The Redemption sector

Each Clowner is born a sterile diminutive drone by the techno Communion, it's mind completely blank as it emerges from the incubation tanks, the Techno Communion imprint the desired skills and characteristics onto the small being and sell them as cheap, nearly self sufficient 'eat anything' slave labour throughout the Redemption Sector.

These drones proved to be the first beings since the dawn of time that the daemonic Imagifiers from the nether regions of reality were able to make contact with, as they lay in comatose slumber growing in within dank birthing tanks.

A lone drone was imprinted upon by the Imagifiers dark whisperings, and upon sale and allocation to farming labour on the planet Helot Prime was able to escape from it's owners and enter the wilds of the countryside. There the drone was picked up by a travelling circus of Crowmantia, famed for their tradition of clowns within their society as a means of entertaining the glum smog ridden city filled with mass poverty they call home.

The drone easily infiltrated the Crowmantian city of Arkham Glomchil, and proceeded to corrupt more and more of it's fellow drone clowns with the same imprinting devices the Crowmantians used on rogue and acquired drones. Before long the entire cities population of drones were corrupted, the drones referred to as Clowners by the Crowmantian society.

Using these Clowners as pawns, the Imagifiers channelled their willpower and essence and through the process of automatic writing the first of the Black Cult manuscripts were penned.

Smuggled through the undercities and forgotten passes of the wilderness between Alpha Cities, the Clowners planted the manuscripts within reach of the not the downtrodden civilian labour force of the Empire, but the corrupt noblemen and women of the upper classes grown weary of Imperial worship.

The bored and corrupt recipients of the forbidden manuscripts authored by the Clowners found themselves in possession of blueprints for the formation of sects and meetings of the most secret kind.

Bizarre rituals, key words and tokens were documented, with instructions on how to conduct the clandestine gatherings and enact the required rituals required to bring about the summoning of energy beings who would gift the summoner with power and knowledge of the future and the very nature of existence.

In a society of mindless ritual and veneration of a forgotten leader, the nobles set about creating the Black Cults within their circles of influence. The original manuscripts became heirlooms of power, and the key words and incantations became a closely guarded secret, not least of all from the totalitarian Imperial government and fanatical Church of Tzar.

Almost overnight, fully formed secret societies emerged within the Empire, each with an identical code of conduct, agenda and framework of ranks and organisation. Cult leaders appointed themselves Locus, their bodyguards and meeting security measures became Tyler Seneschal's, clad in ritual armour and bearing giant serrated halberds, and the cult followers became Fellowcraft members: followers of the dark arts. Clowners soon appeared as attendants and candle bearers at the cult meetings, held in the forgotten and abandoned catacombs of the Alpha Cities or secret floors within the nobles villas and palaces.

As the cults mastery of their ritual words of power progressed, along with their adherence to the odd direction and requirements of their secret meetings and initiating rituals, small flashes of insight and the unexplained began to manifest during the proceedings, further enticing the Locus to delve deeper into the new material being provided by the unassuming Clowner attendants. Before long ritual sacrifice and other depravity became a staple of the meeting agenda.

As the cults began to descend into orgies of terror, the members maintained their public persona without fail, even going so far as to instigate murder of any potential defectors and going out of their way to recruit ever more senior members within the military and government. A dangerous root had taken hold within the Empire, a time bomb of insurrection.

As the Black Cults began to form the sinister Clowners began their own campaign of sedition and made plans to recruit the Techno Communion agents sent to investigate them.

The Techno Communion with it's unparalleled saturation of the Redemption sector with spies and technological marvels of oversight began to show interest in the strange actions of their drones within the city of Arkham Glomchil.

A number of Technician class drones were ordered to Helot Prime, themselves merely advanced models of the diminutive basic drone, in the Technician upgrades case: the granting of individual sentience for creative thought, human stature and a greater lifespan, albeit controlled subconsciously with a deep religious loyalty to the Techno Communion and their Artificial Intelligence master.

The Imagifiers, channelled through the Clowners found little resistance overcoming the Technicians conditioning, relishing in the emotional immaturity and weakness of the crudely produced drones. It was noted by the dark beings that the vat grown drones were particularly easy to corrupt and influence, and that the true born humans beings, although more difficult to influence, were lured by their own thoughts of personal gain or naivety.

These newly corrupted Technicians were baptised the first Alchemists, twelve in total, and were instructed in the physical and mechanical application of the forbidden knowledge by the Clowners, channelling the Imagifiers as they had done before when authoring the cult manuscripts.

Arcane and baroque machinery beyond mortal design were planned, utilising the supervision of the Imagifiers and knowledge gleaned from the Alchemists, themselves able to infiltrate the secret machine information nodes and walk freely among the Techno Communion Guilds found on every Alpha City street within the Empire.

The Alchemists acquired the knowledge of drone creation and began refurbishing the long abandoned Techno Communion guild compounds within Arkham Glomchil, bolstering the enthralled populations resources and technical capability who were still oblivious to the cult formations and actions of the unassuming Clowners.

Altering their appearance, the Alchemists soon began to modify their own bodies with the addition of mechanical insectoid appendages to aid in their work and preparation, relishing in the freedom from the Techno Communion authority and otherworldly power of the Imagifiers . Bizarre and sinister breeds of drones were also created to act as the Alchemists assistants, performing duties the Clowners stature could not afford.

The first milestone of the Alchemists endeavours were the Soul Engines: reality bending mechanical instruments, spiked spheres circled by rotating rings shrouded in electrical and metaphysical energy clouds, powered by the very souls of human sacrifice and nestled in entangled pipes and wiring, required to distribute the soul essence in the appropriate fashion. The moans of the drone beings welded to the instrumentation as expendable operators were continually silenced by the ozone void that stifled the air around the machine.

Five souls engines were placed around the sacrificial altars at the Black Cult gathering locations deep under the Alpha Cities forgotten foundations, and the coming of the first Dracul being was anticipated.