Immaterium

The Immaterium (also referred to as the Empyrean, Aether or Warp) is an alternate dimension in the fictional Warhammer 40,000 universe. Superficially, it is the Warhammer 40,000 solution to the problem of faster-than-light travel, an equivalent to the hyperspace concept popular in science fiction. As the Immaterium is a domain of pure energy unaffected by physical laws, faster-than-light feats are possible within it.

The energy that makes up the Immaterium is believed to be the direct result of sentience. Considered to be a dark reflection of the material universe, it is an ocean of chaos, raw emotion given form. Stirred by emotion and action, the Immaterium is the realm of Chaos, home to the dark gods and their followers. It also is rumoured to house the spirits of the dead, and therefore can be considered the "Underworld" of the Warhammer 40,000 universe.

Warp Travel
The realm of the Immaterium, while not ideal, can be used for faster-than-light communication and travel. Vast amounts of energy are required for a vessel to enter the Immaterium, and while within it, they are often at the mercy of the currents and eddies that make up the dimension.

Time also proceeds at different rates in the Warp than in the material universe, often creating a form of stasis. In real time, journeys can take months or even years, though to the crew and passengers only weeks seem to pass. The timing itself is unpredictable due to the very nature of the Immaterium, and occasionally a fleet of reinforcements will emerge from the Immaterium to find that the war they were sent to fight in has long been lost, or not yet started.

Requirements
Several things are necessary for travel within the Immaterium. Primary among these is the ancient device known as a Gellar field, a psychic ward that protects the starship. Without this arcane techno-magic, the souls of those travelling within the Warp would be exposed to the many daemons and creatures that inhabit the twisted realm.

For jumps any longer than a handful of light-years, a member of the mutant psyker breed known as Navigators must be aboard. These mutant humans are able to 'see' the currents of the Immaterium, and are able to guide a ship to its intended destination with much greater accuracy than normal humans. However, for a Navigator to fulfill this role, he needs a reference point, which is provided by the Astronomican. The extreme outer sections of the in-setting galaxy however are too remote for the Astronomican to reach, leaving them largely if not totally untouched by humans.

Chaos followers do not use Navigators, instead possessing their own methods of navigation. In an early novel, Eye of Terror, a space-traveller who has spent considerable time within the Eye of Terror tells a Navigator, unable to see the Astronomican, to use faith instead; because the Warp is a realm composed of psychic energy, a pilot who can focus their minds and wills upon their destination will cause the Warp itself to shift in order to convey them to their goal. Chaos followers are also quoted as using bound Daemons, either within a mortal pilot or within the ship itself, to guide them through the Warp- such entities are actually superior to the Navigators, as they are naturally at home in the Warp, but they can sometimes be more trouble than they're worth, as the love of the gods of chaos can be brought with sacrifice.

Dangers
The Immaterium is far from a safe place to travel through. Great currents and storms can blow starships into uncharted areas of the galaxy and make travel through certain regions impossible. that last for centuries can isolate sectors and leave fleets becalmed within the material universe. Even worse, ships could find themselves stranded within the Immaterium itself, a terrible fate for its passengers as they become playthings for the dark creatures that inhabit that diabolical realm. Sometimes a ship will emerge from warp space centuries after they left yet only have experienced a few days onboard, while many more vanish without trace. Vessels traveling through the Warp are constantly under attack by the malignant lifeforms that inhabit that dimension. If a ship's Gellar Field fails, the vessel and inhabitants are torn apart, in ways some consider physically impossible, by daemonic entities and the pure ferocious energy of the Warp.

Fast Flowing Stream Analogy
A common metaphor used in the Imperium to explain how warp travel works likens the warp to a fast flowing stream, moving rapidly along its motionless banks, which represent real space. A leaf dropped into the water upstream will move along, floating on the surface of the water, moving faster than if a man was to walk along the banks The leaf is carried by the water until it lodges at some point downstream from its original location. (Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader)

===Tyranids and the "Shadow in the Warp"===
Encounters with Hive Fleet Kraken demonstrated that the presence of the "Hive Mind" (the mysterious entity that seems to control the entire Tyranid race) can interfere with proper warp travel; many vessels that had attempted to flee from the hive fleet were flung off course.

Realm of Chaos
The powers of Chaos and their servants are known to inhabit the Immaterium. Daemons are only able to exist within the Immaterium, unless certain conditions are met within the material realm. The Immaterium is where the servants of the four Dark Gods (Khorne: the Blood God, Slaanesh: the Dark Prince of Pleasure, Tzeentch: the Architect of Fate, and Nurgle: the Lord of Decay) gain their power from, and their followers will undertake any action to increase this power.

Along with the powers of Chaos, the Immaterium is inhabited by many strange creatures, foremost among these being the species known as Enslavers. They are formed by the shifting energies of the Warp from the nightmares of sentient species, and prowl the Immaterium like sharks. They come in many forms, but all are mindless, and all are predatory, seeking out unprotected souls to feed on.

Psychic Realm
The Immaterium is a dimension of the spiritual, created and influenced by mortal emotion and action. The mind of every sentient creature leaves an imprint within the Immaterium, and although the signature of one mind is almost insignificant, when the imprints of an entire race are combined they have a huge impact on the very nature of the Warp (This seems to imply that the Immaterium is not chaotic by nature, but has been made so by the chaos and war in the material realm). When an emotion or faith grows strong enough, it becomes one of the denizens of the Warp. Many of these beings vanish when the emotion that creates them passes, but the strongest become self-perpetuating, spreading the thoughts and events that grant them form and power. The strongest of these beings become the gods associated with a group, and almost every single race or force of will is represented, be they Chaos, Eldar, Ork, or Human.

Psykers
The abilities of psychically gifted individuals known as psykers are powered by or draw power from the energies of the Warp, and when such action is undertaken, the daemons and creatures of the Immaterium are drawn to the psyker's mind like moths to a flame. Daemonic entities can use an unshielded psyker's mind like a gateway into the material realm. Once this has occurred often a chain reaction starts, to the point where common 'ungifted' minds can be possessed and used as gateways. Those trained in the use of the psychic arts are able to resist such incursion to a degree, but the greatest fear of the Inquisition is the fact that an untrained psyker can become the target of daemonic possession, or if sufficiently powerful, control the daemonic entities of the Warp. Due to the influence of Chaos within the warp, such individuals are almost always megalomaniacal, seeking to use the daemons and power of the Warp for personal gain.

Warp/Realspace Overlays
On rare occasion, the realm of the Immaterium is able to break over into the physical universe. These nightmare realms are often home to the once-mortal followers of the Powers of Chaos, and are often the site of titanic atrocities.

The most well known overlays are:
* The Eye of Terror, created when the Eldar inadvertently caused the creation of Slaanesh, and now home to the traitorous Chaos Space Marine Legions and their followers.
* The Maelstrom
* The Storm of the Emperor's Wrath
* '
* The "Perdus Rift"

Warp Storms
Regions of material space can be affected by the ebb and flow of the Immaterium. These 'warp storms' can isolate star systems and sectors from each other, by making the Imperium's normal methods of travel and communication impossible. These storms can last for any amount of time, ranging from weeks to centuries, and can occasionally break out into the material universe, creating a temporary Warp/Realspace overlay.

Controlling the Warp
There are conflicting accounts as to what prevents the Immaterium from spilling out and completely engulfing the material universe, and vice versa. Possible causes (potentially all of them) are:

*Tzeentch, the Emperor of Mankind, or a creature known as the "Numen" (from the Inquisition War Trilogy) that keeps it at bay.

*The anti-psychic technology of the Necrons, as implied in recent canon.

*The laws of physics.

*While the Warp spills out in to normal space, so does normal space spill into the Warp in regions like the Eye of Terror (which has more stability than being in the Warp proper as a direct effect of its mingling with real space), so it is possible that an equilibrium is always maintained. The warp and real space never truly "engulf" or "replace" each other, they are technically only described as corrupting each other and mixing. Thus a balance is always achieved, just through different states.

It should also be noted that warp travel and psykers accessing the Immaterium weakens the warp/real space barrier by tiny increments (as psychic activity is often noted as a 'weak spot' between the Warp and our dimension), which suggests that if the warp had never been accessed by lifeforms of this dimension the two would remain totally separate.

Apparently, the Immaterium seems to only be relevant to the Milky Way galaxy (although the Tyranid's case poses a question), implying that it is either a unique occurrence, that there may be other "warp shadows" of other galaxies, or that the Warp continues in other areas, but is uninhabited by Daemons due to lack of sentience.

A paradox of thoughts is apparent: the extra-dimensional entities of the warp are sustained by the minds and souls of living creatures within the physical world. So what would occur to the warp if all life was obliterated through the fall of the physical reality? It is noted in the Necron Codex that the Warp was once a calm realm of pure energy, but uncontrolled psychic activity and emotion has 'whipped up' the Warp into a realm of insanity and danger. The irony of the situation is that the beings that seek to consume the galaxy in the Warp would perish if such an event occurred. Still, that could perhaps even be their goal, if not consciously.

The exception to this are the Chaos Gods themselves. Originally formed from sentient emotion, and totally reliant on them, these beings have reached a level of power where the effects are inverted; they are totally self-sufficient, and are capable of invoking these emotions in mortal beings.

Inhabitants

The Enslavers are a race of aliens that inhabit the Immaterium. They are also known as Psyrens, Krell, Dominators or Puppeteers. Enslavers drift with the currents of the Immaterium, and are drawn to the psychic emanations of other creatures. Once a suitable psyker host is located, the Enslavers form a parasitic mental bond, which over the course of a few days will turn the unfortunate, mind-controlled host into a living warp portal, so that more Enslavers can enter the material universe and find new hosts.

The Enslavers had their most profound impact on the galaxy in a catastrophic event known as The Enslaver Plague. As a result of the tactics employed in the ', the Immaterium became greatly destabilized and a rush of Enslavers to the physical universe occurred. The Old Ones were wiped out and life in the galaxy became almost extinct. This included all the living creatures that the C'tan use as food, so the C'tan went into hibernation, along with their Necron armies, to wait for the galaxy to become repopulated.

The Enslaver's body consists of a spherical lump trailing tentacles. The Enslavers can change their body color at will, and float up to three meters above the ground.

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