WorldEmber 2023 Homework

Introduction

Salutations Dear Readers! On a whim I decided to revisit World Anvil after a long hiatus and I stumbled across WorldEmber World building event and Prep event. To my surprise I was instantly pulled into the spirit of this event and was invigorating to restart my world from creative stagnation. Personally, I am not a naturally inclined or gifted creative type, however I am also the belief of if you are not good at something then you need to work harder at it. (If it is something that you want to improve!)
Enough of my babbling! Here I will give a quick summary of my world . . . .

Empire of a Thousand Sunsets

The war lasted centuries, alliances were forged, broken and remade after conquest and also after defeat. The Ancients and The Old Gods selfishly coveted the world for their own goals, however the Divine Ones wished to depart the world and remain aloof but create an Eden for their creation: Mankind. Whom's world did Mankind inherit?

The setting and time period of the majority of Empire of a Thousand Sunsets are set many millennia after the Eternal War (as it is more commonly called now in myth and legend and religious texts). The world is filled with spectator landscapes and flora and fauna with a acute sense of awareness of the world, the people practise a form of spiritual worship that has a direct outcomes both for good and ill. To my readers and players, navigating this world is not only focusing on going on an adventure and dealing with the Bad Guys but also deciding who are the Bad Guys and is doing the right thing always is the right thing to do.

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Week 1: Pledge Your Goal

As currently my world building has stagnated I wish to focus on establishing a concise and expanded chronology of events from the Eternal War to the Founding of the Empire of a Thousand Sunsets. This will then give me a solid base to build upon the lore of the world and give depth to the historical events, culture, social structure of the Empire (which will be of my world with possibilities of exploring other organisations and locations at a later date.)

Goal:

Brief Historical timeline of the founding of my world (myth creation), prehistory and how the Empire of a Thousand Sunsets was created and evolved over the generations.

Reasons:

As an avid historical fiction and fantasy reader, I love the whole concept on how the protagonist world's and their place in it, is just a small part of the history of the world they are living. I hope that exploring and creating this rich history of the world of the Empire of a Thousand Sunsets myself and sharing with you all would be as exciting as undergoing an adventure with the main storyline in the future.

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Week 2: Creating the Mini-Meta

Initially I thought that to be safe that I would just create a literal timeline with articles going in chronological order with sub articles perhaps littered moderately throughout but then that would be not very creative inspiring and probably very boring to read. I then thought about how other mediums play with the idea of giving timeline information to build up a world.

My sources of inspiration for this Mini-Meta:

1. A historical fiction book called The Historian, by Elizabeth Kostova: which reveals a timeline of historical events through present day actions (present day in the novel). This is done similarly like Bram Stoker's Dracula where past events are revealed through letters, missives, stories and flashbacks to name a few.
2. Wheel of Time series, By Robert Jordan (finished by Brandon Sanderson): I get a lot of inspiration from this book but in particular to this situation, within the Wheel of Time series plots it is always a running theme that distance and time distorts facts and rumours can gain a life of their own to the point that discerning the truth is a complicated and nigh impossible task.
3. Beowulf saga, Iliad, Pagan legends and myths: These have always intrigued me as a lot of myths and legends are distinct yet in some ways weirdly similar. As a lot of our ancient history and probably events in prehistory that weren't properly recorded at the time are in those myths and legends.
4. The Bible: Now I don't specifically mean The Bible that is in current use but on how it has evolved and changed through history and what is has influenced its' content and also on how it has influenced cultures, society and the world.

To summarise the themes from the sources above throughout WorldEmber event I will create a in-world chronicle detailing a debate of historical texts from the archives of Empire of a Thousand Sunsets Royal Library, these will include extracts from the historical texts (with in some cases literal and/or interpreted translations), discussions, revisions and in rare cases censorship. So, without further ado I present to you all:

A Treatise on the Compendiums of Vishidal History

Forward

Interpretations of Vish

Vish and The Others

Emergence of The Old Ones

Creation of Vishidal

Divergence of the Karmaic Forces

Karmaic Theory

Earliest Texts on Karmaic Influences

Main Branches of Karmism

Supremency of Bar-Karmaic system

Founding of the Divine Authority

Summary of the Chronology of Mankind's Vishidal by High Archja Hortiu

Author's Note

Aftermath of the Eternal War

Correspondence between Prehistory and Bar-Karmism Creation Myth

Reemergence of Mankind

Lake Moon Cliff city states

Sunrise Wars

End of the Sunrise Wars & Emergence of Landis Kingdom

Golden Age of the Landis Kingdom

Great Calamity & Decline of Landis

The Divine Authority & Founding of the Empire

Conclusion on Chronology of Mankind's Vishidal

Critiques on the Bar-Karmaic theocracy

Antiquarian evidence of Vishidal Creation

Social Upheaval of Late Bar-Karmaic societies

Critical View on the Evolution of Karmaic Law during the Landis Period

Mandate of Divine Authority

Epilogue

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Week 3: Welcome your readers!

Introduction

As my homepage was a wall of incoherent text, I decided to add more elements and break-up the text into a proper introduction and add a teaser at the top of the page so it is the first element readers shall see. I added an example of what my world's early language written system would look like and also added a Book at the bottom of my upcoming world building final goal.
In Conclusion, there is alot I wish to change and annoyances I have not found a way around, for instances the lack of font changes and layout options (I am currently on a Freeman account) and the inability to centre the image of the early script language. I will keep trying to improve and update this homepage more regularly than I have so far.

Elements Added to Homepage

• Premise
• Early example of my World's written script with translation
• Introduction to the world of Empire of a Thousand Sunsets
• Upcoming Book which will be the final end result of WorldEmber event.

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Week 4: Last Minute Prep!

Here we go! I am very excited and apprehensive about starting my first WorldEmber event. For my last minute preparation, I have collected all my reference materials, notes, saved some world building prompts and podcasts to give me motivation and inspiration in the weeks to come. I have created a separate OneNote project to make it easier for me to do some brainstorming.

Update (30-11-2023):

These past few days I have been preparing some outlines for my world building articles and deciding what types of articles would fit best. To make it clear to my readers I am creating an in-world book that will delve and explore the different aspects of my world but using in-world texts and understandings based on what is deemed 'correct' by the people within the world and not necessarily mean that is what actually happened or fact. This is to give some depth to the notion that beliefs, history and society change and evolve.

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Writing Schedule

My daily schedule will consist of the following:
Commute: Brainstorming & Listening to podcasts for inspiration.
Work Breaks: Outlining the plot and rough drafting article or sub-section of article. Evenings: Rewriting rough draft and adding in text styles and layout structure.
I am generally more creative and productive in the mornings so on the weekends I will focus on consolidating the week's articles and reviewing any consistencies and missing portions. In addition, I will also use that time to draw sketches, plotting maps or other aesthetics.

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World Ember 2023

Update 04/12/2023

My initial thoughts after World Ember officially dropped was mixture of awe, admiration and anxiety. Also came the realisation that I seriously underestimates the scale of World Ember itself.
So after much deliberations, I have decided to shift away from the in-world concept of historical document to protray all of my World building.
Several reasons for this is that it would ease the pressure on creating articles that World build and also conform to the in-world views. Secondly, I am concerned that an in-world concept could be construed as a short story so then would invalidate the submission into World Ember competition.
Now my articles will follow the same pledge and mini meta but would focus on creating a series of articles starting from creation of my World upto the founding of the titled Empire of a Thousand Sunsets.

Update 08/12/2023

Few updates so I have finished and submitted 2 articles in special categories; 1 in Myth/Legend category and 1 in Natural Law category, so please check them out.

Vishidal Creation myth gives an overall of the creation of my world and the Gods that reside there.

Karmaic System law again gives an overview of the Karmaic laws and how it operates within my world and how individuals and social groups interact with it.

I am currently working on another article that I will submit to the Organisation special category and enjoying the challenge of intense world building that is part and parcel of World Ember.

Update 12/12/2023

Alright, let's get started! In the past few days I blitzed through and submitted 4 articles and I am 70% done on my progress bar, anyway the articles submitted are as follows:

Ouran Loho Seekers: Exploration Guild based and in mutual support of the Empire of a Thousand Sunsets. Check it out in the Organisation special category.

3 separate Species articles; Celestial Blossoms (which I submitted in the Species special category), Zephyr Raptors and Luminous Drifters.

I am currently working on a substantial Miltary Conflict article which should make me reach over the 10K word count. However other articles in the works are various other species articles and 1-2 habitat articles that I could start but would definitely would need more time to figure out. In terms of submitting any more articles I would probably add in 1-2 species articles and maybe submit an article for the Condition special category. Unfortunately, after this week and early half of next week, I won't be able to contribute much to WorldEmber leading up and during the Christmas period as I have work and family commitments to fulfil, but so far everyone has been very friendly and supportive. Also the sheer amount of amazing work that everyone has done and are still doing throughout WorldEmber is just amazing!

Update 15/12/2023

I reached 10,000 words! Wooo! Well it was a pretty intense few days as I smashed out the Military Conflict article out but it was less fleshed out then I wanted, as I would have liked to added maps and battle plans but don't really have the time or energy to delve it this yet. I also made a more general article about more information about the Karmaic Gods mentioned in the Karmaic Creation article, this general article was just for my references so at a later date I will split up each deity in their own separate articles and really expand and add more details.
Well next for me during World Ember will be maybe add 1-2 more articles but at a more relaxed manner, and also organise all my notes that I have randomly collected throughout this event. Shout out to the community in giving me plenty of advice for how to keep notes and lore organised, as well as few ideas to show you my progress and to-do lists etc on an article to be linked on the homepage.