Earth

## Summary

Humanity’s home, Earth, is the crown jewel of the multiplex. After overcoming impossible odds and vanquishing slag from the planet, Keo ushered in a new era of growth and technological innovation. He designed an impenetrable orbital defense system, intent on protecting Earth from any future slagic invasions. After centuries of growth and repopulation, it was decided that humans should spread themselves across the galaxy to increase their odds of long-term survival. Though millions left Earth to populate newly discovered planets, Earth remained the beloved home of humanity and even Keo himself.

Nearly every country on Earth identifies as Keonic. Nevertheless, cultural, political, and even ethnic differences continue to exist between major nations. Since Earth’s population was decimated during the outbreak, survivors settled in a handful of locations to build up their defenses together. The most significant of these survivor settlements existed in Brickonia, Dmakov, the UTL, Makesh, Kopreau, and Paladi. It was in these locations that the first new cities were born, and it took a long time before people began moving back to the quieter abandoned cities and territories of the past. In the current year, 3044, many of those smaller countries have been repopulated or converted to wildlife preserves.

### Capital City: *Vitorum*

The capital city of Earth is Vitorum, located in the country of Brickonia. Also known as “The Holy City”, Vitorum hosts the Keonic Temple where Keo himself resides. It is here the Apostles meet to consult with Keo and each other.

### Major Events

#### 2107: The Outbreak

In the span of one day, millions of people were corrupted by slag. A large segment of this corruption was the result of food sources and water supplies becoming contaminated by akka fluid, the corruptive secretions produced by mature slag. This fluid was brought to Earth by the Exin, a lizard-like alien race that appeared to have an unnaturally symbiotic relationship with slag. The ultimate fate of the Exin is shrouded in mystery, though several were confirmed killed by human survivors.

The Exin, themselves part of the hive mind Krozox, established psychic contact with the Immonist founder and primary figurehead know only as "The Redeemer" well before their arrival. The Redeemer, referred to as a "dark channeler" by some, provided the Exin with Earth's coordinates. Once the Exin arrived, the primary Immonist organization SMITE distributed the akka fluid using a variety of means. The chaos that ensued during The Outbreak led to the almost complete dissolution of SMITE, and the persecution of Immonists during The Great Crusade ensured their extinction.

#### 2107-2696: The Great Crusade

The Great Crusade refers to the span of years in which the apparent deity Keo systematically attained followers and cleared the earth of slag. It was slow going at first; the first country to be liberated was Brickonia, and liberating the entirety of its small continent took nearly 50 years. By this time, most surviving military forces had heard the rumors of Keo and confirmed them, so Keo's forces began to grow exponentially. With the cooperation of international military personnel and resources, the liberation process began to increase exponentially. Losses were heavy at first, but every generation of survivors grew stronger and more well-equipped than the last.

Despite being an age of hope and resistance, it was a particularly dark time for a number of reasons. Eliminating slag in large quantities proved to be difficult, even with military resources. While smaller clusters of slag could be destroyed quite easily with bombs and heavy artillery, large "mammoth" slag produced such powerful fields of psychic energy that explosives became completely unreliable. Usually they simply wouldn't detonate, but in some disastrous cases they detonated far too early. Nevertheless, there are many confirmed cases of nuclear weapons being used to mass-clear areas of land. Human losses resulting from this are speculated, but no records confirming such losses exist.

The liberation of Earth was sped up exponentially with the formation of the Unum Vires, Unum Ceres, and the Apostles. Humans finally mastered the art of slag extermination, and life could finally move beyond simply fighting for survival.

#### 2195: The First Unum Vires Battalion

In the year 2133, a coalition of former TCF soldiers and personnel fighting with Keo decided it was time to form a regulated military. Their current fighting forces were disorganized, ill-equipped, and barely trained. Settling in the recently liberated city of Geldin, the coalition brought ~100 able-bodied recruits from Keo’s ranks and proceeded to train, rank, and equip the small fighting force with remnant TCF armor and weapons. Using tactics they had learned from fighting with Keo, these teams of soldiers began to liberate smaller towns and cities independently, recruiting any survivors they could. They called themselves the Fists of Keo, and in a few short years the name became recognized by survivors all around the world.

Eventually, the Fists of Keo were confronted by a pretty serious obstacle: the corruptive s-fields of slag mammoths. Without Keo’s psychic assistance, the soldiers were vulnerable and were unable to liberate even moderately-sized cities. Thus began Keo's next objective: enabling humanity's psychic potential. He began seeking out survivors with psychic potential and training a team of channelers. He discovered and trained channeler after channeler, sending them off to fight with the growing battalions of Fists. Equipped with additional psychic protection, the soldiers doubled their efficiency. With the additional development of channeler-powered piercers, humans could finally take down massive slag amalgamations without Keo's aid. Once Brickonia was declared slag-free in 2174, Keo began to establish highly organized military training institutions and channeler academies. Keo dubbed the psychic forces of humanity the Unum Ceres, commonly referred to as the Channeler’s Ring. He also gave the Fists of Keo the divine title of Unum Vires. An emblem was designed -the Eye of Keo- and at last Keo’s forces fought under a universal banner.

#### 2362: The Revelabis is created

Keo’s power and immortality led to his deification, and a new world religion emerged: Keonism. The founding principle of this religion was that Keo was the divinely selected savior of humanity and should be worshiped as such. During the 24th century, Keo created 3 Revelabis: mystical devices large enough to envelop a human. When a channeler of sufficient strength and capability entered a revelabis, they were transformed into an animus, a bionic being akin to Keo himself. Seven animus were created to serve as Keo’s Apostles; their duty was to cleanse the earth of slag and protect humanity, but also to enact and proclaim the will of Keo. Though Keonism already existed in an underdeveloped form, the creation of the Apostles ensured the establishment of universal Keonic practices, beliefs, and rituals.

#### 2699: Wormhole tech is developed

Once Earth was declared slag-free, the focus shifted to expanding the spread of human influence across the universe, destroying slag wherever they went. Keo, possessing supernatural intelligence, developed wormhole travel as a means of reaching faraway solar systems. Once activated, each "port" created two wormholes: one within the port itself, and another unstable wormhole wherever the destination was set. Once the unstable wormhole was stabilized by having a receiving port built to contain it, the gateway became a reliable means of traveling from planet to planet. The wormholes could not be closed once they had been opened, but the ports ensured that the wormholes would remain in the orbit of their designated planets. Many criticized their construction, claiming that it opened doorways for slag and other potentially dangerous invaders to reach Earth. Supporters argued that humans would need to outgrow Earth eventually anyway if the fight against slag was to continue.