Infraperegrination of the Utter Islands
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First order of business, the state of affairs for Hingsajagra.
The year 11664 is largely parallel to our world's 20th Century, but without the huge advancements into machinery (while industry being important). More importantly, the world is an industrialistic world but industry is forwarded by magick and war. Industrialized magick. The end of the world that follows after World War I vibes.
The world is mostly split into five eras, as reckoned by Shennin scholarship. The modern year is 11,664 of the Lotus Calendar. This puts it at the 243rd Cycle of History.
1 - Burgeoning Era (1000s to 7000s.) The Agricultural Revolution. The time of Chiefdoms, Warbands, roving eras, Naka Kingdoms, Yakka Kingdoms, Siyukuy Kingdoms, etc. This era ended during The Ultimate Cleave. The great apocalypse that split the Great Southern Continent from the Dakmalan Continent and turned it into a fractured archipelago.
2 - The Ancient Era (8000s-9000s). The time of Ancient Shen, Ancient Metoma, and Ancient Razru cultures. Widely accepted that the end of this era was during the Black Meteor Cataclysm, an ancient Metoman prophecy that came true. A meteor slammed into the earth and shattered the Utter Islands even more, into its modern geography.
3 - The Classical Era (9000s-10,000s). A time of great upheaval, but also the rise of classical cultures. The influential Old Razru Empires, the Asitowan Principalities, the Lotus States (filled with the Jing, Rak, Sanun, Si, and Yun ethnic groups, which would eventually coalesce under the Meteorite Emperor to become the Shen people), Utrang kingdoms, the Yagan Kingdom, the Meshiri Kingdom, the Yeung Kingdom, the Natara Kingdom, the Kamitan Communes, the Dakai Tribes, the first few Raga tribes, the Tawun Chiefdoms, and more. It is widely accepted that this time only ended after the victory of Shen and the World Collective against the Devil King Roghan.
4 - The Rebirth Era (10,000s to 11000). The Industrial Revolution. The Smith-Kings and the Merchant Princes created textile factories, weapon factories, and machine tools. Most significant was the invention of the Karma Engine. Surplus yields across all industries, creating industry, as well as machineway of engineering and architecture. This era is said to have ended with the first Uprisings against Kings, spearheaded by humanitarian sages that arose during the time of increasing industry.
5 - The Modern Era (11000s to 11500s). The Bourgeois Revolution. The merchant princes and machine-capitalists seized the means of production and operated from there, hiring and putting laborers to work them. The power of these engines and the strength of free market trade caused even gods (see: Hri Vaizzan the God of Merchantry), spirits, and monsters (yakshas, anjuras, uki, etc.) to be subsumed into the labor force. It is widely believed that this era ended with the overthrow of the monarchies that ruled for 2500 years, represented the most with the First Apocalypse with the consummation of the Heavenly Shennin Kingdom spearheaded by the Invincible Blade Princess the Empress of the Universe. On the Fire Dog Year 11512 Kafeng Masagwa and the Knights of the World set to motion the First World Revolution that shattered all bourgeois and aristocrat rule. It was not to last.
6 - The Revolutionary Era (11500s to 11607s). The Hundred Revolutions Era. With the power of factories, the proletariat of the world fought to consolidate power, but with Kafeng Masagwa's death and growing distrust in the Knights, the world alliance shattered into nation-states. The nation states fought separately for national liberation, explosive uprisings filled the 100 Year Revolution. This caused unprecedented global bloodshed and violence. Wars that ended all wars. Separated into nations, they were easily cowed and beaten into "Peace" through the concerted efforts of the International Bourgeoisie, headed by the Universal Capitalists and the Trillionaires of the Trichiliocosm, which would quickly vanish as they appealed to the people. In the guise of a successful revolution, the revolutionary efforts were cowed. This era ended with the rising of the efforts of the Second World Knights Coalition who tried and failed to bind the people together in the face of unprecedented genocide. This was the Second World Revolution, which failed.
7 - The End Of The World (11608 to modern day). The End of the World. The bloodshed of the revolutionary era ended the world. The international bourgeoisie, headed now by the Central Yavinian Guild of the Ressen-Nalenji Empire, penetrates the world and seeks to join it together under the guise of "After The End" where the world must rise. The revolutionaries have been defeated and stamped down, the majority of the people, tired of war, do not want any more revolutions. Communism and Revolution is seen with contempt, as "mountaineers" and "foresters." As banditry and piracy. As detrimental to human progress. Will you prove them wrong? Or finish the job? You know it deep in your heart that there's only one way for the new world to be born.
The most important invention of the Revolutionary Era. It resembles a giant spirit house but with the offering platform replaced with a closed in sacrificial furnace. There, little gods, weaponsouls, ghosts, sacrificial people, and mantra-mandalas are burned upon samadhi fires. Karma Engines are therefore a joint machinist-monk invention (and indeed, the patenter of the technology is widely agreed to have been Vajra Monk Rakan Jesung, who grew up in a working-class machinist family).
In doing their karma is converted into usable energy, often electrical energy or mechanical energy. The study of karma is known as Karmalogy in the world. In Karmalogy, karma is seen as the potential energy of existence and being itself, and many Karmologists posit that the entire current world of Hingsajagra exists because of the Karma of the past world. When sentient beings are sacrificed to the Karma Engine, this is seen as a painful but purificatory ritual, and is deemed ethical by many world faiths as the being that dies from the Karma Engine's samadhi fires is almost always reborn as a human due to the neutralizing of their karma. Many who have surplus good karma do not go through this, and so the majority of criminals and harmful animals are given to the Karma Engine.
Infrakarmalogists, however, put forth that there are abundant amounts of ambient karma that arises from the world itself, surplus karma that emanates from the deeds of the past world, and this can be used to power karma engines without voluntary suicide.
Magnetitologists have been creating Magnetite Engines, which seek to replace Karma Engines. Magnetite is widely believed to be the infrasubstance, the aggregates of atoms. A level above the smallest quantum, where the material dissolves from perception. Magnetite arises from places of intense emotion and thoughts, and so it can be mined from worship, war, joy, and other such sites of powerful explosive emotion. Currently magnetite is being used in socialist Hokou and in Selorong. The bourgeoisie that own Karma Engines (many of them non-religious themselves) have become ardent anti-magnetitians, and have begun slander campaigns against them.
No default fantasy. The major cultural power of this world is China, Thailand, and Indonesia. Use their medieval aesthetics to fluence and inform your End of the World depictions.
No "races." Elves, dwarves, etc. aren't demihuman races, they're completely different magickal beings and spirits. Lean on the folklore.
No automatic rifles. The extent of guns is matchlocks. The chemistry of the world does not allow for automatic weapons. Armamental Technology therefore is focused on blade-and-bow-technologies. Sappers are important industrialists. There are Sword Factories, Bow Factories. Cannons exist but these are few and far between.
No automatic vehicles. Keep the cavalry, the chariot, the dragonriders and the phoenix knights. But no cars. Keep the carriages and the boats.
No tanks. Tanks are replaced by magick mechs called Yakshamachines.
No Latin. If you want to look for a lingua franca that performs the duty of Latin, use either Sanskrit, Old Chinese, or Old Javanese. In the World, they're Ancient Razrunan languages or Ancient Rakeen languages [Rak is where the Meteorite Emperor arose from and he turned it into the Court Language for the First Dynasty]) Yes, you can in fact translate Latin phrases into one of those languages. Such as Shantim Krute, Yuddhaya Sajjah for If you want peace, para bellum. Or bajingan perang for casus belli. Ignore this for prefixes and suffixes (e.g., -istry, -ology, -onomy). Keep it for proper nouns that must come from an in-world language.
Everything else we can justify into a 20th century analog. A kind of perfect ideal is Late Medieval Warfare.
Buildings. Large rectangular buildings are a feature of only one world place. Tall multiple-roofed places are still built with either wood or skystone (a stone of colder make) that creates a facsimile of our world.
Expressways. Don't exist. The world is connected together by railways and riverways. Riverboats are cheaper to make and use than karmaboats.
Industry. Industry hinges on the karma engine rather than the steam engine.
High-rises. High-rises are crafted by ancient building-wizards. The majority of high-rises in the world are giant yaksha statues hollowed out and repurposed.
Automata exist but are rare. It requires decades of study for a wizard to reach automata level construction. Automaton wizards are known as automatists.
Industry. Almost everyone has swords, but these swords come not from the artisan but from the worker working the weapon-machines. Wagons and horse bridles, tiger-bridles, clothing... all the mass-produced clothing arise from a Manufactory. The machines here are often created by either wizards, machinists, or gods and made to be owned by capitalists and merchants.
Inspirations and Approximations
Each major region is inspired by the following regions, though they're not exactly those regions. It would be impossible to fully map any of the regions accurately to a real world culture because of the difference in material conditions, but you can use the following for aesthetic, cultural, and religious inspirations.
Temog Ra-Om, the Charnel Isles, Pemi, and the Heavenshards are inspired by Maritime Asian cultures, Southeast Asian cultures, and Pacific cultures. This includes coastal Vietnam and Thailand.
Hiraga Ra-Om's southern coast inspired by inland Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam. Further up north it is inspired by China, Korea, Japan, Mongolia, Tibet, and other Central Asian cultures.
Jagged Swordfields people are inspired by Russo-Siberian people.
North Wadzara is inspired by Japan and West Coast America.
South and Eastern Wadzara is inspired by mixing Arabia and Central America.
Southern Nilatpa is inspired by the Indianic cultures.
Western Nilatpa is inspired by Spain, Germany, and France.
Central and Northern Nilatpa is inspired by Italy, England, and Danish cultures.
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