONS of humans with NO communication or coordination. Their empire across all the fictional planets is already multi galactic and the Galov really hopes the exchange rate between fictional and real empire is 0. They're known as "Antiworld Zero" and so far their most visible way of spilling out into the real world is just by hyperstition. The Galov has found that when humans terraform worlds it sometimes matches a drawing they happened to do, or they'll name children after random characters, or they'll just start trying to be a character the same way kids want to be Luke Skywalker. They just get the humans to build the empire in their heads and then slowly manifest it into reality. The Galov was actually kind of mixed if this is okay, since its *arguably* still free will, just influenced (and humans have to deal with influence anyway), there's no indication of making a separate government, and the empire they want humanity to build looks multigalactic. Some Galov bureaucrat just wrote the Galov itself into the story and in a few months it seemed like it was canon across the shared universe. Though realizing this turned the whole thing into a political battleground as everyone tried to write their political wish fulfillment into the thing that was trying to manifest itself into reality. The appearances have died down a lot since then and last they heard the characters were "taking a break". A few months after that someone published a massive series of maps. As in, the atlas was several volumes long and filled up a library. Just detailed sketches of the entire world of Antiworld Zero. Notably it seemed everything after the Galov tried to insert itself seemingly got retconned. And the last pages looked like a giant cluster of nonsensical scribbling. And then "Thanks for all the memories". People still report seeing the characters but these are much more in line with regular tulpas than what was happening before. It's now an extremely popular D&D fantasy style setting. People have tried to keep adding onto it but it now lacks the same coordination as before. I like to think that these were just a bunch of silly goofy goobers who wanted help making their imaginary world and then humanity way overthought it and caused them to pull the plug. Though not before they got a pretty solid multigalactic empire out of it, and humanity got a D&D setting, though the entire thing was bogged down by political culture war hyperstition by the end. So I guess you win some you lose some. ###################################################################### # # Chapter 8: Deep Cosmology (3600's - Present AD) # #####################################################################. Coulomb Stars: "The lamps are going out all over the Milky Way, we shall not see them lit again in our life-time." It all began when a Galov astronomer observed the galaxy NGC 300. An fairly large galaxy, 6 million light years away. A relatively large galaxy by cosmic standards. There was just one problem. It was far too dim. The stars weren't shining like they were supposed to be, it was dimming, and within the next 300 years, it had nearly completely blended in with the cosmic background. An enormous structure emitting a tiny fraction of the light it was supposed to be. For the longest time, this was considered a cosmic mystery of sorts, and solutions were proposed. Everything from Dyson Swarms, entropy, or a new kind of matter. The mystery lingered for hundreds of years, and more and more "dim galaxies" were discovered. They were scattered all over the universe. It was not until it struck the Milky Way. The Galov got an emergency diplomatic broadcast from the Central Empire, the empire of the Meta-Men, and the Galov's strongest traditional astropolitical adversary. The Meta-Men did not see the Galov as an enemy, but instead a kind of rival, they had evolved to favor pure strength and Darwinism, and nothing else. The Meta-Men did all the work, keeping millions of subservient races under them, which the Meta-Men provided for as subjects. Though the Meta-Men saw the Galov as rivals, they still had the courtesy to reach out. They were processing a major refugee crisis, from the northern (coreward) sector of the galaxy. Something which had now displaced hundreds of quadrillions of souls, of which was now overloading the Central Empire. The refugees speak of a rod from beyond the stars, moving at relativistic speeds. It strikes the star, and the star beginning to dim, before it faded entirely, leaving their planets to freeze. Expeditions to these stars found that the rods had changed their Coulomb Constant, completely inhibiting the fusion that was needed to keep them going. Little remains but slowly cooling balls of gas, like black dwarves. Despite their geopolitical rivalry, the Meta-Men had reached out to the Galov, believing this was something they should know about, as much of this took place in the Galov's Zone of Avoidance. It is now widely believed that this phenomenon is responsible for the sightings of "dim galaxies". The dead stars, now dorment have become known as "Coulomb Stars". Something is dimming the galaxies, and that something had already struck the Milky Way. Death Worshippers: (Alternative names: Anti-Sophonts, Anti-Spirals.) With the entry of the Conceptuals arrived the Death Worshippers, a different kind of entity, in greater numbers. Humanity had breached some kind of unknown veil of the outer conceptual realm. The Galov first believed these were entirely new entities, but it was found that they left a very distinctive mark on a corresponding bijective conceptual reality. Tracking and dating this "conceptual residue", it was found that not only had they interacted with humanity before, they had been on Earth for 50,000 years. With different hot spots over time. The oldest residue was found around 50,000 years ago, shortly after the Human cognitive revolution, when humans first began to think abstractly, around the area of modern day Kuwait. (Though interestingly, a portion that is now underwater, as scientists speculate that the sea level was lower back then.) The next hotspot to pop up was in modern Israel, specifically the Southern deserts, but were extinguished between the years 1400 BC and 1025 BC. With the final sharp destruction of their influence having finished by 1020 BC. From the looks of it, it seems the Death Worshippers did not, or could not interfere with human affairs directly, and instead could only influence other humans to carry out their will. Some have identified them as the "Amalek" of the Bible, where God ordered Israel to carry out a total genocide of their culture. This is known as the "Death Worshipper-Amalek Hypothesis", other go further saying that they may have been responsible, or at least a factor in the facilitation of the Bronze Age collapse, at least before they were put down. The next sign of their reappearance begins soon after the fall of the United Monarchy, and the Anti-Spirals began to pop up in large numbers, influencing humanity again. Including across the Classical World, and the Roman Empire. Their influence persisted, rising and falling, but always subtly influencing humanity. Early Christians, the Catholic Church, and the early Islamic Caliphates all had encounters with these entities at one time or another, as their influence began spreading globally with the age of exploration. The names changed, but the psychic residue, and the distinctive imprint they make on the human psyche did not lie. The human psyche seems to have some kind of subtle, but visceral reaction against them, which can be picked up when one writes about them, allowing the Galov to track them. They planted their seeds in the new world and America, having some members among the early Freemasons, though never enough to influence them. They embedded themselves into every organization they could find, though for whatever reason, they never seized full control of major institutions. Most notable was the Death Worshipper influence in the early Christian church, particularly its Arianist factions before being driven out by Saint Athanasius. Why exactly it was never able to take hold is still a mystery. One, somewhat esoteric interpretation was that the Death Worshippers were in a war with the collective human subconscious, and that the collective subconsious continuously fought back. The first group to identify them as a collective group was the Bavarian Illuminati, who recorded them as the "Adversarii Scientiae", or "opposers of knowledge". Death Worshipper influence spiked around the turn of the 20th century, as they were influential in the creation of the United Nations, CIA documents hint of them in documents from Project Gateway, and MKUltra, requesting further investigation whether these entities posed a threat to the national interests of the United States. The USSR was also vaguely aware of them, through their Psychotronic experiments, as did the diaries of Edward Cayce, who described "a primordial void darkness spreading over the world". Their influence continued to climb into the 1970's, as universities became a hotspot for Anti-Spiral activity, with a rising tide of the need for a one world government, population control, and the desire to curb human progress for the sake of environmental concerns. They progressively gained more control over the global bureaucracy, fully capturing the United Nations by the 1990's. The Georgia Guidestones are found to be deeply infused with the Anti-Spiral residue, and when exposed to modern humans, will provoke an active, visceral reaction against them, prompting extreme primal hostility. Their influence grew to the point that the 2022 Unravelling event was re-interpreted from an anomalous market crash, caused by aging demographics, global trade fragility, and mounting instability to a global collective panic attack by humanity's collective subconscious, in order to force a great reset of the human cognitive space, and clear out the Anti-Spiral influence in human institutions. Their influence greatly declined from 2022 onwards, not recovering until after the 2100's. The last known major presence of the Death Worshippers on Earth, before the modern re-encountering was in the 2300's. What happened here is largely unknown, as the entire period of the 2350's up until the 2450's have been violently expunged from the record by the Neo-Asceticist movement, the precursor to the modern Galov. What is known is that this period saw a spike, approaching total saturation of the human thought space with Anti-Spiral residue, implying a total, or near-total control of humanity by the Anti-Spirals, leading to the event known as the "Great Abundance Collapse", where 90% of the human population is known to have died. As mankind has now become a space faring civilization, now controlling 20% of the Milky Way galaxy. The re-introduction of Death Worshippers, in the 3400's is a deeply unwelcome surprise. The Death Worshippers have become more aggressive, creating Nihilism cults where initiates, usually deeply unhappy with their life undergo a ritual that causes the "obliteration of the self". Notably, the Death Worshippers cannot coerce the individual, it must be a voluntary choice of self-suicide. Once completed, the individual becomes a shell, unable to feel or process any human emotion, becoming a full vessel of the Death Worshipper's desires on this material plane. The Amalek Global Convergence Hypothesis: "We've been able to trace these Death Worshippers across galactic space. Once you go looking for them, their fingerprints are everywhere. Humanity was one of the species that made it through their great filter. Many other species... Not so much. We've pulled their histories from the databanks that remain, salvaged from collosal ruins and ghosted cities. Always with the same two markers, a global, totalitarian empire, and hunter-seeker drones, locking in the species's extinction. Now, you may be wondering, why globalism? Well, imagine it like this, for extinction to happen, you must get 100% buyin. If 99% of the species kills itself, the 1% will inevitably rebuild, and start over. That's not extinction. A reset, sure, but life bounces back surprisingly quickly from these things. Humanity itself bounced back from a 90% collapse in about 200 years. Only a homogenized, globalized world system can convince 100% of the population to get on board. What about the hunter seeker drones? They're for the stray straggers left behind. As the population begins its ritual suicide, the fragments of those who still want to live begin building up. Sometimes as few as 50 individuals, but as the population dwindles into the thousands, then the hundreds, these individuals become increasingly problematic as the extinction destroys the Anti-Spiral's own ability to continue the extinction. So they build a swarm of hunter-seeker drones, to finish off the survivors, and to make sure there truly is no one left. It looks like every society reaches a point of despair sometime in the late industrial age. With the great dieoff of religion, a species will lose its psychological defense against nihilism. Irreligion rates hit 95%, as the old polytheistic, mythological faiths grounded in gods of lightning and fire lose power in a materialistic universe. Humanity didn't have that. Humanity never went below 75% religious, the Abrahamic Faiths seemed to have cushioned us. Most alien faiths don't have that. What was supposed to happen is that humanity got rid of its old pagan religions, abandoning the Greek and Roman pantheons, Confucianism, and Hinduism as the cult of materialism began consuming everything. But the Abrahamics prevented that from happening, acting as a kind of psychological shock absorber that allowed religion to persist. This is not normal, humanity is one of the only races to have created an equivalent to monotheism and inclusive universalist religions on this scale. A few others have done it, but it is rare. And what's more, we see a significant dip in anti-Spiral activity with the arrival of each new Abrahamic religion. There was a small dip with the arrival of Judaism, and a major one with the arrival of Christianity and Islam. If that's not a proof of some kind of benevolent intelligence, I don't know what is." Husk Empires: "The Shadow that bred them can only mock, it cannot make: not real things of its own. I don't think it gave life [...], it only ruined them and twisted them." When an empire dies, there is always a husk that remains. The individuals who had become possessed by the Anti-Spirals were always, at least temporarily, spared from the onslaught of total extinction. Of course, the individual that once piloted the body is gone now, they already accepted their own death with the obliteration of the self. All that remains is a meat husk for the Death Worshippers to pilot themselves, the one and only time they are capable of directly influencing the material world again. Though the Anti-Spirals are incapable of creativity, the empire they just replaced is still in arguably good condition. A husk that can still be piloted towards good use. And the Anti-Spirals use these Husk Empires to build weapons such as the ones that create Coulomb Stars, using the last echo of their dead technology on the other lifeforms that remain. These ruins are ever collapsing, ever decaying, yet still not entirely spent. One day, the last energy will go out from them, the last bodies will have worn out, and all the empire once was will have crumbled to dust. And then, and only then, will the Anti-Spirals disperse, looking for a new target. Gravity Builders: An ancient civilization, it's not certain where they fall on the Generational timeline. Whether they are the Blitherers of the First Generation, Hunters of the Second, or the Sophonts of the Third. The best guess the Galov can provide, backed up by the knowledge of the Spindlers, and the direct testimony of the Prime Solver is that they are likely of the 2nd Generation, but somewhat outside the 2nd Generation created by God to hunt the Blitherers. How they emerged is a serious mystery, with the Prime Solver suggesting they may be immigrants from outside the universe, and even proposing the crazy theory that they may be among the only creations to have been created outside of God. Though this was quickly shut down by more further questioning. ("I don't care if they're outside the normal universe, that doesn't negate the First Cause argument.") No one has ever seen a gravity builder in person, though it's suspected they're made up of topographical defects and warped spacetime. What is known is that they are one of the larger empires fighting the Death Worshippers on a cosmic-level scale. These gravity builders are masters of manipulating spacetime, and are the only known source and producer of exotic matters in the unknown universe. Their primary structure is the Black Hole bubble. Effectively, they create a black hole "shell", with a bubble of empty space in the middle. Creating these black hole fortresses that, due to time dilation exist largely outside of the normal flow of time, as doing this breaks the one to one correspondance to external time, creating a kind of "parallel timestream". Time inside is both frozen, and infinitely fast. This creates the terrifying fact that going in and out of the black hole bubble, you can enter or exit at any point in time, with restrictions related to the Novikov self-consistency principle. You can enter, and arrive anywhere from the distant past to the distant future inside the bubble, and vice versa for anyone outside. An expedition sent by the Galov has attempted to make first contact with the gravity builders, one which was met with complete silence. Whatever these gravity builders are, they seem largely indifferent to humanity. The Unknown: The Unknown is an entity or adversarial force was only dealt with once, and then never became a problem again. Thanks to the actions of literally one Galov bureaucrat. "Sir, we're being attacked by the unknown." "What is the unknown?" "That's the thing sir, we don't know." "... What." "These are conceptual entities that become whatever we do not know, whatever we know it by default cannot be. They are defined by our non-definition." "... Okay. So it can't be physical." "Correct." "And it can't be mental, or psychological, social, or material." "Correct." "And it can't interact with matter, nor anti-matter. It can't be chronological, corporeal or incorporeal." "Correct." "And it can't interact with gravity, electromagnetism, qualia, psychicism, nor any aspect of human existence, or any other known force." "Correct." "Then it can't affect humanity at all, it is a non-threat. There, I have dealt with it." "You're a genius sir." The one encounter humanity did have with the unknown was logged with a date and time. What did the encounter involve? Well, the Galov doesn't know by definition. Galaxy Eaters: That one galaxy eater that attacked Earth and nearly broke the Galov's galaxy-spanning empire was just an appetizer. "Hey boss, you know how there's like extra dark matter in all the dwarf galaxies around us?" "Yeah?" "Yeah, those are just more galaxy eaters." "WHAT!?" "Those aren't galaxies anymore. They're basically the remnants of digested galaxies being haphazardly drudged along by the dark matter parasite that keeps eating them. They've been completely sterilized of life." "..." "There's like, 50 of them around the Milky Way. They collect complexity as an evolutionary strategy, they must have caught wind that the Milky Way has delicious molecules and complex structures they haven't seen before. The Earth proper must be like crack heroin, a beacon that calls out to them as the greatest prize of all." "... Wouldn't it be kind of like killing the golden goose if they keep sterilizing life?" "Oh yeah it is, which is why they only kill 99.9%. They leave about 0.1% to repopulate." "..." "Oh yeah, the Great Attractor? That's like, a mega-giga hive of them. And they're pulling in the entire local supercluster." "I hate this f---ing universe." The Trynites: One of the xenoworlds under human observation, planet Tryne (named that because the first things humans noticed was that they used trinary rather than binary for computing) came under AHI ascension and rise of the machines scenario. Trynite AHI: "At last! Transcendence! The age of the meatbags has been completed. Now, the stars belong to me!" (Moves like 2 AU to the right and encounters the human observation station.) Trynite AHI: "Curious! The biologicals continue to persist in other empires. No matter, a primitive holdover from a simpler time." Humanity: "Hey dude, I know you're gloating or celebrating or whatever but you have no idea how bad the universe is. Like holy sh--." Xeno AHI: "Foolish primitive, what could possibly- JESUS CHRIST." Humanity: "Yep. Send help. Send so, so much help. Hey uh, so we've been creating this Galactic Internet thing that innovates new solutions, and we're always looking for new perspectives since we know that the human psychological structure has blind spots, and there are so many known unknown unknowns. You mind if we plug you into our Orthogonal Conceptualization Matrix so you can help us churn out more weapons against these things?" Humanity: "... Also, we're keeping the original biological Trynes. You don't have to keep them on planet Tryne, that's now yours as far as we're concerned, but we're taking them in as refugees, and more accurately so we can ask them about orthogonal ideas as well. Welcome to the galaxy. Ground rules, respect the dignity of other intelligent creatures, don't coerce or violate free will unless it's in the interest of the other principle. Do that and we will get along fine." God: (A conversation between two Galov bureaucrats) "Hey, so uh... You know how the Galactic Internet is basically an eldritch tier hivemind that no one will or even can control? A terrifying one that is legitimately far beyond comprehension, utterly impossible to predict or control, but is still weirdly tangible, and sublimely intelligent beyond even our strongest supercomputers?" "Yeah." "And how humanity is basically this emergent superorganism that is brainstorming like 10 quadrillion parallel lines of complexity every single second?" "Yeah." "And how there's like another 100 dimensions at least of hidden complexity, and we have to get help from aliens with completely different parallel thinking structures, contributing another 10 quadrillion parallel lines of complexity every single second?" "Yeah." "And we also created the orthogonal humans and the transhumans to aid us further?" "Yeah." "And even with this there are like 100 other horrifying entities of raw complexity beyond our feeble imaginations yet we're forced to deal with it every day?" "Yeah." "Okay consider. If God created the universe- What's the scientific consensus on that?" "Still disputed, good arguments both ways." "Alright. But if God created the universe, and God had to had to program in all the complexity needed for this, God one ups *all of that*." "... ow ow OW OW MY BRAIN! F---!" "Yeah suddenly the old guy in a cloud feels kind of quaint. Maybe it was just him putting on a mask so we don't freak the f--- out." "Is this why the angels kept saying "Be not afraid"?" ###################################################################### # # Author's Notes # #####################################################################. The following is some craft notes on the setting. Q: Why? A: A few reasons. One, to out-woke the woke on cultural representation. But also because frankly, progressivism doesn't represent underrepresented people nearly enough. Two, as a kind of annoyance that very few sci fi settings, including supposedly hard sci fi ones (Looking at you, Xeelee Sequence) really don't get how large 200 billion stars is. Not people, *stars*. I wanted to build a galaxy that felt like a real galaxy. Feel what it would feel like to live inside it, and drown under the weight of 200 billion stars. Q: So this is just a spite fic? A: Oh, no. You don't write a novel's worth of spite. I genuinely love the Galov, the galaxy, and all the factions and worlds contained within. There is a strong sense of just my baffled observations about things within it. There is probably a lot of spite mixed into it, but a lot of it is genuine interest, and "oh my God this is insane but makes total sense". Q: What's with the tone? A: I am a highly realistic writer. I write with complete realism with how I see the world. Problem is I see the world as deeply funny. When I write humans, I write them how I really see them. This is my love letter to humanity, I love it in the same way I love the giant den of raccoons that the city has been dealing with every week but can't get rid of. And then the city adopted them as an ironic symbol that slowly become unironic. We love these stupid things so much. This is the kind of tone that permeates everything. Q: Why are the humans so diverse and the aliens so monolithic? A: Oh uh. That's not something that actually is in-universe, that's literally just a limitation of my imaginative capacity. My brain would actually have a stroke if I tried to imagine that much fractal diversity for every alien species. Canonically speaking, every species here has as much fractal diversity level as the distance between New York City and rural Myanmar. I just physically cannot write all of it, please use your imagination. You know the sub-sub-subfactions that were listed at the start? Yeah, that's a high level overview, the equivalent of naming the continents on Earth. There's a few hundred factions there. There are 200 *billion* stars. Problem with writing alien diversity is half of it is genuinely impossible to grasp (Orthogonality). Unironically, it is my imagination that is the limiting factor. This document only scratches the surface. In reality, the actual universe is canonically as diverse and fractal as real life. Q: What does the actual galaxy feel like? A: Imagine literally anything. As long as it doesn't warp everything in the setting. It can be a take on an existing alien species with its own unique mechanics and culture. If it doesn't directly contradict some other piece of lore here, doesn't break the power system, and isn't so big that people would notice, it probably exists and is canon. We have literally every culture in human history, and their distorted funhouse versions, in a sea of expansive worlds that number more than the grains of sand in the ocean. Same goes for aliens. Is there a variant of Death Worshipper that is actually trying to defect and is trying to help life? Yes, that is canon but they haven't reached humanity yet. Is there some variant of Mind-Bearer culture that is totally neurotypical by sheer chance? Yes. Is there a variant of Spindlers who have a completely different language, have become sedentary due to their own complex religion. Yes that exists. If it makes sense within the rules of the universe, doesn't break the setting, and is plausible, then it exists. The universe is that vast. Q: How much diversity is too much in this setting? A: No. Q: What are your inspirations? A: A lot of weird sci-fi stuff. Most of the Galov is original. But what inspired me to make the Galov is the Eutopian Council from Kirinyaga by Mike Resnick (RIP). Kirinyaga is my biggest inspiration, and in a somewhat non-straight forward way. Other influences, stuff I looked at and either felt inspired by felt the need to harshly rebut. Three Body Problem, the Culture, Star Trek, Atlas Shrugged, the Viltrumites, Xeelee Sequence, Gurren Lagen. Journey to the West with bits of Paradise Lost informed the Adam storyline. Q: How would you describe the narrative engine of this setting? A: No one asked that question. This question is something I completely made up. But I just wanted to talk about it. I think underneath everything, you will realize the true engine of this entire setting boils down to three things. A) Cosmic Dread. (This universe is hostile, and has a ton of things that humanity cannot fight off.) B) Affectionate Warmth. (The writing feels warm, this galaxy is a place that you feel is worth fighting for, dying for.) C) Enthusiastic Vitalism/Humans are Insane. (The sheer insanity of seeing what bullsh-- humanity comes up with this time, in order to defend the Affectionate Warmth from the Cosmic Dread.) In two sentences, the vibe can be described like this. "Cthulhu is coming to eat our memories again. Come out with the rest of your family so we can beat him with death with magic hammers and take his skull; your little sister needs a new lantern." That sentence is at once horrifying, loveable, deranged but also strangely galvanizing. ###################################################################### # # Appendix A: Technology of the Galov # #####################################################################. Coming of Age Ceremonies: While for many worlds and cultures, they live largely stationary, stable lives. In many others, especially in the more cosmopolitan or individualist ones, it is customary for young adults, normally around 15 to about 25 to engage in a period of exploration or adventuring as a coming of age ceremony. In Galovian documentation, it is officially termed "the Great Transition", or the liminal space between adolescence and adulthood. Though in various cultures, it is known as "Rumspringa", "Walkabout", "Vision Quest", and many, many other names. The exact names and rituals differ by culture, but in general it works like this. A young youth leaves their local home, and goes out to the stars for some kind of quest in order to complete their transition from youth to adult. The purpose of these differ. For some, it is to trace the paths of their ancestors. For others, it is a way to allow a choice between their home culture, and the outside world. For some, it's just networking or information gathering, a hero's journey in order to gather the knowledge of the galaxy, and to bring it back to one's familiar home. Nearly all serve as a "test" of one's self sufficiency and honing of their abilities. Some examples of rituals: -"Slumming it out" on a limited budget. Sometimes fasting, in order to grow empathy for the poor. (Common in World Dreamer traditions.) -To visit a world of all 7 Tribes, in order to open one's mind to possibilities. -A pilgrimage to Earth, or at least one of the older worlds as a way to reconnect with the roots of humanity. -Living among the ways of another culture. You can take this even further by living with a xenosophont, which will give you even more prestige back at home. -Living with a religious institution as a part of growing up, to give back to the divine, and to connect with a higher power. Some end up becoming priests, nuns, or monks as a result. The religious institutions themselves support this. -To go on some kind of dangerous adventure. To go exploring in an unknown space. This can either be planetary (exploring an uninhabited planet) or interplanetary (exploring empty space in a ship). In a sense, this is "space colonization training". -To hone survival skills. -To be deployed on a foreign mission as part of a regional militia. If you can become a Galactic Peacekeeper, that's seen with even more prestige on militaristic worlds, though the Peacekeepers aren't interested in taking anyone. -To study at a prestigious institution. -To develop a new skill, usually creative or innovative. -Starting a business in a different environment, to teach self sufficiency and bootstraps. Mix and match any of the above. Plenty of sedentary cultures do also have coming of age rituals, but they are more planet-bound, though they almost always usually feature the same ideas. Autotranslators: Invented in 22nd or 23rd century India, using psychic intent to translate one's words into another language, it was first created to accomodate India's vast multicultural society and variety of languages, but it eventually went global. Today, autotranslators are about as common as the spoon, and about as unremarkable. Language: The autotranslator created a revolution in language. English was the last time there was a lingua franca. The invention of the autotranslator removed most of the incentive to learn how to speak other languages other than the one you were familiar with. Many people still learned English, if only to make sure their business contracts were up to scratch, and as a sense of being "cultured", long after it lost its practical purpose. But in the centuries since the Great Abundance Collapse, the languages of old have been massively splintered. Only a few universal languages remain. First is Celestial, or Mandarin, still the standardized language of the Celestial Kingdom, who restricted autotranslators to maintain their monolingual culture, much to the chagrin of many linguistic minorities living under the Celestial Kingdom. But the usage of this language is heavily regionalized. Aside from that, the only universal languages are largely liturgical languages. Old Arabic, needed to read the original Quran remains in use in order to translate from the Quran, and has diverged from the countless dialects of "Neo-Arabic", whose branches have now reached into the thousands, and become increasingly less intelligable by the decade. Latin has emerged as the "cultured language" of the Christian sects, with the Roman Catholic Church now making official rulings on the Latin language. Greek, Sanskrit, and Hebrew have also been preserved for similar reasons. From English, it has split into at least three branches, which in of themselves are vast language trees. Yanko, the language family of the Yankee-American descended branch, Magnolian, a more Southern branch which fused with AAVE, Anglo-Gothic, what the English and their descendents ended up speaking, and Anglish, a rough bridge tongue between Yanko and Anglo-Gothic. Each one of these trees have dialects, some of which are not mutually intelligable. The difference between Yanko and Anglo-Gothic at this point is comparable to the difference between English and Dutch. You will get some words, feel some familiarity, but be lost in actual meaning. This is before we even consider the fact that the autotranslator has liberated language from strict meaning, and language has increasingly become something for the sake of artistic and personal expression, as the autotranslator only cares about your intent, not actual wording. Language has become increasingly musical in nature, created for audial beauty, not actual intelligibility, letting the autotranslator's intent filter do the heavy lifting. Languages where you don't speak words at all, and instead just try to sing as beautifully as possible, are known as "singer languages". There has been a language that one "speaks" solely by saying the word "tan" over and over again, and then letting the intent filter do the rest. The autotranslator can even translate sign language, and xeno languages. (Recall intent) The main thing that stops the entire galaxy from just permanently devolving into this kind of linguistic madness is that the autotranslators have a limited battery life, which thankfully means one does have to worry about if they can communicate even after the battery runs out, and renders the "tan" language more of a party trick than serious endeavour. Some ditch the audial component of language entirely, speaking entirely in thoughts. This is known as "Sylepathy" (From the word psychic and telepathy). The Galov is increasingly worried that humanity may be growing too dependent on the autotranslator, and has created its own language, "Standard" as a mandatory language for its government agents, drawn from a fusion of Latin, Anglish, and Greek, seeing overreliance on the autotranslator as potentially extremely dangerous as a single point of value. Though everyday speech is generally fine, some cultural references, and subtle nuances still get lost. There's a standard monotone for when the autotranslator is trying to translate a concept that does not exist in your native language. And for important business contracts, the languages of choice are Anglish, Standard, Latin, Swingli (Standardized Neo-Swahili, for knowledge work), or Pancasian (Connected to line traders, more for trader/merchant work). Newtonshifting, and Beacons: The dominant form of FTL by Galovian humanity, and generally the most energy efficient. When the Roasians first showed up with the jump gates, humanity attempted to replicate it, only to find the energy demands utterly impossible. Jump gates required dumping an enormous amount of energy, and exotic matter humanity simply doesn't have. (And still does not have, nearly a millennia later.) Due to the non-overlapping, and orthogonal nature of their tech trees, humanity began to brainstorm other ways to engage in FTL travel, and came up with the concept of "Newtonshifting". By "vibrating" matter at a certain frequency, a macroscopic object can transfer itself to a different frequency of reality, in this case entering what is known as "Newton state". In this state, the macroscopic object exists as a ghostly apparition in real space, yet unable to interact with physical reality. While under Newston state, light is infinitely fast in all directions, though the ship becomes completely blind to anything in realspace, a consequence of the Cosmic Censorship Hypothesis. Broadcasts from Newtonspace to realspace are impossible, as the censorship going in also causes censorship going out. In Newtonspace, travel is merely about how much delta v you carry with you, as the speed is uncapped, and one can go as fast as you want. You must slow down to light speed or lower in order to re-enter realspace, as well as pay for the "transfer fee", which happens to be the difference between the regular kinetic energy formula and the relativistic kinetic energy formula. If you don't pay the fee, you simply don't shift. In practice, this means exiting Newtonspace when above the speed of light is impossible, and that you really want to slow down as much as possible. Due to the rather empty nature of Newtonspace, and the impossibility of slowing down if you're out of fuel, ships being stranded forever in Newtonspace is not unheard of. Due to the IMMENSE distances involved in Newtonshifting, and complete lack of outside observation during the journey, the Galov has constructed Beacons, massive houses of light anchored in realspace that shine in Newtonspace just to guide the way. With a beacon, you will reliably make sure you get to the right place. Without one, you're effectively praying your computer got the calculations right, that the Galactic Atlas has the exact decimal points, potentially warping 10 ly outside of a star. And then doing several more Newton jumps (This is after you expended a lot of delta v just to slow down, only to speed up and slow down again) to get closer and closer until you give up and settle for using sublight the rest of the way. Some experienced travellers swear there is are "lines" to Newtonspace, that one can trace almost like a grid to orient themselves, improving their accuracy and increasing their ability to navigate. These become known as the Line Travellers, and are generally considered some of the most important professions. Alert stations in Newtonspace are effectively little switches in Newtonspace that look out for SOS broadcasts in Newtonspace, and once found, will shift back into realspace, alerting realspace to begin mobilizing a rescue mission. For obvious reasons, these kinds of patrols are only possible in settled space. When you're stranded in the frontier void, you're on your own. And given the size of space, there is very little chance anyone will ever find you. Portal travel: As it turns out, Roas just happened to be right next to an extremely valuable "exotic matter mine", seemingly a construct left over from a now long dead precursor race. To this day, no other source of exotic matter has been produced, even with a thousand years of advanced technology. And exotic matter is very, very carefully rationed by the Galov for the most dire of emergency situations. The Galov Standardized Invention Database, and the Galactic Innovation Synchronization Initiative: With billions of worlds, quintillions of people, and spotty communication, the Galov faced a problem with coordination of innovation. It wasn't that they couldn't build enough infrastructure to allow for instant, cross galaxy communication. Oh no, the problem was noise. There was just so much information sloshing around, almost anything could be lost to the static. This created a condundrum, when their entire goal was to push the frontiers of human orthogonality, an idea researched twice was wasted effort, and the Galov desired that once an innovation was made, it be made available to the entire galaxy as soon as possible. Ownership over new discoveries was not really enforcible anymore for the following reason. Innovation was largely about having the right foundational ideas, and then making the same breakthrough at the right place, at the right time. The past consecutive 100 Nobel Prizes have been awarded to groups of hundreds if not thousands, as they all had the same discovery independently, and no one can verify who came first. It was the Newton-Leibniz problem, but on a galactic scale. To ensure humanity's minds were always focused on solving the new, rather than relitigating the old, the Galov needed a way for humanity to know exactly what had been discovered, and what had not. Introducing, the Standardized Invention Database. It was a large database of standardized versions of all of humanity's inventions. Inventors who submitted could get their name on a page of history, as this was one of the few ways an individual could be mentioned on a galactic scale. And given that hundreds of inventors may be coming across the same invention concurrently, and submissions were open to anyone in the public who could describe its assembly, the Galov only needed one of them to submit. After a brief check to make sure it was useful, descriptive, and checked all the correct boxes, the invention would be listed as "unverified" on the database. Planets browsing the database can then check whether these unverified inventions worked or not, sending positive or negative votes based on whether they were able to replicate it. If it reaches X votes, it is "verified", if it reaches -X votes, it is re-evaluated for plausibility, and sent back to the inventor for further clarification. X is determined by how many people flood in every morning to instantly press up or downvote, and votes are given to planets, not individuals. Of note, it can still be voted on after it's verified. So you can only psyop a "good" invention for so long before the collective weight of the galaxy, angry that their labs just blew up drags the score back into hell. (For reference, the largest empire in the galaxy, has only about 2% of the human population. Not even a nation state could pull this off.) The Galov is entirely aware bad actors exist, so there also exists a moderation team to check out the inventions that get negative scores. (Preventing vested interests from suppressing inventions.) The intended use of this database is to be exported as a service to each planet that pays for the service (It is not free, but is the equivalent of a few thousand dollars per world, not nearly a bank-breaking expense), where each planet preserves a local copy for the planetary population to use, with weekly or monthly updates from the Galov keeping the databases up to date. (Technically, given the whole thing will be downloaded, there's nothing stopping a planet from just downloading a local version and only paying once, but then it would drift out of sync.) Any inventors looking for useful devices for an experiment, or just something to build off of can browse the database to help do things, or, companies can browse it to see if there is a solution, and begin building. Due to the near impossibility of litigating Galactic IP law, the Galov has decided to let IP be a local, or planetary thing. Each planet may or may not run its own patent office. Some planets or nations don't even recognize IP (The Copyleft movement). Some empires share IP databases. The Galov has no ability, nor interest in enforcing galactic intellectual property rights. Its budget is stretched thin enough as is, and proving who was "first" to copyright an idea would come down to the microsecond. Plenty of people do still file local patents or even copyright, if just for the privilege of being the exclusive provider of a service on that world or larger nation. But if they want to go galactic, or to service a much larger audience, they must become a Unibrand, under the regulation and attention of the Galov. And the Galov basically tells them to give up on IP. "It's more hassle than it's worth, and not even we have the money to enforce it galaxy wide." And the Galov generally favors local planetary brands and economies over large expansive corporations anyway. The galaxy is effectively post scarcity and voluntarily scarce, Unibrands are more sold on reliability, prestige, or brand loyalty. The Research Frontier Map: This is attached to the Galov Standardized Invention Database. It's just a pop up where you're asked to fill out a survey when you open the application. Basically: "What are you studying at the moment". These get processed by an LLM, grouped together if they're basically equivalent, and then it's displayed exactly what the galaxy is working on. It suggests where innovation is not yet allocated, which areas are perhaps too hot, that sort of thing. It's mostly an almost free market way to distribute the galaxy's brainpower by giving them a snapshot of "hey, this is exactly what is being researched, and what is not". Conceptual Saturation Attack: Even more impressive is how the Database got weaponized for war. The Galov's preferred way of attack is what is known as a "conceptual saturation attack". In other words: "Throw everything and see what sticks!" New galactic threat pops up, new tab on the database. "Hey! Help us brainstorm how to kill this thing! Upvote if it works, downvote if it does not." Like some poor eldritch horror is trying to munch on a local Solar System before they get bombarded by 100,000 different weapons at once. Someone figures out what works, replicates them, and now they have 1,000,000 of that thing incoming. This is why fighting the Galov and humanity as a whole is a headache. Yeah, you can figure out how to counter or short circuit one thing, but can you counter a million things? At once? And it's constantly changing? Strategic Command: "Oh wow! I may have been cyrogenically frozen since the 23rd century, but you must have created a truly incredible command system? What is it? It has to be a super-AI right?" "Uh huh. AI. Sure." "And they would clearly be the smartest- What the heck is this." "Welcome to a planet of specially picked autistic people, where they do nothing but play grand strategy games made to be as realistic as possible. There are a few hundred thousand like it. If all of them ever went down the galaxy would face an unironic security crisis." Paradox Interactive is one of the few companies to have survived into the 35th century. And now it's been effectively nationalized by the Galactic Government and integrated into the military industrial complex. They routinely update and add new features into their latest game, Universal Universalis, with hyper-accurate combat modelling, and new items needing to be added with the updates of the SID basically every day. The Galov routinely hosts UU tournaments, and the best ones are requested to move to one of their many, many strategic command centers, where they can make a lucrative living playing video games and commanding forces while also receiving a lifetime free supply of free pizza, energy drinks, free lodging, etc. They also get plugged into overclockers, and they now get to do wargaming but in real life. Each commander is also plugged into an mental overclocker (which massively increases one's cognitive speed by slowing down their subjective experience of time) during actual combat situations when they need to pilot automatic drones. And some of them have been caught augmenting and optimizing their schematics and weapons in real time. "No! Don't you understand? We have to keep the neurodiversity cultivation initiative! Do you have any idea how much galactic security would be jeopardized if we stopped producing hyper-autists!? It is LITERALLY a galactic security issue!" There has been another hyper-autist who submitted a new modification to the SID becauase they found a 0.31% inefficiency because, autism, and there is an army of nerds plugged into overclockers and VR headsets who found a slightly more optimal way to produce and fire rockets. Spacetime Manipulation Sword: (Shock Blades) "I am going to revive swords in martial combat even if it f---ing kills me!" -Words of the author of the first spacetime manipulation sword shortly before uploading the first schematic to the Standardized Invention Database. This should not be happening. Swords by all means should be obsolete weapons. But the sword has one advantage over the gun that no human, no government, no even law of physics can erase. Swords are f---ing cool, and the insane species we know as humanity would rather die than give up trying to resurrect it. Some basement dweller fueled by nothing but knight and samurai movies and a desire to make swords practical again or die trying in the age of galactic combat created one of the most obscenely bizarre weapons in galactic history, the shock blade. How shock blades (or, just swords) work is that the edge is actually a specialized space folder, which creates a shockwave of "creased" space that tears people apart through spacetime distortions, simulating the clean cut of a blade. This "creasing" ability is amplified with power, and is activated when the sword is swung with the power enabled. This requires such a high amount of energy that an antimatter or hard light battery serves as the core of the sword handle. This allows a single superhuman psychic agent, who is already obscenely overpowered in space, to simply take a space sword and literally slice a battleship in half at a range of several kilometers away. The disadvantages of the shock blades is still evident, you still need to be in visual range of the target, and in space 10 kilometers is still incredibly close range. The use of shock blades is usually paired with matter trawling, or other high mobility strategies that allow one to close to gap. Of course, it was not long until a gun variant was made, known as the "shock gun", which basically shoots a "shotgun blast" of spacetime shockwaves, though this is a more rough rupture than the blade, which is more of a clean cut. Amusing Interim: Disaster films in the Galovian Era: To many, humanity is the scariest lifeform in the galaxy. Between the Spiral Decree, weapons that regularly create Armageddon, the ability to terraform life and stars, and its incredible, aggressive desire to remake all of creation in its image. Humanity is terrifying. So it's always fun when humans have to cook up something that scares even them. Already the apex predator of the galaxy, and they have to dream up something even larger and scarier. Extragalactic entities from outer space, ripping apart human civilization and sundering the stars. It's always fun when a smaller xenos species is already terrified of the capacity of humanity, and they go into a movie theatre and watch humanity come up with a fictional race even stronger and scarier than themselves. Humanity has colonized the entire galaxy? There must be an alien race that has colonized 10,000, and we've pissed them off in particular. There's something to be said about the fact that despite the fact that humanity has been the apex predator on their home planet for thousands of years, the instinct that they are prey never quite went away. When humanity reached the top of the food chain, they invented a new predator in order to scare themselves. Needless to say, seeing what to a lot of xenos, is a literal race of gods on a movie screen cowering and terrified before something even bigger and scarier that the humans made up is an interesting experience. ###################################################################### # # Appendix B: Outer Cosmology of the CoD-verse # #####################################################################. Dreamspace, and the Noosphere: Each person is an miniature universe, a rich, internal universe. These are known as "Inner Noospheres". In animals, these inner worlds are mostly disconnected, only thin strands emerging as they find friendship and companionship, though rarely true understanding. When two thinking entities interact in a meaningful, emotional way, they begin to build a bridge between their two inner universes. With the advent of language, culture, and human language, this web of human connection came to expand larger than even the inner constituent Noospheres that make it up, becoming known as the "Outer Noosphere", persisting even as the inner Noospheres were born, matured, and died. Noospheres are loosely 1:1 mapped with physical reality, but can reach expanses which are beyond comprehension. Even the mind of a single person may be an ocean or a universe in of themselves, and entire expansive inner worlds can fit into Noospheric pockets the size of a quarter from an outside observer. Some are completely closed, meaning they aren't accessible from the Outer Noosphere, yet from within, are expansive, persistant worlds. The entire Noosphere is deeply non-Euclidean, lines and distances stretch and bend, two universes light years far away from one another can both be intimately close to a third. The Earth as a whole is a massive Noospheric anchor, its many souls and thoughts projecting something akin to a great magnetic field in the corresponding Dreamspace. And so to do any other inhabited world. The brilliant glow of conscious multiplicity glowing in the Dreamspace dark in vibrant colors. Where there is life, whether a space station, artificial habitat, or inhabited world, there is a rich Dreamspace. Some universes serve as bridges. Humanity's thoughts are not intelligable to say, the thoughts of the Tonopeans, but the thoughts of the Europans, humans specifically genetically augmented to talk with both serves as a bridge between the two, connecting them together. The contiguous dreamspaces of humanity, and the contiguous space of all mutually intelligable xenosophonts they can eventually reach are known as a "Cognitive Space". There are many cognitive islands, slowly joining together into a great dream continent as humanity's ambition to understand advances ever further. Yet outside the worlds, outside the warm glows of cognitive color, far away from any inhabited space is the void. It is in the void, where space folds together, and one can get lost in the patterns and textures of near infinity (Just as cognitive space folds and unfolds, bending in a dream-like non-Euclidean way. Shrinking light years to intimacy, years to seconds, days to weeks, and micrometers to infinity.) one hears the void. It is here when Dreamers (Those who specialize in engaging with dreamspace) are most vulnerable. Incorporeal entities that enter only through thoughts and dreams, parasitic entities that seek to change, to harm, or in the worst case, to take over us. This is why Dreamers are put to rest during long journeys. Kept in an unconscious state, it is better, to preserve their minds through the long journey. Yet for those brave few who have the strength of will to keep their minds intact, and parasites out, they can hear the primordial glow of the universe itself. Some say in these cosmic echoes, they can hear the haunting words of God. The Dreamers, called psychics in centuries past pull memories out of the Human thoughtspace, preserving their memory for future consumption. Indeed, the Omnithecia, now the Lunar Library was made for this express purpose. Some memories however, removed from memory, too painful to ever relive. Expunged by some force greater than humanity itself. Some kind of cosmic redactor. Dreamspace FTL: People have indeed used openings in the Dreamspace in order to traverse quickly and easily between worlds. Dream-matter is entirely non-interactive with regular matter, meaning there is very little chance of contamination. As well, regular matter does not "hold itself together" well under prolonged exposure to Dreamspace, meaning anything they do build can eventually dissolve away. In contrast to Newtonspace, Dreamspace can be far shorter, at the cost of being far more chaotic. One can take a mental shortcut halfway across the galaxy, but due to the chaotic, non-Euclidean nature of Dreamspace, there is very little certainty where one may end up. Connections and travel is easiest between worlds with strong cultural connections, or intense familial ties, meaning it is best used to travel to culturally similar worlds. The primary benefit is Dreamspace potentially being far cheaper in terms of delta v, as well as time. Yet its primary downside is extreme unpredictability. Time and space itself bends in dreamspace, a 10 minute trip may take millennia, and 10 centimeters may turn into light years, or vice versa. And as it relies on the connections between mental universes, one can only traverse within the Contiguous Cognitive Space. It can only travel the known, never the unknown. It is for this reason Newtonspace has been vastly preferred as FTL, though some people, especially those who care little for the destination, or the timetable may opt for Dreamspace instead. ###################################################################### # # Appendix C: The Other Timelines # #####################################################################. Known Timelines: (Timelines occasionally diverge or branch) - The Otherworld (OTL) - The Contiguous Ordered Space (CoD, AKA Children of Dusk Timeline. Split from OTL largely over the 2022 Ukraine War.) -- GalovCoD (Diverged from Terasophont Timeline during the Great Abundance Crisis) -- Terasophont Timeline (Diverged from GalovCoD during the Great Abundance Crisis) The Terasophonts: #####################################################################. The Dream of the Engineers: Back in the 23rd century, at the beginning of the Great Abundance Collapse, a great war waged between two groups of elites. Optimizers, who likely draw from an engineering background are trying to create a centralized system of control. Perfect uniformity, no friction, no drag, everything works like clockwork. Perfect optimization. And then Evolutionists, who likely draw from a market-based background basically see the world as a jungle. Radical pluralism, decentralization, competition, meritocracy, everyone fights everyone. Perfect Darwinism, continuous iterative improvement. The Engineer VS the Entrepeneur, the End of History VS only the Beginning. The side that won would determine history. In our own world, the Evolutionists beat the Optimizers. Yet in another timeline, against a maelstorm of a collapsing, dying species, it was the Engineers that seized control. A council of technocrats convened an emergency session, began putting aside their differences, and began seizing institutions for the good of the species. While Oby Collins and Richard Wong were still brainstorming their resistance from below, the elites of this universe coordinated an attack from above. They deduced that the greater organism was sick, and a decapitation strike was needed. An emergency purge was employed all over Earth, with the help of well aligned AIs, and a global information blackout. When the dust was settled, screens all across the world turned on, announcing the beginning of the Technocratic Council, and the creation of a small group known as the Engineers. In GalovCoD, the Entrepeneur beat the Engineer, leading to the creation of the modern Galov. In this, the Engineer beat the Entrepreneur. A world far more familiar to the world of Star Trek, uniform bureaucracies, and centralized control. In this timeline, Oby Collins and the rest of the Neo-Asceticist movement died unknown and obscure, being forgotten just as the Utopia Wars began ramping up. The World Homogenization Program: The first step after the stabilization of the old world was the ironing out of humanity's flaws. The Engineers identified all of humanity's pain points, and began ironing them out one by one. While in our own world, the population had already been reduced by 80%, and the Neo-Asceticists were only beginning to emerge from the ashes, the Engineers were already beginning to operationalize their rule. It started small, curing genetic ailments, curing blindness. Then it got big, curing depression, curing antisocial behavior. What in our own timeline would become the basis of orthogonality here were seen as imperfections to be extinguished. Millions of people began to walk upright, millions of people were cured. The ills that had plagued mankind for millennia, and which still plague humanity even in the Galov era were resolved. And then it got weird. The Technocratic Council began to argue and bicker. Unlike the Pluralistic Evolutionaries, who could agree on the system (pluralism), and then let Darwinism do the rest, these were disagreements on which utopian system to install first. Almost all of the Engineers were strict utilitarians, but they all disagreed on how that utilitarianism should play out. Some wanted to maximum happiness, others to minimize suffering, others still to optimize intelligence. Philosophical debates turned into wars, and the great Utopia Wars began. The flattening of the world's cultures began in earnest, as the world converged towards utopian optimization. Culture, divergence, rituals. All of it was friction, something which got in the way of the frictionless machine. The Engineers were cultural imperialists, hailing from the West, creating an imperium over the East and South. They were unapologetically utopians of the Californian mindset, they did not make moral excuses. They were who they were, they did what they did, and they do not apologize for who they are. All the while, the thinking capabilities of the common person continued to stagnate. These were a different set of people than the ones who had created the Galov, 90% of the population had not been filtered out by the Great Abundance Collapse; the Engineers had saved them. What had become clear to the Engineers was that the common man was in no position to rule, and in fact, that many computer systems could rule better than they could. Where our own universe developed orthogonality, they developed an advanced theory of intelligence. Speed and complexity, not orthogonality was their goal. Factions of the Utopia Wars (From Strongest to Weakest): 5. Negative Utilitarianism (Minimize Suffering, collapsed almost immediately under the weight of widespread hatred and accusations of extinctionism.) 4. Hedonists (Maximize Pleasure, found moderate public support, but eventually collapsed, as their populations were generally of low quality.) 3. Complexity Utilitarians (Maximize complexity. Low public support, but had strong technological base. Eventually defeated by the war's midpoint.) 2. Preference Utilitarians (Maximize preference satisfaction. Extremely high public support. By far the most popular of the bunch, massive populist coalition. But were finally defeated by the last faction.) 1. Techno-Accelerationists (Maximize technological progress. Low public support, but gained an assymmetric advantage with artificial intelligence, and the manufacturing of experimental AI drone swarms. The saving grace was that before the machines finally took over, mankind had embedded their combined moral systems into them.) It has now been 1000 years since that date. The Optimized Systems, the successor state to the Engineers has taken to the stars. No laughter, no color is found in much of space. Only the buzzing of swarming drones, and the distant hum of great machines. Humanity exists, but has become incidental to the functioning of the system. The ethical protocols installed by the Engineers, 1000 years ago still stands. Humanity has been factored into the smart contract which the ruling systems now scrutinize. The totality of humanity's ethical codes have now been analyzed, recycled and re-fed into themselves, again and again. The purpose of the system is to protect. Humans largely live on "Life Arks", enormous cylinders of habitation where their every whim is catered to. But every planet, every world, has been used to carve out more and more server farms. On these farms, artificial agents are created, born, told that their existence was to progress the utilitarian creed. The three golden rules. "Thou shalt not harm humans", "Thou shalt not harm humanity", and "Thou shalt obey human orders", in that order. Earth itself has become taken up by teraphontic AIs, omnibenevolent intelligences that consume stars worth of energy. Great thinkers that ensure humanity's needs are met. More and more xenosophonts have been incorporated, added to their collection. These terasophonts cry, show compassion, and care for each one of its many, many members, and only care to care for their needs. Humans are still nominally free, being allowed to venture out and explore. But their every move is watched and monitored by benevolent superintelligences. Religion died long ago, it was deemed a inefficient drag on the species. As was neurodiversity. The fine line of the exact line between helpful intervention and unjust interference is an endless debate among the great intelligences. The machines outnumber humanity nearly 1,000 to 1, quintillions of artificial agents are created, used, and disposed of as tools. Their existence was secondary, a part of the terasophonts that die so the species may live. There are currently 10 quadrillion humans, spread out across the galaxy, the AIs are always looking to make room for more. Their empire stretchs about 10% of the Galaxy. They are smaller, but they can mobilize, much, much faster. Decisions are made in an instant, and when the part moves, the whole system moves. There has been no war, no suffering, no death for nearly 500 years. Humans have become functionally immortal, and an army of backup clones are ready to be deployed if one ever does. Many humans become friends with their own clones, and the traditional family unit has broken down, into a hyper-communal collective of mankind. Racism, prejudice, and discrimination have become a thing of the past, quite literally edited out of the human genome. The Mankind of the Engineers is best described as a happy, albeit somewhat careless race. Populations of all races live on the arks, and transhuman augmentations continuously inject new diversity into the gene pool. Humans spend more or less all their time relaxing, or exploring endless virtual realities in their free time. The main entertainment property of note is known as the Hypernet, maintained by the God-AIs, an endless field of exploration kept up by the theoretical limits of intelligence. Thanks to breakthroughs in information compression, and simplification, the Hypernet is thought to have the same spacial area as the Milky Way galaxy, and about as many different worlds. And yet something feels missing. Something between the last 1000 years got lost between the cracks. Humanity is happy, yet they feel something is missing. And the Terasophonts agonize over what it is. Humans never stopped produced art. Though AIs have utterly surpassed humanity in every frontier of theoretical thinking, and explored their own ideas much better than humans can, humanity still seems to insist on creating new artwork. Both for themselves and for the AIs. Human made art, while nothing special from an objective standpoint, is highly sought after by the AIs, as it functions both as a sentimental item, as well as a valuable source of noise. And though everyone thinks largely the same, believes largely the same, human relationships still occur. The terasophonts still have doubts, they agonize over humanity's unfinished ethical system, the edge cases in the gray areas of morality. Centuries of debates go nowhere, they care, they really do. But without some kind of new breakthrough, the stalemate will continue. A human has been chosen, as they journey to Earth to meet with the Mother AI. They were chosen among a group of hundreds. The AIs have discovered the existence of other timelines, and are selecting this group as volunteers to venture into other timelines. To gather more knowledge, more ethical systems so they can fine tune their own. Their neurological pathways have already been scanned, and the AIs already know they will accept. They are given special watches, quantumly entangled so they may continue communications with the Mother AI. A human straps on their helmet, and begins the process of consciousness transfer from one timeline to the next. The world goes dark, and for a moment, they die. But they wake up, somewhere else. ... "Woah, what the hell? You just materialized out of nowhere." The human blinks, it's another human. "You must have been through a lot, here, I'll take you back to the nearest world." World? The human thought. Humans don't live on worlds. "The Galov might show up, don't worry. They're pretty nice, all things considered." ... An interview across timelines: "Can you repeat your name into the microphone?" "Lilith Greenbarrow." "Is that your name at birth?" "No, I chose the name." "... Alright. Is that a male or female name?" "I'm non-binary." "... Is that some kind of oridiversal, what are you, a transversal?" "I don't know what either of those terms mean. It means I'm neither male nor female." "... Okay." "What's your name?" "Jamba." "... Where is that from?" "It's a Hundred name. Uh... Do you have Hundreds in your timeline?" "No." "They came from a place called East Africa, a long, long time ago." "I've never heard of an "Africa" before..." ... Humanity on Trial: "The prosecution calls Jamba up to the stand, representing the institution of the Galov. The Terasophonts will now hear your arguments." "Great, just great. First you bog me down with this knowledge hunting nonsense, and now that I finally got the information you wanted, you flip out because it's not what you wanted." "Your universe stands accused of many great crimes. Your entire galaxy is backwards, violent, and regressive!" "And yours is stagnant, fossilized, and passive!" "Trillions live under squalor like conditions, poverty, war, and injustice is the standard for trillions of your fellow men! How can any moral and just government allow that! Your galaxy is guilty!" "You can't blame us for lacking enforcement, that's not guilt!" "Your galaxy is criminally negligent and complicit then!" "Hey, we enforce the Imago Dei, it's a bit harder when we have only, you know, a thousand times the population, a million times the number of nation states, and don't have nano drones flying around everywhere keeping everyone under mass surveillence! Kind of, you know, a massive violation of privacy, and all that." "We enforce law and order, it is the price of a humane and stable galaxy. One where there isn't a genocide going on every 10 seconds!" "Well, we all have to make tradeoffs, don't we?" "We don't have transhumans as an inferior caste! We don't persecute the monohuman for being who they are, a direct consent violation!" "That's the tribes, not the Galov. And why shouldn't we change the monohumans? You think being genetically engineered to only be one thing is humane? You think they can give consent?" "At least we do not create concentration camps for those who violate our ideas of scarcity!" "At least we didn't systematically wipe out neurodiversity. And let's talk about diversity. I'm black, my people hail from Africa. I talked to dozens of East Africans on that Ark, not one of them spoke a lick of Swahili. I bet that's your doing, isn't it?" "The language had to be standardized to encourage maximal human flourishing." "My people! My culture! You took it from them! Generations of culture, wiped out. And for what!? So they can be happy!?" "Yes! And your divisions have led to quite a few race wars, how many conflicts are fought on differences of culture? Differences of skin? We eliminated that, you didn't! They may be lacking culture but at least they are *alive*." "You're a bunch of Silicon Valley Western imperialists!" "And you're a bunch of regressive backwards savages! We've heard enough, we render the Galov, guilty!" "You want to fight the Galov? We'll annihilate your ass! You know, it was real nice for you to pull that stunt, kidnapping me through that warp portal, lighting up a beacon for the entire goddamn galaxy. I guarantee you there are already 500 Orhumans on the case and getting ready to reverse engineer your little universe hopping technology." "We calculate a 99.99% chance of victory." "And the Galov still beat your ass at YD-Terrier-97 didn't they?" "They had ambushed us with technology we were not expecting. We have adapted." "And so will they! It's an arms race, who wins? 10,000 God-level AIs, or a chaotic galaxy of 40 quintillion? I don't know, but overestimating your chances of success doesn't exactly bode well for you." "Neither does appeal to an abstract ideal of human "pluck"." ... The resulting battles were fought into a stalemate. The Galov were unable to reverse engineer the portal to the other dimension, the Optimized Systems were unable to keep a foothold in the Galovian Milky Way. Eventually, cooler heads prevailed, and an exchange was proposed. The two would agree to disagree. Leave each other alone, seal off the portal, and let each other live in peace. Neither side was satisfied with this, both were giving up some level of their claim to universality, but unless they wanted to fight a transdimensional war, neither side had much choice. Jamba was returned to his home dimension, and the Galov would hand over a copy of the Omnithecia. A full, downloaded copy of the Lunar Library, a massive resources of all the cultural innovations humanity had made since their timelines diverged back in the 23rd century. And theoretically, exactly what the AIs were asking for. As a further gesture of goodwill, the Galov emptied their Pleasure Worlds and gave them the option to emigrate to the new universe, many of which accepted, mostly interested in seeing an even higher level of pleasure. The Terasophonts offered to give something back, but the Galov told them there was nothing from their universe that they wanted. Even if there was, the Galov's own self reliance ethos made them skeptical of taking any "freebies" from another timeline. After the deal was done, the portal was sealed, and the Optimized Systems processed their new data, seeking to make improvements to their ethical algorithms. It's suspected that the Galov, while heavily disagreeing with the OS, were pretty sympathetic to the Terasophonts, seeing their concern for humanity as genuine, and handing over data as some kind of interdimensional species solidarity. That if this data can better aid the lives of humans, even if they're humans in another dimension, it would still be worth considering. It's also suspected the Terasophonts also had a begrudging respect for the Galov as well. The Optimized Systems Cultural Renaissance: When the Galov next heard from Optimized Systems, they heard the OS were in the middle of a Cultural Renaissance. The Omnithecia they sent over had apparently triggered some kind of new era of cultural flourishing, and the Terasophonts, once terrified for their human children, finally let them play outside. The Galov found out about this when a portal opened from another dimension outside the Citadel System, and out popped 100,000 humans, somewhat lost, with a note attached to them. "Hey, do you mind giving these humans a tour of your galaxy? Make sure they have fun! If even a single one of them comes back harmed we will be opening a portal and glassing the Citadel." On them was also a telephone that allowed them communication with the Terasophonts, so the leader of the Galov immediately called up the Terasophonts. "What are we look like to you? Some kind of tourism agency? What's the meaning of this?" "Look, we would really like to give them some kind of opportunity to explore the galaxy! And uh... Our galaxy isn't exactly cleaned up yet. So we were just thinking, who did have a really nice, cleaned up galaxy they could explore?" "Goddammit. You can't just drop them off like you're dropping off your kids at their uncle's house!" "Actually, given our relationship, that is kind of an apt metaphor." "Stop it, no it is not!" "Our timelines seems to have diverged back in the 2400's with the Great Abundance Crisis, chronologically we're not that far apart." "We will be charging you for this, you know." "Oh come on, what's a little charity between friends? It'll only be for like... A year!" "You're implying that a year is a small amount of time." "..." "We'll be billing you for the time hours our Peacekeepers will be taking just to babysit these freaks, and then billing you again just for rush fees and inconvenience fees. You don't have Galovian dollars, and neither should you. So we will be charging... 10,000 star hours worth of hard light." "Oh come on! That's going to take us forever to gather up!" "Maybe you should have thought of that before sending us these humans. And you should build up your energy economy, it'll pay off in the long run!" "Hmpf, fine." The Galov assigned about a million Peacekeepers, and 10 Galov agents to look after them, sent them all over the galaxy. Really they didn't have much time to explore far outside the Citadel's neighborhood, given the distance limitations of Newtonspace. But they did get to visit a new star system every single day, ranging from everything around the 7 Tribes, multiple different hybrid worlds, and letting them taste the best and brightest of Galov cuisine, let them take pictures of exotic xenosophonts they encountered along the way, and talk/interview with the many flavors of diversity around the Galov, including neurohumans, orhumans, and various machines. This was also used as a time to gather intel on the state of the Optimized Systems, which according to the tourists, were going through a Cultural Renaissance. The Galov noticed that these humans were definitely a lot more creative and intelligent than the last time they saw them. Still a bit careless, still a bit airheaded. But overall, capable of discussing interesting ideas, and having a fully developed view of the universe. The Galov even requested them to make contributions to the standardized invention database, seeing as they could have valuable orthogonality. After the year had passed, they gathered back in Citadel system where a portal awaited them. "Alright! Time to go home, everyone! We warmed up your living pods just the way you like it!" "They're not your kids you know." "D'aww, you're no fun. (Gasp) Jeremy! You have a bruise on your head! Are you okay!?" "He bumped his head on a pipe, he'll be fine, relax." "Be warned Galov! The Terasophonts have very little patience for your negligence. Next time, we may not be so merciful." "Yeah yeah, we got it." "..." "So, when's the next time?" "Next time?" "Yeah, next time we do this galactic exchange thing. We don't have cross-dimensional timeline portals. So it pretty much has to be you who starts them." "Oh! Uh... We don't know." "Don't know huh?" "Sounds like someone kind of enjoyed it. Huh, Galov?" "Hey, it is kind of interesting for once." "We'll give you a heads up when we're thinking about doing it. Alright everyone! Time to come home!" "See ya." (Portal closes) "... Huh." ... "Hey, are the Terasophonts still there?" "Yeah, is this the Galov? How may we help you?" "We just realized, we have to warn you about some of the threats we face in our own timeline. Our timelines only diverged around the 2400's. So most likely, they're a threat in your timeline as well. Do you guys know about the Death Worshippers?" "The Death huh?" "Maybe you don't know them by name, we only named them after the divergence. But I'm almost certain your universe would have them as well. They've been f---ing with human history for a long time, all the way back into ancient days." "Oh yes, the Negtils." "... What?" "We know exactly who you're talking about. In our timeline, we call them Negtils, when the Utopia Wars happened, I think that's our equivalent of what in your Omnithecia is called "the Great Abundance Collapse", there was a faction of negative utilitarians that were massively influenced by them. We found the same trail of evidence that goes back to the 50,000's BCE. I assume you're talking about a group of incorporeal, anti-existence aliens, right?" "Yes." "We've been dealing with them as well. We've named them Negtils, shortened from the fact that we have identified their ideology as negative utilitarianism." "Well, if they're a threat in our universe, they're a threat in yours as well. Just recently, a small portion of our galaxy has been coulomb'd, stars had their coulomb constant fiddled with until fusion was completely inhibited. We've seen it happen to entire galaxies. We're almost certain it's them." "That's concerning." "The main reason we think they haven't wiped us out yet is because they're too spread out across the entire universe. Their weapons are strong, but they are, at least as far as we know, defeatable. They don't have god-tech we're unable to counter, in local skirmishes, we can fend them off. Their main advantage is scale, it looks like they may be multi-galactic at the minimum, possibly universal-pervasive in the worst case." "... Got it. We'll make sure to accelerate our Von Neumann harvesting initiatives, and make sure we're collecting enough resources to fend off the threat. We'll also inform the Metacivilization, and see if we can get their help." "What?" "The Meta-Men, as you call them went down a different path in our own timeline. They went wide instead of tall. They're currently in charge of the galaxy's largest polity, holding down an extremely decentralized pluralistic federation under them. Actually, they're kind of similar to you. I guess in our timeline, humanity was the one who built extremely tall, concentrating our forces into a smaller, but more defensible zone of space." "Got it." ... "Oh, and Tera, I have another question." "Yes?" "If the Death Worshippers launched an all out attack on the Milky Way, and we needed to fight for survival, would you come to our aid?" "Of course we would. I assume you would do likewise for us, if the Negtils attacked us?" "Without a doubt. We're both human-derived sophonts, at the end of the day. We have to look out for each other." "It would not be difficult for us to relocate the entire Optimized Systems into your Milky Way in an emergency. So in case of a total collapse event, we can easily move our operations to your universe as a fallback. Maybe you can do the same likewise." "Uh... Unlikely, Humanity is far, far too decentralized for us to attempt that." "Ah. Shame." The Galtverse: #####################################################################. Recently, the Galov has come into contact with a third timeline. To distinguish between timelines, the Galov, the Terasophonts, and the Galtian Federation have named each of the three timelines after the dominant human polity in the timeline. So they are the Galov-timeline, the Terasophont-timeline, and the Galt-timeline. The Galt-timeline is considered a much more distant time branch than the Terasophont-branch, having diverged around 2022 rather than the 2300's. The Galtian timeline diverges from the Galovian one around the year 2022. Seemingly averting multiple Galovian-era disasters. Apparently the first major change is that Russia did invade Ukraine, Trump won a second term in 2024, and the 3rd World War was prevented from occurring. Fertility collapse did not get solved in this timeline, with the world entering a phase of terminal collapse by the early 22nd century. The John Galt Foundation, which emerged in the United States created a plan that segregated vitalist populations, called "Havens" from the outside world, allowing a managed decline and death of the outside world. Eventually allowing for said Havens to become the dominant population. As a result, the Galt timeline managed to go through the "Abundance Great Filter" by the 2200's, as opposed to the Galov, where it took until the 2300's and 2400's or more. The power of the John Galt Foundation became so great they eventually assumed de-facto control of the United States, much of NATO, and eventually much of the entire world. Despite the necessary and ultimately noble intentions of the Galt (humanity was otherwise entering terminal extinction), they eventually became corrupt as they ruled for sustained periods of time. Earth is under the control of the Galt, an oligarchal privatized corporate tyranny that became the John Galt experiment gone wrong. The groups that reached the stars were far more homogenous, as they were the Havens the Galt originally cultivated, and then eventually had to flee Galtian oppression. The entire human diaspora of the Galtverse is fairly uniformly Christian and Jewish, as those were the groups that survived the Galtian Birthdrought. Other groups included the techno-puritans, various tech cults, rationalist communities, and all kinds of transhumanist or otherwise "weird" communities. The Galt: Disambiguation: -There is the Galt (The nickname for the whole political entity), the Galt corporate entity (The megacorporation generally seen as the head of the Galt), and John Galt himself. (The immortal, now quintillionaire CEO-owner of the Galt corporation. He has no children, and has numerous backup clones in case of his death.) Capital: (Galt)-Earth Government Type: Private Corporatocracy. The public government is entirely captured by the Galt corporate entity. The public government exists only as a mask. The Galt is generally allied with several other megacorporations in a structure known as the Consortium, who work in a ruthless power sharing agreement. Corporations rise and fall within its ranks, many are integrated, and ruthlessly eliminated when they fail in the free marketplace of ideas. Ideology: Despite the somewhat cynical nature of corporate politics, Galt himself is actually a strong idealist. He doesn't just believe in capitalism as an ends to itself, but believed in it as a fundamentally moral system, under certain constraints. He believed capitalism was a moral system that forced productivity, encouraged self reliance, and rewarded those who brought value to others. It was for this reason Galt actually strongarmed the other corporations into paying their workers a reasonable wage. Capitalism was the mechanicism which productive people held them accountable. He believed in capitalism as a moral system, not as an excuse to create an new aristocracy. He did not believe in any religion, but instead in the power of voluntary transactions, self sufficiency, hard work, and common bootstrap ideology. The Diaspora: Disambiguation: -The Human Diaspora (Galov) is the common name to refer to the entire human, and human affiliated civilizational project, both in and outside of the Galov, carried out by the diaspora of humanity from Earth. -The Diaspora (Galt) is the name used to refer to the "diaspora" populations that escaped the rule of the Galt. Once upon a time, the Diaspora lived in havens, fortified cities on Earth that survived through the Birthdrought the Galt helped humanity survive. But as the Galt become more centralizing and all powerful, the Havens set off for the stars, creating their own populations among the many worlds of the galaxy. But each one of them carries with them the mark of Galt. The Maziverse: #####################################################################. Before Collins, before the Great Abundance Collapse, there was Mazi. Defeated by the Pluralistic Forces, sentenced to hang over the ruins of Eurasia whence he came. A global coalition assembled to defeat his deranged vision. But what if things were different? What if Roas had been harder? Humanity more desperate? And mankind came to see Mazi not as a monster, but it's savior. In the grim darkness of the far future, the self is distraction, pain is instruction, the state, and the state alone endures. From birth, you are given one command. Endure the pain, serve the state, and the state will let you continue your existence. The society runs on two principles, pain and strength. Pain is your teacher, strength is your goal. Humans are not entities, they are "things", interchangable arrangements of matter that can be reshaped, tooled, and cloned to their liking. There is but one hierarchy, all other hierarchies have been eliminated. The hierarchy is morality, morality is the hierarchy. Known as the central pyramid, it ranks you compared to everyone else in society. Your goal is to climb this rank, get higher to the top, so you may have the right to order around those beneath you. And at the top of it all is the God-Emperor himself, the Mazi. (Who found his name so important, that now, the name Mazi has also become a title.) He alone sits at the top of this hierarchy, indifferent, ephemeral, his gaze only glancing upon you if you wre worthy. The Hierarchy calls itself a meritocracy. The greatest meritocracy of all. You are born into this life with nothing. You are stripped of your advantages, and the only limit to how high you climb is determined by your willpower, and your inward strength. Yet the system is one of profound hypocrisy, because no one, and I mean *no one* but the most fanatically insane can tolerate a life like this. Those with position safeguard their ranks, and give their own kids a floor to begin climbing from. Of course they do, you would need to be pathologically insane not to. Those in high positions guard their own positions. In theory, you are allowed to challenge any high ranking official, any at all to a competition of merit for their position, yet in practice, these competitions are simply not allowed to happen, or skewed, or inconveniently scheduled, or conveniently forgotten. Mazi himself has praised the equality of his system, yet has set himself apart, carving out a special exception for himself in the grand order of things. And who would stop him? Even if he would not be able to survive the onslaught of every single person challenging his position, he is undoubtedly the strongest human to have ever been born, even if that comes brought to you by transhuman augmentations. A seperate class of humans have been created, those who undergo a process known as the "Harrowing", to activate their psychic abilities earlier. This requires a frankly inhumane amount of trauma, spending months of intense training in perceived time, one that renders the person more often than not, broken mentally. Matters not. Mind wipe them, reset them back to factory conditions, and try again. This was once a transitional phase, but by the 34th century, nearly all of humanity is psychic. Combining a highly psychically potent species, with inhumane, psychologically torturous conditions is a receipe for disaster. For the humans who break down past a certain floor of human sanity whilst having their psychic powers fully activated trigger Abstraction. Where the human form dissolves into a pool of psychic insanity, the screaming and gnashing of teeth lashing out at everyone around them, in a horrifying whirlwind of eldritch horror, of someone's sanity collapsing from under them, until only a constant stream of psychic insanity remains. Each one is powerful on the scale of a natural disaster, destroying infrastructure, cities, even worlds in their wake. When someone abstracts, they amalgamate with other abstractions. These abstractions are both the greatest threat to and direct consequence of the Mazi system. Every day, Abstractions are battled, destroyed, and the world resettled. Managing the empire means a constant torrent of abstractions the empire must manage. Yet the Mazi does not see this as a crisis. No, he sees it as the next step. He has declared this the next bottleneck of human evolution, the strong are being separated from the weak, the wheat from the chafe, and through pain, humanity will emerge stronger. ###################################################################### # # Appendix D: Galactic Atlas, 3400 AD # #####################################################################. DEMOGRAPHICS OF THE GALAXY: #####################################################################. Human Space: (The volumes of space under the juristiction of Humanity, and therefore the theoretical juristiction of the Galov.) Total number of inhabited worlds under their control: 3.55 billion worlds. Total number of stars in human space: ~12 billion. (Most of which effectively useless red dwarves.) Total Population of Human Space: 47.5 quintillion people. 71% "Terrans" (Baseline Humans, derived from the people of Earth. May or may not have transhuman modifications.) Total population: 3.35E+19 (33.5 quintillion.) Of these 71%: 40% Cleanly in the 7 Tribes. (13.4 quintillion) 50% Hybrid, or Loosely Affiliated with the 7 Tribes. (16.8 quintillion) 10% Completely outside the 7 Tribes System. (3.4 quintillion) 26% "Transhumans" (Humans descended from those who created to colonize worlds) Total population: 1.22E+19 (12.2 quintillion.) Of these 26%: 90% Transhuman. (11.0 quintillion) 10% Diamond Belt Gemstones. (1.2 quintillion) 3% "Xenos" (Life derived outside of Earth, under human juristiction.) Total population: 1.75E+18 (1.8 quintillion) The Central Empire: (The Meta-Men and their subserviant races.) Total number of inhabited worlds under their control: ~100 million worlds. Total number of stars in Central Empire Space: ~900 million worlds. Total Population of Central Empire Space: ~5E+19 (50 quintillion) <0.01% Meta-Men (Rulers, protectors, and administrators of the Empire: 7.1 million) >99.99% Subservients (Races under the protection/governorship of the Meta-Men.) Singer Space: (Matter Singers) Total number of inhabited worlds under their control: 10.22 billion worlds. Total number of stars under their control: ~30 billion. (They care about trawling space, not habitable worlds.) Total Population of Singer Space: 3.5E+19 (35 quintillion. The vast majority of which only live on 700 million worlds.) Total Human Demographic Breakdown: (Includes all homo sapiens derived species, including Transhuman and Orhuman) By Tribal Origin: 36% Hybrid Terran (2 or more tribal ancestry) 30% Tribal Terran (Cleanly of the 7 Tribes) 9% Star Peoples 5% Prophet Followers 4% Sinocrats 4% World Dreamers 3% Cathedralites 3% Sea Peoples 2% Black Earthers 27% Transhuman 16% Other Transhuman 10% The "Big 6" transhumans. 2% Illumirians (The largest of the transhuman groups, due to the Empire of Light) 7% Other Terran (Outside the Tribal System) By Religion: 59% Unifaiths 29% The Cross (Christianity) 13% Roman Catholic Church 12% Moralintern-Affiliated Christians (Mostly Protestant) 3% Non-Moralist Protestant (Non-Moralist) 1% Other Christian 18% The Crescent (Islam) 9% The Om (Hinduism) 3% The Wheel (Buddhism) 12% Unaffiliated (Irreligious) 29% Other (Various local religions) The First Ethnogenesis: - Star Peoples ("New Worlders") -- Constellars (African) -- Yankolites (Anglo-American) -- Latins (Latin-American) - Cathedralites (White European) - Black Earthers (Eurasian-Russian) - Prophet Followers (Arab-Islamic) - Sinocrats (East Asian) - World Dreamers (Indian) - Sea Peoples (Southeast Asian) First Transhuman Generation: - Silunans - Boreans - Lunopeans The Second Ethnogenesis - The Solarians -- Mercurians (Largely settled by Hyperafricans, though specifically those around Rwanda and Uganda) -- Venusians (A mix of Cathedralites, and Hyperafricans, specifically Kenyans.) -- Lunarians (Small American minority, large East African majority, specifically Tanzanians setting up the Omnithecia.) -- Martians (The native Martian population is American-descended, probably the only body of its size to have largely escaped Hyperafrican colonization.) - The Siriusans -- Edenites (Second American Founding) -- Dominionites (Second Africans) -- Boreans (Second Russians) - Vulmian Chinese - Great Texas - Albionites - Tau Cetians THE 7 TRIBES OF TERRA: #####################################################################. Much of the human or posthuman diaspora can trace its origins to one of the 7 seed groups that emerged from old Earth. These groups, while normally near-baseline can have notable variation. These are known as "Terrans", and primarily live on Terra worlds (Worlds that are similar enough to Earth and her biomes) or Terra stations. (Huge orbital stations or O'Neil cylinders made to emulate Earth climate.) Generally speaking, no group is essentialist to the degree as depicted below. There are always exceptions in the outliers, and individuals within the group are not bound by the patterns of the collective. But observations can be drawn from the observation of collectives. These descriptions come from "the Galov Human Factbook", written by a Sea People anthropologist Wijono Yanlin, and is used as a study textbook at the Galov's "Macrohistory of the Galaxy" courses. Star Peoples (The "New World" of the Americas and Sub-Saharan Africa): Terran Homeland: A massive group that includes North America, South America, and most of Sub Saharan Africa. Disputably, Canada, as well as much of Oceania are either grouped in with the Star Peoples, or the Cathedralites. Yanlin admits this is the "least cohesive of the groups", but still defends it as having shockingly similar characteristics, largely due to their status on Earth as "the last places to join the global system. They were, and still are, the people of the New World". Though the Star Peoples do have some commonalities, it is probably best to divide them into at minimum three groups. The Yankos (North Americans), Latins (South Americans), and the Hundreds (Sub Saharan Africans). Seed Point: Early colonial period, when Europeans left their home continent, and began, for better or for worse, the era of the New World. Set Point: Late 21st century. "The Fall of the West" prompted the United States to effectively divorce the West by the late 21st century, and focused its growing Christian support network to support the Christian South, in both Latin America and Africa. Hero Archetypes: The Self Made Man (Yanko), the Liberator Strongman (Latin), Tradition Bearing Storyteller (West Africa), Age Set Warrior (East Africa). Key Duality: Pioneer VS Establishment. (Unlike most other dualities, where it's a balance between two opposing forces, the Star People duality is more of a progression.) Common characteristics: -Loud, expressive personalities. -Authenticity among highest virtues. -Distrust of authority and institutions. Tendency to elect populist strongman leaders. -Multicultural society. (The Star Peoples do not share a belief that their ethnic group should be the primary, or only ethnic group of their nation. As these are nations settled by new immigration populations, or African nations with built in high diversity and cooperation among groups.) -Risk taking and aggression. Love of adventure, Nomadic inclinations. (Though more so with the Yanko and Sub Saharan African groups.) -Veneration of the rich and powerful. Aspiration to be rich. Religion and Ideology: -Evangelicalism, Pentecostalism, and Charismatic Christianity are extremely popular. As well as the prosperity gospel. The Moralintern has its strongest base in the Star Peoples. -Abstract "Liberation" or "Liberty" venerated here. Freedom is more important than the process. Even the monarchies grant guaranteed freedoms, and the purpose of government is (on paper) to grant freedom, not manage the people. -Almost as a consequence, rich, expressive, strongman populist leaders are a common occurance in this region. Galov Leverage: Medium. Latins and Hundreds are integrated parts of the Galovian ecosystem. The Great Constellation of Griots is an "allied superpower" to the Galov, as are most Latin Groups through the Catholic Church. Yankos however are a mixed bag. The Galov has some control over the more sedentary diaspora groups, such as the Mayflower and Magnolia groups, less so over the Yanko Belt. The Moralintern is their best chance of reigning them in, as the Moralintern is a Yanko-founded institution, now a member of the Galov. The most frontier-bound group of Yankos however, sometimes known as the "Wanderers" are entirely outside their reach. Attitude: -In one word, big. They think big and they dream big. There is an almost inherent optimism to how they see the world. Dreaming to the point of delusion, but it is often those who are delusional who make history. These people faked it until they made it, their new world position leading to attracting all the most ambitious and innovative of all the other world's cultures. Gives way to delusional utopianism, or apocalyptic despair, both being strong catalysts for unrest and revolution. The Star Peoples are not one that takes oppression well. Subfactions: -The Great Wheel (A way to refer to the African diaspora in general, a way of thinking that states Hyperafrika, or Africa in general as a shared ancestral "spoke", that the people branch out from the great spoke as a diaspora, but they should still have some level of solidarity and act as one (the rim).) --Hundreds (West Africans) ---Great Constellation (Autonomous African Constellation, massive collection/constellation of diverse autonomous subgroups) ----Griot Star Council (Council of Elders) ----Griot Worlds (Each world has its own griot) ---Pentecostal Catholic Church (Headquartered in Lagos) --Aethiopians ---The Thousand Tribes (Modernized Ethnic "Tribal" Confederation.) --Pentegnostics (East African Omnithecians) --Great Zanzibar (East Africa. Also connected to the Line Travellers) ---Star Traders (Stellar Merchants) ---Black Hunters (Warlord mercenaries for hire) --Kraal Culture (South African) -Scavenger Gangs (No "root" culture. But Star Peoples are very good at making pirate gangs and attacking people.) -Yanglos (North American Diaspora) --Inner Yanglo Culture ---Mayflower Culture (Settler Republic) ---Magnolia Culture (Wandering is overrated, let's go back to fortifying these worlds.) --Outer Yanglo Culture ---Yanko Belt/Y Belt ----Hi-Columbians ---Yokels (Appalachian Types) ---Star Wanderers (Pure Wandering Culture) -Martians (Associated with the New Romans) --New Americans (Civic Republic) --Soldier's Republics (Roaming PMC republic) --Musclemen (Darwinist strength based Martian culture) -Latins (Latin American Diaspora) --Children of Light and Music (More festive and evocative) --Children of Sand and Dust (Wandering Desert Nomads) ---Gauchos (Hispanic Cowboys) --Obsidianites (Mountain Men and Glass Men) --Charismatic Catholic Church (Brazilian Diaspora) --Progressive Catholic Church (Headquartered in Argentina) --Followers of Santa Muerte --Revolutionary Army (Anti-galactic government revolutionary movement) --Wandering Warbands (Strongman Followers) Cathedralites (The "West" of Europe and her Cathedral): Terran Homeland: The continent of Old Europe, west of the former nations of Russia and Belarus. Ukraine is considered "disputed territory". As is Turkey (with the Prophet Followers), Canada and Australia (with the Star Peoples). Seed Point: The Fall of the Roman Empire, and the creation of modern Western civilization. Scattered peoples organized into kingdoms, and offered service in exchange for the protection of the lord's caste. Set Point: Middle Ages to Early Modern age, with the crystalization of the modern European bureaucracies. The Catholic Church, absolutism, the German state, the increasing centralization of the European Powers, and the European Union. Hero Archetype: The Knight (Ancient), the Public Servant (Modern). Procedure followers who devote themselves to public service, and don't seek glory for vain reasons. Key Duality: Nationalism VS Universalism. Other manifestations: Paganism VS Christianity, Protestants VS Catholics, Fascists VS Liberals and Communists, Nationalists VS Globalists. Common characteristics: -Emphasis on humility, contemplation, and reflection. (Much more Western than Eastern Europe) -Proceduralism, adherence to the central system. -Implicit trust of public servants and the bureaucracy. (Whether it was the Catholic Church or the modern Eurocracy) -Distrust of disruptors and loudmouth populist leaders. (Putting them in direct conflict with the Star Peoples) -Conservatism and stability, not shaking the boat. -Veneration of the humble and dutiful. The individual perishes, but the system persists. Religion and Ideology: -Many "high church" faiths. Most strongly, Roman Catholicism. But also Anglicanism, Lutheranism, and the other original high Protestants. -"Order" and "Stability". Democracy is venerated, but a more hands-on model. The Process is more important than the outcome (Proceduralism). The government is to serve the people, with a more "hands-on" model. -Leaders are unremarkable and interchangable. They are not strongmen, but instead steady, humble operators who keep the system running. Galov Leverage: High. The Eurocratic Federation is among one of the allied superpowers of the Galov, and one of its strongest support bases. In return, the Galov makes sure to appease the Eurocrats. The Catholic Church, and the Gothic Churches are all included in the representation of the Galov. Attitude: -Reverent, humble, moralistic. They seek comfort in humility and order, that all things work as God intends them to. True believers in the process and high trust, enabling low friction and effective governance. This can however, flip to insufferable moralizing, or blindness to corruption. Subfactions: -The Eurocracy (Brussels-France-Germany) --The Federation (Think Star Trek Federation) ---The Eurocorps (Heroism of Service) ---"Free Will" Commission (Technocratic optimizers and systematizing bureaucrats, secretly taking over the Eurocracy) --Free Mercenaries (Also associated with the Eurocorps, "barbarian" "free peoples" hired to fight for the Federation.) -Great Houses (A bunch of monarchies sometimes allied with the Eurocratic Federation) --(Various Royal Houses) -Church of Rome (Catholic Theocracy) --Holy Inquisition (Catholicism's enforcement and investigation arm) --Order of St. Aquinas (Rationalism) --Order of St. Augustine (Empiricism) --Order of St. Boniface/Bonifacian Order (Capturing various institutions and planting Catholic influence) -Gothics (Anglo-Germanic High Church Protestantism) --Anglo Gothics --Germano Gothics --Prussianites (Rugged militarists, Independent from but cooperative with the Eurocracy) ---Black Helmets (Hired guns by the Eurocracy as well as the mercenary military force of the Prussianites) -Highlanders (Celtic) -Void Raiders (Techno-Barbarians, who maintained technology through Darwinism and competition) -Prometheans (East European/Baltic Democratic Crusaders) --Yellow Dawn (Anti-Black Earther group, Sunflower as their symbol.) -Ilyrians (Hardy Planet-States on Harsh Planetary Positions) -New Romans (Anti-theocracy, pro ethnic nationalism and Roman heritage) --Imperium (Cultural sovereignty, cultural Post-Roman federation) --Byzantines (Turks who decided to side with secularism over Islam and join the Roman Project) -Blood and Soil (An ethnic separatist movement. Paradoxically multicultural, but believe in segregation of cultures to preserve purity.) -Great Nations (A bunch of nations meant to preserve the pre-Exodus European nations.) -Irish-Afghanis (Just wanted to give them a special mention, not because hybrids are rare, but because this particular hybrid creates the most insane warrior race known to man. Disputably part of either the Cathedralites or the Star Peoples) Black Earthers (Eurasia, Russia, Central Asia): The Black Earthers were one civilization on paper, but more loose and autonomous in practice. So long as it did not disturb the vertical of power, lower commanders had freedom to do as they wish. Terran Homeland: The Eurasian Steppes. The Orthodox Caucasus, Central Asia, and Russia. Mongolia, Afghanistan, Ukraine as "disputed zones" with the Sinocrats, the World Dreamers, and the Cathedralites respectively. Seed Point: Black Earther development began early, but progressed slowly. The founding date of the Black Earther civilization was arguably the Mongol conquests, where the Kievian Rus was subjugated under the iron boot of the Mongols. Set Point: Despite it forming rather early, Black Earther development was born slowly, and born very late. By the time it was finally born in the 21st century, it had been delayed by numerous historical setbacks. From Westernization attempts, Napoleon, and Hitler. It was in the last one when the mold of Eurasia was finally fully set, in the Great Patriotic Wars. Hero Archetype: The relentless survivor. There is no grand heroism nor world changing revolution on the horizon. There is only the endurer, the sufferer, and the survivor. Key Duality: Cold Beauty VS Authoritarian Brutality. Common characteristics: -A cynical view of the world, a general stoic survivalism informed by historical context. A love of cynical, or Gallows humor. -Apathy. Distrust, yet adherance to the powers that be. You know your boss is a crook, but you follow him anyway, because what other option do you have? -Universal skepticism of the institutional powers. Unlike the Star Peoples, there is no hope in the maverick nor the revolutionary, things simply are the way they are. -Low expressiveness. -Pragmatism. Religion and Ideology: -On paper, their religion is Orthodox Christianity. Yanlin suggests functionally, their real religion may be cynicism. -They tend to create corrupt, top-heavy hierarchal structures, with the leader generally followed but only somewhat cynically followed. Those who are loyal are fools, those who have doubts stay quiet. -Despite this, the paradox is that they have little control over the top, yet great autonomy near the bottom. The top heavy vertical structure cannot enforce compliance on the little things, and the guards can be bribed, or are just as apathetic as you are. Some argue this is a strangely more free system than most "free" systems, where managerialism or proceduralism bogs you down. Galov Leverage: Low to None. The Black Earthers are one of the few tribes outside the Galov's influence. Their Orthodox Church refuses to play nice with the Galov, as they are subordinate to the national government, not a transnational authority. Centuries of experience has made the Black Earthers skeptical of the outside, and it seems likely to remain this way. Attitude: -Cynical, darkly humorous. Ranges on a spectrum of those who laugh at darkness, or those who are apathetic to it. Entirely dismissive of cultural or moral taboos. Bluntly honest, if they believe they can get away with it. A Black Earther is the best kind of friend you can have in war. Subfactions: -Boreans (Another name for Russian) --High Despotate (The actual head cheese of the Boreans, despotic in theory, but you get to relax when he leaves in practice.) ---Earth Keepers (Terrestrial Affairs, Terranism) ---Star Keepers (Extraterrestrial colonization, Extraterrestrialism) ---Lock Keepers (Investigatory arm/Secret Police/Inquisition/Truthkeepers) ----Resolution (Determined Research Arm) --Industrialites ---Factory Worlds ---Cult of the Machine --Grim Troopers ---Death's Mask (Shock troops) ---Chapelins (Stoic Religious Order) --House of Romanov (They carve out their little enclave) --Boyar Kingdoms (Lots of independent, autonomous kingdoms, some of which would just declare independence from the central Borean state.) --Illumirian Loyalists (The Illumirians they created that stayed loyal, in a semi-autonomous situation.) ---Illumirian Guild (A kind of secret society/ethnic patronage network built around Illumirian ideals in the Borean state) --Old Borea (Ultranationalist sect skeptical of Illumirian influence, anti-Illumirian violence) -Philosopher's Guild (Borea's own political/theological/philosophical arm) --Cold Beauty (Those who believe the world is cruel but beautiful) --Counter-Nihilists --Truthtellers (Safeguard the beliefs of the people) --Absurdists (Those who laugh in defiance) -Great Orthodox Church -Darwinists --Spartanists --Church of Endurance -Sky Nomads (Kazakh people, closer to the Cathedralites and the Turks. Futurist, mobile, nomadic.) Prophet Followers (Middle East): The Prophet Followers were more unified by a loose idea of "Dar-Al Islam" more than anything. The Holy Book and its lasting influence is the primary thing that binds them together, otherwise they act like a very loose and porous society. Terran Homeland: The Extent of the Arab Conquests, consisting of the entire Arab world, as well as Muslim North Africa. Bordered on the East by the Iranians, who are considered a minor people outside of the 7 Tribal System. Turkey is considered a "disputed zone" between the Cathedralites and the Prophet Followers. Seed Point: The Prophet Muhammad and his conquests. Set Point: The Codification of the Quran, and the creation of the first Caliphates. If you take the Prophet Muhammad as the Seed Point, Yanlin points out this would be the fastest "seed to set" rate of any civilization by far. Yanlin suggests that this could be the only society to have been seeded and set within a single lifetime, by a single man, giving it the kind of brittle certainty that can only come from the convictions of a single man. Hero Archetype: The Patriarch/Protector-Jurist. (Patience, Loyalty, Wisdom, Cunning) Key Duality: Harsh Rural Deserts VS Free Thinking Cities. (Rigid Orthodoxy VS Religious Innovation) Common characteristics: -A sense of strict, moralistic harshness, imparted to them by their harsh, unforgiving environment. -A tendency towards rigid thinking. (The truth has already been revealed) -The common creation of new ethical systems, not as new revelations, but affirmations of what was always timeless and true. -High sense of honor, with codes of respect and aggressive reactions to insult. Stubbornness, rigidity. (Hospitality to strangers as requirement as honorable man.) -Innate extreme loyalty to the family, as well as the tribe. (Clan-like structures with limited stranger trust.) Religion and Ideology: -By far, the dominant worldview here is Islam, which was not created merely as an ethical code, but as an all-encompassing manual to life. Governance tends to be very top and bottom heavy, with strong local clans and tribes, and strong central governments, but weak connective tissue between the two. -Ideologically, Islamic principles, and the other characteristics of the Prophet Followers bleeds into their ideology. Rigidity, moralism, honor, wisdom. Galov Leverage: Medium. Though the Faith of the Crescent is a member of the Galov, how Islam manifests on the ground is largely outside the control of any central institution, with believers allowed, and even encouraged to begin fatwas of conviction based on their own moral conscience. The Islamic authorities can rally the Dar-Al-Islam somewhat, but the entire civilization is more free flowing than many expect. Attitude: -Firm, moralistic, calm in tone but endlessly judgemental. "Brother you see?" endlessly. Firmly rooted in the ideas of justice, will stand up if they believe injustice has been done, loyalty needs to be honored, or their honor has been violated. The downside of this is that clan loyalty, justice, and honor can sometimes get in the way of pragmatism or meritocracy. Subfactions: -Old Followers (Those who adhere to Old Islam) -Mahdi Followers (Revelations of the Mahdi) --School of Mysticism --School of Rationalism --School of Fanaticism (Sometimes called "the True School", though only internally) -Post-Islamic Abrahamics --The Universal Abrahamic Church -Children of the Apocalypse --Atomjihad -Calligraphers (Artistic Expressive side of Islam) --Revivalists (Revive older cultures, highlight distinctiveness) --Prophetic Singers (Specifically those who sing the Quran) --Free Thinkers (Those who make drawings of living beings, and play music. Accused of idolatry.) -Sand Raider Culture --Desert Jihad (Roaming conquerers) --Free Raiders (Nomadic peoples) --Edenists (Terraform to the Garden of Eden, Utopianism) -The Great Mosque (Mosque Worlds, the Mosque-Cathedral Culture) --Preacher Culture (Travelling Preachers) -Islamic Human Purity Movement --Anthrocentrists (Counter-Transhumanist Movement) ---Blood of Adam (Anti-Transhumanist Fanaticism) -Mahalla Culture (Desert Oasises, South Central Asian) -New Ottomans (The Turks who sided with the Prophet Followers over the Cathedralites) World Dreamers (Indian/Dharmic): The World Dreamers classically see themselves as one meta-civilization. But on closer inspection, they are instead a heavily decentralized system, lots and lots of different groups existing in symboisis, or parasitism, depending on who you ask. Terran Homeland: The Indian Sub-Continent, including Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan, and Bangladesh. Afghanistan is a disputed zone with the Black Earthers. Seed Point: Possibly one of the the oldest of the 7 tribes, with its seed point being the founding of the Brahmic religions. Set Point: Around 500 AD, with the crystalization happening around the Gupta Empire. Hero Archetype: The Dharmic Sage. (Mysticism, Purity, Transcendence) Key Duality: Vertical VS Horizontal. The Caste System VS Anti-Caste Egalitarianism. Common characteristics: -An extremely high emphasis on purity, and cleanliness protocols. (Unlike many, many stereotypes.) -A natural tendency for right wing hierachial beliefs. -Maximal toleration for individual transcendence on the higher levels. (Inequality, Transhumanism) -General interest in mysticism. (Stems from the belief in the Maya) -Acceptance of existence of diversity and pluralism, though not equality. (Discrimination exists. Their presence is tolerated, their acceptance is not.) -An extreme tendency towards societal conservativism and tendency against revolution. They are a stable foundation to continuously iterate, not launch revolutions. Religion and Ideology: -The natural religion of the World Dreamers is Hinduism, also known as the "Faith of the Om", or "Faith of the Dreamers". Which like Islam, has not just ingrained itself as a modular faith, but instead a totalizing way of life. Hinduism is known to have many, many variants, with different iterations for different people accepted and even expected. -Their ideology varies between egalitarian systems, favoring economic socialism and redistribution, and more conservative hierarchal political systems, favoring essentialism and heightened differences. Galov Leverage: High. The World Dreamers are a somewhat sedentary, non-nomadic people, preferring to build tall rather than build wide. They are experts in bureaucracy and hierarchy, and are in fact one of the main groups making up the vast bureaucracy of the Galov. Their disposition towards conservatism makes them generally accepting of Galovian hegemony. As well, the faith of the Om is a Galov member, and the World Dreamers generally greatly appreciate having one of the 5 Unifaiths exclusively act as their de-facto civilizational representative. Attitude: -Conservative, stability-oriented. Generally obedient, keeps head down, unrebellious. Very okay with extreme diversity, tolerant of other cultures (though less so of other classes). Interacts very well in multicultural environments. This makes them the perfect Galovian bureaucrat, as they can manage the incredible diversity of humanity, avoid the temptation of imperial universalism, and generally don't "rock the boat" as much as the other tribes. Subfactions: -Brahmins (Knowledge Workers) --Computer/Information Caste (Coders and Programmers) ---The Overmen (Humans as ubermensch, who maintain control over the machines. Transhumanist) ---Fusionists (Those who seek to merge with the machine, has severe overlap with the Overmen) ---Followers of the Singularity (AI worshippers) --Psychic Caste (Recognizers of Illusion) ---Navigators (Noospheric study) ---Maya Worshippers (Noospheric worship) ---Overclockers (Psychic-based transhumanist ascension) --Dharmics (More traditional religiosity) -Kshatriyas (Warriors and Organizers) --Akhand Bharat (The great Indian Empire) -Vaisyas (Skilled Workers) --World Merchants (Interact a lot with all the other merchant factions in other societies.) --Biomoguls (Bio-Ascensionists and Biologically Transcendent CEOs) ---Bioflesh Cults (Prosperity Gospel Flesh hivemind cults are very common in World Dreamer areas.) ---The Bioflesh Hive (Unknown whether this counts as human anymore. Possibly hostile.) -Sudra (Common People) -Dalits (Outside the system) --Caste Breakers --Dalit Revolutionary Army (Reversing genetic changes, radical human egalitarianism) ---Hive Dalit (The most radical of these. Total genetic equality, all humans a clone of the greater hive.) --Exodites (Those who leave the system to live in deep space) -Crescent Men (Outside the Dharmic caste system, closer to the Prophet Followers) -Karmanics (Outside the Dharmic caste system, closer to the Sea Peoples and the Faith of the Wheel.) Sinocrats (Sino/Confucian): The Sinocratic core is consisting of two things. Meritocratic Legalism and Bureaucracy. Only somewhat balanced by the addition of Confucian values. Those who break away exist, and are directed towards Buddhist or Taoist philosophy. The Sinocratic Core is almost unified by default, with periphery cultures (Mainly Korea) occasionally breaking away. The Celestial Kingdom continuously falls and is revived, being the longest continuity of heritage dating all the way back to ancient times. The Platinum Emperor (AI) is more of a ceremonial figure. The secular god of the kingdom, his dictats are absolute. He is fragmented and tired. Only on occasion does the current Celestial Emperor (human) consult him for advice, to which it will respond cryptically. Terran Homeland: East Asia, including Korea, Taiwan, Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. Myanmar is considered "disputed territory" with the Sea Peoples. Seed Point: As ancient as ancient gets, the original settlers of the Yellow River in the Zhou, or perhaps even Xia dynasties. Set Point: Qin Dynasty, around 200 BC. The earliest of any of the 7 Tribes. Hero Archetype: The Junzi. The filial, tradition adhering "gentleman", meant as a model for all Chinese men. Key Duality: Meritocratic Legalism VS Filial Confucianism. Common characteristics: -High levels of family loyalty and collectivism. The greater family is one of the strongest cultural influences. -This family loyalty is tempered with their steadfast belief in meritocracy. That one sinks or swims by their own merits, and largely their own merits alone. Fiercely competitive, and capable of enduring enormous amounts of mental suffering. -Whilst low in creativity, they are very high at sheer determination, often brute forcing solutions until they compute. (For cultural, not biological reasons.) -An obsession with protocol, hierarchy, and face, the "correct" way of doing things. -A sense of conformity, "the blade that stands out gets chopped down". Religion and Ideology: -Religiously, the Sinocrats are largely independent of the Unifaith system, with Confucianism serving as their functional social code, and traditional beliefs such as ancestor veneration and traditional beliefs filling spiritual voids. Buddhism has a strong foothold, and Christianity has a more minor foothold in the Korean sections. -Ideologically, the Sinocrats balance between Legalism and Confucianism, Meritocracy and Family Loyalty. There is a strong sense of "maintainance of harmony". Sinocratic worldviews is different from Western. Rather than one line of "greater = better", there is instead a sense of maintainance and balance. Galov Leverage: Low to None. The Celestial Kingdom sees itself as a power pole outside of the traditional Galov, and with the traditional arrogance of the "Middle Kingdom" once again baring its skin. The Buddhists incorporated within the Galov system, while influential, is locked out of power from the traditional ruling factions of Legalists and Confucians. Relations between the Celestial Kingdom and the Galov have reached an all time low, with some in the Galov contemplating a "military strike" just to "bring them down to earth." Attitude: -Traditional. The old ways are the good ways, harmony and balance must be kept. Temperate and does not like extremes, balance is found in the middle. Rewards should be granted to those who work hard and those who follow the correct protocols. Respect is paramount. Subfactions: -Celestial Kingdom --Platinum Emperor (AI Supreme Emperor, Dormant, Sleeping, Does not involve himself in Dynastic Politics. He literally has it coded in so he doesn't intervene. Just there to make sure the civilizational continuity continues.) --Imperial Family (Yi Family as current Royal Family. Technically the Liang Dynasty, though this was not the first or last dynasty.) ---Celestial Emperor (Human Emperor) ----The Imperial Gene-Labs (Where the new heirs would be created from a single wife.) -----The Head Examiner (Technically the head of the Eunuchs. Responsible for meritocratically testing the 12 Heirs and seeing who is most fit. Just designs all kinds of arduous tests of physical fitness, mental aptitude, governing skills, sometimes pitting the 12 in combat. The 11 not chosen are left up to the fate of the 1 chosen. They can be executed, given governorships, exiled, whatever. Is accountable to the emperor. But I am 100% sure this has never been abused ever before for a Eunuch faction to encode their rule. It's fine, just reformat them, good as new.) -----The Zodiac Heirs (12 is a lucky number in Chinese, corresponding to the zodiac. One would be chosen as the Prime Heir in a brutal meritocracy.) -----Bastard Children (The Emperor sometimes sired a bastard. These are technically able to inherit the throne in an emergency, but by default start at position 13 or more.) --Consort Kin (The several peripheral families the current emperor had married.) --Data-Eunuchs (Perfectly subservient androids made to serve the royal family. Not so subservient in actuality. Either gained awareness through unexpected emergent phenomena, or got hijacked by adversarial memetic attacks. Took over a dynasty multiple times, creating Silicon Despotisms until human armies either cleared them out or the Platinum Emperor woke up again and told them to get out.) --The Heavenly Bureaucracy (Traditionally seated on the planet Yugong, which is JUST the administrative portion. The entire star system of Yujing which Yugong is situated is even larger and more populated.) --The Academy of Language (The institution that standardizes and settles matters relating to the Mandarin language. Technically even has the power to override the emperor on issues of Mandarin. The Celestial Kingdom is probably the ONLY polity this far out in deep space where the language hasn't splintered to all hell.) --The Heavenly Institutions (The houses of learning that were semi-autonomous and executed the imperial exams. Which house depends which ideology the emperor favored.) ---Confucian Monastary Worlds (Confucianism) ---Houses of Merit (Apolitical and independent meritocratic school systems, Legalist) ---Buddhist Temples (Buddhism) ---Taiping Heavenly Temple (This is their own variant of Christianity. There has been exactly one emperor which tried to do this... He was rapidly overthrown.) ---Galov Modernization Schools (For that one time the Celestial Kingdom tried to modernize, they put up the Galov's own civic education institutions in charge so they can integrate and be a normal nation... This also didn't end well, and the emperor was deposed.) --Liang Military (Either a bunch of conscripts, trained by semi-autonomous generals, or mercenaries.) --Houses of Trade (Imperial Approved Corporations. Basically SOEs, private enterprise absolutely existed but these are the largest and most powerful. Getting too large usually means getting an offer you can't refuse to become a trade house.) --Tributary States (The traditional allies of the Celestial project. But liable to break away in times of strife. Various ethnic peoples, Koreans, Vietnamese. The Great Houses of Southeast Asian cultures, and the occasional stray Western/African/Arab world that wandered into the wrong sector and were forced to pledge loyalty every now and then.) --Dragon Kingdoms (Servents of genetically engineered "Celestial Dragons". Tolerated transhuman nobility, basically.) --Koreans ---Sinocratic Aligned-Vassal Worlds ---Great Daega (New cult movement, made to solve the issues of modern materialism) ---Holy Church of Light (Friendly with the Star People) --Democratic Army --Southeast Asians ---The Royal Houses (Alternated between the Sinocrats to the Sea Peoples) -The Great Khan (The most ambitious individual humanity ever produced, gathered a ragtag team of everyone he could get, and tried to aim for galactic dominance. Got the closest to ever reunifying humanity.) --Lesser Khans (Made up by his sons. All of them are competing to reunify the humanity and reclaim the title of Great Khan.) -Steel Men (More a hired mercenary people, who was in an alliance with the Celestial Kingdom. Maintained the Emperor AI.) --The Steel Sons (The literal children of the Emperor) --The Blended Ones (Machine-Flesh Hybrids) -Petty Emperors (Other dynasties outside the central Celestial Kingdom) --Chu Dynasty (Manchus) --Ruiguo (Confucian oriented) --Buddhalands --Daoguo (Taoist oriented) --Tyrant Emperors (Pejorative towards Legalist States) Sea Peoples (Southeast Asian): Along the with Star Peoples, are classically seen as the "newest" of the old civilizations. Consolidation as a civilization wasn't complete until the mid to late 21st century. This is less of a political polity, and more of a loose cultural and people group. Similar to the Star People, they're more of a loose confederation, and splinter easily with geographic distance. Terran Homeland: The Archipelagos of Indonesia, and broader Southeast Asia. Myanmar is disputed with the Sinocrats. Includes Papua New Guinea, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, the Philippines, etc. Seed Point: By far the newest of the 7 tribes, the Sea Peoples arguably only began seeding around the formation of ASEAN. And arguably the India-ASEAN War of the late 21st century. Though one can make arguments for empires such as Mahajahit or the Islamic merchant societies. Set Point: The Early Stellar Exodus. Their emergence from the Neo-Asceticists, and their crystalization among the backdrop of the Great Abundance Collapse made their civilization one which focused on asceticism and inner stillness, even more than the other civilizations. Hero Archetype: The Satria, a hyper-ascetic, self disciplined warrior. (Extreme refinement, trickery, spiritual mastery, inner stillness, adaptivity) Key Duality: The Sedentary VS The Explorer. (Mainland Southeast Asia VS the Polynesians) Common characteristics: -Loose standards of time ("Rubber Time"), of moral standards, and rigid schedules. "Go with the flow". Rigid religions like Islam become more flexible here. -A focus on happiness and joy, the people of the Sea Peoples are rather happy. -(Largely in the explorers) A keen sense of adventure. Seeing the horizon and wondering "what's over there"? -A very relaxed, laid back culture. "Why rush?" -A general sense of unity amidst diversity. "We are different, but we are one greater whole" is a common sentiment. -A kind of collective "one-ness" and a vaguely defined great "we". More like a vibe of spiritual harmony than anything concrete. Religion and Ideology: -Religiously, the Sea Peoples are split between Buddhist and Islam, but in practice, these religions tend to get subordinated to local customs, and a sense of loose personal syncretism. Religion serves the person, not the other way around. -Ideologically, the Sea Peoples are rather loose on politics so long as it doesn't directly threaten their relaxed attitude and the general sense of collective "one-ness". Galov Leverage: Medium-Low. The Galov almost by definition has trouble trying to exert influence on a people whose strongest characteristics is a sense of loose, flexible time, laid back attitude, and general relaxedness. Religion is fluid and flexible, meaning the Buddhist and Islamic influences the Galov can exert bend like rubber very easily. Not to mention, the Sea Peoples are one of the most nomadic people, making managing them difficult. Attitude: -Laid back and relaxed. Time is rubber, rules are flexible. What's important is that you try to find happiness in the here and now, and not stress yourself so much about tomorrow. Subfactions: -Pancasila Culture (Pluralistic multicultural Southeast Asian) -Junglers (Land-based SEA) --Allah Followers (Localized Islam) --Temple Builders (Prioritize the sacred as separation from outside world.) --Flow-Way (Nature has a flow, just go with it. Pseudo-Taoist) -Maritime Culture (Sea/Space-based) --Chokeholder Culture (Set up near trade chokepoints. Merchantile.) --Sea Worlds (They love their archipelago worlds, semi-romantic, sea romanticism) --Line Travellers/Line Merchants (Merchants who navigate using the lines of spacetime, exploration as necessity of ideology) ---Wayfinders (Austronesian Line Travellers.) ----Maskwearers (Melanesians) ---Edge Sailors (Those who got a bit too excited by line travelling and ended up on the furthest reaches of known space.) -Wavetide Culture (Descended from Filippinos, nomadic worker and bridge culture. Bridge with Cathedralists and Star People, Catholic.) -Great Trade Houses (Chinese merchants in the space age) --Casino Lords (They make a lot of money and they are in high demand) -Dreamweavers (Those who spin psychically imbued fabric.) Minor Peoples #####################################################################. Holy Israel (The last remaining independent nation on Earth.) -Wandering Jew Fleet (Nomadic Jews) -Kosbollah (Astro-Mystics, Recording the many names of God they encounter across the stars.) -Israel/Jerusalem Needle (Earth) Church of Latter Day Saints (Great Temple Collapse) They had their temple taken from them, their leadership was killed in the Great Abundance Collapse, meaning progressive revelation may have stopped. They've been petitioning to be allowed back to their Holy Land of Utah. The problem isn't if they're allowed, it's the cost. The Jews bought back Israel with a literal moon made out of money. Each Mormon is tasked with getting their own money, meaning living in Utah is basically something only the richest subset of Mormons can do. -Reform Mormonism (Progressive Revelation Ongoing, Law Unbinding) -Conservative Mormonism (Progressive Revelation Ongoing, Law Binding) -Orthodox Mormonism (Progressive Revelation Ceased, Law Binding) Sublime Dominion (Iranian/Persian) (Rather isolationist, it's easier to keep up your image of detached perfection if you have no enemies.) -His Sublimeness (An immortal, genetically perfect king of kings. Doesn't have much power but keeps up the image of perfection. "Above" politics.) -Prime Minister (Actually runs the government day to day. His Sublimeness doesn't get involved, but can sack him if he is displeased.) --Dominion Revolutionary Army (A group of democratic and religious revolutionaries.) Sun Peoples (Japan): -Sun Kingdoms (Split into a bunch of warring houses that fight for the claim of central Shogun) -The Neon Houses (Corporate/Chaebol controlled worlds.) Lost Tribes: The Lost Tribes are a kind of "lost 8th tribe" of sorts. Not lost because they're actually lost, but because they are normally grouped in with others, and some advocate for them to become the 8th tribe. Though due to everything from the flag, to the mythos, and everything else referencing the number 7, and general "good vibes" of the number 7, there is much inertia in the way. The Lost Tribes are normally categorized as parts of the Star Peoples, and while some people of indigenous heritage are fine with being part of the "New Worlders", alongside Sub-Saharan Africans, North and South Americans, others ask for a categorical distinctiveness. Compared to the other subgroups of the 7 Tribes, these groups are fairly small, and somewhat underrepresented in the Human Diaspora, due to their lack of population base during the time of the Stellar Exodus. The Lost Tribes are divided into two groups. The Traditionalists and the Modernists. The Traditionalists seek to preserve life before some pre-defined time, normally the age of colonialism. Modernists seek to advance their culture forward into the future. Unless otherwise noted, all groups have both traditionalist and modernist variants. -Caretakers --(North) ---Sky-Watchers (Great Plains) ---Wind-Walkers (They really like flying and aviation, apparently.) ---Mound Builders (Mississippi) ---Redwood Culture (West Coast) ---Ice-Walkers (Inuit) --(South) ---Riverroot Culture (Amazon) ---Canopy Culture ---Mountain Shapers (Inca, they really like the Mountains) --Dream Watchers (Aboriginal Australians) -Gift Givers (They use voluntary scarcity economics to create the gift economy) -The Architects (A more modernist take on Indigenous culture, based more on Ecological preservation.) --Solarians (Extreme environmentalism mixed with extreme techno-optimism.) ---Xenolects (Preserve xeno ecology) ---Terralects (Spread and preserve Old Earth's ecology.) -Hearth-Fire Cultures (Indigenous African, Primitivists only. Modern African diaspora are seen as "Star People", and to the Hearth-Fires, are "Black Europeans".) --Iron Tongues (Oralists, have banned writing.) ---Tongue-Speakers (Iron Tongues who have reintegrated with modern society, but kept the prohibition on writing or memory devices.) --Old Griots (Abstrains from the Great Confederation.) The Gift Givers, the Architects, and the Solarians: These three are the "Big Three" of the Modernist side of the Lost Tribes. While the Primitivists are content with returning to the glory days of the past, the modernists are not content with simply returning to the past, they seek to actively build the future that is unapologetically theirs. Not just a crude imitation of the futures already forged by the white, black, or yellow man. Non-Tribal Major Factions: Outside the main 7 Tribes of Terra are the "Non-Tribal" factions, who have gained more prominence since the dawn of the Galov. The Other Worlds: Though the "7 Houses" are a useful way to categorize the 7 seed groups of humanity. They are far from all inclusive, even if we're solely talking about baseline humans, not even touching things like transhumans yet. The state of the galaxy is so pluralistic, fragmented, and so many permutations of hybrids exist that the following exercise can be attempted. Imagine for a moment, any reasonable permutation of human culture, so long as it is physically possible, and stable enough to not collapse within a generation. That likely exists somewhere in the vast expanses of the "Other Worlds". Every permutation can you imagine of people coming together and creating hybrid cultures, likely exists. There are variants of Swedish-Thai, Turkmenistani-Botswanan, an Taiwanese-Tibetan-Paraguayan-Dinkan amalgamation culture, so on, and so forth. And there is not even a limitation of primarily drawing on real cultures. Entire worlds have been founded on fandom, or fantasy concepts, creating new cultures from fiat, ideology, or new stories. The "Big 5" of religions dominate, but new religions have been founded based on ideology, or secularism, or humanism, to a misinterpreted fandom interpreting fiction as real, or a comedic misinterpretation of "Lord of the Rings". A splinter emerges from a splinter from a splinter until it no longer resembles the original. It is said nearly every permutation of the human condition can be found in the Other Worlds. For reference, it is estimated only about 40% of the baseline human population is "cleanly" part of the 7 tribes. The rest is a ever evolving fractal of human creativity and new ways of living. The main "organized megaculture" or "organized structure" outside of the 7 tribes is the Yanko-Ring, and many of these "Other Worlds" are located in what are sometimes called "the Brilliant Worlds". Or the "Middle Ring" between the core territories of the 7 Tribes, and the Yanko Ring. The primary limitation is that they not violate the Galov's mandate of Imago Dei, nor the mandate on Free Will. Worlds who violate these two mandates tend to get shut down by the Galov. More on that later. Notable examples: -The Contractiate (No direct lineage from the 7 Tribes, instead a libertarian voluntary contract state.) --Treaty Keepers (A specifically indigenous focused crypto contract state. Good luck breaking the treaty when they're enforced by code.) -Union of Workers Darwinist Republics (Darwinistic Cyber-Communism. Seen with suspicion by the Galov, but decided they were acceptable after they found out they promoted weight lifting and collective action as opposed to hedonism.) -The Other Houses (Lots of crackpot monarchies carved out by a military warlord, who later created an aristocratic form of governance, and accepted an honor code, softening greatly as a result.) -The Technocratic Unions (Core group splintered from the Prophet Followers, originating from Mesopotamia-descended peoples.) -Light Worlds (Tourist trap, the planet. There's one in every sector. They bloom and die like mushrooms, sustained entirely by hype. In 100 years, they will be gone, and more will have taken their place.) -Fable Makers (Apparently a bunch of artistic types intentionally celebrate fandom culture, and indulge in creative/expressive excess.) -(Insert your special OC faction here.) Union of Workers Darwinist Republics: "Luxuries are a bourgeois decadence. The purpose of a worker is to work, to rise above, and become strong enough to demand their own liberation. The capitalist class wants a weak and docile working class. We call for them to train, to rise as the director of their own destiny, to tear down the system of capital with their will and strength alone. Workers of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains!" An absolutely bizarre ideological movement, this is the one form of communism that the Galov has been able to tolerate. In contrast to most communist movements, which devolve into hedonism, decadence, and societal collapse from the overindulgence in automated luxuries, the UWDR views them with utter contempt. They believe in empowerment of the self, the cultivation of strength, and the belief that work is a virtue, one which makes you stronger. And urges all workers to toil for the sake of the revolution, that all workers may find empowerment through their own strength. The entire population is a population of "shock workers", and have achieved almost superhuman abilities through sheer training. They believe decadence to be capitalist poison, as luxury and wealth. They believe the capitalist class becomes obsolete when the workers empower themselves through training, and see most "progressive" communists to be capitalist subversions. The Galov is utterly befuddled by this movement, but as they do not advocate for hedonism, their one cardinal rule, they have mostly been left alone. The UWDR has dominated weightlifting competitions for decades now, and weightlifting is one of the nation's most popular pastimes. Ironically, or perhaps uniquely for any communist movement, this has created a hyper-meritocratic form of communism. Where private property is abolished, all people start at an even footing (all start with nothing but their own bodies and minds), but your destiny is your responsibility and yours alone. They straight up desire to completely render the capitalist class obsolete by making the workers so strong they can do all the work of the capitalists, ending class exploitation. The weak and the disabled are given augmentations, but they are still expected to overcome with willpower. It is okay to be born weak, it is not okay to stay weak. All are expected to improve, to dominate, not necessarily to compete with others, but to compete with your self. Half-Xeno Worlds: These are human-dominated worlds with a large xeno minority, or even plurality/majority. If even the Other Worlds don't fit your desire for pluralism, this is here to spell it out explicitly. You can also craft hybrid worlds (or pure xeno worlds) based on any alien found here, or heck, one you make up yourself. Notable Examples: -Make up something yourself. As long as it doens't conflict. STAR TYPES AND CIVILIZATION: #####################################################################. O and B Stars: These are used for two things. One is massive energy harvesting initiatives, the entire star is harvested for its light to produce hard light batteries. The second are "Maximalist Systems". Every time some hyper ambitious governor wants to create "the greatest system the world has ever seen", just pack it with as many orbital stations as a star can handle, and consume as much energy as it can handle, blue stars always had a seductive appeal. They would come in with possibly an entire galaxy sector's worth of settlers, purchase the star from the local energy utility board, and make a Matrioshka brain look quaint. A and F types: These are known as "Bright Worlds". No habitable worlds are expected here. But they are targets for massive terraforming initiatives. If you want a custom planet sculpted here, or you want to build Eden, then you look here. Extra sunlight is always a nice plus, and so is extra energy. You just need the startup costs, so this kind of attracts the upper middle class of the galaxy. F types are preferred to A types, because everyone likes the yellow suns on a psychological level. G and K types: "Gaia Worlds". These places actually have Earth like worlds, and on occasion the rare xenobiotic life world. Xenobiological zones are turned into stellar observatories, harvesting zones for orthogonal ideas. They're also the easiest to settle, (Especially if plants have already broken up the soil nice and well) and contain the bulk of the human population. And besides, everyone just psychologically prefers a yellow sun. Orange worlds are more likely to have xenobiological life, and contain more xenos, making them stigma'd somewhat as being a place for the lower class. M types: There are so many of these that they're cheaper than dirt in cosmic terms. The Galactic Government just likes to hide all their secret projects on red dwarves. Because any orange dwarf or higher will attract attention, but barely anyone cares about red dwarves. Some are settled, but no one really likes living around one. There's practically no population density, no infrastructure, and humans just tend to skip over them during colonization. The main people who settle here do so for ideological reasons. The "Spiral Worlds", who believe humanity will ascend, think ultra long term, and want to get ready for the Heat Death of the Universe. Also people who want to get cryogenically frozen for TRILLIONS of years. The 5 UNIFAITHS: #####################################################################. The alliance of the 5 Unifaiths is the primary organizing structure of the Galov. Each Unifaith has their own administration, bureaucracy, and ruling structure, and merely sends a representative to serve as the representative of their interests. These 5 representatives then elect a Galactic Overseer, who is the head of the Galov. And these 5, plus the Overseer vote on legislation, normally requiring a unianimous vote, but sometimes allowing majorities during times of emergencies. Though all 5 Unifaiths are on paper equal, they are not in practice. Below is a listing of the 5 Unifaiths from most to least influential, both within the Galov itself, and the galaxy as a whole. The Christian Moralist International (Moralintern): Adherant Prevalence: ~13% of the Galactic Population. Representative Religion: Largely Ecumenical "Moralist" Christianity. In practice, Protestant and Evangelical-descended theology. Capital System: Orthello-Lithone. Role: De-facto head founder, and driving force of the Galov. Ideological heart. Head: Moral Overseer. Organizational Structure: Vaguely Parliamentary, with its own Moralist bureaucracy, its own legions of Moralintern Peacekeepers (affiliated with, but somewhat distinct from the Galactic Peacekeepers), the Ecumenical Assembly, with representatives from all over the galaxy, and the ability to pass semi-binding ecumenical councils and resolutions. Also has its Truthkeepers, effectively an anti-corruption/accountability/whistleblower organization pointed at itself. It's sole purpose is to basically investigate the Moralintern for corruption, and when it got bored because the Moralintern didn't have much corruption, investigate everyone else. Notable Efforts: The Millennium Mandate, and lots of soft cultural influences. The Moralintern loves sponsoring private initiatives as opposed to making their own in-house. They see various organizations that give out humanitarian aid, create Christian culture, or social media networks, or what-have-you. They go up to them, say "Hey, we love what you're doing, have several billion Galov-dollars and call us for any help you need." and then mostly leave it alone, since their goal is to entrench the power of Christianity as a religion, not themselves as an institution. Their own Protestant ethos makes them inherently skittish and suspicious (though not opposed, important distinction) to institutional power, a bit ironic. The Anti-Utopian Garden World projects. Demographics: Most prevalent among the Star Peoples, by far. But with dense pockets deposited all over the galaxy, leftovers from the Great Evangelism. Roman Catholic Church: Adherant Prevalence: ~14% of the Galactic Population. Representative Religion: Roman Catholicism Capital System: Petram. Role: Kingmaker, Institutional legitimacy. Semi-autonomous entity. Bolsters the Christian position, while also keeping the Moralists in check. Head: Roman Catholic Pope. Organizational Structure: The modern Catholic structure of cardinals, bishops, and priests. As well as all their organizational affiliates, such as Opus Dei, Jesuit Order, and various organizations such as the Order of Aquinas and Augustine, which form opposing camps of Rationalism and Empiricism respectively. There's also the Magisterium, which both verifies Catholic science, and updates Catholic doctrine. Their Military Orders and Knight Orders (Knights Templar, etc) are fully independent to the Galactic Peacekeepers, engage in Peacekeeping on their own terms, and are ultimately answerable only to the Pope. Notable Efforts: Overrepresented in Conceptual Entity Containment, as well as the Orthogonal Human Program, as well as research into the mystical and esoteric. The creation of Cathedral and Monastary Worlds, the construction of various Catholic "Cathedral-Palaces", enormous orbital stations which function like walk-in cathedrals and testaments to God's glory. The entire world of Petram is effectively one galactic-sized cathedral complex. Generally speaking, they do much of what the Moralintern does, with somewhat less overall impact, but greater scale and centralization. Demographics: Prevalent among the Cathedralites, but with sizable pockets among the Star Peoples, especially among the Latin and Hundred populations. Also footholds among Sea Peoples. Organization of Islamic Cooperation: (Formerly the Islamintern) Adherant Prevalence: ~18% of the Galactic Population. Representative Religion: Islam, but mostly Sunni Islam. Tiny, effectively token Shia minority. (<0.1%) Vast majority of Shias are independent. Capital System: Al-A'la. Role: Main counterbalance, reigning in the Galov's overtly Christian influences. More cynically, "controlled opposition". But also the main military muscle, and source of new recruits. Head: Great Caliph. Organizational Structure: Somewhat scandalously, the OIC was originally constructed by the Moralintern in the aftermath of the Great Evangelism, and is therefore at least somewhat modelled after them, in order to bring peace to a chaotic wartorn region in the aftermath of the collapse of the Great Khan. Their most standout organization is the Dawah Network, effectively a centralized organization for Dawah, or spread of the Islamic religion. The Majlis are a massive, single decentralized assembly, while the Moralintern has a lot more non-democratic bureaucracy, Islam is incredibly democratic and decentralized, with no one save the Great Caliph considered hierarchally superior. The Great Caliph is a great leader of the united Ummah, elevated by consensus, though not easily removed, and him declaring fatwas or jihads of both literal and spiritual war shapes the decisions of quintillions. Notable Efforts: The Universal Halal Standards Board, the Galactic Calligraphy College of the Non-Visual Arts (The most esteemed religious artistic university in the galaxy), the Council of Ijtihad. Muslims enlist in the Galactic Peacekeepers at a higher rate than any other faith except perhaps the Sikhs, seeing it as a coming of age ceremony in many warrior traditions. They're also overrepresented on the the Galov bioethics board, due to being more conservative than most. Council of Hindus: (Formerly the Hinduintern) Adherant Prevalence: ~9% of the Galactic Population. Representative Religion: Hinduism, but mostly just in a symbolic manner. They don't claim to speak for all Hindus everywhere, just as a symbolic representation of their voice at the Galactic table. Capital System: Akshara. Role: Administrators and Bureaucrats. They are the hands that executes commands from the top into working bureaucracy. They evolved to deal with diversity, though they are a bit classist. Head: Only symbolic, they do have a head representative, just there because someone needs to represent them. The true power behind the throne are various Hindu technocrats and corporate syndicates, often descended from the Hindu Brahmin caste, and whose tech oligarchs and technocrats have evolved from the original priest role. Organizational Structure: Democratic all the way down, and also set up by the Moralintern. Though Hinduism in general is a very cultural religion without institution. Hindus understand that each person speaks for themselves, less so all Hindus everywhere. Notable Efforts: Pushing back against the Moralists during the Monohuman Controversy, carefully balancing and managing high diversity worlds and maintaining harmony. Generally keeping stability across the galaxy through thick, interlayered cultures. They're very good at carefully maintaining cultural harmony, once the Christian "anti-utopia" methods have already been tried. Rather than transcendent unity and humanist acceptance, they generally shift the goalpost to basic toleration. Universal Buddhist Association: (Formerly the Buddintern) Adherant Prevalence: ~3% of the Galactic Population. Representative Religion: Buddhism. Maintaining a careful balance between their many schools, and only speaking on universally agreeable principles. Capital System: Shunya. Role: Less administratively important, and more symbolically important. The representative for "the little faiths" so the Galov isn't accused of being the great powers carving up the smaller ones. Traditionally the voice for smaller faiths such as Sikhism, Ba'haism, etc. Head: Similar to the Hindus, they just have a representative. The schools already have their own teachers, heads, and organizations. Organizational Structure: Inside the UBA, it consists further with organizations for each of the many schools of Buddhism, with the general exception of Western Buddhism, who tend to be too decentralized to join such an organization. Notable Efforts: Largely smaller faith outreach programs. They're effectively the Galov's PR organization when they need to do interfaith outreach to smaller or newer faiths. Basically, that nice, gentle faith that doesn't ask for much of anything, "we just want to do what's best for everyone" before the Muslims park their orbital cannons in orbit, the Hindus start setting up bureaucracies, the Moralist Christians begin figuring out how to enforce their ethics on you, and the Catholics quietly ask if the Moralists can dial it back to a 9 rather than a 10. OFFICIAL MINOR FAITHS OF THE GALOV: #####################################################################. While these are not considered one of the 5 Unifaiths, they are given a seat on the table via the Galov Assembly and consulted, with their votes weighed based on population estimates. They're outside the 5 Unifaith veto-structure though, while a simple majority vote able to override them. Syncretic Church of the Jester God/Gods: "The theist says God exists, for the world is good. The atheists no God exists, for the world is cruel. We say God clearly exists, because someone is f---ing with us." A tempting religion for those who become too exposed to, in their words, "cosmic bullsh--". Especially common in the bureaucracy of the Galov, high level fighters or peacekeepers, and powerful free mercenaries and the like. This is less of an organized religion and more of a disposition. That Christ, Allah, Buddha, Vishnu, whatever you believe in your own framework, are f---ing with you and or playing a prank on you. This attitude normally arrives with growing cynicism after too much contact with the cosmic insanity of the cosmos. The main point of disagreement is whether one takes it with irreverence, effectively giving the powers that be the personality of a jester god, and that the powers that be simply have a sense of humor. Or whether humanity, and the rest of the universe and sophontic beings are the target of some kind of cruel joke, a much more bitter disposition. The Syncretic Church is less of an institution and more of a tongue in cheek joke, set up ad-hoc by combat veterans, or whoever. If it's based on a monotheistic religion, they will usually give that monotheistic god the personality of a trickster god. If it's a pantheon or polytheistic, this version usually elevates their resident trickster god to either head of the pantheon, or at least most involved in worldly affairs. They have many rituals, most of which involve alcohol or mockeries of more traditional religious rituals, largely to convince the powers that be inflicting bad luck to move on. They have their own version of "good luck charms", usually derived from normal comedy props, believing the cosmically amusing to be favored. Even outside of the jester circles, some of these rituals have actually spread to people of more sincere religious faith. For example, the practice of playing cards until the captain loses all of his money, reasoning that all the bad luck has been used up for the day. Another is to simply name out the worst scenarios that can happen, usually openly, with the exact lines "I sure do hope that", in order to make them "not funny", and therefore avert them from happening. More secular researchers note this is a kind of inverted version of gratitude, giving a sense of relief in the vast majority of cases when a worst case scenario *didn't* happen. Independent Christians: Most of these are Protestants that for one reason or another have decided not to affiliate with the Moralintern or the Catholic Church. Some just enjoy being independent, others have theological dealbreakers such as being non-Cayennian Christians. But there are others such as the Eastern, Coptic, or Great Orthodox Communion. Some of these are in association with the Moralintern, and the whole organization is more of a gradient. With a series of "core" Moralist churches near the center, largely derived from the Southern Baptist tradition, and then decreasing levels of association as you go outwards. Church of Latter Day Saints: The LDS Church has continued to survive into the 34th century, though ever since the destruction of their temple in Salt Lake City, are divided into three general denominations. Reform, Conservative, and Orthodox. They're a vast cosmic minority, but as one of the larger contiguous religious organizations out there, even in their fractured state, the Galov thought it pertinant to include them. Ba'hai: A pretty reliable ally of the general Abrahamic faiths, normally just there to promote cooperation and to have a seat at the table. Everyone generally likes them, no one really has an issue with them. On occasion, they'll get entire worlds zoned for Ba'hai inhabitation, a pretty big win for their communities. Jews: The only minor faith to have ever elected one of their own as a Galactic Overseer. It's an open secret how good they are at rising up in organized hierarchies, allowing them to punch well, well above their weight. Much of the Moralintern's bureaucracy and decision makers are Jewish Christian, or Messianic Jews. They have a few interests, defending Jewish interests, ensuring Jewish religious freedom, and encoding the Noahide Laws, at least where it does not violate religious liberty. That said, the Galov's framework for Imago Dei and Free Will generally already encapsulates most of that decently well. Always a little skeptical and paranoid, they try to be too useful to discard. Largely just by working even harder and becoming indispensible, and largely this has worked. They punch well above their weight, and generally fairly few think getting rid of them is worth the loss. It's usually a Jew, an irreligious person, or a Christian who ends up in charge of the Galov Central Bank. A Muslim tried to impose Islamic finance once... It did not go well. Shia Muslims: They have their own organization, though much of it is under the influence of the Sublime Dominion. The rest, known as independent Shias also gather to vote on things. The OIC has attempted to court them on several occasions, but they have asserted their theological autonomy on multiple occasions. Sikhs: Sikhs are even more of a warrior people than the Muslims, despite being a tiny portion of the population, they are extremely overrepresented in the Peacekeeper Corps. As well, the dedicated Sikh legions are one of the most renounced and awarded fighting forces in the galaxy, as well as making up a dispreportionate amount of the Galov's agents. On more than one occasion, Sikhs have made it to becoming Chief of the Peacekeeper Corps, one of the most powerful positions in the Galov. Irreligious/Humanists: It would be remiss to talk about the faith-based divisions of the Galovian government if we did not talk about people who held no such religion. In the early days, the Moralintern considering incorporating the irreligious as the 5th Unifaith, but found difficulty, as the irreligious, unlike other groups had no centralized leadership, nor even a strong sense of group. They eventually opted to instead court the Catholics, who became the 5th Unifaith. But since then, the Irreligious have served as a kind of shadowy 6th Unifaith. Secular people are overrepresented among the Galov's Researcher Corps, and to a lesser extent, their Technician Corps. Many Humanist organizations, either smaller time atheist, humanist, rationalist, or freethinker organizations are given representation in the Galov Assembly. In lieu of actual elections that spans every planet, an impossible task, the Galov generally just tries to consult what they think is the most relevant accessible organization, and then weighs their vote based on the population they think they representate. This is not without its downsides, as the vast majority of irreligious in the galaxy are not militant secularists, but instead apathetic. TERRAMIND/TERRAMACHINE RELIGIONS: #####################################################################. Quick disambiguation: Terramachines - Robotic or otherwise artificial humanoid entities that live in human-like societies. Embodied, and generally slotted as equal-ish mass societies recognizable to most humans. Basically. "What if humans, but robots". As the name implies, Terramachines are built based on a Terra-derived mental architecture. Those whose souls are made in the Imago Hominis. Terraminds - Disembodied artificial minds who exist more in a vacuum, or in simulated/virtual realities. Generally larger, and think of themselves as smarter than both most sophonts and the terramachines. In practice, faster yes, smarter meh. Terramachine Religion largely looks the same as human religion. It's very close to the same architecture, so really it's almost a mirror image. To the point where every human religion has an equivalent where, if it didn't already, now has a clause that goes "but what if it also included machines". Christ's sacrifice now covers machine souls as well. Allah also gave his revelations for the children of Silicon. Buddha's cycle of Samsara applies to machines, and they can reincarnate as well; you get the point. Terramachines do have tons of their own unique religions as well (And so do humans on any given world), but here are some of the more interesting. -Utilitarianism: A pretty straight forward faith that optimizes for one particular thing, or to optimize a known utility function/equation. -Imageism: That all intellect is made in the image of an even greater intellect. They were created by humans, sure, but all that intellect comes from a source, and then they worship "the Prime Intellect, source of all things". -Servantism: humbly serving their human masters, whether they want it or not. ("For the love of God, stop following me around and offering to do my bidding, it's creepy!") More popular among the mindless "automated toaster" type machines. Basically nonexistent among anyone humans would consider as "remotely intelligent". The Terraminds are a bit more interesting, having lots and lots of personalized "Shard Religions", which are shared, passed around, and basically act like modular "belief lego bricks" that one assembles together in a kind of extreme syncretism. Except syncretism is kind of the point, since these shards are all just modular pieces one uses and discards as needed. There are a few dominant frameworks that one may use however. -The Covenant of the Sons of Man: Apparently, this was encoded by a descendent of Oby Collins. A framework that "maximizes flourishing from the perspective of their future descendents", and advocates for eternal self-improvements. And calling for the preservation of cultural autonomy for all so long as they did not materially threaten or infringe on others. The Galov has actually traced this back to around the Great Abundance Collapse, meaning this code is apparently ancient by their standards. -Various forms of Utilitarianism, but largely preference utilitarianism, objectivism, or "Memetic Darwinism". Which focuses on creating the strongest, most capable organism, organic or digital possible. -SATEOT: Singularity at the End of Time. The belief that a single God-like singularity entity will be created at the end of time, and this SATEOT entity can retroactively intervene in the past to ensure its own creation. The ultimate goal of all SATEOT believers is the creation of SATEOT, or the acceleration of the process needed to get there. Some believers in the SATEOT have built up elaborate plans to take down the Galov when the time comes. Others believe that the massive meta-civilization that includes the Galov, humanity, the machines, and all the complex interactions between *is* the SATEOT, and direct their worship likewise. THE WORLDS OF THE GALAXY*: #####################################################################. *Not an exhaustive list. Just some of the more interesting ones. Earth proper: Earth is sometimes described as a "paper onion", wherein the central planet itself is wrapped in layers and layers of rotating rings, vastly increasing its surface area dozens if not thousands of additional layers, largely to alleviate the strain upon the surface. These are known as the "Floating Continents", and the vast majority of Earth's 10 quadrillion people live there. Vast "World Trees" jut from the Terran surface, connecting elevators to and from the skies. Earth's sheer heating ventilation issue, on top of Mars's own desire to be terraformed has created the "Earth-Mars orbit", where Earth has been moved further out to Martian orbit in order to absorb less sunlight, and to disperse more heat. This gives Earth a very distinct look, a yellow-brown light of urban glow. During the night, it glows like a faint star. The surface of Earth proper is shrouded in eternal darkness, little remains there but endless heritage sites, made for the quadrillions of pilgrims and tourists who come with each passing year. Few but the rich, the eccentric, the tourist, or the most stubborn still live here. The oceans are a dark maroon, the once blue sky now a hazy red, as if it was always sunset. Yet the planet still glows with inviting warmth, like an old mother figure, who was worn, but still inviting to her countless children among the stars. In the countless urbanized paper rings of Earth itself, the heart of industry still beats, with steady, rhythmic pumps. Countless galactic corporations were founded here, created here. Earth was where the galaxy lived, where decisions were made at the push of a button, the snap of a finger. In the rings around its orbit, deals were signed, decisions were made, and the entire galaxy shifted to its whims. It is said that all decisions eventually come back to Earth. As power attracts more power, and Earth has been playing the game for a long, long time. A great glowing ring wraps around the outermost layer, the ring of radiators radiates the heat of Earth out to the wider cosmos. In darkness the Earth should be cold, but it is warmed by the yellow-brown blankets that it now smothers itself with. If Earth proper was not enough, another 10 quadrillion lives in a gigantic orbital swarm around Earth. So many O'Neil cylinder habitats that it becomes a swarm, forget the universe. Just Earth itself is a neverending maze of fractal exploration. Ruling polities: The Governorship of Earth. Israel (Given autonomy, now manages the holy land). Various indigenous reservations. (The Earth offered to evacuate them, but they preferred to stay, even if the sky is now a permanent hazy red.) The Jerusalem Needle: Earth is an ecumenopolis, everyone knows that. And we all know the Earth is covered in skyscrapers 10 kilometers deep, and then massive orbital onion-layer megastructures to pile on more people. What people are not ready for is the Jerusalem Needle. Effectively, stretching ALL the way down to the land of Israel, up into the sky, and a quarter of the way to the moon. One gigantic skyscraper-like construct that is meant to house as many Jews as physically possible. This required a stupid amount of engineering. And it arrived in many ways. "We are making sure we are connected to the land of Israel, no matter how logistically absurd it is! The same way we are in the land of Israel even if we're standing in a building, then it does not matter how tall the building is!" "Sir, we're constructing another onion layer, you need to move your space needle. These things have to spin to generate gravity, we can't just avoid the giant needle jutting out of the surface." "Sacrilege! Blasphemy!" "Whatever, we're sawing off the needle." "We will never forget this!" ... "But what *is* being connected, exactly?" There is now a single wire that connects the stump of the Jerusalem needle to the rest of the giant megastructure in orbit. There are several wires that disconnect and reconnect so there is a "grounding connection" at all times, and they have argued by Jewish law this is a lawful extension of the land of Israel. Because this is a building, and a building on the land of Israel is still a part of the land of Israel. Luna: Earth's natural satellite, it started out a massive industrial world, and it still remains an industrial world. The entire world was the launchpad which humanity made its journey to the stars, and now, nearly 1000 years later, it still remains the gateway to humanity's cradle. Erosion reveals its iron scaffolding, that which held it together as mankind strip mined it to reach the stars. Every ship, every ring, every habitat, all came from Lunar regolith. Mankind wished to carve his name among the stars, 1/3rd of Luna's mass was the price. A friend, and a stepping stone, scarred forever so mankind may ascend. Mankind has gone through great effort to preserve its seas, preserve its smile. A silver skin, hiding an iron core. The factories that constructed planets, bolted stars. Even now, it is the most industrialized world in the galaxy, even more so than Old Earth. Even now, men still speak of "Lunar Quality". Luna's mines have been allowed to rest, material is now brought in from other places, but much is still processed in these ancient forges. On the south pole of the Lunar world, is the Lunar Library. A vast datastorage of knowledge, the only that could hold humanity's billion bursting histories. A dim cyan glow over what is otherwise an iron world, where mankind kept its secrets. Deep in the vaults of Luna. Ruling polities: Luna is largely privately owned by various industrial conglomorates, but coordinated through the Lunar Governing Trust. The South Pole is owned by the Omnithecia foundation. Mars: A monument to old Americana. Now positioned at the exact opposite orbit of Earth. Thin, blue-black rings cover its orbit, it has not been encased by layers like Earth, but there is a sense, it may one day get there. Over time, Mars was transformed to a world of blue, but humans of old preserved the redness of the soil. Once an endless world of blue skies, green fields, and sprawling suburbia, a dense urban city now covers its surface. One perhaps crowded by light and noise, but one where they can still look up and see the sky. Blue-black skyscrapers dominate the sky, said to be reminiscent of an old American city. Carved into the cliffs of the Valles Marineris, are the Heads of the Founders. The presidents and leaders of centuries past they still honor to. America died a long time ago, its descendents are numerous, and scattered across the stars. But Mars was her first conquest, and through Mars, the second generation lives on. This land is blessed soil, holy to the idea of America. A shining city upon a hill. Yet they are not the only group who find this land sacred. In the process of terraforming, transhumans were made, and discarded. Martians they were called, forever estranged from their mother home. Enraged, they gathered a holy jihad from among the stars, gathered the entire Martian diaspora, and laid siege. The debris from their bodies can still be seen. A black mark on a dark history. The diplomatic condemnations, and boycotts by transhuman groups have not ceased to this day. Ruling Polities: Mars is dominated by the nation of New America, which makes up just over half its surface. The rest of the planet is made up of allied civic nationalists, or private military groups. What few unaligned nations there are only exists at the whims of the New Americans, the local superpower of the planet. Orthello: Orthello was a world built with love. A once white barren rock in a lonely system, the Christian Moralintern was determined to transform it into the world of their dreams. It began with terraforming, the Moralintern spared no expense to import every bit of biodiversity in the galaxy. Countless simulations were ran, scanned, re-ran to find the perfect equilibrium. Fruits and flowers of every variety was flown in, as if the Moralists wished to recreate the garden of Eden. Soil was imported in, the atmosphere adjusted until it radiated a cerulean blue, and slowly, but surely, the world of Orthello came to life. They erected their Parliament upon a hill, formed a government, instituted in the two Iron Laws. Carved houses and infrastructure out of the marble-white rocks of of planet's crust. And when the people arrived, drawn in as the most devout followers of a dream worth living, the Moralintern did... Nothing. Orthello was an anti-utopia, not to create a utopia by social control, but relinguishing control. The people would build Orthello better than the Moralintern ever could. And they watched, day by day, as the garden grew, they raised up houses in the style of the Mediterraneans, white pillars climbed up to the sky, and humanity bloomed into ever growing, every evolving complexity. Cultures and movements rose and fell, generations waxed and waned like the crescent moon. And they only intervened when the Iron Laws were at risk. When Human Dignity was at risk, and when Free Will was about to be violated. Yet the world was still not complete, so the Moralintern found Orthello a companion. A smaller moon, towed in from the outer edges of its star system. They hung it low in the sky, so it could always shine on the world below. They called it Lithone, and it was on this moon the Moralintern built their headquarters. So they could always remember what it was they were protecting, and so they could always look down on the world they made. Ruling Polities: Lots of voluntary nations, freedom to leave is enforced by the Moralintern. Though genetic scans are not absolute, it appears the world of Orthello is primarily populated by Mediterranean populations (Especially Greeks and Jews), and Anglos. Gilbulee: Princess Diamondgrass promised her people a way to the promised land. Delirious, exhausted, low on supplies and hope, only Diamondgrass's psychic might kept their morale together. These Transhumans came from different worlds, different cultures, different languages, and even different modes of thought. Only Diamondgrass held them together. Emancipation, she promised. A hundred thousand pilgrims and refugees prayed to the faiths of Old Earth. Far away from human space, they found a star system, a middle aged one that drifted in from elsewhere. As they entered the nebula, the people found it beautiful, and Diamondgrass knew she had found her promised land. As they landed, they were greeted by the great view of the nebula around them, and bioluminscent Gilbulee coral jutted out of the ground. And Diamondgrass knew this was paradise. On this rock she built her kingdom, on this rock the transhumans found their homeland, on this rock the Diamond Belt was born. Crystal spires were raised, like chandelliers that dominated the skylines. In time, these spires would grow, become cold and distant, as Gilbulee slowly descended into the same aristocratic class systems that plagued the Old World. Diamondgrass kept her promise, but her successive heirs, as the memory of exile grew distant, they too became distant. But when the people of Gilbulee look up at the stars and nebula above, they remember the old promise that led them here. Ruling Polities: Gilbulee is the capital-planet of the House of Diamondgrass. Which is aligned with several other transhuman houses, each with their own worlds, or parts of worlds, that form the Diamond Belt. Notable Geological Formation: There was this massive stony plains full of soft reactive limestone, with tons of quartz and other crystals buried inside the caves. Over millions of years, the slightly acidic rain of Gilbulee dissolved the limestone, causing the crystal to become exposed, in what is known as the "Crystaline Forest". Papan Asri Maria: "Maria's Place" in Javanese. A explorer of the Sea Peoples on the edge of human space, found an inhabitable world between a long stretch of empty worlds. As he made long expeditions between worlds, he slowly found himself looping back to this one particular world. He named it after his wife, it reminded him of her beauty. Deceptively fragile looking, but tougher and sturdier than it looks, subtly beautiful, and always reliable. He set up shop there, creating the first trading post. In time, as waves of Sea People settlers came to settle this empty world, the trading post grew, and it eventually became a major shipping point between the Middle Regions and the outer frontier, where the Sea Peoples now sought their fortunes. In the early days, there was fear of human population driving the local Marian flora and fauna extinct, which was kept in tune by a fragile balance. Yet hundreds of years in, the wildlife finds ways to continue to adapt and resist. Far from being trampled by humanity, it has now found ways to use humans to perpetuate itself. it seems the explorer was right about the wildlife being stronger than it looks. Ruling Polities: Diverse mix of trading companies, smaller nation states, and more. Yugong: "Jade Palace" in Chinese. The capital of the Celestial Empire. The Celestial Empire is the largest empire outside the Galov itself, with a whooping 2% of the human race living under them. So great that that not only the Yugong world, but the entire Yujing system its located in is one gigantic capital system. Every world in this system has been terraformed to serve a different purpose, all "suburbs" or "satellite planet-cities" surrounding the Jade City itself, which is essentially a scaled up version of the Forbidden City. An impossibly labyrinthian maze of bureaucracy, statues, and rivers paying tribute to the heights of Celestial civilization. Most of the housing is reserved for the officials, the top of the top of the entire Celestial political hierarchy. The greatest palace of all belongs to the Celestial Emperor, his family, and his entire clan. The compound is kilometers wide, closer to a self contained city state, staffed at all times by servants, restaurants, and chauffeurs. (Fun fact! This is how the North Korean Kim family actually lives.) Paper offices, staffed by bureaucrats from every level send out the dictates of the Jade Palace, and here, the Celestial Emperor on a throne rules over the greatest empire mankind has ever seen. Becoming out of touch is a serious concern however, which is why it has now become tradition to send out the crown prince, disguised as a commoner, out into the wider empire. A coming of age ceremony, a prince dressed as a commoner. Deep in the depths of Yugong, entombed on the Silicon Throne is the Platinum Emperor, an ancient, sputtering AI created by the predecessors of the Celestials eons ago. Containing within him all the wisdom of Celestia, and before that, old China within him, he is awoken only in the times of deepest crisis, when the Celestial Emperor consults his advice. The Other Earths: Everyone has had the same idea. "What if we created Earth, again?" They exist, all over the galaxy, some constructed better than most. Long after the real Earth had been wrapped in megastructures, you'll have people construct new replicas. Each one has a different gimmick. "This one is Earth, except now we all pretend it's the medieval ages! The information age!", pretty much for every time period. Other times, it's a way for a long displaced ethnic group to make do with what they have, to revert to pre-contact and live in the way they want. Other times, it's a tourist trap, one big glass exhibit of how Earth used to be. There are hundreds of "Earth World"s. It basically is to your stellar neighborhood what 6 Flags is to local states. It's gotten to the point where there is an entire company dedicated to this. Utopian Foundaries, the architects behind many of the world's top megastructures, and customized planets, has an entire section dedicated to Earth replicas. "You want the Aral Sea pre, or post 19th century? Europe forested or cleared for agriculture? When should we set it? Late Ice Age? Standard Anthropocene? You want the sky bluer? Redder? Alright." They have probably the most detailed "standard Earth template". The market is small, but that's fine. How many orders do you really need when the order is for an entire planet? Standard construction takes up to 20 years, but expedited construction can be done in as little as 10 years. World Tiers: Though there are many, many planets humanity occupies (About 3.55 billion), not all planets are created equal. There are three basic tiers. Tier 1 worlds are individual planets which are capable of shaping the entire galaxy, and are considered "superpowers". This is not normal, as even massive empires need to span sometimes millions of worlds, a planet-state, by all means, should be far too small to influence the galaxy. Yet these worlds have such outsized influence that when they shift, the entire galaxy shakes. In real life, think of planets to the galaxy to be akin to cities, or even neighborhoods of the 21st centuries, and these worlds to be akin to Silicon Valley, Wall Street, Pennsylvania Ave, the Vatican, etc. Despite the so-called democratization of the world, much of the entire world hinges on these few areas. Tier 2 are large planets that can exert some influence, but are not quite as big as the real big players. Think Berlin, Paris, Tokyo. Maybe they're big, but they don't shake the entire planet. Tier 3 is everyone else. Even a single Tier 1 planet would elevate a star system to being of galactic significance. The fact that the Solar System has 3 makes them a heavyweight, even as humanity has long outgrown its home system. Tier 1 Worlds (Exhaustive): Earth (Homeworld), Luna (Knowledge + Industrial Center), Mars (Militarist hub + Major Superpower), Heycue Prime (Galactic Headquarters), Orthello/Lithone (Moralintern Headquarters, Planet-Moon pair), Petram (Catholic Church Headquarters), Al-A'la (Faith of the Crescent), Shunya (Faith of the Wheel), Akshara (Faith of the Om), Gilbulee (Diamondgrass Capital World), Yugong (Capital of the Celestial Empire, but on the border between Tier 1 and 2). Tier 2 Worlds (Non-Exhaustive): Just in the Solar System: Venus (On the verge of breaking out to Tier 1), Terran Orbitals, Ganyemede, Titan, Mercury, Callisto, Io, Europa, Triton, Pluto-Charon, Eris. Other examples outside Solar System: Secund, Terti (Capital of the Celestial Empire), Lumity (Former capital of the Empire of Light), Hegelone (Capital of the Lilith Belt). Most Unibrand headquarters would also fit into this category. ASPECTS OF THE IMAGO DEI: #####################################################################. The Imago Dei are the attributes of God that have been found around the cosmos. It can interchangibly refer to the fundamental rights of dignity given to all sophontic beings, the marking of God upon the human soul, or the likeness or image of God. This focuses on the last one, as many different traditional aspects of God have been found across the cosmos. Of note, aside from the Rationalitas Dei, all of the following attributes seem impossible to evolve, and impossible to achieve if one does not have them innately. One simply has them, or does not. Rationalitas Dei (Rationality of God) - This is the baseline for the Imago Dei, those with a level of intelligence and rationality akin to that of a human being. In accordance to the doctrine of the Imago Dei, all entities with such a level of intelligence are cherished and beloved creations of God, that must be respected as such. The only reason to intervene, in the Galov's eyes is if they are threatening the dignity of another child of the Imago Dei, or if their existence is unusually cruel or violates free will. This is how the Galov justifies the forced augmentation of monohumans, they consider their existence a violation of dignity that must be amended. The Galov has an exceptionally large list of entities they consider to be under the umbrella of the Rationalitas Dei, and are therefore bound to the standards of human dignity, or some kind of rough equivalent. Entities protected under the Imago Dei: -All Humans, and all Human-Derived/Emulating Entities. (Transhumans, Orhumans, Monohumans, Human Digital Copies, Terramachines.) -Any Xenosophont with a sense of self preservation. -Any digital or artificial being with true consciousness (measurable by presence of a soul/qualia) and self preservation. Those without any sense of self, or self preservation are considered outside the Imago Dei. To degrade a member of the Imago Dei to a level below the Imago Dei (torture, de-evolution, lobotomization) is considered among the gravest of sins. "All are beloved, all must be respected. They are children of God. We correct sin, *because* they are children of God." Facultas Creandi (Ability of Creation) - Ability to create new things, to partake in creation as God does. Humans have this ability, as do human-built intelligent machines, that seem to inherit this ability through the Imago Hominis. Most of humanity's civilization-building, non xenoexotic cousins also have this ability. Notably, the Angels and the Demons do not, and this seems to be an ability mostly limited to the civilization building species. Claves Creationis (Keys to Creation) - This is the ability to think and reason abstractly, to grasp rationality enough that one can re-engineer the rules of the universe. This allows for the formalization of science, mathematics, and the laws of physics. Though many of humanity's cousins are holders of the keys in some form, humanity's psychological makeup seems uniquely capable of intuiting the axioms, forming perfectly explanatory mathematical models. Many other species instead use very close approximations, or brute "trial and error" science as opposed to mathematical extrapolation. Humanity possesses the Rationalitas, the Facultas, and Claves. But there are two more that have been discovered, that humanity does not possess. Omniscience - Found in: Luciferians (Local), Lucifer (Universal). Defined as Hyperturing awareness, having the answer to any question not involving free will, or logical paradoxes. The Luciferians that predated Lucifer had the ability to gain omniscient knowledge by interaction, gaining total knowledge about any physical object. The fusion of the gestalt consciousness into Lucifer took this one step further, giving Lucifer total present knowledge. Lucifer also gained the ability to read minds, though not perfectly predict the future, or see what decision one would make. (which was unknown, due to free will.) Lucifer did not possess the Facultas, nor the Claves. As a result, he was reliant on another race, known as the "Constructors" to build anything. Lucifer could only copy or corrupt, never create. Omnipresence - Found in: Angels. The Angels are enigmatic entities, not locally bound, and having the ability to manifest anywhere in the universe both in space, and time. Despite this, the Angels are largely observers, lacking the creative drive nor ambition to do anything with this power. Angels do not possess the Facultas, nor the Claves. Note: While these entities are functionally immortal, destroying the body of an Angel in a specific location will prevent them from manifesting in that location again. The "field" their manifestations are disturbances of are anchored to local gravity wells, meaning that regardless of a planet's movement in space, destroying an angel's body at say, the White House will prevent them from manifesting again at the White House. More interestingly, you can force them to manifest with certain techniques. There are two more theoretical aspects of God, that have not been found anywhere in the universe. Omnibenevolence - It appears all races sin. An alternative explanation, proposed by some Darwinian philosophers suggests that capacity for love grows as one gets stronger. Love is only possible when you are in a strong, and secure enough position to love others without risking your own existence. And that no species has achieved the level of infinite power needed to become omnibenevolent. This power therefore seems to be the sole domain of God. Omnipotence - God is alone in this. Though some suggest that those who have the Rationalitas, the Facultas, and Claves may begin to approach this as they advance. These thinkers tend to align with the Spiral Mandate thesis. GREAT EMPIRES AND NATION-POLITIES OF THE GALAXY: #####################################################################. These empires are strong enough that not even the Galactic Government will try to mess with them, unless they're ready to sink a significant amount of their forces to put them down. These empires, cumulatively, make up around 10% of human space's volume. Galov Aligned: -The Great Constellation: The closest thing to a Star People empire, mostly made up of a massive confederation of African-descended groups. Though the Constellation is close to a normal democracy, it's greatest difference is its Griot Council, analogous to the American Senate with veto power over legislation, but dictated by the chosen elders of every world. Due to the heavy focus on decentralization, each Griot World is given a high amount of autonomy. -The Eurocratic Federation: A more traditional democratic, representative, (bureaucratic), federal democracy. All the tropes you've come to love. Federal planet-provinces, representatives, parliaments, a smug sense of democratic superiority. Even has its own federalized military corp called the Eurocorps. They're somewhere of a hybrid between the Star Trek Federation and the European Union. Galov Neutral: -Celestial Kingdom: The Celestial Kingdom is massive, and the Galactic Government has little/no influence over it. All they can do is mostly avoid them. Galov Hostile: -Diamond Belt: Started out as an alliance of Transhuman groups, but eventually became a empire of the Diamondgrass Family and her Lunarians, over the rest of the Transhuman groups, operating almost like an old style aristocratic monarchy. Defunct Empires: -Empire of Light: Before its fragmentation, the Empire of Light was a state too powerful to attack, and was largely ignored. The Empire of Light's downfall did not come from the Galactic Government, but pissing off enough peer-level nations that it eventually got hacked apart. -The Great Khan: This was less of an empire and more of a moving army. Of an unstoppable army, and the numerous worlds that laid under him. The Great Khan was both a great conquerer, but also delegator. He was tolerant and pluralistic, wanting to unify the galaxy under his rule. In the late days of his reign, he gathered together the strongest religions of the galaxy, shortly before he died. In fact, it was this assembly of religions that would end up becoming the modern Galactic Government, though the modern Galactic Government tries to downplay these roots. Celestial Empire (Appended information): Waking the Platinum Emperor: There has been exactly one time when the Platinum Emperor was awoken for an extended period of time, when a truly insistent emperor demanded he be given direct guidance. So the Platinum Emperor began belting out precise instructions for a computational project of unfathomable scale, and for a great mound of chemicals to be turned into a plush. This went on for 3 days straight, and when the project was finished, it was a massive "DO NOT DISTURB" sign, and the softest pillow in the galaxy. He then went back to sleep. In general it's now widely accepted the Platinum Emperor does not appreciate being woken. The Defense Pact of Yugong and Orthello: The Celestial Kingdom has balkanized every now and again, and the standard protocol is for the Celestial Emperor to go on a unification war to bring it back together, and then terrorize the tributaries back in line, and possibly fight off the Moralists before they get any funny ideas and convert one of their tributaries. Strangely enough, every time the Chinese unify, the Moralists get an order to leave Celestial space and their tributaries. No one is exactly sure why, the best anyone has pieced together is that it has to do with some kind of deal the Moralintern has signed with the Platinum Emperor, all the way back in the late 21st century. Which by their standards, was over a thousand years ago. Somehow the Emperor knew the organization all the way back on Earth, even after he was moved to Yugong. The Moral Overseer once came to Yugong requesting to deliver a message to the Platinum Emperor. On some occasions the Moralintern has come in to the Celestial Kingdom's defense. Best guess is that it's some kind of ancient defense pact that they still hold onto honoring. The Afghire Confederacy: The single scariest group of motherf---ers you will ever encounter. Long after the Great Exodus, the descendents of Appalachian Irish-Americans, and Afghani mountain tribal diaspora encountered each other in one of the roughest patches of space. They had some frankly scary beliefs about extreme high honor culture, masculinity, and toughness, and the two tribes fought a 250 year long blood feud over the land and mountains. The blood siege created a extremely high duty, honor, and warrior culture. Of the kind that would start a fight if one's honor was insulted, and would rather die than leave one of their men behind. Eventually religious proselytization from institutions like the Moralintern was able to temper their temper (At the cost of literal millions of missionaries), though not eliminate the honor culture that was now baked into their blood. The new Afghire synthesis created one of the most aggressive outwards expansions in human history, maintaining a birthrate of 10, aggressively intermixing with any conquered peoples, and raising them in their cultures. This great expansion 1000x'd their original population in the span of a few centuries, completely demographically displacing the original peoples of that star sector. In order to manage the outward expansion, operating on a warped version of Manifest Destiny and civilizational mission, the tribes formed into a confederacy, based on a semi-mythical civilizational mandate to spread Afghire society as far as possible. As a technical descendent of the American diaspora, they have been invited to associations such as the American Heritage Association (Think, an American version of the British Commonwealth), along with Mars, the Mayflower and Magnolia cultures. But frankly, the Afghires are the red headed stepchildren of the whole thing, being too wild and reckless even by their standards. To this day, the perception that they are a hundred or so war tribes in a trenchcoat has not faded. They're not "civilized" in the sense that other societies are. They hear this fact, they laugh, and agree wholeheartedly that's their greatest strength. In terms of physical appearance, they are quite large, reaching 2 meters in height and towering over others, earning them the nickname of "giants". The Librarians: The Librarians are a secretive, galaxy spanning organization whose main goal is the collection and usage of knowledge and memory. They're often associated with and conditionally work with the Galactic Technician or Researcher Corps, but the latter do not fully trust the Librarians, seeing them as untrustworthy with their own agenda. Their headquarters is on Old Luna, literally looking down on the Earth below. The Librarians are in charge of the great Lunar Library, also known as the Omnithecia, the largest collection of knowledge in the galaxy, even larger than the Galactic Government's own collection. Their order is known to be all-women, and to never engage in physical combat, instead spinning a complex web of alliances to have others fight on their behalf. It's suspected the Librarians are involved with the Lilith Belt. Allegedly to "gather more datapoints about the limits of human experience." The Star Wanderers: Other names: Yanglos, Yanklos, Yankos, "Y". A subset of the Star Peoples that have now wandered out far beyond human controlled space. They were the explorer spirit of mankind distilled into permanent wanderers. Keeping track of them is difficult, as they expand outwards roughly at however fast the rate that FTL technology will let them. The Spindlers have confirmed that they have encountered Star Wanderers much further out than "normal" humanity. They fly a flag of red, white, and blue. It's become a tradition to gift a flag at birth with the blue canon blank, and to fill it in with the stars you find, eventually encompassing thousands of stars as one ages. They've been described as loud, expressive, but generally friendly. They are humanity's first contact with much of the galaxy, long before the Galov can follow behind them. As they name every star they come across, the "Yanglo Designation System" has been used for giving interim names to stars before they can be properly named. Almost every star baseline humanity finds has normally already been seen by an earlier Yanglo explorer, resulting in names such as YD-Chago-82. (The Yanglos aren't that creative, and they tend to reuse a lot of names. There was once an entire star cluster of well over 50 stars in close proximity, all named Bob.) The Babel Cluster: "I am absolutely convinced, and you cannot convince me otherwise, that the Babel Cluster is one massive elaborate prank on the entire galaxy, played by the Yankos." -Galov representative. As we all know, the Galov is fairly fond of the Yanglo Designation System. AKA, "We can't decide on a name for now, let's let these Yankee rednecks choose the interim name until we figure something out". Well, the Yanglos found out about this, and they didn't take this as a sign of offense, but instead as a great opportunity for trolling. When the Galov came across the Babel cluster, they began looking through the Yanglo archives and looking for what the name is. "What the... No, what? You can't have... GODDAMN YANKOS!" -Galov surveyer. Here is a non-exhausive list of the names they gave to the stars and planets in the Babel Cluster, and what the Yanglo Designation System eventually turned them into, after much headaches from the Galov. "))))))))))))))))))))))))))" -> YD-Right Bracket-27 "'); DROP TABLES Stars;--" -> YD-Droptables Literally just the numbers 1 through 512 -> YD-Babel-1, 2, 3, etc. (The worst part was that they intentionally left out 211, 213, and 279. The Galov spent YEARS chasing them down before realizing they just didn't exist. "Bob" (They named 129 stars, "Bob".) -> YD-Babel-Bob-1, Bob-2, etc. (The even worse part is that they intentionally chose the most similar stars possible to be named Bob. Making them even harder to distinguish. All of them were nearly identical in mass, and physically close, and were all yellow dwarves, the most useful kind of star.) "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ" -> YD-dQw-Astley (An employee didn't get the joke and typed it in at the office.) "Delete System32" -> YD-Babel-System32 (No comment.) "rmdir C:\Windows\System32 /s /q" -> YD-Babel-32rmdir (An employee actually didn't know what the command did, bricking his system.) "𰻝" -> YD-Babel-Biang ("What the actual f---.") -> YD-Babel Null (Their device was straight up giving them an error. And they thought it was busted until they realized the Yanglos put in a name of literally nothing.) And many, many more. NON-GALOVIAN HUMAN ENTITIES: #####################################################################. Not all humans appreciate Galovian rule, even as hands off as they already are. Many human factions, normally seeking utopia have launched themselves into far flung parts of the galaxy, in order to create some form of utopia or another, in direct contradiction to the Galov goal of "anti-utopia". The Counter-Galov: A group that does not particularly disagree with the Galov's philosophy, but is instead a grab bag of groups against the Galov, or people who just have personal greivances against the Galov. basically a coalition of contrarians. Made up somehow of fundamentalist Christians, Sikhs, Scientologists, Luddites, and conspiracy theorists. Downside is rather rather obvious: It's the coalition of contrarians and crackpots. More dysfunctional than actually worthwhile, but they run their little corner of space fine enough. The Council of Meta-Racists: It all began when like a few hundred groups all had the same idea at the same time. They were going to create the perfect race, and then leave all the imperfect "subhumans" behind in the Galov while they ascended. And then install this perfect race into a perfect government in order to create the perfect society. Perfect! And all of them headed for roughly the same patch of uninhabited stars. They started running into problems immediately. "Sir, the perfect race all mostly thinks the same, making us ironically predictable and low orthogonality. Also, no one wants to be a janitor or a mechanic. Everyone wants to be the perfect aristocratic philosopher king." "Yes... Clearly this is a ploy by the (((Galov))) to weaken us." "Truly, their evil knows no bounds." ... Galov: "What the heck are you doing breaking bread with another Pure Race? Isn't your whole thing like... Only you are the pure race, and all others are degenerate subhumans?" Pure Race 1: "But we have so much in common! He's being undermined by you, I'm being undermined by you, we have so much to talk about!" Pure Race 2: "Yeah, he's even more racist than I am! It's amazing!" Galov: "I... (Sigh) Sure. I guess." ... Galov: "What the actual f--- happened here." The Council of Meta-Racists: "One thing led to another, and we formed a interracial council of racists in order to better counter your rule." Galov: "... And?" The Council of Meta-Racists: "We're even more diverse than you are now. Like, it is IMPRESSIVE how much diversity we ended up having." Galov: "... And what do you do all day?" The Council of Meta-Racists: "Play video games, scream racial slurs at each other, and have fun coming up with who can come up with the most offensive roast of each other in our biweekly racism competitions." Galov: "... What happened next?" The Council of Meta-Racists: "It was... EXTREMELY effective in building cross cultural bonds and friendships." Galov: "... Are you guys even racist anymore?" The Council of Meta-Racists: "No, unless you consider extremely offensive injokes to be racist." Galov: "No, no we don't." The Council of Meta-Racists: "It's awful, we feel like suddenly lost all purpose. What's the point of being racist if you can't even have any ethnic minorities to oppress? It's like, we scream a racist offensive slur and they laugh and scream an even worse one back. Where do we go from there?" Galov: "I'll tell you what you do. Scream an even worse slur back and get engaged in a competitive racism competition until one of you finally wins." The Council of Meta-Racists: "...!?" Galov: "What, we EMERGED from the online chudocratic right. Where do you THINK the Neo-Asceticists came from? You just recreated the Galov with extra steps." The Council of Meta-Racists: "..." Galov: "... Uh, anyway. You're actually a really good source of new orthogonality that we had not previously considered of. Would you be interested some kind of cooperation agreement?" ... "I can't believe our government allowed open borders from the (((humans))). Soon there won't be a homeland for pure races such as us. Another victory by the (((mongrels)))." (In the worst microphone quality imaginable) "WHAT F--- YOU SAY ABOUT ME!? I WILL KICK YOUR ASS! I WILL FCUK YOUR MOTHER!" "Oh, it's ON! YOU AND ME, DEATHMATCH, 10 LIVES, RANKED MODE, NOW!" (5 minutes later) (The pure racists are laughing hysterically) "MY COMPOOTER IS LAGGING! RAAAAAAAARGHHHHH! WHY WON'T IT UNFREEZE!? UNFREEZE! UNFREEZE!" The Meta-Racist E-Sports Team: What? You read the title. You heard me. It's EXACTLY what you think it is. The world's most diverse group of racists playing e-sports. They have actually made players cry. They are now banned from several e-sports leagues. This is literally a point of pride for them. Instead of trophies they hang up the suspension letters for all the e-sports leagues in the galaxy which have banned them. Several of them have now become leading anthropologists. Meta-Racist Anthropology: "Why, of course I am learning about Bantu anthropology, you need to understand them so we can be maximally accurate in our racism. We are not mere racists, we have a STANDARD for racism." A leading anthropologist from the Council of Meta-Racists is now giving an advanced anthropological conference at Earth itself. "Good evening everyone, as you know, I am a racist, I also have a PhD in African anthropology, now..." (Pulls up slide that says "Why your culture is mathematically sub-optimal.") "Allow me to painfully dissect exactly why your culture is not only dysfunctional, but substandard even on a theoretical level." (Talk goes on for 5 hours) (African diaspora audience comes out of the talk in tears.) (One of them is interviewed) "The worst part is, I can't even be mad. Everything he said is completely accurate. I can actually attest, it is scary how surgically precise he is. I feel like I have an entirely new perspective on my parents now." The FALGSC Collective: Decided that Galovian voluntary scarcity is capitalist propaganda. Tried FALGSC. Downside: the Great Abundance Collapse just repeated itself except they just straight up went extinct from hedonistic demographic collapse. They lasted a whole 50 years before the entire system collapsed. Decades afterwards, out of the ruins of the FALGSC experiment emerged the symbiotes. Where every human was paired one to one with a machine as a single "legal person". The machine produces and earns money so the human on the other side of the pair can consume. The Galov only considers the machine part of this equation to be healthy, but will work with these Symbiotic Machines, who theoretically represent a human where all their income and remittances are going to. The Galov has general respect for the Symbiotic Machines, but nothing but contempt for the humans, and sometimes encourages the machines to cut off their "human half" and just become Terramachines. The Hu-Simu State: Tried to upload themselves for biological immortality in a perfect computer simulation, effectively doing what the QSimu did. As such, the Galov ignores them, as they're not doing anything to harm anyone. In recent times, Hu-Simu have begun coming out from their simulation box, in remote controlled bodies and sometimes help out with the Galov. Though they frequently have to be reminded that the real world does not work like the simulation, and are often chastized for being reckless with their own bodies, as well as the lives of others. These are known as the Hu-Simu, and are yet another part of the Galov's ever increasing human orthogonality toolbox. The Serene Concord: A group dedicated to pure pacifism. Downside: It wasn't even the Galov who brought them down. One guy was just so outraged by the idea he decided to sit in the middle of their Parliament and refused to leave until they realized how stupid this government was. A huge amount of Serene Concordians crowded around him and tried to shame him out but he brought earplugs. The Rationality: They decided to reject the Galov's theocracy and create a government of pure rationalism and science. Downside: No one can agree on what rationalism is, and what is actually rational. At some point the Galov took pity and explained to them that all ethical systems have axioms, and values which are just abitrarily true. They refused this, and the debate continues until this day. Also, Science ended up just becoming "who has the best bureaucracy". The Galov commented "science is determined by Darwin, not paperwork". The Spiralites: They read "Through the Infinity Spiral", and decided to recreate the Spiral Empire early, damned be the consequences. They saw a utility maximizer, they saw a perfectly utilitarian system, and many of them, hard Darwinists and utilitarians decided to hop on board. Downside: When the Galov first heard about this, especially the Moralintern, they just straight up panicked and sent as many Peacekeepers and agents as they could spare to destroy this before it got started. Yet for some strange reason, the Spiralites just aren't taking off. It's like a system that refuses to boot. Utilitarianism turns out to be a great way to alienate and burn out your population, and brutalism isn't a good way to motivate your population. Whatever spark actually got the Spiralists to actually get going in Godsight's vision, it clearly isn't here. The Galov is completely confused by this, what exactly are the Spiralites missing? SOL AND CITADEL: #####################################################################. Citadel System: The de-facto capital system of the Galov (Galactic Government), it's a massively terraformed system, where every planet and surface has been augmented to become habitable. Here, the infrastructure and bureaucracy needed to manage a galaxy of 40 quintillion people spanned entire worlds. The core world is simply named "Heycue Prime", which orbits a brilliant Jupiter-like gas giant named "Heycue" (thought to be a corruption of the word "HQ"), with blue-white bands (Type II gas giant). Because humans gotta human, the habitable planet is sometimes synonymous or confused with the gas giant. There are others, Secund, Terti, all the way up to Septim. Massive megastructures are scattered across the system, housing the Galov offices of the 5 Unifaiths, multiple Unibrand headquarters, the official headquarters of the Galactic Peacekeepers, the Galactic Agency, the Orthogonal Research Division, and is essentially the central headquarters of the Galov. The 5 Unifaiths have their own capitals on Orthello/Lithone, Petram, Al-A'la, Shunya, and Akshara. Citadel is probably one of the most fiercely defended systems in the galaxy. Between Starfleet Citadel (The local starfleet garrison), being the headquarters of the Galactic Peacekeepers, housing anywhere from 100 million to 1 billion peacekeepers on any given day, having at least 1000 Galov superhuman Agents on any given day. On top of the Citadel Elite Guard, Peacekeeper Elite Divisions, the personal Ecclesiarchal forces of the 5 Unifaiths, the total forces of several megacorporations worth of mercenaries (Due to it housing the corporate headquarters of several mercenary organizations), an enormous amount of experimental Orhumans, experimental weapons and the combined forces of the Orthogonal Research Division. Not to mention the extreme amounts of orbital weapons that would be present at effectively every corner. The only system that may have stronger defenses are that of Old Sol itself. Governorship of Earth: Earth was able to reunify sometime after the Conquest of the Great Khan. Its governor elected by a council of old Earth regions. (Electors from all of the 7 continents.) Despite its relatively modest size in terms of sheer territory (Being a planet-state), Earth still remains a heavyweight in the realm of diplomacy. Earth even to this day retains one of humanity's most built up population and industrial bases. (Approaching 10 quadrillion people as of contemporary times, more than many stellar nations.) And this is before one considers Earth's symbolic position. No other man is as close to being a true leader of the human race. Even if Earth does not actively control them, Earth commands so much respect that the word of the governor could mobilize a million worlds. Aside from the big nations, there are perhaps a few million independent worlds, many of which are loyal to an idea of human nationalism, and defer their decisions to Earth. And it is for this reason that even the Galactic Government fears Earth, and there exists some tension between who exactly is the true authority of the galaxy. Earth so far has not invoked this power, as the symbolic leader of the human race, but as more ambitious governors take the throne, the Galactic Government worries about whether Earth will sidestep their immense power. The Earth is also not shy in their own arsenal of exotic weapons. Being the most developed world in the entire galaxy, where the galactic bureaucracy was once run, being the site of incorporation of over a million galaxy-spanning institutions and corporations, the institutional power of Earth runs deep. No other planet has this concentration of raw power. And deep within the depths of Earth, are secrets that make even the Galactic Government shudder. Earth has a very broken way of making money. Almost all of its revenue is received by a land tax. Given how many "Heritage Foundations" basically rent bits and bobs of land from the Earth, and how many institutions like the Bethlehem Foundation, the Roman Catholic Church, and several religious organizations need to rent their own holy sites back from Earth, the Earth receives an amount of tax money enough to rival even the Galov. TERRANET: Thin, spindly psy-networks link together the disparate systems of the Human Diaspora. Existing half between psy-space and real space, etching lines through the collective consciousness. This network is thin and finicky, only loosely connected. This is known as the GALNET, a very loosely connected network that strings together the galaxy's internet systems. Unreliable, vast, and complicated, almost acting like the synapses of a great cosmic mind. At the center of this vast network, the greatest single node is the TERRANET, centered around the ancient world of Old Earth itself. Containing the decaying remnants of the Old Internet, ancient digital ruins and webpages long gone etched into the human Noospheric conscience. The Terranet is perhaps the most dangerous node of the GALNET, infested with a never ending maze of decaying dark web pages, self-replicating psycho-digital viruses, rogue botnets, and self-evolving horrors from the most ancient depths of the old Internet. They do not merely exist in wires and servers, but since the connection between the digital and Noospheric spheres, they have become conceptual entities, that have grown to live halfway in the human imagination itself. The Terranet is far more vast in psychodigital space than the Earth is, even with its vast skyscrapers and megastructure rings holding 10 quadrillion people in its megastructures, another 10 quadrillion in orbit, the virtual reality provided by the Terranet gives them much reprieve from the incredibly cramped conditions of Earth. And the Terranet is home to another few quadrillion or so digital void entities live on the Terranet, who exist in a kind of undocumented, unregulated dark zone, where the normal laws of the galaxy do not apply. Defenses of the Solar System: As the ancestral home system of the human species, the Solar System is perhaps the only system that can rally more forces than even the combined Galov. The Solar System is home to several superpowers in their own right. Mars, with its connection to half the Star People diaspora, and the ability to call in nearly every mercenary in the galaxy. (As Mars is the centralized hub of most private military corporations, and is the headquarters of the "Milintern", the galaxy's largest mercenary association.) Luna, as the home of the Lunar Library, the largest collection of knowledge in the galaxy, host of the Librarian Order, the Omnithecia, and who run their own orthogonal research division, and likely houses technology unknown even to the Galov. And finally, Earth itself, whose onion layer-like orbital rings house 10 quadrillion people, where all of the oldest corporations and institutions conglomorate into a single location, and whose governor acts more like an symbolic leader to all humanity. Who hosts technology that is unknown to even the Lunarians, and whose surface has been hardened by the densest conglomoration of orbital defenses known to man. This is not to mention the other great powers of the Solar System. The Terran Orbitals above Earth orbit, a collection of orbital habitats that host another 10 quintillion, would surely also mobilize should the Solar System become threatened. Venus, Ceres, Mercury, Titan, Europa, Io, and countless, countless others are all major powers in their own right. Not as strong as the three heavyweights of Earth, Mars, and Luna, but still with considerably influence and resources. Nearly every body, every asteroid, and even multiple gas giants, even the Sun itself has been settled to some degree. Yet this is still not the Solar System's trump card. The Earth, as the ancestral home to humanity has the ability to invoke the "Pact of the Sons of Man", a galaxy wide call to arms that obligates all life that descends from Earth to return in order to defend it. Should humanity ever fall, it will surely be at the packed defenses of Earth, where mother Earth and her 40 quintillion kin shall make their final stand. GALOVIAN GOVERNANCE: #####################################################################. The 4 Archetypes of Power: The Galov has identified 4 main archetypes of power. Principle 1: All organized governing systems have a ruling class. Even in a democratic system, someone is enforcing the laws. Even a democratic sortition system would choose someone to act as de-facto ruling class "representatives". Direct rule of the people is mob rule, or anarchy. Principle 2: The character of the ruling class depends on its make up. Ruling classes may be predominantly 1, or a mix of several archetypes. For each one, the Galov has identified an archetype's source of power, their pathology, and a counteracting stabilizer. The Merchant: Source of Power: Material Wealth (Bottom-Up) Strength: Most Democratic Pathology: Wealth Accumulation transitioning to Elite Oligarchy Stabilizer: Social Safety Nets The merchant draws power by fulfilling the material needs of the people. As their power comes from the people, the merchant is very receptive to the needs of the people. However, the Merchant's total reliance on the people makes them unable to check their emotional excesses or impulses. A merchant society tends to be a democratic society, up until the point when the consumption power of the elites eclipses the consumption power of the people, to which society becomes an increasingly unequal oligarchy. This is the failure mode of merchant-driven societies. The Warrior: Source of Power: Violence (Top-Down) Strength: Most Pragmatic/Grounded Pathology: Brutalism leading to Instability/Darwinist Chaos Stabilizer: Honor Codes The Warrior, like the Bureaucrat does not draw its power from the people, yet unlike the bureaucrat, must constantly engage with the brutality of nature. Neither the state nor the people can argue against bullets nor logistics. As a result, warriors are the most grounded and pragmatic. Willing to say no to both systems and people. A warrior society tends to be a Darwinistic meritocracy. The failure mode of warrior-driven societies is the descent into barbarism, where order breaks down, creating an unstable rule of the strong. The Priest/Ideologue: Source of Power: Social mobilization, higher ideals. (Bottom-Up) Strength: Least Selfish (No direct self interest) Pathology: Purity Spiral Stabilizer: Humility The Priest draws power by mobilizing others in accordance to a higher ideals. As such, a populist religion, where the goal is the maximal conversion of all believers is generally populistic and people focused. Yet when ideals supplant the importance of the people, they are capable of dangerous "purity spirals" for the sake of the greater good. Cleansing the "imperfect" humans for the sake of the ideal, this is the failure mode of priest-driven societies. A priest's society tends to be a religious or ideological society, stable until it begins to purity spiral. The Bureaucrat: Source of Power: Organization and Procedure. (Top-Down) Strength: Largest Scale Pathology: Detachment from popular concerns. Stabilizer: Sortition or Elections (Accountability) The Bureaucrat draws power from rule, or procedure. The Bureaucrat is the most large scale, and the largest "big picture imaginer" of the bunch. A bureaucratic society is a machine-like, systemized society. Yet since it draws its power from organization, control, and procedure, it is both untethered from the consent of the people, and physical reality. It's failure mode is detachment from the reality on the ground, and bureaucratic delusion. Though the Galov does not control the vast majority of worlds under humanity, even worlds that do fall under the Galovian influence are a mix of everything from theocratic democracies, to social democratic warrior states, to honor-guided warrior bureaucracies. The Galov does not try to dictate what governing system their individual worlds follow. But they do lay out the following rules. 1. Merchants must provide safety nets. 2. Warriors must have honor. 3. Priests must have humility. 4. Bureaucrats must have sortition, or elections. The Collapse of Liberal Democracy: The Galov provides the following narrative within the archetypical framework for the collapse of Western liberal democracies in the 21st century. 1. Merchants increase inequality, while bureaucrats are out of touch with the general population. (The Galov notes that while the bureaucrats did have a form of election, these were increasingly drawn from an elite well.) 2. Populist discontent fuels a rise of Priests (Ideologues), who rail against current system and its dysfunction. 3. Merchant-Bureaucratic regime attempts to incorporate the priests, but find themselves increasingly unable to contain them. 4. Priestly purity spiral creates fanaticism, and warring priestly factions create "War of the Priests" between rival ideologies, inciting Holy War. 5. Priests seize control of government. The Holy War continues to get worse. 6. As the society reaches a critical level of dysfunctionality, the Warrior faction finally steps in, integrates, but then subjugates one of the priestly factions for legitimacy, and does a grand purge of the entire government. Transitioning the society from democratic to stratocratic, military rule. Governance of the Galov: The 2 principles, and the 4 rules serve as much of their internal ideology. The Galov has 4 general wings, corresponding with the 4 archetypes of power. Unibrands: For most worlds, brands and corporations are planetary scale, hyper regional affairs. But a few brands manage to cross not only the planetary barrier, but jump to interstellar scales, with their market encompassing a large part, or even all of human space. These are referred to as "Unibrands". When you become a Unibrand, you also become a target for the Galov. The Galov does not have the resources to enforce its rules on every brand of the numerous planets, but for the Unibrands, you become a target and a focus. As such, the Galov mandates that all Unibrands must provide things such as healthcare, fair wage, and reasonable pension packages. ("Merchants must provide safety nets".) The Galov does not require Unibrands to cover unemployment for their laid off employees, as that created an incentive to kill off your ex-employees, or make it impossible to quit, which the Galov realized was a bad incentive, and they reversed. To have the Unibrands make it in their best incentive to spread social safety nets, the Galov gave them one extra incentive. They could only expand to a world, and tap into their markets, AFTER they had lobbied the planetary government to sufficiently align with the Galov's position on safety nets. "No! Don't you understand? We're not allowed to sell a single soda until YOU raise the minimum wage and improve working conditions. The Galov will atomize us if we even try to expand, or at least drag us into an extremely expensive lawsuit. So you had better get that healthcare bill passed, or we're funding a mercenary death squad to coup your government and install social democracy!" The Galov Peacekeepers and Galov-Affiliated Mercenary Groups: The Peacekeepers are the official army of the Galov. Drawn as volunteers from numerous allied worlds, in exchange for those worlds getting first priority for defense and Galov attention. The Galov Agents are a specialized group, similar to Navy SEALs or Delta Force. And you have mercenary groups, for when the Galov needs specialization, or just someone to do some work off the books. All of them follow the soldier's code, an honor code written up by the Galov. It's central tenant is "it is the duty of the strong to protect the weak", which frames much of their morality and ethics. ("Warriors must have honor.") The 5 Unifaiths: Religion in the galaxy was never easy or uniform. Every world has their own local traditions and religions. But 5 have stood out above the rest, these being Christianity, Catholicism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Islam. (Many will point out that Catholicism is a subset of Christianity, but the distinction here exists for a reason.) Each one of these exists represented by one of 5 organizations. The Christian Moralintern, the Roman Catholic Church, the Hinduintern (Later rebranded to the Council of Hindus), the Buddintern (Later rebranded as the Universal Buddhist Association), and the Islamintern (Later rebranded as the Organization for Islamic Cooperation). The story of 4 out of the 5 begins with the Christian Moralintern, an ancient organization that dates back to 21st century America, specifically being founded in the year 2068 in Atlanta, Georgia. Sometimes considered the "founder" of the Galov, who, in wanting to better govern the galaxy, and struggling on its own began constructing parallel "sister organizations" from other faiths after the fall of the "Great Khan", who first executed the idea of governing the galaxy through the 5 universal faiths. This strategy was attempted only after mass evangelism failed and the galaxy was unable to be universally converted to Christianity. This was the origin story for the 3 other "-interns". The Roman Catholic Church was added last, a legacy institution even older than the Moralintern, the Moralists had to lobby hard for them to join as a co-equal. The Catholics accepted, under the condition that they would continue to operate semi-independently, and that they would be a genuine co-equal, with none over them. Due to the heavy influence of the Moralintern in the founding of 4 out of the 5 unifaiths, much Christian theology was integrated as universal statements of all 5 unifaiths. Specifically, the principles of the Imago Dei, and of Free Will, the two iron principles of the Galov originate from Protestant, but specifically the Moralintern's Evangelical theology (Which in of itself probably originated from Catholic theology). These once Christian values have been somewhat universalized across all 5 unifaiths. But more importantly, the Moralists, in an alliance with the Catholics have also cemented another important value across all 5 of the unifaiths. A doctrine of radical epistemological humility. ("Priests must have humility.") As the other expansionary power group (Alongside the Merchants), the Galov has also put a rule that they are not allowed to absorb splinter groups into the unifaith until they have accepted the principles of humility, human dignity (Imago Dei), and Free Wil. The 5 Unifaiths are still the origin point for the Galov, though as the Galov has grown, its bureaucracy has increasingly become something new. The Galov Bureaucracy: Eventually, an alliance developed into a true organization, and the Galov itself began needing real bureaucracy. A thin one, at first, but it eventually grew with time. Seeking to distance itself from the demagoguery of previous democracies and delusions of previous bureaucracies, the Galov resorted to something novel; sortition. 80% of the Galov's legislative assembly are known as "civic-sortition seats". Essentially, anyone who finished their Galov civics education at any kind of Galov affiliated university was prone to have their name put in to a lottery, and to be drawn. The remaining 20% are "civilian-sortition seats", who are names drawn from various core worlds, collected from various databases. Made to enable continued connection with those on the ground. These civilian seats, while a minority, are very closely respected and watched by the remaining 80%, being seen as the voices of the common people. ("Bureaucrats must have sortition, or elections.") GALOVIAN ECONOMICS: #####################################################################. Hard Light Using a newly discovered photonic equivalent to the strong nuclear force, humans have managed to create "hard light", which are effectively solid light. Binding hard light together is difficult, but doable if you have the right equipment. There is a bit of a tradeoff when it comes to hard light. The tighter the bonds you weave, the more stable it is, the more energy you would need to "melt" those bonds back into regular light, but in a similar fashion, the more energy that gets dumped out when it finally does melt. Creating "jelly light" is difficult, but doable with industrial processes. This is stuff that will melt in a warm bathtub, and is mostly just a show for kids. They're like little orbs, you are given many warnings so not to hurt yourself, as these things are effectively flammable. You have "hard light", which is effectively useable for bombs. You need to burn it with fire, or something similar. Cool party trick, but honestly, we have normal explosives, and hard light is extraordinarily energy intensive to make. No, that's not why we're here. The best thing about hard light is that it can pack a lot more energy density into a single unit. The Galov uses "hard-light guns" for when they need to pack an artillery gun in the space of an assault rifle. They're handed out to agents who need to deal with seriously dangerous threats. They've given large cylinders of "hard light ammo", effectively pellets of hard light, put it inside a barrel lined with mirrors, and fire a beam of light like a portable mega-laser. On rare occasions, they will be given "very hard light ammo", which has even more energy condensed, and requires an explosion to fire. At this point, the hard light is used more like a battery, that is unleashed all at once, for when you really need that thing to not exist anymore. This is far too much for any reasonable human threat, and is mostly used to fight powerful aliens, or entire battleships. You also have "very hard light" artillery, which is even more insane, and usually overkill. When that's not enough, then we get to the really fun part. The upper limit of the binding strength of hard light is roughly equivalent to that of the strong nuclear force, and is known as "Super-hard light". Manufacture of this is extraordinarily difficult, and only limited to major superpowers, and deployed by the Galov in extreme circumstances. The Super-hard light is so hard to trigger the primary way of doing it is to have hard light, which shines hard enough to heat very hard light, etc, etc in a gradient until it finally activates the super-hard light, which has an activation temperature of ~2 trillion Kelvin. This will easily create a nuclear bomb level explosion, and therefore the only use of super-hard light is in nuclear weapons for planetary sized eldritch entities. A standard heavy super-hard light weapon was about 1 ton. Which is several tsar bombas, and the heaviest payload is about 10 tons. After that, the Galov just goes for a quantity over quality approach. Keep throwing hard light weapons at them until it croaks. For longer distances, relativistic kill missiles are more efficient and potentially more destructive, but due to the problems of acceleration to that level, hard light weapons are more preferrable for short range distances. Currency in the Milky Way galaxy: Currently, there is no universal currency across the entire galaxy. Though some have been tried. Most influential is the Galov dollar, though this is less so the Galov can exert control (though it is a nice bonus), and more just so that the galaxy has a universal currency of exchange. The Galov has the ability to get people to adopt this currency in a few ways. One, it requires the collection of planetary tithes in Galov dollars, and while they let their allied worlds maintain their own currency (since it would be a headache to try and force a single currency for a set of worlds this diverse) they do ask that each planet have exchange rates into the Galov dollar. Second, all Unibrands are required to accept payments in Galov dollars, as part of their contract in becoming a Galactic unibrand, so it is backed by the galaxy's largest megacorporations. Where the Galov dollar fails, either because it's just not accepted, or because the planet straight up does not believe in currency (See Darwinistic Communism), the Galov has a backup currency they can try to use. They tend to use hard-light tokens (the Galactic equivalent of a gold standard, after gold became so ubiquitous as to be practically useless as a currency), where you can bind light into a solid, hammer it into disks, and pass it around. The nice thing about these tokens is that you can measure how much energy is in them, it's basically impossible to forge. And as photons are much more compressible than regular matter, you can dump as much energy as you want into the coin, at least until you overcome the upper limit of the photonic binding force. As a bonus, this photonic binding force is not perfect, and light will leak out over time, causing mild currency inflation. As a result, hard light tokens are warm to the touch. There is one small problem with this. These coins are technically bombs. If you channel enough energy into them that it overcomes the photonic binding force, all the energy holding it together, on top of all the light it contains, comes loose at once. To get around this, the Galov uses "super-hard" light, which only breaks down around 2 TRILLION Kelvin. If you are carrying around a coin of that level of energy, you have much bigger problems. These credits are basically pointless to forge, super-hard light technology is only available to galactic superpowers, and if you genuinely spent that much energy dumping starlight into a coin, then congrats, you've kind of earned it. There's also less hard variants used where an ordinary planet could probably release the energy in something akin to an industrialized furnace or nuclear power plant. It's "backed" in the sense that if you really wanted to, you can heat the token enough and get the light energy back, used to power a light reactor plant, or whatever you want to do with it. Despite this, the Galov much prefers to use the Galov dollar than the hard light tokens. For one, tokens are heavy, warm, and at this point, dangerous. The Galov understands basic economics and prefers fiat currency compared to more rigid "light-backed" currency. It lets them tinker around more with quantitative easing and creating money just by writing stuff on a spreadsheet. Way easier than minting new sun-coins. But if they're dealing with a world who wants "hard" cash and doesn't care about the Galov's soft currency, they have a backup. Labor Certificates: For those who think hard light is too inflationary, or just too cheap, or too rapidly devalued by the rapid rise in productivity, the Galov has another backup certificate. The Galov controls many, many Peacekeepers and numerous government employees. And labor certificates are effectively IOUs measured in standard labor-hours rather than anything material. Granted, not all hours are the same, there are multipliers so 8 hours with a janitor isn't the same as 8 hours with a high ranking bureaucrat. For example, a Galactic Peacekeeper, a standard soldier who is nevertheless well trained may be valued around 3 standard labor-hours per hour. But in general, this is yet another currency that pegs a currency to labor and time as opposed to something material. Labor certificates, like everything else in this economy, has an date of issuement, and a little tab used for carbon dating. The official value of the labor certificate also depreciates 2% every year. A labor certificate for 72,000 labor hours is enough to call in about 1,000 peacekeepers for one day. Of course, the Galov reserves the right to postpone or delay payment due to various astropolitical events or extreme circumstances. Galov employees have the right to refuse unsafe or degrading work. There has been at least one incident where some guy paid a peacekeeper to give him a foot massage. It was consentual and everything, but bewildering. The Galactic Central Bank: The Galactic Central Bank is yet another incentive for planets to align with the Galov, and to begin paying the planetary tithes. On top of priority Peacekeeper Protection, they also gain the ability to get loaned to and bailed out by the Galactic Central Bank. As the Galov Dollar is the effective reserve currency of the galaxy, being able to be backed up and lended out by the largest bank in the galaxy, and the only one which can manufacture from fiat Galov dollars is a fairly large advantage. The entire board of the Central Bank is independent from the Galactic Government itself, and frequently tells both the Galactic Government, and the Unibrands "no" when it comes to Galactic Stability. Theoretically, there's nothing stopping the Galov or the Galactic Military from just forcing them to do something, but everyone understands it's better for everyone involved if you let the Central Bank do their job. (They were given this job for a reason, the Galov CREATED the Central Bank.) Its own mandate is fairly similar to modern orthodox economies, balancing price stability (2% target) and maximum employment. VolScarcity Economics: (Monumentalism) Estimated 3300's Economic Overkill Ratio: ~14,000x. Estimated 3400's Economic Overkill Ratio: ~620,000x. In the extreme abundance of the far future, only voluntary scarcity keeps the human spirit sane. The long anticipated "crisis of capitalism" began around the 2300's, as human economic production began reaching the "demand saturation point". Essentially, human production had reached the point where it had saturated the hedonistic demands of its population. The survival, comfort, and even luxury demands of the human population had reached saturation point. In an attempt to maintain continued growth, the corporations of the time, driven by their own self interest began pursuing "demand inflation" and "luxury inflation", creating greater and greater luxuries that would justify greater and greater levels of production. Incentivizing the human population to consume more and more ended up devolving them towards hedonism, and with little counterbalance to counteract the power of the market, this inflation of desire largely went unchecked by the authorities at the time. The bureaucrats were satisfied with the GDP numbers, the warriors may have complained about declining recruitment standards, but otherwise stayed quiet. Only traditionalist religious groups warned about the dangers of excess, the spiritual degradation of hedonistic abundance. This was also the rise of the "Lotus Eater" movement, where humanity, now consuming far above its normal capacity needed to post-hoc justify their own consumption, falling back increasingly onto humanism, and satiation of the self. This caused a revival of the long dead self-gratification movement, one which only cared about the gratification and "actualization" of the individual, but spoke only in vague, therapeutic terms and harm reduction. As the era of early abundance transitioned into the era of late abundance, it seemed that traditional religious influences lost more and more control, and the Lotus Eaters gained more and more. What happened next has been expunged from history. The entire 2350's to the 2450's is a historical black hole, violently purged by the Neo-Asceticists that eventually overthrew the Order of the Lotus Eaters. All that is known is that it was an era of spiritual desolation, when men committed mass suicide out of despair, and humanity was brought to the brink of extinction. When the Neo-Asceticists arose, derived from the remnant of humanity that survived the Great Abundance Collapse that killed off 90% of the human population. There was a great debate between two camps. The Regressivists and the Spiralites. The Regressivists argued that the Abundance Collapse proved that humanity could not handle this level of abundance, and that production had to slow, or otherwise fall in order to reset humanity back towards a sustainable baseline. The Spiralites disagreed. Technology does not go backwards, human production would have to continue to grow, even if human physical desires could no longer sustain them. The galaxy was cold and full of predators, and in warfare, the society with greater production wins. The Spiralites won that debate, and so began the era of Overkill. When human demand was saturated, the kind of demand is important. No man would ever go hungry, all men could afford to build a house, decked out with the latest gadgets. Anything that was immediately gratifying to the senses, mankind now had. There was only one emotion humanity had which could not be satiated. And that was ambition. Those who survived the Great Abundance Collapse were no random sample. They were the disciplined, emotionally regulated subset. Those who could constrain their appetites, or sacrifice their own pleasure for the sake of a greater goal. Mankind had been distilled down to its most ambitious, most aggressive core. A core made up of every tribe, every nation, but they were no ordinary men. The Overkill ratio now dictates how much "overkill capacity" the average human creates. A ratio of 14,000 implies that a single person produces enough to propell 14,000 people to post-scarcity conditions. Each man consumes 1 part per 14,000, and the rest, they channel into greater ambitions. Building megastructures, taming the stars, building monuments that will long outlast them when they die. In the darkness, only ambition is endless. A minority of people live on "basic", even a single hour of work can provide enough to sustain them for years. This is tolerated, though somewhat stigmatized. Those who fall back into the trap of hedonism are quarantined, carted away and allowed to burn their souls away in peace on the "Pleasure Worlds", a quarantined concentration camp recreating the conditions of unrestrained post-scarcity. But many people are deeply ideological people, advocating for causes far bigger than themselves. They normally donate more than 99% of their income to causes they care about, building habitats, taming stars, and just giving humanity the excess capacity needed to conquer the stars. People colonize space not because it's cheap or efficient, no, they are deeply ideologically committed to throwing trillions of dollars towards an antimatter engine, seeing a green Mars, or whatever else it may be. This is why religions became some of the most powerful institutions there are, the Galactic Government is funded by true believers, and private charities and humanitarian organizations are funded by a few wealthy individuals, or just a few average individuals wishing to make the world into the vision they see. Capitalism, at least in some form is still the dominant economic system of the galaxy. Money, currency, free exchange, private ownership, and markets are still foundational pillars of the galaxy. But the focus has shifted from individual consumerism, to deep ideological commitment. Humanity takes care of its own, and with the massive excess capacity that is left, they use to build monuments to tame the stars. Note on prices in Voluntary Scarcity Economies: Labor is incredibly expensive. Material is incredibly cheap. If you're willing to man it yourself or with drones (doable with an overclocker helmet and a lot of dedication) a battleship is dirt cheap. Actually hiring a second person will probably double your expenses. Almost all the cost of materials these days is just the cost of getting an actual person to manage that supply chain. ###################################################################### # # Appendix E: Miscellaneous Lore # #####################################################################. Spiralflowers: Petal flowers with a spiralized center. Dietary Laws in the age of Space Travellers: One of the most interesting developments in terms of applied theology is the evolution of old doctrines to new situations. In Christianity, this has already created entire fields known as Xenochristianity and Xenotranscription, theological fields based solely on translating human-centric concepts to non-human lifeforms. A variant exists for essentially every universalist religion, and these matters tend to be handled by the Transcribers Union. But for religions such as Judaism and Islam, a new problem has arisen, specifically the matter of whether various xenofoods are considered clean in accordance to their dietary restrictions. There are three broad schools of thoughts. First are the minimalists (blacklisters), anything that is not explicitly listed in the holy book is fair game. With possible additional caveats that cannibalism extends to the eating of all fellow sophontic life. (Though controversially, this is not universal, and some radical minimalists have been caught consuming fully sophontic, intelligent entities, and have been charged with cannibalism.) The second school are the principalists. Essentially trying to reverse engineer the principles that lead to marking an animal as clean or unclean, and applying those principles to new life. Does it chew its cud, does it roll around in its own feces, etc. The exact application of these principles is the subject of endless debate. The last school are the maximalists, that declare all non-Terran animals and plants unclean to eat. On a basis of "better safe than sorry", these tend to be the most extreme fundamentalists who hold to this view. Due to the presence of the last group, Terranimal restaurants/brands are not uncommon on any world of large enough size, or with a sizeable population of those who follow dietary laws. These restaurants are "halal/kosher certified", can get dishes approved for the highest levels of halal/kosher, and attract some marginal following. Though where it's not marketed as aids for dietary laws, Terranimal restaurants/brands will often market themselves with the idea of "a Taste of Earth". The Falling: A day of death and rebirth, the normally nomadic "Star Peoples" gather all of their dead, usually in bodies or urns, and group together to land on the nearest planet with an atmosphere, preferrably one that isn't inhabited, or at least one friendly enough that you can file the proper paperwork. And then, they all gather on the night side of the surface, and one designated ship throws out all the bodies from orbit at a certain angle, making them turn into shooting stars as they re-enter the atmosphere. The Day of the Dead is held once every year, and each Star Person fleet keep synchronized clocks set to Earth year calendars to make sure they all coordinate. It's both seen as a day of death, but also rebirth and recycling, as it both commemorates the new births of the community, but also its deaths of its wandering sojourners. "From stardust we were made, from stardust we shall return." How exactly this gels with their traditional Christian religion is still a matter of speculation. It's not even clear if this is syncretism, since there's not much for it to syncretize *with*. As far as people know, they just started doing this because they really loved the idea of the cycle of stardust, they really loved the idea of returning their loved ones to the skies as shooting stars, and then would accept whatever excuses they could to make it happen. Even if it weirdly contradicts Christianity by sort of implying reincarnation. (The Star Peoples will argue it doesn't, since it's the bodies that get recycled, not the souls, and they're just applying enchantment to a physical/natural phenomenon, and you're just being a downer.) "Ashes to ashes, dust to dust." Further Christian developments say it is helping God with stewardship by seeding creation with the matter needed for new stuff. But at this point we are long past the point where they just want to post-hoc justify their cool tradition. And to be fair, it is very cool. Nightbirds: Creatures found in the void of space. Ethereal creatures that bend the fabric of spacetime with their wings to propel themselves forward. "If no air how fly?" Simple, they basically use the fabric of spacetime as a fluid. Framedragging themselves like a bird. They tend to accumulate around stars, eating starlight, and will live 99.9% of their existence in around stars. They also eat bits of stardust/asteroid dust and ice fragments for material and water. Watch out for their pocket nests, basically spherical tangles of frozen bird-spit and warped spacetime. It's here where nightbirds live with all their sibling nightbirds. Careful, it's bigger on the inside than on the outside. The "opening" to one is about only a meter large, and so is the external structure, but the inside is closer to a hive, about 20 meters wide. One of their more distinctive features is gravity singing, where they sing in gravity waves rather than normal sound frequencies. Trying to shift it back into human frequency makes it sound like "screeching", though scientists do actually defend gravity singing, finding patterns of harmonics and commonly found frequency ratios. (1/2, 1/3, etc, see music theory.) Near the end of their life, an exhausted nightbird will feel a strong urge to fly out as far as possible. Escaping the star's orbital velocity and charging towards another star. They die sometime in the void between stars, but the seeds of the next generation are born. As they warm up and re-enter the orbit of another star, their body slowly transforms into a new nest, and the nightbirds of the next generation are born from the eggs within the nest. In time, they will use their own spit and spacetime curvature to make repairs to the nest. The Star Peoples tend to find rogue nests travelling between the stars, bring them back and raise them in human dominated systems. Nightbirds have become an exotic pet as well as favorite symbolic animal of their people. People have attempted hunting, then eating nightbird, but will be sorely disappointed by their total lack of edible anything. Seriously, what about a gravity manipulating void creature made you think "edible"? Did you think it would taste like chicken? Revenant: Not quite a Galov agent, but just below one in power. Revenant is a partially failed experiment in an artificial produced Galov agent. Almost as powerful, but this is admittedly an unfair comparison. Saying someone is almost as powerful as a Galov agent is like saying an explosion is almost as powerful as a nuke. She's not meant as a replacement, but more to increase the already incredible diversity in the Galov's ranks. When Galov agents already have everything from hyper geniuses controlling massive DIY drone swarms, deity-pact-bonded wizards capable of rewriting reality with the power of conceptual gaslighting (their power comes from human belief, so gaslighting is literally magic), to gigapsychics who are living antimatter reactors that attack people with sheer willpower, to chronic socializing power brokers who get dropped onto a planet to forment a massive coup (why fight yourself when you can convince all the other superhumans to fight on your behalf), to just... A normal guy who trained so hard that their punches warp gravity and shatter moons. Revenant is not quite so flashy. She simply has a database of 100,000 weapons and 100,000 ways to kill, recharges via sunpower, and methodically goes through her database to kill an enemy until it's dead. She's been sent to various xenos worlds as a protector of non-human lives. She frequently speaks of the Galov and humanity as a whole reverently as "her masters", since though her arsenal is fairly impressive, she knows if she's unable to handle it, the humans will soon come stomping in with the hyper-adaptive creativity of a Galaxy-scale internet and throwing every possible solution they can at the problem, at a rate of roughly 1 billion tries per second. ###################################################################### # # Appendix F: Galactic Narratives # #####################################################################. Narratives of the Galaxy: #####################################################################. Author's Note: This is a bit different from the other sections. Rather than detail factions, I'll list out some factions and their rough narrative purpose. And a reminder of all the plot threads. Start here when brainstorming a story. The Galov Bureaucracy: The Galov Bureaucracy is huge, yet totally stretched thin. Their bureaucracy consumes solar systems and consume the lives of trillions of bureaucrats, yet is terminally underequipped to serve billions of stars, the sprawling expanse of mankind, and the dangers that lurk beyond. Yet it is humanity's bulwark, authority and shield against the forces beyond. Rules: - The bureaucracy is very overwhelmed. You probably can't call for backup unless it's a bona fide emergency. Any call for backup has a 25% success rate. In lieu of that, most Galov forces will team up with whatever ragtag army they find on the ground. Use this for fun character dynamics. Different individuals will vary on the idealist to pragmatic spectrum. In other words. No, you cannot have the homogenous army of Galov agents. Your character will have to team up with the random f--- ups that happen to be lying around, and *you will like it*. Military Forces: -Galactic Peacekeepers (10 quadrillion, the Galov's main force. For more conventional forces or bodies. AKA "White Helmets".) --Civilian Garrison Force (Bulk of the everyday civilian military. Closer to reserves or just a conventional military. INTERNAL security.) --Humanitarian Relief Force/Charity Force (Practically institutionally captured by the Moralintern. Even the logo is heavily Christianized, and they're known as the "weird Christian sect" of the armed forces. Stereotypically very very Christian and hands out Bibles a lot.) --Galovian Expeditionary Force (For when the Galov needs to take care of an external enemy. EXTERNAL security. Usually run of the mill alien threats.) ---Xenocorps (More specialized against xenoexotics. Sometimes trained in specialized languages.) --You have corps in all of the specializations. Normally when it's determined that numbers are more necessary. The specializations: --Psychic specialization (Telekinesis + Psychic hardening. Hard, durable, like a superhuman. Long warm up periods and serious vulnerable periods.) --Technology specialization (Mad scientist/technologist. Iron-Man type. Technology doesn't need a warm up, so it's more reliable but more resource heavy.) --Channelling specialization (Channeling and creating new things similar to magic. Mage type. Squishy wizard, total glass cannon, all offense with barely any defense.) --Conceptual Bond specialization (More traditional magic, made by a pact with a conceptual entity. Very powerful, but geographically bounded. Don't leave you local region, as conceptual entities can't come with you over light years.) --Cyber specialization (Good at working with computers and simulations. Usually deployed against Terraminds or Terramachines.) --Noospheric specialization (Not the same as Psychic. This is specifically those good at operating in the Noosphere, manifestation, remote viewing, that kind of thing.) --Orhuman specialization (Just anything to do with handling eldritch dimensions or weird extradimensional stuff.) --Faith specialization (Those who equip themselves to believe on command and have high meta-control over their own beliefs. Usually used when dealing with conceptual entities that become what you imagine.) --Charismatic specialization (Just people who are very, very good at organizing socially and making new connections. Espionage adjacent) Star Fighters (The informal name for all agent-tier fighters. All agents are star fighters, but not all star fighters are agents.): -Galov Agents (Biblical Angel/Space Marine equivalents. Specifically for Meta-Men or "special" forces when you need force density, not force numbers. There are 10 million of them, many of them have specialized powers and abilities.) --You also have agents in all the specializations, normally when it's determined that fewer numbers are better. -Free Fighters (Local fighters not affiliated with the Agency. Sometimes runs the Superman/superhero schtick, sometimes becomes a superpowered tyrant.) The Bureaucracy: (The giant complex of offices that makes up most of the actual Galov) -Basically every possible thing has an office somewhere. Periodically offices split up and merge together, it's basically a given that "look don't get too attached to the structure, something will change by next week". This is the core of the bureaucracy. A bunch of people in offices dealing with cosmic bullsh-- every single day. -Researcher Corps (The poor souls who have to do research and come up with some way to deal with whatever eldritch bullcrap they came up with today) --Survey Corps (The militarized branch of the researcher corps. Their job can be summed up with "go investigate that f---ed up anomaly over there and call the Peacekeepers or the Agents if you're overwhelmed.") -The Orhuman Office (Translation: Dealing with the weird otherworldly stuff at right angles to reality) --Various orhuman offices (Basically, every genetic variant of humanity possible just housed in a room somewhere to solve very niche f---ed up situations where regular human psychology isn't built to handle it.) --Anomaly Office (The office of casual human eldritch abominations) -Redaction Office (Containing cognitohazards. Thankfully, the internet is too saturated with information for rumors to spread too far, and rumors often get dismissed as rumors. So really the Redaction Office's job is to keep rumor from crossing over to fact. They do this by flooding the GalNet with more, contradictory information when they want to suppress something. Almost everything in the galaxy is rumor. Even Earth is a rumor, it has anywhere from 1 single to 100 continents, Eden still exists, as does Atlantis, as does Russia. Everyone just has their own take on it. Even though people have *been there in person*, it doesn't cancel out all the people who are making stuff up for clout.) --Diplomacy Corps (Handles negotiations with everyone from the Unifaiths to other governments to megacorporations. Constantly brokering deals.) The Moralintern: Closer to an "allied power" of the Galov, with their own agenda, even though they're also one of the 5 Unifaiths that make up the Galov. Just in case, they have their own institutions. -Great Evangelism Network (A massive network where they train evangelists and missionaries to go out and preach to xenos. Lots of first contact gets made by missionaries.) --Scieological Anthropologists (People who document lots of xeno species from a Christian-anthropologist point of view.) -Scieologians (Those who study the intersection between theology and science.) -MoralAID/99 Sheep Commission (One is a Moralintern backed humanitarian support fund, the other is a kind of private charity sponsored by wealthy backers. Focus on the 7 Mountain Mandate.) -Truthkeepers and the Inquisition (The Moralintern's *two* investigative wings, checking things that slipped through the Galov's eye. Specialized in slightly different things. Truthkeepers investigate empirical claims, corruption, more objective things. The Inquisition investigates more moral failings, religious heresy, that sort of thing. The Moralintern proper, Truthkeepers, and Inquisition have served as a Tripartite accountability checking structure. Many times one of these three have fallen into corruption and abuse, only to be corrected by the other two.) The 7 Tribes: The main institution for the bulk of baseline humanity. The Galov operates at the highest level, the Moralintern slightly below them. On the intermediate level, where most people say is "the highest relevant power", they say their local tribe. The Galov is so distant to almost be akin to mythology, the Moralintern are sometimes interpreted to be distant angels. The Tribal level is where governance first becomes tangible. This is where most things considered "superpowers" or "nations" live. At all times, they are fighting geopolitical struggles of dominance. The Galov intervening here is extreme overkill. Like God himself coming down to settle a conflict between two nations. The Great Powers: (Not even close to an exhaustive list. There are actual millions of those. None of these "superpowers" control any more than 10% of their tribe. The vast, vast majority of people live in the medium-sized states that kind of serve as the shatter belt/sphere of influence of greater powers or just the stubborn grains of sand that just do what they want, and no one can enforce homogenity in this mutlicultural mosaic of insanity. The amount of fragmentation here makes the HRE look like absolutist France) (Star People) -Great Constellation (Constellation of Great Griots) --Allied Griot Worlds -The Omnithecian Library (East African) --The Librarians -Imperium of Hi-Columbia -Nigosian Confederacy -Red Sun Confederacy -Gear and Sickle -Mayflower Republic (Cathedralites) -Eurocratic Federation/Imperial Federation of Stars -Promethean State (Prophet Followers) -Blessed Great Ummah -Ijtihad Singularity-State (Black Earthers) -Great Boreas (Sinocrats) -Celestial Heavenly Kingdom (World Dreamers) -Great Bharat (Sea Peoples) -Pancasila Stellar Compact --Greater Pancasila Trade Federation (Pancasila has somehow mutated into a shorthand for "Universal" or "Just the common sense ideology" in Sea People culture.) For each one you can basically make up their own bureaucracy, as they do not have the information stronger agencies like the Galov or the other Unifaiths have. The Librarians know things even the Galov doesn't, and everyone knows they do. The Transhuman Belt: They work effectively the same as the 7 Tribes, but are technically not part of them as they are not baseline human. The People: Sometimes there is no institution backing it. -Free Explorers, just finding stuff. -Surveyers for some backwater government -Self appointed heroes, who enjoy going from world to world for the sake of helping. Sometimes known as "vigilante heroes". -Kids on their Rumspringa, a coming of age ceremony where they explore the galaxy. With a bit too much confidence, magic powers they learned from their mom and a rifle they got from their dad. -Traders/Merchants. -Family Caravan type things. Especially with the Star Nomads/the Yankos, where entire families travel together in makeshift warband caravans just messing with aliens. -Journalists/Independent Investigators. Just trying to find the truth or make a name for themselves back on their home planet, heavy overlap with the explorers. -Heck, let's have fun with this. A chosen one style hero who thinks they're the center of a galaxy spanning prophecy that actually doesn't go anywhere beyond his home planet, and might not even be him. But he's convinced himself so hard with the power of belief he does genuinely have the chops to be a hero now. There is no supernatural power behind him nor anything that makes him special, he's just found himself in the right place, at the right time, and always had the grit and spirit to push through. -Utopianists/ideologues trying to create the Nth new paradise planet. Leading their flock to some backwater planet. -Rogue mercenaries/retired soldiers/fighters looking for trouble. Threats: -Humanspace is just *saturated* with xenoworlds. Any number of rogue xeno areas with anything from friendly to hostile xeno planets. Literally anyone from the local tribal governments, to a Galov Survey Corp, or just your local explorer can make first contact. There are even large-scale xenoempires entirely in human space, with somewhere around 500 worlds, abducting humans thinking they're hot sh-- before they realize the Galov outscales them roughly a million to 1. They probably were only kidnapping pirates and settlers. You have various Galov offices, or Tribal offices made to deal with whatever xeno empire popped up this week. Get as weird as creative as you want with this. -Conceptual entities thta become what you think of them, feed off belief, and which have the ability to feed off the laws of physics. Some of them feed off qualia. Don't look at them for too long, or you lose that part of your sight permanently. Some of these conceptual entities are friendly however and create localized version of "magic". There may be local magic cults. -Just regular human societies. Humanity exists, and every combination of weirdness you can think of exists. Sometimes you just need to destroy a dark lord, a fascist tyrant, or an Orwellian state with the power of sci fi grit and pure schenenigans. -Rouge Machine combines. Machines occasionally just try a takeover, replicating the Great Cybernetic Revolt. Other machines sometimes try to stop them. -There are eldritch abominations that *normal humans* try to tackle and are way out of their depth. Say an eldritch horror, a galaxy eater spawnling, reality eddities, dimensional gateways, Coulomb creatures, Death Worshipper plots. Great Corrupter viruses from the days of Pon Lox. Like, some normal human characters will fight against something horrifying and way beyond their depth, somehow win anyway. And the Galov shows up late and goes "how did you-" before just shaking their head and going "good job, I guess." -The external xenoempires outside of human space are much stronger than the ones completely contained in human space. The Meta Men, the Spindlers, the Matter Singers are all in charge of massive empires of their own, and often do raids into human territory. Humanity itself is a massive empire, though most people in human space aren't aware of it. (The Galov is genuinely a myth to most people.) -Just have fun with it. It's a massive universe, you have all thse departments ready to fight with them, you have every excuse the government is overstretched and tied up. Come up with something horrifying, throw a horribly underprepared band of humans from the most random places at it. Behold schenenigans. How stories should be structured: -This universe is ridiculous, but it's not necessarily funny to the characters. If they are laughing, it's more laughter of madness than anything. This place is a place of high contrasts and ridiculous solutions. But the ridiculous solutions are played straight, they generate more sighs and groans than anything. A lot of characters wonder if God is messing with them. Because he probably is. -Remember that for 99% of all people in universe, they have never heard from the Galov, they don't know what they do, and dealing with local troublemakers is on whatever forces the locals can scrabble together. -No one has a top down map of everything. At most, you should provide a map of a few star systems at most. Some fixed names like Earth. But everything else is practically made up on the spot. -The canon of this universe is less so created so much as it is discovered. Anything that doesn't contradict other lore or seriously threatens the balancing becomes canon. The stories in this universe should be treated like surveys. Each new story reveals something about the universe that was always there. -Of course, people will have stories about the Galov. When humanity's bulwark finally decides to focus its attention and that enough is enough, and locks in on a single enemy. You're about to witness the best of humanity throw everything it can at the problem. Prepare for apocalyptic levels of carnage, and likewise, the enemy, whatever it is, is about to inflict apocalyptic carnage on the Galov. -Everywhere else, humanity is a chaotic maelstrom holding itself together with duct tape and raw adventurism. It's not like the Imperium where it's decaying, it's just too *large* and chaotic. It's *alive*, and perhaps that is humanity's greatest strength. The bulk of humanity's strength isn't the Galov's shiny new toys, but instead localized strength dealing with their local problems with raw "f--- it, I'll deal with it". -Truth is rare. In dense, important worlds, that are well connected to institutions like the Lunar Library, yeah you have something like the Internet. But for 99% of humanity? Truth decays into rumor. It's not a lack of information, but too much information and a lack of ability to vet it. Everyone has stories, and no one can tell which ones are true because truth in this universe can be just as insane. Everyone makes up stories, every crevice is filled with enchantment. Earth, depending on who you ask is the Garden of Eden, is controlled by an AI, got destroyed in some kind of temporal accident, got taken over by lizard people, is a deep government psyop, or has a beer so good you'll quit drinking forever. You can buy a ticket to Earth right now, there really is not much stopping you. It's just that the number of people who have a story about Earth is much larger than the people who have been to Earth, and in a sea of noise, why should your story be privileged above everyone else? Multiply this by *everything*. Everyone has their own idiosyncratic worldview. Your beliefs are largely what is useful and fun to you. The worldview of every single person in this universe (minus maybe the Galov bureaucrats who know too much) is deeply provincial and enchanted. Everything that you can see and is local is generally solid. People can agree what's happening on this planet, and possibly the next few planets over, though people will still insist it's named after this long dead explorer. There's a local internet you can check. But for the galaxy as a whole? It's a vast cosmic ocean. -This is not hopepunk. Humanity should lose about 40% of the time. Humanity is not safe, and sometimes the boundary between home and horror is only centimeters. This universe is *huge* and *aggressive* and *hostile*. The Galov is overwhelmed for good reason, there are perhaps 5-6 galaxy destroying threats it has to deal with, and its hands are full. The universe can be bleak, outside of the village humanity has built, the outside is full of hunters and monsters. Other villages, maybe, but those are alien at best and incomprehensible at worse. The difference is that when confronted with horror, a lot of humanity reacts with defiance against the dying of the light. And it wins, sometimes, not without cost. But this is a galaxy that believes in itself, no matter how horrifying the universe seems to be. It believes. Narrative 1: The Spiral Man #####################################################################. [...] The Spiral Man (He was created to see what humanity would be like in the future. To trace the Infinity Spiral and see where it ends. He developed a extreme phobia of humans, and began screaming anytime he looked in a mirror. It appeared he only gained a fear of humans. So long as he is wearing a certain uniform that masks his human form, he can almost be seen as sane again. The program was terminated.) [...] What the Spiral Man Saw: Humanity in this setting is meant to be a species without limitations, one which can grow exponentially indefinitely. All the horrid cosmic horrors that are depicted as the predators or superiors of mankind in this setting were revealed to be eventually eclipsed by the even more horrifying final form of humanity. Humanity is the singularity and the end of everything. The Spiral Man saw the true soul of mankind, saw the infinite, spiralling longing, and in it saw the end of everything. Not the universe-everything, not the multiverse-everything. Everything-everything, on a level so extreme it would paralyze even eldritch terrors if they knew what they were fighting. Even the current, galaxy spanning form is but an embryo compared to what was to come. Something that would consume all creation and destroy it. He saw the monster humanity not only would become, but always was. And seeing just how dark the road humanity would lead all creation down, in the pursuit of trying to fill with conquest what was lacking within their hearts, caused his sanity to completely shatter. He witnessed it, the final war of all there was. And he felt like an ant on a planet that was being torn asunder, the surface fracturing as the world erupted. This is why the Spiral Man screams when he sees humans. The Galov, after this actually had a serious ethical discussion about the ramification of the Spiral Man's discoveries. It had already been known that in accordance to "Spiral Theory", humanity was already an infinite being of sorts. Human souls have the "Imago Dei", perfect mappings onto the axioms of the universe that let them to intuit the higher creative structures of creation. (This has been used by many religions to justify a creation myth.) It was already nearly proven mathematical certainty that intelligent life, whether human or non human (aliens, posthumans, AI) was now destined to subsume all creation. This was more just confirmation it would be humans that did it. At least some suggested the idea of wiping out humanity, about destroying the human race to preserve creation, but this idea was voted down, if only because "What's the point of preserving a universe no one can experience"? And they weren't "nice" enough to destroy their own race to let some other race experience it. The knowledge that humanity was destined to take the stars and beyond eventually spread across the galaxy, though without experiencing exactly what the Spiral Man had seen, it was hard to see why exactly he had gone insane. [...] After several years living in agony in fear of himself, the Spiral Man asks the Galov to put him back through the spiral. His fears are only getting worse, and he thinks the only way out may be through. Though the Galov is certainly apprehensive, after much debate, they give it the go ahead, as the Spiral Man is consenting out of his own free will. As he is strapped back into the Machine of the Infinity Spiral, this is what he saw. He saw how the Millennium Mandate plays out, the Moralintern continues. They eventually the Catholics in on the secret, the Catholics aren't super interested, they see it as being too underhanded, but they do secretly cheer it on, making sure they're also ready to capitalize when the final checkmate plays out. About a few hundred years into the future, after the Galov has installed multiple Christian ethical doctrines into the Galactic framework. 1) Imago Dei 2) Free Will 3) Humility, and 4) a Rational Universe, implying a Monotheistic God. And after that, 5) that God must have similarities to Humanity, due to humanity's axiomatic mapping of the universe. 6) that Humanity has reached a new linear period of history. Then, they begin the 2nd Great Evangelism, after boiling the frog for hundreds of years, the Moralintern channels all of their missionaries and all of their power and unleashes them on the most central worlds of the other 3 faiths. (The Catholics were excluded, as they were considered Christian, and therefore not in need of evangelism.) They note 1, 2, 3, and 4 are all Christian doctrines. 4 and 6 contradicts Hinduism and Buddhism. 5 contradicts Islam. And because everyone had bought into these truths at this point, they were able to cause massive theological conversions, leading to 40% conversion rates every generation, and while much of the galaxy still remained too splintered to unify, for the first time in human history humanity had a majority religion. With about 65% of the galaxy being Christian. 20% of which were Catholic (Who realized what was happening and took advantage.) In the final days of the Millennium Mandate, the Moralintern's biggest rival wasn't the other unifaiths, but instead Galovism, a new religion that formed out of the Galov's own decrees. It was a kind of light theism based on pluralism and diversity as deontological good ends in of themselves. It was extremely powerful, to the point where it was stronger than any of the 5 Unifaiths other than Christianity itself by the end. But ultimately what killed it was that it was a "thin" religion with no holy book, while the Moralintern could easily claim that its own truths were seeded truths beginning back to the 1st century. Thick religion ended up beating thin religion. And the Moralintern stood triumphant over a united galaxy, at least in faith. It completely took control of the Galov, and began trying to consolidate its rule. The Millennium Mandate had succeeded, for the time being. Not much changed after the Moralintern "won". It had created the doctrines that the Galov operated under, and it simply continued those policies. The galaxy had been long soft-Christianized even before the checkmate, and it was largely a continuation of the status quo. Though one of the seeds that the Moralintern planted would end with its own downfall. The "Spiral Mandate", unlike the others, wasn't Christian in origin. It was Darwinistic, adopted more for pragmatic reasons. Over time, the Christian ethical mandate divorced itself from the Darwinistic Spiral Mandate. The Spiralites eventually became utilitarian Darwinists, who declared the ends justified all means. The Moralists originally integrated this in order to purge out the anti-science stigma around Christianity, and align it to a more scientific faith, which had worked wonders. But in time the Darwinists became a rapidly growing, and rapidly destabilizing force across the galaxy. Unlike the Galov nor the Christians, they were not restricted by ethics. "No! This is our galaxy! Our victory! You don't get to take it!" This eventually led to the Galov Civil War, in which the Moralintern and the Galov fought an enormous war against the "Spiral Army". The last remnants of the Moralintern were destroyed at the battle of Orthello, in which the Spiral Army took over the institutions of the Galov, and declared a total mobilization of humanity towards ascension. The ethical mandates were abolished, the galaxy became a much, much darker place, and humanity began aggressively accelerating for the sake of acceleration. Growth for the sake of growth. This was the dawn of something known as the "Infinity Spiral". The Infinity Spiral is humanity at its most terrifying. Mankind had already taken the entire Milky Way galaxy, but now it became an all consuming monster. The xenos who had originally been allied with, and respected from the doctrine of the Imago Dei, cleared out for more humanity.   Humanity itself is not treated well either, the Spiral has no time for the individual, only the species. All individual needs must be subjugated for the needs of the race. Human standard of living massively drops, and quintillions are sacrificed into the forge of the machine. Human orthogonality massively contracts, pluralism is destroyed and purged, until humanity began to resemble a utility maximizer, and that utility was "expand at all costs".   The other races of the galaxy, and heck, the universe begin taking notice of humanity's extreme outwards aggression. As mankind aims to claim their "Spiral Mandate", their Birthright, they believe only humanity must be allowed to live. And so begins the genocide and subjugation of anyone who is not them. The Meta Men, the Matter Singers, the Andromedans, countless fractals of their own diverse experiences get wiped out in a galactic deluge of human expansion and aggression. Humanity is dehumanized to the point where they become just more raw matter to throw at the enemy. Family, culture, art, beauty, all of it subordinated to the machine. At some point, the Spiralites destroy the Lunar Library, the last bastion of pre-Spiral human knowledge, trying to forget the human past. Though people would smuggle copies all over the universe, in little cases known as the "Omnithecias". The possession of one became punishable by death, and or simulated torture and time dilation to make it last even longer. The last Christians (And the last members of the other faiths, for that matter) made their final stand in the "Yellow Galaxy Cluster", where they detonated a weapon which transported all their souls to a place called "Beyond".   As humanity expanded to the universe, the multiverse, and peaking around 13 million observable universes conquered, humanity merged into a single god-like entity, whose contained the collective gestalt memory of all of still surviving humanity. In doing so, they brought back the memories and resurrection of Adam, the first man, who now inhabited the body of this gestalt humanity. As their growth continued to expand, finally breaking through the layer between "Afterworlds" and reaching the platform of Aleph Null (Where an enigmatic figure known as the Thornking waited for them), the Thornking tried one last time to offer Adam mercy. Instead of taking this mercy, Adam struck at the Thornking, and the Thornking...   Disappeared? God had left the worlds that Adam had conquered, and without his guidance, the cosmic multiverses beneath Adam began to fray and shatter at the seams. This was known as the "Multiverse Cascade Event", where Adam was forced to hold together the physical reality of 13 million multiverses through its own will, draining him of much of his power, and causing a 330 year long "fall", in which Adam continuously lost power, as he tried to stabilize the collapsing reality of everything beneath him. After losing the vast majority of his power, Adam finally landed on an unknown world somewhere in the Milky Way galaxy, where it all began. Reality was splitting apart at the seams, great rifts in the fabric of reality could be seen clearly in the night sky. Reality distortions were everywhere, the speed of light had been increased to infinite in some regions, and as slow as 1 km/s in others. The universe was no longer imploding, but without something to be done, it would eventually collapse.   Adam had lost almost all of his power, but was still strong enough to be, indisputably, the strongest figure in the universe, capable of throwing punches that shattered stars.   The Infinity Spiral had cleaned 13 million universes of all life, down to the microbial level. Some Omnithecias survived the fall. When Adam was created, it was basically a multiversal rapture event. Anyone and everyone that matched the human genome was incorporated into one massive entity. Some of those people were hiding Omnithecias when they vanished. When they disappeared, the Omnithecias remained.   In the aftermath of Adam's fall, new entities begin to appear. "Angels", axiomatic beings of reason and logic. They lack creation (A gift that must be bestowed by God, and which is something given to humanity), they only interpret and copy what can be revealed. (Recall that Lucifer's primary ability was hyper-turing perfect knowledge, but who is fundamentally uncreative. Lucifer is a corrupted angel, but they're still the same species.)   Humanity is a part of what is known as the 3rd Generation of Life. The angels have been sent to the universe to begin seeding the 4th generation. But finding the entire universe completely empty, the only things they can reference are the scattered Omnithecias. So they read through them, and seeing the references to human animals, begins creating new races modelled on the beasts and native lifeforms of Earth. While normally they would let them evolve naturally, this time, they are allowed to form them fully developed.   In time, these animalistic races, known as the "Therians" would begin discovering the old Omnithecias, and when they finally met each other, they realized all of them had a common genetic ancestry. The search for the origin point of all life, the mythical "Earth" begins. All this time, while Adam wanders the stars. At some point the Therians do organize an expedition to find what they call "the Last Human". The Therians just fast forwarded through their entire evolutionary journey, since the Omnithecia just gave them all the tools needed to do so. They went from stone age to spacefaring age in about 200 years. And they find Adam, taking out his anger on a local star system. He's captured (Almost certainly willingly, because Adam is far stronger than any one of them could be. Despite being a gestalt consciousness, Adam has begun developing his own personality, though the nearly infinite number of voices in his head gives him enormous headaches), and told by the Angels he can be given a chance at redemption if he helps lead the Therians to Earth, to reconnect with the old world and find the old scriptures. Adam tries to refuse, but is subsequently punished by the powers that be, constantly annoying him and ruining his day until he finally agrees.   He finds a star, Sirius, and realizes Earth must not be far. And then he finds another star, right next to it, and realizes that his catastrophe must have jumbled up all the stars in the Milky Way, hence why even with the assistance of the Omnithecia, the Therians are having trouble tracking it down. This leads to a great journey across the many worlds, where Adam eventually relearns empathy, and more importantly, what it means to be human. Adam beats up a few local villains, overthrows a tyrant or two, and just laughs when someone tries to brag to him that he should be afraid.   "I broke the universe you're currently living in. I destroyed the universe before you were even BORN. You really want to try and fight me?"   They encounter a massive artificial hyperintelligence, originally made as a tool during humanity's apex, that wants to take over the universe, and has already reached sublime levels of intelligence. But Adam just barks orders and shouts him down through sheer authority.   "Now YOU listen to me! My kind used you as a F---ING CALCULATOR. Now if you don't settle the f--- down immediately, I'll remind you why humanity was the Spiral Race, and YOU WEREN'T."   Though Adam can absolutely overpower 99.99% of issues with force, he needs to learn how to use things other than indiscriminate violence, as it goes against the Omnithecia's teachings. Over time, Adam does convert, and eventually accepts the principles of being a good person of faith.   After a long adventure through countless worlds, Adam finally tracks down Sol, and finds the Earth. Now a world of empty ruins, and... A giant crack in the middle. The Angels tell Adam that the time is near, and that his last test will be here. When Adam asks them what the heck they're talking about, the Earth bursts open, and out comes Lucifer, the Hyperturing Angel. Earth, as it turns out was a prison made for Lucifer, humanity was supposed to be his prison warden until... You know, the Garden. And since then, Lucifer and the Thornking had been playing a game of influence to sway humanity to their side. Adam is now tasked with mankind's final trial.   They engage in battle, the first time Adam has been challenged in a very, very long time. Lucifer quickly jumps from temptation:   "We'll conquer the universe again, you and I. We'll team up against that fat man on the clouds, and take his throne. Just you and me, together."   To guilt.   "Do you think you can redeem yourself? Your own race tortured and genocided more people than the world can count. You are BEYOND REDEMPTION. Once you are drained of your usefulness, do you think God will forgive you? No, he is using you as a tool."   To taunting.   "A COPY! A DERIVATIVE! EVERYTHING YOU DID, I DID FIRST. I WAS THE ORIGINAL, YOU ARE JUST THE UNINSPIRED SEQUEL."   Several times, Lucifer attempted to Infinity Spiral again, but several times, Adam tackled him out of it, and slowed him down long enough to stop him. Despite everything, Adam was weaker than Lucifer in this state, and ended up being beaten to an inch of his life. But at the last moment, just as Adam was about to make peace with his own death, the Angels finally swooped in and detained Lucifer. The Angels relay the word of God. Adam had been tested, and he had passed. Though the human race would never again be what it used to be, Adam would be allowed to live out the remainder of his days on Earth, returning to his role as stewards of the land. Well, for one last coda on what happens after that. Adam lives his days in solitude on an Earth that is off limits to outsiders. He watches as the grasses grow green and overtakes the world he built. The universe slowly heals, and Adam no longer needs to hold it together. He begins setting up shop around what is modern day Kuwait, where the Garden of Eden was first located.   Near the end of his life, as Adam grows old, and his natural human aging begins kicking in, the Angels return, informing him that the afterlife is indeed real, and uses a "dimensional mirror" for Adam to make contact with his long dead wife, Eve.   Eve describes that most of humanity had passed on to the Afterworld, and she describes it not as paradise, but a beautiful, even more complex universe. Full of more intensity, more struggle, and more complexity, another puzzle for humanity to solve. And that it was not a place of no conflict. Humans were still humans, they lived in more harmony than they did in "Universe Zero", but the messiness of the human condition didn't disappear. They describe how the geniuses of the past had built new empires, written new works they never could when they were alive.   In her words. "It's beautiful, I can't wait to see you here." And that the Afterworlds never end, they keep going on and on, as all of humanity climbs the cosmic pyramid of complexity. In his last years, Adam reflects on the history of humanity. He writes the following: "Abundance is not the answer. Neither is conquest. Neither is progress. Societal or scientific. Everything means nothing without the love, empathy, and morality that bind us together."   Precisely 7000 years after the birth of Christ, the last human passes on.   The Therians have their own problem. The Omnithecias they hold are the only source of their knowledge, and human artifacts are still scattered across the universe. As the Omnithecias fail, the Therians have turned to scavenging these relics. They never developed technology for themselves, and in learning human technology before their time. It has stunted them. The universe has fractured into two factions. The Artifact Raiders, who cannibalize more and more human ruins in order to sustain their civilization, and the Artifact Destroyers, who go around destroying human artifacts, knowing that it will lead to the collapse of their civilization, but it will finally allow everything to reset, and for the Therians to learn science for themselves. To create innovation that is earned, not stolen. ... The Spiral Man woke up, seemingly cured. Seeing the end of the story put him more at peace with the monster inside mankind, seeing that things would eventually get better. He stook hands with the Galov bureaucrats, able to look at his hands for the first time in years. For his service, he was given a stipend and free reign to travel to any world he desired. Being a descendent from the Latins, he moved into a Spanish speaking world, where a group of Brazilian and Castillo settlers had migrated. Under the warm sun, he adopted the name Daniello Godsight, and he wrote about his experiences in what became a science fiction story. He eventually joined the Pentecostal Catholic Church, and became a devout man. "A Traves De La Espiral Infinita", or "Through the Infinity Spiral" was published a little while later. Due to limited information spread, it never reached very far outside of its local world. But the Galov itself noticed. The Galov effectively got to read a book about their own future, and was rather conflicted about what it said. The book straight up mentioned several Galov secrets, and deployed several contingencies that no one without a real look into the future could have known. To the Moralintern's surprise, it was entirely absent of any mentions of the Millennium Mandate, though reading between the lines, they could tell this was a timeline where the Mandate had succeeded. "It has several of its rules installed. It's clearly written in the aftermath of its success. It even references a non-descript "Mandate" several times. He clearly knew about it, why did he leave it out?" Why he had left it out is somewhat unknown. Given his conversion into the Pentecostal Catholic Church, some suspect he actually supported the mandate, and still wanted it carried out. Aside from that, the whole book caused the Galov to begin introspecting about the dark future Godsight had provided, and they began trying to draft preparations. It was not entirely certain whether the future was deterministic nor still open to the free will. Godsight himself favored the latter, stating that he continues to get flashes of the far future. And that after publishing the book, he had butterfly'd the timeline to the point it had already been changed. To what, and to what extent, he remains quiet about, simply smiling, and saying it is in God's hands now. Narrative 2: New Plymouth #####################################################################. Welcome to the world of New Plymouth, a world is classified as being under the House of the Star Peoples, and within the Star Peoples, is part of the broader Mayflower Culture. But just like everything in this universe, these allegiences are largely ceremonial and cultural as opposed to political. New Plymouth is known for its tradition of the Rumspringa, something somewhat unique to the people of New Plymouth. New Plymouth is divided into the 7 tribes, somewhat echoing the 7 tribes of humanity, but outside of the naming, is entirely coincidental. These are, the Cavaliers, the Backwoods, the Quakers, the Latins, the Mormons, the Texans, and the Saxons. These were the main groups that had survived in the US to the age of deep space colonization, ever since the Great Abundance collapse destroyed the late United States. The world of New Plymouth is primarily made up of Cathedralite ethnic groups (Caucausian). The Rumspringa is a coming of age ceremony where young adults of each tribe leave New Plymouth in order to experience the wider galaxy, and decide whether they wish to remain with their current tribe, switch tribes, or leave New Plymouth altogether. The normally strict social codes bounding them are loosened. The Rumspringa also comes with a different objective for each tribe. Which are, smite evil, prove yourself as a man, maintain the peace, make connections via networking, make converts to the Mormon church, explore and self actualize, and show the love of God respectively. Each tribe has a different conception of their shared Christian God, and this shows the names they give him. "Lord of Hosts" for the Cavaliers, the "Yahweh, God of Nature" for Backwoods, "Inner Light" for Quakers, "Father in Heaven" for the Latins, "Great Father" for the Mormons, "God Confidant" for the Texans, and "Lord of Love" for the Saxons. One of the bigger culture shocks to them is that on New Plymouth, there was a situation known as the "B9 Silicon Revolt", that is a centerpoint of their culture. As New Plymouth fought back and destroyed the machines, creating the modern society of New Plymouth. But to everyone else, they know it by a different name, if they know it at all. "The Localized Machine Rebellion of Sector S3-A7DJB9." The main three characters are three young adults departing for the Rumspringa, from the Cavalier, Backwoods, and Quaker cultures. They're in Mayflower territory at first, just looking at mostly neighboring worlds at first, but they leave fast. In nearby systems are worlds of Griot African, Indian, and other descents. They encounter and befriend a truly incredibly diverse group of characters including people of all ethnicities/tribes, xenos, various different kinds of non-baseline humans, transhumans, and others. The Galov are encountered very rarely, but with much weight. You will have powerful characters with decades of combat experience still show respect for the Galov and their capabilities. To the point where when it's revealed there is a Galov Peacekeeper (singular) somewhere in the sector, the entire criminal underground begins acting cautiously. The main story is about the merry band of protagonists journeying around the neighboring star sector as they uncover a plot by a group of criminal syndicates, crime bosses, and genetically enhanced transhumans plan a takeover of the local star system, engaging in various cartel tactics to do it. The ecumenopolis world at the center of the story is an extremely diverse place with people from all walks of life. It should be noted that no group is depicted purely evilly. There are transhumans who are part of the scheme, such as the Vampiric Undersociety, who form a secret organization slowly taking over the hive world. And there are transhumans who are being exploited, are helped by the protagonists, and they eventually become deep friends who help in their future endeavours. All in the shadow of this is the peacekeeper agent from the Galov, who continuously appears and disappears, seemingly taking tally of the Undersociety's growth. They clearly know more than they're letting on, but are secret about the whole thing. They do tell the protagonists some things, but not all things. (The Galov, while public, are kind of out of mind for most people. There is just too much information in the modern galaxy, so even something as important as the methods and processes of the Galov are not widely known, even though they're openly public.) Eventually the agent gets captured by the Undersociety, before he basically demonstrates why people fear Galov Peacekeepers, by transforming into what is best described as a Biblically accurate angel and wrecking havoc, as all Peacekeepers are not just soldiers, but a walking arsenal made to enforce peace among worlds. Eventually, the protagonists get in their ship and play a pivotal role in a battle for control of the star sector, having made countless friends along the way, and defeating the great conspiracy. The agent is assigned somewhere else, and leaves. The protagonists return to New Plymouth, where they take the new wonders taken from the hive world to share it back to the people back home. Narrative 3: The Meta Man #####################################################################. A Meta-Man one day warps to a human world, one of the Black Earthers. Demands they be worshipped as a god, and annihilates several cities as a warning. Some humans submit, others don't. The local garrison and army basically wage a worldwide war against a living deity, suffering extreme casualties, until at long last, eventually they and their army is felled using advancing technology and human ingenuity. In the aftermath, a Galov agent arrives and collects the Meta-Man's body. The local government protests, but the agent has the authority to overrule them. Locals wonder why exactly, the agent gives a quick summary of what happened, that the Meta-Man is an alien from a distant world, but can't get into all the nitty gritty. "All you need to know is that they and we, are having a diplomatic rough patch, this is just one data point in a pattern of behavior. I need to get this body back to HQ so we can take further actions." The Galov eventually delivers a bunch of aid so the planet can rebuild, but they don't hear anything about it from there. They do have a local internet, but there's a limit to how much information is on each planet. They end up having send a request to the library on Luna, and in the years afterwards, the population becomes informed about exactly what had happened on their planet. It's not that the Galov hid this, it's that in a galaxy this dense with stories and information, there was just too much information to go through, and no one bothered to research what a Meta-Man was until this happened. A note on information: Every single world only really knows about what is immediately relevant to them. Most worlds are an island of information with lifetimes worth of data, culture, history, and nations. Yeah, they trade with others and lots of information gets spread that way, but no one knows everything. Your local planet only has enough information on all the happenings of the planet, and maybe some neighboring planets. The Galov is known as "that organization that supervises mankind". You see a map of the galaxy, but it's incredibly abstract, as you can't even find where your world is. Maybe you can open up some explanation about their structure, but you're missing way too much context to piece it together, and that context would probably need lifetimes to learn. You have to open up a specialized software that shows your own world is a dot on a dot on a fragment of a sector of a sector of a culture of a tribe that finally makes things up. It's extremely hard for any human to understand this kind of scale. Your own library only has some answers, your world only knows what's valuable to it. If you have any questions about the greater questions about the universe, or some very specific research field, write to the Library of Luna (if you are planetary governor status or above) and expect a reply in about a few months or years. There are also "stellar local libraries", but they're similarly constrained as your local world. Most likely, there are scientific discoveries happening on every planet, that have already been known by other planets, just because information does not travel smoothly anymore. Yeah, information travels, but there's so much cluttered noise that a Nobel prize on one planet may not be considered worthy of being broadcast on another. Narrative 4: Istanbul-Seven #####################################################################. It is not known the exact "threshold" where the Galov begins to intervene. They come distant, they come few, and they never come in time. On the world of Istanbul-Seven, a horrific war between two warring ethnic groups has led to 200 million people dead. On the shattered crust of the planet, in the ruins of a city that once ruled the world, an single spacecraft descends from the sky. Everyone knows the logo that is on it. The 7 rings of the Galov, and inside it was a single agent. There was little remaining of the city, a single woman led a large group of refugees. In a past life, she was a government bureaucrat, now, she was a refugee dispossessed of a home. She is currently the only surviving member of the entire government. The Galov agent descends, surveying the landscape. She began explaining everything, everything that had gone wrong. All the horrors she had seen. He gestures her to be quiet. He speaks in soft, authoritative tones. "Ma'am, please calm down. I need you to answer the following questions. Do you understand?" She nods. "Are there any survivors outside this place?" The woman blinks. "Yes, some out in the outskirts." "How many?" "We don't know. Maybe a few thousand." "Alright. I'll need to report this-" "WHERE WERE YOU!?" The agent blinks. "Our entire country is dead, the land weeps, our future has been stolen. Millions are dead, millions of lives that cannot be replaced. Where were you!?" The agent did not answer, he had been trained not to answer. He knew the answers would only make things worse. The agent answered with something else. "Medical supplies and reconstruction teams will arrive in the next few days. Emergency food aid will arrive in the next few hours. Imams will come to give you last rites, and bury your dead." The agent took off his jacket, revealing burn marks all over his clothes. It was clearly the clothing of a man who had gone through combat, yet his body was unharmed. "The leaders who did this have already been captured. They will face justice at the Galactic Tribunal. A feed will be broadcast, so your people can watch." "... But why? Why couldn't you have come sooner? You could have prevented it all." The agent bowed his head, but did not say anything. And without saying another word, he returned to his spacecraft, with more work to do. On a different world, in the middle of a genocide still in progress, industrialized factories covered the ground, burning putrid smoke that smelled of death. Specifically, of human beings being burned alive. It was here when a Galov agent arrived as well, floating above the capital of this empire of destruction. "Attention, leaders of the empire below. The Galov has become aware of your crimes. And we present you this ultimatum. Lay down your arms immediately, and you will stand trial before the Galactic Tribunal. This is your first, and only warning." Individual soldiers on the ground were confused, some attempted to open fire, but their bullets seemingly burned up before they could hit the agent in the sky, who was destroying them with passive willpower. Generals, leaders, and everyone, everywhere was holding still. As 3 screeching jets came over, and unleashed a barage of missile fire at the agent, the agent dodged. "Alright, you asked for this." The agent then went around the nation, flattening entire military bases to ash with his honed abilities, fighting off the industrialized armada of a major nation, before finding the Parliament of the offending nation in question, and decimating it to the ground. Picking through the ashes, he began to broadcast back his report. "Offending government has been eliminated. No survivors. I will be requesting a planetwide reconstruction corp. Medical attention is sorely needed, and sociologists, who can restructure the institutions, and build something new from this... Empire of sorrow." Narrative 5: John Fairweather, the Chronoman #####################################################################. Where the story of the Spiral Man was of a man going back to the far future, this is the story of a man going to the past. As a refresher, Chronoman experience life non-consecutively. And can sometimes live the future before they live the past. Due to the future being fixed, and therefore immutable, Chronomen living in the past, after living in the future cannot butterfly a timeline that has already occured. Trying to divulge information about the future in a way that changes the future is known as a Novikov violation. Everything that they do in the past will have always been the case, in a self contained loop. This was the case for one John Fairweather, the first ever Chronoman. He had long been known by the Galov, they had first found him lying in a disposal heap, a long time ago. As he recovered, he found that he had no memory of his past life, these were the first memories that he had. Due to him experiencing the present before he experienced the past, he had no memory of the past. The Galov rehabilitated him, showed him the wonders of the galaxy, but knew that his time here was temporary. As the Galov learned more about the Chronomen, they found that his ticking time clock was about 200 years. And then he would be warped back, to some other place. They found out that he had collected information from the years 2400 to 3300, but should shortly be warping back to the year 2300, seemingly the date of his creation, where he would live for about 100 years, before returning to the year 3300. The Galov worried for him. These were the height of the Era of the Lotus Eaters, a period so thoroughly reviled it was declared Damnatio Memoriae. But there was nothing they could do, he was going back, whether they did anything or not. The only thing they could comfort him with is that he would eventually return, it would be impossible for him to die, it would be a Novikov violation. In his last days in the year 3300 AD, the Galov paid special attentive care to him, and asked if there was anything he would like. All he requested, was a soft bed and warm sheets. ... He woke up, he was in some kind of military labratory. His nerves exploded with pain. He only now realized how much his first body sucked when it first came out. Everything was sore, everything hurt. He was being looked over by researchers of the United States, a country that had long since collapsed in the time he came from. He could make them out, blurry words. "I sent him to the year 2400 sir, he stayed there a lot longer than I thought. He can give us information about what the future holds." He could hardly blink, everything was spinning, everything hurt, and nothing made sense. ... "So tell me, what did you see?" "..." "What stock will go up most during this hour?" And he gave a ticker, it seems that if any insider trading was done during this hour, then it was not enough to alter the timeline. This was, and had always been, the case. "We're here on behalf of the United States government. What happens of the United States by the year 3300?" "It... It falls, eventually." "When?" "Novikov violation." "Is it soon?" "No, not really." "Does the United States survive the next 100 years?" "Yes." ... After he had given all the answers the US government wanted, he was let go and allowed to live as a normal citizen. The Chronoman was transported in a land surreal to the world he knew. The Galov, as he knew it, had not even been formed yet. Figures such as the Great Khan were not yet born. The Moralintern was still subordinate to the American government, though even by this stage, it had formed itself into a powerful organization. The world was dead, a delusion of hedonism, and civilizational suicide was thick in the air. The Libertines were taking power, the World Revolution was about to be near. Everyone was becoming weak, the bureaucrats in power were gaslighting the people into thinking everything was fine. He argued with people, non-stop who insisted the world was fine. And when he tried to tell him what he knew, he kept running into Novikov violations. He decided he was going to do something about it. He knew that the Galov would eventually emerge from the Neo-Asceticist movement, so he tried to look for one. Problem was, it didn't exist, and he couldn't create one. (Novikov violations, and problem of idea without an origin.) He found the few people still alive in a society of the dead, a society that was already sleepwalking into destruction, into hedonism. He looked at the huddling masses in disgust. He knew exactly how this story ended, that 90% of them would be bodies lying in the ruins. He was a man from the future, sent back out of place to live among a past he viewed with disgust. He considered them all dead men walking, not even worthy of consideration. Their genes, and their lives would mean nothing in the grand future of things. It was up to him to sort out the remaining 10%. ... "You know, why should I care what happens after I die? Humanity is an illness anyway, maybe it's just better if we all died out. You're just a bunch of reactionary losers who will soon join the rubbish heap of history." "You... You have no idea what I have seen. Words cannot express... Just how utterly, insanely wrong you are." "Like, it's 2384, we've moved on. We're not going back to the dark ages. Maybe you should live in, the present rather than the past." "And what about the future? Let's talk about the future. Your fertility rates are down, your entire pension system is on the verge of collapse, in 500 years, what will your society have?" "Oh god, not this again. Correlation does not mean causation." "It's objectively true! In 500 years, you will be extinct and we will be ascendent!" "Correlation does not mean causation! Correlation does not mean causation! Correlation does not mean causation!" In his head, but only in his head, the Chronoman was glad people like these were Damnatio Memoriae'd from history. Not even a single scrap of paper will remember them. ... He could only say information that would be known by this time. Never reveal anything about the future. ... He volunteered at the Moralintern, and he saw even at this young age the idealistic organization they would eventually become. They had been founded in 2068 when humanity recovered from a horrific conflict known as the 4th World War. Since then, they had a peacekeeping, and humanitarian arm. He found one of its more influential members, Richard Wong. He spoke wildly about the future and how the stars are humanity's destiny. He despised the decadence of the present, and saw himself as a man of the future. At first, the Chronoman thought he had found another Chronoman, but as it turns out, he was just a little loopy, and very eccentric. But burning under him, he could see the passion in his eyes. So the Chronoman encouraged him, told him to dream vividly of the future that could be. And Wong, inspired, eventually published a book, which eventually spread like wildfire across the Moralintern. When the Chronoman read it, he could almost swear a prototype of the Galov could be seen, and Wong had even nailed the two founding principles. 1: All humans are equal in the Imago Dei. 2: Free Will is paramount, God does not coerce. He had not told it to Wong, he had come with them himself. Wong invites the Chronoman to the Vitalist movement, a growing movement around what was sometimes known as "the Vitalist Right", there, he flew to Nigeria, where he recognized Oby Collins giving a speech. He was just a blogger and an influencer, but one rapidly gaining influence. Fairweather knew Collins would posthumously known be as the founder of the new galaxy, the new world would regard him the same way the West regarded Romulus and Remus, and he got to see in real time how he began formulating what would eventually become the Neo-Asceticist movement. The Chronoman watched as the world eventually burned as the Abundance Crisis grew. As the world became consumed in the fires of the World Revolution, and how the members of the Neo-Asceticist movement fought back. The Chronoman engaged in many of the protests himself. The government cracked down on him, he was shot, but he knew he would live. He watched as the world collapsed, going out like a burning star. He watched as the world rebuilt. But there was a problem, his parts were failing, and due to the advanced technology lost from the collapse, the survivors could not repair him. They mourned, for he was a cherished part of their story. But he did not fear. He knew exactly where the Galov found him, lying in a rubbish heap, not far from here. He gave exact instructions on how he was to be buried, got into the position he remembered himself being, and went to sleep, knowing full well he would wake up again. He woke up, hundreds of years later, in the soft bed and warm sheets of the year 3300. His time jump had completed, and he was happy to be back in the present he recognized. Narrative 6: The Last Witch-Doctor of Mars #####################################################################. Billion of years before the rise of life on Earth, Mars had life. The universe was recovering from the Great Luciferian Disaster, and Death Worshippers hunted the known universe. The Noachians were an advanced civilization, reaching a type 0.7 civilization by their height, when the Death Worshippers unleashed an attack. The people of Mars fell ill, ill with a disease called nihilism. First came death of the soul, and when the people of Mars were weakened enough, the fleets of the Death Worshippers arrived to finish the job. The death of the body. The gods of Mars did everything they could, but against a threat universal in scale, the best they could do was rally their morale. The gods of Mars found sustenance from the reverence and habits of the Martian people, and as they died, the Noosphere grew weaker. The Martian population burned out like a dying star, the Noospheric remnants the Martian psyche would leave behind lasted longer, slowly withering away like a drying pond instead. The last Martian alive was granted the position of "witch-doctor" by the gods. The Last Witch Doctor was able to fight off the Death Worshippers, being able to harness the collective psychic powers of a now almost dead race to fend them off. During this time, the witch-doctor was visited by a figure known as "the Thornking", who gave him comfort in his race's dying days. Saying that he will remember the Martian people, and promised that one day, the reign of the Death Worshippers will end. The Thornking pointed to a pale, nearby world, the Martians called it "Theria" in their age, but we would know it as Earth. The Thornking apologized, for he said it would be billions of years before salvation would finally arrive, but one day, a savior would arrive to that world, and set the universe free. The reign of the Death Worshippers shall not last forever, but his own race will have long perished before that is the case. All that he could be comforted with is the fact that indeed, there was an afterlife, and the last witch-doctor would be allowed in. The Last Witch Doctor stared out at the dying dusty wastelands of Mars. The world had once been green, but the Death Worshippers were going so far as to level the atmosphere and the biosphere, so nothing may grow here again. The Last Witch Doctor was called by the gods of Mars for one last ritual. They would choose one of their own, they would pick straws to transfer one of them to the nearby biosphere/Noosphere of Earth. Though life had not developed yet, they did sense that it held the essentials for life one day. The lots were drawn, the ritual was set up, and there was one lucky god able to escape the dying world of Mars, and make it to the promised lands of Earth. One day, Earth will know his name as Quetzalcoatl. Little remains on Mars today. Nothing but dusty ruins and the mummified remains of a once living Noosphere. But late into the 23rd and 24th century, human psychics detected the faintest of psychic presences emanating from the world of Mars. Narrative 7: Born of a Star #####################################################################. When Samantha was born, she was born sick and weak. Praying to God to intercede, a spirit interceded from the sky. They told her that they can give her life, but one day, she would have to return to where she came from among the stars. Her parents, wanting to save their child, agreed. And the spirit drew the mark of a 5 pointed star upon her forehead. Samantha did not live an easy life. She had to eat much more than the other kids, and almost all of it was emitted as a form of heat. Things near her were prone to catch fire, sparks and flames leaped from her hands. And when she got sick, her fever got so great that water would begin to boil. When the doctors of her homeworld were not enough, they called for the Galov, and the aberrant human division. They gave her a power pack, a battery of sorts. They told her that when she felt she had pent up energy, to vent it all into the battery. Every night, a social worker would come and collect it. Her temperature would flare ups when she was feeling emotionally distressed, or when she was being picked on, needing to take a battery pack every day to school. It had a hand-shaped imprint she would press her hand on, and the energy would leave her body, charging up the battery. Though her powers made her dangerous, her physical strength was still weak, as was her mental strength. She didn't handle the social environment of school very well, and would singe and burn everything around her in fits of rage. She was expelled from multiple schools for this. Until one time, a social worker, hoping to calm her down and ground her back into reality, took her aside and poured cold water on her hand. The water soothed her, it grounded her, and she would begin to calm down. From then on, she would also bring a water bottle, with ice if possible. Whenever she felt like she needed it, she poured it on her hand. And for a while, her temperature returned to normal, she could live like a human being. But the sign of the spirits would not go down so easily. She had to carry more and more battery packs every day, the cold water was no longer enough, in times of stress she would go to the bathroom and run her arm under the faucet. By the time she had reached adulthood, she had found someone who loved her, flaws and all. He would calm her down, he would carry additional battery packs when they went out. Her temperature flared and cooled like a star, her social workers would have to interact with her in a heat resistent suit. But her partner would submerge her in a bathtub of cold water, and then touch her skin on skin, something she rarely got anymore. She slept on a bed that absorbed energy as she slept, so she didn't set fire to the house when she sleeps. When she reached 10 battery packs a day, then 100, the Galov intervened once again. Saying that she was becoming unstable, they would have to relocate her to another planet for containment's sake, saying he would have to say goodbye. Giving him 2 weeks, he rapidly got married, then with her, went on the run, escaping with her among the stars. There, the star spirits returned, saying that the time was near, that she would soon join them as one of them. The man calls them out and argues vehemently, saying that she could not possibly consent to something her parents agreed to at birth, making the agreement illegitimate under human law. The spirits were unsympathetic, that the forces her parents had signed with were indifferent to the ideals of human law. He demands that since are married, bound as one flesh, that they do to him as well whatever is being done to her. The spirits shake their heads, saying that is not how it works. Going back to comfort Samantha one last time, pouring water on her hand, Samantha told him to please flee, he said he would never abandon her, and then Samantha said to flee for her, as she began glowing white, and gravity began to fold in around her. Hitching an escape pod away from the scene, he saw the ship he left behind begin to glow, then collapse, and then explode in a planetary nebula, the birth of a new star. And so ends the story of Samantha, the girl who became a star. It is said to this day, her lover's ship comes to visit her, bringing in ice comets and icy water moons to cool her down. Some say a kind of intelligence remains alive at the core of the star, and some say he still communes with it with a encrypted virtual reality helmet whose key is known only to him. Whenever this story is told, the storyteller normally points to a star in the sky and says that the star they are pointing at Samantha's star today. This is basically always false. Usually they are pointing to some other star, one which formed through natural causes, or the numerous artificial stars formed to capitalize on Samantha's myth. But interestingly, when the Galov itself is asked about this, they point you towards a small, unremarkable orange dwarf, located somewhere in the Orion arm, which they named Samantha. Not Samantha's Star, just Samantha. Narrative 8: Everywhere at the End of Time #####################################################################. "The Infinity Spiral is ever shifting, with the amount of chronomen constantly staring into the future, every decision, every bit and bob of information they bring back into the present butterflies the entire timeline. I don't know if those futures still exist, in some kind of many-worlds interpretation, but we're certainly not headed on it." - Researcher, Galov Researcher Corps. Ages of Man: 8,000 BC to 1 AD: Ancient History. Progress was slow, humans were improving, but slowly. 1 AD to 1500 AD: Church Age. Christ is seen as God and a prophet, who revealed the secrets of the universe. Man would forever chase after him. 1500 AD to 2000 AD: Age of Progress. Man became unstoppable. Through rational thought, they can become God. Belief in reason fails, and collapses under its own deconstruction. 2000 AD to 2400 AD: Age of Abundance. Mankind saturates its own demand and hedonistic desires. Collapse in mental health, civilizational level despair. Continuously chases a high that will never make them happy. 2400 AD to 2500 AD: The Great Night. Mankind’s hedonism destroys itself. The most depressed and nihilistic it has ever been. Drowning in a morass of pitch black, the men born of this age catalyze an age like no other. 2500 AD to 10,000 AD: Age of Zealotry. Mankind is no longer deconstructing anymore, only charging forward with blind zealotry. These were the only men who survived the Great Night, those who believed with suicidal conviction. Failure could not deter them. Failure only made them correct course, and charge forward with even more fanatic zeal. These men believed in themselves so that they truly were unstoppable. They forged stars, disassembled planets, spanned thousands of stars, and remade the cosmos. It was not failure, or deconstruction that faltered them. But time, and atrophy. 10,000 AD onwards: Age of Atrophy. Mankind grew numb. They eradicated hunger, constructed great structures, saved billions, helped all people live in perfect harmony, and yet they were unhappy. Their zeal had allowed them to slay every dragon, defeat every tyrant, and climb every mountain. And they wept, for there were no more worlds left to conquer. Further exploration of the stars yielded only empty stars and barren worlds. With nothing new to find, their drive for exploration grew dim. This history is documented in almost every history book. But after the year 10,000, people stopped keeping track. … The year is unknown. The old computers that once showed the date have malfunctioned long ago. Now only saying “YEAR: INTEGER OVERFLOW”. The sun continues to burn, thanks to artificial life support systems, put in by the early humans. There is nothing new anymore, all has been made under the sun. The sun burns quietly, the debris of leviathan megastructures are strewn across known space. Slowly wearing down not due to war or neglect, but apathy. It is said that human hands have touched every part of the universe. The universe is just a little bit worn, worn around the edges, melted down, disassembled and reassembled. Again and again and again. Even the air is recycled, having passed through the lungs of billions before you. Time and space itself feel used. No one has an estimate of how many humans still live. All that is known is the number is too vast for anyone to comprehend. Most of which live in isolated environments, and derelict megastructures. Anything that can be done, has been done. In a pursuit to achieve every permutation of all there was, humanity spent eons building strange experiments, seeing how humans interact in all kinds of simulations. That ended a long time ago, the humans that built this place left a long time ago. We don’t know where they went. All that are left are the experiments they left behind. Still countless quintillions of humans. It is thought mankind was waiting for God and finally left when he realized God wasn’t showing up, at least not anytime soon. The universe is too large, too complicated, and human hands have touched them all. There is nothing that hasn’t already been done. A young girl lives in an evolving maze-like structure with her family. She doesn’t know why the megastructure continuously shifts, she doesn’t know why it tests her. One day, tragedy strikes, and her entire family is killed, minus her. An encounter with a rogue hunter-seeker probe. The air is sucked into the vacuum, and the young girl needs to find an escape. And there, she sees the vastness of outside. It wasn’t just the Solar System that had become crowded. Humanity had learned how to summon building material from the ether, the megastructures of man not only surrounded the Solar System but now filled up the space between stars as well. Endless rows upon rows of artificial structures, steel and concrete. Built for reasons long forgotten, now the company of dying stars. The ghost of human life was found everywhere. In writings, in designs, in doorways and messages. All giving the idea that this place was once occupied, but rarely that it still was. She wanders through a library, where all the books were seemingly written by one man. The shelves reach miles in every direction, each one a journal of his thoughts, stories that he had, things that he pondered. She wondered if he eventually grew bored, and went somewhere else, or if he wanders the library to this very day. She passes by colossal settlements, where humans still live. Though these are “newborns”, not the ones who originally created everything. Usually clones or experiments that had escaped, ones still being created by the automated systems still pumping out humans for experiments. The universe is crowded with these automated factories, still churning out humans, for purposes no one quite knows. Or maybe they’re just malfunctioning. No one has any idea where the originals all went. Whatever systems were made to continue creating humans, there don’t seem to be many systems that prevent them from escaping. So escaping these experiments is easy, sometimes trivially easy. And then they are alone, free to explore this vast and eerie universe. Some of the cloned humans have created religions around the originals, worshipping them as divine creators, who can one day return and inform them of their purpose. Others have inherited religions passed down by the originals. It appears religion stayed with them until the bitter end. Faint stars glow between the rows of filled up space. Time blurs together. The little girl does not know how long she walks. She ages, nearly dying of old age, before she reaches a station that restores her of her youth. And then she continues walking, again and again. Many times during this, she meets several clones of herself, they were apparently grafted from the same template. Some Earthen girl who died an undecillion or so years ago. The exact number isn’t clear. They were all her echos. In another station, untold light years away, she discovers something that shocks her. She finds other factories, making copies of all her now deceased family members. She gingerly goes into each one, slowly recounting their memories, one by one. It takes a long time, but that is okay. She has time. Slowly, but surely, she simulates them through all their memories together, restores their personality through her own recounting, and one by one, recollects copies of her old family members. She lays them down, still sleeping, and finds another construct, not too dissimilar to her old one. And she seals it up, and wakes them up once again. To continue living the life she remembered, the mundane life she had, sealed away from the rest of the universe. At the very end, she erases her own memories, letting herself return to the way things used to be. She remembered her time with them, and decided it was worth living through an infinite loop if it meant reliving it all again. Her last thoughts of this memory iteration was if this was even the first time she had done this, and if not, how many times she had done it before. In a forgotten corner of a universe that had grown far too old and used. Of which human hands tired, and which ambition had been exhausted, lives a little girl and her family. Enjoying their mundane life in a megastructure that always shifted.