The Birth of the Lions
The Builders, couldn’t process the minerals they found without a refinery and engineering complex. They then, had to carefully make connections with other races to seek out a race willing to help them that had the facilities they needed. Rather than one race, it turned out to be several, spread out in one of the sectors closer to the seat of the Galran Empire. This is also a story in itself, that some of the people who helped the Builders, were themselves rebels trying to start the foundation of a resistance against Galra rule even if their own race had willingly submitted to the Galran Empire or otherwise forged a treaty with them. There were obstacles, threats, scares, and triumphs. Tragedies occurred. Zsu Zsu’s ancestor was from one of the races destroyed for helping the Builders, by trying to build the second group of lions. The Galra Empire, never found out exactly what they were building, only that there was a weapon of considerable power. Those at the facility had managed to delete the files before they were raided. No one now remembers why or who, but the facility and any others on the planet that were assisting the builders, all self-destructed. At that point in time, only two lions had been ‘completed’ to the point they were aware and functioning. There were no official Paladins. The Galran Empire now realized that there was a resistance that had created weapons they had felt were strong enough to allow them to defeat the Empire. The hunt for these weapons began. The next two centuries saw the death of many of the ally’s of the Builders, along with the completion of the remaining lions. It was a game of cat and mouse across half the Galran Empire as it expanded and grew. Zsu Zsu’s maternal ancestral race, wasn’t the only one to perish. A few others were nearly exterminated as well. They became part of subsequent waves of Builders, which joined the original ones. Each generation of Builders became part of a small set of colonies in a system close to the Balmera. Though, the creation of the Second Guardian, had stripped all of the asteroids of the same rare material used in Voltron. There wouldn’t be a third, not from this group of rebels.