Carcidel

The world of Carcidel is a star system of 5 planets, and its namesake is from that of the Carcids. The Carcids mastered the forces of magic and merged it with technology, using an element known as thaetrium. The Carcids and the empire they paved across worlds have fallen to extinction, but their legacy remains consequential; new nations have risen up to the fill the power vacuum, and old cultures are being rebuilt, reconfigured, forming something new atop the ashes. Thaetrium is now a commodity that is vital to industry, and the nations who lack it will be left behind. The Carcids' portals between worlds remain, and the possibilities of war or peace, trade or isolation, and integration or independence, hang in the balance to current day.   Carcidel contains elements of both science fiction and fantasy. The supernatural and the scientifically explained are often blurred when dealing with some of the bizarre, perplexing technologies that the people of Carcidel utilize. Yet, some technology may also seem fairly grounded, even when compared to the technology of our own world. Despite all this, the esoteric still abounds in the untamed corners of the worlds; reanimated fossils of primordial god-like beings, forgotten experiments gone wrong, and horrific aberrations at the edges of space are among the many unexplained threats that plague the people of Carcidel. However, the only threats most are concerned with have roots in crime, war, corporate ambition, and economic ruin.   The Carcidel System hosts 5 planets, titled in order of the closest to the sun to the furthest: Laestares, a world that is half-night and half-day and home to the Kalauża. Terra, a world that is both populous yet notably strained for resources, and is the home planet of Humans. Kythanis, a gas giant that hosts 7 moons with many different sapient species. Dathael, a planet ravaged by deep space aberrations every 100 years. Lastly, Vastathus, a dwarf planet that orbits at the fringes of Carcidel, known as the Malefic Verge, and is ruled by many aberrations.   Over 3500 years prior to Carcidel's current era, the Carcids began their conquest on planet Terra. Using their natural talents of magic and technology, the cultures of humanity were gradually assimilated. The Carcid Empire eventually grew to rule over nearly every planet in the star system, expanding and communing through naturally occurring conjuration portals. These portals link the moons and planets of Carcidel, and were first unlocked by the Carcids, leading to many possibilities of interplanetary contact.   In the final years of the Carcid Empire, their lands had already been fractured by several resistances, military overspending, the inability to conquer and permanently settle Dathael, and a dwindling supply of thaetrium on Terra. When a Carcid pioneering crew attempted to engineer a portal that could allow transport to other star systems, they crossed into a realm known as the Hellscape, which was under the guise of a new planet. The pioneers gradually yielded to it's deep corruption, all while convincing a wave of Carcid citizens to immigrate en masse, along with their emperor, Extallis Malathan III. The zenith of the conflict in Carcidel reached its peak; Malathan was corrupted and nearly a quarter of the Carcid elite were trapped in the Hellscape, while the remaining citizens effectively succumbed to a genocide from the interplanetary uprisings. This series of events that brought the downfall of the Carcids is known as "The 4th Insurrection."   Over 95 years after Malathan's demise and the collapse of his empire, the societies it left behind are still adapting to the empire's absence, undergoing an overhaul of their own borders, returning to their own cultural values, and learning how to cope with the finite nature of thaetrium itself. Yet amidst this recovery, a new fiendish empire is growing and contorting in the fires of the Hellscape, and Malathan's return may prove fateful.