Post Series: The Cymoplean Empire - The Divine Union

> *Atop waves a divine enemy arise to consume the lord in times of his greatest peril, but his children have awoken and every day more arouse to realise the divine mandate of their gods; preserve our lord, preserve him and live in aeonian salvation, the responsibility of salvation reposes in our hands solely so we may pass it unto him, the lord and our saviour.*
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> ***Divination! Destiny! The Divine Amalgamation shall deliver the mandate of the gods!***
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## *From down under they rise*

> *Turn your gaze, approach from above they do not.*
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### The Cymoplean Empire

The Cymoplean Empire is a feudalistic covenant nation entirely inhabited by aquatic based lifeforms, the Cymopleans themselves are multispecies hailing from an unknown common ancestor; to the Cymoplean’s this common ancestor was a single being, the Divine Lord, who sacrificed his life energy to create the gods whom then went on to create the Cymopleans and all other aquatic species. The Cymopleans believe that they themselves were the first species to be created and thus possess a more potent divine essence, they believe it is their gods will to unite all the aquatic species of the universe (and thus the other aquatic gods as well) and bring the divine lord back to life. As they expanded across the galaxy they were resisted by aquatic and non-aquatic species, religious zeal spurred great crusades and many species were brought into the Divine Union; the military might of the Divine Union snowballed into the first ever Mandated Crusade, a great ever growing crusade that lasted a thousand years in the quest for more divine essence to bring back the Divine Lord.

#### The Leviathan Council

The Empire is led by the Leviathan Council, not a single entity but a continuously growing school of Luthc whose minds combine into larger single entities and then perhaps combine again; the Luthc a hive mind in all but name, alone they are capable of individual thought but connected they become one of many. The Luthc are all psionic and as they expand the numbers of the Leviathan Council its psionic power increases, the Luthc often detach from the council to lead armies or command fleets as they can channel the power of the council through themselves, like conduits for the psionic power; as the empire expanded so too did the Luthcs’ numbers, they would all travel to the homeworld to join the council.

#### Feudalism

The council comprise the Empire’s leadership and bureaucracy all in one, the mind of leviathan steers and guides all functions of society replacing the need for any formal logistics body as the Cymopleans simply know what must be done. While the mind does expand though, it did not match the pace the of Empires expansion as it was increasingly occupied by other aquatic species, while these other aquatic species were all assimilated into the divine covenant they were not directly guided by the Leviathan Council, this was passed off by the Cymopleans as a religious code that prohibited one aquatic species from ruling over another though truthfully the leviathan council simply lacks the power to do so. This resulted in the feudalistic system, all species are supposedly under the rule of the council but are kept in line by belief alone; some species believe that they are more divine than others though and compete among each other to prove themselves to the Leviathan Council (the most divine of them all). The power of each aquatic species rises and falls throughout time, the most powerful species are often the first the send legions of their own to die in battle to prove themselves as the most devote, this continues the perpetual cycle of all rise and fall.

#### The life essence of the Divine Lord

In an Empire united solely by faith it was paramount to make its belief infallible, it needs something that proves undoubtedly the existence of the Divine Lord, and what is could be better proof than the life essence of all aquatic life itself, water. When the Divine Lord sacrificed himself his life essence was scattered across the universe so that his life essence would serve as the home for his creations, this of course must be true for all aquatic life lives in some form of water, the fact that the same can be said for air and the argument that air / water is simply a requirement of all life is regarded as an unintentional side effect of creating life that the Divine Lord could not resolve due to not being present to fix it. This feeds into the belief that water, in its natural form, is sacred; thus any who consume it or pollute it are committing sacrilege of the highest level, and because many species must commit these acts to survive they must be the divine enemy, for they consume the life of the lord to survive. This belief secured its foundations against those who seek to disprove the beliefs of the Divine Union and unified the aquatic species in hatred of other species who consumed water.

#### Forceful assimilation

The Cymoplean Empire expands through conquest and integrates all sentient aquatic species into their fold, upon first contact the Cymoplean Empire allows the newly met species time to hear the preaching's of their religion in the hopes they will wilfully join the Union; many religious nations do join as the Cymoplean's recognise the existence of other aquatic gods as the creation of the Divine Lord and thus all are part of a wider religion, however many species resist the peaceful attempts... but by hook or by crook these species will join the union. Those who resisted are indoctrinated by mass psionic conversions, this is not seen as forceful assimilation though... psionic energy is believed to be the Divine Lord's power - his divine essence - and mind conversions are simply the Divine Lord's enlightenment.

All nations that join are supposedly part of the Divine Union, however, the Divine Union is simply a more "inclusive" name for what is really the wider Cymoplean Empire; the only real distinction between the Cymoplean Empire and the Divine Union is that the Leviathan Council cannot directly rule over all its v̶a̶s̶s̶a̶ls unionised nations and they are simply left to follow their own interpretations of the Divine Mandate

#### God made manifest

All species of the Divine Union are fiercely indoctrinated, at first this was only achieved by the constant presence of the Luthc who converted the populace but as the power of the Leviathan Council new venues became possible. Using their combined psionic might the Leviathan Council could channel their energy into a material form that to other species would appear godlike, this psionic form would affirm the existence of the species god (as it would look like what the species believed their god to look like) and then also of the Divine Lord; who could deny the existence of the gods when they materialised before their very eyes?

The Cymopleans use the illusion of gods to great effect, in great battles these "gods" will materialise from nothing to benevolently aid their loyal subjects, who could doubt the righteousness of the Divine Mandate when your very own god comes to smite your foe? How could the benevolence of the Council be questioned when the forcefully assimilated species was pacified by their never before seen god?

In reality this all the work of the Leviathan Council, who genuinely believe in the existence of all aquatic gods, these psionic forms they create are simply projections of the actual gods, whom the Leviathan Council act on the behalf of.

## The Cymoplean Castes

The Cymoplean are multispecies and come in four main variants which are called ***castes***, these variants all believe in their own god and segregate themselves willingly into roles.

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> The **Luthc** are octopus like in form, intelligent, charismatic and entirely female.
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> This species posses a rare genetic trait that makes them all inherit psionic power, as psionic power is believed to be the Divine Lord's energy / power the Luthc are considered to be somehow closely linked to the Divine Lord (and lends credence to the belief that the Cymopleans were the first species to be created by the gods or even that they were created by the Divine Lord herself)
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> The Luthc are capable of psionically joining their minds to others to create a great mind, more dangerously though, they can absorb others psionic power.
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> The **Kirven** are more squid-like in form but despite the menacing appearance they have minimal physical threat, the danger comes from the ability to produce electricity which underwater was both a blessing and curse. Note that the Kirven are also all female.
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> The Kirven are scientists with little emotion, they cite the existence of the Divine Lord as scientific fact and are prolific sociopathic torturers of unbelivers
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The **Mervin** are brutish and volatile, the bodies are seemingly designed for no other purpose but to kill. The hulking mass betrays the agility and finesse these brutes can achieve and the few who posses psionic power are known to instil feverous rage in their kin, often the psionic Mervin lead groups of themselves into battle.

> However, they are not wholly stupid; in fact, they posses the same average intelligence of a Human teenager. This species cast is also entirely female.
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> The **Stervin** are the worker caste of the Cymopleans, they are the smallest of the species; the mass of five large Stervin just matching the smallest of the Luthc, they are disproportionately strong to their size and intellectually complicit, happy to repeatedly do mundane tasks. They are also entirely female.
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### Reproduction

An entirely female species you say! how do they reproduce?

The answer is more obvious when the fact that there are more Cymoplean species is brought to light, the above mentioned caste species are the **main four** species; there are two more species yet to discuss, these two species are the **Moplean** and the **Scydrox.**

#### **The Moplean**

The Moplean is an extremely rare species and the male of the Cymoplean species from which all female species are born, the Moplean is a gargantuan gelatinous vessel which resembles somewhat the form of a jellyfish. The size of the species it beyond measure as they are truly titanic in size, for the sake of description, the average mass of a Moplean is over a thousand cubic feet. Highly reclusive this species live deep underground or, if they must, in a self made mountain of rocks on the deepest ocean floors.

The Moplean is covered in a layer of gel which it produces out of its eyes, every decade it sheds its gel which is collected by a the **Scydrox** who equally divide and store it into four separate holes. A male and female Scydrox then jointly inseminate each cache of gel by engaging in copulation with each other whilst in the gel, in the act they secrete pheromones that activate the gel. The outer layer of gel then hardens to become an eggshell and millions of larvae develop who compete against each for days until a few thousand are left, at which point the gel becomes a nutritious substance which feeds the survivors. When all the gel is consumed the eggshell breaks (this should happen at the same time the other 3 eggs will be hatching) and all the Cymoplean species will emerge. The finest of each caste species stays to serve the Scydrox.

The Mopleans themselves reproduce when their gel is not harvested and after shedding enough gel they fill the entire chamber with it, this can take centuries depending on the size of the chamber, once entirely surrounded they allow themselves to die; two immature Moplean eggs that lay dormant within the Moplean then hatch and the baby Moplean's then consume the gel, they grow, one moves to find a chamber, they become adults and create two eggs within themselves for later reproduction.

Now might be a good time to clarify that the Cymoplean and Moplean are the same species, in their language "Cymoplean" means "Divine Seraphic" whilst Moplean means just "Divine". This is no translation error, the species literally call themselves "The Divine". Due to the dominance of females species though they are called the Cymopleans.

#### **The Scydrox**

> *Vain. Exotic. Lethal*
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The spiritual leaders of the Cymoplean Empire and the Divine Union, the Scydrox are the rarest of all the Cymopleans, even rarer than the Mopleans; for every thousand Mopleans there are just one Scydrox, which means that for every male and female couple there are two thousand Mopleans. To explain the gravity of this you must realise that the entire Cymoplean Empire who occupy 78 galaxies themselves and over 500 galaxies within the entire Divine Union, only 52,000 Mopleans exist, meaning there are only 26 Scydrox.

##### Exalted Preists

The Scydrox are as rare as they are entitled, the Scydrox were once considered monarchs though now they are considered much, much more; They are believed to be made of the Divine Lord's purest essence and are considered the most divine species of all, they are the epitaph of nobility, shown by the fact they are the only species to wear clothing of any kind.

    The Scydrox are the embodiment of divinity, everything that they are and do is sacred and to merely touch them or defy them is sacrilege; as self absorbed higher beings they consider themselves gods in mortal form whom none shall defy.

The sleek forms leave many to ponder how they cope with hostility, to spare a long description... they excel in all things lethal; within themselves is immeasurable strength that is said to enough to rend entire spaceships apart, none match their speed and few match their wit. The Scydrox do not train themselves, they do not practice or study for such things are beneath them; they are naturally the greatest of the Cymopleans and no amount of training could ever stand up to a Scydrox's pure might.

Despite their status though the Leviathan Council leads the Empire, the unfathomably low number of Scydrox forces this truth; a mere 26 Scydrox could not lead more than a few planets let alone 500 galaxies, whilse a single Scydrox alone has more power than one million Luthc the Leviathan Council numbered over ten billion by 2380.

Presently the Scydrox still perform the most important role of all though, and that is the production of the Cymoplean species (the details of which are explained with the Moplean) the Scydrox travel from Moplean to Moplean to inseminated as many gels as possible, it could be said the the Scydrox simply live for sex for that is what the majority of their time is spent doing.

How the Scydrox themselves reproduce is through extremely rare chance, in the rarest of cases when the gel of a Moplean becomes an egg instead of it being populated by larvae it becomes the home of a single Scydrox until it matures. The odds of this happening are virtually 0 and the only reason 26 exist is due to the thousands of years of reproduction that has occurred; though they are also helped by the fact that the Scydrox can reverse their aging by bathing in the gel of the Moplean… an activity they do simultaneously with copulation.

### The Scydrox. A precursor species?

A prevalent theory, outside the Cymoplean Empire and Divine Union, among xenologists is that the Scydrox are the remnants of a long lost ancient species who once held great power within the universe but lost it all; this theory is supported by the revelation that the Cymopleans were once a relatively unitnelligent and benign species, but after an underwater earthquake the Cymopleans made centuries worth of scientific progress in decades.

The theory gained further credence when Commonwealth scientists discovered that Cymoplean technology also relied on extradimensional laws of physics, a technological feat only ever achieved by the Ancient Enlighted species whom the Commonwealth created their own extradimensional tech from, this left two main theories... the Scydrox are an ancient species who survived extinction hiding underneath the surface of the oceanworld (Cymoplia), an earthquake... whether natural or unnatural, unearthed the Scydrox who indoctrinated the Cymopleans and are using them as pawns in a renewed quest to conquer the galaxy.

If so, this is good news.

Because the other, more worrying, theory implies a darker future may await the universe… this theory is named "The Divine Lord Theory"

## The Divine Lord Theory

Suppose in the ancient times a certain enlightened species, that we do not at all know, dabbled in realms of dimensional travel... Suppose that by opening so many gateways to other dimensions, which of course is completely safe, something else opens a gateway to them?

Let us suppose that this entity was the literal god of the Scydrox whose belief in it alone was enough to create him, which is most definitely impossible when it comes to hyper reality and dimensional influence...

Now suppose that this entity is worshipped as a god and that worship sustained it, an entirely impossible scenario which has never been replicated by anyone we know at all.

Now imagine the Enlighted, in their ever growing wisdom, realised that it was not a good thing; and in this entirely theoretical situation, were forced to exterminate the Scydrox and wipe all record of the entities existence from history to prevent his worship ever being repeated.

Humour this hypothetical scenario and endorse the possibility that a few Scydrox survived it all, and have lately awoken from a long slumber; and now they spread the gospel of this entirely made up being, known as the Divine Lord, with the goal or reawakening the forgotten god.

Humour the possibility that even though in its slumber, its very presence is seeded in the minds of all sentient life, and those more psionically attuned felt it more strongly within them; the presence of great psionic entities is never known to manifest itself in folklore after all...

… supposedly.