009 Questions Are Answers

I’m working on this cozy animal-folk courier game where you play the chonky rat, Vuldorf, as she flies around Kindred Vale on a broomstick, delivering packages between other “Kin.” I’m inspired by this tabletop roleplaying game, Wanderhome, in which you play anthropomorphic animals who wander. It has no dice, no stats; it’s all roleplay.

In Wanderhome, there are these little gods whom you can encounter. They all have options for their “tags”— and some are marked for more high-magic, and others for more tragic stories; there was one that I encountered in the book, with the “tragic” symbol. Its tag was “dead.” I have this idea for a wolf character, Olidié, who is a wanderer, herself. She’s searching for the graveyard of the gods.

I’m picturing there being scattered little shrines to spirits. And maybe you’ll stumble across a little spirit on your travels. 

But what if the spirits are dead gods?

What then?

Well, that changes the setting dramatically. And depending on how deep it goes, that lore changes the vibe of the game equally.

Why are the gods dead?

Were they bigger when they were alive?

Did someone... kill them?

As spirits in Kindred Vale, do they hold grudges? But, of course not. There is no conflict in Kindred Vale. So how do you operate in a conflict-less setting, factoring in death?

How can someone die, and it not drag things down?

Maybe it’s a journey.

I had an idea for a vagrant character who’s a possum. He lives in an abandoned train car. (Because there must be some kind of [defunct] railway system for this project.) The trains don’t run anymore. You can’t leave Kindred Vale. And no one can enter. Grump (the possum vagabond) is trying to fix the train. He thinks that the journey is one that Kin should take. 

There’s something wrong with Kindred Vale. 

There’s something wrong with Kindred’s Veil. 

But the point is not fixing it.

The point is to wander. And to learn. And to connect individuals. 

Is that not a journey?

The only difference between a “journey” and a “wandering” is the presupposition of a destination. “Journeys” have end points. 

I wrote recently on my website— an article about my name and about finding myself— but I included a postulation of this nature. No one would say that a healthy, newborn baby is dying. But once you factor in the end point of life, well, that’s when mortality has a say. Living more energetically does not equate to dying more expeditiously. 

In Vuldorf’s Deliveries, there is no threat. There is no end. And by that, there is no death. 

But things were not always like this. 

Some wanderings become journeys.

Some paths end.

And it’s possible, just maybe, that the only way to ensure an endless wandering is to take away the possibility of distance. 

“Distance” is the space between Point A and Point B. Destination. 

Kindred Vale used to be connected to the greater world. There is a greater world. But in that greater world, there is conflict. There is death. There are ends. 

The trains had to break, to ensure that no one would take a journey. 

Something had to end, so that everything else could go on.

…

It feels strange to be on the third floor of my school building, printing this. I only ever come to this floor to print— or, last year, to play Nerf. I feel like the third floor doesn’t get much love. Just locked glass boxes, impermeable— yet containing hidden gems. “Hidden” because I can’t get at them, like the resin 3d printers— even though they are clearly visible. 

Maybe the best way to hide something is in a glass case. Maybe, if you let someone believe that they know what something is, they’ll stop looking for it; they’ll stop searching deeper.

In The Secret History, Henry answers Julian’s question, “What is beauty?”

Henry states, “Terror.”

I’ve re-read this book multiple times, just trying to understand that. (And also to count how many cigarettes Henry goes through during the conversation with Richard and Francis when they reveal what’s happened. Answer: upwards of ten! Donna writes him lighting, smoking, and lighting another sooo many times! Is that part of dark academia?)

I’ve tried to explain this to people— that as soon as you understand something, you cease to be able to love it. But, as the Classics students at Hampden College should know, “love” is a modern word, and combines concepts from many words. Greek has at least eight words for “love.” 

Perhaps the real fear is the fear of loss. 

When you don’t understand something— well, it’s like the Dunning-Kruger Effect— beginners fallaciously think that they know more about a given topic; experts understand that they know little. When you don’t know something, you think you know everything. Maybe “beauty” is this logical fallacy of grasping something made of straw and calling it gold. 

And when you finally get your hands on something gemstone, you feel like you lost something.

So, as writers, how do we balance the terror of nouveau amour with the satisfaction of lore-building? 

How do we convey meaning without giving up incomprehension?

I have this concept, for example, in The Mouldy Underpass, everyone— undine and human alike— has a set number of Words allocated to them for their life. And when they die, it is because they have used up their allotment of Words. In the “privileged” world— the world of “privileged” information— there’s an undine dealer who sells “blow”— a drug that gives you more Words. (I’m aware that that’s slang for cocaine.) You inhale this drug, and it gives you, essentially, more time. 

But where do the Words come from?

They come from someone.

The Words are siphoned from a living soul, depleting their time alive— so that the undine dealers can sell their breath.

I’ve decided to keep my thesis-book set in San Diego, but to incorporate worldbuilding from Ettingrad (the blood magick/dark academia setting of my Daggerheart game) into it. 

One of the most essential practices of Gore (blood magick) is called “Siphon Essence.” But blood doesn’t really fit into the San Diego setting well. Siphoning someone’s Essence doesn’t have to be sanguine in nature, though. It could be suctioning someone’s Words out of them. And that is, essentially, the same effect. 

So to bring it back to Henry, how many Words did he have? Before he shot himself and saved the rest from a life of prison, or worse? Did he have any extra? Is that why Camilla still loved him, after he was gone? Because, maybe, he wasn’t gone. If someone is still using his Words after he’s gone, well— “He will only be gone from the school when none here are loyal to him.”

There are surprising similarities between The Secret History and Harry Potter. Not in plot, nor in themes, but rather in the little lessons that shine only after being polished for hundreds of pages. 

What do you think? Is beauty terror? Can you still love something after coming to understand it?

Is the real virtue of “soft worldbuilding” the incapacity of the readers to ever, truly, understand how the world works?

I often think that questions provide better answers than answers.