Milky Way Galaxy

A view of the Milky Way from Old Earth

The Milky Way Galaxy is the presumed home of the human race, with homo sapiens determined to have arisen there over 250,000 years ago. For the bulk of that time, humanity as it is known now was confined to one planet, Old Earth, and existed as one species, homo sapiens sapiens. The Milky Way is a moderately populous galaxy today, being of middling size among giant spiral galaxies. Despite its averageness in many regards, the Milky Way does retain an overabundance of pure humans, including many sects who see the Milky Way as being a spiritually significant homeland and the rightful abode of humanity. Several of these sects exist outside the normal intergalactic order, refusing to participate in the colonization of the universe.

Old Earth itself was rendered uninhabitable during the Orion Wars, wherein one of the belligerents used a radical starlifting procedure to induce a series of cataclysmic novae in Sol, humanity's home star. Old Earth's atmosphere was obliterated, its surface was badly irradiated, and billions of people were killed. Sol remains today, as does the physical husk of Old Earth, and the entire solar system of humanity's origin is preserved as a Royal Intergalactic Heritage Site. Neighboring peoples from the Proxima Colony offer tours of Old Earth, and it is the most-visited tourist attraction in the universe.