Algol SystemConsisting of the lush and green Palma, the arid and barren Motavia, and the icy and desolate Dezoris, all orbiting the Algo star, this planetary system, where both magic and science co-existed.
Until the rise of King Lassic. First a benevolent ruler, he became a cruel dicatator after converting to a mysterious new religion. His became a reign of terror and supression, until the legendary heroine Alis and her companions rised to defeat him.
From there, the Algol system saw the flourishment of extremely advanced technology over the next millenia, which among other things was used to turn the desert Motavia into a paradise world. Its inhabitants of multiple races lived relatively in harmony. The weather itself was kept stable, engineering plants were made to mass-produce both genetically modified living beings and advanced machines to serve civilization's needs. Artificial intelligences took the boring decisions needed for the day-to-day life.
Great CollapseI wonder what
The People will see
In the final days.But then strange things started to happen. Malfuctioning systems, rampaging biological experiments. And the people had grown so depedant on those commodities that they didn't know how to react. Palma itself was destroyed when its mechanized moon was made to crash into its surface. In the end, the young hero Rolf and his friends sacrificed themselves to destroy the Mother Brain computer that was responsible for keeping all the engineering plants and weather systems working, shuting them all down in one move. Yet in the aftermath as the survivors struggled to rebuild their lifes, there lingered the question of who had built the Mother Brain to begin with? The cloaked space station that housed it had exploded soon after for unknown reasons with Rolf and his friends inside, leaving no witnesses and little evidence behind. The closest thing to a clue are enigmatic references to “earthpeople”.
There was also left the issue of the survivors of Palma that had managed to escape in space ships or were in orbital stations when disaster struck. Motavia was slowly but surely degrading back into a desert world, so the Algo system could no longer support its population.
Whole New WorldsInnumerable stars
Won't tell us where to go
It's a long long run
To the Place in the sun
With hopes and dreams
Our ship will cross the sea
To the whole new world
Shining like a Pearl
The whole new world
Only one pratical solution remained. A series of colony ships were built at great pains from whatever technology remained, and then pointed to the most promising worlds in the nearby stars. Initially with most of their population kept it cryo stasis, those ships set off to the long crossing trough the empty space. Many of those ships consisted of combined domes with their own soil and atmosphere, allowing for the growth of plants and animals inside, both for self-sustenance and seeking to re-learn the art of bioengineering.
As new generations were born and died inside those domes, in some cases they forgot they were inside an artificial ship, developing their own civilizations that considered their enclosed spaces as all there was to the world, even forgeting about the technology that surrounded them.
In other cases, power struggles broke out among the ship's crew on what courses to take, on how to invest their limited, dwindling resources.
Due to that and the harshness of space, more than one colony ship was destroyed, and many more simply vanished. Some resurfaced, some were found wrecked, but a significant number is still unacounted for after millenia.
Eventually tough, some of those colony ships managed to reach new planets filled with life that could house the population they carried.
The colonization process wasn't easy. Agressive wild life, local civilizations already there and darker, hidden things that weren't meant to be disturbed meant the colonists had to adapt to build their new homes.
Still, civilization flourished, with people remastering advanced technology. “Magic” had became something of the past, replaced by the more sophisticated and mass-produced Techniques Systems. Advances on star coordinate system beacons allowed for much easier travel between the newly colonized worlds. A voyage that had taken centuries to make could now be performed in a matter of hours!
The GovernmentTecnically speaking, the worlds populated by the colony ships are still all under the command of the Government back in Motavia. In practise, the Government holds little actual power ever since the colony ships left the reach of the Algo System. Only after the stablishment of the star coordinate system beacons could the government start playing an active role on the distant citizens again. Due to that, government representatives and government army members can be found in every one of this new worlds, even those that openly declared their independence. The government officials usually let the local people govern themselves, but will intervene when big incidents happen, in particular trying to prevent any new inter-conflicts.
The biggest achievment of the government is probably that they managed to keep the economy relatively unified in the form of Meseta-golden diamonds fabricated by a mysterious process, virtually indestructible (to the point they can be found on the guts of monsters that chew right trough ceramite plate), yet easily compatible and transportable, Meseta will be acepted as a valid currency in virtually any place (including virtual space).
Hunter's GuildLong ago with the rise of rampaging biological experiments, a new profession was born in the form of individuals specialized in hunting down those “biomonsters”-The Hunters. First acting alone, they soon started coordinating with each other in order to find the better jobs and payments, and supporting each other against tougher threats. This loose cooperation evolved over the millenia into a multi-planetar based organization that is willing to do almost any violent job for the right price.
Arguably as powerful as the Government, if not outright more powerful, the Hunter's Guild is always willing to take in new talented members, and won't hold grudges if you break off with them. Its biggest mystery is how it can organize itself whitout any kind of visible leaders.
The Devastation WarAfter the new planets colonies stablized themselves, the people could enjoy some centuries of relative peace. But even then it was just a matter of time that somebody somewhere decided that they wanted something-and raised an army to take it by force.
The biggest conflict of that kind in recent history was the Devastation War in the Gurhal Star System. The main planet, Parum, was a lush paradise inhabited by a variety of races. However among the planet's human population, a movement arised that decreed their supremacy and started a war to enslave the other planet's races and destroy whoever resisted. It didn't help that certain underground cults took the chance to try to spread as much havoc by themselves as well. The conflict raged for 500 years, devastating most of the natural ecosystem of the planet, and would've actually wiped out every single living being on it if not for the Androids revolt. The needs of war had led to the mass production of androids with advanced combat AIs as each side tried to get an edge over their enemies and natural resources dwindled. Tired of being used as weapons of war for others, those androids united and suceeded on finally conquering the planet and crushing everybody else, forming a new robotic administration, ruling with cold efficiency. They even managed to convince the neighbour planets, water-covered Neudaiz, inhabited mostly by Numans, and the dangerous but resource-rich Moatoob, to form an alliance.
Start of the Millenium
It's the year 7000 of the Algol calendar, a century since the Devastation War's end, and the alliance celebrates its 100th anniversary with the announcment that they negotiated with the Government the colonization rights for Ragol, a new, life-filled planet on a distant system, ripe for colonization. The first wave of settlers actually has already installed the basic infrastructure, including the Star coordinate system beacon to and everything is ready for sending the second wave.
Yet as candidates start signing up, the Android Administration suddenly declares the second colonization wave to be delayed indefenetely, and starts negotiations with the Hunter's Guild for the organization of an elite investigation force. To investigate what exactly remains undisclosered, but the promise of twenty thousand meseta per hunter sounds quite tempting.
Techniques System and Espers
The fall of Magic
As far as the oldest records reach, in the begginning magic and science existed side by side in Algol.
However as King Lassic started his reign of terror and unleashed devastating spells and mystical beasts upon the general population, magic became heavily stigmatized on the aftermath of his death. People turned to technology to support society, with the start of mass production of robots and the first mecha prototypes. Magic became almost unknown, altough it was still known by certain segments of the population...
Mystic Cults
Hiding in underground society or in isolated places, small orders secretly kept advancing magic. Most of them were disciples from the wicked King Lassic himself, that used their spells for personal gain at the expense of others and spreading acts of terror whenever they could. Even tough the emerging robot armies and mecha squadrons would hunt down those wizards, sorcerors and other magicians wherever and whenever they appeared, it seemed like they could never fully wipe them out. In the deepest dungeons and old, forgoten places, they persisted, training their dark arts, waiting for the moment to emerge once more.
EspersNot all of those who still practised magic were so evil minded tough. Predating King Lassic himself, the Espers were mortals that had seeked to research and use magic for the betterment of society. And even tough they also suffered persecution at the hand of the Government at first, they managed eventually to prove their good intentions, and in colaboration with scientists and engineers they developed the Techniques System.
Basically put, it was standardized magic that could be learned in a safe, quick and efficient way. No longer the need for dark pacts or decades of studies over obsolete tomes. Altough it was also harder to try to research new tecniques than new spells, but that was probably for the best. Power corrupts quite easily after all.
In order to evade the heavy stigma associated by magic, spells turned into Tecniques also received brand new namings. Some of the examples that persisted to this day:
Foie/Gifoie/Rafoie - Stronger grades of fire tecniques.
Barta/Gibarta/Rabarta - Stronger grades of ice tecniques.
Zonde/Gizonde/Razonde - Stronger grades of lighting tecniques.
Grants - Cleansing Light tecnkques.
Megid - Extremely dangerous tecnique, both for the user and target.
Resta -Physical wound healing tecniques.
Anti - Disease and poison healing tecniques.
Reverser - Restore critical failure of lesser organic or mechanical systems, provided they haven't stoped working for too long.
Ryuker - teleportation tecnique.
Deband - Reinforces defensive frames.
Shifta - Increases power output of target weapon systems.
Jellen - Decreases power output of target weapon system.
Zalure - Weakens body structure.
Even with the Great Collapse, and then the colonization of the New Worlds, Tecniques System arts kept adavancing. They started being stored in compact data disks, allowing for them to become a trading good and making them available to the general population. Those who specialized themselves in such items became known as Forces. They usually wield Rods and staffs made from advanced alloys with integrated circuitry. They work side by side with both gunslingers and blademasters when there's enemies to face, and have become a well respected and productive segment of society.
Still, even nowadays some lunatic wearing colourful robes and masks shows up unleashing unknown tecniques. Both the Hunter's Guild and The Government have an unspoken policy of "shoot them on sight". They'll offer you good rewards for doing so, but don't expect them to answer any questions about what they are or where they come from.
The Scars of the Devastation war are still pretty visible across the planet. Most of the surface is desert wasteland and heavily polluted oceans.
Most of civilization is concentrated on an handful of massive techno-cities, each with an heavy concentration of hundreds of millions of people. Empty space is at a premium, but otherwise most people can live confortably thanks to the availability of high technology. The Android Administration may not allow a freedom, but makes sure almost everybody has good, basic healthcare, advanced education, and a wide array of virtual entertainment forms. They still expect you to get a job of sorts and contribute something to society.
Factory centers are scattered across the planet's surface, exploiting a variety of mineral resources for energy and material productions, plus water and air purification plants. All of them fully automated.
The Android Administration's control in the planet is still far from absolute. There's an unaccounted number of people scattered across the planet (unofficial estimates between a thousand and several million) living in fortified caves, ancient shelters, or even hiding in the factory centers. Some have formed tiny self-sustainable groups, most survive by stealing and raiding whatever they can. The Android Administration sometimes sends the military to deal with them, but most of the time, as long as they stay away from the cities, considers the damage caused by them as "affordable losses". Finding and dealing with all of them properly would consume much more resources than they currently drain.
The Parum's Organic Restoration Project has succeeded on restoring some bits of green and wildlife here and there across the planet, but they're still sealed off to the general public.
Souls are a thing, and actually one of the highest arts of crafting consists of binding the souls of powerful monsters to items (exact mechanics pending for now though). Binding of humanoid souls however is usually highly forbidden. That doesn't stop cultists and less scrupulous organizations/nations from doing so though, like the Helsiana family.
Also to be clear, it's not as much that you're using the soul as a resource for crafting, but that you're binding the soul to an item to gain some of the properties of the original owner. Like a brutish monster may improve an item to make you stronger/tougher, while the soul of a more mystic monster may result in an item that enhances your mental capacities.
"Free" souls usually end up drifting around in space, losing sentience and form until they become more background noise than anything else. Ones with particularly strong grudges may become ghosts or nastier. There is no afterlife beyond that, no gods to judge/punish you or paradises or hells, just the empty void.
Souls can be copied, but demands more exotic/magic processes are is necessary for a clone to operate and thus soulless beings can exist, with the caveat that when they die, they die and their minds are gone forever. An original's soul will often seek a soulless clone to inhabit. A single soul can also be fragmented over different bodies. With a bit of luck and a lot of work a fragment may grow into a fully fledged new soul.
Whatever research was conducted on that matter, the conclusions were that some souls do grieve their deaths and would love a second chance, however most quickly just stop caring, feeling "released" for not having to worry about the many sufferings of life anymore, feeling content just to travel freely through space and watch events unfold. Seems related to the fact that you no longer have a body producing hormones motivating you to do stuff. That's also why even the souls of vicious cruel monsters can be "tamed" into powerful items.
Once they lose sentience, they're basically gone forever.
As far as the studies go, soul energy is highly refined energy, but still energy, when decomposed it's the same as that radiated from stars. There is some degree of recycling, but it's no more reincarnation than plant->herbivore-> carnivore->poop->soil->new plant.
After all, there are artificial life forms being created like newtypes and whatnot, and sentient populations do grow as long as there's raw resources to sustain them. If there was always a limited amount of "life energy", where was it when the planets were just lifeless rocks?
Dark energy would be negative energy, anti-(most)life and stuff, not "really hard to see energy". Darker monsters thrive in Dark energy though.
Which in turn would mean that yes light energy would be positive energy that's also what's radiated by the sun and stars.
There technically is a limited amount of energy that could generate life in this universe. However since it's same energy that powers up stars, that would normally not be a limitation until one starts approaching an heat death scenario.
However Dark Force has been crystallizing light energy to power up its schemes and minions over the millenia, preventing it from being recycled. Even when Dark Force gets stomped, most of the light energy crystals it had trapped remain unaccounted for. It is said that Dark Force itself will possess any particulary strong soul it meets, granting itself an even more powerful form, and sometimes even reaching a gestalt of light-dark energy.
Dark Force is not part of any "natural process". If anything, studies point that if you go back in time there are no signs of Dark Force's activity at all until its first catastrophic appearance, leading to the theory that something or someone banished Dark Force (or something else that led to the creation of Dark Force) into this universe from somewhere else.
The Devastation War did not affect only the Material but also the other planes themselves.
You emerge in a desolate plane. The skies are black with crimson clouds, with no visible stars, only a grey glowing sphere in place of the sun. The land around you is a wasteland devoid of any signs of life, besides ruined metal and plastic structures, vehicles and mecha wrecks of all sizes, as if there had been some cataclysmic battle in this place. Rivers of bubbling, clearly unstable chemicals are the only thing moving. The geography in the horizon twists into bizarre shapes, cracked mountains taller than anything you've ever seen and seemingly bottomless gorges. The air itself smells toxic, and so cold it burns your skin. The only reason there's no ice it's because everything is completely dry of water.
You recognize this place from the tales of Dark Force's last defeat. The corrupted dimension that permeates all planes and allowed the Darkers to emerge almost anywhere at any time. The millenium heroes managed to break into this place not so long ago, cutting a swath through the Darker armies, until reachin and slaying Dark Force itself, but the place is still tainted, many vestiges of evil endure, and only time will be able to heal this place. There's rumors the millenium heroes did not strip clean everything that was valuable in this place. But every following expedition to this plane ended horribly. Equipment malfunctions, diseases outubursts, system crashes, entropy seems to be specially strong in this place. It's only used as a means for getting from one place to another nowadays.
Old stories tell of a variety of different planes connected to each other. In the current time they're just that-stories. There's right now only a single other confirmed plane that goes by many different names depending on who you ask-Astral, Ethereal, Shadow, Abyss. Just like the material, it has quite a bit, except that whereas in the material the laws of physics and magic are relatively stable, in the alternate dimension they're highly unstable.
Some scholars present the theory that in the past there were indeed a lot of different planes, but whatever event spawned Dark Force also made the planes collapsed into a single one.
Gods may be a thing of the past, but most organic beings still seek spiritual guidance.
The Church of Light is probably the most popular religion/life philosophy in the galaxy, teaching a somewhat loose of principles that state you shouldn't be a dick to others, stay healthy, seek to improve yourself and help around whenever you can.
Also booze. The ability to get drunk is a key characteristic of organic beings that androids and other mechanical AIs cannot replicate. The Church of Light earns a significant amount of its income from the production and distribution of all kinds of alcohool and their events often have plenty of drinking spirits. Although they have plenty of holy recipes, the Church of Light is always on the lookout for new ingredients and brewing methods.
During the Devastation War, some of the Church of Light's more zealot elements conducted a series of crusades in the system in the name of protecting their believers. One of their key events was when holy warrior princess Anita recognized the emerging power of the Android Administration, but even her closest friends refused to believe her previsions, ending up with Anita waging a one woman crusade against seemingly random androids in the system which ended when she was betrayed by her old allies who saw the princess as having become a deluded rampaging fanatic. The betrayers did live long enough to regret their mistakes as they witnessed the seemingly random groups of androids organize themselves and win the war, slaying most of the church's crusaders on the planet during the process. At the end the Android Administration allowed the Church of Light's more moderate elements to remain in the system to help pacify the organic population's spirits.
Nowadays most those past confrontations have been forgiven even if not forgotten and the church of light appears to be in good relationship with the Android Administration, holding offices all over the system and in the colony ship as well.
The Church of Light has by far the highest percentage of Divine Pilots on their ranks, but even then most of their members cannot use any techniques at all.
An organization whose members dedicate their resources to the research of everything that is organic-and its improvement, in particular top healthcare services at affordable prices, but also cloning plus embryo and gene selection and manipulation. Very few people in Parum risk rolling the dice when it comes to having descendants for the last known centuries.
The Bio Coders are composed of mostly androids, however they are not actually part of the Android Administration and have always operated as an independent organization. Actually some of the records on their databases are older than any other known organization in Parum. The Bio Coders claim to have salvaged said records from other now forgotten organizations and that's usually the accepted answer, although some conspiracy theories run around of the Bio Coders having their own deeper agenda. Their relationship with the AA has varied between neutral and good terms. During the Devastation War the BC first worked as mostly a charity organization providing support for the wounded from all factions, refusing to take arms up against anyone beyond self-defense. When the AA rose and failed to get the BC's alliance they chose to instead just tolerate their presence and work around them, calculating that any conflict between androids should be avoided. After the AA's victory, an agreement was settled with the BC where they would be allowed to remain independent as long as they recognized the planet's new rulers. Since then the AA and BC have successfully collaborated over a series of projects, but there has been some key disagreements over how to deal with problems caused by organic beings. In particular while the AA often prefers to locking down or outright killing problematic individuals, be it hackers or rampaging bio-weapons, the Bio Coders often defend trying to “cure” or reform them. Even when they keep relapsing time and time again.
The rise of synthetic food processors has led to the ancient art of baking cakes to become almost lost. Fortunately an organization has kept the tradition alive over the centuries, the Naula Bakery.
Nowadays they have a chain of countless stores all over the galaxy, seemingly run by mostly family members. They are often found setting shops in dangerous and/or hidden areas, leading to the theory they'll go to any lengths in search of new ingredients and cooking conditions while keeping them secret or they have a terrible sense of direction. Regardless their products are the true thing, considered the top delicacies in the galaxy and even kings can be bribed by the offer a genuine and fresh Naula cake. Not only delicious, they often have unique and exceptional restorative qualities, including the fact even androids and other sentient machines can enjoy them. Although many have tried to reverse-engineer and copy those delicacies, the Naula family is somehow always one step ahead, creating new recipes to keep their many fans hooked, always pushing the boundaries of sweetness.
The Naula Bakery has their own armed forces to serve both as escorts and deliverers, allowing them to send their candies virtually anywhere from raging war fronts to hostile alien worlds. Although not particularly numerous or powerful, Naula Bakery does possess an exceptionally high number of Arcane Pilots.
Even the AA appears to be charmed by Naula Bakery's sweets, allowing them exceptional freedom of activity in return for a steady supply of their cakes.
For an exiled young member of a family of space dragons, the start of the Devastation War presented itself as an excellent opportunity. Young Dragon lady Taka joined one of the factions and raised through the ranks by power and guile. Although the faction soon collapsed, Taka knew to jump away from the sinking ship along with a group of select loyal members, forming a group of mercenaries, picking her fights to progressively increase her power and influence. Along the way she managed to gather some other dragons to her cause along siring a series of half-dragons and they appeared well on their way to the top. But Taka had been exiled for a reason and a series of growing disagreements led to her force splintering in several groups.
The only one who survived in any real way was the one called Manakete Mercenaries. Possessing only residual amounts of draconic blood and arcane talent and either salvaged or cheap mass-production technology, most everybody looked down on them, even Taka herself when she was their leader. Offered only crappy jobs and worst payments, the Manakete mercenaries recognized the emerging potential of the AA and ended hiring themselves mostly to the androids, fighting with fervor to prove their worth. Suffering terrible casualities, the AA did greatly reward their loyalty by granting them a series of lands, resources and privileges as rewards as the war went on. This was also a marketing ploy on the part of the AA to get other organic factions to see that they weren't just machines that hated all life, but the Manakete Mercenaries won't look a gift mecha on the engine.
After the war ended the Manakete Mercenaries were offered exceptional permission to keep their line of work in Parum while virtually all other local mercenaries and militaries were disbanded. Their main competitor in the system are currently only the Hunter Guild's themselves, with the Manakete Mercenaries offering worst quality services for cheaper prices, plus making less if no questions about their assignments. Although the AA's bot armies technically keep peace in Parum, the Manakete Mercenaries find plenty of work as private guards and bounty hunters for issues too small for the military to deal with. They have a group aboard the colony ship in Ragol's orbit and already sent some members as part of the first investigation wave, but none appear to have returned.
During the Devastation War a young civilian found herself faced with either fighting in a prototype mecha or dying to an invading force since there were no other pilots available. Oruma took to the cockpit and progressively revealed herself a natural talent, resulting in being named volunteer for the army. Oruma did not like the stress of war or following orders or needing to get up early, but she found herself enjoying the thrill of battle and victory, ending up defeating ace after ace, including Taka herself at a point. This raised a series of suspicions, and eventually it was discovered that Oruma was a latent natural esper increasing her own piloting skills through magic while inside the cockpit. This led to a race between several factions to find out more latent espers or attempting to create their own, with often terrible results as their wild magic proved to have too many unknown variables to properly control. Oruma found herself being burned out in particular after she found the shift of interests make her end up allied with Taka when not so long ago they were trying their best to kill each other. So Oruma managed to convince her superiors to let her retire from piloting before she too mentally broke down and went into a rampage of her own. Gathering her salary savings and spoils of war, she founded a company with her name focused on developing technology for non-war purposes and rarely if ever used her own esper abilities, claiming to be too much trouble.
Oruma however found herself forced into battle one last time again when Taka combined unstable magic and technology to convert one of the system's planets into a massive mecha to turn the Devastation war her way-by destroying Parum itself and ruling the debris left. Oruma was called into war again and fought alongside a last-minute coalition, yet it didn' seem enough to stop Taka's ultimate magimecha. In the end while the sacrifices of the remaining champions of the Devastation war bought her time, Oruma pushed her esper abilities to the limit and managed to break the unstable balance holding Taka's impossible machine together, disappearing together from reality. From there the Android Administration easily swept aside the last exhausted remants of the other factions and consolidated their victory. Oruma company narrowly avoided being integrated into the new global government by showing great willingness to collaborate.
Nowadays Oruma Company fabricates a series of toys, civilian vehicles, video-games, and assorted home appliances, although sometimes somehow their research leads into one of a kind super prototypes more suited for exceptional battles than normal life.
This used to be an ice world, until a combination of heavy explosive use and accumulation of greenhouse gases greatly raised the temperatures, melting all of the surface, leaving the planet fully covered in water. Unlike Parum's decay that took decades, Neudaiz's major melting was sudden, in a matter of a few days.
Most the population died or left, except for a recent batch of Numans that quickly adapted to the new conditions. Those numans in turn engineered a series of algaes and fish to survive in the new enviroment, creating an artificial ecosystem virtually from scratch. A lot of machinery was abandoned by the previous population. Sunken ruins litter the great ocean's floor, partially or fully hidden in the darkness. Although several have been reclaimed, repurposed and recycled, a lot more still lie in waiting for new masters.
The high levels of pollution and radiation on the water make exploration hazardous at best and re-colonization virtually impossible. Only the new likeforms developed by the numans survive for any significant amount of time, and even then only on a delicate balance that needs to be constantly re-calibrated. Although none says it openly, it is a dying, doomed world, the radiation and toxic poisons on the great ocean slowly devouring everything, to the point even the current Parum may look like paradise, but the local Numans refuse to abandon it.
Neudaiz is divided in multiple dome-kingdoms each with their own governments interacting through a complex myriad of agreements and pacts. When words fail ritual mecha duels are employed, as all sides know any kind of escalating war would end up with them all dead.
Neudaiz mostly exports information, be it the data they gather from their artifical ecosystem to advanced duel techniques, passing through a variety of unique audio-visual works renowed for their blend of melancholia and delusional hope. Neudaiz's holo-books, series, movies and audiologs have won an outstanding number of inter-planetary awards. Artists from other worlds travel there to experience the same enviroment that allowed those kind of works to be created. Mecha pilots from accross the galaxy come visit Nudaiz just to test their skills directly against the dome's champions who wrote their treatises.
Many conflicts raged during the Devastation war, but probably none was bigger than the arrival of an einst hive force. Sensing the weakness created by the conflicting civilizations, it saw the opportunity to easily consume the whole system. Indeed, several planets of the system swiftly were turned to lifeless husks by the einst, while the local warring civilizations were unable to mount any kind of proper truce to stop the alien invasion.
Just to make matters worst a Nei pirate fleet arrived at the system, raiding the places weakened by the einst's assaults.
This however led to the einst hive force turning their attention to the Nei pirate fleet, their queen seemingly not willing to let anyone steal her “food” , no matter how little.
In the following confrontation both forces significantly weakened each other. The einst had massive numerical advantage as usual, but this Nei hadn't built her reputation on nothing and could face armies of drones single-clawedly. Plus her own mutant minions were no pushovers either and fought fiercely for their own mistress. As both armies of bio-weapons clashed against each other, it became evident that while the einst were able to recycle their forces over and over, this Nei's bio-factory ships were being overrun and capsized one after the other without any means for her to replace them in a timely manner. Thus this Nei gambled her remaining forces into a direct strike against the einst queen while on orbit of Moatoob, succeeding in personally slaying the alien matriarch. The einst hive force was thrown in disarray for some moments, only for the queen's strongest daughters to take over and declare that she, Reza, was to enforce her late mother's will, engaging this Nei and dragging them both into free fall towards Moatoob's surface.
This Nei decided she didn't have time for this and attempted a new approach. Talking with Reza while they traded savage claw blows, she claimed to have done the einst princess a favor by granting her independence where before she was but a glorified drone only following orders. Plus this Nei right now only wanted to get out of the system and there was plenty of other food for Reza to eat.
By chance or fate, as they fell on the planet's surface they crashed near a tourist cafe. The workers were too terrified to do anything besides their job. Nei and Reza were both still regenerating their heavy wounds and burns. The cat Newearl asked coffee and cookies for two. The young einst queen was instantly seduced by the new smells, colors and tastes. Nei took the chance to quickly escape. Reza only devoured one of the workers arms when they tried to ask how she would pay the bill. The einst queen then commanded her hive force to conquer the planet, but do their best to break nor kill too many stuff. She felt like she still had many other new things she wanted to experiment!
And that is how the Einst Queen became ruler of Moatoob while this Nei left the system. Reza would sit out of the rest of the devastation war without giving significant help to either side, although she could've easily tipped the scales either way or even finishing conquering the system. But her desire for power was drowned by her newfound desire for just having fun and relaxing, traits usually drowned out in the einst. Indeed Reza's remaining sisters and new daughters often try to get the einst queen to follow the family's line of work, but she doesn't seem in any hurry to consume everythig in her path, just those that annoy her too much. Still some more paranoid voices will claim that she's actually fooling everybody while building up new and terrible breeds of einst using the planet's resources. And indeed the Android Administration is itself eerily silent on the true military might Reza has available.
Moatoob is an unstable mining world covered in rock and magma, plus the recent einst fungus forests. Reza keeps some city-domes around as her personal gardens and playgrounds, housing some operas, shops, cinemas, restaurants and other places of leisure. One may think you could get easy access to Moatoob's resources with sweet talks and sweeter gifts, but Reza is no fool and hates any kind of games of deceit. Those that attempt to manipulate her soon get to experience the wrath of her daughters, or of the queen herself if they're really unlucky. Those non-einst that work under Reza are usually those had nowhere else to go or are truly loyal to her. They're not many, but they're enough to keep Reza happy for now.
The einst queen of Matoob trades her planet's raw resources for a variety of refined items and technologies, mostly with Parum. The Android Administration goes to great lengths to keep any competiton from other planets down, as the mineral production from Matoob is key to many industries.
Some decades ago, Reza offered to help with the restoration of Parum by sending boxes filled with spores of her fungus forests. The Android Administration still keeps them tightly sealed in underground laboratories of Parum's second moon. Not because they suspect it is a trap, but because they suspect it would be too efficient and soon all of Parum would be covered on the alien green.
