Aylathiya
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Aylathiya is one of Cosmoria's three major arms, in conjunction with Zalanthium and Florathel. Once home to some of the most ambitious civilizations in history, the crusts of its worlds have long since run out of resources. Aylathiyan civilization has flattened as many mountains as they see. Finished with the home worlds, they left to exploit the millions of minor planets in this arm. Five millennia ago, the last intelligent species left their home worlds, each one competing with their neighbors for every resource they can get. With every useful asteroid long since melted down, Aylathiya's civilizations face two choices, harvest the scraps or haul material from the hellish interiors of rocky planets. Both options leave much to be desired. Aylathiya's civilizations, dozens of species, and myriad of worlds carry on, their civilizations as grand as ever, but doing more to live within their means than before.
In the distant past, thousands of petty nations ruled Aylathiya, finding a unified planet was rare, let alone a unified star system. The first consolidations were brutal affairs, made possible by Thaumaturgy. When it took decades to travel between stars by ship, the users of Thaumaturgy, the Magi, could make the trip in weeks. A single person could conquer worlds, threatening dissenters with radioactive hellfire. Indestructible with the technology at the time, these individuals became known as Overlords. Most were Spirits who referred to themselves as deities, but as populations increased, more powerful magi emerged.
As the art of Thaumaturgy grew more refined, individuals could no longer enforce their will across planets. Small groups, typically of magi, became the norm. Civilizations like the Cosmic Commonwealth of Magi, Oberherr League, and the Matoehdahn Contract rose. A small class of magi commanded billions of commoners to spread across the galaxy. A peculiar development across the core in Florathel was the civilization ruled by kings of normal ability, not unstoppable cohorts of magi. This development took Aylathiya slowly, only becoming common two thousand years ago. Overlords and magocracies became less common, but they did not go down without a fight. Numerous wars, the largest and most recent being the War of the Ancients, determined which kind of civilization would rule. Rule by the many, instead of the few, is the new state of affairs. Large multi-species federations dominate Aylathiya. The Greater Martial Consilium and Commonwealth of Aggregate Aylathiya are the premier examples.
Most of Aylathiya is highly developed, with Hyperlanes allowing for quick travel to most stars. The current population is 32.4 trillion, about half of its peak population in 7556 CE. Consequently, economic and industrial output of region peaked in the 7556 CE. Since then, its only brushed up against this maximum. Currently, its economy is about three-fourths of its height, but recent trends like liberalization could rocket Aylathiya past its ancient maxima.
Prehistory
Life first came into existence in Aylathiya not on its planets but in the vast ocean of space. This life, analogous to the ocean-dwelling bacteria most common in the universe, has evidence for its existence dating back at least 4.5 billion years. Aylathiya supported a stunning array of life since well before the first planets cooled enough to entertain seas of liquid water.
It would come to a handful of other planets, but the number of abiogenesis events is fifteen—three of which happened in space. This is a small number compared to the dozens of life-bearing worlds across Aylathiya. While some life is descended from spaceborne life that settled certain worlds, the majority of habitable worlds were not born but built. The builder was Ma'eau, a force of creation responsible for most of Aylathiya's life. A microbe species molding ecosystems to bolster its supply of food, Ma'eau unconsciously influenced life across Aylathiya to terraform worlds. The center of this network was Velevev, which became the host of planet-spanning brains responsible for coordinating the life of Aylathiya.
Ancient History
The first civilizations of Aylathiya emerged as the life forged by Ma'eau began to evolve. While doubtless countless ancient societies rose and fell even millions of years ago, the first ones to leave a permanent mark were the Hyperians. With their heavy usage of radioactive fuel cells, archeologists can accurately date their earliest relics to 160,000 BCE. The Hyperians created much of the ancient megastructures Aylathiya is known for. Aubade, Eos, Phaethon, Taek, Onaud, Elisa, the original Vossen Bands, and others. They also created the Loresavt, an intelligent species tasked with building and maintaining these structures. While they had gone extinct everywhere but Phaethon and Eos, the Loresavt continue to defend the legacy of Hyperion.
The Lareas Alliance from Florathel made a vassal out of this legendary nation, but could not conquer the Atlin nation of Gehenna. The hubris of Lareas eventually caused the Advaris Swarm to emerge, wiping out all civilization in Aylathiya. When the Andvaris Swarm subsided, the first interstellar societies could form. The Un'oit, driven out of the void by the Tegrelis supernova, began to settle Nocturne.
With the formation of Ectabana signalling the beginning of the common era, interstellar civilization sprung up across the universe. The First Aeternal Society emerged on Olaris in 76 CE. The next civilization emerged in 120 CE with the unification of the Dotsk into the first Empire of Medb. The Cosmic Commonwealth of Magi formed by 1000 CE as a region-spanning magocracy, a society ruled by magi. In truth, all societies in Aylathiya were magocracies; organizing people barely capable of melting bronze into interstellar societies required the magic arts. The Dotsk advanced technologically, but soon destroyed their civilization by creating Belshazzzar, a machine whose job was to capture spirits. The Spirits rebelled to form the Oberherr League, beginning the era of the Overlords.
Society from this point on was ruled by powerful individuals. People who could raze planets by themselves, allowing for the creation of interstellar empires through force alone. Legendary individuals, from spirits to artificial super intelligences to magi of legendary ability conquered stars. Some of these magi, now called the Angels, used their power to suppress the Overlords, inadvertently becoming Overlords themselves. These people created intelligent species, such as the Humans, Huefolk, and Luxscions, and created empires. The angels made studying history difficult, with their propensity to thoroughly wipe out their enemies.
Premodern Era
By the time the fifth angel was said to have emerged, the Overlords were long destroyed or banished. States like the Matoehdahn Contract, Boreal Empire, and Resonant Divinity now ruled Aylathiya. On its fringes, Un'oit hoards went from world to world, extorting food and water from whatever primitive civilizations resided on them. In fact, the Un'oit raids contributed greatly to the rise of interstellar states. Planets could not stay divided when invaders routinely threatened them.
The sixth angel, Sydiah, would prove the most influential. The founder of Aeternalism—the religion that canonized the idea of angels altogether—she created the empire of Sedrua. Her hundreds of creations, called Architects, lead the nation while she remained on the home world of Zushilo. At its height, Sedrua controlled nearly all of Aylathiya, even moving into Nocturne. Every species they came across, whether in the stone age or interstellar civilizations, were admitted into the empire.
Sedrua was directly responsible for the creation of its biggest rivals, the Payotari Quartet and the Triumvirate Civilization. The Civese united their grand cities to defend themselves from Sedruan attack. The Triumvirate emerged when Titania, one of Sydiah's architects, betrayed her creator.
Coalition Period
The death of Sydiah rapidly degraded Sedrua's capabilities. The disastrous Sedrua-Quartet War and Sedrua-Triumvirate War resulted in Sedrua fracturing into dozens of states. The coalition between the Triumvirate and the newly formed Quintet Payotari Association ushered in a new era. The Three—Holos, Ma'eau, and Titania—ruled in conjunction with POLIKY, the machine who administered the QPA. Negotiations with the Providence Union of Florathel began, intent on splitting the entire universe between the two powers.
Many called this the "end of history." Private ventures (not unlike modern corporations) created a complex web of ownership. Citizens could own property in entirely different arms of the galaxy, even if they had never been there. After five hundred years of unprecedented economic growth, the private ventures had wealth rivaling modern nations. Military bases and churches joined the rush to acquire property, accumulating trillions of square kilometers of land.
The Coalition Crisis shattered dreams of universal peace. Private ventures on Aegyn seized the property of all non-humans on their planet, flooding the government with lawsuits and counter-suits about whose property it even was. Shoddy, often conflicting, paper records made the process even more difficult. Other planets across Aylathiya took matters into their own hands. They formed species-based, or even ethnic-based, syndicates who defended their property when the government couldn't. The Triumvirate looked especially weak, and when the Providence Union and QPA were found to have been arming groups favorable to them, the coalition ended. The Triumvirate entered into civil war as its ministries and military units battled over which territory was rightfully theirs. The Union and QPA quietly took territory during this dispute.
Common Epoch
Expansion Era
Contemporary History
Map
Ecology
The ecology of Aylathiya is diverse and highly influenced by both the natural and artificial species that populate the region's wilderness. Aylathiya is strange in having a robust space-based ecosystem. Most star systems have been at least partially colonized by space-based life.
Natural Flora and Fauna
Aylathiya has a large number of natural flora and fauna known as the "Noirae." Noirae, singular Noirum, are a domain of life native to the void. Noirae are most commonly space-based organisms; however, numerous planets have become hosts to naturally forming ecosystems featuring Noirae through panspermia.
Common Noirum species include The Pestilence and Maledicta. Outside of these prolific species, most other species are heavily localized to a particular system or region. There exists a small subset of the Noirae that are capable of traveling near the speed of light by using ludicrously smalls amounts of energy. Many scientists hypothesize that this subgroup, known as the Celiratids, has an artificial origin.
Artificial Ecosystem
Artificia are a form of life common to Aylathiya that rival the Noirae. Artificia are space-based forms of life descended from the ancient self-replicating probes. Some Artificia have origins so far back in time that the civilization that created them is entirely unknown. Over one thousand of these craft are thought to have evolved into Artificia. Twelve models of extant self-replicating craft have not diverged enough to be considered Artificia.
Most objects in space break down after only a century. However, reproducing craft can persist for millions of years. The same rules of natural selection apply to artificial life. As such, Aylathiya is filled with dozens of species originating from a handful of probes. Common classifications of Artificia are "Yggdrasil," "Sora," "Ophanim," "Antero," "Avid," and "Celestio." Each classification relates to the model that "species" within the class evolved from. The most ancient of the Artificia is the Yggdrasil at over 10 million years old. The newest is "Celestio," having only recently formed due to the unstable nature of some of the Celestial Plague.
Anomalous Ecosystem
There is space-based life whose origins are neither "natural" nor "artificial" but a third category, "anomalous." Creatures within this category are by far the most diverse and also the most dangerous. Commonly, anomalies emerge through the manipulation of the environment by natural agents in unexplainable ways. Put differently, anomalies do not emerge through abiogenesis and do not diversify through evolution, they simply exist as they are in their current forms.
Examples of anomalous forms of space-based life are almost all Spirits. The Ekrosian Guardians and the precursors to the Naidaran species are the most widely known. They exhibit strange qualities that cannot be reproduced naturally or artificially within the realms of known science. The most common anomalies are the Ekrosian Guardians, a species that forms when cosmic dust spontaneously arranges itself into a form of life. Whether they are inclined to use Thaumic abilities or are made of magical energy, anomalous life has a grasp on some kind of Thaumic power.
Abiotic Aspects
Abiotic elements of the ecosystem, excluding self-replicating probes which are considered artificial life, are simply known as "Abiotics." Trillions of self-repairing spacecraft sometimes roam space for thousands of years. They usually remain in wild areas, often destroying each other or life forms for the resources to self-repair. Most of them are military craft but many automated harvesters continue to gather resources to this day. Many nomads raid these crafts for resources to resell them.
Many modern ships, whether manned or unmanned, also become unwitting participants in the ecosystem. Many spacecraft fall prey to these self-repairing craft. Most ships flying through undeveloped regions need military escorts to ensure safety. Even though the risk is well-known, thousands of ships, usually from border worlds, fall prey to Aylathiya's ecosystem every year.