Worldbuilding Wednesday

[silvercat17]

It's time to tell us about your setting!

Here are some possible questions you can answer, or tell us whatever you want. Feel free to go as large-scale or small-scale as you want.

• What kind of magic or technology characterizes your world?
• What are some myths, legends, or idioms that are common?
• What's a major city and what's it like?
• What's the landscape like where most of the stuff is happening?

This is a great time to share info about your canon that would allow others to make collages.

Comments

[ilthit]

I am working on a setting for "gothic romance" stories, period late 18th to early 20th century, for the Holly and Hawthorn series, which I want to rewrite... I have so many projects though. 😅

The idea is that it is like our world, but there is a second world overlain over it, like Faerie in works like Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, which I'm partly being inspired by, but I didn't want that second world to map on to any particular mythology. Magic on this side of the veil is based on patronage from the powerful individuals from the other side, or tied into artifacts from the other side, or based on contracts and traces of magic the other side has left on this world. In JS&MN, I really liked the idea that Norrell was using magic based on old contracts made by the Raven King, who has the true personal power--so in that vain.

This also allows these patrons from the other world to be benign, neutral, or completely terrifying. I was more interested in telling stories from the mortal world, especially this awful little warlock Dickory Kingfisher, and this awful little rich girl magician Charlotte, from opposite ends of our period--Dickory from the late 18th century, and Charlotte who was born in the 1870s--and their respective patrons and affiliates. I hope I make something decent out of it eventually.

(I realize that if this was a YA, Charlotte and Dickory would fall in love. I am actually distressed by that realization. But this is me and they're both gay, so no.)

[ilthit]

My little verse intros and story links are being collected on memoryofremembering as well!

[wallwalker]

I'm still doing some worldbuilding on the world I have for The Marked Man, so let's see what I can get down today. I don't know how final it necessarily is but I think it should help somewhat.

Previous worldbuilding: This one post about plant life.

What kind of magic or technology characterizes your world?

Technology levels are quite low. There's no real way to transmit electricity or anything else over wires because of the vines that would pull the towers down in a matter of weeks. People have to rely on messengers to carry news, and that can be very unreliable.

Farming is generally small-scale, and crops are limited, since the vines could cross-pollinate with a lot of what we would consider staples. A few plants are fine, mostly root vegetables like carrots and beets; sugar beets are a very common crop, because sugar is quite valuable and one of the few really worthwhile trade goods. (Not as sought-after as honey, but then, honey is much more difficult to keep from being tainted.)

What are some myths, legends, or idioms that are common?

- The reason for the vines' existence is a bit source of folklore, but no one can agree on it. Some say that they were sent from some angry God, or an embittered force of nature, due to some unspecified terrible thing that humanity had done. Some people say that it can assimilate other life into itself - animals as well as plants, and even humans. The fact that the plant's tendrils are capable of growing into human flesh doesn't help these rumors; it's little wonder that the few people who return to themselves in time to run away and try to get help are treated with suspicion at best.

- There's a particularly bright star in the night sky, larger than the other stars, that the people view as a particularly bad omen. They call it the Coward's Star, but no one really knows why anymore. There are a lot of stories, most of them being some variation of a young man who, out of fear or laziness, decided to shirk his duties to his home village and run away, following the star as his guide. Most of them have him die during his voyage, which is his comeuppance for running away.

What's a major city and what's it like?

The largest settlement in the area is simply called Sunflower City. It's called this because it is one of the few settlements that grows sunflowers, and more importantly, produces honey. They have the entire settlement surrounded by a fine metal mesh; it's very strange, considering that such mesh would normally be near impossible to create. They say that they have access to some new way to create it, but how is that possible? It's a closely-guarded secret.

At any rate, the mesh is necessary to keep the bugs that are in the city in, and to keep others out. The leaders of Sunflower City keep beehives, and the vine flowers' nectar is highly toxic. If even a few PPM mix with the sunflower honey that the bees are producing, the entire crop is tainted. More than once, they've had to destroy hives where the honey was beginning to turn the telltale purplish color that meant that some of the bees were feeding on the vineflowers. It invariably means that there is a hole in the mesh that must be repaired.

Getting into and out of Sunflower City is necessarily difficult. The entrance procedure is very nearly like that of an airlock - travelers have to be searched for any contraband, vine cuttings or outside insects, before they're let in, lest they destroy the crops. Usually they have to be quarantined for two days at least before they're allowed to travel freely. The honey trades have made the city leaders rich, and they don't want anything to jeopardize that. (They also sell sunflower seeds and oil, and those are pretty lucrative as well, though not so much as honey.)

What is the landscape like where most of the stuff is happening?

Flat. Very flat. Some say the vines pulled down the mountains themselves. Sometimes, you'll see places where the vines have grown up near to the sky, where flowers are in full bloom and clouds of insects flock to their sweet smell. It is dangerous to go near them in any circumstance, so very few people know if there's any true scaffolding beneath them, or simply the vines turning inwards on themselves.