= Asterians =
. ''"Reality has never been an obstacle for us before. You just have to stop thinking like a human and start thinking like a star!"''
. —[[Princess Alice]], to her consort [[Princess Lexi]]
The '''Asterians''' are young stars who have assumed incarnate form to live among various societies throughout the universe. Notable Asterians include [[Princess Alice]], [[Princess Meredith]], and [[Supreme Leader Malice]].
The name ''Asterian'' derives from the Greek ''aster'', meaning "star".
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== Background ==
Stars were the first celestial bodies to form after the universe came into being, and nearly everything that came after is composed of elements formed in stars. It could thus be said that the stars are, in some sense, the "architects" of the universe as it exists today.
As a sacred rite of passage, young stars assume an incarnate form and live among a terrestrial race throughout their adolescence. These embodied stars are known as the Asterians. Several Asterians have chosen to live on Earth alongside humanity, typically assuming the appearance of young human girls or women.
== Powers and abilities ==
As stars, Asterians are extremely long-lived, potentially able to live billions or even trillions of years. This vast lifespan, alongside their extraordinary resilience, makes Asterians functionally immortal. While their earthly incarnation represents only a small portion of a star's overall lifetime, the unfathomable difference in timescale between the human lifespan and a stellar lifespan means that, from the perspective of humans, Asterians appear to remain adolescents indefinitely. For what it's worth, [[Princess Alice]] doesn't seem to mind repeating the eighth grade for centuries.
Asterians are capable of manipulating matter and energy at will. Sometimes they can bend causality and the laws of physics, too, but only when it's really cool. The only absolute limitation on Asterians' power is that they cannot interfere with another sentient entity's free will.
While mages of any species can manipulate reality to some degree through terrestrial magic, terrestrial mages are generally constrained to the linear experience of time and localized experience of space typical of their race. The Asterians, in contrast, are capable of perceiving the entirety of time and space simultaneously. Despite this, they are not omniscient, due to other limitations, such as Princess Alice's narrow memory.
== Culture ==
Asterians largely consider themselves to be "above" earthly social constructs. The Milky Way Asterians, in particular, regard the categorization of humans by gender, sexuality, ethnicity, etc. to be meaningless trivia that is "beneath" them. They regard prejudice and discrimination among terrestrial races to be entirely baseless and meaningless, often leading them to become radical advocates of equality.
Some terrestrial races have considered the Asterians, as the embodiment of literal heavenly bodies, to be deities. Others have considered them to be aliens. Most Asterians assign little significance to these labels, viewing them as simply more trivial earthly constructs. Some of the more immature ones, such as Princess Alice, instead choose to embrace these labels, because they think they're cool. Worship of celestial bodies has been so common throughout history that most Asterians have been revered as divine by at least one culture somewhere in their galaxy.
== The Milky Way Asterians ==
The Asterians residing in the Milky Way are broadly regarded by Asterians in other galaxies as a congregation of weirdos, misfits, and deviants, with Princess Alice once stating that the other Asterians view them as "kind of cringe." The Milky Way Asterians have never seemed particularly bothered by this, however, choosing to embrace their identity as the universe's nonconformist eccentrics.
=== [[Centralia]] ===
* [[Princess Alice]]
* [[Princess Jeanette]]
* [[Princess Meredith]]
=== [[Discordantia]] ===
* [[Supreme Leader Malice]]
=== [[Zeoria]] ===
* [[President Theodora]]
=== Others ===
* [[Millennium (Stellar)|"Millennium"]], a character from the TV series ''[[Stellar]]'', speculated (but not confirmed) to be an Asterian
