“Are they alive? They move, they shriek, they fall upon us in ravenous waves. But I see death, decay, and corruption, not life.”
The Hive are an ancient, festering evil. They base their entire existence around the extermination of other forms of life, especially those that follow the way of Light and the Traveler, and approach their task with religious fervor. To the Hive, killing and conquest are not merely acts of war, but of worship for the dark Worms that inhabit them, which demand tribute through killing. Failure to appease the Worms results in death.
The might-makes-right philosophy that dominates the Hive is called the sword logic. It instructs all Hive to gather tribute through killing, keep enough to sate their Worm, and offer the rest to their superiors. This pyramid scheme culminates in the Ascendants, Hive so powerful that they can cheat death by hiding their souls within another dimension so they may never truly die — unless they can be slain within the Ascendant Plane.
Known History
Billions of years ago the Hive were a feeble race who lived within the gas giant called Fundament. Then the three children of their king – Oryx, Savathûn, and Xivu Arath – found the Worm Gods, who offered the siblings unlimited power in exchange for servitude and hosting their spawn within the Hive’s bodies. The pact was sealed, and their species forever damned. Now the hive are reapers of souls that have razed entire galaxies to feed the hunger of the Worm Gods.
A disastrous battle to retake the Moon from the Hive later became known as the Great Disaster. They were led by the Ascendant Prince Crota, who killed thousands of guardians over the course of the battle.