Prologue
During the Cold War, humans weren’t able to stop. They created things, horrible things.
Russia discovered a virus and named it the Technocyte virus. It was able to mutate animals into powerful creatures. However, to obtain this new form, they underwent such excruciating pain that they went insane. The animals became ballistic and would attack anything in sight. The virus could be a powerful weapon, if used correctly.
An agent got deployed with the task of unleashing this virus on America. When they got wind of this, they sent an agent of their own to intercept the other and take the virus with him. The two agents fought long and when the American agent finally won, it was already too late. He was infected with the virus and the virus itself was spread around the world.
The consequences were catastrophic. Not only animals were infected, the flora was too. In only a matter of time, the humans were able to travel to space. They left the earth without looking back. The first planet they inhabited was Mars. While they were there, they created techniques to terraform the other planets. And so, they rebuild their lives and became known as the Orokin.
The Orokin were creators of massive buildings and powerful weapons. But they always wanted more. Our Origin System just couldn’t satisfy their needs any longer. Another system was found, the Tau System. The Orokin planned to travel to this new system and terraform it so they could live there too. The only problem was that the climate was too harsh for even them to work in. The Sentient were created. An entire race was made with the ability to adapt to any kind of damage that they would encounter as well as the ability to replicate from damaged components. The creatures gained sentience and quickly realised the Orokin would lay waste to the Tau System as they had done to Earth. When they returned from the Tau System, they were ready for war.
The Old War was waged hard and long. But none of the Orokin weapons were able to defeat the Sentient. Their best trait had become the Orokin’s worst nightmare. Every new used weapon was immediately countered with adaptation from the Sentient. When the Orokin were almost defeated, they remembered them.
A few years prior to the war, the Orokin had been studying and exploring a mysterious realm named the Void. In this extradimensional space, the laws of physics held little sway. Yet, the Orokin thought they had figured it out. They first build towers in it and then they sent an enormous ship into the Void. The ship was inhabited by families. All who hoped to build a life somewhere new. When the Zariman Ten Zero, the ship, entered the Void, the contact with the Orokin broke immediately.
Two years later, the ship re-emerged. The only survivors children. They never told anyone what happened in there, but somehow they had all acquired inexplicable powers and abilities. The children didn’t know how to control them. No one wanted to help. People were scared of the destruction they could cause. And so, they got shunned and were hidden away from view. Until now.
The Orokin never truly understood the Void’s powers. This meant that the Sentient wouldn’t either. The children, now known as the Tenno derived from the numbers of the ship, were given exo-skeletal suits. These suits were able to channel their powers into personified abilities. The children were taught the ways of war. And with these Warframes, they drove the Sentient to near extinction. The Orokin quickly destroyed the Outer Terminus, the gate between the Origin and Tau System. But before this happened, the Sentient dispatched their final weapon: Natah.
Natah was sent to exterminate the Tenno and destroy the Orokin Empire from within. Before she could do so, the Tenno, for unknown reasons, turned on the Orokin. The Origin System now laid in ruins and Natah had only one last task to complete. Yet, she couldn’t bring herself to do it. Instead, she grew affectionate towards the Tenno and took them under her wing. By crossing over from one System to another, she had become barren as all Sentient were who had done the same. The Void power that energised the Outer Terminus corrupted the Sentient. So with no way to conceive children of her own, Natah viewed the Tenno as such. From that moment on, she would become known as the Lotus.
With the war over, the treasures of the Orokin were ready to be taken. The workers and slaves of the Orokin took their ships and weapons. The Twin Queens secured the cloning technique that made them and adapted it so new clones would feel complete loyalty to them. This faction became known as the Grineer.
The servants and merchants took the Orokin robotics and technology. They worshipped money and cared only for making profit. Named the Corpus, they stood under the lead of Nef Anyo. Their weapons were energy-based and with the robotics, they made an army. The lower class Corpus were always threatened with falling in debt, and debt was no small matter in this faction.
Another faction was called the Infested. These were the creatures created from the virus. Apart from the occasional outbreak, they inhabited only the dwarf planet Eris and ancient drifting Orokin vessels.
The Tenno had been put in cryosleep by the Lotus. She wanted to keep them safe and hidden from the Sentient, should they return.
The only thing left of the Orokin are the few still active structures, forgotten weapons that they build and the towers stranded in the Void.
The Tenno are being reawakened by the Lotus, not remembering anything of their past. Many of them are still children and don’t remember anything of their past. The Lotus puts them in trustworthy families and lets them raise them as if they were their own. When they’re old enough, she lets them study the ways of war with battle suits of their own choosing, unaware of their true nature. They are then set loose upon the solar system in clans of four to tackle a wide variety of missions designated by the Lotus to maintain a balance between the Grineer and Corpus factions or to quell Infested uprisings.
While the Grineer were researching ways to overcome their genetic degradation caused by many generations of repeated cloning, the researcher Tyl Regor found and broke open a vault where an ancient Sentient was held within. There are sightings of Sentient drones on all planets and it’s been said that they will return to the Origin System to reconquer what they have been defeated with.
