The Architects

More myth than reality, the Architects are the supposed creators of life in the Vast Infinite.

Considered to be more shrouded in mystique than even the most enigmatic of long-forgotten mortal deities, the Architects arrived in the Vast Infinite approximately 1 million years ago, when the planets were barren and life non-existent. Even before this arrival, they had already forged their executioner-race, the Ravessi, eldritch monsters wrought from the fabric of the Abyss itself and designed to destroy any universes the Architects decided didn’t meet their standards.

As gatekeepers of existence itself, the Architects were rumoured to be tyrannical and more than a little picky. They flitted from universe to universe, reality to reality, seeding life, then either leaving it alone to evolve naturally or destroying it (using the Ravessi).

They were believed to be easily capable of traversing existence itself, and it is theorised that the ease of their movement across multiple universes implies they were not physical entities at all. However, their true appearance, or even the basics of their personalities, is unknown to all but the oldest of Novhar. It isn’t even known how many Architects there once were; it is quite possible that there was only ever 1 Architect, or that they existed in some form of hivemind, like the Ravessi do.

After untold eons of creating and then eradicating life, the Architects arrived in the VI and settled on Eld, the largest planet. Here, they moulded the Novhar race, birthing the first generation of those majestic immortals. For 800,000 years after seeding Eld with this new lifeform, the Architects are believed to have retreated to wherever it is unknowable gods retreat when not actively overseeing their mortal domains.

But the activities of the Novhar drew them down from the heavens. In creating new, lesser races of their own, the Novhar had betrayed the Architects and brought down upon the VI the fate that awaits all disappointing universes: complete and utter annihilation at the hands of the Ravessi.

The Architects met their end about 100,000 years ago, when the Novhar pre-emptively attacked first. How, exactly, a race of immortals was able to banish the givers of life themselves to oblivion, isn’t known. What also isn’t known: whether that destruction is permanent, or whether any or all of the Architects managed to escape beyond the Vast Infinite, to move onto the next universe.

In the modern day, with the Novhar themselves also supposedly rendered extinct, nothing is known about the Architects beyond guesswork and extrapolation. If the current day Imperium or the Drasken Empire weren’t both staunchly atheist nations, it is quite likely they would’ve enshrined the Architects as religious gods, to occupy a vague and terrifying pantheon.

As it stands, the Architects are relegated to the more fantastical works of historical non-fiction in the deeper recesses of most libraries.