The First Empire
Cultural event
Ages Ago
Little is truly known of the First Empire. It existed so long ago that its history has become indistinguishable from legend. Whispered in half-remembered stories, etched in stone ruins, and buried beneath centuries of dust and ash. To some, it was a golden age of impossible marvels; to others, it was a warning written in metal and silence.
What few scraps remain suggest they were a civilization so advanced they may as well have been gods. Their ruins speak of machines that never slept, towers that touched the stars, and vessels that crossed the void between worlds. They bent biology and matter to their will, crafting beasts, bending the climate, and perhaps even time itself. Some claim the Skeletons were their creations; others whisper that the First Empire was Skeletons, long before the curse of eternity was laid upon them.
No one knows how long they reigned, what enemies they faced, or whether they ruled over Kenshi or merely visited it. Great craters and buried structures hint at wars fought with weapons too vast to imagine, or perhaps disasters of their own making. Their cities have long since crumbled, yet rusted bones of titanic machines still sleep beneath the sands, and strange signals still echo from places no one dares to enter.
Whether they ascended, destroyed themselves, or were cast down, the only certainty is this:
They were not like us.