Daxam - History

History

Daxamites were originally Kryptonians who left their homeworld in order to explore the Universe. They are an intensely xenophobic race, and are fearful of alien invaders. Daxam's inhabitants tend to stay on their homeworld, but some have ventured into the galaxy. Daxamites are not vulnerable to Kryptonite because The Eradicator, programmed to preserve all Kryptonian culture, altered the birthing matrix ("artificial wombs") the explorers took with them so that the newborns would be fatally vulnerable to lead. Like their Kryptonian cousins, Daxamites manifest powers and abilities similar to those of Superman when exposed to the light of a yellow star, including vast strength, damage resistance, great speed, flight, enhanced senses and heat and X-ray vision. Their own sun Valor was a red giant, so while on their homeworld, they could not have their powers.

In the post-Infinite Crisis continuity the Daxamite started their life as a more peaceful and less xenophobic offshoot of the Kryptonian race, choosing to gain the trust of the people living in the planets they found rather than mercilessly killing them as the other Kryptonians did. So, when the Kryptonian explorer Dax-Am discovered a planet inhabited by a peaceful native population, the Kryptonians decided to merge with the Native Daxamites, giving birth to a race with inherent Kryptonian powers, plus the ability to breed with other humanoid races. This, coupled with the fact that, even when they lost track of their Kryptonian origins, choosing to consider themselves only Daxamites, they kept traveling through the stars, allowed for a large population of half-breeds residing on the planet, naturally inclined to seek new planets, as the descendants of the last Kryptonian purebloods kept alive their ideals of isolation and xenophobia.

Eventually, the social unrest stirred by isolationists and explorers exploded in a full-blown civil war. The isolationists won, founding the Cult of Sorrows, and rewriting history to blame aliens for the ruins of the war, and hide the presence of half-breeds in Daxam. By the time of the invasion of Earth, Daxamite society evolved into a semi-religious regime, greatly disapproving of any other form for spacefaring but conquest and war, outlawing several pieces of technology, and displaying a widespread xenophobia in every single inhabitant of the planet, let alone for selected individuals as Sodam Yat, Kel and Lar Gand, the first and the latter forced to self-exile themselves to avoid harsher punishment for their different ways.