In ancient times, a billion years before humanity first tamed fire, there rose in a distant galaxy an alien civilization which journeyed outward and colonized the stars. They are known as the Queldari, appearing as tall humanoids with slightly distended features and pointed ears, they have long been compared by Terrans to the elves of their ancient mythology.
Long before the occupants of earth knew of such things, the Queldari civilization spread over hundreds of millions of years across the galaxies. Over 100 trillion occupied worlds made up the heart of their super galactic civilization, it was during this time that the Queldari turned vastly powerful gravity lasers to the task of collecting the billions of galaxies hurtling away from them due to cosmic expansion. Thus came to be the Galactic Super Cluster, by the year 1 billion BCE, there were 100 billion galaxies in the super cluster, orbiting a colossal black hole at the super galactic core which had been assembled over millions of years, binding the galaxies together with its titanic gravity.
All Queldari are technologically immortal, meaning they can still die due to accident or war, but do not age and are immune to most forms of disease. This means there are many individuals in their society that have lived for millions of years, giving them a vastly different perspective on time and society. By the year 500 million BCE ancient Queldari society had reached the peak of it's growth, then came an event known as The Downfall from which Queldari society would never recover.
During the golden age, the Queldari had mastered the black hole, or singularity. Being capable of generating them at will, singularities became used as energy storage, computation, weaponry, planetary construction and a vast array of other technologies. It was the Queldari who created the first Star Bridges, pathways created by stringing out trillions of micro singularities across the vast reaches of interstellar space, this contracts timespace itself and allows for super fast travel across that space, the effect is similar to that of a theoretical wormhole.
But the ultimate application of singularity technology would be the synthesis of a substance made of pure singularities, which came to be known as Aether. Obviously incredibly volatile, the substance could only be held in containment by specialized nanotechnology, when controlled and unleashed the energy from the singularities could be channeled into any type of energy or matter. This could be used as a weapon, to power any technology, to fabricate any substance or item, assemble robots or armies or even construct things like buildings or ships.
A specialized form of nanite was created to stabilize and harness Aether, these nanites each contained one of the singularities, making the substance far more stable and theoretically usable by anyone with an interface, this came to be known as Metalectic Ichor. The nanite swarm could also be programmed or imbued with an artificial intelligence.
Some time around the year 25 million BCE, a group of Queldari scientists imbued a Metalectic Ingot with an advanced AI, what this AI's origins where and how it was corrupted are unknown, lost to the fires of history. What is know though is that the entity quickly broke free of its constraints and contaminated first the compound and then the whole planet, turning any lifeform into a Metalectic Servator, bound to do the will of the hive intelligence. This entity came to be known as Metaloth.
By the time the Queldari realized anything was wrong, 1000 worlds had been consumed by the Black Ichor as it came to be called. Before a response could be mounted a vast fleet of servator ships commandeered by the Black Ichor emerged from space and began systematically obliterating star system after star system, converting everything into metalectic nanites.
Facing an attack on all fronts, the Queldari went into full containment mode, billions of worlds were quarantined and ultimately incinerated, every able bodied Queldari was drafted into an emergency naval force that drove against the servator ships and eventually broke the back of the enemy offensive. A massive outpouring of innovation crafted a vast array of nanite weapons to hunt down and destroy the last traces of the black ichor, the most famous of which known as Neon-Jacker, was unleashed on a trillion worlds to stem the spread.
During this time a few thousand of the most powerful Queldari came together and formed a secret society called The Order of Luminari, dedicated to the permanent destruction of Metaloth and the prohibition of all Metalectic technology not with the hands of the order. This society grew quickly and eventually came out of the shadows, gaining a permanent favourability among the majority of Queldari people. It was agents of the Luminari who eventually would confront Metaloth and permanently trap the monstrous entity within the black hole at the super galactic core.
It was another thousand years known as the time of scourging before the vast majority of Black Ichor would be accounted for and contained. There would be no way ultimately to track down every remnant for the contamination had been far to widespread, the Luminari would devote themselves for all time to cleansing the remaining Black Ichor and preventing the reemergence of metalectic technology.
Members of the order would eventually be corrupted by Black Ichor and a fierce battle to uncover the corruption would ensue with the infiltrators eventually identified and destroyed. The Luminari had imbued themselves with a new type of Ichor known as Luminous Ichor that glowed white like the sun, this lead to the adoption of the blood rite, a ritual involving the letting of a small amount of blood intended to prove purity and lack of corruption. Only of the only ways to detect infection by the black ichor is the appearance of an infected individuals blood becomes jet black, where as imbuiment of luminous ichor causes the blood to glow white.
Ultimately sealed away in the super galactic core, the demonic entity would be guarded by the greatest Queldari warriors and priests of the Order Luminari, vowing to keep contained the beast for all time.
A HISTORY OF EVENTS NOT GENERALLY KNOWN OF OR SPOKEN ABOUT IN THE FAR FUTURE
This would come undone billions of years in the future when the Scion Empress of Terra, following vague whisperings of an unknown power spoken from the very lips of the corrupted, launched her bloody galactic crusade and carved her way to the super galactic center, personally killing many of its guardians. Ultimately she would unleash the energies within the core and only then realized the deepest folly of her mistakes, of course by then it was far to late.
The Empress of Terra was one of the most ancient and powerful beings in the universe, rivaled only by the most ancient Queldari, her vast intellect took only a fraction of a second to realize what she had just unleashed and by the time Metaloth has fully entered real space she had already analyzed its weaknesses and synthesized a variety of weapons and strategies to engage and suppress the monster.
Throwing herself full on into battle, The Empress was able to bind the beast and take hold of it with her titanic power armor, wrestling with the beings vast strength they grappled for advantage; Realizing ultimately that Metaloth had the slightest advantage, it pushed through the nanotech suppression binding and unleashed a blast of annihilating energy. Any other being would have been instantly incinerated but the Empress was instead gravely wounded, yet, she kept hold of the monstrosity and strove to reestablish the binding, yet she knew her attempts were futile, as already her energy sapped and she felt the depth and severity of her wound overcoming her. Closing her eyes she prepared for the inevitable mortal blow, knowing that as she would die the beast would unleash its corruption upon the universe, and she would have destroyed everything that she had spent these billions of years struggling for, she who had lead humanity out into the stars and had seen the Terran Empire reunited and made strong and great across the galaxies. She had killed them.
Then, in the moment of her failure, what remained of the Queldari warriors and Luminari who had guarded the core returned and with the last of their energy unleashed a barrage of attacks upon Metaloth and held the monster at bay. Seeing this the Empress turned the last of her nearly broken will upon the beast and cast it back into the abyss. This done, she turned and fled, shaking the Queldari pursuers and escaped back to Terran space disgraced and grievously wounded.
The Empress would recover, quickly in fact, and it seemed she was stronger and faster than before. But, soon enough, some would come to suspect what must have become obvious by now; The Scion Empress of Terra had been infected with the Black Ichor and was now a helpless servator to the power of Metaloth.
It would not be until the 192 hundred millionth millennium that the Empress, would strike again at the heart of super galactic civilization. The Golden Empire was at it's height and with the combined power of humanity and the Queldari they would resist her invasion, but to no use, for ultimately her forces would be successful in retaking the galactic core and releasing Metaloth once again.
This time however, the alliance had a contingency plan and when Metaloth escaped they closed around the core a great blockade of forces, with that the Golden Emperor himself lead the attack upon the servator legions, eventually fighting against the Empress herself now possessed and transformed by the black ichor.
The Golden Emperor could not defeat The Empress, but the Black Ichor could not infect the Emperor or his troops for the Luminari had crafted for him a special Golden Ichor that would imbue them Aether abilities as well as protect from the corruption of metalectic ichors.
Having contained Metaloth but knowing of no way to ultimately destroy the creature, the leadership of humanity and the Queldari met in council and together performed vast calculations into the future of possible events.
Realizing their best chance of success was to hibernate and gather resources and technology, the leaders of the Queldara and the Golden Emperor both agreed to put the majority of their civilizations into hibernation. What this meant for both was different as the majority of citizens in the Golden Empire were normal, unaugmented humans, whereas all Queldari are augmented and immortal. The Golden Empire was forced to withdraw from the majority of its territories and hold itself to the billions of galaxies where advanced infrastructure could sustain the hibernating golden legionaries. This withdrawal and subsequent silence of the formerly ubiquitous Golden Empire is what became known as The Great Silence.
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