[u]The Domain[/u] A large cooperative based society which views itself as the sole light in an ocean of darkness. [hider=Species] -The Shapeless The Shapeless are blank, pale humanoids who aren’t human at all. They are androids who formed a secret police force for the Domain to crackdown on dissidents during the revolution and purge society of the misanthropic forces within. They have since moved on to a more imperial role, being the front line in subterfuge when they are not attaining high positions of power within the Domain’s system. The shapeless have no actual gender- they take on any identity they need to at any time. Their populations aren’t large and they usually are in their default androgynous form when living a more civilian life. The Shapeless are met with regular suspicion by the other species of the Domain, even if in practice the Shapeless prefer to be rather transparent with others about their civilian activities. The Shapeless can also change their size, but must conserve their mass. What this simply means is that when they are larger, they are much lighter and when they are smaller, they are much denser. Shapeless take on a very, very diverse range of roles, though entertainment and spying is where they are most often seen. -Materialists The Materialists are the most common species within the Domain, and make up nearly half the population. The Materialists much like the Shapeless aren’t of any unified form. Instead they are humanoids who have come to have body parts they can attach, replace and change with ease of really any shape or size, though they are often limbs. Such development is caused by how they are basically humans spliced with axolotl DNA which has come with the tradeoff of limiting their cognitive development to that of a fourteen-year-old. Improvements on the physical traits have come about, but there is a distinct absence of attempts to even bother to improve the cognition of the Materialist folk, not only because of an absence of neural R&D within the Domain, but They tend to have frills of no practical purpose and come in many colors. Their colorful, vibrant society is pretty much dominated by cooperative life and daily work. Materialists occupy many positions within the government and while not the founding species of the Domain, the Materialists have in recent times become the most widespread group much to the disgust of the Tibians. Materialists are used frequently as an infantry force in the military and usually are given specialized vat grown body parts and often do the engineering and grunt work in the Domain. -Tibians The Tibians are a clade of humanoids who have large eyes, a large, bony head with something vaguely like a beak and muscular limbs. Unlike the Materialists or the Shapeless, they are very rigid in their body form and have a seeming reverence for it. Tibian society has its origins in a science foundation and they are very much oriented around intelligence, machinery and technical data. They do a large share of the R&D in the Domain as well, with Tibians holding many positions within multiple Domain organizations to this day. The Tibians once ruled in a caste system over the world of light, but proved simply unable to hold power in the face of resistance. -Splinters The Splinters are silvery humanoids who live in the notorious depths of Lurs who have four limbs and a body structure far more suited for tree climbing than anything else. The Splinters, used to lower gravity environments usually crawl around on worlds with earth-like gravity out of habit. The Splinters tend to live in the poorer parts of society even as immigrants to the main world of Lux and elsewhere as a cheap labor force that works behind the scenes for the cooperatives. The Splinters are barred from forming unions by the high council due to “abuse” of the union system as of right now. Many Splinters make use of their own language instead of the common domain speak and often are second class citizens. The Materialists tend to share many nasty rumors about the activities of Splinters, not helped by how the domain has members who deliberately incite such tensions on a regular basis. -The Spindlers The Spindlers are swarms of semi-intelligent spiders who are a common aspect of the Domain’s civilization who can be found living on and around the various humanoid species as a common cohabitant. Their special relationship with the Domain’s society goes back centuries. They were uplifted from Orb Weaver spiders in ancient times. It is unclear where they come from. The Splinders are treated as a special kind of citizen within the Domain due to their unique nature. For instance, Spindlers are obligated to pay a web tax under the current Domain tax code. The Spindlers come in huge numbers and have been described mainly as “comforting” to be around. The Spindlers are a diverse group, with many colorations and patterns of very, very vibrant sorts. The Spindlers are very coordinated and can be trained for a vast degree of actions. Spindlers tend to form relationships with citizens of the Domain. [/hider] [hider=Points of Interest] -Lux Lux, the world of lights is a bright world which looks like a bike tire from afar, are the world itself is within a toroid and at the center of this 70-km radius torus is the command station. It is a world known for its bright appearance and being swarmed in orbital stations set up by various cooperatives from within the world itself. Lux has been styled as a light within the darkness, illuminating in a universe dominated by savagery. Or so the Domain’s narrative goes. Lux is filled with multiple cities built up over the ages in a world that is in perpetual twilight. The Materialists, Tibians and Shapeless all come from this one world. Lux is a somewhat forested world with many large fixtures, primarily at the world’s core which is accessible through numerous elevators found around the world. -Lurs Lurs is a sordid world which was occupied nearly a century ago after decades of attempts. Lurs was a common annoyance for Lux, which had been preparing an invasion for decades primarily to gain access to a world closer to the core world of Cutis and because Lurs had symbolic value. For if Lurs could be tamed, any world could. Lurs is a small, dense cigar shaped world which rotates rather slowly. It contains within itself a jungle in perpetual darkness. Lurs is filled with arboreal cave dwellers used to the absence of light and a huge range of extremely deadly, genetically enhanced super creatures. It is from this world the Splinters are native to. Invading Lurs was a long-time pet project, with expeditions going back centuries. However, it would only be recently that dominance over most of the world was finally achieved. Lurs remains still a hard to contain place, as it is densely populated and while the Domain gained a foothold, it hasn’t fully secured the internal world. Externally they claim dominion of the world, however. -Rayleigh Rayleigh is a small 30-km long world cylindrical world known for being in perpetual daylight from its central fusion generator acting as a tiny sun. It is known for meandering green hills with seas and deserts, along with a distinct lack of forests. Rayleigh came under control of the Domain over two centuries ago in a takeover caused by the local authorities being easily exploited by the secret policing forces of the Domain. They basically ceded their sovereignty to the Domain and have been a client world ever since. Rayleigh in modern times is well known for being a world of industry for the Domain, with spacecraft manufacturing being a huge aspect of their society along with their natural reserves. (The Domain occupies or has partial control on 27 worlds total, not counting the various orbital outposts. Only 3 of these worlds have been elaborated on for now.) [/hider] [hider=Society] The Domain is a syndicalist society whose foundations come from three centuries ago, during the darker years of the shattering’s aftermath. In this darkness, a totalitarian society had come to power on the rather unassuming world of Lux under the guidance of a ruling caste of humanoids known as the Tibians. Ruling from a central command center, looking down upon everyone else they ruled coldly and incompetently. These Tibians were care takers for the most part, they were part of one of many projects for a private entity whose general motives have long since been forgotten. What is well known however, if that the Tibians abandoned their initial duty and made a totalitarian state enforced with a secret police force and draconian policies. They controlled a large underclass of individuals and had focused primarily on stability over one world in what they saw as a chaos filled hell. To the Tibian masters, risks were detrimental and the domestic dangers within would endanger any hopes for expansion. Simply living rich from the local produce and local industries that they had the underclass make for them was good enough. Such exploitation seemed like it would, at the time, be the new normal. That is, if the Tibians didn’t try to rely upon a class of androids they had found and exploited as a policing force for their fiefdom. The Shapeless were androids they had found within multiple caches that contained thousands of them. The Tibians thought they had command over the Shapeless due to their seeming absence of free will from their perspective. The Tibians ruthlessly used the Formless to spy on the underclasses, but didn’t realize just how volatile of actors the Shapeless really were until it was too late. Their weak power structure, thought entrenched by spacecraft and owning most of the weaponry was cracked from within by rogue Formless who acted to overthrow the Tibians and the instatement of a Domain before sifting back into the fold. Ever since, the Domain has managed to deal with a huge range of issues such as continued arguments as to how to handle a society built on populist ideals and which worlds to expand the revolution to. The Domain in the past century has managed to become far more expansionist with increased industrialization and a renaissance in bioengineering that the Shapeless have taken full advantage of in a society where decentralized cooperatives make up a larger system of government. There is a council system within the Domain which makes use of multiple cooperative representatives who nominate potential first citizens. These cooperatives united into multiple factions over time, consolidating progressively more over the decades as the Domain slowly became wealthier. These factions became three political parties aligned primarily by ideology. The Domain’s political system is oriented on influencing blocs of people in different cooperatives to flip their affiliation to their ideology with geography being of low relevance. -The Formless Party The Formless Party is a deeply libertarian political party whose general agenda is deeply individualistic and oriented on the power of the individual, and is fundamentally hostile to any caste system to the point where their administrations are by far the most hawkish when it comes to liberating other worlds. The Formless Party has its origins around two centuries ago during increasing prosperity and with the charismatic leadership of Versima the Bright they managed to gain the chair of first citizen. The Formless Party is currently an opposition force in the modern era, but their policies are responsible for the free flow of civilians throughout the various colonized worlds of the Domain and cracking down on unions. Their propaganda often focuses on the idea of the Domain as an ideal far more than as a state. -The Populist Party The Populist Party was the first party to come into power and was the only political party at the founding of the Domain nearly three centuries ago. The Populists have their founding mythology in the hijacking of the Central Station, where the Tibian Elite had ruled over everything in comfort. Infiltration with the Shapeless turning against their masters has been rewritten in a populist tone, emphasizing the revolts in this same period by the Materialists against decades of arbitrary despotism and dismal development. The Populists claim to act on majority will and majority will alone, all morality being viewed as essentially defined by what the majority view as correct. In short, they are a party defined by mob rule. -The Constructivist Party The Constructivists are a very policy obsessed political party, far less interested in high ideals of individuality or of enforcing the popular will and far more in building a better world. The Constructivists are the youngest party, but they have enjoyed first citizenship twice so far. Their origins come from a civil war (The Destructive War) a century earlier caused by tensions between multiple worlds within the Domain who sought a more equitable relationship with Lux itself. This led to multiple spaceship battles and the rise of the Constructivists on multiple worlds, spearheaded by the admiral Tras of Rayleigh. Tras with the help of multiple associates managed pulled off a de facto coup on Lux itself. Tras enacted radical reforms for over a decade before the other cooperatives could get Tras to step down. The Constructivists continue their policy, direct and blunt approach to politics to this day, and are notorious for it. [/hider] (Incomplete, needs tech still)