Long before the days of Galactic Civilizations, before the great pall of darkness cast by Chaos had ever been given opportunity to recede, there existed a world wrought with such demons, that naught has been known since the days of the ancients.

            Across its landscape strode these wicked creatures, whose huge, bloodthirsty appetites stood as a living obstruction for Order and civilization. In the iron grip of lord Chaos’s schemes did their purpose reside, for this world was of Chaos’s greatest, and cruelest strongholds of evil.

            But through great challenges come prodigious successes…

            “Behold My Children!” boomed The Holy Voice across these wicked lands—and, at once, the blackened plumes of destruction parted to allow The Righteous Light to shine forth upon its broken ground for the very first time. The huge reptilian beasts, whose destruction and tyranny thus far had owned the world outright with no challenge, fled for their dens as they cowered in fear beneath the powerful words of Lord Order. “Arise From These Ashes Of Destruction! For You Are To Become The Greatest Of All My Creations!”

            …And thus, the ancient race now known to be the Enlar came to be…

Unlike the other, mindless and wicked monsters that roamed the land, the Enlar possessed the capacity for greatness. They were endowed with huge, powerful brains and sixteen dexterous tentacles with which to build their civilization in the hostile world around them. Walking on dozens of short, spindly legs, the Enlar—by their weak appearance alone—seemed doomed to failure on such a cruel and forbidding planet. But, where they lacked in physical strength, they were more than compensated with the gift of unrivaled intelligence…

            “Doubt Not Your Destiny!” commanded lord Order, to the trembling race of beings who breathed their first stinging breath of harsh air with their waking birth of existence. Each stared to the sky with his single, unfocused eye—writhing in fearful anticipation beneath the thunderous bellows of their Creator’s words. “For It Is You Who I Have Chosen To Return Structure And Order To The Universe!…It Is You Who Will Repair These Broken Lands!…And You Who I Have Given The Power To Decide The Fates Of All Lesser Creatures!”

            …And at once—even then, at the waking hours of his brother’s creation—that wicked mind began to resent their creation, and begat planning their demise…

            The Enlar were released by their creator upon one of the most unwelcoming planets ever conceived in the womb of the universe. And, like newborn children exposed to the elements, they were at once brought to suffer to by the wrath of Lord Chaos.

            Torture and terror were the only two facts known of existence by the Enlar, for they were at constant mercy to the tooth and claw of the much larger, and more powerful predators of their ancient world. Their large brains, composing some two-thirds of their body masses, were sweet delicacies to the huge and hungry beasts that roamed the land. Not a day passed without the Enlar living in constant fear—a fear that cannot be described to any not born of their kind—as death form them is more excruciating than what is even conceivable to anything but the Enlar mind.

            The Enlar possessed a highly developed nervous system, whose sensory preceptors are designed to detect even the slightest sensations, capable of registering every last living detail, which are then sent directly to the brain for several layers of redundant neural processing. Though such abilities endowed the Enlar with a limitless capacity to observe, analyze and understand—it was nothing short of a curse, cast upon them, to suffer at the feasting jowls of their natural enemies.

To the Enlar, every talon’s scratch, every sinking tooth, that penetrates their soft flesh is met with the agony of thousand screaming deaths: far more than what is considered possible by any other species in the known universe. For even the slightest sensations of discomfort—nearly undetectable to the consciousnesses of most other races—become the searing agony of an Enlar’s torturous end…

            “Why?!” the Enlar people cried to the heavens, cursing the day that the cruel essence of life had ever been breathed into their helpless bodies. “For what reason have you brought us here merely to abandon us? Soon, we are all to die, while our enemies grow fat from feasting upon the flesh of our children!”

            But the Enlar, though lacking in spirit, possessed a keen intellect that was without peer. And so, one by one, they began to band together and form coalitions: exchanging ideas, and inventing newer and more effective ways to protect themselves. Their hearts grew bitter and calculating, and their instinctive sense of perpetual fear was merely an adaptation developed over the generations as a means of self-defense. For every Enlar was born with the knowledge that everything must be under constant vigil and control of his vastly superior intellect—their only one true advantage—because the slightest moment of laxity would invariably result in the excruciating death of being ripped apart for the sweet, fleshy nutrients locked within his body….

            Life did not come easy in those days of ancient terror, civilization was not given to them: it was dredged out of the limited resources on an unforgiving world. The Enlar were relentless in their fearful studies—perpetually analyzing and understanding to the “Behavior Of The Beast,” in an endless struggle for survival, so that they may live but for another day…

But as the years turned into centuries, and the centuries into millennia, the Enlar thrived and multiplied—while never abandoning the one true pillar of their existence. Never did they cease their constant observation of their surroundings, and they had grown adept at recognition of the weaknesses in their natural predators, and even quicker to react. As time passed, they mastered the harsh conditions of their world—systematically exterminating the ever-dwindling numbers of the myriad grotesque species that continued to plague their civilization—and their knowledge grew with every age.

            Within a few short generations, they had conquered the elements, erecting sophisticated protective barriers to secure themselves from the ravages of the outer-world beasts and wild tempests that were natural to their land. Within a dozen more, they had mastered the art of civilization, as they built vast empires that managed and processed the limited amounts of raw materials that their relatively poor planet had to offer. And while the other species of the universe were still struggling to rise above the feral creatures of their own worlds, the brilliant Enlar children had already ascended to the stars to continue their unyielding quest for understanding…and protection…

            The few pitifully outnumbered creatures that had managed to escape the Enlar’s genocide were specimens whose existence was only permitted for reasons of study. For if there was one thing the Enlar people knew, it was to understand their enemies, so that they may understand and manipulate; just as every Enlar knew that to give up even the merest scrap of information was to turn the blind eye to the threat, and such always led to the path of suffering and destruction. How else could they have accomplished so much? No, it was knowledge and control alone—the only two gods the Enlar now knew—to which they owed everything. No more were they the helpless creatures of the past, just as Lord Order was now nothing more than a painful, forgotten memory.

            And yet, with their accomplishments grew their pride, for it was they—alone—had accomplished the impossible, against all odds. Within the time-span of every Enlar’s ancestral memory, they had succeeded in protecting themselves from their mortal enemies…for the time being…

            And so it is said, that when the Enlar had breached the heavens to explore the stars, they knew no limit to their arrogance.

            “View My People And Marvel!” Order proclaimed to Chaos, boasting of his finest creation, as he watched his people rise from their planet to begin their ultimate task. “It Is They That I Have Decided To Restore Order To Your Madness!…For Against Every Misfortune, They Have Succeeded—And Amidst Ever Advantage, You Have Failed!”

            But with a shrewd smile of complete confidence, Chaos’s retorted: “And What Of Your People, Younger Brother? Their Success Is But A Mirage—Visible To None But The Desperate Man Dying Of Thirst Alone In The Dessert!…It Is I Who Have Conquered!…I Who Have Won: For Your People Now, Mighty As They May Be, Serve No Other Than Me!”

            And so, distraught by the words of his nemesis, Lord Order returned to his children, and was appalled by what he found. For, in his absence, they had grown conceited and complacent: expanding further than what the reaches of their knowledge could accommodate for.

Their folly had come full circle…

            “STOP!” warned Order, finding his children in manic study of a horror beyond even their most brilliant’s comprehension. In their endless quest for better understanding, traveling amidst the stars and unraveling the secrets of their surrounding universe, they had unwittingly uncovered the dark trap, set by Lord Chaos, for their own demise.  “My Children, You Must Leave This Place Of Wickedness! Your Purpose Is To Restore Order, But I Find You Learning The Ways Of Chaos And Cruelty!”

            “Leave us be, wretch!” returned the Enlar, swelling with pride and hubris. “For we have much to learn from these creatures, and you are but a distraction! Leave us, and never return!”

            And so, in sadness more than rage, Lord Order abandoned his people.  Finding them upon the brink of destruction, he granted them their wish and never returned…

            He merely watched as their ships studied in orbit over the Ignus home world, confident of their safety in light of their previous successes. And as the Enlar pried with captivated lenses as the strange, serpentine bodies of their newfound specimens, Lord Order did nothing to prevent them from continuing down the road of death and destruction.