The Great Void was a dimension located outside the boundaries of the multiverse. It was originally composed of a single world, but after a series of events, it was shattered into countless pieces, giving the Void is current characteristics and shape. It was bordered by another plane of existence known as the Outer Void, from where the entities known as the Void Creatures come from.
The first known inhabitants of the Great Void were the ten Ancestral Sovereigns, who took upon themselves to civilize the Great Void. Their efforts were much facilitated with the arrival of many other people, leading to the expansion and mass population of the Void.
At the time of Harry Potter's arrival, the Void was in its seventh generation of factions, and was governed by the interfactional organization known as the Great Conference.
History
First generation
Early expansion period
While no one knows when and how the Great Void was formed, history places year one at the arrival of the ten individuals which came to be known as the Ancestral Sovereigns (or Ancient Ones). At this moment in the history of the Great Void, there was one single and massive world, not the multitude found in the late years of the first generation and those that followed. Records indicate that it was during this first year that the ten came to invoke the first Great Conference, which legend holds to be where several laws of reality within the Void were established by the Ancestral Sovereigns, amongst them the lack of ageing and the very concept of severance. Shortly after this event, a small-scale summoning occurred, and it is widely believed that these newcomers came to form the early structure of what would come to be the Ancestral Factions.
At this, the factions (mere tribes at the time) migrated to several distinct points of the world, the Crimson Emperor, the Black Patriarch and the Amber Prince leading their followers to the east, the Golden Khan and the Ivory Tsar heading north, the Viridian Sultan and the Indigo Consul moving to the south, and finally, the Azure King, the Jade Shogun, and the Silver Hochmeister migrating to the west with their followers as well. As they reached suitable locations, each sovereign founded a settlement, each serving as the capital of their respective faction.
However, the Great Void suffered its second population wave, larger than the first. Its newcomers were integrated into the ten factions, and due to the diversity of people and their origins, the Void was home to a massive technological boom. As this happened, the Crimson Empire and the Azure Kingdom began to expand their spheres of influence, the other factions feeling the growth of their colleagues’ power. Another summoning would hit the Great Void, increasing the somewhat extensive population, and causing another technological boom.
Crisis of the Heresiarch
The late phase of the early expansion period saw the birth of an extremist religious philosophy known as Nihilism (not to be confused with real world nihilism) in territory of the Indigo Republic. This new religion came to introduce the view of the Great Void as a sentient entity, while also promoting the view that the very existence of the Ancestral Sovereigns prevented the true awakening of the Great Void as a proper deity. While directly challenging the rule of the ten sovereigns, this religion was adhered by many inhabitants of the Great Void, all under an individual which was referred to as the Heresiarch by his opponents.
Eventually, this religion was spread to the other factions, inspiring attacks against the ten sovereigns and their supporters. Seeing the threat of this new-born faction, the Black Patriarch summoned his fellow sovereigns to the Great Temple, starting the Second Great Conference. Yet as it occurred, they were attacked by the forces of the Heresiarch, the defenders eventually winning the battle with few casualties. At this act of aggression, the Ancestral Factions called for a holy war against the Nihilists, starting the first of many brutal conflicts within the Void. This period of war was marked by the violent persecution of both nihilists and their supporters, all publicly executed for what was perceived as treachery by the majority of the Void's population. After many battles, the ten sovereigns remained alive and saw the capture of the Heresiarch, who was then placed on trial and executed afterwards.
With the end of the war and extinction of the Nihilist heresy, many post-heretical thoughts emerged amongst the surviving inhabitants of the Void. Amongst these philosophies was one which kept the Nihilist view of the Great Void as a sentient entity, but with the Ancestral Sovereigns as its avatars. This view was at first unofficially supported by the sovereigns, and only later it became official policy. The depopulation caused by the war was met with a fourth summoning, partially restoring the population of the Great Void to its previous levels. Historians mark the end of this period with the establishment of the Crimson Emperor’s dominion over the east, alongside the formation of an alliance between the Crimson Empire, the Black Patriarchate, and the Amber League.
Late expansion period
Meanwhile, dominion over the west was achieved by the Azure King, who called for a third Great Conference, seeking to establish himself as the leader of the ten sovereigns. While he could exert his influence over some factions, he was primarily opposed by the Crimson Emperor and his allies. This led to a small confrontation which saw the Azure King defeated and the Emperor acclaimed as the “first amongst equals” of the ten sovereigns. This event game birth to a bitter rivalry between the Crimson Emperor and the Azure King, its long-term consequences manifesting later during both the first and second Great Conflicts.
In this period, the factions saw another great expansion of territory, leading into an investigation regarding the size of the world and the nature of the Great Void. It was during this investigation that cracks in the dimensional walls were found, fissures into a neighbouring dimension of the Great Void. The technological advancements made by the sovereigns allowed the detection and tracking of trans-dimensional movements. This concept of this device inspired the Crimson Emperor to create a machine which allowed the observation of this new dimension, known to them as the Outer Void. However, the device malfunctioned when activated, causing a space-time rupture across the Great Void. Inspired by this event, the Ancestral Sovereigns gathered once again in a fourth Great Conference, and decided to break the world into several pieces. How they achieved such a thing is unknown, but it was followed by the creation of the portal network which would survive into later generations, allowing travel between the many worlds of the Great Void. However, this separation, together with the space-time rupture was enough to severely weaken the dimensional wall, causing a small breach to appear, connecting the two dimensions.
First pre-war period
Defined as the period right before the first Great Conflict, the early years of this pre-war period was marked by the exploration of the now shattered Void, several worlds being discovered and many having been devastated beyond recovery by the separation. To effectively travel between the worlds, the Void Glider was developed by the ten factions, its original models allowing a safe, yet somewhat lengthy travel. This period also saw the first experiments by the Crimson Emperor on the Outer Void energy emanated by the fissures, allowing him to create rudimentary and minor creatures from the collected energy.
Tension would grow alongside the Breach itself, which allowed greater quantities of Outer Void energy to enter the Great Void. Curiously enough, the Void suffered another boom in its population with another summoning wave, allowing and pressing for the development and improvement of the portal network. The growth of the Breach paralleled this progress, allowing for a more precise detection of movement in the Great Void. The detection of colossal movement in the Outer Void was followed by a migration of Void Wisps into the Great Void. While already aware that something was wrong, the study of the behaviour of these Void Wisps suggested they had escaped from their native dimension due to fear. This, together with the Breach reaching a critical point in its vulnerability led to a preparation for a possible attack coming from the Outer Void.
These fears would prove to come true, as sometime after the exodus, an entity from the Outer Void attempted to enter the Great Void forcefully, but was stopped by the combined effort of the sovereigns. While the Crimson Emperor sought to discover the means to close the breach, armies were deployed in mass for the first time since the war against the Heresiarch. This period of suspense would end with further damage made to the breach by the Void Entity, allowing its entrance into the Great Void and starting the First Great Conflict.
First Great Conflict
Immediately after the Enemy entered the Great Void, forces from the ten factions fought against the Enemy and other lesser Outer Void creatures which it commanded in the Breach, seeking to quickly stop any advancement of the Enemy, and drive it back to the Outer Void. Their efforts were in vain, as the defending forces were annihilated by the Enemy and its subordinates. This was followed by an undetermined number of skirmishes in the worlds near the Breach, with the ten sovereigns claiming victory in quite a few battles. However, it did not take long before the Enemy grew bolder, and attacked the capitals of both the Azure Kingdom and the Silver Order, devastating the two. The two cities were reclaimed by the Eastern Entente and the forces of the Golden Khanate, yet the damage had already been made.
The Crimson Emperor issued the mass production of robotics, seeking to increase his army and prevent the severance of more humans. As this happened, the Golden Khanate was attacked by the Enemy, and the Golden Khan disappeared during the battle. While the battle was won, the Khan would appear later in another world, having been stranded there due to a faulty network accessor. In the middle period of the war, the Crimson Emperor began to devise new tools of warfare, and developed a weapon of mass destruction to use against the Enemy. However, the Emperor’s plans were never fulfilled, as this weapon was still incomplete at the end of the war.
The capital-worlds of Arar and Lunel were also attacked by the Enemy’s forces, and while Arar was destroyed, the defenders of Lunel managed to drive back the invaders. This successful defence led to a bolder attack by the Enemy, who brought all its forces to assault the Temple. The ten sovereigns attempted to defend the ancient structure, but it was still destroyed by the attackers. Despite this, they still managed to drive back the Enemy and its forces once again, the ten sovereigns still alive after this whole ordeal. The territories of the Crimson Empire, the Black Patriarchate, and the Amber League were targets of massive attacks by the Void Entity, and it would be during the battle of Solinar that the Crimson Emperor engaged the Enemy directly, finally emerging victorious.
This ultimate defeat of the Void Entity saw the Outer Void forces confused and leaderless, allowing for their total destruction.
Post-War
Shortly after the war, the sovereigns gathered in the famous fifth Great Conference, taking measures to rebuild the void after the devastation left by the conflict. The war had left a bitter sentiment in the people of the Void towards anything related to the Outer Void, and this was most prevalent in the western sectors. For these reasons, the Crimson Emperor, who had been fascinated with the Outer Void instead of being repulsed by it, began to work in secret by conducting experiments with the energy which had leaked from the Outer Void, as well as that taken from the Enemy’s minions. In this endeavour, the Emperor succeeded in creating far more complex entities from the Void energy, using as templates his memories regarding certain animals from his homeworld.
As this happened, the reconstruction of the Void was quickly progressing, and when it ended, celebrations occurred across the Void. However, the secret work of the Emperor was discovered by his colleagues, and was quickly seen with suspicion by his rivals. Not much is known about the event that followed, but the period of history after the post-war period is referred to by contemporaries as the “Dark Age of the Void”, which was then followed by the Second Great Conflict, where all the ten factions were eradicated, leaving the Void empty of life.