The firelight danced against the cave walls, throwing long, trembling shadows as if the stone itself was listening. No one spoke. Only the rain dripping outside and the distant hum of the Undying Forest broke the silence.
Kaiser stared into the flames, his voice a graveled whisper. "Earth… or Terra, as it was once called — the cradle of all that came after. It was where humanity first stood against the void."
He looked up slowly, meeting their eyes. "But you see, humanity was not content with standing. They wanted to ascend."
"Thousands of years before the first Empire rose, the people of Terra reached beyond their own world. They mastered light, matter, and the very code of life itself. They built ships that could cross galaxies, machines that could rewrite atoms, and cities that floated between stars.
"They called themselves the Earthlings — not because they were bound to the planet, but because they carried its name like a memory. Wherever they went, they said, Terra follows."
With every height humanity reached, the seeds of its downfall grew alongside it. Progress became pride, and pride became ruin.
The First Cataclysm
It began in 2863 A.D., when the first light-speed engine was completed in the nation of Iliria, once known as Eastern Europe. That same year, the race to the stars began — and with it, humanity's final war.
Every nation on Earth scrambled to possess the technology. Borders collapsed overnight as the twenty-second world war ignited — the most destructive conflict in the planet's history.
For centuries, the fear of nuclear annihilation had kept humanity's worst impulses in check. But with the promise of faster-than-light travel, restraint vanished. In mere days, thousands of nuclear warheads were launched.
Earth burned. From a population of twenty billion, only four billion survived the first three weeks.
The atmosphere turned toxic, the seas boiled, and the soil became a graveyard of glass and ash. The world itself turned against its children — a poisoned mother devouring the offspring who had broken her heart.
The Age of Unification
Yet somehow, amid the ruin, humanity found a final shred of unity. From the ashes of every nation rose the first Planetary Parliament, formed in Primrose, Antarctica — one of the last places untouched by radiation.
Among them stood Mal Noli, remembered forever as the Father of Space. Though his creation had sparked humanity's near extinction, he refused to let that be the end. Under his guidance, the first intergalactic ark ships were built — vessels capable of carrying what remained of mankind beyond the stars.
By then, the population had dwindled to barely two billion. When the ships were launched, it was said that Earth itself wept — her last tears falling as snow upon Primrose.
The Founding of the First Colonies
In 2865, three great colony ships left Earth, bound for the worlds of Andorra, Kasper, and Baraka. Five years later, in 2870, the Treaty of Primrose was signed, granting each colony full autonomy and sovereignty. For a time, peace held. Humanity had a new beginning.
But peace was never meant to last.
The First Galactic War
In 2921, Andorra's ruler, Boris Male, broke the treaty and declared war on Earth and its sister colonies. It became the First Galactic War, a conflict that spread across the void like wildfire.
Andorra's technological superiority was unmatched — their fleets faster, their weapons deadlier. On January 5, 2922, Baraka fell. The occupation marked the dawn of Democratic Rule on Baraka — and the end of the first free colonies.
The war ended, but not the hatred. Two powers emerged from the ashes:
The Andorran Empire, built on conquest and control.
The Republics of Earth and Kasper, united under the Planetary Systems Treaty.
Centuries of war followed. Billions perished. Empires rose and crumbled.
The Rise of the Baraken Empire
By 4594 A.D., Baraka had grown restless under Andorran rule. Its leader, Frederic Roches, led a revolt that stormed the Andorran capital itself. He killed Emperor Molio Trifonov, seizing power over a galactic empire that spanned fifty-four worlds.
In the centuries that followed, Baraka evolved from a conquered world into the center of power — the heart of the Unified Baraken Empire.
Meanwhile, Earth — now renamed Tarra — withered. Centuries of radiation and climate decay turned it into a dying husk, its once-blue oceans now black and silent. Eventually, it was abandoned, left to rot in the far reaches of the galaxy — a cursed reminder of mankind's first sin.
The Legacy
As Kaiser finished speaking, silence filled the cave. None could believe such a history had been erased — buried beneath lies and time. The air felt heavy with the weight of truth, as if the Labyrinth itself had been listening.
Then the ground began to tremble. Dust fell from the cavern walls as a deep roar echoed through the level. Outside, the light dimmed — not from clouds, but from a shadow descending from above.
When they ran out of the cave, they saw it — a giant figure, emerging from the fractured sky, descending toward the Third Level.