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malicious-fisheeves · 7 years

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World Building June - 1

Day 1: Introduction

Just to start off, the name of the story is Talons of Peace, set in a fantasy land named Absu (though it goes by other names)

I’ve actually done this before but didn’t finish, hopefully I’ll be able to this time.

All the information is below the cut!

Absu as it has been known to some is a world inhabited by many peoples, all of which have left impressions upon the land whether they were aware of it at the time or not. From the names they gave the land -- Absu, Abyssius, Mel, Seraf -- to their actions, even seemingly innocuous ones.

While there are some variations, it is widely known how to world began; in the beginning there were many primordial beings. These beings had no consciousness and whose goals were to live and eat other beings like themselves. They had not even the thought to avoid being eaten. There was no time, nor space, until Melukkaa (referred to as Melukkaa, Meluuka, and other variations of that name) became capable of foresight, or insight, and used their newfound knowledge to consume all the other beings and make their soul complete.

As told to us by our mothers, whose own mothers told them, and has been recorded on the stone tablets and painted in the caves, and written into the great pillars, that Melukkaa was consumed by a terrible unending emptiness, knowing solitude. Their tears became the ocean, black and fathomless, and the sky above crackled in their rage, grey and infinite, but there was no lightning -- it is sometimes believed that thunder is not rage, but instead the moans and roars of despair of a lonely god.

And so there was Melukkaa, the sea and the sky. From the deep sea came Eeyr, and from the grey pale sky, Toor, who formed from the first flash of lightning. Toor took this light fragment and took it for herself, tying the light to itself and making it into a sphere. This sphere became the sun, and this sun attracted Melukkaa’s gaze. Envious of Toor, Eeyr stole a thread of sunlight, enraging spiteful Toor.

But Eeyr was swift and small, and so Toor could not chase her alone. Toor took some of the light, and only some of the color from her being, and created Adite, the dawn. Adite would chase Eeyr across the sky, over the horizon. Eeyr had no thread of light to spare, and so she took all the color from her thread and created Nuptos, the dusk. In the day, Nuptos and Eeyr would chase Toor across the sky, and in the night Toor and Adite would do the same.

The night became cool, the day hot, and from this disparity came Kotos. Kotos, the god of heat and cold, didn’t care much for Eeyr and Toor’s bickering and so dove deep into the ocean. The hot side of their body boiled the water, the cold side freezing it. Kotos found this rather unpleasant, and so they created Zemera, a god of fire to boil more of the ocean away, but the ocean quickly surrounded Zemera despite their flames. Kotos first tried to freeze around Zemera, for the god of fire is so easily susceptible to being reduced to ash, but Zemera melted the ice. The second time, Kotos burned the ocean so hot that the salts and minerals melted, and the pressure from above solidified them. This solid mass became Meganae, both protector and keeper of Zemera, and the land that all beings walk upon.

Kotos did not like how quickly their power had spiraled away from them, and so they arose out of the ocean. They wandered between the gods and around the land, finding other’s company displeasurable – all besides Melukkaa’s.

The land rose out of the ocean, for Zemera would melt the land that would cool, pushing up the ocean and creating the lakes and the rivers, sometimes trapping its water inside. The land too heated and cooled, and when combined with the salts and minerals, the very beginnings of life began. This was Kistal, the god of the living and the one who would ferry souls to Melukkaa after death. Kistal was immensely powerful, able to overcome all but the most perilous of conditions. From the heating and the cooling of the land and the ocean, and Kotos’ influence was far but not even, came the seasons. Vuwmus, the winter and spring, and Ixteus, the summer and fall.

Originally, these two gods reigned equally over the land together, and the day and night for each were equal, and both were seen with equal respect - but Eeyr and Toor became envious of Kistal’s power, and the attention zer infant creations had. These creations could die, their souls would return to Melukkaa and be reborn as anything else that lived – something unique and amazing to undying Melukkaa. And so Eeyr and Toor conspired to wipe out Kistal’s creations, or at the least limit them. So, Eeyr created Tydea -- using the warm, dark places to make disease. Toor created Yphine, a shapeshifter who would hunt the infant creatures and so make them respond by either becoming hunters themselves or becoming the hunted.

Vuwmus detested this action, believing that Kistal was very similar to themself and Ixteus. But Ixteus saw power in joining Toor and Eeyr, and so they betrayed Vuwmus. Learning of the betrayal, Eeyr and Toor shifted the balance of day and night. Winter would suffer long, cold nights, and so the plants would wilt, freeze, and die, and the animals would starve. Ixteus was rewarded, being given the longer days.

But Kistal’s creations responded in kind. These new challenges adapted to, many even thrived. We, us humans, or Lilim, were one of these creations. We spread far and wide, to any place we could -- and the gods saw opportunity in that. For living beings drew Melukkaa’s attention more than anything the gods had made themselves, even Kistal zemself.

So infant humanity was put to work. They made monuments, sacrifices, and suffered great cruelty under the gods’ hands. Things built for the glory of the gods-- even language itself was a tool for the gods so we may better praise them.

It took an innumerable number of years -- years lost for the gods did not give us a way to tell time other than counting the days and nights -- before humanity began to question this. Why did the gods make humans build when other animals did not? They had no answer. Why did humans suffer storms of fire, to see their crops die and their children and elders starve, when other creatures did not? They had no answer.

From the rage came dreams. These dreams collected from humanity, and from the collected dreams came the divines. The new gods were gods of human things -- Tartys, Hadariel, Hadariel, Abaddon, Ithuriel, Ophanim, Melkyal, Yefefiah, Rathanael. These gods gave the humans things the old gods had not, but their true purpose was to protect humanity. Tartys, the metal worker, created chains for which the gods would be bound by, Ophanim forged armor and weapons. The divines could not fight separately, as their power was weak individually, and unlike the ancient gods they could be killed.

But the war began, and the humans fought dragons, and the gods and divines battled. But the long standing divisions of the gods made them fight for their own personal glory, separate from one another. One by one the old gods fell and the new gods gained power. The old gods could not be killed, but they were stripped of their power and trapped inside their physical form, their left over power to be used by humans.

But this war had not affected but one god -- Melukkaa. Melukkaa avoided the war, instead staying among the humans in the city Aluumaan, which he had created with the humans there. Even as his children were imprisoned, he did not sway his hand much to the relief of the humans and divines. Melukkaa was left to remain in power, or perhaps the new gods did not wish to anger the supreme being, The Sovereign as he was known. – and The Calamity.

That is the story all are told, from the moment they are capable of learning this story to the day they die. While variance exists there are only changes in the motivations most commonly, the events most often happen in the order to which been described above.

This is one version of the story of Absu, and it is critical to understanding the people who live there. The world was born of consuming violence, grew with envy and deceit, and was created as known by Lilim and Vanailin by momentous courage and love. While the language, the Old Tongue, was created in service of the old gods, humans have long twisted it for themselves, for the human spirit has always been a rebellious one.

#world building june #wbj #wbj 2017 #world building june 2017

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