Dive Deep into Creativity: Your Ultimate Tumblr Experience Awaits
Infodump - Blog Posts
ermm infodump about knux's fists under the cut
I'm probably missing something here, but I always found it kind of strange how some artists will depict Knuckles without gloves as having these spurs on his hands. I guess that is quite a literal and straight forward way of representing the shapes of his gloves, and I don't think there's anything wrong or incorrect about this depiction (especially if it actually showed up in cannon somewhere and I just didn't see it), but personally I don't see it that way.
I always kind of figured that those two little points were meant to be something that he was concealing underneath his gloves rather than something that is a part of his body.
My logic being... The gloves he wears are boxing gloves. Boxing gloves are meant to soften the impact of a punch so that you don't kill your opponent or otherwise seriously mess them up while participating in the sport. Knuckles was introduced as an antagonist who later on became a good guy, right. So I kind of figured that the reason he had shapes under his boxing gloves (which are supposed to be for fairness's sake) are because he's 'cheating'. Putting something heavy or even dangerous underneath or around your boxing gloves can negate the softening effect and cause even worse damage to your opponent.
His tribe is called the Knuckles tribe. He's named Knuckles because he's the last one. I figured his tribe was called the Knuckles tribe because they specialized so well in hand-to-hand combat that the weapons they developed and were known to use were brass knuckles. I figured that's what he was hiding under there, and that's why I draw him without the boxing gloves, fully exposing weapon that has been hidden underneath his gloves this whole time.
(I like to draw them hanging on his side when not in use so his hands are free to grab stuff.)
So I guess in summary, I kind of figured it was meant to convey the message that Knuckles can and does fight dirty. We continue to see that he will resort to underhanded techniques here and there, even if they've become less frequent with time. (Most recent example I can think of is when he threw a rock at the last robot standing in the Frontiers Prologue)
To me, conveying them as random spurs (something echidnas don't really have) feels a bit too literal and loses some flavour. Also I like decorating the iron knuckles to have aztec serpents carved into them or something, as if maybe they belonged to his father or he uncovered them from the ruins on Angel Island or something. It adds some culture and history to his character that I really like.
Here’s an LONG ASF infodump about the CPPS I play! The name is Club Penguin Dimensions, my current hyperfixation!
I know how to recognize more than 21 different ciphers to help my friends solve enigmas and such, because playing a Brazilian Club Penguin Private Server moderated by nerds and Gravity Falls fans, I don’t get the privilege of just being casually interested in Club Penguin anymore…
For reference, the guy called CDPI is Raul, a character controlled by the admins and is kinda like our very own Cucurucho… He appears randomly in parties or missions or even hangouts when the server is active (kinda rare because the community is very small but it can happen) and speaks in ciphers and morse code, usually giving us a tease about future events or what the CDPI (Council of The Interdimensional Penguins) has been up to…
There’s also a 125 pages long google docs about the lore (the code and deciphering part, not the actual history lore), it’s still unfinished and doesn’t contain all the codes, and the server has also been alive for only like- One year and a half? Crazy stuff. The list for all the codes that have been used in the game’s lore goes like this:
- Morse Code;
- Galactic Alphabet;
- EPF Secret Code;
- Hidden messages in an audio’s spectrogram;
- ASCII;
- Hidden messages if you edit and photoshop images by changing brightness, saturation and all;
- Braille;
- Nautic Signaling (I think that’s the name? Idk);
- Caesar Cipher;
- Author’s Cipher (from Gravity Falls);
- Steam games ID;
- Base 64;
- Bar Codes and QR Codes;
-!Links on Imgur;
- Binary Code;
- Decimal Binary Coding;
- Masonic Cipher;
- A1Z26 Cipher;
- Jefferson Cipher;
- And the most recent enigma also had Atbash Cipher.
We also got like- 4 Exclusive mascots! Well, one of them is kinda “side character turned mascot”, but you get my point!
Here’s Angie
She’s the newbie working at Club Penguin News, and she’s known for being energetic sunshine and a conspiracy theorist nut! She can go on and on about gnomes for hours and is very passionate about gossiping. Just a cutie pie!
Next we have Bambadee!
Yes! This IS Bambadee! The one guy from the Stowaway Story? So, he went through a bit of a redesign, and his story also went a bit different than his original counterpart… After his first encounter with Rockhopper, he became a part of the Migrator’s crew, constantly adventuring with Rockhopper and Yarr and residing in Rockhopper Island when they’re not out in the seas…
And since he’s confirmed he’s an orphan after bawling his eyes out after someone asked if he has parents in one of his meetups, I headcanon that he sees the captain as a father figure. Bambadee is like- My 2nd favorite mascot, he’s very kind and gentle, but always has a brave attitude that inspires and captivates others. He also has a very strong sense of justice, being very protective of his friends… He’s also canonically in the aromantic spectrum.
Here we got Sunny Morinson!
Sunny is the coolest- A very skilled and dedicated EPF agent that may be one’s of the agency’s best assets. She’s very calm and collected, usually appearing to guide us through EPF missions or to just chill in the coffee shop- She’s a proper coffee addict, works as barista, her best friend is G Billy, and she hangs out with the Penguin Band in the downtime… All the artworks for her events are so pretty istg I love her…
Now, this next guy right here is Guido
Guido is a nice, but overall very mysterious guy. He’s an icon here in Brazil since he’s probably the first brazil exclusive mascot ever created (back when Club Penguin Brasil was still alive), but anyways, he’s and interdimensional traveler and uses his clock to do so, he’s friendly but very lonely, also has the tendency to being shy in front of thera and just being very reserved. He’s also a pretty big deal in the lore, as in the story, when the og island was fated to die along with everyone that didn’t migrate to Club Penguin Island, Guido along with Gary and Rory created a portal to the new island. Guido also has some connections with interdimensional gods and creatures, with me personally theorizing he’s got some secret connections with >v>
And last, we got Ettore Salvaore!
This guy… Is a lot-
Think of Stanford from Gravity Falls but if he was greedy, that’s Ettore. He’s and EPF agent, Gary’s main assistant, a genius in his own right, owner of the PuffleBerry Mall, loves theater and plays and is a time travel fanatic. He’s very morally grey in his actions having caused two disasters in the island because of his power-hungry tendencies. He summoned Scorn after stealing Guido’s clock for time traveling shenanigans at the Medieval Party and made a deal with Box Cipher (yeaa Summerween event was WILD), got possessed in the process and almost destroyed the whole island till the EPF rescued him. He’s kind of an asshole but one of my favs with how charming and elegant he can be while being total boyfailure material lol (he’s also canonically bi)
And those were the exclusive characters! They appear on the island periodically along with other mascots, and also worth noting that Rory is a mascot and the Penguin Band very fleshed out characters and motives in here-
Also noticed how we have a lot of LGBTQ+ characters? Yea we got a gay dimension with a gay catalogue too, accessible through the Box Dimensions main room. It’s very pretty!
This post is already getting pretty long and Tumblr has a limit of pictures apparently, so I’ll just give these fun facts and wrap this up-
- The mods like showcasing the relationships between the characters, so the mascots make reference to their friends all the time and also appear in groups for major events like (Penguin Band + Angie), (Rockhopper + Bambadee), (Dot + Sunny + Rookie + Stompin’ Bon) for example;
- There are constant additions of codes that can give you all sorts of outfits for your penguin. I personally love using the spiderman clothes or wolverine costume when I’m not rocking the dino hoodie;
- Jetkie is heavily implied canon;
- Club Penguin Dimensions has a version of Bill Cipher called Box Cipher, he’s been promised to return ever since his appearance last year at the Summerween event, where he caused chaos among the island and caused a bunch of interdimensional ruckus (FNAF animatronics and The Mystery Shack and a final boss after the 6 EPF missions you had to do in this party made it my favorite original content of Club Penguin Dimensions ever);
- There’s this one artist that always manages to sneak in a Sonic referencein the arta he makes for the game- Last I checked, the shape of Sonic was foind in Stompin’ Bob’s background art for the Teen Beach Movie event and as a pin in Guido’s bag these last few months;
- There’s a crew of content creators that go live and do videos on Club Penguin Dimensions and it’s lore and events, they’re called “Cream Soda”;
- In March 2024, an original part called “A Cabotagem” happened where Bambadee came to Club Penguin to recruit help in his search for the missing Captain Rockhopper, and after weeks of exploring different islands with Bambadee in the Migrator, we found out the Captain was kidnapped! With an animation called “ O Sequestro de Rockhopper - A Grande Revelação” being released a few months after explaining how the Captain was kidnapped and why, pretty cool stuff.
Anyways, I think that’s it for now. If there’s anyone actually reading this, just know that all I said didn’t cover half of the plot, and if you have any questions about it, feel free to use my ask box, I’m so sad that there’s not a lot of brazilians on tumblr, especially after twitter died, I could talk about these penguins for hours lol
TO MY TWO MUTUALS WHO CARED, THIS IS FOR YOU!!!!!!!!
I made a Google doc abt it but I don't feel like copy and pasting the whole thing, so screenshots it is,,,
I just think yugi going absolute critter brained within a mile of water is just very funny to me. Also it would be more accurate in this au for slifer to be the guardian of the sea instead. ra can fill the sky portion
Also do you know how fucking round warbling white eyes are??? and remember how ra has a sphere form? It was intentional
As for obelisk, the tosa inu just gave me yugioh energy when I was researching dog breeds from japan
Also here's the two animals I was talking abt
Anyway infodump over time to frolic about it in my mind
Guys would you love me if I infodumped about my dragon yugi au 🥺 🥺 🥺
Had an ~idea~
A pokemon species that has a gender ratio of 100% / 0% does still have pokemon in the 0% one.
Just.
Until they realize theyr trans.
I don't think people realize how absolutely wild Linux is.
Here we have an Operating system that now has 100 different varieties, all of them with their own little features and markets that are also so customizable that you can literally choose what desktop environment you want. Alongside that it is the OS of choice for Supercomputers, most Web servers, and even tiny little toy computers that hackers and gadget makers use. It is the Operating System running on most of the world's smartphones. That's right. Android is a version of Linux.
It can run on literally anything up to and including a potato, and as of now desktop Linux Distros like Ubuntu and Mint are so easily to use and user friendly that technological novices can use them. This Operating system has had App stores since the 90s.
Oh, and what's more, this operating system was fuckin' built by volunteers and users alongside businesses and universities because they needed an all purpose operating system so they built one themselves and released it for free. If you know how to, you can add to this.
Oh, and it's founder wasn't some corporate hotshot. It's an introverted Swedish-speaking Finn who, while he was a student, started making his own Operating system after playing around with someone else's OS. He was going to call it Freax but the guy he got server space from named the folder of his project "Linux" (Linus Unix) and the name stuck. He operates this project from his Home office which is painted in a colour used in asylums. Man's so fucking introverted he developed the world's biggest code repo, Git, so he didn't have to deal with drama and email.
Steam adopted it meaning a LOT of games now natively run in Linux and what cannot be run natively can be adapted to run. It's now the OS used on their consoles (Steam Deck) and to this, a lot of people have found games run better on Linux than on Windows. More computers run Steam on Linux than MacOS.
On top of that the Arctic World Archive (basically the Svalbard Seed bank, but for Data) have this OS saved in their databanks so if the world ends the survivors are going to be using it.
On top of this? It's Free! No "Freemium" bullshit, no "pay to unlock" shit, no licenses, no tracking or data harvesting. If you have an old laptop that still works and a 16GB USB drive, you can go get it and install it and have a functioning computer because it uses less fucking resources than Windows. Got a shit PC? Linux Mint XFCE or Xubuntu is lightweight af. This shit is stopping eWaste.
What's more, it doesn't even scrimp on style. KDE, XFCE, Gnome, Cinnamon, all look pretty and are functional and there's even a load of people who try make their installs look pretty AF as a hobby called "ricing" with a subreddit (/r/unixporn) dedicated to it.
Linux is fucking wild.
HEY
Tell me all about your Star Wars OC's/Self-inserts. Give me the lore, the headcanons, the tea, all of it! But expect me to do the same.
Info dump to me cause I love it but don't be a dick about it. ❤️
Shoutout to Whitty for being the superior romantic f/o
Granted, Whitty has actually been my f/o for a year but it’s close to 2 years! And he has been on my side ever since without faltering. Heads up I’m gonna infodump about this!!
—-
You know those Undertale fans, who as they become older, accidentally get back into the fandom and simp for any of the skeletons all over again and stay there usually fixating on x reader fanfics with any of the sans/papyrus? Yea I was one of them, however what I didn’t know, is that it wasn’t going to last long.
I really thought I was like everyone else and Papyrus was the one for me because for the longest time, whenever I simped for fictional characters, I never actually shipped them with ME/MYSELF even when reading fanfics. The only time that I ever felt that way was with Marvin the Martian or any crushes from around 2017 but that just kinda stopped?? And then whenever I simped for characters it was just putting an oc with them.
Around early 2021, like during online class, I started to ship Papyrus with ocs and then with my selfinserts and then MYSELF like how Alligatia level of myself. I truly thought I loved Papyrus (specifically Swapfell) and then. Oh no, FNF CAME AROUND. I had interacted a few times, later on made my fnf x undertale crossover and then it was finally around the time of the end of the school year that I self shipped with Whitty.
—-
Look where we are now. I’m now demigirlflux nonbinary and aceflux and have a Whitty plushie.
What I’m saying is Whitty is my biggest comfort character and will always be my top f/o right beside GF who was actually the first FNF character I simped for and loved.
I also made this because of a trend and credit to Taco Meme on YT for that funny ass MMD.
🤸 Welcome to marine facts with Bagel: part 9
When a bloom of jellyfish get close to the surface, like really close, that's usually a sign of something wrong (usually things like over heating) (idk how to word it) within the waters they inhabite (if that makes sense)
Bagel out 🤸
🤸 Welcome to marine facts with Bagel: part 8
A brine lake (I could be mistaken on the name), are much denser than the regular ocean water due to being higher in salt content, which causes them to be like separate(?) from the rest of the ocean, the only thing is due to the super high salt content creatures that go in it will face consequences, such as death
Bagel out 🤸
🤸 Welcome to marine facts with Bagel: part 7
Mother octopuses will not eat or sleep in order to protect her eggs until they hatch which can take anywhere from 50 days to 7 months depending on the temperature of the water
Bagel out 🤸
🤸 Welcome to marine facts with Bagel: part 5
Sperm whales, which are one of the loudest animals in the world, can produce sounds waves so powerful that it can cause your eardrums to burst as well as vibrate your body to death
Bagel out 🤸
🤸 Welcome to marine facts with Bagel: part 4
Filter feeders like blue whales and whale sharks are incapable of swallowing us because their throats are too small
Bagel out 🤸
🤸 Welcome to marine facts with Bagel: part 3
Unlike us humans whose hearts accelerate when we panic or get scared a narwhal's heart does the opposite and slows down. When panicked narwhals can essentially become so scared that their heart slows down enough to the point that it stops. When scientists are trying to help narwhals that are stuck under ice they have to be extra careful because of the consequences scaring a narwal has.
Bagel out 🤸
🤸 Welcome to marine facts with Bagel: part 2
Wolf eels (which are not eels at all despite the name) have life long mates
Bagel out 🤸
🤸Welcome to marine facts with Bagel: part 1
The placement of a hammerhead’s eyes allow it 360 vision
Bagel out 🤸
Imma use this as an opportunity to talk about one of my favorite creatures from Celtic mythology: the kelpie
(All of this is copied and pasted from my notes app 😇)
Now the kelpie is a shapeshifting water spirit that is usually found near like streams and rivers and I think other bodies of fresh water; it usually takes the form of a horse but is capable of taking on other shapes such as that of an old woman or a man. The thing that gives the kelpie’s identity away is the fact that the kelpie is perpetually wet and cold with waterweeds in its hair or mane. When in horse form the kelpie is known for luring weary travelers to ride it; once they get on its back the kelpie then takes off into the nearest body of water, the rider, who is now stuck to the kelpie, is forced underwater by the kelpie and eventually end up drowning, after the victim is dead the kelpie eats them. If a victim ends up on the back of a kelpie one way they can prevent their death is to grab its bridle, this essentially gives the rider control.
I may or may not add more stuff to this though not specifically kelpie or folklore based, that or I might just do so on my page in general
Please info dump on this post!!
I know a lot of times people autistic/neurodivergent people feel like they have to apologize for their interests and I want to help change that.
I genuinely want to hear about your interests! I want to hear the "fun facts" and the lore of really specific media. Don't shy away from including details, you can write out a whole essay and I'll read every word. Just share about something you like unapologetically!
Uhh I’m gonna use this as an excuse to infodump about graphs and fractals and how those two combined help me reason about everything from artistic composition to neural networks to psychology to neuroscience to quantum physics to distributed systems to astrophysics to etc etc etc. I’m calling this theory the:
Fractal theory of Everything
And I’ll probably post a lot of #looooonnnggggg posts about it under the tag “#fractal theory of everything” if you wanna adjust your filters accordingly. This is just the intro post to explain the theory. Actually using this theory to explain everything will be the posts which follow this one.
TLDR located here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1DF9lYoQXZbebiIgB071Pv_lHiISCiocuSq-pbubD_xg/edit
Imagine everything as a bunch of nodes (cities, people, classrooms, photons, tumblr users, etc) connected by edges (roads, friendships, paths, quantum strings, followers, etc). This representation is called a graph and you might be familiar with it (looking at who follows me) from math and/or computer science.
This representation of a graph is useful because sometimes a large enough graph is self-similar at multiple scales, meaning when you look at like 100 nodes it looks about the same as when you look at 100k nodes. See percolation which shows why magnets stop working when they get too hot or too cold.
I argue that any graph with meaningful data (meaning not all noise and not all uniform) is an approximation of an n-dimensional fractal. As the graph approaches a more and more accurate approximation of a fractal the data becomes more and more meaningful.
Applied to explain the Double Slit Experiment (one of many applications of this model I've thought of so far)
If you assume that energy is finite (change in the momentum of objects over time) then you start to think about how the universe could possibly exist with its near endless complexity (see fractal graphs from above with their complexity).
My conclusion from energy being finite is that adding a new particle to the universe must scale at most linearly, otherwise adding more particles would make the universe quickly use way too much energy way too fast. Think about a universe where every particle collides to some small degree with every other particle. If you add one more particle to a 2 particle universe then you’ve added 2 more collision checks which is not so bad, right? However, if you add one more particle to a 100 particle universe then you’ve added 100 more particle checks. It becomes obvious that if energy is finite then this is a massive waste of energy for very little increase in scale of our universe. Since intelligent life which can reason about stuff like this can only exist in a sufficiently large universe, there’s a bit of a survivorship bias in that we must live within a universe which scales linearly at worst in order for us to be able to reason about all this, assuming energy is limited.
Since the universe must scale linearly, each particle can only “talk to” the top X most important particles around it for each “update frame” of the universe. (Time is weird though because the universe kind of slows down fast moving objects and my theory is that fast moving objects get more frames compared to slower moving objects but this is even more speculative and hazy than the rest of this infodump. There’s also some weird time shenanigans with looking back through time - see double slit experiment).
Having each particle only talk to their X most important neighbors means that the universe can scale linearly since every particle doesn’t have to talk to every other particle anymore (yay!).
However, limiting the number of edges each particle has also has ramifications in quantum behavior (behavior of particles on a quantum level or dealing with 1 to 100 particles rather than billions).
Basically when a particle only has a few other particles near it in spacetime it’s as though that particle has a weak GPS signal and the particle ends up moving in ways it shouldn’t because the particle only has a few friends to orient itself with. I theorize that the double slit behavior seen with a laser beam entering two slits is due to that particle having to guess where and when it is in spacetime based on the very few particles around it (see math theory of multilateration).
Therefore since the particle can't orient itself it has to guess where it is using probability and some sort of pseudorandom process. This creates the wave pattern seen in the double slit experiment.
honestly getting infodumped to is like. dreamy
there's nothing that melts me more than just hearing someone be passionate about something. And if someone has hurt you in the past and makes you reluctant to fuckin completely go off on the expanded canon of the X-Files or whatever, I'm gonna hit them in the head with a big mallet. You're adorable, show it. Please
i know i’m not very active here and just. lurk. but
T H I S .
Literally this post summarizes my exact thoughts.
There was so little content of The Wall! It was so disappointing! And I’m not just saying this because I run a blog; The fact that we had so little attention of the Wall legit upsets me! Listen, I love the Toppat Clan with all my heart, but having more content for The Wall would be slightly preferred imo
The Wall is home to two of my favourite characters- The amount of lore we could have had with The Wall would’ve given so much to work with! We basically know nothing about Dmitri, Grigori- Nobody! Like,, wtf did Frosty do to get his ass trapped in jail? I Know it’s irrelevant but I wanna know!
We have enough information about most of the Toppats to at least know what personality they have, which jokes they work with and don’t work with, a comprehensive backstory we can piece together through lingering lore pieces, yadda yadda...but wtf do you know about The Wall? Basically nothing! Why is Dmi’s reputation so important to him? What even is the backstory of The Wall to begin with? Who ran The Wall before Dmitri? We get that with the Toppat Clan- In fact, we are literally shown each former leader through pictures and given information about them through bios! We get nothing with Dmi and it makes me SAD.
Don’t even get me started with how badly Grigori —unironically my secound favourite character in the who series— got treated!
Where were his L I N E S-
Mans LITERALLY had no voice acting in CtM- I Don’t know why I care so much, but I do-
Just give The Wall the representation it needs- My only reference for these fuckers is the fandom and child I-
Man.
Sorry for the rant I’m very passionate about these things-
The Wall should’ve played a bigger role in Completing the Mission: An analysis/infodump/rant that’s honestly longer than it should be
Hello dear subscribers I am here today to talk about not only my disappointment regarding how little we see of The Wall in Completing the Mission, but to analyze what could’ve been a really intriguing character and a perfect foil for Henry (in a different way than Ellie).
Part 1: Dmitri Johannes Petrov, a break in the genre
What makes Dmitri appealing as a character (to me at least) is much different than what makes other characters in The Henry Stickmin Collection appealing. What makes other characters in THSC so appealing?
Sometimes it’s their generally goofy or otherwise lighthearted personalities
Or a humorous element of an otherwise serious character.
Sometimes it’s an unexpected facet of a character that’s rarely shown to others.
However, none of the humorous elements that we love other Henry Stickmin characters for apply to Dmitri.
Relative to other characters, Dmitri is very serious in tone, such that trying to imagine him in a humorous scenario doesn’t feel fitting to his character. We don’t see him involved in any of Henry’s humorous gags, or even any of his own. Even Grigori, his second-in-command, has his humorous moments.
While it can be easily argued that this makes Dmitri’s personality stale in comparison to other characters, I’d argue the opposite. Dmitri’s serious no-nonsense tone makes for a very interesting foil to Henry–not just for how he behaves, but how he forces Henry (and others) to behave.
Part 2: More on Dmitri
So, we know that Dmitri is a serious character, beyond what we normally see. This no-nonsense attitude of his is reflected in how he talks to other people.
While he maintains some level of respect with Grigori (at least as far as we know from what little interaction we see between them), he’s much ruder to lower ranking employees at The Wall.
What else do we know about Dmitri?
Remember when I said that characters in THSC are often made more appealing because of a rarely seen side of them? This actually applies to Dmitri as well, but in a more subtle way than the examples above.
In Dmitri’s case, this “rarely seen side” to him is how much he cares about his reputation. He gets irritable at other members of The Wall when it gets threatened, as shown above. However, when Henry and Ellie escape and release the other convicts, he expresses to Henry just how serious it is to him–in a notably quieter voice than usual.
He takes his reputation very, very seriously, to the point of becoming vengeful if it’s damaged. In Completing the Mission, he ignores the entire Toppat Clan (and another government) to focus on Henry and Ellie.
It even drives him to desperation at the end of Toppat Recruits, being the source of his most memorable quote (and last words).
Yet, even with his apparent concern about maintaining his reputation and his anger when Henry and Ellie get in the way of that, we only get to see him in one route in Completing the Mission. (Okay, technically 2 but Pardoned Pals and Toppat Recruits are different endings branching off the same route.) These same motives could’ve put him as an antagonist in other routes branching off of Convict Allies.
Part 3: Grigori Olyat
Yet another reason I wish The Wall got incorporated more actually has to do with Dmitri’s second-in-command, Grigori. Despite being the secondary antagonist of Fleeing the Complex, we actually know very little about Grigori.
First of all, what is his relationship with Dmitri like? Is their relationship strictly work-related, or does it go deeper than that? Is it a friendly, fulfilling relationship for both of them, or is there some level of toxicity on one or both sides?
Stepping away from Dmitri, does Grigori have anyone else at the Wall that he considers close, or at the very least is on good terms with? Or do other employees at The Wall avoid him? Does he have anyone outside of the Wall that he’s friends with?
Out of the major characters in THSC, Grigori is easily the one we have the least information on, and even Toppat Recruits/Pardoned Pals does nothing to expand on his character.
Even with how little we see of Grigori, there are still noticeable differences that we can see between him and Dmitri. For one, Henry is still allowed to be his goofy self around Grigori, as long as Dmitri isn’t also present.
It’s also likely that Grigori is younger or less experienced working at the wall than Dmitri is, given that he’s unfamiliar with the protocol for dead inmates.
Also, accurate to his bio, Grigori is much more skilled with combat (and he’s even pretty acrobatic with it).
Whether Grigori and Dmitri’s relationship is positive, negative, or strictly work-related, these differences would’ve made for an interesting dynamic.
Part 4: The Lore
The lore surrounding The Wall could honestly be its own series of posts. But this post is honestly long enough as it is, so I’ll briefly summarize some of the more interesting aspects off the top of my head.
Multiple employees at The Wall are armed with spears that can blast lasers that instantly disintegrate any person they touch.
One employee was apparently hiding the fact that he’s an earth bender.
One of the inmates is an actual alien. This is never expanded upon.
There’s an unknown history between The Wall and the Toppat Clan, which has resulted in at least one locked up Toppat (probably more) and two undercover Toppats working at The Wall: Wallace Pemberton and Gordon Smith. Wallace Pemberton is confirmed to be loyal to the Toppats, but it’s unknown whether Smith is also a spy or whether he’s a double agent for The Wall.
So, with all that out of the way, and with this post having sat in my drafts for almost a month now, I hope this suffices for an explanation of why I wish The Wall had gotten more attention.
you'd think that people in the Alan Walker Cinematic Universe would be a little more skeptical. but instead they're like "oh they're funding the archaeological excavations!! they're collaborating with the US Government to rebuild humanity after the solar storm, they can't be that bad!!1!"
mate: they're literally called Red Nexus
that's like the most evil-corporation-sounding name of all time.
"yeah after my major, history-rewriting archaeological discoveries i will be taking funding from the Evil Science Laboratory that does Unethical Experiments (and also held my old professor in captivity)"
- Statements dreamed up by the Utterly Deranged
and guess when they were founded??
in nineteen-eighty-fucking-four -- year of our lord Jor Jor Wel!!! wake UP sheeple they're going to brainwash you all (and do other bad things presumably)
Lore Post Masterlist
Note as of 10/14/24: The direction that I've wanted to take the project's lore and organization has changed and there's also been some major changes to specific pieces of lore. Essentially, everything in the Modern and Kingdom History sections are missing information. The biggest changes were to kingdom lore.
If you want updated information, shoot ask my active blog @ilisteria
Oversimplified Elvaria
Dust Era(before the Cycelian Empires): https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/701918504380661760/okay-so-may-as-well-start-with-a-very-bad
Classical History-
Age of the Cycelian Empires(before The Fall): https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/702579281401954304/oversimplified-elvaria-lore-part-2-classical
Age of Shadows(post-Fall, before modern kingdoms): https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/702769161697378304/oversimplified-elvaria-lore-part-2-classical
Creation Era(beginning of the modern kingdoms): https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/702773927220592640/oversimplified-elvaria-lore-part-2-classical
Modern History-
Warring Era- Minor Wars: https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/703233019527544832/not-oversimplified-elvaria-lore-part-3-modern
Warring Era- Ember War: https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/703951269062197248/not-oversimplified-elvaria-lore-part-3-modern
Era of Orders(current era): https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/703955151357165568/the-current-state-of-elvaria
Kingdom History-
A through F: https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/704024010136207360/oversimplified-elvaria-lore-part-4-kingdom
H through Z: https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/704560268013879296/oversimplified-elvaria-lore-part-4-kingdom
Universal Lore
Civalthax(Voiskana): https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/704568530086051840/universal-lore-part-1-the-high-realmsvoiskana
Anarexen(Altersae): https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/704772914731515904/universal-lore-part-1-the-high-realmsaltersae
Derizaren(Spaelcul): https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/704968067239886848/universal-lore-part-1-the-high-realmsspaelcul
Boriasonde(Tilemgie): https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/709767137490796544/universal-lore-part-1-the-high-realmstilemgie
Realms of Death(Realm of Endless White and Realm of Skybeasts): https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/709927201541423104/universal-lore-part-1-the-realms-of-deaththe
Mortal Realms(Lower Planes and Lesser Realms): https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/712277912575950848/universal-lore-part-3-the-mortal-realmsthe
Elemental Planes: https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/714264400696066048/universal-lore-part-4-the-elemental-planes
Other
Organizations on Elvaria: https://elvaria-project.tumblr.com/post/708409826648129536/organizations-on-elvaria
Universal Lore- Part 4, The Elemental Planes
All life has the drive to evolve, whether they know it or not. Some are fated to lose the race of genetic and intellectual superiority, some never achieve the creation of civilization, and it is debatable whether or not some will ever even achieve sentience.
Some beings are beyond evolution in the High Realms they isolate themselves in, beings that perceive themselves as the closest to the ideal of perfection and thus are stagnant so long as they believe so.
Some beings are the purest form of evolution, elemental beings that can alter the shape and thought of life through assimilation but could be mistaken as mindless to those that fail to understand a simple truth: the purest defiance of fate is evolution.
If the High Realms represent the driving hand of fate, the Elemental Planes represent the breathing will of life.
These elementals, of course, have their own realm, or rather level of existence, that they are born in- physically it is beneath the Lower Realms, but is as deeply intertwined to the other's existence as are the High Realms and Lower Planes, and is (if anything) closer to mortals than High Realms beings are.
The purest of elements are Stellar, Flame, Air, Earth- the first elements that drive evolution before water and nature come forth, and thus these elements are the ones that make up each sector of the planes where the first elementals came.
The planes form as a vast cave system would, the four largest chambers each holding an elemental core, and from these cores do the energies coalesce and birth new elementals into the current Existence.
The elementals, though beings of pure energy, are unstable lifeforms in their first century of existence, and there is a high chance for their forms to separate into core and body.
The body is capable of developing its own core through the energy created by the division, and so it becomes a physical elemental. The core does not develop its own body, but in exchange gains greater intelligence, and so it becomes an ethereal elemental. On occasion, one half may not become an elemental at all and collapses back to a basic energy state that lacks consciousness. Some elements are more prone to splitting compared to others, and some may only form as a specific type by default.
Air is closest to the ideal of formless freedom, and thus they may only become ethereal elementals.
Stars are second closest to the ideal of steadfast perpetuity, and thus they may become both physical and ethereal but have a greater tendency to form as the latter.
Flame is closest to the ideal of mastery through trial, and thus they may equally become physical or ethereal.
Earth is the closest to the ideal of corporeal self, and thus they may only become physical elementals.
The few elementals that remain whole in both physical form and ethereal mind become Potentates that anchor the Planes, voluntarily falling into eternal stasis until their cores burn out to maintain the existence of the realm.
But what of the impure elements that too drive evolution, and what of hybrids of the four?
They do not exist on the Elemental Planes, instead being born upon individual worlds in the Lower Planes and the in-betweens of space.
Some are "natural" in a sense, water and nature elementals while not being true elementals are at least considered half-elementals and naturally come into existence upon worlds with Potential, although they are a sort of byproduct of evolution. Due to this, they can freely choose between a physical or ethereal form.
Some are created unnaturally, being hybrid elementals born from the collision of pure elementals and/or half-elementals. Whether they are physical or ethereal is dependent on the property of the material they resemble, with storm elementals being ethereal and crystal elementals being physical.
All, however, are capable of assimilation and all share the drive to evolve and become greater beings. They seek Potential and to spread their influence, either being born from said Potential or drawn to it from the Elemental Planes.
When a world meets the threshold of Potential either through an event or natural evolution, Elementals will cross into it and fuse with certain mortals to their whim, merging their ideals and thought and spirit and form in order to create an "evolved being".
These evolved beings become almost a separate race from the race they came from, with some being genetically different(or may not even have genes left) and some still having genetic similarity to their original race but difference in ability and appearance, though all will now have a core akin to an elemental's, and so their lives become intertwined with the power of the core and the ability to pass onto the Realms of Death is forfeited.
When the core's energy fades or the core shatters, so will their consciousness, and they too will meet the same fate as an elemental that fails to return to their birthplace should they have one- reversion to their element's base material.
Such was the fate of the Sky Lords of Avianaen that became no more than the passing breeze, and so did the silent Åskorhaia sentries that became stone and Mountainheart.
--------------------
Taglist for writing-
@aneci
If anyone else would like to join the taglist, feel free to DM me or send in an ask! I will also have a separate taglist for art posts.
Universal Lore- Part 3, The Mortal Realms(The Lower Planes & The Lesser Realms)
A Cycle consists of the beginning and end of an Existence and the nothingness before and after. An Existence consists of the universes and realms that are born and die within it.
This Existence was born with the gleaming light which pierced through nothingness, with that light having brought forth the flow of time as a seemingly endless stream of sand, the tapestry of strings that formed the expanses of space, and the possibility through alternatives that allowed the creation of new branches on the tree of universes. But of course, you've heard the whole story by now.
In that light was a force of creation that stretched throughout all the universes of existence, swathes of iridescent cosmic gas that quickly formed the first stars and planets.
To the beings that lived and remembered many previous Existences, this all came at what felt like the blink of an eye, and this plane that would belong to true life would become known as the Lower Planes.
What distinguishes the mortals from the denizens of the High Realms is what eternity is to them. To mortals, their lives are finite but what comes after is infinite- they have souls that can pass on to somewhere beyond the reach of the High Realms, an existence where there is no end other than when they feel it should end. To immortals, their lives seem infinite but what comes after is nothingness- they lack souls, with their options being to reform back in their home realm and toil once more or cease to exist; an existence where the end dictated to them is the one of all nonliving things.
Those of the High Realms lack a concept of a soul, and most do not understand what one is, save for Nix- but even he does not fully understand the origins of souls and thus can only create imitations of them, false lives that are unstable and lack a true free will.
In the Lower Planes are countless souls of civilizations and species that once or will or do exist, and thus with souls comes a force called "potential". This "potential" gives them the ability to evolve, and some by slim chance become more than mortal, but less than immortal. These evolved beings may have been created through manual evolution, magic, technology, or a fusion with elementals(should the world have them), and some are born through pure chance, but these beings often have the ability to faintly see the threads of Space.
Through these threads do they slip into a space in-between, above the Lower Planes but below the Realms of Death, and here can they thread their own strings into the grand tapestry of existence and create Lesser Realms.
These Lesser Realms are only able to be created in relation to a place in the Lower Planes, such as a city above the clouds or a mirror of the environment reflected by a lake, but some more powerful beings may create a Lesser Realm bound to a unique concept or state of conscious, such as a realm of dreams or a realm that is only accessible to those that understand a fundamental concept of a belief.
As such, some species may consider these evolved beings to be "gods", or at the very least an embodiment of some aspect of their world or civilization.
Lesser Realms are often inaccessible to High Realms beings, but if the location one is bound to or if the concept it relates to is fathomed or influenced by a High Realms being, the Realm can be subject to the influence of a force of creation, such as corruption from the Abyss' nothingness.
These realms can persist after the evolved being dies so long as they willed it, but when they die, the Realm begins to unfurl its "strings", and thus can be destroyed by another evolved being that comes across it.
In the grand Order of this Existence, the High Realms house both outsiders and creators, the clockmaker watching the clock and only reaching down to repair cogs and gears-
To the Lower Realms, the face of the clock is all they perceive, and every atom that composes the face is another world and civilization.
The hands move because Fate dictates as such, and the numbers that are raised above the clock face can observe the space above the face and the movement of the hands.
These numbers are the evolved beings, and with their differing perspective on their place in existence, they may alter the face of the clock ever so slightly to leave a scratch or dent that can slip past the eye of the Creator.
These dents are the Lesser Realms, a miniscule puncture on the grand tapestry of Space, and the way for mortals to alter Creation's truths akin to ants on an endless field.
--------------------
Taglist for writing-
@aneci
If anyone else would like to join the taglist, feel free to DM me or send in an ask! I will also have a separate taglist for art posts.
Universal Lore- Part 2, The Realms of Death(The Realm of Endless White & The Realm of Skybeasts)
When observing the order of realms in this existence, it is fair to say that the High Realms are roughly in the same level as The Realm of Endless White, but most denizens of either will never encounter the other.
This realm is, as it is aptly named, pure white. There is no civilization there, and when first entering it may seem that there is simply nothing there at all. It is simply a realm of expansive ground that has no variation in topography- but there is "life", or rather the remnants of life.
To explain the Realm of Endless White, you must first know of the Realm of Skybeasts, where all dead from the Lower Planes must pass through first before they reach the White.
Whether they have sinned or were gracious in life, or were mere children or elderly before their deaths, all life of the Lower Planes is sent here and enters through a doorway known as Telvorshei Ermelorisk, or "From Where We Emerged". No living being*¹ has ever crossed through this entryway or has gazed through it to describe its appearance- but for those nearing death and those who have already died, on both ways there is only a white light within the doorway. High Realms races are unaware of the existence of this realm and none have ever entered it*².
The doorway is located in a fixed spot within the Realm of Skybeasts, but whether the entry into a realm of death is a peaceful or horrifying ordeal is a matter of your own luck. As anyone who has died would quickly find out, the Realm of Skybeasts, also known as The Plateau, is filled with strange beasts known as skybeasts, and the vast majority of them are incredibly aggressive and possess a great many ways to kill a soul, including various venoms, spikes, and teeth.
If a soul did not get mauled by a skybeast as soon as they emerged, they will very quickly also realize that in contrast with the inviting clouds that create the ground of the realm, there are a great many eyes that dot the sky in all sorts of colours and forms that a mortal never would've thought existed. On a calm period, these eyes are inactive and appear to not be present(thought if you look closely they are closed). On an active period, they will randomly emit blasts of energy that can disintegrate any soul they land on. In the distance there is also a giant gaping maw that opens during these active periods and vacuums up souls that happen to be near it.
If you manage to survive this and travel in any direction away from the maw, you will come across rudimentary shelters and outposts surrounded by fences made of various Skybeast parts.
These are the only major signs of civilization and a souls' best chance of making it to the Realm of Endless White.
The outposts are roughly the size of a town and they have very simplistic names, with the inhabitants are a mix of races from across the Lower Planes. There is no major language barrier as souls appear knowing a common language along with whatever is their native tongue, but abstract ideas that are unique to specific worlds are not automatically learned by souls from worlds without them.
As for the condition of the people and whether or not they can die, people who die at the age of adulthood for their kind will appear in the Plateau at their peak strength in life and with whatever they had on their person when they died(if they were stabbed or shot they carry the thing that was stuck into them too), but are incapable of learning new spells from other souls. Children and adolescents will appear at the age they died but will be able to grow up to the age their species considers as mature and can learn new spells. The only ways to permanently die in the realm are to be consumed by the maw, be completely eaten by a skybeast, or be blasted into smithereens by the Eyes. Souls that suffer a temporary death may slowly regenerate if a part of them remains or will reappear at Telvorshei Ermelorisk.
Life in these settlements is considered somewhat tribal, with the main concerns being food(appetites are significantly slower than in life), shelter, hunting and resource gathering, and weapon crafting. Some settlements that are close to each other will choose to specialize in weapon crafting, some in building, and some in medicine. Souls that are known to have a violent nature that cannot be persuaded to become skybeast hunters are kicked out of the settlements and left to fend for themselves.
Banditry does exist in the Plateau but is rare as some settlements may have domesticated the more tame skybeasts. Whether or not a settlement is raided also depends on the actual species(plural) in the settlement and what kind of technology the people have, so a bandit group composed of species without magic would not try to go against a settlement composed of species with magic or with technology sufficient enough to compensate for a lack of magic.
Now, the Plateau does have a sort of leadership, albeit very distant from the regular souls.
The beings are not of any race among the souls of the Plateau, so souls that have encountered them before(and have the concept of divinity on their world) view them as strange gods. Those from races without the concept of divinity have two different views, one being that they are of a long extinct race and have evolved after spending many uncountable years in the Plateau, and the second that they are actually native to the Plateau but evolved to become more intelligent than the skybeasts.
The leaders themselves are known as the 7 Elders by souls and are split into two groups: The Supreme Ones and The Fragments.
From what little souls have heard about them, their names have the prefix "The Elder of" and are something akin to Many Eyes, Many Arms, Many Legs, Fragmented Life, Fragmented Death, Fragmented Time, and Fragmented Space. The maw in the land and the eyes in the sky are part of what used to be an 8th Elder known as Many Mouths, according to souls that have been in the realm from the first few thousand deaths in existence. Now, the 8th is known as The Devourer of the Plateau.
The Elders live in a very out of place citadel with geometric patterning and a large central chamber that few have ever seen, and it is generally accepted that the Elders are strange in that they have never left the Plateau.
Souls are able to leave the Plateau whenever they hit a kill quota of skybeasts, and this number tends to be higher for those that have committed something their society considers to be negative and lower for younger souls that couldn't actually commit anything considered a crime, but it isn't uncommon for souls to have quotas that are unreasonable for what they have done in life.
The Elders, though, have been present for as long as anyone knows, unable to pass on or perhaps unwilling, as the Devourer has consumed some trillions of skybeasts but has yet to disappear.
And so the focus must return to the Realm of Endless White, also known as The White or The Expanse, to complete this description.
When a soul has reached their kill quota in the Plateau, they will appear in The White in simple garb considered to be casual or sleepwear from the species they came from. In The White there is no need to eat or sleep, only to just exist. Desires such as lust or greed do not exist, and so the personalities of the souls that make it there are very watered down. Some souls choose to lay down and sleep until the end of everything, and some others choose to travel around and learn of the many races in existence with there being no skybeasts to fear anymore.
Curiously, some Altersaeans, Spaelculans, and Tilemgians have appeared in this realm before, but not many of them.
Now, the only way to permanently kill a High Realms being is to slay them in their home realm under specific circumstances and methods, which will lead to two outcomes for them: one is two simply cease to exist, the other is to appear in The White. Due to The Tearing, there are a fair amount of Tilemgians there, but all the High Realms races that appear will lose their connection to their creators and thus their abilities, with some also facing severe memory loss.
Voiskanans are believed to also follow these outcomes, however what few Voiskanans that are seen to make it to The White only maintain their existence for a few seconds before fading into nothingness, as their souls will always be incomplete and thus return to their origins.
--------------------
¹- The most immediately noticeable case is with Yūregian undead, which are technically not alive but also aren't fully dead. A Yūregian necromancer can raise a body if it's intact enough, but on the soul end, the closer a Yūregian soul gets to reaching the quota, the harder it is to raise them into undeath. If the soul manages to meet the quota, they can no longer be raised as The White fully severs the connection between the Lower Planes and Realms of Death. However, this almost never happens as necromancers are fast acting enough to prevent a soul from being in the Plateau for more than a week. As to whether the necromancers know of the Plateau, the memories of it are wiped from the undead individual and are restored temporarily each time they return to it.
²- Tilemgians may become the first exception to this as they are now semi-mortal after the Tearing of Boriasonde, so it's possible that a few that don't end up ceasing to exist after death will end up in the Plateau. Alternatively, the descendant races of them that are scattered throughout existence could reach total mortality close enough that at some point they'd be admitted to the realm as any other mortal race would.
There will be a short story posted at some point that will explain the origins of the Elders, so look out for it! This post will be linked to it too.
--------------------
Taglist for writing-
@aneci
If anyone else would like to join the taglist, feel free to DM me or send in an ask! I will also have a separate taglist for art posts.
Part 1, The High Realms(Tilemgie- Boriasonde) Drafts
The proper Boriasonde(Tilemgie) post is here: https://at.tumblr.com/elvaria-project/universal-lore-part-1-the-high-realmstilemgie/yo1donzt3f70
If I were to assign one word to each of the stories of the High Realms, Altersae's would be fear, Spaelcul's would be frustration, Voiskana's would be vengeance, and Tilemgie's would be hope.
I wanted to convey that the Tilemgians are the ones that will be able to let go and forge a future for themselves, and thus the story ends on a hopeful note, but I'm not sure if I managed that correctly, so here's the versions that didn't make the cut. I'm not going to bother adding the writing taglist to this post since it's very trivial.
--------------------
Version 1(Incomplete)
Note: This one got chopped because it would've been too long and also too dramatic. I also felt that the first part was very irrelevant so I just scrapped the whole thing.
Howling sandstorms tore across the dunes of Desaebla, leaving behind swirling grains of sand that remained afloat in the skies.
The skies would remain a burnt yellow in hue as the storms persisted for many days, but not all of the desert was battered by these storms, for far away from the Asurei-shielded Dalirnan cities was a canyon surrounded by strange magic.
To the eyes of outsiders, there was no canyon, and they felt no pull to travel across or near it. To them, it was simply another dune among the many that covered Desaebla. To those more observant, they saw the air ripple ever so slightly when sand grains passed through it, but they assumed it was only a hallucination from the scorching heat and felt a compulsion to leave it be.
But the canyon was no strange phenomena akin to the air-lands that dotted the skies or the perpetually ablaze lands of Emorscal, it was unnatural, carved by the hands and power of many that came from a realm afar.
The strange beings known as Tilemgians were once a grand race that held power over the concept of Time, for their creator Tilisnet was the embodiment of Time and the one that granted each Cycle a beginning and end and the ability to progress.
Without Time, there would have been no start of life or creation to be born upon the Space of Seclir, and there would not have been a definitive beginning of this existence for Avaas to cultivate.
This Cycle, though, was always bound to meet a short end from the circumstances Avaas had seeded. Tilisnet knew of the beginning and end of each existence, but it was not his duty to speak of these, only to ensure that Time would still flow to its natural end. His people would also know of this, and they understood that it was not their place to change fate, as no one could, and that they were not preservers of individual worlds or civilizations, as that was the duty of Avaas and his people. They had foreseen the end of their realm of Boriasonde and the disappearance of Tilisnet, but they were never able to prepare for it or warn the other High Realms of it, as this existence had an ordained fate from the start of this Cycle, and this fate dictated that their race would fall from grace.
--------------------
Version 2(Complete-ish)
Note: his was supposed to be a comic but then I realized that I cannot draw in a comic format for my life. I'll stick to single shots thank you very much. The character in yellow is not the same character as the one in the proper Tilemgie post. This would've been titled Clockwork Bird. Also please disregard any issues with the text colouring, I cannot fix it at all. Tumblr is just making it worse each time I try.
"I still hear the whispers carried by time, you know. Not ones that carry orders from Tilisnet, of course, but whispers from people."
"That's not very encouraging considering our current circumstances. Are you certain that you're not hallucinating?"
"Don't be ridiculous, I'm not hallucinating. "But it turns out there's still things to learn. "There's a word mortals have that we don't- miracles. When good things happen without reason or explanation."
"We're long past believing in that sort of thing. Our realm is gone and our powers are diminishing. Many of us are scattered across all points of existence and some of us are unfortunate enough to become sick from the memories we hold."
"But we're still alive, aren't we? Though we don't have much power compared to our past selves, we still have power and we can still survive on these mortal planets. These are miracles, if not to you then at least to me."
"At this point I don't consider our survival as a miracle, more like a tribulation. At any moment we could disappear, and at any moment time could cease to exist and this existence's past, future, and present could collide and end this Cycle."
"But that hasn't happened yet. Time still flows, even if the sands do not flow entirely in the right direction. But living on the mortal plane for the past few hundred thousand years has taught me to focus more on the little things rather than the grim bigger picture. "We're no longer bound solely to our duty- we can afford to care more about ourselves as individuals, if not be a little selfish."
"Selfishness brings irrationality. You are becoming irrational, sister. This is not good for us, and we cannot forget our duties that we were created for, as without us there is no time."
"I never said to forget our duties entirely, just that we have more "freedom"- another idea I learned from eavesdropping on mortals. "Boriasonde being destroyed and TIlisnet disappearing at first seemed like tragedy when I looked into our future eons ago. But to be honest, I've forgotten a lot of what came after. I've chosen to let go of many memories in order to live like this."
"But I have chosen to remember."
"And you've become sick as a result. "Fate is a strange thing, and I know there's no one that embodies it since it's the natural progression of entropy, but I don't see this fate as our end. "I think of it as our signal to change. It's going to hurt, but maybe change will redefine our place in this existence."
"And you think the memory overload is a "miracle"? The permanent death of many billions of us, the impending doom of our kind, and the loss of Tilisnet? "This was not a good change, and you saw how change led to our current predicament- in fact the whole of existence's predicament! The Abyss was never meant to exist, Avaas' desire for change doomed us all. The change you suggest, there is no guarantee that it will not end us."
"Tell me, when I release this clockwork bird, does it matter if it remembers me after I die?"
"Our situation is not comparable to a clockwork bird."
"Just humour me."
"...No, but birds are not bound by-"
"-When I set it free and let it pass through the barrier, this being of clockwork will become a real bird that breathes and bleeds. It has no duty other than to survive, and whether or not it does shouldn't be determined by me. When I am left in the past, the bird will have a choice to remember or forget and to stay or go. "If it stays, it will die without knowing the world outside and never realize what it could've been. If it goes, it will learn of the many wonders of life outside this canyon and be able to live a life of it's own choice. "Our fall from grace was a tragedy, yes, but we are the clockwork bird with the choices in front of us."
"...If we change, who will be left to maintain time when we become a new race?"
"As long as we still exist, Time will endure. We will never bleed red like the elves on this planet, but we'll always be connected to the Sands of Time, and so will the race that comes after us. "The bird is still a clockwork being in its heart, and the essence of clockwork will be carried by its children if it chooses to have any. "We should fly freely in order for Time to live on, we can't be afraid of mortality forever. Even if flying defies parts of our duties, we will still carry on the essence of them. "No one has to be sick anymore from the memories. Actually, we don't even need all of our memories for our duties- we just need to know how to fix and maintain Time, not all the details of said Time."
"And what if the day comes where our memories will prove crucial to whether or not this existence will outlast the Abyss?"
"Write them down and give them to the Altersaeans and Spaelculans. We can warn them now without the duty stopping us. "This is the miracle all of us have been looking for since our creation. Even if some of us never wanted to fly, we've all wanted to be able to warn others in the hope that maybe, just maybe we could change fate. We don't all have to die. This existence doesn't have to end this way."
"...Then for once I will believe in your irrationality and "miracles"...but are you certain that the sickness will end if we forget the future and past?"
"I'm not going to say certain, because I gave up foresight for my life. "But just take the chance so we can live for the first time since our creation- and that clockwork bird will be our guide."
--------------------
Okay so one last notes section. I chose to not(and also kinda forgot to) mention the whole "there's pretty much no one managing time right now except like a very small population of Tilemgians" thing. Time may or may not get messy when I work on the present and future of Elvaria itself.
Also felt the need to slightly elaborate on line "We now can evolve as the drakes on the elven planet and the crystalline structures on the pseudo-planet have done." in the proper post, mainly the crystalline part because the drake stuff is in the Dust Era post.
So I'm probably never going to talk about the pseudo-planet since that draws away from the focus on Elvaria(which the realms posts are already doing so I need to do less of that), but basically Elvaria's solar system has six planets, and of those six two of them have life, being Elvaria itself and the pseudo-planet. They'll pretty much never interact so it's very irrelevant, but the life on that planet is crystalline time-crystals and the planet itself is in a phase state because of it's composition also being mostly time crystals. Tilemgians on there are doing pretty good in comparison to the ones on Elvaria since the pseudo-planet is closer to sands of time than any other.
Universal Lore- Part 1, The High Realms(Tilemgie- Boriasonde)
"We had always known that we would not be forever. We could see all pasts and all futures, and we could see which of those was most likely to be the true path of time. This "absolute time" was what we were created to control, to ensure that the sands of time would always flow in one direction and never loop back.
"We could see the futures of many civilizations both new and old and the future of the dimension-travelling Altersaeans and space-weaving Spaelculans, but we did not see one for us. In all the threads of fate and each of the grains of sand that held a destiny, we did not have one. No endless expanse of black or white, but a simple nothing- we were fated to never have a future.
"We could not prevent this, and we could not flee- after all, without our home realm or Tilisnet, there was nowhere we could survive in- no realm held the exact conditions that could sustain our beings. More so was that none of us were able to warn Avaas or Seclir of Nix's hand in our destruction- Tilisnet said that it was not our place to do so, as we were never made to defy time- only protect it- so we could only accept our fates and live while we still could.
"Now, Tilisnet had created us to have some semblance of free will- more than the Spaelculans, but less than the Altersaeans, as he foresaw that it would one day be necessary that at least some of us would be able to sever ties with him. This had also meant that we were capable of arguing, but some of us did not want to and clung onto the hope that there was one path that could lead to the preservation of Boriasonde. Some of us argued that this was folly and that absolute time cannot be defied, and that we must endure for surely we will persevere in some other form.
"I was part of the latter group. I knew we had no future as the Tilemgians of Boriasonde and the Peoples of Time, and I too feared that The Tearing was our end, but a part of me knew that we would change, that at least a few of us would survive and become something new.
"I was correct, but there was no joy in this as my old friends that were of the former group are all deceased. So, so many of my brethren are dead and cannot be brought back even if Tilisnet were to return and Boriasonde to be rebuilt. Those that have died had their clockwork hearts be torn apart by the tendrils of the abyss or shattered by the piercing shockwaves from the very fabric of Boriasonde's reality being torn apart.
"If their hearts were still intact, they had a chance of being restored, but there is nothing left of them besides memories, and even those are becoming fainter with each day that passes.
"We are scattered throughout this existence- some flung into a distant future, some in the present, and some in the past; some were fortunate enough to make their ways onto planets with strong magic that could preserve us though not save us, and some were able to muster enough power to travel to Derizaren or Anarezen-
"-But our fate has been sealed, and what was once our greatest power has become our greatest detriment.
"The Altersaeans are meant to only remember for as long as the celestial body they guard exists. When that body is destroyed through unnatural means, they are "reset". The Spaelculans gardually forget as time passes as they were never meant to remember every detail of the Lower Realms' lives and worlds. Us Tilemgians were special in that we were never meant to forget, as this inherently violated the duty we were created to perform. We could not suffer from memory overload due to our close bond to time itself, which made us the exceptions to the rules all else in existence must abide by.
"Thus, our memories were our pride until The Tearing. With The Tearing and our scattering throughout time and the High Realms and Lower planes, we have been reduced to a lesser form for the lack of a better term. Our memories that count to almost an infinite amount of years are now a disease, and these memories cause us to become sickly as our now near-mortal minds cannot handle the burden of infinity.
"Many of us have both willingly and unwillingly forgotten some of these memories so that we could preserve our lifespans, some have also gone as far as to give up some of their abilities such as foresight.
"But the remainder groups...they still cling tightly to these memories, as they believe that to abandon them is to abandon our duties. They feel mortality so keenly in their sickness and yet they are stubborn in believing that we are still infinite. I envy them in that regard, but they too will die if they continue to live in this way.
"But enough of wallowing in our misery and mourning what was lost. The existence of the Tilemgians is now in the past and we cannot change this- but we can change ourselves. We now can evolve as the drakes on the elven planet and the crystalline structures on the pseudo-planet have done.
"Though we have lost much, we have been reborn to a trial by flame, and I hold hope that we will endure and become a new species that will carry on the duties of time while being both Eternaveilan and Mortal."
--------------------
I'll release the drafts for the alternate versions of what this was going to be later, and yes this story is supposed to be a lot shorter because it'd otherwise reiterate what was already stated in the other High Realms posts.
Previous High Realms lore posts- Derizaren(Spaelcul): https://at.tumblr.com/elvaria-project/universal-lore-part-1-the-high-realmsspaelcul/910zw5urt2xv
Anarexen(Altersae): https://at.tumblr.com/elvaria-project/universal-lore-part-1-the-high-realmsaltersae/1far5pd63wga
Civalthax(Voiskana): https://at.tumblr.com/elvaria-project/universal-lore-part-1-the-high-realmsvoiskana/w8dawu2zblez
--------------------
Taglist for writing-
@aneci
If anyone else would like to join the taglist, feel free to DM me or send in an ask! I will also have a separate taglist for art posts.
Organizations on Elvaria
With the end of the Warring Era, there have been many opportunities for organization to arise than span many kingdoms from safer conditions and better kingdom relations. Many organizations are scattered around the lands of Elvaria, with some allied with certain kingdoms, and some that are strictly neutral. They vary in purpose and skills, as well as in ideals, traditions, and people. This list only includes the most notable of the elven(or mixed) organizations and is very general. Specifications will be provided on a different post, and organizations outside of Elvaria will be excluded. Additional groups may be added in the future and will be added accordingly along with a notifying post.
--------------------
Neutral Organizations These are unaligned to any kingdom.
--------------------
The Seekers
A group of battle-priests that was formed during the Ember War by the half-Flaernan-half-Dalirnan Kalathiv and Lustarisean Iniko after deserting their respective kingdoms out of dissatisfaction of the warring conditions(War of Shattered Ruby and the Ember War) and politics. They still exist in the modern day but don't get involved in politics unless they are directly threatened. Currently they have an ongoing dispute with the Hidden.
The Hidden
A group you could either call mercenaries, hitmen, thieves, or all of the above, it is comprised of exiles, deserters, and outlaws that make it almost their entire purpose to cause problems for the kingdoms and exact revenge on particular people(if they're still alive). This group formed near the start of the Ember War where some people were being incriminated for even mere suspicions of being involved in the assassinations of rulers and criminals for petty crime were being conscripted for the armies. The founder, Xie Sha'nie, was recently killed during a battle between the Seekers and the Hidden over their current dispute, and the organization has since been handed to the Avianaen deserter Phalikiron and Yukiosan exile Ostoril.
The Accord of Oracles
A small group of, well, oracles that has existed since the Age of the Empires and have been granted diplomatic immunity by all kingdoms(except Jivankova out of circumstances and they have their own oracles). The gift(or curse depending on how you view it) of foresight came from the Tilemgians during the brief time the Eternaveilan races had a hidden presence on Elvaria's surface and was given to 7 bloodlines, one from each kingom(including the minor kingdoms). The Lunarisian Velscira would found the Accord and her bloodline has survived to the modern times, with the current leader being the Zodianan Bas'nurilos.
The Academy of Blades
An academy located on an island between Haliskor, Elorinar, and Yinorael, the school staff are very secretive and highly selective with potential students. Graduates must swear a binding oath of secrecy or join the school as a teacher, and the school itself is neutral unless directly threatened. The staff teach a very peculiar type of magical combat which is reliant on blades(usually swords or daggers) that seems more reliant on willpower and spirit rather than Asurei. The founder is unknown to everyone other than the "headmaster" Walekrian Wei'Mo Tan-Shi, but is alive as far as anyone knows.
The Circle of Speakers
A small group of druids and beast callers, the group was founded after the founding of Floernia. Most of the members are Floernians and a few are Dysheraln, with other kingdoms' people being few and far between. All of the members have an unusual attunement with nature, whether it be being able to commune with fauna or with flora(this also includes understanding the hums of the Dysheraln which is how the group picks out fakers). They do not have a proper leader as it used to be Cirania and they felt no one could act as a replacement(suggesting so is practically heresy), so they have ambassadors instead to deal with politics.
The Vermillion Hand
A small group of blood mages(not quite into necromancer territory) that were the result of the experiments of Ilskorith Mavkoril, a deranged Yūregian scientist who was expelled from the Society of Harvesters for using live subjects in his experiments(further elaboration in the future) during the Ember War. Think Frankenstein but the people are still alive. The group is generally avoided by all the kingdoms and they tend to keep to themselves as well, only appearing if they are directly threatened. The founders and leaders of the group are Zorthex Kax'sarthi, Dal'zythal Akzonil(pseudonym), and Zikir'thal(pseudonym).
Calamity
A city of elves from around the Yiagilian and Elemortian kingdoms that live on an island. All of them have been expelled from their respective kingdoms due to being born with the Harbinger condition that causes their natural attunement with Asurei and the elements to be distorted and lead to incredibly destructive and unpredictable spellcasting, leading to the alternative names for the condition being Nature's Wrath and Wrathblood(note that sometimes it's a case to case basis on whether or not a Harbinger should or shouldn't remain in their kingdom). Regular cities were not built to handle such abilities, so Calamity was specially built to not collapse from all kinds of disasters and special training is given to young and new members so they do not create something unfixable. The founders and leaders all go under pseudonyms and their given names have been stricken from records across the kingdoms they came from. The group of leaders consists of the Zodianan Hollower(creates black holes), the Föllen Alatsan Earthshaker(creates earthquakes), and the Yukiosan Frostbite(freezes blood).
The Cult of the Doomsayers
An apocalypse-prophesying group with an obsession for death well beyond what even a Yūregian considers reasonable. Their main practices include inducing insanity as they believe it "opens eyes to the truth", sacrifices, and "trials of dedication" performed in accordance to a scripture that is nonsensical to anyone outside of the group. It is uncertain if members of the group can read it themselves. The leader is Yl'thirak Shattersoul who has never actually been seen and doesn't have a name that matches any currently existing elven race in the world, so it's generally believed that this is a pseudonym.
--------------------
Kingdom-Based Organizations This list excludes royal or noble councils. Organizations that came from a kingdom but expanded to span the continent or the world count under kingdom-based.
--------------------
The Lady's Bulwark
Half of the military and guard force of Åskorhal, the Bulwark consists of two sections: the Mountainguard and Heartkeepers. The Mountainguard manage the city and village guard along with being the majority of the footsoldiers should a war ever break out with another kingdom. The Heartkeepers regulate and guard the Mountainheart crystal ore veins and central crystal to prevent outsiders from gaining access to it and prevent overharvesting, as all Åskorhaia Elthir consider them to be the blood and heart of the Lady of the Mountains.
The Watcher's Spear
The other half of the military and guard force of Åskorhal, the Spear consists of two sections as well: the Dragonbreakers and Stormtamers. The Dragonbreakers tame and train the storm dragons native to the Gyvorkal mountains to use in aerial combat and scouting. The Stormtamers are split between those who ride dragons and those that don't, but they are the more proactive group when it comes to preventing outsiders from scaling the mountain. A more accurate description of them would be storm throwers as they harness the might of storms to hurl electrified spears at people that come too close to the mountains.
The Speakers of the Echo
A temple of priests from Avianaen that ritualistically blind themselves so they only need to focus on hearing, as they are the only people that can still hear the "echoes" that come from the sky. Sometimes these echoes are understandable, sometimes they aren't. The general populace assumes that the echo is the remaining voice of the Sky Lords, but a few believe the echo is something more, and some others believe it to be a trick of the mind trying to hear the wind. The Triumvirate of the Skyborne are part of the first group and leave the temple as an official establishment in the hopes that the Sky Lords(excluding Thiroaven) may come back one day.
The Elscorin
The descendants of the Avianaens that followed Thiroaven during the War of the Skylords and refused to renounce their loyalty even after his defeat. They were cursed by the blood of the Dragon Lord Enthivar and his people(dragons) when it touched their skin. Half of the loyalists became Gorasbora, those who cannot fly lest the wind tear their spirit and flesh apart. The other half became Haraspira, those who cannot land lest their hearts cease to beat and their bones crumble to dust. They together would form the Elscorin, which was less a group that wanted vengeance and more needed to rely on each other to survive.
The Board of Scholarship and Enlightenment(BSE)
Originating from Dalirna, the Board is meant to establish and regulate universities throughout Dalirna and any others they founded in conjunction with other kingdoms. They maintain a high quality of education with appropriate academic material and funding in order to ensure that graduates will be at the top of the job market for their major.
The Archivists’ Society
Originating in Dalirna, this society is basically a guild for writers around the world. They have their own weekly newspaper(more like a pamphlet or booklet) called The Inkwell where writers both in and out in the guild(but they have to pay a publishing fee) can submit writing to be published in the booklets.
Guild of the Elemortian Scribes(GES)
The more academic counterpart of the Archivists' Society, they generally deal with publishing and field writing for academic pursuits as well as copying of old texts to be preserved. Many professors are in this guild as it allows an easier passage from post-graduate to a job in the teaching profession.
The Eyes of the Augurer
The mages' society of Dalirna, they encompass all the types of magic professions in the kingdom and their duties may range from managing the barriers around each city and town to actively monitoring and trying to divert major sandstorms into the sea, along with other things.
The Artisans’ Guild of Elemortia
Also originating in Dalirna but quickly became a powerhouse guild of all the Elemortian kingdoms, they deal with all crafted goods and have become an economic power and regulator to ensure fair trade between merchants, buyers, and sellers. Some say they can bypass kingdom regulations if need be, even though the Artisans' Guild didn't stem from the Dalirnan nobility or ruler.
The Pyres of Condemnation
The group that deals with prisoners and crime crackdowns in Flaerna. Public opinion of them isn't the highest, but they do their jobs well and provide large amounts of employment for Toliskvya Flaernans deemed too dangerous(more to themselves than others) for common trade jobs.
The Economic Sect of Flaerna
The sect is filled with rich nobles and businesses that flourished during the Ember War, with the majority being blacksmiths and ration producers(don't ask how a wasteland can make rations I don't have an answer tbh). It has recently made a shift towards more common trades but controls much of the flow of money coming in and out of Flaerna. They are in a sort of competition with the Artisans' Guild when it comes to controlling Flaernan markets.
The Global Trader’s Association For Bejeweled Goods(GTABG)
Coming from Föllen Alatsa, the organization controls the flow of jewelry and quality metals and gems to prevent imitations and ensure that the materials came from legal sources. Jewelers from other kingdoms with land that can produce precious minerals quickly joined the association when it was created, and the association would become close partners with the Artisans' Guild.
Mineral Harvester Coalition/Miner's Union(MHC)
This organization goes under two names for the two sides of it: the side that deals with exporting both common and precious minerals, and the side that deals with internal issues in Föllen Alatsa, namely the disconnect between the nobility and miners in terms of what actually goes on in the tunnels. The Miner's Union can be thought of as the side that deals with the ethics rather than business.
The Jewelrycrafts and Metallurgy Society(JMS)
Originally, they were part of the GTABG until they split off to focus less on the sales part of the trade and more on training and employment side of things, though they're still global. They also encompass smithing and the newly emerging engineering fields rather than only jewelry. For people seeking apprenticeships in any jewelling or metallurgy fields, the usual process is to join the Society stating your desired specialization and region, and then you'd be assigned to a master craftsmen from your kingdom with boarding and pay covered by the trade apprenticeship programs of the kingdom.
Wardens of the Bloodied Grotto
This group exists solely to keep regular civilians away from the Cave of Bloodied Quartz in order to protect them from the almost corruptive abilities of the quartz within. The group occupies the two guard towers at each of the two entrances and consists of trained guards ordered to immediately execute anyone that approaches within a certain distance of the blocked off entrances, as well as mages personally trained by Lustariseans to maintain the barrier that protects the stone around the cave to prevent someone mining into it by accident.
The Cave Watchers
The guard force of Föllen Alatsa's sprawling cave system, they have to deal with crime as well as monitoring the caves at all times to predict a collapse and minimize the potential deaths. Their methods aren't perfect, so it's very common for them to be skilled in healing and earthen magic whenever they fail to reach a collapse point in time to evacuate the miners. They also employ mages known as Earthspeakers whose specialty is to artificially stabilize major ore vein tunnels in order to further minimize risk of collapse points, and though they are more sensitive to tremors, when a tunnel is about to collapse there is little they can do but evacuate the people in it.
The Sentinels of The Archer
The Archer of Light was one of the first of the survivors to begin using light magic after the debris leftover from The Fall started to, well, fall. The accounts from that era of early Hikarinan history say that they would strike the debris in the sky with their arrows in order to expose more of the sky and sunlight, along with protecting those that hadn't adapted yet from the beasts that evolved during the darkness post-Fall. They left no descendants behind, but the Sentinels of The Archer would come around after their death to continue their duties. Nowadays, they're pretty much just the elite guard force of Hikarina. Many members swear an oath of celibacy but it isn't mandatory.
The Selectors
I wouldn't count this as a royal council because they aren't actually involved in political decisions so that's why they're here.
The group consists of 9 members of unknown race(suspected to be elementals by regular citizens) that determine who will be the next Matriarch of Jivankova when the current one is close to her death. The process entails the General Selection of powerful Jivankira Elthir from the general populace, then the Proper Selection where the group of powerful individuals are further filtered through an examination, and then all of the final group are to undergo the ritual to become a Matriarch. The ritual almost always filters the final group to one person that survives, but if another person lives, the two are to duel to the death as there can only be one Matriarch alive at a time. The group that failed the Proper is executed to prevent a potential overthrow of the new Matriarch. The Selectors do not have any say in anything until the Matriarch is nearing death and the cycle continues.
The Assembly of Asuremancy
The Assembly consists of only Lustarisean and Geintori Asuremancers and is led by the Shin'nyo Apolis Asuremant, Suigimano Shinoto. They very rarely have a presence outside of Lustarise's caves, but are incredibly accomplished in the usage of Asurei well beyond what other elven races usually can achieve. There is a special screening done every 10 years from the birth of a Lustarisean up until their 200th birthday(for late bloomers this is usually the latest their talent will express itself) to determine whether or not they have the potential to join the Assembly. They are given the choice to accept or decline(but can join later) if they pass the screenings. Every Lustarisean and Geintori can use Asurei, but not every mage of their kind is a proper Asuremancer.
The Walekrian Guild of Fine and Performing Arts(WGFPA)
They contain most(if not all) the artists of both fine and performance arts in Walekria and aid them in gaining a name for themselves in the professional field as well as exhibiting their work. Similarly to JMS, apprenticeships and immediate employment are offered by the guild. As a side note, they do get offended if people call their musicians bards.
Royal Institution of Biological and Geographical Oceanographic Study(RIBGOS)
While it is a university, it also is an organization for graduate students of the university to further research into the field. They're paid well as is, but are able to take an extra job as a professor if they desire an extra income. Due to the nature of the job requiring being able to travel to the underwater parts of the university and cities, most of the members of the institution are Walekrians, but you may see the odd Zodianan from a water sanctuary here and there as well as other elven races in commissioned vehicles.
The Conservationists of Permafrost-Bound and Arctic Sea Artifacts(CPBAS)
As the(very long) name says, the organization's purpose is to conserve and research artifacts from the past that was frozen beneath the permafrost of Halinskor and under ice floes or floating in the sea. Yukiosans are not built to dive, so the organization is very reliant on the Anctora variant of Avianaens that are able to dive into the sea's twilight zone. They have a strict policy that any artifact they find that can be accurately traced to a living relative has to be returned to them unless they give explicit consent for the organization to keep it for history.
L’ombrene Necrose
A society meant to provide for the extra needs of Yūregian undead, such as repairing of injuries and providing materials to make their bodies last longer.
The Cult of the Black Moon
A Yūregian cult that worships the Black Moon. They are not as extremist as the Cult of the Doomsayers, but are still considered at least odd by general Yūregian society. They believe some sort of being lives inside the Black Moon and will lead them to another world when a great calamity befalls Elvaria. They're allowed to openly worship so long as they don't do anything illegal per se.
The Apothecarium
Yūregian society is currently split into 3 groups- the Apothecarium, the Necrivana, and the Oltharan. This split is occurring over the debate on whether or not necromancy is an ethical and proper "cure" for the curse or plague that affects Yūregian society. The Apothecarium is the side that is strictly against the practice of necromancy, believing that investing more research into alchemy would produce a cure that doesn't require dying first as they view the condition as the result of a disease. Besides politics, the Apothecarium is also a guild that produces the vast majority of medicine and potions in Yūregia.
The Necrivana
The Necrivana are the group in Yūregian society that believe necromancy is the only way to solve the condition which they consider to be a curse. This is the group supported by the majority of noble families.
The Oltharan
These are the Yūregians that are either advocates of both necromancy and alchemy as solutions or do not want to support either side in case the kingdom is torn apart in a civil war over this issue. They are actually the minority in views and have very little political backing as the society usually pushes people towards choosing a side.
The Society of Harvesters
A Yūregian group of necromancers that work towards finding a solution for the "curse" that affects Yūregian society. They are led by the Premiède Patrimonte Mähdrecher, Roderikcht Marcheuse Fantoine, and thus holds a fair amount of political influence as well as noble support.
The International Academia of Astronomical Sciences and Observatories(IAASO)
Founded in Zodiana, the academia is both an actual university and an organization. Unlike RIBGOS, members of other kingdoms are able to attend the academia and join the organization as a researcher(side jobs as professors are also offered) so long as they have the sufficient drive to study astronomy and have completed their basic schooling.
The Royal Zodianian Society of Traditions(RZST)
The Society manages festivals and prepares the kingdom's cities and towns for observances of events significant to Zodianan culture. This organization was created when the Ember War ended, as though tradition dictated that affairs of tradition were given to the youngest member of the royal family, there is only one living member of the direct bloodline left so it would be better to relegate the duty to a separate party.
The 13 Sanctuaries
Zodiana has 13 sanctuaries that each specialize in their own craft or production along with allowing Zodianans to study one element besides the stellar energy they are born with. The main 12 sanctuaries have their own leader that is a member of the Starsword Council, and the sanctuaries themselves are split into 6 elements: flame(Ailes and Laeis), water(Cavenor and Saritoris), earth(Tevara and Secrion), nature(Vogira and Cariscron), ice(Peisica and Aquival), and air(Gimera and Larinen). The 13th sanctuary, Ocphis, is limited to Sarkathian Zodianans as it embodies the purest form of Qilanar's power, and those that feel most drawn to it are rejected by other elements. Elven races from the Elemortian kingdoms are able to attend the universities each Sanctuary contains but the populations are still majority Zodianan.
The Global Committee of the Culinary Arts(GCCA)
A recently formed group that is the board of culinary achievements and consists of top chefs from every kingdom(except Åskorhal, Jivankova, and Lustarise for obvious reasons). It used to exist during the Cycelian Empires Era but had been dissolved after The Fall, and has since been remade for the sake of tradition. Their most recent(and first) activity was the Global Elvarian Cooking Competition, a resurrection of one of the old traditions of the original GCCA. The chefs on the committee plan on creating a special restaurant rating system to identify restaurants and taverns with excellent food and dining experiences to award them in order to bring them the popularity they deserve.
--------------------
Taglist for writing-
@aneci
If anyone else would like to join the taglist, feel free to DM me or send in an ask! I will also have a separate taglist for art posts.
Universal Lore- Part 1, The High Realms(Spaelcul- Derizaren)
"I do not hide knowledge from my people, the Spaelculans, as there is not much to hide and not much very relevant to the duties we preform in maintaining this existence. "You may think of us as weavers or artisans, if that makes it simpler to understand what we are and what we do. All the fabric and tarps that mortals use for their clothing or tents come from the work of weavers, and the work of artisans give others the ability to build complex structures with the processed goods.
"In the same way societies and civilizations are built on the backs of craftsmen, the elaborate 'tapestry' all celestial bodies rest upon is created by us. This tapestry is very durable, but the fine threads it is built with are still fine threads even when woven together.
"When these threads begin to snap from the "weight" things in existence upon the location possess, it creates gaps that you may know as black holes. These are not created from the natural processes of stars, so they are not true black holes, but rather better described as spatial rifts. They function about the same as black holes, so there is no need to keep that distinction in mind, as you are not one of my people that have the ability to fix such rifts.
"Why I am telling you this?
"To put it simply, we, or rather I, did not always need my own people to aid me in the repairs of spatial rifts. In the many, many past Cycles, I was able to very easily manage the opening and subsequent sealing of the rifts myself. They occurred in very predictable locations and were few and far between that I could anticipate the rifts before they happened. The few that formed in an unexpected location were manageable as well.
"But in this Cycle, for some strange reason, these rifts form in completely absurd locations that I'd never have been able to predict. Locations where across the whole of existence, there is nothing that can feasibly pierce through the plane so violently and suddenly and in multiple locations at once- and I have witnessed the birth and end of an innumerable amount of universes.
"In the first 4 or so billion years of this Cycle, it was random but I could still handle it on my own, though it stretched my presence thin in the later end of that period. I refer to this as the Heralding Eon, a time where it was unusual but it was not a concern to me yet, but I now know it was a warning of more tumultuous times ahead. "By the next 5 billion years, repairing the rifts no longer was a task I could handle alone, and so I looked towards my kin Avaas' creations as inspiration, creating the Spaelculans by imparting traces of my essence into spatial energies.
"Them forming into a reflection of my image was entirely incidental, but my form is best suited to this task, so it was most efficient for them to have the same limb arrangements. After all, you do not see fish or birds weaving the webs of a spider- but to return to the story of why I am in my current predicament and why Derizaren exists...
"My people are not perfect copies of what I am. They were never meant to be, as their duty is to simply weave the threads of space and repair them in the locations where rifts form. They are also to monitor designated spaces that I cannot keep in my peripherals. But of course, the Lower Planes are unable to see the threads that make up the metaphorical tapestry- not the inhabitants being unable to, but that the threads are entirely unviewable in the Lower Planes to anything that is not me.
"They may hold the Lower Planes, but they are in a sort of phase state for the lack of a better term. The threads are formed by spatial energy which is automatically in the phase state, making them only visible through a sort of "screen".
"The realm of Derizaren was only partially made to shelter my people. Its proper purpose is to act as a "screen" that allows my people to directly view each of those strings, and the power I have imparted to my people allows them to perform their duties from there. Very rarely do they ever need to have a physical presence in the Lower Planes, and that is usually either when an Altersaean requires aid or some race that cannot be sheltered in Anarexen has to be sheltered here.
"But we do not shelter any race. We cannot afford to be philanthropists and preservers to beings, only the fabric of space itself. If a race does not contribute in any way to the progression or maintenance of this existence or cannot so much as grasp the information carried by the threads, we do not take them. If they can grasp the flow of information carried by spatial energies, I choose to impart some of my power to them so they become a pseudo-Spaelculan and can contribute to our work. This can, of course, be revoked at any time.
"As to those of the former group, the best and more relevant example would be survivors of the Tearing of Boriasonde. Tilisnet has essentially vanished from this existence somehow, and whatever realm I or Avaas could create is not suitable to the aspect of time that the Tilemgians are, so the most we can do is grant the ones we could find among the Lower Planes and give them sanctuaries in our realm that they may shape to be more habitable to them. But this is not a perfect system, and many more Tilemgians are scattered throughout existence.
"Avaas believes that I should pay some more care towards the Tilemgians, as they are essentially the successors of Tilisnet until he reappears some day. I will admit that without them, time would not be flowing right now and the whole of existence would be stuck in a time loop, indefinitely frozen in time, or collapsing onto itself as the absence of time means the concept of progression and regression disappears, but there is nothing I can do.
"My domain is space, not time, and I and my people are spread thin enough already in this eon I have named the Turbulence Eon. Since the disappearance of Tilisnet, more of the threads of space are breaking and some have even disappeared- I cannot monitor both the Tilemgians and Spaelculans, and Avaas does not tell me anything. What little I know is what my people know as we are spread very thin trying to quite literally be everywhere at once. "Avaas is growing paranoid and irrational, and he does not let me know of anything. From what I can tell by his behaviour, he knows something very critical to the current events, but he doesn't believe it himself and hasn't spoken a word to his people.
"I can respect him as kin, but when this involves one of us disappearing, which has never happened before, I and my people reaching our limits of what we can do to prevent the total collapse of this existence, an entire High Realm collapsing and the survivors being scattered throughout existence, and the Altersaeans not knowing what is going on themselves and following orders blindly- that is where I draw the line. "This is not preservation, this is madness, and this is why I cannot do more. Derizaren and the Spaelculans exist to maintain the fabric of space, nothing more and nothing less, and the fact that I even had to create either is enough to show the state of the Cycle's order right now.
"If this existence continues to last even a billion years more, I would be very surprised and frankly the odds are very close to being zero. There used to be one of us that could likely be able to fix this problem, but I have not seen him since this Cycle was started. He may have disappeared like Tilisnet did, but I would not be able to sense him as he is the embodiment of nothingness, and nothingness does not leave a trace.
"Avaas turns away when I mention the name of the Fourth. This is how I learned for certain that he has been hiding things from me, but as to what, I will never know unless he confesses.
"Forgive me for a tirade unbefitting for a being such as I, for my frustration runs deep-
"But his silence will be our doom- there is no other way to phrase this."
--------------------
Taglist for writing-
@aneci
If anyone else would like to join the taglist, feel free to DM me or send in an ask! I will also have a separate taglist for art posts.
Universal Lore- Part 1, The High Realms(Altersae- Anarexen)
Avaas had always been the first of the Four that embodied existence in the boundless cycle, as he represented the very idea of "alternatives" and was The Watcher of all that would ever exist. He was the only one of the Four that could still remember all that had occurred since the very first Cycle- the indescribable joys of observing the first civilizations that advanced to traverse space, the sorrows each time the Cycle was at the time to close and planets could no longer exist, the emptiness in the time between Cycles, and the pain of betrayal in the times where there was a Fifth. The Fifth of his kin would've been the same innumerable age as him, would it not have been the fifth being sealed away some many distant Cycles ago after going mad in the face of inevitability.*¹ Avaas' duty was and has always been first and foremost preservation until it was fated for his duty to end, and in this Cycle it was no different, save for one minor difference. He felt that Nix had become irrational, in a sense, over each Cycle, never learning to become independent from the rest of them, and thus never developing that sense of a "beyond" that stretched past the expanses of nothingness that Nix was. So he assumed that in this Cycle, Nix would be fine on his own and find his way back to them without them to guide him towards the radiance of creation, and would learn that there was more to existence than what he[Avaas] could ever teach him.
Tilisnet of Time and Seclir of Space did not disagree with Avaas' choice, as they too felt that Nix needed the valuable experience of "growing up" after many Cycles where he did not need to. After all, each Cycle started and ended about the same, so it surely wouldn't have been too difficult for Nix to find his way through creation's light as he did in the previous Cycles. But of course, none of them truly understood the essence of Nothingness past "lack of an existence", but Nothingness could wallow and knew misery and fear. Tilisnet, Seclir, and Avaas were furthest from the beings that came from creation, and thus they did not realize that Nothingness could perceive the fear creation held towards Nothingness. They did not know that Nix feared disappearing as creation spread across the many universes, and they did not realize that Nix would judge their choice to find his way alone would be interpreted as abandonment. Avaas, The Watcher of all that could exist, had turned away from the darkness, and was blind to what lurked in the Abyss. In this action did he fail at his foremost duty to preserve, as this mistake would cost this existence dearly. But do not mistake Avaas for an ignorant being, as he had duties to perform that were separate from preservation. As Tilisnet let his sands flow through existence and bring the concept of time and Seclir weaved his spatial threads to create the tapestry of space, Avaas was to oversee the first light of this Cycle as the first universes were born. As one does with a tree did he cultivate and graft branches onto the first universes, creating alternate ones as these seeds of existence sprouted and grew, and quickly in the eyes of the timeless did planets and stars emerge. As The Watcher, Avaas was to witness each of the planets that could potentially develop life, and as The Preserver, guard them until it was their time to fade with the end of their universe. It was a strenuous duty to watch every planet with life across the whole existence of a Cycle, some inconceivable number beyond mortal understanding which was under his jurisdiction. In the past Cycles, he would assume this duty himself without complaint, but early in this Cycle did he feel an unusual air of dread that echoed throughout the existence. For the first time since the Fifth was sealed away, he knew fear.
In order to split his duties to better watch over all the new planets across the universes he observed, he created beings out of the very concept of "alternatives" he represented. The first of these beings was granted parts of his knowledge to pass on to the others, and he asked the first to name themselves. The being would choose the name Anaare, and so Avaas would name the realm created for the beings to roam Anarexen in their honour, and name the beings themselves Altersaeans.
These beings would aid him in watching over and protecting planets with life across the many galaxies and universes in existence, and they were the alternative to him if he were to fail in his duties or some force were to stretch across existence to smother the light of creation and life.
As these beings were the many eyes of The Watcher that gave him more reach into the corners of existence*², they were also the first to notice the creeping darkness that reached toward stars and snuffed out their light, and they would realize that they could try as they might to preserve, but they could not escape inevitability against a force even Avaas did not know.
They would try to hold out against this creeping darkness, sending some tens of them to hold it off of developing civilizations, but even their mighty power perceived as godly by mortals were many times not enough.
Sometimes they were successful in holding off the darkness and the beings that sprung from the rifts the darkness bled through, sometimes they could only buy time as the worlds were doomed and the only choice left was for civilizations to flee to another planet, but in the cases were the Altersaeans could do neither, they could only watch the worlds be consumed and the people be damned to whatever lay in wait in the devouring abyss.
Avaas would take notice as he watched some of the branches of universes begin to lose their light, and he watched as stars would flicker and disappear from existence. The Altersaeans began to report of the darkness that consumed the stars and many mortal lives, and they said that the darkness had felt like a false life- nothingness that tried to imitate the idea of existence but was limited by its own being. They said it had felt familiar, like a distant brother that had lost their way and stumbled in the dark calling for them-
But they said that they also felt afraid of this darkness. This darkness was subsequently natural and unnatural, lonely but vengeful- and Avaas would quickly realize that this was the dread that he had felt long ago, the dread that warranted the creation of the Altersaeans.
He knew all they had felt, as they were a part of him as much as he was a part of them, but he did not want to believe his mind's first thought. It was likely the truth, but as he felt fear, he did not want to accept the truth.
His fear turned him irrational, and so he did not tell the truth to his people.
He did not want to believe that the darkness that plagued the light of creation sprung from his own kin Nix, and so for the first time in his existence did he choose to tell a lie.
This lie was for himself as much as it was for his people.
They all bore witness to the fall of Boriasonde and Tilisnet's sudden disappearance, and Avaas would learn of the increasing amounts of turbulence and breaks in the fabric of space from Seclir, but he continued to hide the truth from his people as he did not want to be seen as a flawed and irrational being, and he himself acknowledging the truth would be acknowledging that he had failed the duty of preservation that he was meant to embody. His own blindness and lack of foresight to Nix's perspective of existence was what would spell the unnatural end of this Cycle.
In this did he realize that he was never omnipotent, and that even the embodiments of the 4 concepts of existence were as flawed as the mortals they presided over.
He could not find Tilisnet even in the in-betweens of universes, and with Tilisnet's creations being scattered around existence, he could not ask them if they had foreseen this.
Something so simple as assuming a seemingly small change would not lead to disaster had led to this, and Avaas still could not accept this.
To this day, the Altersaeans are not aware of the truth, continuing to perform their duties in the belief that the abyss was natural with the passage of time and that it stemmed from the inaccessible in-betweens of universes. They try in genuine faith to their duty and Avaas to protect as many civilizations from this abyss as possible, and their work has thus far held off the darkness well enough for mortals to not be aware of its existence, but this will not always be enough, and they knew as well as Avaas did that this was an undeniable truth. The darkness does not halt for the whims of what it believes to want it destroyed, and it will continue to spread its roots throughout existence- to the worlds with boundless "potential"*³, and so the Cycle may once again return to nothingness.
--------------------
¹- Post coming at some point when I feel the time is right, it's in the perspective of Avaas to recount the Fifth.
²-This will be mentioned in the posts for other realms, but despite other realms being part of the existence that makes up a Cycle, no High Realms being can access any realm other than the Lower Planes(where planets are). The Elemental Planes are far too low for their power to reach into as their concepts are entirely separate from that of the elementals, and the realms between the High Realms and Lower Planes are either related to death or are small pocket dimensions limited to regions of worlds that reject High Realms influence.
³- Refer to this post since even though it's a note to self it does somewhat explain what the "potential" is -------------------- Taglist for writing-
@aneci If anyone else would like to join the taglist, feel free to DM me or send in an ask! I will also have a separate taglist for art posts.
Universal Lore- Part 1, The High Realms(Voiskana- Civalthax)
Before the creation of this existence, there were four beings of immense power that dwelled in the vast darkness.
The first was named Tilisnet, who was born in the previous existence, being reborn every five cycles. He had power over the flow of time, able to bend and shape it to his whims, and he could repair or halt its flow as he wished.
The second was named Seclir, who was born near when the previous existence had ended, being reborn every eight cycles. He had power over the fabric of space, weaving the energies within it to create stable planes and quell chaos.
The third was named Avaas, who was born during the start of the first cycle and existence, and was far older than Tilisnet and Seclir. He had power over worlds and realms, able to travel between them as he wished, ensuring that the cycles could continue without issue.
The fourth had no permanent name, as he was reborn at the start of every cycle, and thus was referred to as Nix, meaning 'nothing' in a long lost tongue. He was the void and abyss, his death and rebirth ending and continuing cycles, creating a nothingness for time and space to turn into something. Without Nix, the flow of time cannot exist and space will be torn apart.
Normally, Nix would have been found by Avaas, as it was how it went all the other cycles, but this time, Avaas had chosen not to search. He believed that Nix would fare fine alone, as Tilisnet and Seclir were able to control their powers and prepare for the birth of a new existence. Nix, at first, found this to be odd, but let it be, as he assumed that Avaas would look for him at a later time. Though as more and more chaos was muted and turned into peace, he felt betrayed, believing that Avaas had chosen to ignore him despite Avaas having searched for him in every other cycle. These feelings of betrayal festered into anger as more time went by and the existence was created, developing an anger towards the light of the young stars that now flooded the skies, thinking that Avaas wanted to destroy the nothingness of Nix in this cycle.
In retaliation, Nix created an ultimate nothingness that became a hidden realm that even Avaas couldn't travel to, located far beyond the reach of the light of the stars, and there he learnt to turn his nothingness into something, with the something being the embodiment of his anger and feelings of betrayal, infusing this something with the chaotic energies of nothingness. These energies would come to be known as abyssal energies, and this hidden realm would be known as the Civalthax, the Abyss.
Nix continued to tamper with his abilities and the abyssal energies, learning to condense them into shapes and bending the energies to his will. He wielded them as Tilisnet would with the flow of time and as skillfully as Seclir would weave the other energies of space, and yet still avoided the eternally watchful gaze of Avaas, whom he still felt resentment towards. With the combination of the abyssal energies and his emotions, he created Nythokra, the first of the beings of the abyss.
Nythokra was a being of pure darkness, its appearance being a twisted image of Nix's own self. Nix was horrified of Nythokra, fearing that if he continued further down his path of anger and went on to destroy the light, everything else would fall along with it, leaving only him and his horrid creation. However, a little whisper from within the depths of his mind assured his doubts, as it was either destroy all or be destroyed, and he didn't want to disappear and be forgotten, unable to be reborn in the next cycle.
His hidden realm of Civalthax kept expanding as the millenniums passed by, the abyssal energies inside of it slowly twisting themselves into corporeal forms that eventually came close to being "living" beings, of which Nix named Abyssal Lords, while in the new existence, which had developed and grown considerably, the creation of worlds that could harbour life begun.
Nix watched one world in particular with great interest, one that was entirely dry but still seemed habitable, even after it had sustained three asteroid impacts. He envied that Tilisnet and Seclir could create such worlds and allow them to have life, and so he used his own few powers to create a small seed, infusing it with the tiniest bit of abyssal energies, and sent it to the planet, hoping that he would be able to create proper life or at least influence its evolution.*¹
Nythokra watched this alongside Nix and spoke for the first time, asking Nix if there were other ways for life to be created, and if true life could exist in Civalthax. Nix had no answer, and he did not know, but it left a single thought in his head: "Can I make life?" As he continued to watch the development of the planet and observed the evolution of its life, he began to obsess over creating similar, but perfect beings, wanting to spread his influence and gain the ability to create something directly from his nothingness.
Nythokra, being a twisted image of Nix and the reflection of his emotions, was compelled to aid Nix in the process, gathering the Abyssal Lords to find a way to make more pure beings that had solid forms and were alive. Though, they struggled, as they did not fully understand how life worked, and neither did Nix, who was only able to observe living beings from afar in all of his lives, and he, Avaas, Tilisnet, and Seclir were embodiments of the aspects of the Laws of Order, thus not making them able to be considered living.
Regardless of the many failures, they still continued, destroying and creating over and over, using abyssal energies and manipulating nothingness, even resorting to having to steal some of the energies Tilisnet and Seclir constantly created.
Eventually, they succeeded, creating the first living being of the abyss by forming the combined spatial energies into a solid being and making one of the Abyssal Lords mate with it, as was observed with the life on the planet. An unstable lifeform it was, but still a lifeform nonetheless. Though the being was corrupted in the process, it gave birth to a being that lived and breathed and could grow, and so, Nix named the being Voiska, though the being of spatial energies died. When Voiska was considered an adult- or at least based on the guessing of Nix, Nythokra, and the Abyssal Lords- they were given the chance to choose a mate in order to create more living beings in Civalthax. Voiska chose an Abyssal Lord named Kazilv, and with gender being nonexistent among the Abyssal Lords, the mating was successful once more, and this time, twins were conceived.
Nythokra and Nix decided to steal more of the spatial energies that Tilisnet and Seclir created, but found that they had both created their own realms and their own living beings using their energies, leading them to channel their energies to the realms directly rather than let it flow throughout the existence.
Nix was ambitious, determined to create more life like Voiska, and decided that he should make use of the instability that the flow of time constantly had, redirecting small channels of the energies in Tilisnet's realm of Boriasonde to Civalthax.*³ Going unnoticed by Tilisnet, he deemed his plan to be a success and created more beings of spatial energies for the Abyssal Lords be mated with, leading to more life like Voiska being born.
Nythokra named the elf-like beings Voiskanans after Voiska, and Nix established a kingdom for Voiska to rule, which would come to be known as Voiskana, the kingdom of the Abyss. However, seeing the life that so easily was created by Tilisnet and Seclir made Nix envious, reminding him of why he had started all of this, and he felt spite and anger towards Avaas once more, leading him to start using the Voiskanans to achieve his goal of destroying all of the light in existence, wanting to leave only him and his creations to roam around in his reclaimed nothingness.
This desire for the return of nothingness still burns within Nix to this day, fueled by his fear of being destroyed and by his thoughts that he had been betrayed and abandoned, with the Voiskanans having conquered and destroyed many worlds and stars in his name.
Now, Voiskana has opened rifts into the world Nix had long observed, named Elvaria, slowly planning to corrupt it from the inside out.
But, only time will tell what the fate of this existence will be, and one can only hope that Nix will see reason someday…
--------------------
¹- This seed did indeed influence the evolution of life on Elvaria, but not in the way Nix intended. It instead led to the growth of the ancient druidic race the Partoa Elva fought near the end of the Dust Era.
²- The kingdoms of Solaris, Lunaris, and Urthalis have by then been established.
³- The redirecting of the energies was the major influence that lead to the collapse of Boriasonde, unbeknownst to most including Nix.