#rambled fantasy wip

[anotheranonymousquill]

hi hello STS for you! what can you tell me about your vibey fantasy wip? (the vibes sound *excellent* honestly) are we just roadtripping about it or do they have a Quest going on?

Thanks for asking!

Yes, so I'm thinking it'll be a fairly episodic story with them taking various shepherd type jobs transporting heards of stock across long distances. This'll be cows, sheep, maybe horses or deer ect that you'd find around the globe. But I'm planning to play around with slightly magical or fantasy versions as well.

Think deer with antlers that grow valuable plants and are a sought after material when they naturally shed each year, or your more typical Pegasus.

The vibes I'm going for are high fantasy with a focus on exploring the world and its natural wonder rather than having to save it from some great catastrophe or do war. If that makes sense.

I'm more of a character driven person when it comes to writing, so I've given myself Reya Teran (26f) and her friend/younger brother figure Syon Klau (21m) to explore the world through. Neither of them have a home by this point, and both are fairly happy wandering from place to place so long as they get a bit of adventure along the way. They'll both probably also have some type of powers.

But yeah, it's mostly characters taking once off remote cattle driving jobs with whoever needs some extra hands, visiting small towns, and exploring the land.

I'm having fun with the worldbuilding and plan to play around with the common language being similar to our sign language, with dialect or accent differences depending on your occupation. For example, busy shops in the main parts of town have rapid and small movements to keep up with the noise and pace of their work, while the faming jobs in large open plains or in high wind/bad weather have big clear motions to be understood when shouting is tiresome or can't be heard.

That's most of what I have at the moment, but it's been a heap of fun to brainstorm and worldbuild for even though I haven't worked on it much or had it in mind for very long!

[acadieum]

up to no good.. 🤫

[rewritingrosie]

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[leiatalon]

Ode to the Glossary

Readers and writers alike, rejoice! There is a keeper of worlds and names. A guide to stories of choice and change, Seek out ye wonders here.

A master of lore and fame awaits! A library of words and fate. Come early or come late, Seek out ye wonders here.

I keep having to consult The Eternal Library's glossary to remember how to spell a name and was inspired to write this little poem in appreciation of the humble glossary. 👑

[nrivanwrites]

did anyone ask for a SUPER LONG writeblr/wip intro?

my name is Ro, I'm 23 years old, and I currently work full-time as an optician while I juggle approximately a dozen projects. please please PLEASE tag me in your projects, tag games, whatever. I love to look at things :)

here's a handful of my current projects. let me know if anyone wants to be on a gen/specific tag list!

THE LAST LORINEAN

epic fantasy, draft 3.2

A marathon of a project, spawning from an absentminded idea in 2011. While the central cast has undergone some face-lifts over the years, the bones have remained somewhat unchanged. There's probably a million drafts of this out there, but we'll call my current one the third big effort to get the story written.

Found family, magical road-trip, and laying the foundations for an interconnected multi-series exploration of the universe in which it's set.

Those born on the Aronian continent do not dream, long-cursed by the Witch Queen of the previous age. The dream-weaving Lorineans, who once provided a reprieve from the curse to the Aronian people, conspired against the kingdom and earned their eradication at the hands of the now-immortal Emperor. The empire now lives in dreamless peace, a united force of human, elven, and faerie kingdoms.

In the rural south of the Empire, Lilliana Karington has been living a quiet life. Unbeknownst to her, a Lorinean has been hitching a ride on her soul for her entire life—a secret that will send her on the run. She is joined by a fugitive by the name of Sadene from the faerie kingdom of Kyrania who carries secrets of her own, secrets that could topple the Kyranian monarchy and pantheon both.

With Imperial soldiers and Sadene's twin brother on their heels, Lilli must learn to trust the Lorinean she is bound to if she is ever to find a way to return to her peaceful life. But as she learns more about the secrets her Empire hides, the harder it will be to find peace ever again.

THE DAUGHTER OF DENMARK

historical fantasy, draft 3

a.k.a. I played Hamlet seven years ago and now it's everyone's problem. A novelization/reimagining of Hamlet through the lens of gender, queerness, and what a religious conflict means when there is concrete memory of Denmark's pre-Christian heritage. However, please don't expect historical accuracy from this project. It's about vibes.

Court intrigue, love quadrangles, repressed trauma, tragedy… y'know, the Shakespeare of it all.

Hamlet has known what her life was meant to be from the very moment she was born. Named a Ragnarson to ensure her claim to the Danish throne, she has been sheparded by her kind-hearted father and traditional German mother towards the title and burden of King.

When a hunting accident brings Hamlet near death, she is sent to her mother's old university for safety, far from the politics of Denmark. The things she saw in the world between life and death haunt Hamlet between her studies and blossoming friendships.

All too soon, Hamlet is called back to Denmark, where a dark shadow has robbed her of all she once knew. Through madness and memory, she must spiral to the end of a story that was written long ago.

PROJECT: ATLANTIS

epic sci-fantasy, outlining

Inspired by a Google+ roleplay group the two of us were members of in 2014-2019, a friend and I have been building a world and narrative that stretches years of cowriting. We are slowly finding a way to adapt our work into novelizations. One day, we'll even come up with a title!

Political intrigue, vast worldbuilding, and a web of characters spanning one end of the world to the other. Featuring a conlang and neography!

After fifteen years of tenuous peace in Atlantis, the question of succession has risen again. Faolan Althaea is of age to take her family's throne, but the banished descendants of Faolan Agallai have retained their influences in the dark, and they are ready to make another bid for the throne. Althaea is thrust headfirst into the boiling conflict, and she must learn fast which faces to trust.

On the other side of a once dormant portal, Faolan Illyrius is paying the price for rescinding his claim to the coveted throne. The godless, ransacked world of Aegina—known as Earth to its inhabitants, the aeg'oroi—is hiding knowledge that could turn the tides of the Faolan and Agallai conflict, and he is the one who must get his hands dirty to find it.

The Agallai loyalists have not been dormant since orchestrating the death of Althaea's parents. They have gathered supporters of a new generation, preying on the aeg'oroi that regent Priar Arsina, ruling in Althaea's stead for the last fifteen years, is so determined to alienate. As the succession crisis comes to a head, loyalist agents vie for control over the portal connecting Atlantis to the aeg'oroi homeland.

Something dark lurks in the shadows of Entropy connecting these two worlds. The gods have fallen silent, and their people are divided. Will Atlantis stand, or will sickness devour it all?

ON THE PRECIPICE OF THE UNIVERSE

narrative sci-fi poetry, final draft

Return of the king… because I am going to be self-publishing her! I am starting a fresh round of edits and will be looking for some beta readers soon. Mostly need a vibe check on the amount/length of poems and general format. Then comes cover design (will be commissioning a college friend), page design, and figuring out how the hell I'm gonna do this!

Sentient spaceships, loneliness, and the great unknown.

When the last war broke out on Earth's surface, the spaceships launched. No one expected the fires to reach high enough to knock the entire fleet out of the sky—save one, a sole survivor drifting onwards to a new planet.

Years later, only one of the ship's passengers remains alive, going through the motions of the day without fail. The last human alive cleans the vents and weeds the hydroponic gardens. And, they write, chronicling the little life they have left to live.

OEDIPUS REGINA

tragedy, draft one

Apparently, I am allergic to writing a play about anything but the ancient Greeks. Yet another gender reimagining! This came at the request of some college friends who acted in The Kassandriad and have done some readings of my other Greek plays. Still debating if I will be swapping the masculine and feminine for the names.

Cycles of fate, inherited trauma, and the inherent eroticism of riddles.

Oedipus, princess of Corinth, is a young woman when she hears the prophecy that she kill her mother and bed her father. She flees the home she has always known and finds herself in Thebes, a city living in the shadow of a sphynx and the absence of their queen. The childless, widower king takes an interest in her; an interest that sets in motion a cacophony of disasters for the Theban throne.

EAT HER HEART OUT

drama, draft one

Guess what. It's a reimagining of a Greek myth. Who is surprised. This one is taking a look at the Homeric Hymn to Demeter—and yes, I am aware of how many Persephone retellings there are in the world. Leave me alone. What if I'm built different (I'm not).

Motherhood, dependence/independence, and unreliable narrators.

We visit three worlds: of the gods, where Demeter searches for her daughter and Persephone toils in the Underworld; of the mortals, where Demeter hides among a mortal family during her endless winter; and of the Muses, who tell the story à la true crime podcast. The lines intertwine and an old story is made new (again).

[jemiswumbo]

works in progress:

twitch streamer!luke x reader

- luke is a gamer that streams on twitch with his friends (percy, annabeth, etc etc). they don’t know he has a girlfriend as she wants to remain out of the public eye. during one stream luke acts a little off, making his friends and his chat suspicious (18+)

UPDATE: this is now complete! you can read it here

hockey player!luke x reader

these NHL playoffs got me feeling some type of way (go oilers go)

luke and reader go on a quest

reader’s godly parent sends her on a quest during the lightning thief. she takes luke with her (much to his dismay due to his previously failed quest And bc he’s already stolen the master bolt). fluff and angst and adventure and also maybe 18+ !!!!

[oros-ash3s]

thinking about all my stories and characters interconnecting with each other in this completely inseperable way due to the constant theme of grief.

the chrysalis, which is about moving on, letting go of the past. the war that breaks out and the oppression within is due to the grief that has shaped each character, driving them to hatred and this inexplicable need for revenge. in its very core it is about grief, about family, about losing what you love most — and then losing yourself in the process.

metamorphosis, the story of change. it focuses on grief and monstrosity, how generational trauma effects you, and how grief can change you to the point of turning you into someone completely unrecognizable. how mental illness can turn you into a ghost of the person you were supposed to be. this aching and longing that consumes you, this forever climb of the box that society wants you to fit suffocating you and making it impossible to heal.

golden veins, which is at its core about death. the idea of anticipatory grief, of mourning the person that you could’ve been, if perhaps you had more time. the longing of the unanswered questions that death leaves in its wake, and the longing for closure that you’ll never recieve.

what lies below, which tells the story of the stages of grief, and how to finally bring yourself to accept the loss of a loved one. how denial can lead you into a deeper hole, and how accepting it, how the allowing the thing you’ve been anticipating for so long to finally take hold, can be so freeing.

and felix and reagan, siblings doomed by the narrative. felix, haunted by something that he doesn’t know how to control, or properly understands. felix, who cannot escape death, escape pain, no matter how hard he tries. and reagan, who has to grieve her own brother. over, and over, and over again. felix and reagan, fighting against something that is so much bigger than them.

in the end, all my stories tend to lead back to the same theme. grief and longing for things to be different. and with each of them, the audience watches as the characters are forced to grow, adapt, and change. despite everything.

[getvalentined]

Thinking about the Degradation Paper again and decided I'm just gonna drop the whole outline because this is a project that's already taken literal years but I wanna get some form of it out there. There are citations missing from the outline because there's a separate file with timestamped in-game video links in it, a folder of images to be linked as examples for certain points, and a whole bookmarks directory with every real-world scientific citation, so they're not all pasted in here. I don't assume people will be typing any of them in by hand anyway, I just wanna clarify that I do have citations for everything! It's just writing it all up that is...so extremely difficult.

The whole last section of the outline just says this:

I'll get there, me from the past.

[blu3ha1redbrat]

Writer's Rant: A dilemma

Okay so, I'm writing my main character, and I'm the kind of person who imagines the entire plot of my book like it's a movie and then I start writing. But, my main character is what I see most people in book communities dislike: soft spoken, overly kind and weak-hearted, but she is also very headstrong, intelligent (she has her flaws too ofc) and after the events that happens she does a complete 360.

But, my dilemma is that I wanted to make a "strong" main character from start to finish, to please the audience I'm trying to reach and maybe in some ways in the beginning she is strong but idk.

I guess my main thing is that the FMC is a black woman, and often, black women are portrayed (especially by non-black authors) a certain way (because of stereotypes) and I wanted to make her soft to show something different regarding black characters.

I'm not sure, and I don't know if this is a stupid dilemma I have, but here's my rant for now :)

(also, i've been writing on google docs for years now, and I switched to Microsoft Word and I'm in love.)

[allaboutmagic]

dear lovely ppl on writeblr,

im still finding my way around this blog and i gotta admit, im a little overwhelmed right now. like how do one get this kind of thing started? idk, what kind of information is worth giving? what do you think is interesting? how do one get on more lists for tag games or other helpful stuff? (@sableglass i love that im on yours already, thats really amazing! and so inspiring, but sometimes i feel like youre so much further along with your story and your characters more specifically and idk, im just getting started in a way and im not sure how much i can contribute then, you know?)

any experiences or useful tips you would have liked to have at the beginning are highly appreciated thanks so much and have a lovely day <3

[shionxion]

I'm finally motivated to draw again!

The creative juices are flowing once again and I couldn't be happier. Taking a little detour from drawing Ava, Ravy and Valeria real quick and focusing back on these two.

Once again I'm really trying to nail those sad and upset/angry expressions portrayed by my WoL and G'raha. There was a certain type of sad and upset/angry expression that I wanted for these two!

I think I've got it! :D

(Getting expressions to look just right is very important to me, I'm sorry!)

So, yeah. Have fun with this little wip for these two.

(Because they sure won't.)

I've been meaning to make some relationship lore with these two. Oh and other stuff too. :D

Do not use or repost.

[foreststarflaime]

Excerpt from current wip bc I am kicking my feet and giggling they’re perfect (AGS is going on a Loveless date)

Genesis was practically bouncing with excitement all the way there, grabbing his partners’ hands and swinging them about to drag them along faster.

When they were seated, Sephiroth started ripping up the program to make little origami balls out of the pages to flick them at Genesis, who tried to fry them out of the air with the smallest fireballs he could muster. Angeal was sitting between them, but had long since given up on trying to stop them, and was now both fondly exasperated and their scorekeeper and commentator. It was probably a good thing that Sephiroth had managed to convince Angeal to let them get a private box.

As the lights dimmed, Genesis shoved his feet up on the chair beside him so he could properly lean on Angeal and grab his hand so he’d have something to fiddle with.

[wndaswife]

hai y’all thanks for voting :DDDD i am soooo surprised ab the college au popularity but realized i’ve never written a proper fic for that setting before! unsurprisingly mommy aura wanda won :3

i will combine the top three and update you all once i have a plan that i’ve begun! (also i’ll try to somehow mirror mcu wanda, and also try to come up with a really interesting dynamic for those who said they wanted something different)

[fumifooms]

Onis, cannibalism and the above-divine power of human conscience in Touge Oni

"It can only be referred to as the curse or by its ancient name, kidou (Way of the oni). It is the greatest, mightiest and most abominable power of all humankind. The source of the ??? selfish prosperity accomplished through the relentless reaping of the harvest that is the people. It [is] a be[???] formless concept but it is the foundation on which civilizations and t[he ???] kami are built. What must be done, I do not know. It will not suffice to merely kill and be rid of it, it must be taken." -Sansei Shounin Kozumi

Hello! Short opener because I want to get straight into it- Have you read Touge Oni? If you haven’t, stop right the fuck here and go read it!!!!!!!! Go read it go go go!!!!!!!!! With that said, I’ve been having this thought since vol 5~6 but I just did a full reread before going into reading volume 7 and I am only more confident now. Because of the nature of this analysis, word choices are very important, there is no official english translation currently and although I also read the manga in french, there is a high quality english translation by Penny Theater, thank you! The pages shown here are theirs.

There are 2 sections here to cover: what are onis and what is the power that be: what gives onis credence at all, what gives the oni curse power, what gives gods power. Going into these two things points us towards an answer to perhaps our current biggest question in the story— what the hell is the oni curse?

About Onis

So, first I think we have to acknowledge the real life counterparts to the beings and beliefs Touge Oni references. In our real world, En-no-Ozuna, or En-no-Gyoja, is a half-historical half-legendary person that is credited for the creation of Shugendō, a religion. With this knowledge there’s a lot of fun links that can be made with the story, like how its religious practice involves hiking through mountain ranges (Touge Oni: oni of the [mountain] pass). Or how, Zenki (Zen’s alias) and Goki (future-Miyo’s alias in the first chapters) in legends are (mountain) onis that En-no-Gyoja rallied to his side, they pledged to renounce their evil and follow him. Shugendō means "the path of training and testing", which is also very reminiscent of themes the story has been pointing towards. "Let us, then, be up and doing, with a heart for any fate".

Ehem, all this to say, shugendō is a religion that’s very syncretic, which means it combines ideas a lot of different religions and schools of thought, including buddhism, taoism (remember that En-no-Ozuna in the story is referred to as an unaffiliated daoist monk), ainu beliefs and shintoism. For the purpose of this analysis, (including my lack of finding shugendō ressources about onis) that means it doesn’t narrow down what interpretations of onis may be relevant. In Touge Oni, many beliefs and religions similarly coexist pretty much seamlessly, and it even references several ancient texts on deities and whatnot, and the "canon" on the details of onis is pretty much unheard of from my research. I’m not a religious or Japan expert by any means but I know just enough to affirm that this sort of mix and mash is accurate to the era, beliefs coexist in ways that are sometimes not cut and clean. For this analysis I went diving into the wikipedia for onis and let me tell you that was an example of this, buddhism, shintoism, folktales, without mentioning non-japanese cultural equivalents subtypes and influences— there are so many variations of onis through time.

All this to say…! We can’t rely on historical depictions of onis to solve this, there’s no cheat code, we have to analyze through what Touge Oni gives us for the answers we seek. Even Touge Oni tells us how onis can refer to different things, oni not only being used for man-eating monsters but also for ‘eccentric people’, those who don’t fit in, those who people want to villify and dehumanize. Nevertheless, from the humble amount of research I did, I found a couple of real life examples that can give us something to work with:

— Akiko Baba classifies onis into five categories: 1: Folklore onis, associated with ancient ancestral spirits, especially earth spirits. 2: Onis associated with religions held by people living in mountainous areas, like the yamabushi (who follow shugendō!!! Yamabushi meaning, those who lie down in the mountain). (Baba-san please tell me your sources I need to find any sources on Shugendō-specific onis… Are you just talking about Zenki and Goki?!!) 3: Onis linked to buddhism, like evil demons (jakki) and devil figures from outside cultures like yakshas and rakshasas. 4: Human onis, bandits or violent people who became onis as divine punishment. 5: Onis from transformation stories, where someone transforms into an oni because of intense resentment or anger, especialy in nō theater.

You’ll notice here that many of these have interesting implications for Touge Oni onis, especially the human oni category! But also how Zen notably succumbs to his violent rage against Shounin has some similar implications to the transformation oni, and of course there’s the yamabushi oni, which as far as my research went mostly means onis who can be "tamed". Onis eating humans isn’t a constant, but it’s a very common (and often central) aspect of their presence as a myth.

— Lafcadio Hearn in his book Shokunjinki ("the man-eating oni") says that "those who have been greedy of their living are supposed to become gakis (starving spirits)" before falling into the Gakidō (the kingdom of starving spirits) after their death.

So here it’s greed that corrupts. This will be more topical in the conclusion section of my analysis, but for now let’s just piece all of this together and remember that there is half nature and half nurture to onis in most myths that are relevant to us here, half earned and half innate. In versions like in Touge Oni where onis were humans before being changed, they started out the same as anybody but through immoral actions or negative emotions have transformed into literal monsters, either as divine punishment or just the innate corrupting nature of their acts or feelings. Cannibalism is most definitely an immoral action haha, with or without the concept of sin, so this slots neatly into that. So that’s the earned half— But once you become an oni, something has been innately changed within your being, even if your actions were your own as a human— and like in Touge Oni, it’s not unheard of than an oni would want to reform themselves, but still quite uncommon for them to be able to or invited to, En-no-Ozuno’s act like in the legend to extend a helping hand to onis, offering to direct their life towards good, and for the onis to accept and join him… This is a big act of faith in these onis, these people, in that they haven’t been warped enough that they can’t enact any free will for good anymore.

Okay! Lastly for the only irl-historical section of this analysis… The onis in the oni village call themselves ayo-no-oni, or in its full name Ayo-no-Sato-no-Oni. It’s a one-eyed, man-eating oni that’s the oldest verifiable depiction of an oni in japanese literature (Izumo-no-Kuni Fudoki). Thank you Penny Theater! Fun fact, one of the irl origins for onis is thought to be miners and such, so the onis here being metal workers who have injured eyes from their work is a fun detail.

Okay, that’s all the obligatory context out of the way… Now, onto the mystery of the Touge Oni.

Cannibalism is the sole thing known to turn people into onis. Only humans become onis, and the only way to do so is eat human flesh. Like mister monk here, I think the oni curse being divine punishment in a strict sense is unlikely — and was disproven in the manga. But even then it doesn’t feel like the oni curse truly has morality attached to it, it seems like just a… Phenomenon. Uninterested in the circumstances around those it afflicts and impartial in how and who it develops and hounds.

And well… As we see soon enough, the kamis have no power over onis’ state. Like En-no-Ozuno points out it’s very unexpected, the extent to which kamis, especially ookamis and especially Hitokotonushi, should be unlimited, but it seems that this curse of the onis’ even has power over the kamis, is above them, something almost higher than gods in the hierarchy of the laws of the universe, maybe an innate energy or power of the world, like life.

Incidentally, there’s something that humans have and nothing else does, which could explain why the curse only affects humans, a power that becomes central to the story… Something like mantra.

Additional info would be that in Touge Oni, an oni’s horns have a huge focus on them. They’re often referred to as if they are what holds the curse, maybe are the origin of it, where the seed of the curse is planted, like if the horns fall from your head then the curse will just leave you as well. They’re the only visible trait of an oni in most cases, the first and most iconic one at least, and En-no-Ozuno has designed a way to "block" them from appearing through putting a hoop on blood vessels, to which Shounin points out that you can also block their "murderous urge" and "madness" in the same way, perhaps in a process akin to blocking chi flow, a concept that exists in some forms of medicine like acupuncture. The exact mental effects of being an oni are unknown, it’s implied that being an oni comes with side-effects of violent urges and a short temper, but we see with the village of onis that that’s not exactly… Relevant, or noticeable? A lot of this more fragile mental state could logically be attributed to what would push you to commit cannibalism in the first place, famine and horrible conditions that put you in a survival of the fittest mode, trauma and extreme circumstances. So in the end, the finer points of what it means to be an oni in-world are left vague. Different degrees of transformation exist, so to speak. Future-Zen in the capital chapter grows to an enormous size. The appearance of horns onto someone eating human flesh is immediate.

About mantra

From the very start, Touge Oni places a lot of emphasis on the power of language.

Even every chapter ends with records of the sacred treasures being made/shown, religious writings and information archiving. The story references older stories for its own era, and also it very much has a meta dimension to it (that it spells out at the camera with its diegetic fourth wall breaking and timetravel shenanigans-), Touge Oni is a story from the old past of our real world reaching us readers through a book.

The manga ends up talking about philosophy a LOT, and strives to teach a way to think of life where you become aware of the gigantic infinite cosmic scale of the universe and without forgetting or undermining the meaning in a life, the joy to be had in the small things and deciding your own fate. These two aspects of the story, the importance of communication and philosophy, make the entrance of the concept of "mantra" (呪) fitting, smoothens it with coherence and intuition both.

Mantras are thoughts, concepts, wants and will all wrapped into one word. Mantra is your conscience. Mantra is soul. Mantra is kidou.

Kamis see things like bonds between people, Sadera’s zenmiyo shipping goggles etc, and similarly Ookuninushi says that Miyo has a nice mantra after meeting her and it’s… Well, it’s vague, we’re unsure what to make of it, in meaning and measure. Most direct and substantiated theory imo is that she has nice willpower and life philosophy, like when she talks to Susanoo and he takes an immediate liking to her because of her words about life and joy and how to find happiness even in cosmic insignificance. But still! Vague as hell, in good part due to just how wide of a concept mantra is, even just hard to wrap your head around it and visualize it fully.

In the end it’s a pretty abstract concept, so there’s still much to finetune about how it acts and the philosophy around it. For example, Hitokotonushi says this about the nature of wishes and mantras.

The nature of wishes and the nature of mantra… Perhaps she means how Zen understanda how a want affects the whole of the world, that everything is give and take and that when taking balance doesn’t stay the same. Something gained somewhere is something lost elsewhere, like in the ukei, gaining ground and ressources are things enemy man-grass cannot have, and all these things that Miyo taught them and did for them are things for which they in turn attributed to her, it generated thoughts and emotions and worship and mantra, Miyo gave and they gave back.

Mantras can be seen as the power to grant wishes… Interesting indeed. In this way, mantra, like worship points in the ukei, could rather be seen as an unlimited ressource that humans generate. Then, maybe it’s more that Zen wishing for Miyo’s feelings to be changed would be suppressing her mantra, rather than taking, disrupting the flow of this mysterious, powerful energy… Like disrupting chi.

But let’s step back! Kamis are made of mantra, "humans brought them forth through mantras and gave them forth". And THIS is why when a kami has less worshippers and gets less worship, less reverence and thoughts from people, they become smaller and weaker, enough that now most kamis can’t step outside their shrines, enough that some become microscopic when completely forgotten— Wait why are kanjis making up atoms and the fabric of the universe?

Let’s remember that when Miyo got smaller than microscopic, smaller than atoms, the essence of matter and time was writing characters. The kanjis here move, they seem alive almost. There is something divine about human language, human thought, in its essence. Many times we see how important consciousness and thoughts and will are important within the world of Touge Oni, how the concept of them exists and lives as a force. This is a kami talking abotu what resides in a black hole- death and nothingness yet everything that is.

Who knows how much mantra truly has power over! Fascinating. But see, while having people’s indifference as a kami is bad, having their hate is worse. Like Hitokotonushi states, humans’ terror for kamis have turned into a plague over kamis. Hitokotonushi is an impossibly powerful kami that is by that virtue terrifying, and perhaps more importantly is a easy target for anger- with infinite power to grant wishes yet only grants wishes from people who successfully climb her mountain, even granting harmful wishes. The jealousy, the frustration, the injustice— there are so many reasons why Hitokotonushi would become a target for negative emotions, so many reasons she would have to flee to the moon to be far enough from humans, in fear of their sole mind’s will’s power.

So humans, their worship, mantra, people’s thoughts and feelings and conceptualization of a kami, are what gives kamis their status and power, and also what takes it away. Even more than simply taking what they have away, what they have given in the first place, mantra can curse.

Let’s remember the description of kidou by Shounin that I opened this analysis with. "It can only be referred to as the curse or by its ancient name, kidou (Way of the oni). It is the greatest, mightiest and most abominable power of all humankind. The source of the ??? selfish prosperity accomplished through the relentless reaping of the harvest that is the people. It [is] a be[???] formless concept but it is the foundation on which civilizations and t[he ???] kami are built. What must be done, I do not know. It will not suffice to merely kill and be rid of it, it must be taken."

Kidou is mantra. The foundation on which civilizations and kamis are built. The mightiest power of humankind. The reaping of the harvest that is the people like harvesting worship points from man-grass. Shounin wants to save Hitokotonushi from her current affliction, something that can only be done by countering human mantra somehow, something kamis and even sennins, who seem to operate through a lack of mantra rather than under it like kamis, cannot do. It will not suffice to be rid of it, it must be taken, it must be given to the kamis to be self-sufficient, it must be presented to the divine. The oni curse is mantra.

Shounin’s goal is saving Hitokotonushi by removing mantra. Although I think remove might be the wrong word— I theorized that removing mantra from humans could save Hitokotonushi either through directly removing the bind of human mantra upon kamis, or stopping the mantra from changing- deteriorating with time with less worship or turning to anger disrespect and terror, BUT his presentation to the divine consists in giving mantra to kamis- presenting it to them, hence my saying just earlier that this could instead be giving them the power of mantra, rather than just removing it from existence entirely. Instead of telling a fire it no longer needs fuel to keep going, you give it the power to feed itself wood and gasoline endlessly.

And just now I spoke of sennins in a way living without mantra- let’s get into that.

The final step to becoming a seinin is to walk through a town wracked by famine and misery without stopping or lifting a single finger. To offer no help and remain focused on the task to get through it above everything. It’s about leaving empathy behind and putting yourself above the situation, it’s about growing indifferent, as though the suffering of others even around you is inconsequential and doesn’t concern you.

To become a sennin is to leave the scale of thinking of humans, it’s to have learned as a human to think like kamis and see humans as small and meaningless within the cosmic design of the universe. Or rather, a type of transcending humanity that grows cynical, almost resentfully so, where emotions are worth less than nothing and cold logic reigns. But to what design, to what goal? The pursuit of spiritual ascendance is motivating and tempting enough for most, but we do see that some of what we see in Shounin are character flaws specific to him. The sennin mother was kind enough. Shounin talks like no one should care about anything if they are enlightened, but everything he does is ironically out of love for Hitokotonushi-sama.

This incoherence can probably be explained by the "reintegration" Shounin regularly does. We can look at the sacred treasure record of saiukou. "Regular disintegration and reintegration are necessary to keep personality-mantra coherence. Remember your heart." Something Shounin does to brute-force not fully leaving his feelings behind and remembering his goals? I hit the 30 pics per post limit so lemme just stitch the rest of the relevant sacred treasure record puzzle pieces together whike I’m here…

To ascend is to leave mantra behind. Somehow, to wield mantra is to be above-divine, it is incompatible with godhood or ascendance yet it influences and all is bound by it. It is a power that as a sennin you give up, a sacrifice instead of a granted wish, mantra is like the power to grant wishes and ascendance in true ascetism fashion is to, like Zen, refuse to use it and take.

Mantra, the human-exclusive level of thought and philosophy and communication and ability to visualize and build and want. The power of desires. The thing through which one can ascend or curse.

To become a divine being is to leave humanity behind, to leave humanity behind is to leave empathy and compassion and emotions behind. These things are however what makes us different from gods, what gives us powers over them, what makes life as insignificant man-grass worthy.

What is the oni curse?

Kidou, the curse of the oni, as per Shounin’s explanation what civilizations and kamis are built on, what he seeks to take to unchain kamis. Kidou is mantra.

Okay so… The curse of the oni is mantra, but how? What does that even mean?

Well, we’ve learned that most things are ruled by mantra, aka human will and imagination. Becoming a sennin has to do with transcending your own, mantras are what empower and disempower gods. The oni, too, in text, is said to be directly tied to the power of mantra, it is what shuts kamis’ mouths. But sennins, unlike kamis, are not created by human’s mantra, sennins do not rely on humans’ worship (mantra) for their powers and so their mouths aren’t shut, they are outside of mantras’ reach.

To remove an oni’s horns, their curse, by Hitokotonushi’s words is to rob them of their soul. To remove their oni curse is to remove the oni’s mantra. Which means the curse of the oni has tainted their mantra. The… mantra of the curse has tainted and fused with the person’s own mantra, the mantra involved in eating another human being has changed their own mantra innately forever until death. There’s a couple of different ways in which this could happen or for what reason, more precisely.

Human thoughts aka mantra, are what gives gods their forms, we are taught explicitly during the ukei that humans’ conceptualization of a kami dictates their appearance, wether they become a dragon or some other figure. Human mantra also has the power to curse gods- terror for a god becomes a plague that saps at their life and power.

A narrative then becomes clear, does it not? A koi that eats a koi remains a koi, a bear that eats human flesh does not become afflicted by an oni-like curse, the curse is human-bound. If it is the form-altering power of mantra that could curse onis into being, then… Human cannibalism is abhorred and demonized more than perhaps anything else, on a very innate and visceral level.

So by my favored theory, humans becoming monsters after doing cannibalism is that the intense judgement people who commit cannibalism face, this thought that immediately such an act makes them no longer human, takes form and manifests as a mantra that makes it true physically and spiritually— they not only become monsters but their very being is tainted, and since the stereotype of the average cannibal is a heartless emotionless bloodthirsty beast, that’s what onis are forced to become like on an intrinsic level. It is a more or less common myth worldwide, even just often a non-spiritual belief, that committing cannibalism saps at your humanity and turns you into something monstrous, like for example with the wendigo. Like we said earlier, onis are creatures of myth, and the biggest constant is that they are man-eating monsters. Mythical beings are somewhat like kamis, and since kamis can be of disaster or misfortune etc they can be believed in while still being negative in nature, so what’s to say committing an act that intrinsically changes so much about your spiritual state and your reputation in society, fitting the requirements for being an oni, turn you into one? A curse, placed on humans by humans, mantra, thought given form. It is no divine judge,ent, this is not Buddha’s doing, wether or not people can be "redempted" or wether they "deserve" it doesn’t matter, just the intense ostracization and dehumanization that the act inflicts upon you. Now anyone can see at a glance that you’ve committed such an heinous act, and the fear of onis continues on, as many are exiled ir isolated and encouraged to keep eating humans.

To commit cannibalism is to abandon your humanity. AbsoluteColor has an interesting theory centered on this. In their words, becoming an Oni might be something along the lines of transcendence, incomplete as it might be. In the Gabi trial, the aspiring sennin should shed his own emotions and go through a land devastated by war or famine without doing anything, and in a way the Oni who used other humans to feed himself had to shed his emotions, although they did so to gain something for themselves (food), making it a "stunted" transcendence...

My other theory is that since humans possess mantras, eating one breaks something/ fundamentally changes something in your being, either your spirit or body, because mantras are a power that can’t be consumed. So trying to consume it instead deflects it, channeling it in a way, and in this way becoming corrupted because something went wrong. But if it’s unrelated to the taboo as in theory 1 then it’d be weird that animals eating humans don’t become cursed- but the trouble could be that it’s a human eating mantra specifically, again that theme of a human’s special sentience being specially affected by things. Like, an animal doesn’t have the capacity to hold mantras so it slides off their back no trouble, but instead a human eating mantras is like trying to absorb or process it but it causes swelling past the bursting point. After all the process of becoming a god or something divine/above-human is a big topic, and we see how it changes someone and the strain that comes with it, the sacrifices, since by becoming a sennin you shed human emotions. In this reading human sentience itself is transcendant essentually, (and thus deeply affects the world,). Becoming a oni is to be chained by mantra, but the why exactly is up in the air, here it’s that eating another’s as a human, creature that generates mantra rather than being made of it like kamis and absorbing it within yourself messes you up, maybe because by digesting mantra you become made of mantra in some way, maybe the horns are pure mantra, part of them now. The other thing that makes this less likely is that the taboo theory offers some explanation as to why gods would be forbidden to speak about it despite knowing the details of it— it’s something so vile you cannot even speak of its origins, something sow oven into the laws of mantra and the universe that undoing it is unthinkable to even amatsus.

It could be a fusion of these. By consuming mantra you ascend to godhood in a way, and that is what allows one to become affected by mantra. Become bound by it. I’ve also entertained the idea that maybe it is their own mantra affecting their appearance, self-loathing and self-doubt and low self-esteem, your own consideration for your own humanity, after eating human flesh, that you no longer feel human or think you are monstrous. But it has low chances, because that can’t possibly be a phenomenon that always occurs impartially then, not everyone would think of themselves that way, especially with how out of it famine can make someone. This could be not unsimilar to this presentation of the divine deal, where you give the power of having mantra to a being only affected by mantra, onkt the other way around, where a being that generates mantra is now also commandeered by it, an essentialist tool of fate and the universe or something.

So,

to recap!

In my opinion either the oni mantra is strong because the taboo of it is strong, or because mantras are a tangible specially-corruptive thing when consumed.

Since the oni curse is mantra, removing it would have to be done through countering the mantra in some way, perhaps with a stronger positive one about how onis are humans like the rest of us or they can choose their own fate etc etc, or like what Shounin seeks to do to save Hitokotonushi from her curse, through removing mantra entirely.

The koi eats koi thing that the monk brought up is super interesting, any time a manga or japanese media touches on cannibalism it’s go-to example/case study to bring up, I regularly see it referenced even when I pick up a random manga. Asura by George Akiyama from 1970 is just one example. It seems koi eating koi is vey present in japanese consciousness… Which yeah is interesting— Kois are one popularized example but anytime we hear about animal species committing cannibalism we’re shocked by it, so it’s interesting how likely due to japanese exposure to kois it’s what sometimes haunts their stories. This sort of thing is visceral it feels like an innate wrong, so for talking about morality and nature and the innate status of things, yet the concept of higher sentience and how virtues are what makes humans special— it feels very emblematic and topical in many ways, and a very uniquely charged one.

I’m thinking that if they were to through with the Presentation of the Divine and the world became mantra-less Zen’s horns would fall. Which would be an interesting conflict because then Zen would have to consider "ok nice but is it worth trading for human sentience…", which ties back to the theme of wishes… Since human sentience is explicitly connected to mantras I feel like that supports the link I’m making here right, and how human emotions are something not below but rather above and inaccessible to the divine. Gods channel the power from their will through literal god powers that shape the world meanwhile humans can only channel their will through their actions, maybe it’s an inherent shift there that changes everything.

If onis have a strong mantra, and the kami, which are made of mantras, can’t undo the mantra of onis… Then perhaps, the same way that humans gave and take power of the kamis through mantras, humans are what made onis such a strong curse. Perhaps for the horns to fall, the devil’s mark as Ozuno said so fiercely once, the horns that are the mark of the oni, that give them their bloodlust and madness, then all it takes is for humans at large to stop fearing onis so— or rather, stop seeing cannibalism as an irredeemable act that strips your humanity from you forevermore. The power of thoughts is at the core of the story, and the intrigue with Shounin is baiting people to wonder, would it be so bad if that was taken away? Ozuno is tempted to go through with the Presentation to the supreme because it would cure his beloved, and if that were to cure Zen as well… Either from humans no longer being able to make mantras, or kamis becoming more powerful than the onis’ mantra, then that could be one more point of contention. I doubt Zen will be tempted, though, as someone who himself experienced it— survival at its rawest, mindless form. Hitokotonushi said it herself, that he understood the nature of wishes and thus mantras, with how he refused his second most important wish. Miyo herself is stated by people around her to have a fine mantra, a fine will and way to think, so I think that’s why our trio is the stuff of fate, the heroes of this tale. They have a bond so strong that the gods recognize it, and it’ll be because they’ll reach erudite knowledge on mantras and life without sacrificing their compassion or the perspective of a lowly human, baby!! Through shugendō, the path of training and testing, of trial and error and will to keep going!

Touge Oni is a lot about choice and willpower, carving your own path, the desires and ideologies and willpower and sentience of humans, how humans are both small vulnerable and insignificant on the scale of the cosmos and yet how such small beings can have so much impact and influence on the the world and their own fate— let us, then, be up and doing, with a heart for any fate. Miyo has changed the destiny the world thrusted upon her, herself bending time to change her own fate, Zen is determined to break his curse that’s stronger than gods and is already defying what should be dictating his life and behavior by acting upright and travelling with humans— humans are not divine but damn…… There’s something to us, isn’t there.

[paeliae-occasionally]

pae pae, what is one piece of lore you’ve been gate keeping, and why?

pls go on a tangent

Hello love, sorry this took me a little while to get to. Real life :( but in return you get the longest rant I have ever put on tumblr so I hope you are proud of yourself. (Also why have I been keeping it secret? It just hasn’t come up and it is a whole story so buckle up.)

Lore time…

Ok so the lore we are talking about today is Where are the gods??? There were gods but now they are gone. This is broken into 3 events: The Separation, The Dissolution and The Accords (including magestones)

The Past

In the past there were hundreds of gods who roamed the mortal plane. Gods of elements, life and death travelled there to shape the world as they saw it.

As the world developed, the latent simple components of thought and souls began to settle into creatures of the earth.

This created a race of humans, who were the first beings who had souls yet so little innate energy that it would not sustain their bodies forever.

With the rise of humans, Gods of thought and memory grew in power and purpose as more thinking creatures were formed. They had a whole new domain to weave.

The Separation

At this time any magic done by mortals was cast from their own tiny energy store so was small enough to be unnoticeable. The gods intended to keep them to their small powers so that they could never rival the gods in terms of power.

One of the Eldest gods, Ezemhaziel god of controlled magic, traveled the earth trying to create a new way to control magic, the runes. He found a mortal Rin, who seemed to have a talent for magic and a creativity that could help in his work.

Ez created a bond with Rin to share some of his large energy store between them, this is called a Laren bond. Ez later taught him to cast straight from the world around him, similar to how modern mages cast. The pair grew closer and became almost inseparable.

A group of gods watched in disdain as this mortal gained the ability to cast powerful magic. They hated the idea of the narrowing differences between morals and gods, so they decided to remove the threat to their power. These gods gathered and when Rin next left Ez’s side they drew a group of mortals together to kill him.

Rin was attacked by the mortals. He called out to Ez, who came but the gods held him back, and kept him out of Rin’s sight. Rin was killed by the mob. Ez tried to save him with every power he possessed but could not reach him in time. Ez then cursed the gods and the runes and left the mortal plane.

During the encounter Ez pulled so much magic to himself that he formed a concentrated area of Ike, (magic) so much that the mortals could feel the magic that hung in the air around them. These mortals eventually discovered methods to harness the magic around them and became the first druids. Further down the line they also train the first mages. So despite the gods’ efforts (and largely because of them) the mortals get access to more powerful magic. Even though this is all the other gods’ fault, they blame Ez for creating the magic dense area and summon him to a trial.

In his grief Ez does not return to the world so the gods decide that it is reasonable to kill all mortals who have acquired magic and salt the earth where the collection of magic is.

The gods start to go about enacting this, but many other gods are against the idea of culling mortals. This resentment builds especially in gods who rely on mortals as their domain. Gods of memory, thought, fear, illusions and names stand up for the mortals who act as the medium of their power.

The gods who require mortals and therefore prevent the slaughter called themselves the Azeraad, and the gods with no need for mortal creatures label themselves Dieral.

For generations there is a stalemate with a few gods killing and protecting mortals, but most remaining still to prevent a large scale godly war.

The Dissolution

In the decades while the gods watch each other, mortals develop more innovative and powerful magic and build up mage cities. In their development the mages do not forget the massacres that the early Dieral gods committed and plan revenge. They begin work on becoming immortal to further show their power as equals to the gods. Secretly a group develops weapons to use against immortals.

The mage city of Laith’Seyleren is the centre of immortality research and the forefront of magic development when the Dierals finally take notice.

The Dierals break the stalemate to ensure mortals never discover immortality. They destroy the entire city of Laith’Seyleren utterly, no one survives. The other mage cities don’t even find out until a day later when a group of diplomats teleport into a wasteland of rubble and ash.

After this the Mages and the Azeraad gods declare outright war on the Dierals.

The war rages in the deserts to the north west of the Illeri lands with the dieral gods building temples on the mountains to the east and the mages building tall thin mage towers to the west.

Hundreds of mages die in an altogether uneven battle until one mage Muliva Kazi invents a way to bind gods and trap them in Demi-planes then cut the plane off into the aether beyond. This entirely changes the battle as the gods can now be killed. Even the Azeraad gods who fought with the mages were uncomfortable with these machines.

During the battle, a group of mages and Azeraad gods have been working together to end the war but after Kazi’s machines are invented they gain the support of some minor Dieral gods as well.

One member of this group, Paeliae of Laith’Tielere, plans to carry a peace treaty into the temple of the Dieral god of light who leads their forces.

While Paeliae travels through the desert into the walls of godly defences, Ezemhaziel wakes up. He sees the war and the suffering of the mortals and gods and calls on all of the power he could not reach so many years ago to kill the God of light.

He succeeds and takes the fallen god’s seat in the Dieral hall.

Paeliae finds him there and presents him with the treaty. Ez agrees to negotiations of peace and calls the Dierals and Azeraad gods back from the war to meet.

As soon as these words have left Ez’s mouth Paeliae falls to the ground, broken by journey but fulfilled in his purpose. Ez swears one last promise to remember the fallen mortal.

The Accords (Magestones)

The Gods and a collection of mortal mages gather for peace negotiations after years of war.

A compromise is reached where some magic will be bound away so it can no longer be used by the mages or gods.

Magic was bound in giant engraved rocks called magestones. These were made of a translucent stone that glowed and hummed with power. Bindings ran like water across the surface of the stone keeping the magic contained.

Specifically magic relating to immortality, time, and the type of godly binding that Muliva Kazi invented were all collected in magestones so they could not be used again.

Particular war criminals, both gods and mages were also bound in magestones to appease both sides and as a reminder so that a war on this scale would never happen again.

In exchange for the mages giving up large portions of their magic, the gods who fought in the war agreed to leave the mortal plane and return back to their home planes. While in their home planes they can only help their followers indirectly, I.e. creating bonds that are incredibly weak due to the long distance.

Modern Day

So in the modern day the magestones are well established. Mages are taught about the magic restrictions and a few horror stories of people who tried to perform that magic and were absorbed into the magestones. There are a few magestones in Zairel that come up in the Xaeren WIP which is fun.

There are a couple of occasions of gods breaking their pacts and entering the mortal plane and one instance of a god breaking out from a magestone. (He is trapped again eventually, this starts the mist war.) —————————————————————————

Hope you liked the PAGES of lore. There is more but this was already the longest tumblr post I have ever made so that will have to wait.

Tagging the Tag List~ which is new for me:

@thelovelymachinery, @an-indecisive-nerd, @the-letterbox-archives, @oliolioxenfreewrites and @winvyre

[lainswardrobe]

myunhingedportraitprocess1

My work is a mess but I like it being that way.

I like not knowing where something is going when I first start it because it allows the painting to finds itself along the way. And I always end up with unexpected but welcome results.

This may not be the most "egregious" example of my unhinged process but it is one where I enjoy seeing the different stages and felt there was something valuable there to be shared.

Here is the work that this portrait is from.