Hygienic Hypothesis

There is only one conclusion: these avians accidentally drove themselves to extinction through a long-term campaign of over-sanitization. As a species with a naturally weak immune system, they created cleaning drones to disinfect public and private spaces in order to reduce the spread of disease. However, given the state of the planet's landscape, we can assume that the cleaning drones went too far in exterminating native life, resulting in the destruction of organic biodiversity on the planet. Simply put, the population starved to death. As the bodies decomposed, the drones scrubbed away every trace of their existence. As for the remains in the cave, the presence of a functional drone in the area likely diverted others for the sake of efficiency, leaving the plant life intact. The avian creature must have exploited this programming functionality in order to survive here. Unfortunately, the cave's meager plantlife could not sustain it indefinitely.

The command below will trigger the "Hygienic Hypothesis" event in Stellaris:

When this event fires, you can choose between these 3 options:

• Repurpose the drone's technology.
  • Leads to event: Repurposing the Drone
• Engineer a virus to disable the sanitation network.
  • Leads to event: Viral Irony
• Keep this drone as a personal research assistant.
  • Leads to event: Never Alone with a Drone

Stellaris events fire in chains — one event leads to the next. Here is how Hygienic Hypothesis (astral_rift.2640) connects.