In my dreams, everything was burning. A voice was calling out for me.
Summoned forth as the intended sacrifice of a mysterious ritual, a young man finds himself in a new world with the face of his attempted killer, Acacius Duval, as well as a looming death curse if he doesnât carry out Acaciusâ last will. However, while Acacius has left many looming problems, he didnât leave behind the most important piece: his memories.
That would have been too convenient for navigating a world stitched together from apocalypses.
Fortunately, after only a few life and death trials, Acaciusâ unintentional replacement is sent away to the prestigious Nithemoore Academy, where he can learn everything he needs to know about the world and gain the power to grasp his freedomâŠ
At least, if the tracks of history donât doom him first.
First three chapters out now! 130k words pre-written, and updates every Saturday. Hope to see you there!
The first question I got was, âWhy did you partner with Rhoswen?â
âI thought she was a good choice for the strategy I wanted to use.â
âYou didnât have any concerns about working with her?â
eunseok conducts a Q & A with his classmates and makes his preparations to attack veratrum row.
The first question I got was, âWhy did you partner with Rhoswen?â
âI thought she was a good choice for the strategy I wanted to use.â
âYou didnât have any concerns about working with her?â
eunseok conducts a Q & A with his classmates and makes his preparations to attack veratrum row.
I didnât want to wait too long before faking an attack on Veratrum Row, or else Vericâs situation would keep getting worse, and then Iâd really feel pushed to do something drastic.
now that he's ranked up, eunseok makes preparations for his upcoming attack on veratrum row.
With a ghostly laugh, all the light went out. The wind, like a cold hand, brushed against the back of my neck and stroked my cheek.
[Jeong Eunseok.]
[We have been waiting for you.]
eunseok conducts the ritual to challenge the tripartite. is that good?
The poll received 62 responses total, including one self-admitted joke submission.
Question 1: Who's your favorite character?
Jeong Eunseok / Acacius Duval: 71%
Acacius Duval (Original) and Veric: 6.5% each
Roxana and Rhoswen: 4.8% each
Luka, Raoul, Zaire: 1.6% each
Baby caterpillars: 1.6%
Question 2: Who's your favorite character excluding our main character?
Veric: 35.5%, easily sweeping the competition
Luka: 16.1%
Rhoswen: 9.7%
Raoul: 8.1%
Cynara and Roxana: 6.5% each
Acacius Duval (original): 4.8%
Dagian, Etienne, Jules, Zaire: 1.6% each
Depends on who's on screen: 1.6%
Totally butterfly Eunseok: 1.6%
The [Last Genesis of the Kaleidoscope]: 1.6%
The Tripartite: 1.6% <- Good taste!
I was pleasantly surprised by how many people voted for the original Acacius Duval. I'm glad that he can posthumously receive so much support.
Thank you to everyone who participated in the poll! It was great to hear from you all! Which, of course, brings us to...
Author Q&A
I got quite a few questions about the story, the writing process, and also a little about me.
Where would you say we are in the story so far, and how many more arcs do you have planned out? How much of this plot has been outlined?
I have an approximate outline for Part 1 of 2, with a vague idea for Part 2 that Iâm sure will become more solid as I write. Iâd say we have at least 8-9 arcs left to cover in Part 1. I donât think Part 2 will be as long as Part 1. Itâs hard to say exactly how long this will end up being.
For reference, as of finishing Arc 4, there are about 250k words in this story.
Do you plan to publish this story officially?
Yes, eventually, definitely as an e-book. Iâm not sure how printed copies would work; it might be best to do ânovellas,â one per arc.
I also have plans to make epubs for each arc available on the website, but it's been put on hold due to lack of time.
Can I print the story and bookbind it myself?
Yes. Iâd love to see the final result if you do!
Please include an appendix/page that lists the titles/proofs/skills of other characters
Now updated on the website.
Is this the authorâs first story/piece of fiction?
No, my hobby has been writing stories since I was a kid. Quite a few of my current readers and commenters know me from previously published fanfiction, which Iâve written on and off since high school.
However, this is my first published original work. Itâs exciting to finally share one of my original works with the world.
How much do you think the settings & tropes that you're playing with are influenced by East Asian fantasy webnovels/stories, compared to Western ones?
When it comes to webnovels, I read almost exclusively translated East Asian ones. This story is heavily influenced by transmigration academy webnovels, along with a few other genres, such as Saintess romantic fantasies and âtransmigrated as a villain into an Otome gameâ webnovels.
Who did you think the fan favorite will be? How do the actual results compare?
My prediction was that Eunseok would be the most popular, because the main character of a story usually is. This turned out to be the case.
I wasnât sure who the second favorite would be, but in retrospect, I shouldnât be surprised that it was Veric. Weâve spent a lot of time with her, after all, and people have been extremely supportive of her since the start. That makes me very happy.
Whatâs YOUR favorite character?
My favorite character is Eunseok, or else he wouldnât be our main character. But I have a lot of love for everyone else, too. Theyâve all got their own stories.
As for my favorite character excluding EunseokâŠ? Hmmm. Thatâs a secret.
Who is your favorite character to draw?
Eunseok because heâs my favorite. But I give everyone designs that I will enjoy drawing.
What do you do for work?
I work on enterprise software as an engineer. Things have been quite shaken up lately due to AI.
So Iâve been contemplating whether to leave my job and try making a career out of writing⊠The benefits, of course, would be that I would have a lot of time to write. The cons are that, to really make a career/living out of webnovel writing, youâd need a rapid update schedule (1.5-2.5k words per chapter, 5-7 times a week) that would definitely degrade the quality of this story. I donât know if Iâm willing to compromise on that.
A possible compromise would be a Patreon with short updates 3x a week (such as sharing the next scene), whereas the publicly available chapters are published with the same schedule (once a week, with a pause any time I need to finish the next arc).
How are new worlds/frames discovered? Is there any logic behind their internal rules (ie, are there common rules among them?)
The entrance to a Fantasm World will occasionally spawn in Kosmonymia according to the Tripartiteâs discretion. Theyâre usually just found by someone stumbling across the entrance unexpectedly.
The historical period of time that loops in an unsolved Fantasm World usually: 1) is of historical significance, 2) is related to the original worldâs ultimate fate, and 3) showcases the potential of that worldâs power system or technology. Not every Fantasm World contains an apocalyptic disaster, but if it doesnât, it usually shows a node in history where the end could have been prevented.
Fantasm Worlds tend to share common geographic features or biomes with the place where they spawn, such as the mild coastal weather common between Fulsgate and KP-04. This is not a hard and fast rule.
If you solve a Fantasm World, then the Tripartite judges you as being capable of handling the disaster that led to its end. For example, since KP-04âs visual disaster was resolved, then itâs fine to release KP-04âs frame to Kosmonymia because you can avoid the same ultimate disaster. It is also then your responsibility to prepare successors who can handle the dangers introduced by a new frame.
Whether this philosophy actually holds up in practice is a different question.
Any juicy frames that you'd want to reveal before they're brought up in-work?
No. They are all surprise tools that will help us later.
Is there a romantic subplot between Acacius and Luka?
There is something much more sinister going on between Acacius and Luka (and also Eunseok and Luka).
That said, I am deliberately following in a very long tradition of transmigration webnovels having weird and kind of gay relationships between the transmigrator and âoriginal protagonist.â So please feel free to read as much or as little into their relationships as you want.
Will there be an identity reveal?
Yes, but due to my tastes, itâs probably far more diabolical than whatever youâre thinking of.
What's your process for brainstorming & plotting important events? Do you tend to plan/outline arcs in detail, or more like just write as you go?
I donât have a very detailed outline. However, I have a bullet point list of events I want to cover and information that needs to be revealed. These bullet point lists are most detailed for the chapter Iâm about to write, when I have the greatest sense of what information needs to be conveyed. They tend to be less concrete for things that are far off in the future, though I have some lynchpin events that I know I want to occur.
When it comes to planning an arc, I often start off with a âfeelingâ of what I want to happen. Arc 3, the Fantasm World, started with me wanting to cover the classic plot of âschool trip gone terribly wrongâ as well as introducing Kosmonymiaâs âdungeonâ system. So I knew I wanted this feeling of desperation, layered schemes, and just barely scraping your way through by the skin of your teeth.
What gave that arc a concrete direction was combining it with a different thought I had, which was, âItâd be kinda funny to force the guy always paying attention to how others perceive him to literally only be able to see the world through other peopleâs eyes. And then he has to adjust his acting by referencing what they see.â Then I combined that with the butterfly eye spot motif. Connecting together things that you find fun and interesting will take you in novel directions.
So I have a pretty clear direction of where I want to go with a story arc and where I want it to end. I usually have scenes that I want to hit, too. For example, in Arc 1, I had a very clear mental image of Eunseok looking behind Cynara to see the moon path realm losing control, then turning to run; in Arc 2, I had a sense of Lindenâs dramatic challenge to a duel. If I can vividly imagine a scene like that, I make sure to write with purpose in that direction.
When making characters, are they typically made to compliment another character, or to explore a certain character concept? Whatâs your process for character creation?
I tend to start with a trope (âtransmigrated as the villainâ) or core motif (ex. The Hunt) that I find interesting, and then I build on that by complicating the trope and/or adding additional themes. I like thinking about the personality and motives that drive their actions as well.
Sometimes the trope/motif someone starts from is a ânarrative role,â for example, the heirs of the Six Noble Families. Those people needed to exist, to be part of a system of power, and to be important. So from that, I knew they had to be students we see semi-regularly, and they also need backstories/personalities that have them invested in upholding the system as it is. From there, I thought about geography and cultural influence for each familyâs âspecialty,â and then imagined the kids who might come out of those traditions.
For every character, I also like coming up with an interesting âcomplicationâ of their surface-level impression. I like characters who arenât single-note or straightforward to understand, and I like writing strange people. So thatâs how my characters turn out the way they do.
How did you come up with Eunseok & Acacius's characters?
Warning: This section contains statements that may influence your subsequent reading of the story.
My idea for Eunseok started from all the mediocre villain transmigration webnovels I read where someone would transmigrate into a petty villain with a bad reputation and bad deeds under their belt. Then that transmigrator would immediately own up to and apologize for wrongdoings, rectify the past, and wipe the slate clean.
I thought that was pretty boring. After all, if someone has a history of hurting you, would you really be so quick to believe them or forgive them if they said theyâd change their ways? Personally, I wouldnât be convinced. So I thought it would be more interesting to have a transmigrator who was, for one reason or another, invested in keeping up the persona of the villain whose identity theyâd taken. Itâs only if theyâre invested that it feels satisfying for other characters to catch that slip and start digging for answers.
Eunseok was also inspired by a transmigration webnovel where the main character was assumed to be from mundane, modern-world Korea⊠only to reveal 700 chapters in that he was actually from a Hunter / Tower dungeon world, so he had some extra abilities. That was really funny. But I didnât want to wait 700 chapters before revealing my protagonist had something else going on, so you get hints that something is off from the start. Like that, his past becomes an important part of the story.
As for Acacius, I knew he had to be a âvillainâ for Eunseok to transmigrate into. But I thought it would be more interesting if he was a âvillainâ who knew the future that was coming for him, tried to escape it, and in trying to escape it only changed the trajectory by which he arrived at the same end. By the end, he understood exactly why heâd been that kind of person in the future he saw. I donât imagine he was very happy about that.
Since Eunseok was going to be someone invested in keeping up a facade, I knew I had to make the separation between him and Acacius clear. Many transmigration novels have the transmigrator inherit the memories of the person whose body they take, while also switching names clearly. I went in the opposite direction of that⊠Though I have a reason for writing this novel in first person instead of third, where the usage of the main characterâs name would be required.
I want to physically bring out this story and use it as a chew toy.
Itâs an honor. Chew away!
Once again, thank you to everyone who participated in the survey. I always love hearing from you. Let me know if you'd be interested in a Patreon with advance updates, or any thoughts on that front. Hope to see you around for the next arc!
Worldbuilding query after the last chapter, but does the Signifier have any formal temple in the same vein as the Scribe and Secret-Keeper? Their Hierarch seems to fulfill that role in Iyiria, but Dagianâs mention of Lemiriaâs view of the Tripartite, and how certain CI users devote themselves to specific Triarchs made me wonder how the Deceiver is venerated in the world at large.
the signifier is kind of a weird case... formal temples to the signifier are usually visual or performing arts centers of some sort. they also tend to be shut down when their works start affecting popular conceptions of the state's commonly used frames in a way that goes against the government's management.
since you can't just "get rid of art" though, there's usually one "official" signifier's temple / arts center that is part of the government's maintenance of commonly used frames in the area. however, plenty of theaters and art galleries have their own little shrines to the signifier, as many artists venerate them to some degree.
I remember that the Secret-Keeper's other half is the Betrayer, and the Signifier's other half is the Deceiver, but I don't remember if the Scribe's inverse aspect's title was the Obliterator or the Obliviator. Can we get those added to the World Glossary?
sure, i will update the world glossary along with the character index. thanks for letting me know!
Hi, proof of existence is the best web novel I've read (admittedly I haven't read many but that's because I rarely stick to them) and I'm enamored by the world you've painted. The system of titles and named skills are my favourite! I'm finding it a bit difficult to keep track of all the names as abilities introduced so far, though, especially those not belonging to Eunseok, since they're not listed in his record page. (Lowkey I've forgotten what [Deceive]'s full name and appearance are]
Would it be possible for you to make a masterlist of all the names/titles/skills that have showed up so far in the story? Like the titles of legendary figures and Acacius' classmates.
hello! i plan to upgrade the character appendix soon with information on known titles and abilities. legendary figures' information will likely go in the world glossary instead.
[You. Want. To play. Pretend?]
âHey, doesnât your name explain it all? Who am I if not a pretender?â
[There is. Also. Another half. To. The name.]
eunseok has a conversation with [deceiver] and gets ready to challenge the chronicle realm as part of his terrorism plot.
Jeong eunseok'sâ(from @skolomorphic)âpast life never fails to intrigue me you mysterious man. Anyways i MIGHTY be a larper cs im only a few chapters in idkkkđ«Șđ«Șđ«Șđ«Șđ«Șđ«Ș(fanart of jeong eunseok himself cs i only see acacius)
