Fiction:Tuuros Galaxy/Quietus

"Sometimes, it feels as if the hardships of the world around you - war, death, conflict - it feels as if it doesn't happen. We move about our day to day lives, blissfully unaware of what passes underneath or overhead. The galaxies we live in? They have been filled with evil in the past. Lies and deceit; but it comes clear in the end that there are so many in this Gigaquadrant that are ready to do good despite it. This galaxy...however. No matter what good is done, it is built upon the foundations of mercilessness and wrath. The inhabitants are aware of what happens around them - Tuuros is...Tuuros is not what a galaxy should be."

- Unknown

The Tuuros Galaxy, also known as Centaurus A, Eye of Zahamantas, Adulovis Varupharnis and The Nexus is a large lenticular galaxy situated in the extreme reaches of the First Gigaqaudrant and is most commonly associated as being part of the Ikiwa Eropsii Cluster. The only lenticular galaxy left in the First Gigaquadrant (with the possible exception of the ), the Tuuros Galaxy remains in the present day as one of the most unexplored and therefore enigmatic regions of the First Gigaqaudrant.

Unlike the rest of the galaxies of the First Gigaquadrant, the Tuuros Galaxy has no sovereign power nor a political state that oversees galactic administration. The galaxy is in fact among the most divided and politically isolated in the First Gigaquadrant, and is known for the geopolitical division between what is deemed as the 'habitable' sectors of Tuuros and the 'uninhabitable'. Known for having been controlled by the long before recorded history began, the galaxy is rife with conflict over political, religious and economic matters. In modern times, much superstition around the galaxy exists as many believe that this was the ancient seat of power of the.

Denonyms of those inhabiting the Tuuros Galaxy are sometimes known as Tuurosians, although older cultures call themselves Tuurosi. An alternative and more modern denonym by the rest of the First Gigaquadrant is Centauran.

Years of Dusk (TY -8,000,000,000 - TY -878,500,000)
It is not known exactly as to when the Tuuros Galaxy formed, although many suggest that it came into being between thirteen and twelve billion years ago. The Zhulultu, a race of were said to be the first life to have achieved sapience in the galaxy, during the time when the galaxy was still forming. However, over the millennia of the Zhulultu's evolution towards postsapience, their ethos upon the First Gigaquadrant became ruthlessly narrow, believing that only certain species should evolve - those with superior characteristics - and that others deemed unfit for galactic cooperation would be destroyed. As the Zhulultu evolved further and further, eventually achieving their ultraterrestrial nature, Tuuros became a soulless machine of a galaxy - all aspects of its growth and change were controlled by the omnipresent Zhulultu, and thus the nature of the galaxy was incorruptible, though unnatural in itself.

In this time, the Zhulultu expanded across numerous other galaxies - Tigris among others - to establish their absolute rule over the known universe. It was not until some billions of years afterwards did it become apparent to the Zhulultu's contemporaries that the Zhulultu appeared to be systematically spreading through galaxies rather than what may have been thought of as logical - indicating that there was perhaps another force at work. True to their suspicions, the Tuuros Galaxy was saturated with all manners of enigmatic and incomprehensibly advanced technology, spreading out with the influence of the Zhulultu. Many galaxies they established themselves in were also established with the terrifying Scourge Device; a mechanism of ultraterrestrial technology that would wipe out all life in a galaxy upon activating it. The revelation of the Scourge Devices sparked endless conflicts against the Zhulultu, which eventually ended approximately one and a half billion years ago.

Most of the Scourge Devices were either dismantled, buried or forgotten in time. However, Tuuros as a galaxy began to grow uncontrollably as the life there started to evolve with the unnatural influence of the Zhulultu technology left behind. Whilst some of this technology deactivated itself and parts of the galaxy returned to normal growth, some began to over-function, and a large portion of the galaxy became sparse in resources, though the life that evolved within it mysteriously acclimatised to it, creating what is now known as the anti-civilisations. Despite the sudden disappearance of the Zhulultu, they left many traces across the Gigaquadrant, in hopes that a race subject to sentience may come across a means to awaken one of their kind again.

Years of Night (TY -878,500,000 - TY -5,900,000)
The so-called Years of Night, otherwise known as the Lost Years of Tuuros is a darkened area of Tuurosian history. There is little to no record of civilisation in this time - although what has been pieced together in the several millions of years since recorded Tuurosian history implies that the first years of the Years of Night were turbulent and violent. The Zhulultu that refused dissolution found ways to survive their so-called 'physical death' - translating their beings into machines later known as the Sel. The unrecorded cataclysm that caused the disappearance of the Zhulultu seemingly caused the Sel to become chaotic and degrade; the Zhulultu that inhabited these machine husks became progressively damaged and psychotic until their minds dissipated into the faint nothingness among the stars. It is thought the first galactic powers that arose from the galaxy likely warred with the Sel, with several powers being destroyed over time until these powers eventually outlasted them. Sel husks are still present across the Tuuros Galaxy, their machine bodies undamaged by time.

As the memory of the Sel became myth in the millennia after their eventual obsolescence, Tuuros began to evolve in its own natural course. However, the mysterious affluence of damaged Zhulultu technology in interstellar space gave rise to the Schism - creating lifeforms twisted against the natural order. It is believed the nascent years of independent Tuuros was plagued by conflict against the Schism, creating the dichotomous prospect of the Frontier in the process. No names of ancient precursors survive in Tuurosian history from this period aside from the Sel, although several megaconstructs and xenoarchaeological sites in varying states of ruin are known to exist in great number across the galaxy, especially centred around the galactic core.

There is unanimous agreements across modern Tuuros that the precursors that long preceded them were aware of the Zhulultu's legacy; not by name or by experience, but by similar discoveries and eventual rediscoveries of Zhulultu technology strewn across galactic space. Through each period of civilisation in the galaxy, most spanning several tens of millennia at a time, Zhulultu archaeology experienced periods of research and forget, which has since continued into the most recent 100,000 years of Tuurosian history.

Years of Dawn (TY -5,900,000 - TY -60,260)
What is agreed as the beginning of known Tuurosian history occurs approximately around TY -5,900,000 (or approximately 10,000,000 BC by Earth calendar reckoning). Though there is still little known of civilisation before the turn of the sixtieth millennium before TY 1, and the beginning of this epoch is littered with the legacies of the civilisations that came before it - the first known traces of exceptionally ancient powers such as the Auriculumi, and the. The vast majority of the last known 'true' precursors of the Tuuros Galaxy died out within the Years of Dawn, leaving behind graveyards and destroyed traces of their civilisation like several precursors that preceded them. The Years of Dawn is considered a subject of interest to the history and astropolitical landscape of Tuuros - the most complete traces of information survive from this period and imply a prolonged state of war between these near-forgotten cultures.

As with the Years of Night, the cultures that thrived during the Years of Dawn rediscovered and became aware of the Zhulultu technology, and thus the first surviving accounts of Zhulultu xenoarchaeology also survive from this period, some traces of which are at least five million years old. From these more developed and existent accounts, cultures that existed in the last years of the Years of Dawn became aware of the danger surrounding Zhulultu technology and the self-awareness it bore, yet failed to survive the destruction that it brought. The dangers of Zhulultu technology also paved the way of exploring the Hellspace in the earlier years of the Years of Dawn - to the present day there are ruins of hyperspatial megaconstructs in the layers of Hellspace, yet not many accounts survive describing the hellish nature of the dimension.

There is also an area of interest involving the development of independent machine cultures in Tuuros at this time - seemingly rising from nothing, entirely artificial entities with complex minds and cultural values began to shape and form a unique demographic within the galaxy. The rise of machines is largely attributed to the degradation and the dissolution of the Sel - their digital consciences expanding into thinner forms that may have subconsciously or even inadvertently created independent automatons capable of their own directive. Among the first known machine cultures in Tuuros is the of which originate from the mysterious edges of the galaxy sometime in the -200,000s TY.

Years of Day (TY -60,260 - Present Day)
Surrounding the sixtieth millennium before TY 1 (or circa 100,000 BC), Tuuros entered its current epoch. The oldest surviving civilisations with political influence emerged in the early phase of the epoch - the largely thought of as the first prominent power in the galaxy that has influence in the present day. As history from this time is known and documented thoroughly, the Years of Day is considered as the most violent of the years of Tuuros despite the consensus that Tuuros has been in a perpetual state of violence since the Years of Night. Violent events that marked the shaping of the Years of Day include the fall and extinction of the Auriculumi at the hands of their creations, the malevolent s of whom bear the largest extant empire in the galaxy in modern times. The rise of the Asilapheans also marked a wide scale massacre of the last precursor powers in Tuuros, crushing entire civilisations and replacing it with their authoritarian regime.

For several millennia in the Frontier, the Asilaphean Empire reigned supreme. Innumerable fledgling civilisations in the surrounding sectors were assimilated or destroyed, becoming part of their endlessly evolving war machine. Between TY -33611 to TY -16010, Tuuros was largely subject to the war the Asilapheans projected across the Frontier, only for distant powers such as the arising to present a true challenge to them. In TY -2881, the arose from the Pal-Tala Sector; a kratocratic society of enormous beings that easily overpowered the formerly unchallengeable might of the Asilapheans. However, though not as calculating as the machine race, the Vranntan presented a new kind of galactic threat, enslaving vast regions of space to further increase the power of their own war machine. The war against the Asilapheans dissolved rapidly as their influence was lost across the opposite side of the Frontier, though now the Vranntan Order evolved into a power that threatened the galaxy.

The most significant event in Tuurosian history - marked as TY 1 - was the reawakening of the Zhulultu Harbinger ; a monolithic beacon on activated by primitive humanity. Disheartened with the state of an anarchic galaxy, Zhuleshxi organised a plan; converting many viable races over to his cause, and in turn forming. Becoming the foremost power in the galaxy, the first since ancient times, the entire Frontier was threatened by the very existence of Zhuleshxi and his genocidal rampage across his former design. Not expecting the reality of the situation, The Congregation was challenged in its own might - the Frontier had become powerful in itself, powerful enough that whatever resources Zhuleshxi was able conjure from his home galaxy was not enough to overpower it. Zhuleshxi looked elsewhere to enact his plan - a Scourge Device in the.

As Zhuleshxi conquested in Tigris, exterminating many species in his path, Tuuros was suspended in a state of great violence during the occupation of the Congregation in Frontier space. The Asilapheans were free to continue their regime without scrutiny as the Congregation rampaged across the stars, and a Tuurosian Underworld formed not long after as the diaspora of destroyed civilisations united in a shadowy front.

Regions
"How to best put Tuuros together in a first glance? Ironically, divided. It is called The Schism for a reason. We cannot thrive in there, nor can they thrive out here. Of course, many have contacted us and it is common to see a Schism-born out here; but they are clad in life suits."

- Unknown

The Frontier
The Frontier is the geopolitical governance of 26 autonomous sectors that account for approximately 70% of the Tuuros Galaxy's systems. As such, it is generally considered that approximately 70% of the galaxy's population exists within the Frontier. The Frontier is defined primarily by its accessibility by both the natives of Tuuros and potential foreigners for the rest of the First Gigaquadrant. Because of this, the Frontier is widely available to travel through, except for the enigmatic Imi-Xicca region that exists on the far side of the Schism.

The 26 sectors of the Frontier are classified through the Core Regions, Mid Regions and Fringe Regions - the majority of Tuuros' more influential societies are centred around the Core Regions and tend to become less influential the closer to the galaxy's edges. The Frontier's societies are the most numerous and diverse in the Tuuros Galaxy, although it is no less dangerous than the Schism.

The Schism
The Schism, otherwise known as the Discontinuity, Great Scar and Bleeding Space is the 27th region of the Tuuros Galaxy, and accounts for approximately 30% of the galaxy's total population and star count. Defined primarily as an abnormal and supernatural region of space, the Schism plays host to a variety of unstable laws of reality, often to the degree of life evolving on planets considered uninhabitable in conventional terms, and in more extreme cases, life has evolved without the need of a planet to evolve upon. Because of this, the Schism is highly dangerous to those from the Frontier, and vice versa - creating a sociopolitical divide between the Schism and Frontier, as well as a sparse demographic of either populace in the opposite region.

The Schism is sparse of resources, and thus, life and societies that have grown in the Schism have grown to be very resilient and in turn more formidable than a majority of the nations from the Frontier. There are several rumours of dark and ominous phenomena in the Schism of artefacts and supernatural presences that were left behind from the days of the Zhulultu, that may indeed be the reason behind the Schism's existence. Some of the Schism's deepest recesses are said to contain interdimensional leaks to realms both dangerous and threatening.

Satellites
Tuuros has an unusually large number of satellite galaxies orbiting it; sixteen are known to exist. It is known that civilisations of varying advancement have thrived in these satellites for aeons, although during periods of history interaction between the satellites and Tuuros itself has entailed destructive consequences several times over. What is known of these satellite galaxies in the modern age is that they house a more dense and untouched cache of Zhulultu technology - largely thought to be a myriad of stellar engines and megaconstructs.

Government and Politics
Autonomous among nearly all of Tuuros' native species, the Tuuros Galaxy is home to a wide array of fortitudinous cultures both from the Frontier and the Schism. Although normally considered mythological conjecture, it is said that the way in which the Zhulultu of old shaped the Tuuros Galaxy caused Tuuros' life to evolve and interact in ways far more aggressively and violently than the rest of the First Gigaquadrant; thus, Tuuros is often considered dystopian and unruly beyond any measure other than the complete subjugation of the galaxy altogether. In the vast history of the Tuuros Galaxy, there has never been a single galactic government since the Zhulultu - although some believe came the closest to entirely subjugating the galaxy under their rule, although even then the Congregation was met with fierce resistance, and a number of civilisations retained their sovereignty.

Due to the lack of singular galactic government in the galaxy, and an apparent lack of a galactic superpower, the Tuuros Galaxy's political landscape is largely independent and has varying levels of freedoms and rights - nations such as the possess some of the galaxy's most liberal policies, whilst nations such as the  and  are slavers, and have predilections to entirely erase the identities of enslaved cultures altogether. In modern times, some believe that the is on the verge of becoming Tuuros' single superpower, and a number of the galaxy's populace believe it may either be the salvation or the downfall of Tuuros.

Whilst there are divides between every sector in the Tuuros Galaxy, the divide between the Frontier and Schism in itself is perhaps the most aggressive and prevalent. Forged from the perceptions of the unnatural growth of the Schism, a number of the Frontier's races are xenophobic towards the Schism, and those of the Schism reciprocate the sentiment. Whilst there is little military interaction between the Schism and Frontier, the Schism is in a state of perpetual civil war over territory and resources, and thus alliances in the Schism are often rare, and those that are made are almost always temporary. Some nations do not correlate to the aggressive nature of the Schism and do have active diplomatic relations with nations from the Frontier.

A galaxy of entities both peculiar and unnatural, there are multiple governments in the Tuuros Galaxy that are above political and moral jurisdiction, and present threats to both the Frontier and Schism. Many of these threats are ancient and Schism-born, which only adds to the negative perception of the Schism overall. In truth, the Schism is also under threat from these alien governments, and in times have had to defend themselves.

Species and Races
A galaxy of approximately nine million species, the Tuuros Galaxy's unnatural beginnings have ensured the growth of Tuuros' species to be both physically and mentally formidable; proverbs of the Tuuros Galaxy from ancient times entail that the Tuuros Galaxy is full of species with an instinct of survival and an inclination to supersede - it is notable to say that a vast number of Tuuros' spacefaring nations are of species with physical superiority, and those that are not physically strong are often highly intelligent. It is thought that the Zhulultu in ancient times had seeded life across a massive number of the Tuuros Galaxy's planets, and that a number of Tuuros' more influential nations were a product of the seeding process. Among these species are the s and. There is no dominant species within the Tuuros Galaxy in either influence or population, although some argue that the s are the most prevalent race in the galaxy.

In correlation to the Frontier, races in the Schism have not only grown to be strong, but have evolved in ways beyond natural reckoning. Many races in the Schism are able to survive on worlds considered deathly by the Gigaquadrant, and some have even attained biological immortality. However, Schism races cannot survive outside of the Schism without technological aid, and in turn the Frontier species cannot survive within the Schism.

There is a significant number of machine races within the Tuuros Galaxy - a higher concentration than the rest of the First Gigaquadrant that is largely the assumption of either precursor technology or technology directly derived from the Zhulultu. These machine races have varying levels of sentience and thus these species have varying levels of complex governments; the s being among the Frontier's most notable machine races that were the products of ancient precursors.

Society and Culture
"Pffft. Outside of the Tala-Lok and Yaton-Tala Sectors, society and culture is little more than a vast number of savages trying to outsmart and outmatch one another. Tuuros is dangerous, that much everyone knows. You have to be smart, and you have to be strong to live in the wilderness, or you will be the next victim of a pillage."

- Unknown



Tuuros society is extremely fractured, and most cultures are isolated from one another. Whilst there have been countless attempts over the ages to unite the galaxy together, all attempts so far have failed. Nearly every individual savvy enough to live within Tuuros believe that the galaxy will never be united, as the galaxy is rife with xenophobia among the life of the Frontier - among themselves and particular racism towards the life within The Schism.

Due to the lack of a galactic government like the and, criminality and lawlessness is ultimately the sovereign power of the Tuuros Galaxy, and civilisation comparable to the rest of the First Gigaquadrant is seldom found. In more recent years following the, many natives of Tuuros have elected to live within the safer regions of the galaxy, which has in fact alleviated some of the xenophobic tensions between species, although this has increased a political sentiment known as Frontierism - a belief that the Schism must be contained or either destroyed to prevent a galactic war, although it will inevitably create a galactic war nonetheless.

Within the Frontier, society is far more diverse than that of within The Schism; life has evolved in a far wider state than the Schism. However, it remains equally as divided as The Schism itself, with only a few political relations actively making an effort to stabilise the region of space they live within. In the reaches closer to the Schism itself, the and the  exist; two states that profit off criminal activity and violent intention.

Quotes
"The Source of True Evil, a place where darkness thrives!"

- Emperor of

"Tuuros belongs to Chaos. Any other attempts to claim it are inconsequential."

"Tuuros is a broken mirror. No matter if someone were to somehow 'fix' it by bringing the countless pieces back together, the cracks could still be seen... and whatever it would then go on to reflect would be but a distortion."

"It brings dead to imagine what kind of hyper-level power - a metaphorical Olympus, if you will - must collapse for much of galactic society to still be fighting over scraps that even I can't guess how old they are."

- Royal Academy illuminate

"For how much I've pushed down... that side of me, there's still something about this galaxy that gets to me. Whenever I hear its name, or see its image, it's like I can feel, for a moment, the powers stirring in it. Perhaps it is because I retain some connection to them. I know he has brought his legions into it, Saviki and... otherwise. There are minds out there who stitch themselves to powers that have kept me up at night; my father is one of a throng of devils and gods who support the fat of their strength on thrones of corpses and spears and throat-slitting words. I would be wise to fear anything that should emerge victorious from Tuuros. Anything that roots itself in worlds tread upon by such leviathan powers as those that touched that galaxy will do so only through brutality, the likes of which none in this Gigaquadrant are ready to confront. My path away from hellfire is already mapped, should I live to see Tuuros open its wretched heart once more. Do not follow me."

"What is sanity? What is that force that compels men to rise above their based instinct in the hopes of creating something that lasts? What is that motive force behind the lawgiver’s edicts, the statesman’s dictates, and the diplomat’s negotiations? The sane will say that it is a thirst for order, driven forth by an army of contracts, deals, standards, and covenants which bind all living things together. The sane will say that all men are bound not just by the laws of gravity and of thermodynamics, but by their agreements, by their institutions, and by their dealings with one another. But sanity is merely an artifice constructed by the desperate in face of a reality they can neither fathom nor accept. It is the ultimate delusion - it is seeing solemnity in a farce, meaning in a void, and order in chaos. It is a fragile mosaic constructed by souls who, terrified of the maelstrom of reality, jejunely blind themselves in veils composed of their own fragile delusions. The sane are perpetual children, refusing to mature and face reality for what it truly is - an organisation of disorder and a mausoleum for screaming souls held together by chains born from the primordial soup of the universe and of their own artifice. The races of Tuuros are not insane, as the supposedly “sane” would have you think. They merely have the intelligence to see reality for what it truly is, and the courage to embrace it. They recognise that all life teeters not on some eternal plateau of stability, but on the eye of a disintegrating needle barely suspended over an abyss defined only by its infinite scope and edacity. They have forged their souls, built their civilisations, and birthed their philosophies from the only sane principle there is - that the only constant in the universe is change, and the only constant in change is conflict. That is Tuuros - merely mortals choosing to dance the beat of the universe rather than melodies birthed from their own asinine delusions."

- Unknown

Trivia

 * Though this article was created in 2016, the Tuuros Galaxy has existed in one form or another since 2009.