Mythopeia Project: New Day (Part 1)

There was nothing in the whole world, nothing but mud. It stretched on for as long as the eye could see, it covered every tree trunk, every dislodged piece of flotsam, every broken twig and every surfacing rock. Galevo trudged through it all, his legs effortlessly pushing silt, rotting plants and the muddy waters that nearly reached up to his hip away. His breath was deep, slow and steady, preserving as much energy as possibly, while still on guard should the treacherous swamps and bogs choose not to be as lifeless as they seemed.
Galevo felt something slither along his left leg and stopped to take a better stance. Nothing happened. It was probably just a piece of local wildlife, swimming ignorantly past one of the most dangerous beings in the Multiverse. He saw the tiny raindrops descend from the brown-clouded skies, but he could not feel as they hit is face, covered in armoured plate as it was. His feet continued to trudge on, as effortlessly and steady as ever. He was armoured from top to toe, armoured in a blue-tinted, black steel, eerily marked by glowing, swirling patterns. He knew not their meaning, only that they lent the armour its supernatural strength and endurance. Lent him supernatural strength and endurance.
I am the armour, the armour is me, he recited mentally, remembering what he had been taught upon recieving the prized piece of arcana he now was not only wearing, but actually being a part of.
Despite being a second skin, despite granting him arcane powers only the gods could have once rivaled, despite all this, it had its drawbacks. As the rain fell on his face, he could not feel it through the metal mask, not through the emerald-like eye goggles. He vaguely remembered a state of being before wearing the armour, before being the armour.
I am the armour, the armour is me, he recited again, but this time it was not enough to keep his mind from wandering, wandering into areas even more treacherous than the ones he was traversing now. Wandering into the areas of his past. Before all this. Before the Trials, before the Augmentation, before The Many. Before... before he was who he was now.

“And that’s the Cicle of Yarud,” Tom said, pointing towards the stars. Young Galevo could barely make out four stars that might just look like a cicle. If you squinted your eyes a bit.
“And what’s that?” he asked his big brother, eagerly pointing at a fiery streak across the sky.
“Umm,” his brother responded while biting his underlip, trying to remember the name of the celestial body his younger brother had discovered.
“I’m not sure, it looks kinda like a snake of fire, doesn’t it?” he answered at last. Galevo nodded eagerly.
“Like a dragon,” he said, turning his head towards the bigger boy, smiling with a mouth with the occasional lacking tooth.
“Oh, you’ve been listening to old Omba again, have you?” his bigger brother asked disapprovingly.
“Just a little bit, I swear,” Galevo said, looking at the ground.
“Mother says Omba only tells fairytales. She says none of that ever happened,” Tom said lecturingly.
“I dunno, it was all a long time ago anyway. At least Omba says so. Before grandpa and grandmawere born. Before the village was built even!”
Tom nodded. That was a long time ago.
“Is it just me, or is the ‘dragon’ getting bigger?” Gavelo asked his big brother, they both looked to the sky.

“Arpratan Seimu, respond. I repeat, respond Arpratan Seimu,” the voice ringed inside Galevo’s very mind, ripping him from his daydreams, bringing him back to the dull brown swamps. He gathered his mind to send the required mental messages over the web of thoughts that connected him to the rest of his brothers on this world.
“Arpratan Seimu responding. What is the situation, Ligaste Seimu?”
The Mindweb crackled again; “Orlam-Nebet reports a settlement two thousand paces up north. We are to converge on it, you take the eastern flank. He’s transferring his visions shortly,” the message rang.
“Affirmative. Be adamant, honour the Many,” Gavelo sent to his brother-in-arms.
“Honour the Many,” came the response, and then the Mindweb went silent.
Galevo felt a tingling sensation in the back of his mind as the visions from Orlam-Nebet, the group leader they mostly referred to as Grek, poured into his consciousness.
They were were sights, sounds, smells and other sensations. For a second he could feel the beating of Grek’s heart, the breeze of his breat, the very sensation of being another person as if you had never been anyone else. It was awkward, Grek was a brother born from the Augmentation as himself. Similar in all ways, yet feeling his every fibre of being showed Gavelo that they were in fact different. Similar, but different. Shortly after, the scope of the visions reduced to what was important; the sights and sounds.
He saw a small hamlet of thatched huts. People in woollen clothes walking about tending their own business. He saw smiths, shepherds leaving for the fields, children running after dogs, playing with each other in the muddy streets, and mothers shouting at them not to get themselves dirty, all in vain of course.
It was a village that reminded Galevo of the distant place he had once called home. Distant, not only in space, but in time as well. It was a village that reminded him of his birthplace, and more importantly; it was a village like a thousand thousands of villages in the Multiverse. Orphaned places, where humanity lived on in ignorance.
They believed the death of the Ancestor Gods had broken the Multiverse, broken the Web of Worlds connecting them. They had slept through Long Night. Well, it was time for them to wake up.
It was time for Galevo to stir their sleepwalk, and bring the light of New Day.

Mythopoeia - Preparations.

Presenting the winner:

"Well done warrior. You have made yourself worthy to serve Us. You have gone through the Augmentation, you have met the dangers and faced the Trials. Now go forth, unto Our enemies. Be adamant in your quest, be ruthless in your execution. Serve Us well, bring Divine Light to the darkest corners of the Multiverse. Please Us, Our child, and your soul will be immortalized upon death. You are a soldier of the Many, and your destiny is to die. Never forget that... Child of Ours."

So what will I make out of this? Well, I am for one going to emphasize on the "and your destiny is to die" part. Sounds badass, right? Not only that, but it also a chance to explore the psyche of someone whose destiny is indeed to die.

Other this to shed some light on are the capitalized words, the Augmentation and the Trials. As well as getting to know who these mysterious "We" are, the so-called "Many".

So here's the first few thoughts:

I was thinking at length a few days ago exactly what setting this would require. Fantasy? Sci-fi? Alternate history? Something entirely else? In the end it was the word "Multiverse" that drove it home. The decision is quite simple; I won't place great emphasis on the setting. The Multiverse is a concept quite close to the universe, but it is somewhat different. This is something I'll make clear. There will be different worlds and travels between these, but these worlds won't necessary be planets.

This also lends me some freedom regarding what equipment and abilities will appear. Want swords and guns bashing each others? Well, why not!

Hopefully, I'll have some of it up in short time. Just for fun.

Mythopoeia - Results

It was a close race between option nr. 2 and nr. 4, with two leading for a long time only within the last couple of days being overrun by option nr. 4. 1 and 3 however, never received even a single vote. Interesting.

And so it comes to pass that Option 4 is the definite winner. I will get to defining the backstory and supplement what I can as soon as possible. In fact, I have quite a few ideas already, and hopefully they'll be fresh and inspiring. I can tell you so much that they involve parallell worlds, mystically powered armour, fanatic warriors and possibly a virtual reality. Who knows; I've been known to change my mind before.

Updates will appear shortly. Let's see where this takes us, people.

Mythopoeia - Mythmaker

I have always been fond of using my imagination - and a fair amount of intellectual theft - to make up imaginary worlds, something my friends all can give testimonies on. I remember early on in Elementary where I used to play with a few other boys that we were soldiers in space fighting aliens, or brave knights killing monsters and undead, or even superheroes with different items and backstories granting us our superpowers.

I especially remember one of "my" earliest creations - this was before I was of school age, mind you - where I and two older boys played we were superheroes. I developed a fictional backstory for these three as we all made up their abilities. I remember finding a piece of metal that looked like sword and inventing a story about a magic blade granting heroic powers, and a ring that gave powers to what essentially would become the swordsman's sidekick (me, since I was the youngest). The third was a spider-man like guy named "The Hook" who had powerful equipment that revolved around shooting hooks and slinging from rooftop to rooftop.
Ah, those were the days.

Now, I have always kept this interest moderately active, and now... in the words of a certain psychopathic serial killer; "I'd like to play a game."

I'm going to write three short texts, or quotes rather, and then you'll vote on which will I'll develop further. Nothing big, just for you entertainment. Voting will be done in the poll.

Here we go:

1.
"It is the year 2009, and the world's superheroes are busy fighting crime and stopping the evil masterminds in taking over the world. Norway is no exception; here the magnificent Baldr, the stoic Lion of Norway and the vengeful Hird does battle in order to preserve - or destroy - the nation. Who will win in the end? And what will be of the victor?"

2.
"There can be no peace between Klore and Daynelle. War is the natural state, as the gods intended. Be it on the fields of battle, at sea, in the skies of even the underworld itself; we will always fight one another.
As is only right and just."

3.
"Commander's Log. Entry #244.B89/q - We have succesfully left the system where The Breathing Faclon was lost. Already now do I see the tensions between the Seculra and Vinatri. Their ancients struggles are rising to the surface. The prophecies are hard to swallow, and more and more Urgites are closing down in stasis. I fear for the integrity of the crew, I fear for the future of the Undertaking. My own Mekanth have promised their loyalties to me if the worst should happen. Fools - can't they understand that as their commander I must remain above their petty conflicts? And yet - my hunch is telling me that the darkest hours are yet to come. Regardless, the Undertaking goes on."

4.
"Well done warrior. You have made yourself worthy to serve Us. You have gone through the Augmentation, you have met the dangers and faced the Trials. Now go forth, unto Our enemies. Be adamant in your quest, be ruthless in your execution. Serve Us well, bring Divine Light to the darkest corners of the Multiverse. Please Us, Our child, and your soul will be immortalized upon death. You are a soldier of the Many, and your destiny is to die. Never forget that... Child of Ours."

I hope this will spark your imagination. Choose wisely. :-)