For the Drori's counterpart in the A Tyranny Known as Love timeline, see Izlondia (LVL's A Tyranny Known as Love).
The Drori were an ancient and mysterious stellar civilization that controlled the entirety of its home star system, the Iltyanthae Star System, from their homeworld of Izlondia. The location and even existence of both were hotly disputed until archeologists pinpointed Iltyanthae and Izlondia as the Ingffhaestian System and Uingffh respectively in the 2140s. The Drori may have controlled other star systems, but this is highly disputed. The Drori are also sometimes referred to as the Archeotabulons on account of their relationship to the Tabulon race of Uingffh. "Manafly" is another common nickname applied specifically to Drori significantly and supernaturally altered by the wormhole accident that wiped out most of their civilization 3 billion years ago. The Drori are most notable for their role in seeding all known life in local space.
The Drori civilization and species arose sometime around or after 5 billion years BCE and lasted until 3 billion years BCE. At some point around that time, an accident involving wormhole technology destroyed the surface of Izlondia, seemingly killing all Izlondian Drori in the process including the emperor at the time, Macbeth (though it would later be found that many survived, albeit had their forms drastically and supernaturally altered by disturbances in the laws of physics and spacetime generated by the wormhole). However, a very small group of Izlondian residents survived without significant alterations; these survivors later evolved into the tabulon civilization. Meanwhile, the Drori Empire's off-world colonies descended into chaos and decline due to a combination of panic over the loss of their homeworld and government and a significant viral pandemic. These populations died out less than a century following the fall of Izlondia, but not before constructing massive space "arks" containing samples of preserved Izlondian life. Prior to their demise, the surviving Drori populations sent the arks out to other planets and star systems, where they seeded life and eventually fostered the rise of today's sentient civilizations and alien biospheres.
Because of the sheer amount of time that has passed since the Drori's fall, their society, politics, culture, etc. are highly shrouded in mystery - the only traces of their existence are their space arks and a vast series of ruins buried beneath the Uingffhian surface. Based on the limited information gathered from these remnants, the Drori civilization was a rather sophisticated and technologically-advanced society that combined futurism with traditional culture. The Drori government was seemingly organized into an empire with an emperor as the head of state. However, some records support the growth of democracy in the civilization's later years, with a parliamentary system in place. Drori culture likely placed a heavy emphasis on intellect and the arts given the high number of paintings, literature, and other similar artifacts found in the Uingffhian ruins. Drori architecture was sophisticated to match, with both the ruins and the arks boasting highly complex patterns and structures unmatched by any present-day civilization's architecture.
The Drori have stood as one of the most significant points of interest for countless species for centuries. Throughout the existence of the Ingffhaestian Federation, many archeologists dedicated their lives to studying the Drori (whom they knew as the Archeotabulons, which they believed to be an entirely different civilization until Garmageddon revealed them and the Drori to be synonymous) and uncovering their mysteries along with the mysteries of their various ruins and artifacts. Perception of the Drori made a religious turn in the 21st Century with the formation of the Drori Invicta, a shadowy religious cult worshipping the Drori and their last emperor Macbeth as part of a new religion dubbed Macbethism. Macbethist religious fervor only increased in the 22nd Century with the short-lived Drori Invicta coup of 2103 before culminating with the establishment of the fascistic Imperial Sovereignty of Garmageddon, a theocratic nation with Macbethism as its state-sponsored religion, in 2105.
After Garmageddon disbanded in 2153 following the Apatelos Rebellion, Macbethism slowly faded in popularity as more scientific interest and appreciation of the Drori returned.
History[]
The history of the Drori is highly shrouded in mystery. Radiocarbon dating and radiometric dating place the age of the oldest artifacts left by the civilization at around 5 billion years before the start of the Common Era, so historians assume that date to be the formation of the Drori Civilization; however, the scientists behind these studies stressed a wide margin for error for this information. Documents left behind by the civilization state a planet by the name of Izlondia to be the Drori Homeworld, with its parent star system being a system by the name of Iltyanthae; for centuries, the locations of both remained unknown until the Garmageddon Sovereignty revealed them as present-day Uingffh and Ingffhaestia respectively in the late 2140s. It is unknown how the Drori Empire formed.
Unnamed civil war[]
The only known major historical event besides the downfall of the Drori themselves is a large-scale civil war that occurred between 4 and 3 billion years BCE, where the "Coonce Tendril" and "Garcia Tendril" rebelled against the "Drori Tendril." Due to the massive lack of information and evidence of the Drori, the exact causes of the war as well as the identities of the three "tendrils" are unknown, but some pieces of evidence point to the term "tendril" meaning a planet. In addition, since any evidence of the civil war such as bomb craters or military bases have almost certainly eroded by now, the exact scope and severity of this civil war remain unknown.
First Apocalix and downfall of the Drori[]
The Drori ultimately died out in a chain reaction event collectively known as the First Apocalix, which is estimated to have occurred around 3.1 billion years before the Common Era. The First Apocalix began when an experiment on Izlondia involving newly-developed wormhole technology malfunctioned, resulting in the wormhole significantly altering Izlondia's surface and causing destruction on a planetary scale. In addition to burying all traces of Izlondian civilization underground or simply destroying them, the wormhole, dubbed Baruze, seemingly killed off all Drori on Izlondia at the time including the last emperor Macbeth, though it would later be discovered that the wormhole simply altered their physical forms significantly due to severe disruptions to the laws of spacetime and physics; Macbeth, for example, was split into seven pieces which each managed to gain full sentience.
Legacy[]
After Baruze rendered Izlondia uninhabitable, the rest of the Drori's empire fell into civil unrest due to the loss of both its cherished homeworld and its government. On top of that, a highly contagious virus known as Eclipsia-α had begun ravaging Drori colonies en masse. Realizing that their extinction was likely, the Drori built numerous extremely large constructs displaying the most advanced of their technology that would visit other potentially-habitable worlds and seed life on them from surviving samples of Izlondian life in the hopes of reviving the Drori civilization. The Drori proceeded to send these "arks" on trajectories towards nearby potentially-habitable star systems while also keeping a few within the Iltyanthae System with the intention of having them seed life on its planets once Eclipsia-α passed. Shortly after releasing these final artifacts, the Drori civilization became extinct; this likely occurred around 3 billion years ago based on the ages of the youngest Drori artifacts.
Thanks to their sophisticated technology, most of the ark Drori artifacts successfully reached their destinations and proceeded to seed life in their star systems. Because of how the Drori only preserved basic life forms as well as how the arks' target planets and moons had highly variable environments, the life the artifacts seeded eventually evolved into entirely unique forms with little in common with their Izlondian ancestors save for their basic structures like cells and DNA. New civilizations such as the humans of planet Earth and the Krybolartarian Lizards of planet Krybolartarium rose from these new biospheres. The arks themselves managed to remain intact for billions of years into the present day as another byproduct of their sophisticated technology; some later societies, like Garmageddon, utilized the artifacts for their own gain and/or even considered them sacred, though most civilizations failed to discover them as many arks retreated into wide orbits around their parent stars. The arks that remained in Iltyanthae also survived and successfully seeded life, leading to the rise of many of the civilizations involved in the Ingffhaestian Federation.
Surprisingly, a very small group of Drori individuals survived the First Apocalix unaltered, but only possessed the basic instinct to survive and reproduce. These surviving Drori and their descendants eventually evolved into the Tabulon race, which came to form a new advanced civilization that quickly dominated Uingffh; the tabulons' direct relation to the Drori would become a major justification of Garmageddon's oppressive policies in the late 2140s and early 2150s.
Government[]
According to Drori records, the Drori society was an empire with most political power falling into the hands of an emperor. However, there are no indications that the Drori embraced extreme authoritarianism or totalitarianism as its core beliefs. According to later records regarding the Drori, their society began to adopt a nascent form of democracy that the First Apocalix 3 billion years ago left incomplete; this democracy took the form of a parliamentary, constitutional monarchy where the position of emperor only had cultural power and a parliament enjoyed most political power.
Only two Drori emperors are known: Romulus of Drori and Macbeth of Drori. Very few records of Romulus exist, but Drori artifacts frequently cite Macbeth as a prominent war hero who brought prosperity to the Drori Empire following the disastrous civil war while treating their subjects with respect. Neither emperors have evidence for any concrete periods of rule, though Macbeth is known to be the last ruler of the Drori given that the records surrounding the First Apocalix specifically mention Macbeth being caught in the Baruze wormhole's blast.
During the era of the Orion-Cygnus Federation, many citizens of both nations noted the matching names between the last emperor of the Drori and the titular character of historical Earth playwright William Shakespeare's Macbeth. Historians have deemed this a coincidence, but some citizens nonetheless have spread conspiracy theories that a group of surviving Drori traveled to Earth and influenced Shakespeare's writing. These theories do not have any supporting evidence and have been debunked by historians numerous times throughout succeeding years.
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