Editing Mars (section)

== Warhammer 40,000 ==
In the backstory of [[Warhammer 40,000]], the [[God-Emperor of Mankind]] imprisoned a very large shard of the [[Void Dragon]] on Mars during the Middle Ages, knowing that He would [[Just as Planned|need it later]]. Though when He took the Void Dragon to Mars is unclear, so maybe Big-E stored him in the Marianas Trench or underneath the city of Centralia, Pennsylvania [look it up!] and with the advent of space travel centuries later, decided to relocate offworld to Mars, ultimately ending up in the Noctis Labyrinthus. Presumably it [[Troll|amused itself]] by blowing up space probes during M3.

Mars turned out to be one of the first worlds colonized by [[humanity]] because no shit Sherlock it's right fucking there. The colonization and terraforming were backed by industrial cartels and megacorporations, and carried out by their employees. Obsessed with technology and knowledge, its inhabitants upgraded themselves and their planet in every conceivable way. Mars became encrusted with buildings, factories, and laboratories, a sort of hybrid [[Hive World| Hive]] and [[Forge World]] (the first of many to come). It was independent of [[Earth]] (granted right away to prevent/delay the inevitable secession wars that would come from not granting it) which gave the megacorps free reign on how to treat their employees, leading to usage of slave labor. One particular cartel was infiltrated by a [[C'tan]] and flat out became a [[Chaos Cults|Chaos cult]], this lead to [[Doom|a daemonic incursion on Mars, and later Terra, which was dealt with]] by an individual theorized to be related to [[God-Emperor of Mankind|the Emperor]].

During the Age of Strife, Mars could no longer import what it needed to maintain its artificially-maintained terraforming (Mars being too small and lacking a magnetic field for it to stick). As a result the cartels collapsed leaving the planet's inhabitants to die. The only groups that survived were those that hoarded enough know-how to build environmentally sealed facilities that could keep air in and mutants out. This led to their tech-obsession becoming fanatical, and their disregard for anything but machinery made sure that the environment would never recover.

Their culture had changed as well; with so much knowledge lost during the dark times (and with some influence of the Dragon), the people of Mars had dedicated themselves to preserving what information they could, and they did this with a religious fervor, coming to be known as the Mechanicum (and even later, reformed as the [[Adeptus Mechanicus]]).

The [[God-Emperor of Mankind]] won them over to his side for the [[Great Crusade]] by pwning their expeditionary fleet they sent to raid Terra for STC printouts (the only remaining knowledge from the Dark Age of Technology), and then promptly promising them first dibs on any terran [[STC]] printouts, and the new ones that would be discovered by his [[Space Marine]] Legions, and they provided [[power armor]] and [[bolters]] for his growing armies. [[Just As Planned]].

While most of the Mechanicus was on board with this, unfortunately there was tension within the ranks of a few butthurt [[tech-priests]] at the uppermost strata of the leadership fixated on personal gains, and [[Horus]] was able to play on this (with more than a little help from [[Chaos]]) and sow a civil war as part of the [[Horus Heresy]]. And this is where that help from chaos came in, as the aforementioned butthurt senior tech-priests managed to gather followers not with convincing arguments, [[Grimdark|but just by infecting them with cyber-AIDS, known as scrap code, and robbing them of free will]]. Terrible weapons were unleashed, from the mighty [[Titan]] legions to bizarre techno-organic creatures (which may have been [[Daemons]]), and Mars was left even more damaged than before.

The present-day Mars is more or less recovered, though it would never attain the greatness it had before the Horus Heresy. Much of the planet is barely-inhabitable wasteland dotted with forges and hives, where stored knowledge is fragmented at best, and at risk of being subverted by Chaos or, even worse, by the [[Necrons]]. Though the new Adeptus Mechanicus is essentially a superstitious priesthood, they retain most of the Imperium's technical knowledge and best technologies; and Mars is still the seat of one of the most powerful Imperial institutions and is among the top percentile of the most productive forge worlds, if not ''the'' top forge world.
{{40k-Planets}}
[[Category:Imperial]]
[[Category:Adeptus Mechanicus]]