Cities of Britannia
Britannia's cities are its pride and joy, there are none like them anywhere in the galaxy. Monolithic super structures capable of shifting and changing to meet the needs of the inhabitants. The layout of the planet and its cities is revolutionary by design.
Britannia is covered by mostly water. The land it does have is split into vast forests, jungles, rivers, and mountain ranges, all of which are climate controlled by the diligent citizens of Britannian society. Over its surface are massive skyscraper like buildings that extend into the atmosphere known as "cities". They are many miles across, and are made from materials thousands of times stronger than steel.
The cities themselves are color coded. No two cities have the same color. This color is seen on everything from that city including the uniforms of students, police officers, fire fighters, and elected officials. Severe rivalries form between the cities and each of them has their own unique cultures. In each city lives millions of people, all working and going about their lives. Some of these people are so far towards the center of the city they never see the outside world their whole lives.
The cities themselves have a strict ratio of plants to humans. As such, they are covered in greenery. Vines, potted plants, and trees are all grown on the inside and outside of the city making for a beautiful utopia. The lands around a city are also under the care of the cities population. Massive farming complexes are inside the city, so there is no need to carve out tons of land for farming. However, farm animals are strictly forbidden, and any meat has to be hunted with your own hands. As such Hunters Guilds are placed in every city and control animal populations in the area. They monitor population levels of predators and prey, maintaining a balance so that the cities population can hunt.
Raw materials such as metal ores are brought in from off world. All cities extend just far enough into space that the top of the city can be used as a spaceport. The city spaceport will take in the raw materials brought from dead worlds, then ship them to the city below to be processed into useful goods.
Inside the cities superstructure is a very unique building design. Each city is roughly 2.2 million feet tall with a square base roughly 25 miles on each side. This massive area is then broken up into square blocks, each block being 10 feet on all sides with walls that are 1 foot thick. These blocks can have walls and floors removed to make bigger spaces for different things. For instance, a factory may need to be 3 blocks high, 4 blocks wide, and 10 blocks long to fit in everything they need. This greatly simplifies building codes and allows regional redistribution. Large sections of block buildings are known as a "Barony" and have their own Baron/Baroness(Mayor). A city can have many thousands of Barony's inside of it. As such, several Barony's are broken into what is referred to as a "County" which are governed by a Count/Countess(Governor).
Getting to the bigger picture, the entirety of the city itself is split into four identical wings vertically. Then each wing is split into 10 columns based on towns and counties. Each of these divided sections of the wing is called an "Earlland" which is run by an Earl. An entire wing of the city is run by a Duke/Duchess, and is referred to as a "Dukedom". The cities operations as a whole are overseen by a Prince/Princess, and thus the cities themselves are referred to as "Princedoms"(Ex: The Princedom of Heinwald). The duty of the Prince/Princess is to keep the Dukes/Duchess' in line, manage trade, and oversee the Princedoms production of food and water. Several cities within a territory are then run by a King/Queen. The Entire world of Britannia however is ruled over by the Immortal Emperor of Britannia.
All of the Princes/Princess' sit on "The Council of Princes". This council votes on who will become the next King/Queen of the territory. The Kings/Queens sit on "The Council of Kings" however they do not select a new Emperor, as the Emperor is immortal. Instead they follow the Emperors will, carrying out his orders, and discussing as a council what should be done in times of crisis, as the Emperor will often seek their advice.
Britannian society has functioned like this for thousands of years. It is such a solid base for government, that they are seen as the poster boys for an ideal society. As such, many other worlds envy or even despise them. However, Britannia continues onward.
Britannian technology and education.
Britannia is the most technologically advanced civilized world in Humanities Empire. Not only are their cities revolutionary, but so is their educational system.
Children are raised at school from the age of three, spending only the weekends with their parents. This frees up much of the parents time, and gives them a chance to see their children regularly. Parents who are separated get 1 day each. From an early age they are taught manners, respect, honesty, and ethics in a secular environment. They take many trips not only to locations of interest around their own city, but they visit many other Princedoms as well. They are given access to many cultures outside of their own to give them a diverse range of knowledge. Most of the knowledge taught in classes is practical, and rarely do they use problems that fall outside of practical use in some field. On top of this they are given large amounts of down time, and a lot of vacation days since they are in school year round and never stay with their parents for long periods of time. School days range from 10am until roughly 4pm and there is never "homework" but rather sets of manuals and tests that need to be completed. The students are given many chances to succeed and teachers are there to help them when they struggle, but they are mostly expected to get the work done on their own before certain lectures.
They stay in school until they are 21, at which time they join the military for 4 years, while also studying a profession of their choice. If they want to be a chef for instance, they will spend 4 years training in the mess halls. If they want to be a pilot, they will be taught to pilot varying degrees of spacecraft until they can pilot anything.
After this, they are allowed to go even further with their education by going to a university. This service is free so long as they are able to maintain the grades. They are also allowed to study multiple fields after they complete one. During this time, much like their time in basic schooling, they will go on many trips. These trips however will be more focused on getting experience in the field and will often involve short internships.
This practical approach to learning and growing as a person has developed highly independent and intelligent citizens who are highly self-disciplined. They create their own small businesses, join their fields of study, expand on those fields, all without having to be anyone. This has skyrocketed Britannian tech far past other societies.
Around the galaxy people ask for Britannian grade weaponry, armor, spaceships, fabricators, building materials, medical supplies, the list goes on. Britannia is a massive trade hub whose leaps in technology keep them on the cutting edge.
Children of the Emperor
The Children of the Emperor are the biological children of the Emperor of Britannia, enhanced to their fullest potential with gene therapy and cybernetic enhancements.
Unsanctioned Human experimentation is strictly forbidden by Humanities Empire, so they are a secret to everyone besides the elite members of Britannian society. However, in most circumstances they look like normal humans... if you can consider most humans to look normal in this day and age.
Many Humans undergo gene therapy to drastically change their appearances. This can be anything from cat ears, tails, horns, colored eyes, family crests turned into a birthmark, wings, spines, scales, fur, etc etc. Some of the more experimental gene therapies can even give you fire breath, venomous fangs, acid spit, ejectable quills/spines, bladed appendages, etc. These specific traits are then transferred to their children so long as the partner has a similar genetic coding. This has created genetically altered "subspecies" of humans, however at this point most of them are recognized as a completely different species.
This makes the Children of the Emperor stand out quite significantly, as they appear as pure, unaltered humans with beautiful skin and "features". This however is only until they grasp their bonded weapons, then everything changes.
A Child of the Emperor, or COTE for short, is bonded with a weapon core at birth that has the ability to unlock their true strength. Once firmly in their hand, the core acts like a key, activating their cybernetic enhancements. Their bodies will light up as runic tattoos underneath their skin begin to shine. Their pupils will glow a bright turquoise and robotic lines will appear over the iris. Their adamantium fiber weave muscles will activate, unlocking incredible speed and strength. In this form they become human weapons, capable of moving 5 times faster than the speed of sound, lifting objects 1,000,000 times their own weight, and unlocking the full potential of their 6th and 7th senses. Their 6th sense is being able to feel objects approaching them, allowing them to dodge things even moving as fast as bullets from all sides. Their 7th sense is telepathy, able to mentally project their thoughts and hear the thoughts of others. This isn't even mentioning that their other 5 major senses become drastically enhanced. However, once they let go of their weapon core, their powers return to their latent state. In the latent state they can use them to some minor extent but not like they can in their fully unlocked form.
Now many would consider this a feat of engineering, however this would be false. Despite its robotic appearance, the alterations on the COTE are actually genetically grown cybernetics. Meaning they grow their cybernetic enhancements as they get older, meaning during growth spurts they will have an extreme appetite for non-food items that contain the metals their bodies need to develop their genetically grown cybernetics. They will also "hibernate" for a week at a time as their body shuts down to grow their new enhancements. People watching from the outside might see a boy go from being skinny and short to tall and muscular after being gone for a week. Or see a young girl blossom into a beautiful young woman. It can be a startling jolt, not only for people who see the transformation but also for the children themselves who, for them anyway, change overnight.
Their powers however will stay in their latent state until they graduate from basic schooling, where the Emperor presents their core to them. Until then, most COTE don't even know what they are, but are aware of their slightly better speed, strength, and heightened senses compared to "regular" humans.
It is said to study at the Princedom of Heinwald is to be unrivaled amongst your peers.
The Princedom of Heinwald is renowned for its incredibly expansive centers of learning. It is also well known for the high number of famous artists, writers, actors, warriors, new technological research, and advanced fabricator facilities on Britannia. It is a center of culture where new and old ideas are constantly argued over and dramatized.
They also spend much more time on extra-curricular activities and physical education than other Princedoms. Tournaments between different schools is widely publicized and are broadcast across the Princedom. These publicized tournaments include Single Opponent Archery Battles, Dueling, Magic Fencing, and a joust. However the Grand Tourney that is held every year consists of all of these things as well as what is known as "War". War is an event where two commanders do a mock fight with actual student soldiers. They maneuver cavalry, magical artillery, archer fire support, and control the flow of the melee as best they can. The War event is so highly publicized its even seen in other Princedoms.
Because of this many people travel to Heinwald to have children, however, they often leave right after the child enters school, going back to their original Princedom. This tactic is very common and is unceremoniously called "Baby Dropping". You want the child to have a good life, but you don't want to have anything to do with them. It is selfish and frowned on by society, but it happens often. In other Princedoms, these Baby Droppers count for maybe 1-5% of a schools population. However, it is thought that over 25% of Heinwald students graduate without parents to see it. This does not deter Heinwald, these students become the most loyal to the Princedom than any other, and often become its greatest assets.
What is magic?
Magic is not actually magic, however to those who have no idea what they're seeing, they would immediately assume it was magic. "Mages" use a staff that generates effects based on input from the user. The staff is actually a portable fabricator that can alter the air within the fabrication chamber(The head of the staff) into fire, ice, lightning, water, wind, etc and project it at high speeds towards a target. It can even be used to project barriers, alter the terrain around you(such as the earth, plants, or buildings), and levitate you through the air.
The trick is that each staff has pre-programmed command phrases that will activate the staff so long as it is being held. This represents the "magic words" of medieval fantasy. The more advanced the staff, the more powerful it will be and the more command words will be available for it. Different companies make different models and compete constantly to put out the strongest staff, though command words are different between models of other companies. For this reason taking someone else's staff might not be very useful to you if you don't know the command words.
Mage Staves are very expensive and only the richest of families own them. For this reason magic staves have become a bit of a status symbol. The newer and more powerful the staff, the greater wealth you or your family wield.
APM(All Purpose Monster)
The APM or All Purpose Monster, is the futuristic version of a phone, computer, tablet, etc. It is a robotic animal companion that will follow its owner. On its body it will hold a 4D Projector which will allow their owners to make video calls, play video games, browse the "internet", and do anything else a 4D screen can do.
They also come with many other features depending on which model is purchased. Some models, such as tigers or dragons, come with self defense modules, allowing them to protect their owner from harm. Others can store weapons, or even turn into weapons for their owners to use. Big enough models can even act as a transportation vehicle, being able to ride on their backs.
However the majority of citizens have a small animal as their APM and larger APM's are merely status symbols.
The Infinite Wars
The Infinite Wars are Wars between rival powers within Humanities Empire. Loss of Human life between factions however is completely forbidden. Thus the powers that be declare Infinite Wars, these wars are fought by robot warriors and spacecraft. Fabricators pump out new combatants day and night in order to sustain these wars. This puts a strain on a nations economy as the raw materials needed for the fabricators grow. However, wars like this are won and lost over countless millennium. The shortest infinite war lasted 143 years. The longest has been going on for 2944 years and is still going.
The only fear to the population is that once they are taken over they will have to abide by the laws of the conquering society. However there are standards set by the overarching empire that only allow certain things to be changed, not allowing any inhumane actions to be taken. However they could force the destruction of their entire culture or way of life, implementing a new one in its place.
Planets that become powerful enough might even have multiple wars declared on them at once. Britannia for instance is currently embroiled in a 3 prong war against rival nations. However, using a system of static defenses and unassailable fabricators, their defenses have held. Who knows how long this will last however, as they cannot go on the offensive, leaving the enemy to expand while they retract.