The events in T-MEK occur in a planetary system called the Lacertan System. The star, Lacertus, has six planets in its orbit: Voluvia, Acrath, Etramel, Prg'zhak, Slauthan, Melekus.

The Usurper's Credo

I am a Voluvan slave.

Voluvia is the richest planet in the Lacertan System, and my home. It's a burning prison realm ruled by the war goddess Venusiva, industrial motherlode of the wicked overlord Nazrac.

My days are spent foraging for the rare alloys that are needed to construct Nazrac's war machines, called MEKs--Mechanical Extensions for Killing. He once used these lethal tools to conquer the Lacertan System. Now they are merely his playthings--used to uphold his T-MEK Tournament and occasionally to destroy a village of renegade subjects.

My blood and sweat allow him to continue his reign of terror, a nightmare that has lasted well over five decades. How long have I been party to this insanity? Time is non-existent in my mind. My time is marked by the countless scars on my flesh from the overseer's whip. I could be twenty and I could be a hundred. All I know is that I've suffered enough pain and humiliation to last a thousand lifetimes.

I vaguely remember my childhood. Children are used to blast out new mines, due to their small size and nimble fingers. They lower them into craters packed with enough explosives to blow away their tiny limbs. Children, like many other life forms, are expendable in the eyes of the overlords. I'm one of the lucky ones--Venusiva has allowed me to grow to adulthood with all my limbs intact.

Few slaves are this fortunate. Either they die in the mines or are butchered for the goddess. She depends on mortal blood to maintain and strengthen her power. Legend has it that when she has devoured as many souls as there are volcanoes on Voluvia she will be free of the chains binding her to the planet, and the galaxy shall be hers to dine upon. Fears are rising that this is soon at hand. I have worked too long and sacrificed too much to give up my life that easily.

Years of sparring in Venusiva's poison-frenzied pit fights forced me to maim and kill fellow slaves. In my last match, the fight that qualified me for the T-MEK Tournament, I was forced to engage in a fight to the death...with my brother. I can't let his death be in vain, nor can I forgive myself.

Beware, Nazrac. Earning this privilege has stripped me of all fear and all mercy. I will not rest until I spill your blood on the Killing Floor and topple your empire. Your tournament, your laws, and your arrogance will be your downfall. Every match I win increases my power. I will destroy your evil warlords and, by your own rules, claim their planets. In each arena that I conquer, I will smash your altars to that wicked Goddess. Without her daily tribute of mortal blood she will grow weak and be unable to save you.

Mark my words, Nazrac. I will crush Venusiva, your infernal lover, and live to see your flesh rot in your own arena.

The Nazrac Story

Nazrac is the supreme ruler of the Dominion that governs the six planets of the Lacertan System. Nazrac has a strong sense of justice, defined in his own terms. He truly believes that the powerful deserve to rule the weak. He has absolute control over the laws, the police force, the industry, and the technology. No authority is unchallengeable, even his own.

Nazrac was born on Etramel into the Tergoth clan--one of the most powerful bloodlines on Etramel, which was the most populated and socially advanced planet of the system. In Nazrac's youth, the planets of the Lacertan System were ruled by many familial clans, struggling for power. The Tergoth clan figured large in Etramel's politics.

In the course of centuries of territorial battles, war machines were built by many clans. These machines were called MEKs--Mechanical Extensions for Killing. The Tergoth clan ran a sizable industry that made these MEKs.

As a young man, Nazrac worked in the family business of MEK manufacture. He sought his fortune in Voluvia, where raw materials-metals and minerals--were plentiful. He proved his worth as a strong-willed and aggressive supervisor of the slave labor there, and rose to positions of greater responsibility. The MEKs made under his watch gained a reputation for especially effective killing power. More than once Nazrac used one of his favorite MEKs to destroy a village that was quartering a dissident fugitive slave.

One portentous night, Nazrac felt drawn to explore the newest and deepest mining veins, far below the surface of Voluvia. In a growing state of restlessness bordering on madness, he followed a seductive voice through the winding rock channels. Shattering walls of rock in his path, he broke into a vast cavern, unseen by mortal eyes for a thousand years. Here was the lost temple of Venusiva, sunken into the molten rock from a tremendous volcanic eruption a millennium ago.

The goddess had been carving at the rock for centuries, seeking escape from her prison, but without the power that worshippers once gave her, she might never have escaped. She found in Nazrac a devout and eager subject who quickly bent to her consuming will. On that night began the infernal union of Nazrac and Venusiva, set free from her rock chamber, hungry for new worshippers as she had had of old.

Nazrac's new-found lust combined with Venusiva's intimate knowledge of the inner depths of Voluvia drove Nazrac's forging power to new heights. The blood sacrifices demanded by Venusiva kept his slaves in new bonds of terror. The T-MEKs made under Nazrac's now-absolute control became the machine of choice for all who waged war on any planet.

Within ten years of his first encounter with Venusiva, Nazrac had all of Voluvia and most of Etramel under his military and economic power. Over the next decade his rule encompassed all six planets of the Lacertan System. The age and realm of his rule came to be known as Nazrac's Dominion.

Nazrac is a ruthless dictator who builds his power through threats of horrific attack from his armies of MEKs, fierce loyalty extracted from his well-rewarded underlings, and cunning control of all major industries on the planets.

To administer his wide reign, Nazrac has chosen a warlord to rule over each planet except for Etramel, where he chiefly resides and oversees everything. Nazrac believes that power belongs to the strong, and those that prove themselves in battle to be more savage, quick, and fearless than their superiors deserve to take the place of those superiors. For this reason Nazrac conducts his T-MEK tournament, finding the most powerful warriors and rewards them with the chance to rule a planet, under his command.

Nazrac commonly terrorizes areas of any planet that seems to be a breeding ground for rebellion. Many times have villages, towns, and cities turned to smoldering ruins before Nazrac and his legions of MEKs.

The Venusiva Story

Venusiva was once was the goddess of the tribal native people of the planet Voluvia. As a divine being, she drew her power from worship, and in return for sacrifices and abjection, she held at bay the deadly volcanic power surging from Voluvia's core.

In a moment of terrible anger at a great betrayal, Venusiva loosed her anger upon the people of Voluvia. A tremendous volcanic surge broke the planet's crust under Voluvia's capital city, where Venusiva's great temple stood. She gravely underestimated Voluvia's power when coupled with her own wrath. The city and the temple sank in a vast sea of lava, and she along with it.

Stripped of her worshippers and trapped in hardening rock, Venusiva was helpless in her temple, desperately trying to claw her way to the surface where lived the few Voluvians who could restore her power. The people of Voluvia slowly forgot about Venusiva and their population grew through the centuries, protected from their planet's deadly fire by new technology.

Freed by Nazrac, Venusiva lays claim to the worship that she feels is long overdue from the Voluvians. To feed her lust for spiritual power, she thrives on the blood and pain of sacrifice. In her name are performed hand-to-hand pit fights among the slaves, where many enter the burning arena, but only one lives to exit it. These slaves are made to fight each other by use of a diabolical poison of Venusiva's invention. Once injected into the blood, the slave has scarcely an hour to live. The poison enrages the emotions and drives the victim into a blood frenzy. Only by drinking the blood of a similarly poisoned slave can one quench the acid fire of the poison, and save one's life.

In return for the knowledge of ores and metals that Venusiva gives him, and to excite their lustful union, Nazrac also dedicates some of the pain and destruction of his T-MEK tournament to Venusiva. Battles on Voluvia, in the arena called Inferno, feed Venusiva's thirst for sacrifice. Nazrac has also put in the center of his Killing Floor an altar to Venusiva which sends her a spiritual portion of the pain and bloodletting caused there.

Ancient legends tell that when Venusiva has devoured in sacrifice as many souls as there are volcanoes in Voluvia, she will be freed of her bond to her native planet and she will be able to freely travel the galaxy as a goddess of new power, feeding on the peoples of a thousand worlds. Fortunately for the inhabitants of those other worlds, there are many tens of thousands of volcanoes on Voluvia. Fortunately for Venusiva, Voluvia's booming population and Nazrac's constant supply of fresh blood means that her freedom is close at hand.