Zumu Legoti

Disclaimer: This page is about a mythical planet that Crucian historians deny ever having existed (derived from the Sector Creation Stream where Hiera was briefly, originally, named Zumu Legoti). If a planet is renamed “Zumu Legoti” or is discovered with the name “Zumu Legoti,” House Crux does not claim the myths and legends included herein to be lore for that planet.

Do not speak of it, for it is forbidden. That place should be forgotten. It breeds treason and transgression by name alone, a dark festering in our past that we can never seem to be free of. It embodies Vice, Corruption. Do not search for it. It will seduce you, consume you, until you starve in the darkness on its empty promises.

Its name is whispered amongst conspiracy theorists and fools. Young students of Crucian history are often drawn to its lies, believing they’ve stumbled upon some forgotten truth. Secret societies have come and gone in its name, hoping that one day they may uncover its forbidden knowledge, that one day they might find the fabled first-home - Zumu Legoti.

History

Myths of a planet known as Zumu Legoti have existed in House Crux for centuries, dating back to a time well before the Scream. While some tales overlap or seem to corroborate each other, many others diverge or describe entirely different versions of the planet, likely the result of imaginative writers reenvisioning the original narrative, whatever that might have been. 

The oldest available records, albeit corrupted, seem to come from the days of the Second Emperox if not earlier. They reference a world, Zumu Legoti, that is said to have been the first-home of House Crux, perhaps their original destination, but give little detail as to what events would have caused them to leave it or arrive there in the first place. This fundamentally contradicts the belief that House Crux’s target had always been Hiera, the neighbor of Gats in the Ellis system. Some have pointed out that no complete data exists to prove that either narrative is necessarily true.

From these references and scraps of data, numerous theories emerged. Some believe that Zumu Legoti was indeed House Crux’s intended destination, but the planet proved either too inhospitable or too dangerous to settle, forcing Crux to search for another option. Others claim that House Crux splintered early on, a portion of the House turning their backs on or exiled from their families and friends, wandering the darkness until they happened upon Zumu Legoti, making it their home. Others still insist that Zumu Legoti was in reality the original name of Hiera, either chosen by House Crux or whatever alien race might have inhabited it before, and that the name was either lost to time or expunged from existence for some enigmatic purpose.

Writings, survey data from entranced explorers, and various bits and pieces of information regarding Zumu Legoti continued to be produced throughout the Empire’s Golden Age. With little record of war or conflict, historians believe many Crucian Nobles took to hunting for the fabled planet. Records of discoveries exist, but most have been explained as known planets within the Sector, “re-discovered” by foolish Crucian Nobles who had failed to read their charts correctly. A few, however, describe worlds and systems that do not seem to match any currently known or available in databases. Unfortunately, these examples often contradict each other, seeming to describe numerous different worlds as the fabled Zumu Legoti, and the transit data to reach them was often either investigated and proven false or would no longer be accurate after centuries of time. Historians have taken this to mean that such discoveries were likely faked for fame or glory, creative minds inventing worlds that only they could reach.

During the Scream, it is thought that several Crucian Nobles were lost out in the darkness between the stars, still attempting to discover the first-home. Reports of one or two Crux psychics describing visions of the planet exist, but such psychics were driven to madness if they had not immediately died in the cataclysm of the Scream. Large portions of the information collected about the mythical world was lost or corrupted, and what was able to be rebuilt has been of questionable authenticity since.

Talk of the alleged “first-home” persisted, however, though for many years only anecdotally. But with the end of the Second Imperial Civil War and the peace brought on by the Masked Emperox, many Crucian Nobles, particularly Primeborn, began investigating the old rumors and data again, looking to occupy their bored minds. Survey missions, research initiatives, and requests to the sitting Emperox were all undertaken, but to no avail. Zumu Legoti was never discovered, or if claims were made it was, they were never able to be corroborated. Even into the present, small numbers of Crucian Nobles still hope to uncover the “truth,” but it may well be they never find what they seek because it simply has never existed.

Prominent And Unusual Myths

The True Crux

Foolish theorists and researchers have proposed that Hiera is the world of traitors, a splinter of the real Constellation Ship Crux. The ancestors of what is now known as House Crux defied their purpose and mission, abandoning their kin on a hostile and desolate world to die as they fled to Hiera. All contact was cut off and denied, and ultimately the inhabitants of Zumu Legoti perished to the elements of an uninhabitable world. Such hypotheses are considered treasonous to House Crux and the Empire, and pursuit of them is often grounds for imprisonment and the destruction of associated research materials. Still, the notion has persisted.

The Devourer

Several black holes are marked on modern Imperial star charts. Some believe that one of these, or another now forgotten, was the original target of Constellation Ship Crux. Before the ship could arrive, the target system’s star erupted into a supernova and collapsed into a black hole, drawing Zumu Legoti towards it. When Crux arrived, they quickly realized the situation and fled the system, finding Hiera and their Cygnus cousins. Zumu Legoti may still exist, thrown free into the darkness of space by the sudden death of its sun, or it may now be nothing more than dust, torn asunder by hungry gravitational energies.

Paradise Lost

Some historians have proposed that House Crux is not a “complete” version of itself. Originally, House Crux was not just the House of Law, but the House of Law and Order, two interlinked but distinct missions that have today been merged under the umbrella of Law. On Zumu Legoti, these mandates clashed, those seeking to create new laws coming into conflict with those who were tasked to uphold it. Bloodshed followed, many struck down in the towering boughs of a beautiful jungle world before the House of Law separated itself, leaving the planet and exiling the House of Order with nothing more than a few system-drive freighters. Official records were expunged of almost all data regarding the “lost half” of House Crux, and the traitors were all but forgotten.

Qui Manere

Refuted by House Crux as anti-Imperial treason, Qui Manere by name alone may seem to conform to the trend set by other myths and theories. The phrase roughly translates to “they who remain,” or “that which remains.” However, this theory draws upon a scrap of data that to this day has no explanation. Alongside what minimal references exist to the planet Zumu Legoti and its possible discovery, there is the name itself, persistent throughout all known records. The name is meaningless in any known language of the Empire, seemingly a random collection of syllables or an inaccurate transliteration. Others have proposed, however, that humanity never named the planet.

House Crux did find Zumu Legoti, and were possibly in the company of other Constellation Ships when they did. But they did not find an untouched world of burgeoning life or inhospitable devastation. They found a remnant, a device left untouched of something or someone else. Very quickly, it began to affect those who landed on the surface, changing them and invading their minds with language and ideals that were not their own. Conflict erupted, quarantines erected in the hopes of keeping back the affected. Attempts were made to stop this hostile incursion, but to no avail. It spread far too rapidly to allow researchers to study it, and the planet, dubbed Zumu Legoti by those possessed by this alien artifact’s power, was abandoned. All coordinates and references to it were ordered to be expunged so that no others might stumble upon that terrible world, with only a few scraps escaping destruction.

The implications of this theory, that an alien race too powerful for humanity to overcome defeated a pre-Scream House and forced them into retreat, has led to the banning of all legal research and discussion of this idea. 

Many have wondered however, what became of the Qui Manere, “they who remain,” left behind under Zumu Legoti’s influence. Did they overcome it? Did they succumb to it, eventually dying out? Or had they only begun their journey into darkness?