let there be light

Let there be cheese!

Eh, Light can wait.
Alternate proposal: The world begins with the smallest hint of form, a miniscule crystal seed of stability amidst the formlessness that withstands the Void that slowly, over timeless pre-ages, propagates as the surrounding void yields to an expanding network of form.

We need a god/creator,
I vote Nicolas Cage.

I want to create magic first, then the internet.

Let there be darkness. Let there be space and emptiness. Let there be a great hollow hall that a world may be built in!

Erhannis 2015/02/03(Tue)01:11 No. 623360 ID: 321d85
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>>623357
>>623353
>>623349

Behold, the vast shadow, beyond measure, beyond filling, and beyond reason. Empty it lies, insensible of cold, or of time, or of loneliness.

With nothing to measure its passing, perhaps Time cannot be said to be.

Vast potentials, possibilities, silently and motionlessly war with one another, frozen in unchanging deadlock.

Yet in the darkness, when measureless eternities had passed, something shifted.

A crack. A splintering. And a seed crystallized. Magic came to be, beating out the other powers in the motionless race for existence, and its structure flowed over the face of the darkness.

It carried with it dimension and form, and its spread marked the unseen progress of time.

>>623345
Hahahaha, I was SO tempted to go with this, but I kinda want this to be semi-serious, and it's a little hard to have a serious, internally consistent world if the first thing to exist is CHEESE. :P

Dang, sharp lines are hard to see in the thumbnails. Sorry.

First came magic. Then came wizards.

Then came the mind of magic, That which granted sentience and form.

>>623370
Yes. The magic is aliiiive.

Let magic birth fire and let the void dance with the light of many new stars.

Heat! We must use heat and pressure to fuse the asteroids from before into a planetoid

1/2 Erhannis 2015/02/03(Tue)10:59 No. 623382 ID: 321d85
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>>623370
>>623373

As Magic spread its form across the infinite expanse, minute irregularities occurred. Some of these altered the progression of the lattice, and some rippled in all directions.

Aeons passed.

And a question was asked.

"We are alone in darkness. Why?"

2/2 Erhannis 2015/02/03(Tue)10:59 No. 623383 ID: 321d85
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>>623342
>let there be light

>>623383
Yoooo, this is a trip

And somewhere in the distance, from another place, with no explanation as to how such a paradox was possible, something conjured blood.

Blood flows through this universe. This blood changes depending on where it is and how magic interacts with it. What this blood is, I don't know. All I THINK I know about it is that blood flows.

But such things are beyond our comprehension, aren't they?

We need some celestial bodies over here. Let there be planets

>>623383
Somewhere, light years away, nebulae and a quasar is visible from this location. The lights of the bright gas filled galaxy begin to flicker alight. The quasar is mostly harmless.

With the creation of light, darkness was brought into being. From the shadows new magic was born, magic unlike that of the void.

>>623396
Magic of possibility, space, and emptiness!

From magic flowed energy and form, and slowly matter was created.

We cant ignore cheese though. It has to come back as immensely important later.

1/2 Erhannis 2015/02/04(Wed)08:39 No. 623498 ID: 321d85
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In the creation of light, of the stars, much of Magic was burned away, spent - or invested, rather, in the titanic change wrought upon reality.

>>623396
Yet dissension grew. Fragments of Magic regretted the loss incurred, and the pain suffered. They railed against those still standing by the choice made, calling for a return to the peace of the darkness - to revoke their actions and unravel their creation.

But fewer in number, and lesser in power, these voices could not sway the others - neither by persuasion, nor by force of strength, rally though they might to assail their brethren. And so, ultimately they retreated sullenly to the shadows they loved so much.

2/2 Erhannis 2015/02/04(Wed)08:40 No. 623499 ID: 321d85
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>>623389
And the champions of creation continued the work. More slowly and carefully than before, they continued to create. In the creation of the stars, excess matter had also been created. This they ushered together, forming larger and larger masses, accreting dust over aeons to form titanic bodies.

But the watchers in the darkness were not idle. Some were less bitter than others - and some were more cunning. In some tasks, there were those that consented to help their light-loving siblings. And wherever they worked, on whatever they touched, they silently left their mark - as did their brethren.


>>623439
Hmm...we'll see.

while the light touched created worlds the darkened ones decided to create as well. On the the light touched's worlds they seeded something new, something that would demand the light touched's attention and cast their gaze away from the darkened ones and there plans to return everything to the peace of the void. They created life. Life that would grow and spread on the planets. Life that would capture the light touched's attention, draw them in, and sent their imaginations wild. Life, that sapped magic away from the light touched for it's own petty needs.

Darkness struck a blow to the light,
But the light was not defeated, rather, splintered into six fragments.
Red
Orange
Yellow
Green
Blue
and
Violet

Those in the light learned to wield it, to give them avatars, to give them communication and thought processes faster than anything magic alone had ever achieved. Those in the light gradually learned how to represent different things, developing an advanced universal language that encompassed all forms of art.

Those in the dark found their universe changed by the existence of light. Radiation seeped into dark matter within deep space for the first time. They learned how to bang rocks together. And as eons passed, their knowledge of physics grew. They developed advanced technology that could be crafted from the simplest of tools - rocks.

They're getting along that is so sweet! But the rumors of curuption worry me, I vote create a balance guardian. One not swayed by either side but rather invested the equality of all things.

>>623499
>>623524
Along with this guardian, I vote that we should make guardians of the world we make, and whenever a new guardian is created, the heavenly stars align to form new constellations in their honour.

If this happens, make the constellation some scales, where the Stars involved would become brighter or even a unique color. that'd be pretty awesome.

Eventually certain fragments rose to be more than others. These fragments became gods.

>>623524
This guardian shall be a chicken atop an egg,
Both where created at once,
Like Light the Chicken facilitates for the egg,
And like Darkness the Egg gives purpose to the Chicken.

>>623536
If this is happening i would like the chicken in charge of light and also to name it Ra.

Erhannis 2015/02/05(Thu)07:26 No. 623633 ID: 321d85
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>>623524
>>623530
>>623533
It was decided that for each great mass, an overseer, a guardian was needed, for there was yet much to be done - the expanse now teemed with ideas, with possibilities, and who could deny them reality?

>>623502
Just using your term, not your suggestion, just yet, thanks/sorry
The light-touched strove with one another, to find and to be made guardians over the worlds. However, the watchers in darkness were not content to merely watch. Whether from a small burgeoning care for the works they had helped make, or from a secret spiteful desire to taint and corrupt and pull down these new works of the light-touched, they demanded a hand in the governance of these new creations. After much contention and strife, it was decided.

For each great creation, a pair entities would be chosen: one from the light, and one from the dark. They would submit themselves, and in their full consent be forged anew as one, bound together in their new duty as Guardian. Though they remained distinct, representing the sometimes differing interests of their origins, nevertheless their existences were intertwined, a marriage of Light and Darkness. And as Darkness has no meaning without Light, nor Light without Dark, neither could the two Aspects any longer be considered separately.



Pick a system and planet, and as many of their attributes as you care to.

You may also describe the guardian/s, since that seems important, though I'm flummoxed as to how to describe a formless entity of magic. Perhaps by personality, power, etc.? Cunning, optimistic, etc. Note that I envision them as basically being two entities, light and dark, with their unification being a little more of a technicality that'll come up once in a while, probably to explain stuff. Like, they have some measure of power over each other, and you can't destroy just one of them, etc.

We may eventually return to this point, to pick a new planet and start again.

Choose a world built from all the elements in the universe. Every mineral, every metal, every liquid, every gas, every plasma, every mana, every form of magic that has ever existed.

In relative terms, this world is far from the galactic center (whatever metric is used to determine the core of the universe), but has a distinct history as a form of art.

The life that begins on this planet started out as an experiment to create a self-replicating group of minerals, which would transform from one mineral to the next, and back again, in hopes of creating a planet where its layers would constantly shift in materials much like a child's toy, a planetary work of art. The experiment failed when the minerals began to deviate, eventually interacting with magic to create amino acids...

>>623633
It's alright, truth be told I had no idea what I was doing and mostly just wrote that just to see what would happen. So don't worry about it

how about a system that is on the edge of the light touched's territory and the watchers in darkness's territory. The planet has lots of mountains and canyons and a ton of natural tunnels and cave throughout it's crust.

The guardian/s are dueled natured because of it's origin. During the day the light touched being has direct control and at night the watcher in the darkness is in the driver's seat. Both can still sway the actions of the other regardless of the time of day it's just when one is in control the guardian takes on the mannerisms of magic being that is in control. The light touched is light hearted, always seeking to entertain itself, and always trying to discover new things. The watcher on the other hand is shy, prefers to watch things from a distance, and conflicted as it wants things to return to the void but has come to value this new world above all else.

>>623649
If i could add on to this,
since the planet isn't really close to its star the world is coated in snow and ice. The tunnels throughout are thinly lined with ice causing the entire network of tunnels to shine and glint as though the world's veins were full of diamonds.

>>623633
If we're going about choosing lifeforms for this planet, les not try to stick to just run of the mill human like things, we could make flora fauna or imp people g
for instance

>>623536
>>623554
Instead of chickens, lets make the more like Cockatrice. Lizard-Birds, basically.

Ra will be an active Guardian,
And Ti the one trapped in the egg will be a more passive guardian.
Ti will represent the endless possibilities in the darkness, watching, and waiting.

Slowly it will grow, and one day when it's power is sufficient, it will hatch and encase Ra in an Egg made of Darkness. Unless, of course it changes it's mind.

>>623650
I second an Ice Wold.

There should random Pillars of Ice, to mess with the inevitable Sentient Life on this planet.

The people should be created in the image of the Guardians. Feathery and Scaled.
Also, A race of people that are primarily feathered, The Ascendant, created by the light and only touched by the dark, they are the most like Ra.
And, The Scaleborn, Created by the Darkness and touched by the light, Dissimilar to Ra. Though not necessarily in the image of Ti.

They can have viable babies with each other, provided Racism doesn't kick in too quickly, to create intermittent Races.

They Lay Eggs.

>>623679
Love the idea but reptiles are kinda weak in the cold, so to counter this fact I suggest the Scaleborn breath/wield fire.

>>623687
Also, the Scaleborne could live in the tunnels/underground.
And the Ascendant can fly. They could live on the Random pillars maybe?

Planimals, to supply to energy from the base elements to the higher beings.

And Planimal people too? Maybe an accident...

>>623695
Yeas, an ancient race that lives between the two races! A bridge between the two created equally from the Light and Dark.
There should be like three variants,

A "Bear's Foot Sanicle" combined with a "Bear."
And two others.

Hey, I'm kinda sick and have been trying to sleep it off, or I'd have posted this morning. In the meantime, it seems like we're leaning toward some kind of ice world. My intent is that we'll be following the evolution of a number of species (presumably starting with one strain of bacteria...unless they don't?), building up a semi-workable ecosystem. Y'know, unless you all complain bitterly. So if you want to start posting the first few steps of that, (or want to propose a different way of doing things, or something), then feel free.

>>623783
The Ascendant, the Scaleborne, and the Ancients will be goals to reach!

First will need a Hyrdogen based lifeform.
That collects and consumes energy somehow.

Another planimal could be a pine tree mammoth bet those would look pretty sweet. For now maybe some the pillars could be made out of ice and the micro organisms could evolve in those. Could explain later on why some of the species feel attached to these odd landmarks.

>>623806
Agree, Also there should be some that grow in the caves.

>>623783
If we're going to be on an ice planet, then having plant animals or any kind of photosynthesizing organism as our species will be unwise. We need to go for something else, something carnivorous.

For microorganisms, have some kind of chemoautotrophic microorganism. Starlight is not needed if H2, Fe, sulfur atoms and N2 are present to be oxidized.

Hey, I'm making a new update. I'm on the fence about something, though. It's functionally the same either way, but may have philosophical implications, and/or affect how the guardians handle things in the future. Do we want the guardians to simply wait until life happens, or instigate it?

>>624350
I like the idea of it being a happy mistake that they find one day.

wait for it to happen.

>>624350
They don't outright create life, but, I want them to accidentally help it along, like one day they're bloody smashed and accidentally create an image of life which the planet follows on its own

1/4 Erhannis 2015/02/10(Tue)00:48 No. 624419 ID: 321d85
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>>623649
>>623650
>>623679
We go now to a world already old. Far from the warmth of its sun, the heat of its birth gradually faded, magma giving way to sheets of ice over the countless years. Though the tidal forces from its two moons keep the planet from complete icy slumber, it's not enough to stave off the freezing cold of the surface.

The planet's guardians keep watch, handling new developments, and once or twice averting disaster. Their vigil is as tireless and patient as the stars themselves...well, for the most part.

2/4 Erhannis 2015/02/10(Tue)00:49 No. 624420 ID: 321d85
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Ra, the Light Aspect, being by nature a cheerful, impulsive, and curious being, can tend toward impatience, ever seeking something new in the myriad tunnels or among the scattered spires of ice. It galls him that he, the more energetic of his partnership, is confined within an unmelting globe of ice. He tries to manifest differently, but alas, he has, as of yet, been unable to do so.

3/4 Erhannis 2015/02/10(Tue)00:50 No. 624421 ID: 321d85
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Ti, the Dark Aspect, on the other hand, would have been just as happy to be entombed in ice. Shy, she spends the days shrouded deep in the darkness of secluded caves. Some of the deepest tunnels have liquid water, warmed by the planet's still molten core. Though she remembers the void, she finds solace in this new darkness, and has come to appreciate its...solidity. She silently brushes the surface of the water, lightlessly watching the ripples spread across the surface.

4/4 Erhannis 2015/02/10(Tue)00:52 No. 624422 ID: 321d85
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At times, over the years, they disagreed on what to do with the world they were tasked with governing. Ra was ever in favor of grand, sweeping changes, while Ti was afraid of the chaos such might bring, and of what they stood to lose if their changes turned sour. They made superficial changes to the structure of the planet, some cosmetic alterations here and there, but nothing big enough to satisfy Ra's insatiable need for new and interesting things, and even the changes such as they made caused no end of concern to Ti.

On rare occasion, when the bitterness of long years and the frustration of disharmony grew too much for them, they fought; terrible clashes of magic that scarred the surface. They saw the ugliness their conflicts brought. They always regretted it afterwards. Yet a spark of their conflict, a shard of the brilliant magic flashing forth from the battlefield, drifted down into the depths, alighting in a dark, warm pool, and began a change.

It corralled some of the minerals and elements suffusing the waters, and became Life. A tiny organism, harnessing the warmth of the earth, becoming in effect a tiny geothermal plant.

I don't know if that's actually how that works, but magic.

It pulled nutrients from the surrounding water and slowly multiplied, eventually coating the surface of the nearby rocks. Precisely how long it lay there is immaterial. What is important is that it was discovered.

Ti, meandering the caves, came upon a pool which had a slightly different quality to it. She investigated, and to her shock, discovered the organisms. Though their presence frightened her, she understood the gravity of the matter. She summoned Ra, and there in the darkness, in hushed tones, over weeks and perhaps months, they decided the fate of the fledgling race.

Though this new development was not planned, it was there. A new race was in their midst. Encourage them, leave them be, or snuff them out and pretend nothing had ever happened? Even Ra was uncertain. It could change everything so completely.

Perhaps it was the way the creatures silently lay so still, so calmly, or how they flourished in the darkness, but Ti felt a small affection for them begin to grow in her heart.

"Let us guide them," she whispered.

And it was decided.

You can now suggest possible variations. Unless it ends up being problematic, you can consider the images to be basically accurate. So like, you could suggest longer flagella things, or new functions, or something.

Also, would you rather I resized my images to 800x600? Or something?

>>624422
I'm guessing we're to suggest things to the guardians? or do we have direct control over the species' evolutionary choices?

If we're controlling the new species, it's a long way to the top. I think what we should do is instinctively look for more things to ingest. (making a note to later evolve into something which has a broader 'diet')

Though, if we were suggesting things to the guardians, perhaps we could encourage them to eat other things. If there is no life on this planet, except this species, maybe we could broaden our biodiversity and create some other plants or microorganisms for our current species to interact with and perhaps learn to eat?

I bet this current species will always be our favorites though.

We all know that Ra can't sit still for very long in the dark watching life happen. So either Ra needs to blast a hole to the surface to let light in or take some the organisms outside and create a new environment for the creatures to evolve in.

>>624424
Either one/both. It's assumed that directions like, "grow longer flagella" or "learn to photosynthesize" are ways that the guardians shape the growth of the organisms. You can also instruct the guardians directly.

This species is mineral-based, right? That means they probably wouldn't have to eat, if they stay underground; they get their vitamins and minerals from actual minerals.
I think it's obvious we want them to grow up to be big thinky things, but for now, small steps. They need locomotion (quadrupeds sounds nice and stable) and drive.
I picture anywhere from dog-to-horse sized mineral creatures, the energy to move coming from the chemical reactions occuring within them. Mostly hard edges, but the areas around their senses (eyes and ears and such) could be smoother, so that they can have some personality. They go around, absorbing minerals into themselves to keep going; they're essentially walking reactors, which need a constant supply of fuel. And, if we can at this stage, make them curious. If we need to directly intervene to give them thought, we can, but just curiosity might be enough to grow thought.
Also lets slap down some bright bioluminescent moss or something so that they're not blind.

I think we need a little verity. This creature seems to be alone and only lives in the dark, shouldn't it be similar to the guardians? Shouldn't there be a balance? One of darkness and one of light? I say Ra should take some of this life and find a way for it to live on the surface. It seems to live off the minerals of this planet and produces it's own heat. surely all that should be needed is for Ra to give it longer roots so it can live above ground, Oh and maybe he should let the leaves(vines?) on the top glow so when the wind blows it looks as if they are dancing.

>>624431
They would have to grow to multicellorganisms with brains to have curiosity or thought.
For now, they are just stupid survive machines.
(Like little robots)

>>624460
Agree,
Ra, take some to the top of a pillar and melt a puddle in the pillar for them to live in.
The pillar ones, learn photosynthesize!
Cave ones, More flagella.
Both, Learn to reproduce like a jellyfish.

>>624531
Prolly just like super simple Polyp-Planula Cycle.

The guardians experimented with the multicellular organisms, advancing their growth in unnatural yet rational ways. What surprised them was the capabilities of their reproductive cycle; unhindered by the sun, this life could easily devour the universe. Ti was afraid yet further affectionate of these animals, while Ra thought up ways to make their existence beneficial to the universe, and not an unkillable, destructive abomination.

Ra brought them into the sun, and they died. Yet they died in amazing ways that seemed to outline the natural laws of the universe, and so Ra kept experimenting. Ti spun rhythms and patterns of magic and physics into the lifeforms, which ensured their ties to magical affinity and psychic potential. For eons, the life constantly evolved to grow more and more proficient in the darkness, yet capable of performing melodies and lightshows. Ti began to understand the true beauty of the light, but only when it was a chorus of simple beacons in the stillness of space. For all intents and purposes, the overwhelming light of the sun was too intense, and she spun her patterns more intricately to ensure that the caverns would not be completely illuminated, and the lifeforms always sang new songs and made new shows.

And one summer afternoon, Ra went into the cave, as he always did when he wanted to talk to Ti. And he brought out a multicellular lifeform, as he always did, to test what would happen when it died. And yet, it survived the Rayleigh scattering of the radiation from the sun.

Thus began a branch between the different forms of life: those that created art to live in peace, and those that stood in defiance of overwhelming force through perseverance and violence.

>>624538
Kome, i think you should probably suggest something that writes the story instead of actually writing the story. Just a heads up.