Eddies World Ember 2022 Pledge, Papers and Nachos!

For every good deed there is an evil one. For every good king there is a villain. For every man there is a woman. And for every sword there is a hand to hold it.

Be the first one to break the cycle; be the smith of your own fortune and destiny; be the one who is loved and feared at the same time, like a heavily wished-for thunderstorm.

Whoever you choose to be, stay true to yourself.

World Ember is another great opportunity to swing the hammer and burn right through the obstacles which prevents me from writing. Since Koria is still one of my youngest projects - and the biggest - it lacks certain things like a magic system, languages, writing systems and the rest of the species. Not to mention the states and the borders and rivers and...

Homework 1

My To-do list for World Ember is pretty simple:

• create species
• create their cultures
• do not burn out

And now detailed:

I need to write my Underlings, my Dwarfs and my Orcs.

For every species I need to create their fertility rituals & procreation rituals (if there are any, not every species has those), their ways of a marriage, their burial rites and blessing rites if there are some (you know, like christian churches...).

And a magic system where I have the rough outlines in mind and thanks to my viewers I have a rather random novel idea. Maybe not the newest or best trope, but I hope to craft it in my own pace and way.

Story time. I joined WA and WE in 2019 and was becoming an active member of the community during this time. Awesome beans everywhere. It was the time where I started with my german vampire novel. It was fine, but WE 2020 invoked a serious writers burnout with my arcana basics in the Sixth Kingdom. Not of the wordcount (2300 words) but of the how-to. And it was not the only article, so I pledge to not burn out in WE22!

Hopefully I can also start with the Northern Realms with my wild tribes and the Frost Maidens, their deadly pursuit of knowledge, wisdom and power. Maybe I can create the lover of the Frost Queen and the Frost Queen herself. The Vael I was hoping for awaits her signal...

Those are the basis of the novels to come, of the shorter stories which eases the mind like my Caretaker's Inn and - to quote my lady - bring out the fluff in all of this bloody-ero-destiny-murder clusterfffffffff....
Take a seat, have a drink and stay a while, I have stories to tell. :)

Homework 2: Meta, just in mini

This year marks the third WorldEmber I participate in and its time to look towards some of the important articles necessary to move forward with lore and systems for Koria. Instead of looking at a single area, I chose to expand my focus and work through articles that are important to the various races and cultures of the world, like my dwarfs and their Dwarven Brass Dye or the Garladans with their light magic. My largest focus for WorldEmber will be species articles, but as I said above, there are rites to write, systems to hammer together and cultures to flesh out.

Setting the themes is more of an direct approach: with every species I can create the habitats and ways of living and parts of their culture, so it might be a little bit of a historic campaign.

Mood is relatively easy. I do have my soundtracks and with the quote of famous british author Neil Gaiman himself "A book is a dream that you hold in your hands", so I'm floating on my small cloud with some music and start to craft dreams so people can dream with me.

Homework 3: Organisation!

Koria is the youngest of my projects and a vast world with a lot of biomes, old and new nations, a lot of species and a lot, a massive number of points of interests. I do have custom categories, but as my world grow, I want to create more and more categories, because there will be more topics I can't cover right now. But I do need a refined structure since most stuff is ill-organised, I didn't realised until the "On the Shoulder of Giants" challenge. So, for my preparation for WorldEmber 2022 I pledge to create a well-mannered, well-organised structure so that my readers can explore in a more easy way alongside my short stories, tells, tales and - eventually - novels.

Homework 4: Presentation!

For the presentation part of the WE homework I have to bail out a bit, because my Co-Author and I are creating a homebrew CSS behind the scenes for the world of Koria. Due to the fact that we are both working full-time and around the clock including kids on his side it will not go live this year and probably not for Q1 of 2023. We are testing out what is working and what is not, so it might take a while.
Besides that I'm satisfied with the spartanic way of Koria's look & feel.
But what is my inspiration and what am I doing being not an artist, but a writer? Correct, I'll generate headers, covers, people and objects with Midjourney and put them in the articles once I have them. My huge inspiration for e.g. the Dragon Sun Empire is Anor Londo from Dark Souls, a Dark Fantasy game series made by FromSoftware. You have heard of Elden Ring, find the games which came before and infused everything after them.
Besides that it is the Kingkiller-Chronic, "What we do in the Shadows" and LOTR including Scholomance from Naomi Novik. We have a few things to do in Koria and a lot of work is ahead, so WorldEmber can come.

If you are afraid of the forest, then be the deadliest thing in the entire forest.

— Ranger to his apprentice

And this way to the Nachos!

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New Years Resolution / Reading Challenge

My resolution & plans for 2023

My resolution hasn't changed since the last World Ember. I want to lay ground for a lots of playgrounds in Koria, I want to have a solid basis for novels and short stories and whatever comes to mind. Be it love, be it war, be it something in between, be it the futility of good and evil.
My plans for 2023 therefore are relatively easy: expand Koria with species, organisations, making the chronicles of it (well, at least I know what happened 1500 years ago until the Spiral incident...), crafting a bit more nations including societies and hopefully can fully write the Tales of Koria. Three of them are done, now I need further information.
Keep away from Janet

And I have to build the flying velociraptor, natural enemy of the Sky Whale

Eddies Choice. Predicate: splendid!

"Let the flames and the Glux guide you to Irath’las."

— The last spoken part before the pyre is lit.

Welcome to Agia, the world of the incredible Panther's Eye. Feast your eyes on this bad-boy of an article, featuring her funeral pyres as a funeral rite in Agia. Kneel down before the glory of her interactive map and bow before her intertwining of history, culture and necessary trades including slaugther and problems for the environment. Ashes over ashes, what could go wrong?

You want to have oppression from the church? Panthers got you covered. You want holy rituals with oils and correct lit pyres where the job of the pyre builder is at stake? Fret no more, you are at the right place, buddy!

Go, inhale this huge article with so in-depth lore and really thought out article, that I can't comprehend how much I still have to learn, to write, to achieve before even thinking about getting on her level.

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I do not know where to start. And maybe you don't know it either. Follow Annies "Guide to Solaris" to explore...well, her world of Solaris, where the chaining of the sun was a crucial act and the space station of Penumbra is now containing the invasion of the Scourge, hellbent angels. What, angels? You are correct.

If you do not know what to read, start at the top and Annie will guide you. And do not look away from Eun or Blue, both are so pure and holy hell, this is a prime example of a primer. Everytime I'm looking at this, I'm more and more impressed and my own primer knocks at the door of my head...

And did I mention her article randomiser when you truly don't know what to read next? (made by the glorious Stormbril)

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Hanhulas Scriptorium. What a masterpiece. I'm a sucker for libraries of all kind, but the "Qualic Scriptorium" is outstanding. It is a way to show how twisted things can get, even in the good way. I love honey, I love libraries and experiences and Hanhula combined all of my love for it into one single building with small drones, bee-hive-like architecture and glorious art, made by Midjourney. I hope one day I can think of concepts like this and make my articles as pleaseable as hers. Good job indeed.

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Deivis Desert Elfs are just like my people of Bernin in my Arkh'Shok series: they think as a group and their hospitality is unmatched. I mean, where would you go and dine if not in the company of the desert elves, where you have to imprint your name in a handy made out of clay and swap it (Guest has to one from the host and vice versa) so you remember the hospitality you recieved? Such beauty in a small gesture!

I can't describe how much I love this thought-out race, and OH MY GOD DID YOU SEE THE CHIBIS?!

"A King must be a river for his people"

— old saying of Unhellion

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Amelies Runic Magic is a short one and a necessary one nonetheless. What I did with my magic system and hundreds of words she does with fewer words, precise descriptions and small, even better art. The style, the purpose, the precise description and the applications fitted in one coherent package on the page of a notebook. This is something I should learn, to describe things with a few words, but as I know myself: that is a next-to-futile undertaking. A wonderful, short read everyone should see.

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Riverfangs Dragonkin (Iron Dragonkin as example) are one example where I just see what I'm missing right now in my world. More images, more ideas, a bit of CSS magic. But this article in and itself is a prime example on how to hook the reader into your article and your world. It is a simple article with much information out front and further information hidden behind the lines and some CSS. I love the small prose-like explanation at the beginning and the more tome-like style of the rest, including social structure and even colour variations! Go take a look, it is definitely worth your while.

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Graylions creation myth about THE ONE is a easy to digest and read piece of an article. With the lore and the history behind THE ONE and the Elder Gods, Graylion paints a wonderful image of a creation myth, accompanied by various articles in the sidebar for further reading, with underlaying layers over layers of lore, images and wonderful descriptions. It is not easy to create a myth nor it is easy to intertwine it with other articles, the universe lore and what comes next and he nailed it.

The Elder Gods should not be confused with pantheons, gods, or even the greater gods of today’s worlds. The Elder Gods are the core concept and beginnings of divinity within creation. A god is to an Elder God as a mortal is to a god.

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Phoenix' Phoenix! What an article. What a history, what description and oh my, there are so many colourful pictures. Phoenix, that derive their colour from their surroundings, a descendent of ████████?! I mean, look at the structure of the article, with a prose from a too curious scholar, with beautiful images (SilverPhoenix anyone?!) and even a small biolologic-like entry for every phoenix there is. And there is also a ShadowPhoenix there... with a pun. Maybe. Go, find it!

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Aster's TATZEL CAFE! This is one of the articles I enjoyed the most. I love SanZera and I love Asters Tatzels. She made one for me and they are cute, adorable and did I mentioned cute? And now we have a Café, where you can come to eat, drink and play with them if you want and, if you are an experienced Tatzel owner, adopt one (or more, I WANT THEM ALL!). Incorporated two ouf beautiful Anvilities (check them out too!) who are the owners of the Café and they are doing a fantastic job!

I want to create some fauna like the Tatzels and I learned how to bring out the best in people. Rescue stations for stray kittens/puppies and tatzels are the best!

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Blue Fairys Holy Temple, a german article for a change. A nice medium-sized read with history, architecture and a detailled description so everyone knows what Blue Fairy is trying to achive here: totally understanding of how the people of Elaqitans worship. And on top of that it is not only a temple at the foot of the Worldtree, there are also pretty images, generated with Midjourney and carefully crafted maps with Inkarnate. A very good example how to hook the readers and the eye with enough information as needed and without overdoing it and a few images to show how it should look like. Well done, well done.

Much more love

The problem with World Ember and Summer Camp: too many good authors with too many good stories, worlds and ideas and concepts, that you can't love them all. Well, you can, but that would create a monster article and so I did some further reading and picked a few. Please enjoy. :)