The Fall

It's never been clear exactly when the Third Empire fell.   It had splintered, long before the final conflicts and the dissolution of order that has later been called 'The Fall'. But the intersystem conflicts between the claims of would be Emperors can be clearly mapped. The dynasties and the charismatic leaders that fought for the throne have been documented and listed, together with their conquests and their losses as their disputes swept back and forth across each Galaxy - and between them.   With each long, drawn out battle, systems were decimated, lost, and, in some cases, destroyed. But the concept of Empire, the vision of what the disparate forces fought to claim, remained. Victory brought crowns and accolades. New Emperors rose, and old ones fell.   Until everything fractured and fell apart.   The cracks would probably be obvious, if there were the data and the timelines to look back at with confidence. Greed and the desire for power were inevitable motivations for those seeking control over a vast population and the resources they could offer. But the stories that arose after the collapse - the legends, the myths, and the tales beloved of modern operas - hint at a more fundamental cause lurking beneath the restless surge and sweep of civil war.   Without the vision, lacking the confidence and clarity with which the Second Empire had been ruled - the Third Empire slowly rotted from within.   Maunity had served the Keans with love and loyalty. After they departed, the Manuan race - given their freedom - failed to understand that with it, came a huge responsibility. The Third Empire was, in the end, just an illusion. It lost its way early on, never escaping the idea of needing an Emperor who directed every life under their rule. Where the early Manuan rulers tried to sustain the systems and the services that had carried the Second Empire to glory, the later ones squandered lives squabbling over the treasures and the titbits that the Keans had left behind.   The concept of 'Emperor' - the idea of a benevolent all powerful being who would protect all that followed them - had became embedded in Manuan culture during the Second Empire and Kean rule. In the time of the Third Empire citizens clung to that concept with a religious fervour, leading, over time, to the emergence of the cult of the Celestial Emperor - a mythical ideal that mortal Emperors aspired to, but never quite reached.   Had at least one of them recognised that - had they settled for being the mortal representatives of that greater power - they might have been able to avoid the Fall.   The way to the Third Galaxy was lost and forgotten as conflict spread across the First and the Second. Competing iron fists closed around the dominant worlds, demanding resources, sacrificing entire populations to gain the slenderest of victories. Systems and Clusters that declared independence were wiped from existence.   Many of the tales we are familiar with paint a picture of good fighting evil. Of the oppressed seeking freedom from the oppressor - but history is recorded by the victors, and it is easier to demonise the defeated than to recognise the sacrifices they may have made. Historians are well aware of the complexity of politics in this period, and are starting to understand how a clash of competing philosophies and social theories contributed to the dissolution of order - and supported the ambitions of dictators seeking to seize the throne.   Old, and little understood technologies were brought into play. Men that might once have been heroes devastated entire systems, shattered fleets of gleaming starships, and left their battle fields filled with death and the drift of the lost.   The Fall - when it came - was inevitable.   The survivors of the Third Empire ran away. They abandoned duty, refused murderous orders, gathered their families and their friends about them and fled. They fled to a scattering of worlds, through any Nuan Node they could find and activate. Where the flight was organised, those seeking refuge often closed those Nodes behind them, isolating themselves from the burning madness they left behind. Others simply ran, from system to system, from world to world, seeking safety wherever they could find it.   Only legend, myth, and rumours remain of those who stayed to fight.   The Fall marks the toppling of an entire civilisation, civil war tearing it apart and leaving it bleeding and dying. From its ruins, a new way has emerged. Several new ways, it could be said. The Restoration territories have taken centuries to recover, each new culture reinventing itself as they found ways to - not just survive - but thrive.   No fourth Empire has risen to replace the Third - although some of the emerging territories and cultures are beginning to evidence an ambition to grow and established wider dominions. Trade has slowly expanded, and the need for diplomacy tempers the tentative and fragile relationships that have been forged between them.   So much was lost. Knowledge. Science. Technologies. The new expansion, the return to the wider Galaxies is founded in the scavenging of the old. The shadows of both the Second and the Third Empire hang over those who rise from the legacy of their Fall.   But this time, Manuity and its fellow races, do so with the determined spirit of survivors, looking - yes - to the past, but aiming to building a new future in its ruins.