A LONG, LONG TIME AGO…
longer ago than anyone alive would remember, the planet you all walk on was home to vast, globe-spanning civilisations. scattered ruins and the imprints left by folkstories are the only evidence that remains to prove that they were here.
this world’s previous inhabitants, referred to as the progenitors, were wiped out by an apocalypse of their own design. by ripping open the pathways to two completely new dimensions- the Nether and the End- they contaminated their own with diseases entirely novel to anything in the Overworld. they spread quickly, and were almost invariably fatal.
some of the progenitors believed that the technology that had brought this about could also end it. they retreated underground and splintered into small research groups to search for a cure.
they tore open a new portal, and they found the Deep Dark.
their efforts were, to a degree, a success; they found a vaccine, using the skulk’s aggressive, rapidly spreading nature to find a way of bolstering an individual’s immune system. but as each containment facility suffered catastrophic failure in trying to contain the skulk’s aggressive spread, they recognised they wouldn’t live to see it put to use. many of the splinter groups configured their vaccine to diffuse through populations over time in the hopes that it would reach much of the overworld, before being overrun.
lifetimes later, you are here.
travel between the Overworld and Nether hasn’t caused problems for any Overworlder in living memory.
now, the largest civilisations are moderately sized factions, and even they are few and far between.
txto