History
Long ago, before the dawn of human civilization, there existed a species with intelligence and technology beyond even what we have now. The Cielioids, (named for the planet human explorers mistakenly believed to be their home-world), set out to colonize space. The actual home-world of the Cielioid people is unknown at the present, no doubt one of the old core-worlds of the Empire, but the important thing is that they set out to conquer, and conquer they did.
The first Emperors of the E1MS were the winners of the long war that united the Cielioids under a single government. The original core worlds were colonized via generation ship, until the invention of the Spatial Compression device made more rapid expansion possible. Along the way many of the planets they found had biospheres, and some even had intelligent life. All the nascent civilizations they encountered were summarily conquered and brought into the Empire. The name “Empire of 1,000,000 Suns” dates back to early in the Empire’s history. The actual name means "Empire of 16,777,216 Suns", (which is 8 to the 8th power), since the Empire uses base 8 numbers, and this is considered a lucky number. Before this time it was known as the Cielioid Empire, and by the time Era-1 began, it contained around a billion stars.
After the Empire conquered a new planet, it brought in automated industries where most of the work was done by robots to form the base of the planet’s new economy. The native populations worked in agriculture, or service jobs, or the arts, but the industrial jobs were reserved for robots as much as possible. This had several advantages. Robots didn’t demand better working conditions, or higher wages, or rebel against the government. Native populations were generally happy to reap the benefits of an industrial economy without having to do the actual work, and when a planet did rebel against the Empire, the Emperor just shut off all the industry, wrecking the economy until the people fell in line.
There was a strict caste system in the Empire, with Cielioids being ranked by subspecies, and the other races being ranked by relative influence, but all below the Cielioids. Below all the castes were the robots and AIs, which belonged to none of the castes, and were treated as property.
The E1MS existed in the center of a star-rich region called the Spozak. Even before the 1,000 Years War, there was an imperial decree against exploring or colonizing beyond the bounds of the Spozak, because it was believed by the imperial court that outside influences would disrupt the balance of power. The Empire was also bordered by Ool-Tyr and Nalorgian pirates that threatened Imperial interests. The officially sanctioned state philosophies were set up to reinforce the balance of power, so staying inside the Spozak became a tradition within the Empire.
Kroah Dashan was an important figure during this portion of Imperial history, inventing and improving many technologies important to the Empire.
The 1,000 Years War changed many things within the E1MS. When the Computer-God Troniac showed up and started leading the robots in open rebellion against the Empire, most of the robotic, industrial workforce either stopped working, or took over their factories for the other side. The Empire responded by turning to organic labor. First, the conquered races were pressed into service, re-igniting the embers of resistance within them. Toward the end of the war, and in its aftermath, several populations split from the Empire to form the bulk of the breakaway states. Later, Cielioids themselves had to start working in war production, and the “Centaur” subspecies was the result. In order to win the war, the Empire constructed a special robot to lead elite troops against Troniac. General Zarlok (also known as “Zarlok the Betrayer”) was the first robot to be awarded the Imperial Star, the Empire’s highest military honor, for banishing Troniac to a distant part of the Universe.
After the war, the Empire could no longer continue as it had, because of the massive disruptions of its economy and society caused by the robot rebellion. Planets continued to break away. Robots demanded, and got rights. The government was reformed as a constitutional monarchy, with the Emperor reduced to being a figurehead. General Zarlok, the war hero,(considered a traitor by the remaining followers of Troniac), ended up betraying even the empire it had fought to defend, killing millions of innocent civilians in a horrific attack on Artanis 4. After being convicted, Troniac’s body was deactivated, and its program was removed from its memory banks, and beamed out of an old radio navigation beacon, toward a (presumably) uninhabited part of the galaxy, as a symbolic form of exile.
Eventually, things settled into a new routine. There were occasional border skirmishes with the breakaway states, and elections at regular intervals. Things loosened up a bit from the strict old ways, and society got a bit more egalitarian, even for the lower classes. Even during these times, the Empire continued to expand slowly. The constitutional monarchy lasted throughout Era-1, and well into Era-2, when the threat of war with the Holy Empire of Man caused the senate to return full executive authority to the emperor.
During Era-2, the E1MS experienced a renewed surge of strength, and rapidly expanded its borders. After the figurehead Emperor was returned to power, many small wars of expansion took place, (including several conflicts aimed at recapturing the breakaway states). There was also a general crackdown on dissent, and viewpoints opposing the official imperial doctrines were widely censored. There was constant conflict with the Holy Empire of Man, leading up to the War of the Empires.
The War of the Empires was the final conflict for the E1MS, as the superior military might of the Holy Empire of Man gradually crushed the E1MS, and the remnant fled to the edge of the galaxy, where they joined the beginnings of the Galactic Republic.
