Chozo

Quiet Robe of the The'nau Tribe.

### Color(s)

Copper, yellow, orange, red, green, blue, purple, brown, silver, gold, white, black, and grey.

### Distinctions

Bird-like head, claw tipped hands and feet, bipedal

### Notableindividuals

Maru, Grey Voice, Platinum Chest, Shaded Whisper, Samus Aran (human enhanced with Chozo DNA)

### Featured in

Metroid Franchise

The Chozo are the remnant of an ancient, mysterious and highly advanced precursor category civilization of avian sapients that inhabit several planets in the cosmos, including Zebes, Elysia, Agar, Tallon IV, Tarin, and possibly others. Although the eventual fate of the species as a whole is unknown, countless ruins and technological wonders are littered throughout the many planets they once inhabited, with a dozen known living individuals now living in protected relocation within Confederation space, and an unknown number still out in uncharted space.

## History

The history of the Chozo is shrouded in mystery, and what is known to the galaxy at large has no accurate timeline associated with it. Of the precursor races known to have reigned in the Sol-Daiban Galaxy, the most mysterious is perhaps the Chozo. Some Federation researchers theorize that the Chozo in fact predate even the Forerunners, and may possibly not even be native to Sol-Daiban at all. The truth is, unsurprisingly, far more complex than that.

### The Great Journey

The Chozo Ancients indeed came from outside the Sol-Daiban Galaxy, and they may have in fact predated even the Forerunners in their evolution. But their origins and legacy were little different. Having left their origin galaxy hundreds of thousands of years ago, its name and location now lost to the mists of time, their empire was fleeing from an entity which has been forgotten by history. Under the edicts of what they called the Mantle of Guidance, a responsibility they perceived as given by their higher creators to them with the edicts to protect and guide less developed races in the efforts of evolution and the ideals of order, they slowly made their way toward a series of energy surges and signals coming from what would eventually be known as the Sol-Daiban Galaxy. As the Ancients traversed the vastness of space, they left small groups of their kind in inhabited regions, tasked with assimilating these more primitive species into their culture and enforcing their ideals of order. While the Chozo Ancients saw this as their way of "protecting" the less advanced races from even themselves, it was also setting their own advanced empire as "gods" to these vassel worlds. What has become of these outpost clans is now lost to time, likely themselves died out, but these would not be the last of the efforts by the advanced Ancients to prop themselves up as overseers to the universe.

By the time the refugee Chozo world ships carrying so many of their race reached the regions of Sol-Daiban, Andromeda, and the Triangulum Galaxy, they were running low on a number of resources. This caused the world ship fleet to take position in what they would later name the Ym'k'ru Dwarf Galaxy, some 420,000 light-years outside the primary galaxy, as they settled themselves and resupplied their fleet, before turning their gaze toward the great spiral galaxy that lay ahead of them, as it was from there which they had detected the energy signals their fleets had been following, and thus following some decades, the world fleets would resume their great journey to Sol-Daiban.

### Arrival and Anomaly

When they arrived, circa 45,000 BCE, whatever the Ancients had assumed they would find was not at all the case. If there had been an advanced civilization of equal technological tier as the Chozo, it had long since vanished, which puzzled the Ancients. Their scouts searched out into the depths of the galactic arms, most reporting back only primitive pre-industrial stage civilizations to be found, something that in itself said that something was not right in this galaxy. It was only when the final groups of scouts never reported back from the regions of what would eventually be called the Orion Nebula and the ends of the Centaurus Arm that the Chozo began realizing what had occured. The first investigation revealed a region under nearly impenetrable defenses, with forward scouts being blasted to atoms as soon as they had exited the supralight realm of the slipstream, and some seemingly even from *inside* the hyperspatial realm. After a dozen ships were lost attempting to penetrate this line of defenses, the Ancients abandoned their efforts to learn what lay within the nebula, and made way to investigate the regions of the outer Centaurus Arm. What they found there was perhaps even more horrifying than a mere impenetrable defense line. What they found was, terrifyingly, the answers they had been seeking.

What exactly happened in that region of the Centaurus Arm has been lost as the Chozo who came back were so horrified by what they found. The only information they did relay back to their kin was that they had been given a warning, to beware the vengeance of the Precursors. With this warning in mind, the Ancients began searching for a planet in the galaxy to settle as the center of their own renewed empire. Entering into the regions of the Outer Core Belt, the Ancients chose a young planet second from the star that they dubbed Ak'she-na(later called Helialis by the modern Chozo) and the planet they would name Zebes. The planet was less than two billion years old, and while developing within the habitable region of the system, required a terraforming acceleration to create the lush environment the Chozo Ancients knew best. Once the planet had been acclimated, the Ancients would make planetside and begin construction of what would be the capital of the new Chozo Empire, known as Chozodia. Within decades, they expanded out to the other habitable planets of the system, then returning into the main stretch of the Sagittarius Arm and making their course through the galaxy in effort to re-establish their empire, and place themselves to oversee the more primitive races of the galaxy.

### Splintering and downfall

For many millennia, the Chozo Ancients continued to reign in the galaxy, much as the Forerunners once had, and carefully monitored the progress of the younger races of the galaxy. Like the Forerunners, they were cautious of any species advancing as what they perceived as too rapidly, particularly the species that they had found in at least three cradle worlds that would be eventually known as "Terran". However, after tens of thousands of years, time began to wear on the species, and a divide of ideologies and the purpose of their purported divine edict began to form. For generations, the Chozo had proliferated in this new galaxy, and each new generation had come to experience far different interactions with the other species of their dominion than those of their predecessors. Such started to see a division of culture within the Empire, and with it, the divide brought about a split in the ideologies of the Chozo, with one side, made up predominantly by the older and more traditionalist tribes, favoring the existing militaristic reign over the galaxy to maintain order and preparation for the foreseen Darkness that was approaching, and the other, younger Chozo and tribes that had taken root after the Ancients had settled in the galaxy, taking up the ideals of the peaceful warrior, who sought only to end battles, not start them, and of guiding other species to the same technological and spiritual enlightenment that the Chozo had previously reserved for their own empire.

By circa 15,000 BCE, these debates had escalated into an immense civil conflict that became known as the Great Schism, which engulfed much of the galaxy. After nearly a thousand years of terrible civil war, the traditionalist Chozo who followed their current road, that is, to dominate and bring all the galaxy to heel under their reign, eventually found itself beaten by those that had taken to these newer ideals of benevolent guidance and uplifting enlightenment towards the younger races, with the defeated survivors banished from the galaxy in punishment, as the victors could not bring themselves execute their own elders and brethren despite the destruction they had wrought not just to the Chozo, but to the galaxy as well. Almost half of their entire species had been lost in the civil war, and a third of those who had survived the horrifying conflict would be cast out. The remaining tribes would come to call themselves the Thó'ha tribes, or "Watchers", and the aftermath of the Schism was forever a scar that changed the Chozo forever. As for the exiles, they would attempt a retaliation some centuries later, only for their assault to be defeated over Zebes itself, leaving a wrecked vessel buried in the surface of the planet. Since then, the Thó'ha have not seen any further sign of their banished kin.

### Recent history

Since the Great Schism and the attempted assault by the exiled tribes, the Thó'ha have pursued their altruistic goal of enlightening the other sapient species of the galaxy, to uplift them technologically and bring cultural revelation. One of the first they attempted with were the Rema, a species located on a planet within the inner Norma Arm, around 10,000 BCE. They found a planet that was in the midst of atomic revolution, with some degrees of spatial travel achieved. The Chozo first made overtures to help speed the technological development of the Rema, assisting them in not only achieving relativistic speeds for rapid travel within their own star system, but eventually teaching them how to access the linked corridors in slipspace that could be formed by interaction between gravitational fields. While the secrets of the ethereal slipstream were those that even the Thó'ha recognized were beyond being shared due to the potential for abuse, they were able to give the Rema a much needed boost into the next stage of their advancement, and proving that the ideals for which their faction had bled for in the Schism had been worth the sacrifices.

It was half a millennium later that the Thó'ha discovered, to their horror, that the Rema had nearly destroyed themselves in their rapid advances, having become embroiled in their own internal conflict between their home planet and expanding colonies in the outer worlds of their system. In their zeal to prove their ideals true, the Thó'ha had failed to impart the same sense of responsibility upon the Rema that they had learned through their own trials. Despite this, the Chozo made all attempts to repair the damage done by their misguided enthusiasm, eventually helping the Rema recover and begin again, this time at a slower pace of development. Since then, the Chozo became more introverted, operating more from afar to guide a species and insure the ideals of peace and cooperation, the responsibility that comes with advancement, were imparted on all those they enlightened.

Every thousand years, the Thó'ha made efforts to uplift and enlighten a species, until nearly six thousand years ago, when visiting a system in the outer reaches of the Centaurus Arm, that a visitation went horribly wrong. A planet of Humans in the expanding throes of a biological technologies advent, surprising the Thó'ha that they had yet to expand from their own home world and fill their star system, but were already altering their own species on a genetic and cellular level. The Chozo thought perhaps such inward advancements were a sign that these humans merely needed a nudge toward the stars. Upon meeting with the leading caste of these people, self named the Orokin, the Chozo would attempt to assist the Orokin in efforts to spread out in their stellar system. It proved to be the greatest mistake they could make, as the Orokin, after a number of years of exchange and technological enlightenment, would turn on their patrons and slaughter the Chozo who had been assisting them. The Thó'ha vessels were taken by the Orokin's warrior subordinates, the Dax, and secured away as the secrets within were plundered by the manipulative leaders of the Origin System for centuries, until they themselves were betrayed by their own creations. It was the last time that the Thó'ha would make overtures to enlighten civilization until the 2680s,when they emerged from within the coreward regions to guide the various species of the Orion Spur into the formation of a Galactic Federation, just before the horrific Machine Wars of the 2700s.

The last major decision that was made by the full council of Elders was after the discovery of the Naraka System, and the planet they would name Ili Agár Nalíma. The discovery of the mysterious Aeion energy on the planet, and the horrifying encounters with the *Erris* polymorphic parasite, would lead the council to make a decision that was until then unfathomable. At the proposal of Shaded Whisper, the for'mel responsible for the creation of the Mother Brain super intelligence biocomputer, the Chozo's brightest bioengineers would create a living weapon that could consume and eliminate the *Erris* parasite. For fifty years, the The'nau tribe's brightest would toil in efforts to make this proposal a reality, until 2962, when the Zebesian Nest of the Chó'za and Al'fá visited a small Federation mining colony, K-2L, on hopes of procuring some of the exotic mineral afloraltite to use for awakening the The'nau project far sooner than projected. The visit was a failure for the small Chó'za group that had gone, and as was discovered only a day later, it had led the Kromus Pirates to the colony, and their subsequent massacre that left only one survivor.

## Social Structure and Beliefs

True to their avian nature and appearance, the Chozo organize into tribes, or "hasána", typically grouping similar breeds together in social organizations. Rarely did multiple tribes inhabit the same planet in the past, but such a practice was discarded as the Chozo began dying out due to the mysterious sterility that has plagued them for millennia now. With less than a dozen Thó'ha tribes known to be remaining in the 2900s, a number of tribes came to share what nest cities remained, while others opted to preserve their isolation as they awaited extinction.

In an overall fashion, the Chozo Thó'ha were led by a council of elders, typically the oldest living of the tribes who conferred on the course their species was to take. As the Chozo began to dwindle in population, this council became more sparse, less functional and more symbolic once the tribes elected to pass stewardship of the galaxy to the younger species, and led the races of the Orion Spur in the formation of the Galactic Federation. Since then, the council has rarely convened in full, normally conducting assemblies via holographic communications, until the Elders were effectively wiped out in the Invasion of Zebes in 2976.

### Religion

To the Ancient Chozo, there were levels of higher beings to them. On the physical plane, they understood to a degree the concept of the Precursors, the vastly powerful and advanced transcendent race of beings that were able to cross space and time with unparalleled ease, create vast cosmic structures, and even influence the course of evolution in entire biosphere on a macroscopic level. The Ancients understood that they had been seeded on the physical level by the Precursors, but they concluded something else, a higher power, was responsible for their existence on a *metaphysical* level, the origin of their spiritual being. They called these collective beings *Ka'nú-óm Átaní*, or the "Makers of All Things". The Chozo envisioned these deities as personifications of the Constructive or Enthalpic Forces and the guiding Virtues of the universe. Opposite these were the *Sék'ur-tet Om'nazu*, or "They who Return All to Nothing", the Unbinding or Entropic Forces. The Ancients did not assign alignment of "good" or "evil" in these forces, but saw both groups as necessary entities to the Universe, as they saw the Chaos Void not as evil in itself, but an unaligned Force that was beyond comprehension.

The modern Chozo Thó'ha tribes have become more analytical of their ancestors' pantheon, seeing the Makers and Unmakers as metaphorical iterations rather than paracausal beings who personified the Forces of the Universe. They do maintain a general spirituality to their beliefs, but the pantheon of old is taken more as parable to science, opposed to interpreting them as a literal collective of deities.

* The Ka'nú-om Átani(*the Makers, the Enthalpic Forces*)
	+ Ý’á'dn Na-múr - the Bringer of Light, Creator and Mother of All
	+ Al’hý’d Nú-tek - The Breath of Secrets, Keeper of Wisdom and Writer of Dreams
	+ La’tý’ra Ýs-akúr- Matron of Warriors, the Nest of Courage and the Redoubt
	+ Na’bru Ité-nutá - the Forge, Cauldron of Power and the Eternal Flame

* Sék'ur-tet Om'názu *(The Unmakers, the Entropic Forces)*
	+ As'kar Balá-dur - the Keeper of Legions, General of the Dark Still and the Hall of Stasis
	+ Zý'mat Nú-ada - the Harbinger of Dissolution, the Silence and Calm in Passing
	+ Da'sha Komá-téh - the Unbinding Talons, They Who Unweave the Lost Being

Beyond this, however, the Ancients did hold stories that told of other beings, terrible entities that indeed personified their concepts of malicious destruction and not a deconstructive force to allow new creation. These tales were whispered in shadows, now considered by the modern Thó'ha to be akin to "ghost stories", told to inspire better morality and discipline in the young fledglings of the Ancients.

**[FURTHER INFORMATION FORTHCOMING]**

## Biology

Chozo physiology is often noted as being unique and a curiosity. Their muscular structure is highly dense, capable of immense feats of strength in relation to an average height of seven to eight feet and a typical weight range in the upper 200s to lower-mid 400s in body weight, about five and a half times the strength of a human of comparable mass. Part of this may be attributed to the hyper-dense hollow bone structure that gives the Chozo immense physical abilities at lower weight ratios, as well as their ancestral wings that allowed self-powered flight, though this bone structure means that, while Chozo bones are tough, they take longer and more exacting care to heal as their hollow bones shatter when broken. Despite no longer being capable of self-flight, the average Chozo can still make incredible leaps and cross immense distances, reaching two and a half times their own body height in a vertical jump, and over thirteen meters in a horizontal leap. They also possess incredible sensory acuity, able to see small details at a range of several kilometers without visual aid devices.

The Chozo nervous system is highly reinforced and centralized in several clustered bundles. This clustering of nerve centers allows for higher pain tolerances and resistance to energy base stun weaponry. In addition, Chozo have two hearts to pump blood through their circulatory system. This increases their endurance capabilities as well as accelerates metabolic processing and aids in increased healing and regenerative properties. In the case of failure of one heart, the other can handle the increased workload, though it is obviously at a reduced capacity. As the older Chozo reach their millennial age points, failure of at least one heart becomes more likely.

As an avian species, Chozo reproduced via egg hatching. A typical clutch consisted of four to six eggs at one time during the height of the Thó'ha era. Size and coloration could vary, especially between the various breeds and colony Nests. There was a point in time when a full clutch could survive to hatching. However as time went on following the Great Schism, stillborn and even barren eggs became increasingly frequent, until the species entered a period when viable births happened decades apart, with the last birth occurring in 2723 after a century of stillbirths and barren clutches. By 2976, all the Chozo save the tiercel Maru are sterile.

Contrary to most assumptions regarding an avian species, Chozo beaks are soft tissue toward the joining point with their faces that gradually becomes harder into the bonelike tip. This development in their evolution is what allows Chozo to form facial expression and emote, as well as vocal use of other species’ spoken languages, and their own modern language of Chozia. Their ancestral language is expressed in what many species might call ‘bird song', but is infinitely more complex. Each key shift in a song note changes the meaning and structure of what is being said, with any variance meaning dozens of different words stringing together. It is possible to transliterate the song language of the Ancients into spoken vocalizations that represent what the Chozo understand the meaning of a song word to be, which can be used by what few scholars of the Orion Spur who have dedicated their research to the Chozo to translate the myriad of ruins and hieroglyphs that litter the galaxy. However, few living Chozo still speak the ancient song speech, thus leaving the modern spoken Chozia as the language of the Thó'ha tribes.

In regards to bio-gender dimorphism, male Chozo, known as tiercels, are generally broader built, but with flattened breastbones in their chest structure and wider shoulder builds. Their plumage tends to be more colorful than pronounced in size, but can be fluffed up in anger, or in a display. Female Chozo, known as formels, tend to be slimmer built, with more pronounced breastbone structure, narrow shoulders, larger plumage, but dulled or darker colors. Hip structure is similar to human females, in that they are more pronounced to facilitate the laying of eggs. While muscle and fat deposits in the chest area may be visually similar to humans, it is the skeletal frame and muscle mass that gives any impression of breasts, not actual mammary organs.

Most Chozo native to Zebes, being primarily of the Al'fa, and Cho'za tribes, hold breed traits in commonality with the terrestrial accipiter raptor family, resembling eagles, goshawks, and falcons. Different Nest tribes present variations, and some types of corruptive mutations had proven to breed into any offspring. There are some of the Tallon IV Nat’ra tribe who resemble the terrestrial vulture, considered an environmental mutation due to the presence of an odd energy that has rooted into the planet. Shaded Whisper, the infamous bioengineer who created the Mother Brain, greatly resembles a corvid of some kind, despite claims of having come from the Ma’kína tribe of Ili Galtau Nalíma where the primary breed type resembles the Terran parakeet or thrush.

Common colors of the modern era Chozo are browns, beiges, or dull orange colorations, with brighter colors as patterns being individual markings, which is likely due to the advanced age of the vast majority of the species. Occasionally, the brighter and more vibrant colors associated with the Ancients are observed, such as Maru's burnished yellow coat with patterns of red and orange, or sometimes the metallic and monochrome tones, such as the grey base coat and silver patterns of Grey Voice. Shaded Whisper is an oddity with primarily black feathers tipped with dark red, appearing as if they had been dipped in blood, and it is not yet known exactly what her true lineage genome is.

## Known Chozo

* Maru
* Grey Voice
* Shaded Whisper
* Platinum Chest
* August Wind
* Silver Wings
* Quiet Robe
* Bright Visions