Worldbuilding Day 7: History
Apr. 23rd, 2011 09:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kayqyToday's challenge is about recent history in my 'verse. Like the last hundred years or so. Once again, did not quite follow directions (and may have accidentally done tomorrow's assignment, too), but I came up with most of this while digesting my aunt's tasty Chocolate Dessert in her porch swing. And I'm happy with where it's leading me, which is what counts.
My first hang-up came when she said to list dates like death of a king, major wars and so on. I have a strong sense of this continent not having kings or kingdoms, possibly not since the ancient cataclysm that shall henceforth be known as the Division. (If it wasn't already; I'm not going to go back and check my old posts right now. Onward!) If you've ever read Bujold's The Sharing Knife series, I think it's kind of like that setting: a destroyed empire in the barely-remembered past, but now just farms and villages and independent towns, growing into a new civilization. And I couldn't really come up with any wars or other major conflicts; none really connected with my characters' stories, and it didn't really seem right to just randomly tack a war onto a year— OH HEY THAT'S WHY THIS ASSIGNMENT GAVE ME SO MUCH TROUBLE. *lightbulb*
Well, that's something to consider later on, I guess. At any rate, even without consciously realizing the source of my hangup, I managed to figure out a few things by connecting them to something I already knew I had: magic crystals.
No, really.
I knew that the town near Paori's temple was both a crossroads to and from the mountain passes, as well as a mining town for the crystals that absorbed and emitted light and heat and so on. And Vester's parents were traders, so I knew that there had to be traders and merchants and such. And I think they're the ones beginning to hold power. Especially the merchants— traders like Vester's family are kind of the last of the old guard, the mom-and-pops being swallowed by the megacorps... or something along those lines. And of course merchants mean bandits. Which means mercenaries/guards, and possibly some of the 'mercenaries' are a step above (or below) a protection racket... and the local towns go after bandits like they're rabid beasts, but if you're stuck between their 'jurisdiction'... Oh dear, I think I know what happened to Vester's parents...
Anyway, with these concepts in mind, I did manage a small timeline of sorts. Since I don't have any calendar system so far, I just started with Year 0 being when the story starts, and going backwards from there:
Years Ago:
0 — Start of story
5 — Paori starts as a neophyte
8 — Sylver born (on the coast)
~11 — Formula for sound-absorbing crystals developed
17 — Vester born (in mountains)
20 — Paori born (in a cave?)
~23 — Towns make agreement to not tolerate bandits within their areas
~30 — Light crystals become a major commodity
~34 — Mines opened
~48 — Temple area becomes trading post/crossroads
~57 — Hermit living near beacon crystal takes on disciples, creates temple
~72 — Hermit takes up living in a cave near 'holy beacon crystal'
I tried coming up with a timeline for the other continents, but I couldn't do it. I think there's some unrest and such over there, going along their not-so-merry-yet-busy way oblivious of Paori's continent altogether, but I can't connect the two yet. I think the demons are going to be the connection, but since I don't yet know what exactly the demons are doing.... *shrugs*
*reserves the right to repeat some of this tomorrow, if applicable*
My first hang-up came when she said to list dates like death of a king, major wars and so on. I have a strong sense of this continent not having kings or kingdoms, possibly not since the ancient cataclysm that shall henceforth be known as the Division. (If it wasn't already; I'm not going to go back and check my old posts right now. Onward!) If you've ever read Bujold's The Sharing Knife series, I think it's kind of like that setting: a destroyed empire in the barely-remembered past, but now just farms and villages and independent towns, growing into a new civilization. And I couldn't really come up with any wars or other major conflicts; none really connected with my characters' stories, and it didn't really seem right to just randomly tack a war onto a year— OH HEY THAT'S WHY THIS ASSIGNMENT GAVE ME SO MUCH TROUBLE. *lightbulb*
Well, that's something to consider later on, I guess. At any rate, even without consciously realizing the source of my hangup, I managed to figure out a few things by connecting them to something I already knew I had: magic crystals.
No, really.
I knew that the town near Paori's temple was both a crossroads to and from the mountain passes, as well as a mining town for the crystals that absorbed and emitted light and heat and so on. And Vester's parents were traders, so I knew that there had to be traders and merchants and such. And I think they're the ones beginning to hold power. Especially the merchants— traders like Vester's family are kind of the last of the old guard, the mom-and-pops being swallowed by the megacorps... or something along those lines. And of course merchants mean bandits. Which means mercenaries/guards, and possibly some of the 'mercenaries' are a step above (or below) a protection racket... and the local towns go after bandits like they're rabid beasts, but if you're stuck between their 'jurisdiction'... Oh dear, I think I know what happened to Vester's parents...
Anyway, with these concepts in mind, I did manage a small timeline of sorts. Since I don't have any calendar system so far, I just started with Year 0 being when the story starts, and going backwards from there:
Years Ago:
0 — Start of story
5 — Paori starts as a neophyte
8 — Sylver born (on the coast)
~11 — Formula for sound-absorbing crystals developed
17 — Vester born (in mountains)
20 — Paori born (in a cave?)
~23 — Towns make agreement to not tolerate bandits within their areas
~30 — Light crystals become a major commodity
~34 — Mines opened
~48 — Temple area becomes trading post/crossroads
~57 — Hermit living near beacon crystal takes on disciples, creates temple
~72 — Hermit takes up living in a cave near 'holy beacon crystal'
I tried coming up with a timeline for the other continents, but I couldn't do it. I think there's some unrest and such over there, going along their not-so-merry-yet-busy way oblivious of Paori's continent altogether, but I can't connect the two yet. I think the demons are going to be the connection, but since I don't yet know what exactly the demons are doing.... *shrugs*
*reserves the right to repeat some of this tomorrow, if applicable*
