This blog is basically just a place to keep all my world building ideas, art, and lore stuff for my homebrew world, Nairos. I might also put some character and plot info on here since I'm planning on writing a novel taking place in this world. I hope y'all will enjoy reading :)
General Rules and Warnings:
Be respectful. Assholes will be blocked.
Asks are welcome, just don't be weird about it.
Constructive criticism is welcome, too! I made this blog in part to get feedback on my writing. Again, just be respectful.
If you have any feedback or ideas to share, please let me know! I write best when I have a back and forth with others!
My writing will cover some sentisitive topics such as imperialism, colonialism, oppression and discrimination, war, etc. So if any of these topics are triggering for you, please proceed with caution. I will add individual triggers for each post.
This blog does not tolerate racism, bigotry or discrimination, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, antisemitism or Islamophobia. I will block you if I catch you engaging in this.
This blog is pro palestine, ant zionist, anti cop, pro prison abolition, pro union, and anti capitalist. I support the freedom and right to self-determination for all people, and those themes will be included in my writing.
Feel free to take inspiration from this blog! Copyright is a tool invented by capital owners to monopolize creative expression, so take whatever you want. I just ask that you credit me if it's something hyperspecific/taken wholesale/used for commercial purposes.
If at any time I decide a post isn't working for me anymore, I'll tag it as such. Unless a post is truly horrendous, then I probably won't take it down.
Inspirations:
I take a lot of inspiration from other media for my writing! I'll note down the biggest ones, but this is by far not a comprehensive list.
Dungeons and Dragons
Pathfinder
Critical Role
Dimension 20's Unsleeping City
Worlds Beyond Number's the Wizard, the Witch and the Wild One
Dragon Age
Genshin Impact
Arcane
Brimstone Angels by Erin M. Evans
The Grisha Trilogy and Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo
The Spirit Realm, also known as the Second Realm or simply "Spirit", is a plane of possibility shaped to form, of dreams made real. The realm of Spirit is vast and endless, and many a wary soul have stumbled in only to never find their way back home.
There is no one, cohesive, "theme" to the realm of spirits; forests of song, seas of fire, kingdoms of pure light and more can all be found in this place. In fact, some scholars even theorize that there is no one realm of spirits, that it is instead a collection of infinite planes, bound together by whatever force keeps the Realms connected.
Like the Dreaming Realm, the land of Spirits is eternal and timeless. Also like the Dreaming, Spirit touches upon the Mortal Realm while still remaining distinct and separate. Spirits inhabit the realm of mortals, often crossing over the boundary between to visit and leave their mark.
Similarly, mortals will occasionally stumble into Spirit. Whether they return is often left to fate's design, but tales abound of the wonders and horrors found in the realm beyond. Compared to the Dreaming, the Spirit Realm is far more documented, but that is low bar to clear.
Certain areas of Spirit more traveled by humans are known as the Near Spirit. The Near Spirit is not physically closer to the Mortal Realm than the rest of Spirit, nor is it necessarily less dangerous; the term simply describes areas more frequented by mortals.
Denizens of Spirit
Much like the realm in which they dwell, Spirits are varied and diverse in form and nature. The Arcanists of the Bastion divide them into three primary categories: Fey, Fiends, and Celestials.
Fey are the broadest category, an umbrella term describing spirits generally indifferent towards mortal life. Bestial spirits, elementals, and the spirits of nature are most often categorized as "Fey".
Fiends generally describe the destructive spirits hostile towards humanity. Demons are the largest subgroup of this category, but undead, shades, and monstrosities also count among their ranks.
Celestials generally describe the spirits friendly and beneficial towards humanity and the mortal realm. Angels and other spirits of light are most often considered to be celestials.
These categories are not concrete, however. A spirit classified as a fiend can act in beneficial ways. Likewise, a celestial can be hostile towards humans. Spirits by their nature defy classification, and do not abide by human standards of morality or taxonomy.
Spirits and Names
There is power in a name. For spirits, this is quite literal: every spirit has a true name, a name that defines the spirit's very essence and being. To define something is to hold power over it, and that same concept applies to spirits; to know a spirit's true name, to speak it out loud, gives one power over it. The power to invoke it and bind it to your will.
For this reason, spirits keep their true names hidden from those who would seek to wield it against them. They will often adopt what's called a common name—a less personal moniker that does not hold power over the spirit. Great and powerful spirits will often be referred to by titles to avoid directly invoking them—out of respect, or fear, or both.
Guises, Glamours, and True Forms
As beings of pure magic and mystery, Spirits manifest in many different forms. They often don disguises and illusions to obscure their true natures to mortals and other spirits.
The most basic of these disguises is a "glamour", an illusory—often appealing—form that still retains otherworldly traits and features. Glowing eyes and strange auras, curling horns and sharp claws, unnatural beauty and terrible disfigurement—a spirit's nature is still present and on display when in their glamour.
The more advanced type of disguise a spirit will don is a "guise". Spirits in their guises appear human—for the most part. Even the most advanced guises have a tell, though: unusual behavior or speech, irregular movement, certain features that seem a bit "off". Guises are a skill a spirit must learn to master, and some are more convincing than others.
Spirits, in their most natural state, often appear in forms terrifying and monstrous to human minds. This state is known as a spirit's "true form", their full being unfiltered by illusion. Spirits do not often reveal their true forms, not to other spirits and especially not to mortals.
A spirit's power of illusion varies depending on their power and experience. The older and more powerful a spirit is, the more control they can exert over their form. The greatest of spirits can switch glamours and guises in an instant, can craft illusions that best even the most powerful of scries. The limits to this power are, theoretically, endless.
The Dreaming Realm, also known as the Dreaming or the First Realm, is a plane of pure possibility. It is the beginning of everything, the place where dreams and nightmares make their home. It is a strange plane, one ill traversed or understood by spirit or mortal. The Dreaming as we know it is divided into three "regions": the Near Dreaming, the Far Dreaming, and the Deeper Dreaming.
The Near Dreaming is the place where our consciousness goes when we dream. Our dreams are made manifest in the Near Dreaming, personal realms shaped by our memories, hopes, fears and aspirations. Everything that dreams has their own personal domain in the Near Dreaming, though most Dreamers have little to no active control over how it manifests.
The Far Dreaming is more distant than the Near Dreaming, difficult to reach or influence but not impossible. It hosts the greater dreams; those base hopes, wants and fears that are universal. The dream of freedom, the dream of success, the nightmare of ruin; these are all greater dreams and nightmares which reside in the Far Dreaming.
The Deeper Dreaming is wilder and vaster than even the Far Dreaming. It stretches past the infinite, incomprehensible to the minds of mortals and spirits alike. Sanity itself dares not tread in this place.
It is important to note that the Dreaming is not a linear plane of clearly defined boundaries; it exists outside of space and time. The three regions ebb and flow, often overlapping and blurring together.
Denizens:
The denizens of the Dreaming Realm are often divided into two categories: Dreams and Nightmares. Dreams are a manifestation of the Dreamer's hopes, wishes, aspirations, and general subconscious. Nightmares, however, are a manifestation of the Dreamer's worst fears and heartaches, and are actively hostile to the Dreamer. Luckily, Dreams and Nightmares are not physical beings--much like a person's thoughts, they cannot physically affect the Dreamer, only influence them in subtle ways. Ultimately, the Dreamer has control over what shape their dreams take and whether or not their dreams hold power over them.
Although Dreams and Nightmares are often classified differently, in truth they are not so unalike. The lines between Dreams and Nightmares are blurry and in constant flux; Dreams can become Nightmares, and Nightmares can become Dreams. They are simply different manifestations of the same type of entity.
Most Dreams live in Dreamscapes, the individual domains where a Dreamer's consciousness goes when they sleep. Like Dreams, Dreamscapes are shaped by the Dreamer, and are ultimately at the Dreamer's command, whether they realize it or not. They are unique to the Dreamer, and despite being endless, the boundaries between one Dreamscape and another are clear; A Dream that lives in one Dreamscape cannot cross over into another Dreamscape, it is simply impossible for them to do so.
The denizens of the Far Dreaming are more abstract, not directly tied to any individual Dreamer. These are manifestations of greater concepts, those Dreams and Nightmares shared across cultures and civilizations.
The denizens of the Deeper Dreaming, if they can even be called that, are as incomprehensible and unknowable as their realm.
Memory and the Tapestry of Fate:
Memory holds a strange space in the Dreaming Realm; It permeates almost everything, yet is distinct enough to exist in its own space. It is helpful, perhaps, to view memory as a grand tapestry; each individual memory is a thread in this tapestry, weaved together to form fate's grand design. The more things remember an event, the more threads it consists of, and the clearer its image becomes in the Tapestry of Fate.
While the individual threads are often unclear, those greater images it makes up can be gleaned and even predicted, in the case of memories not yet formed. Those who look upon the Tapestry of Fate and predict its patterns are known as Fateseers, or Oracles.
While the Dreaming Realm is the ultimate originator of each of these threads, and of the Tapestry of Fate as a whole, this does not mean memory does not influence it. Without potential, there would be no memories to make or threads to be weaved. But without memory, from where would dreams spawn? As such, memories and dreams are entwined, begetting each other in an eternal ouroboros.
The Tapestry of Fate eternally grows as new threads of memory are added, but what of memories lost? It is naïve to think that all the knowledge contained within the tapestry will last forever—in truth, the threads of memory inevitably fade. The patterns blur as each memory is forgotten; The tapestry unravels as knowledge is lost.
Dreamwalkers:
While it is not uncommon to peer into individual dreamscapes, there are few who have ever physically walked the halls of the Dreaming. These travelers are known as Dreamwalkers, individuals touched by the Dreaming and imbued with the power to traverse its Dreamscapes.
Dreamwalkers are a rare phenomenon, and even more rarely documented. Little is known about how or why a Dreamwalker gains their abilities, but common folklore says they are chosen by the Dreaming itself to act as its voice in the Mortal Realm.
Most accounts of the Myth of Creation begin with the Dreaming, the first realm. The Dreaming is a plane of pure potential, of dreams and nightmares. Dreams need dreamers, however, and so the second realm, the Sprit Realm, was created. The spirits dreamed, and those dreams became reality.
This state of creation lasted for many ages, until the Spirit Realm became truly endless in its expanses. However, this state could not continue indefinitely. One dream, in this age of boundless imagination, was different than the rest--the dream of Mortality, of impermanence. No one truly knows who or what conceived this dream, but it was so powerful and profound that, when made real by the Dreaming, it spawned the third and final realm--the Mortal Realm.
The creation of the Mortal Realm came with many wonders: Galaxies and solar systems, stars and planets and moons, and our world, the world of Nairos. A new age of creation began, one where spirits traversed the realms and wandered this strange new world, leaving it shaped and changed in their wake.
It is said that spirits of flame and stone burrowed into the world's core and created land from the flow of their magma. Spirits of the wind and sky took the vapors from volcanoes and filled the sky with breathable air. The Queen of Storms brought down the first rains, filling the oceans, seas, rivers and lakes. The Lord of the Sun and his siblings, the Morning and Evening Stars, calmed the harsh rays of the sun and stars so life could foster. Spirits of nature filled the oceans and lands with plants, and bestial spirits bred the first animals.
The world was brimming with life, but aside from the visiting spirits, sapience, the ability to think and reason, was not found. The arrival of humanity changed this. Like the realm we inhabit, no one knows who or what spawned the first humans. There are many origins for humanity; some that tell of powerful spirits molding the first people from clay or stone, others that say humans evolved independently of outside interference, and some even claiming the Dreaming itself created humanity, that we were the last dream made real.
In any case, this much is true: The world of Nairos fostered us, and we flourished in turn; Growing and spreading and quickly coming to rule this world of ours.
Notes: So this is my first actual post! The basic cosmology of my setting. As you can probably tell, I took a lot of inspiration from Unsleeping City and Worlds Beyond Number for this one. As I go along I'll make it more original, but I'm working with the bare-bones right now. Let me know if you have any feedback!
