#Abime Spire worldbuilding

[grumpyoldsnake]

Dalgiroth, of my Abime Spire setting! They’re an avatar of space-time that has taken an interest in the Spire, and they visit it from time to time.

Their overall long-term intentions are benign, but they can be pretty mercurial in the short-term. They consider it only polite for mortals to address them with a certain degree of deference or subservience, and if they’re in a bad mood they sometimes outright demand it. They can also be possessive; they get a bit annoyed when other higher beings try to interfere with the Spire.

General info:

Gender fluid — He/she/they/it/neopronouns, with a preference for ‘they’ when speaking in their absence if their current gender is unknown.

Shapeshifter — The illustration above shows some of their more common aspects, but their true nature is pretty amorphous.

Dalgiroth is one of the few people who have interacted with the Spire without becoming bound to it.

[grumpyoldsnake]

Some more in-character rambling about Spire tech! Featuring Diamond’s adaptive watch, this time around.

Reblogged directly from the RP blog because I don’t feel like reposting or removing Diamond’s voice from things, heh.

Inventory Check (And this one for whomever!)

Inventory Check | Accepting!

“Ah, yes, my watch is a bit unusual! It’s important for me to have one that works for me, though. I travel between worlds and time zones quite a bit, but… I still need to sleep and eat at regular intervals, hah.”

“Valien and I worked together to design it. It shares features with many other adaptive watches, but it’s tailored to my own specific needs—and we were able to fit much more into it than might be expected of contemporary Earth tech at the same scale.”

[Image description: An illustration of an adaptive watch. It is modeled loosely after the Eone tactile watch, but with tactile features that are modified to be easier to feel and a speaker at its center. End ID.]

“One of my main concerns was discretion—I needed silent alarms, and to be able to check the time without sound. So while it does have speaking functions that I can activate for specific tasks—guided navigation, for example—it also has a tactile clock face and haptic systems.”

“I use the alarm functions quite frequently! An eidetic memory is all well and good, but it doesn’t mean that things come to mind when I need them to, hah. It has several different alarm patterns so that I can tell the difference between, say, a medication reminder as opposed to a calendar alert.”

—

(OOC: Most of the reviews for the Eone watch that I could find from people who were actually vision impaired and trying to read it said that the little ball bearings were hard to feel, heh.

And I thought that “lines with different lengths” just… didn’t seem like it’d be very differentiated, either? Especially if you’re old and don’t have a lot of feeling in your fingertips, heh.

So! Some modifications. Different dot arrangements for the clock positions, a raised line for the minute hand, and a raised square for the hour hand.

…Plus saying, “to heck with it, this is sci-fi fantasy, it can be both tactile and speaking and also have a GPS and Spire-Siri and shit in it.” Inspired in no small part by my eternal frustration with trying to figure out how to set alarms on watches. xD I decided that Diamond can just use voice control for that, pfff.

Anyway, there’s some interesting stuff out there even in our world! Here’s a really basic list and article on the topic. ^_^)

[grumpyoldsnake]

[Image description: A tall stooped alien with rose-like thorns on his back [left] talks with a thin white human (right) near a hydroponic growing rack. End ID.]

An experimental piece from a while back! Azi (left) and Piper (right) working together in one of the Spire’s active hydroponics rooms.

Piper is the supply manager for the hydroponics facilities, and works directly with the plants as time allows. Azi volunteers his time as a worker in most of the horticultural areas, including both the hydroponics and the earthen installations. (Piper prefers the avoidance of pronouns, but is passably comfortable with ze/zem/zir.)

~o0o~

Azi’s redesign could use some more work, I think, I’m really not happy with some aspects of this one. And I experimented with a new shading method and a line-less style for this piece, and didn’t like the results at all. xD I was much happier with my later efforts with Oscar. I’m thinking soft-shading is maybe not for me.

But! This is still a finished illustration that lets me talk about the Spire a bit, so I’m happy on that front! :)

[grumpyoldsnake]

Abime Spire

[Image description: An illustration of a tall tower with twisting spires and floating defense mechanisms. It hangs suspended in an eerie void, lines of magic tracing through the void in the vague shape of a cat’s eye. End description.]

The Basics

         Abime Spire is an enormous building constructed within a pocket dimension. As such, it doesn’t technically exist in any one universe and can touch almost any realm. It was originally intended to be able to support a self-contained city with many thousands of inhabitants. But the magic that was used to create it was poorly understood by its creators, and has led to consequences that none of them intended.

         The Spire is not, in fact, a safe haven between worlds and a pathway to free exploration; it has instead turned into a vortex which never releases that which it touches. Visitors to the Spire are bound to it, body and soul, and many must spend the majority of their time within it or face debilitating side-effects.

         The inhabitants of the Spire who have already been trapped are doing their best at damage control, and so far there are fewer than 500 people bound to the Spire. It’s an unusual life. Some resources are scarce at times, and the realm itself can seem cold and isolating. Fights are also not uncommon, be they between disagreeing members of the Spire or attacks from outside forces.

Creation and History

         The Spire was created as a gift for the sentient Felidaen artifact, whose nature otherwise exiles her to a self-contained, featureless pocket dimension. Felidaen and the Spire’s other creators (Diamond, Valien, and Waehua) intended to bring life and purpose to Felidaen’s realm. Together, they envisioned a castle in the sky to shelter lost souls from across the multiverse, and a gateway to a brighter future in any of the numerous realms the pocket dimension provided access to.

         Their goals were undermined by the Spire’s curse as described above. While the Spire may indeed be a pleasant home to some, it is also a final destination; there is no moving on from it. Further, the alterations to Felidaen’s dimension  have made Felidaen far more perceivable to outsiders. The potential of Felidaen’s magic and her self contained dimension are quite appealing to many magic users and powerful entities, and the Spire has been the target of relatively frequent attacks and invasions by the less scrupulous of those forces over the years.

         Consequently, the tower itself has been warped with the installation of countless defense systems, maze-like routes to numerous bunkers, repairs after partial destruction, and the layering of defensive spell after defensive spell into both the tower itself and the fabric of Felidaen’s dimension as a whole.

Further Info

Tag for every post relating to the setting (Tumblr) ->

Roleplaying Blog (Tumblr) ->

Worldbuilding Tag (Tumblr) ->

Character List (deviantART, outdated)

[grumpyoldsnake]

Spire Casting | 7-11-19

[Image description: Diamond in his Spire incarnation, though noticeably younger, kneels barefoot on the ground and lifts one arm towards the sky. A circle of runes lies at his feet, and magic like lightning crackles from eight nodes of the circle; two nodes are yellow, two are red, two are blue, and two are white. A much thicker ribbon of white magic also rises from the center of the circle, and Diamond catches and lifts it upwards to join the other arcs where they meet above him. All of the joined magic swirls towards the sky in a bright, blinding beam. Diamond is grinning exultantly. End ID.]

Being lent Felidaen’s power is quite the rush, and creating the Spire is one of the more exhilarating experiences Diamond has had. Mind you, he was sick as a dog for a week afterwards.

~o0o~

This is... not quite in the spirit of my recent attempts to loosen up and complete things quickly; it took about 8 hours and I did spend some time fussing. But I wouldn’t have had the bravery to finish it at all without the recent efforts I’ve been making. So I’d say it’s still a success story! :)

[grumpyoldsnake]

I’ve felt like Linast is nonbinary for a long time, but it’s taken me a bit longer to figure out... how, I suppose? As in what that actually means for him?

It’s one thing to think logically that hey, this magical construct with an artificial intelligence probably doesn’t experience a binary human gender, and quite another for the character to feel specifically non-binary in my head, as opposed to just not having a gender in general.

Anyway tl;dr, Linast is thoroughly human-socialized thanks to Diamond’s involvement. But while Linast is a he, and is not comfortable with any other pronouns, he is not a boy, guy, or man.

By contrast, Phosa is well and truly agender. She has chosen she/her pronouns to help distinguish herself as individual from Linast in casual conversation.

If you use they/them pronouns, both of them tend to think of, well, both of themselves; Linast and Phosa as a unit, one-and-the-other. They're so used to thinking of themselves in the plural that unless there’s some very specific context clues indicating someone was trying to use singular they, they’re gonna assume that person is talking about both of them.

[grumpyoldsnake]

my Type of character: Strong but friendly

I have two characters that fit that description, but I’m gonna go with the one I haven’t drawn in 5 years and who was due for a redesign. So! I think you might like Brian:

He’s an immortal earth titan and former monarch, but he’s much better at being a single dad and an artificer than he ever was at being a ruler. He likes chatting with people and learning about their lives; he’s the kind of guy who will remember your family members’ names and your favorite food even if you’re just casual acquaintances with him. He’s lived through a lot of loss, and he tries to pour his energy into the future even as he learns from the past. 

He’s also 13′10″ (421.64 cm) tall and built like a brick.

(The other character who might fit your type is Adelain! She’s a pretty cool lady. :D)

[grumpyoldsnake]

Inktober 2018 Day 4:

This is Waehua! He’s a guardian spirit. Rather than protecting a single place or individual, though, he wanders. He looks for people; he is a guardian of the lost, the scared, the alone, and the doomed. He guides them to safety and companionship when he can, and when he can't, he stays by their side to offer what comfort he can until they pass.

~

(I’m talking about my settings and characters this month! Check out my “Abime Spire worldbuilding” tag to see everything in order. Waehua belongs to Abime Spire’s co-creator.)

[grumpyoldsnake]

Inktober 2018 Day 10:

This is Clemcy! He was born a half elf into the elven royal family, and displayed the ability to affect the minds and souls around him from a young age. In time, he combined these abilities with healing and resurrection magic to create a form of necromancy.

As a comparatively short-lived individual, Clemcy was not elegible to inherit the throne; his fully elven sister was the sole royal heir. Clemcy was not thrilled with this, and he eventually made this displeasure everyone else’s problem too.

In the end, Clemcy dragged his country into a bloody civil war and got himself killed in the process.

~o0o~

(I’m talking about my settings and characters this month! Check out my “Abime Spire worldbuilding” tag to see everything in order.)

[grumpyoldsnake]

Inktober 2018 Day 2:

The Felidaen artifact is a construct of unknown origin and unknown purpose. She is sentient, but recalls nothing of her creators. She believes that she was lost or abandoned either before her first activation or before she attained full cognition.

While the original intent behind her creation is unknown, it did presumably have something to do with interdimensional pursuits; Felidaen both generates and exists within a pocket dimension, and she is incapable of leaving it.

Felidaen remained in a partially dormant state, largely for lack of any mental stimulation, for an unknown period of time. But eventually, a wandering spirit named Waehua discovered her dimension and awakened her in the process.

Felidaen is capable of projecting an animated likeness of herself in order to interact with her surroundings, but much like Felidaen herself, this projection cannot leave her pocket dimension. She is entirely incapable of interacting with the outside world in any direct capacity.

(I’m talking about my settings and characters this month! Check out my “Abime Spire worldbuilding” tag to see everything in order.)

[grumpyoldsnake]

Abime Spire’s Construction in One Sentence:

Three dudes messed with something they didn’t understand, and everything went to shit.

~

(I’m talking about my settings and characters this month! Check out my “Abime Spire worldbuilding” tag to see everything in order.)

[grumpyoldsnake]

Some in-character rambling about Spire tech! Specifically featuring Clemcy’s handheld computer/phone/thingamajig.

Directly reblogged from the RP blog because I don’t feel like reposting, pff.

Inventory Check (Specifically for Clemcy?)

Inventory Check | Accepting!

“Ah—this? I suppose you could call it a phone, it does have communication capabilities. It’s more of a computer, though. I have a lot to manage here at the Spire. I need to be available if anyone needs to get in touch with me, and able to manage any type of file they might send to me.”

[Image description: An illustration of a handheld computer that looks like a smartphone with a hinged leather case. In the ‘cover’ of the case are hologram emitters and a shrunken keyboard. Below, the keyboard is out of the case and expanded; hologram emitters create two floating screens and a 3-dimensional map of a cave. End ID.]

“I also often need to be able to work with multiple screens at once, or to pull up an illustrative model that a large group of people can see; for example, during strategic meetings. Which… here at the Spire can sometimes spring up unannounced, during various emergencies. So it has several hologram emitters to give me a bit of flexibility.”

[justashadetalkative]

“I don’t want you to get hurt either." (Masha to Diamond)

Diamond hesitates, his shoulders tensing and then slumping slightly. He’s pretty sure that ‘I can handle it,’ ‘I’ve had worse,’ or any derivatives thereof aren’t going to fly with Masha—however true they may be. He searches for something else. “...I know what I’m doing, I promise,” he says, trying to sound reassuring. “I know what I’m getting into and I’ll be as careful as I can be, the risk should be lower.”

He nudges lightly at her side with an elbow. “Besides, you’re better at healing magic than I’ve ever been,” he adds with a weak grin. “If something does go wrong, I’d much rather have you available to rescue me than the other way around.”

[grumpyoldsnake]

A very small practice painting to celebrate almost being done with school! This is one of the arterial hallways of Abime Spire; Diamond and @animalmatriarch​‘s character Steph are in there for scale. This was made with water soluble pencils in my watercolor "sketchbook," and I actually finished it pretty quickly for once! Had to clean up the human figures digitally, though. They're about 3 millimeters high, I do not have small enough brushes nor steady enough hands for that nonsense. xD 

Since it’s been a while,  here is the one other illustration I’ve ever done of the interior of the Spire, and here is an exterior view of the place. 

[grumpyoldsnake]

I suppose it’d be good to mention this here at the beginning: Abime Spire is pure, unadulterated self-indulgence.

The setting has been around since I was six, and playing pretend with my friend. We explored it and its characters together like that for a solid decade, at which point the only change has been that we’ve both switched from playing to writing (and, in my case, drawing).

Obviously, it’s been refined a bit from two 6-year-olds’ original ideas! Many things have been revamped from the ground up multiple times.

But two kids having fun and building a world together is the starting point.

And I’ll pour a lot of time into making Abime Spire something that I can enjoy with the writing and critical thinking skills that I have today... but I won’t burn time purely for the purpose of trying to erase all traces of its origin.

So I’m sure that some of that origin will show through in the kinds of characters, stories, and mixed settings that characterize Abime Spire. Some of it will be childish! The Spire’s maintenance engineers are a group of hyperactive, morally challenged kittens, for example.

But sometimes that’s okay. For me, it helps to think of the sheer ridiculousness of the Kingdom Hearts series, and of the fact that so many people around the world love it anyway.

Abime Spire has been a self-indulgent playground for me for 15 years now, and I don’t plan to change that anytime soon. ^_^ So, take that as you will.

~

(I’m talking about my settings and characters this month! Check out my “Abime Spire worldbuilding” tag to see everything in order.)

[grumpyoldsnake]

Valien signed up as a colonist aboard a sleeper ship when he was 20. His skills, robust health, and relative youth left him as part of the maintenance crew, to be woken at regular (though widely spaced) intervals during the ship’s journey in order to check on the ship’s systems and make adjustments and repairs as needed.

During one wake cycle, Valien conducted a space walk to repair a mechanism on the ship’s hull. An equipment malfunction detached him from the ship, and he was set adrift. The ship continued on without him.

He should have died, but in the end, the isolation that would have doomed him actually saved him. He was found by the guardian spirit Waehua, who reached out to him and guided him into the spirit’s own realm.

There, Waehua introduced Valien to an old friend of his named Diamond. As an immortal who was more than used to adapting to new life circumstances in unfamiliar locations, Diamond helped Valien to start a new life in his new world. In time, the two became close friends themselves.

~

(I’m talking about my settings and characters this month! Check out my “Abime Spire worldbuilding” tag to see everything in order.)

Inktober 2018 Day 3:

This is Valien! He’s a 54 year old roboticist and would-have-been sleeper colonist.

(Please excuse me while I learn how to draw beards)