Mantle (Earth-5875)



"The quest to fulfill the Mantle has haunted me my entire life. And for countless millennia, we have failed to realize the one truth that could have saved us from the beginning. The Mantle isn’t to be inherited by the noble, it is to be taken by the strong."

- - Didact

The Mantle, also known as the Mantle of Responsibility, is an ancient belief held by the forerunners and seemingly, the precursors. A mixture of both imperialistic, racist, and allegedly benevolent religious stewardship of life, the Mantle was the forerunners' self-entitlement as protectors of the Milky Way galaxy under the banner of the Ecumene.

Overview
Although poorly understood, the forerunners considered the Mantle to be the stewardship of all life, a concept seemingly generating with the precursors, an even more ancient species. The forerunners saw themselves as having a responsibility to protect the galaxy and its life duo to their advanced society and technology, provided to them by the Ecumene.

During the last year of the Forerunner-Xenomorph War, select forerunners chose to pass the Mantle down to humanity for unknown reasons, although their peculiar physiological similarities might have played a part on it, and thus humanity's status as Reclaimers was born: the inheritors of all the forerunners left behind and the rightful bearers of the Mantle.

Multiple forerunners secretly held the position that the Mantle had condemned their civilization, including the Librarian, who said it made them arrogant to stop the threat of the xenomorphs before it was too late.

Practices and interpretations
Because they viewed themselves as superior, the orokin believed it was their duty to protect and preserve others, even if it meant the use of force, namely through the use of the Warrior-Servants.

They built giant constructs, such as the Reapers, to police planets and protect other species. They never gave a chance for other species to advance on their own, as they believed it was forbidden under the Mantle. A side-effect was that the forerunners were alone in their fight against the xenomorphs, and were ultimately unable to defend themselves on their own and, unintentionally, defend the galaxy, which was only made more vulnerable.

The forerunners regarded the Mantle as holistic, believing the universe itself to be a living entity that transcended the basics of normal organic beings. Because the forerunners understood the esoteric and the living aspect of space, they attempted to create life and create indestructible objects. The forerunners believed that everything experienced in life, such as good, illness, violence, were all messages from the universe, and as such they wanted to experience struggles and hardships, which they believed would made them better.