Magellans

are an ancient advanced race that considers themselves to be descended from the gods. They are from the Magellan cloud galaxy.

It would be fair to say, that the Magellans are the kindest, most peaceful and most helpful creatures in the galaxy. Getting to where they are takes an enormous amount of luck, and that luck is earned by demonstrating a high level of spiritual and technical development.

Physiology
With the exeptions of their skin colour, hair colour and bright cat eyes, Magellans are almost identical to Humans, when it comes to their appearance.

The physiological differences between Magellans and Humans also tend not to stand out, though they are critical: Magellans have a more powerful nervous system, an advanced immune system, a more graceful skeleton, and elegant musculature. The latter two differences are explained by the fact that it has been millennia since the last time Magellans did physical labor.

Procreation for this race is not without its peculiarities: they give birth to at least 2-3 children at a time, topping out at twelve. And when it comes to those children, there are thousands of females born for each male. Religion keeps the Magellans from performing artificial insemination, and the damage cloning would do to their genetic code and the resulting mutations keep it off the table as well. As a result, Magellan populations grow only slowly. With that said, meetings with Humans are all it takes to turn that around, as it turns out that Human-Magellan babies enjoy both physical strength and strong intellectual capacity. While Human-Magellan males are born sterile, their female counterparts are completely capable of bearing healthy young of their own.

The similarities between Magellans and Humans have led some to hypothesize about a shared lineage. It was thought that Humans came from Magellans, though studies of their genetics told a slightly different story: they share no haplogroups, and genetic footprints with a 98.735% coincidence rate are not close enough to consider the two races a single species. Most likely they are parallel branches spinning off from a common ancestor—it would be highly unlikely that two such similar races would appear independently of each other.

History
Magellan history harkens back to the Great Exodus from the Magellan Cloud to the Milky Way, though the exact reason for the exodus is unclear. That event, however, is at the heart of all three of the Magellans’ schools of religion and philosophy. Each interprets the exodus differently: Vaishasters think their divine ancestors kicked them out, meaning that they need to atone for their sins at any cost so they can eventually go back home. The Sitarakshitars believe their divine ancestors sent them to shed light on other races, meaning that they need to help other races develop at any cost so the gods will come join them in the Milky Way. Rakshis think their divine ancestors died after sending them off as a seed, meaning that the Magellans need to flourish and spread at any cost so that they can become new gods.

Magellan history since the exodus has been the story of a struggle for power between those three schools — their holy crusades, in fact, have ravaged the entire galaxy a number of times. That struggle would have continued had they not signed the Way of Atonement concordat that brought peace within the race and across the galaxy. According to the arrangement they reached, the ruling elite must follow all three schools equally and at the same time as a picture of the triumvirate, a balancing act that has turned out to be highly effective: it has been several millennia since the last time there was a Magellan civil war.

Culture
Magellans are known to be the galaxy’s foremost proponents of aesthetics and spirituality, as almost half of what they do is made up exclusively of rituals and prayers. That sometimes ends badly for them: for example, Magellans under attack on one of their ships cannot return fire until their captain has recited the death prayer, something that takes several minutes. In the meantime, their enemies can do quite a bit of damage.

Because male Magellans are born so rarely, they are the race’s crown jewels. As a rule, they live high on the hog, never have a care in the world, and spend their time reproducing. Magellans do not have an institution like marriage, so females are allowed to spend the night with a male only as a reward for great accomplishments. All children are cared for at temples, where they are raised and taught until they reach adulthood.

Their first encounter with Humans threw Magellan culture into disarray. The biological compatibility enjoyed by the two races has made the morality of interracial unions a hotly debated subject that is stilled being discussed today. Some Magellans think half breeds should be destroyed, while others point to their unique combination of strength and intellect as proof of the blessing they are. Human opinion is equally divided. Incidentally, recruitment of male soldiers ceased to be a problem for Humans once word got out about the race of beautiful star amazons with hardly a man to call their own.