Cerulean's writing evolution over time is kinda fascinating, how his ability to plot steadily declined while his other writing skills improved.
Animorphs: Redux: one self contained plot per book, with larger character arcs very much in the background
Atonement: more sprawling plot, with sections bleeding and leading into each other, but largely self-contained arcs that are clearly building towards one end goal
Intrepid: multiple plots going at once, even before the side stories; threads are sometimes interrupted by new obstacles. At some point, he read the advice "If you don't know what to write next, have someone run in with a gun" and took it to heart
Heretical Edge/Summus Proelium: hope you enjoyed the plot we were having because someone just teleported our main character to the moon and we gotta deal with that instead now - never mind, now they're fighting stone giants- never mind, now they're...
I am planning on starting an online Book Club for a Web serial called Heretical Edge (which I will summarize below). It’s available online completely free, so each week I’ll give out links to the chapters you’ll need to read, and then we’ll discuss it together. Discussions will happen on a Discord, most likely one of my personal servers but possibly the dedicated HE Server (They love watching people live-read things, so I think they’d love the book club). It’ll start in roughly two weeks, so please reblog this post if you are interested.
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Now, for the summary: Heretical Edge is an Action-Thriller Urban Fantasy starring Felicity “Flick” Chambers, an aspiring reporter who is offered an opportunity to join Crossroads Academy, a school for creating Heretics, monster Hunters who protect humanity from evil creatures who live amongst them. Whilst at Crossroads, Flick begins to investigate two different conspiracies. One of them is a plot to assassinate her room mate, Avalon Sinclaire. The other concerns a class photo containing an image of Flick’s mother, who walked out on their family when Flick was a young girl.
In terms of tone, Heretical Edge is similar to RWBY, though maybe a touch more intense at times, and in terms of Structure it’s similar to the web serials by Wildbow such as Worm and Pale. The series features many mythological and historical figures, most notably Arthuriana and the Greek pantheon. (It’s take on Queen Guinevere is a particular highlight.). The Action scenes are very creative, due to the Heretics ability to obtain the powers of the creatures they slay. And the series has a lot of representation as well, showing a broad spectrum of ethnicities and sexualities on every level of the cast. Most notably, I feel, is it’s exploration of Poly relationships.
In terms of content warnings, some of the combat scenes would be considered quite gory if this were a visual medium, though none are described in Lurid Detail. Additonally sexual assault plays a part in the backstory of some characters, though none of it is depicted on screen, nor are their any situations where one is clearly about to happen before a scene ends. And the author has promised that there will not be any such scenes in the story.
Many thousands of years ago on the planet Earth, there were stories. People wanted to know how the world worked, but did not understand. And so they told stories to explain it, stories of magic, monsters, and most of all, Gods. And it was through the telling of these stories that the Gods came to be. Earth had been saturated with metaphysical objects known as “Authorities”, which were akin to admin privileges for pieces of reality. The “Authorities” became a core, and their bodies were made from human imagination.
These gods were sustained by worship from the same humanity that created them, and they would grant boons to the humans of Earth in exchange for said worship. It was a prosporus time, but it would soon come to an end thanks to a threat from beyond the Earth. Deep in space, one of the civilization destroying entities known as the Reapers had encountered something that caused it to deviate from it’s normal path. This Reaper, known as Velber, wandered through the universe on a set path, a route which took 14,000 years to traverse, and dispatched machines that wiped out any civilizations it encountered, regardless of how advanced they were. When it passed by Earth, it wiped out 80 percent of life on Earth, and slew the majority of the Gods.
The key players in driving off this menace were Agamotto and Mamaragan. Agamotto was the mortal son of a goddess named Oshtur, who had helped codify many of Earth’s magical systems. Agamotto commissioned several Fae clans to forge a sword of his design, Excalibur, in order to slay Velber’s forces. Agamotto knew he himself could not wield the sword to it’s full effectiveness, and that is where Mamaragan enters the picture. Mamaragan was an Aboriginal god who was well respected amongst the the gods. Earlier in the conflict, Mamaragan’s apprentice Oggar had hatched the idea of creating Letters of Power, symbols imbued with the lent power of gods and legendary figures. The Letters of Power could in turn be made into Words of Power, giving great strength to their Wielders. Oggar had intended these letters of power to be used by himself and Mamaragan to defeat Velber’s machines, but Mamaragan foresaw that their godly nature would leave them vulnerable to the enemy’s weapons. So he instead gifted the Word of power to a mortal. That mortal then used Excalibur to defeat the machine menace.
The gods had been killed, but the stories that spawned them hadn’t gone anywhere. And thus they were reborn anew, but it was not just the gods themselves that were reborn, it was the world around them as well. At this point in time, much of the surface of the Earth was metaphysical in nature, dictated by belief and by those with the power to shape it. And so when the Gods were reborn, so was a majority of the world around them. This was why this time became known as the Second World, and why that name scheme would persist to later iterations of the Gods.
The stories of the Gods had changed over time, so the second iteration of the Gods were different from their originals. That was not the only change, however. Velber’s destruction has stuck in the minds of man, and inspired stories of Apocalyptic destruction. The Death of the Gods would not be a one time event, it would occur over and over. Once enough gods died, the change to the next world would trigger, and all would be reset. The Gods who had been forgotten by Humanity would disappear, and Gods who’d been incorporated into other pantheons would become permanent fixtures. Gods who were not dead when the Worlds changed would be wiped away, though some (Such as Mamaragan, now going by the name Shazam) found ways to persist beyond the change. Additionally, the Demigods begotten by these gods survived, anchored to existence by their half mortal nature.
Most Gods believed that while every other pantheon was the creation humanity, their pantheon were legitimate. They believed that the creation stories of their pantheons were the genuine truth. It is entirely possible that one of these pantheons is right, but it is entirely impossible to know for sure which one is right. The stories which inspired the gods did have to come from somewhere, after all. While in some cases the inspirations are known, such as how the Ancients inspired the stories of the Asgardians, others are unknown. This means that it is possible for the stories to be inspired by legitimate Gods. There are Gods from other regions of space that are outside Earth’s system, and could have appeared on Ancient Earth. As an aside, the era wherein the stories the gods are made of were written is informally known as the 0th World.
The Second World would pass by naturally, and the Third World would begin, however the end of this world would have drastic impact on the next World. The problem began when one of Zeus’s spawn, Kratos of Sparta, slew Ares and took his mantle as God of War. This would set into motion a series of events that would lead to the destruction of the Greek Pantheon. In the absence of this Pantheon, Alien infiltrators known as the Seosten would masquerade as the Greek Gods as part of their plans to take control of the planet. The Seosten wanted to control Earth because humans had a unique ability, the power to bond their DNA with the DNA of alien lifeforms to gain their abilities. They had the potential to be highly versatile Super Soldiers, but there was an issue. Their ability to bond only worked on physical creatures, known as Alters. Metaphysical creatures, known as Others, did not have the DNA necessary for the process. Gods fell under the category of Other, and would be an obstacle for Seostenic control of Earth.
The Seosten’s ultimate plan was to hide away the Supernatural world from humanity, and advance their knowledge of science to the point that the supernatural was deemed as impossible. This would mean that the Gods would cease to exist after the third world, due to their metaphysical bodies no longer being compatible with their “Authorities”. This plan, to institute what would eventually be known as the Bystander Effect, would require a great deal of power, even for a space empire. They obtained the lion’s share of their power by orchestrating a war between the gods themselves and siphoning energy given off by the conflict.
However, the conflict would escalate beyond the Seosten’s expectations. The people of Egypt had Long be wary of body snatchers like the Seosten, due to their prior experiences with the Goa’uld, and this experience allowed them to uncover the Seosten’s presence, bringing them into the war directly. The revelation could have spurred the gods to ally with each other in order to crush the Seosten, but before such an alliance could be cemented, one of them took an action that scuttled it. Shem-Ha Mephorash had long toyed with the idea of using humanity as a weapon of conquest, and the exposure of the Seosten convinced her to enact her plans. She began to take control of Humanity via a method that involved the Universal Language of the human race. This was seen as an existential threat by the other gods, and tensions ratcheted up between them even though the god Enki had managed to scuttle it using the Curse of Balal.
Being out in the open made it harder for the Seosten to keep the war in line, and so the war began to escalate to higher stakes. Another major driver of this was the Monkey King of Korea, a reckless but powerful fighter. Eventually the intensity of the conflict began to stir the Chaos Bringer who resided beneath the surface of the planet Earth. And this drew the attention of two other groups of Gods from beyond the stars.
The first group were the Elder Gods. These were the first six gods whom had been created before Unicron and Primus were split apart, and whom had subsequently fought against Unicron. The second group were the Kais. The Kais were an offshoot of the Mathusians, the same race which would spawn the Green Lantern Corps. The Kais were descended from a group of Malthusians who had apprenticed themselves under the Elder Gods in order to seek penance for Krona’s Sin. The Elder Gods thus gifted them with an “Authority” covering the concept of Creation, and the responsibility of maintaining the afterlife and various other realms connected to our cosmos. To balance out these Kais, an office known as the Hakaishin was created, who bore the “Authority” over destruction.
The intervention of these gods from the stars put an end to the war between the Gods, and forced them to come to the peace table to hash out an accord that would be implemented at the Dawn of the next World. The biggest result of this intervention was the splintering of the Earth into several realms. This was primarily done to split off the lands of the gods from the physical plane which humans resided. This was a very complex process, and due to the nature of Earth’s make up, Earth could not be split into just the Earth and the domain of the Gods. Several different realms, such as Outworld, had to be made as well in order to make everything work. Additionally, the war had severely damaged the flow of the afterlife on and around Earth, creating the need to create the Soul Society in order to regulate the damage.
Ironically, the Seosten were treated relatively leniently in this matter, as they did not posses the conceptual power to cause the damages that had drawn the ire of the cosmic gods. Thus they managed to get the Bystander Effect which they’d been aiming for the whole time, helped by the placement of a special Artifact which reinforced the planet’s belief in Science. However, the Gods did manage to get some concessions. It was agreed that the Gods would be given physical bodies in the next world, which were less reliant on the worship of humanity to survive, though it still empowered them. A Taboo was also put in place, which acted as a conceptual defense which prevented humans from being able to directly harm the Gods. The Gods won these concessions by striking a deal with the sorcerer supreme of the time, Suleimon Bin Daoud, to empower his proposed “Seal of Solomon”.
The Gods were also given a new duty, to prevent Unicron from awakening. As part of this duty, every 1000 years a God’s council would be organized, which would assess the state of mortal affairs on Earth and the adjacent realms. If a risk of awakening Unicron was detected, the Gods would hold a vote on how to handle it, with the most extreme solution available being the extinction of mortal life. Though if that provision were voted through, Mortals would have the right to challenge the Gods to a series of 13 one on one matches, to avert their destruction.
When the world’s changed over, there was a new pantheon joining the others. This was a common occurrence, but this case was set apart by one key fact: This pantheon stretched beyond the Earth. This pantheon had been born from the stories of the war between the Gods themselves, and was not simply made from the minds of humanity, but of the various alien species who had fought in the war as well. It was a story of a war between two godly races whose conflict split their world asunder. It was the tale of New Genesis, and Apokalips. After they came into existence, the Gods of New Genesis and Apokalips became major players throughout the cosmos. Apokalips’ leader Darkseid sought to restrain all things into his own image, using subterfuge and guile to lead people into giving into their worst nature.
However, they were not the only Gods who transcended the bonds of Earth. During the period of the war after the Seosten’s involvement had been revealed, Odin had allied with other alien races in order to even the playing field. Foreseeing that the conflict would eventually attract the attention of forces outside of the Earth, Odin had his allies spread the tales of the Norse to other planets. As a result, when the change to the Fourth world went into effect, the Norse pantheon became a technologically advanced race with connections that spanned the galaxy. The 3rd World incarnation of Odin attempted a scheme that would allow his consciousness to persist into the body of his 4th world counterpart, but this plot was scuppered. The 3rd World Odin was able to continue existing, and took up the name Mr. Wednesday.
The Gods of Uruk also hatched their own scheme to influence the next World. They cam up with a scheme to create the ultimate neutral party to rule over humanity and keep the Gods from losing their dominion over them. This neutral party was the hero known as Gilgamesh, who was one third human and two thirds God. However, Gilgamesh developed outside of their plans, and their attempt to rerail him back into the role they planned for him using Enkidu failed, and Gilgamesh ultimately wound up cementing the end of the Age of Gods.
Time passed. Eventually the nation of America came to prominence on the world stage, and many of the lingering old gods relocated there, seeking opportunities to gain wider influence there. From this location, Mr. Wednesday would hatch a plot to obtain even greater power. His plan involved orchestrating a new War between gods, except this time the war would be between the New Gods, and the Old Gods, gods who had found ways to persist after the change over from one World to the next. In order to kick off this plot, Mr. Wednesday would need a villain to rally the other Old Gods to action. Wednesday, by this point was well aware of how Gods were created, and so he decided to nudge along the creation of one, with the aid of a certain Investor.
By this point in time, the industrial revolution was in full swing in the Americas, and Mr. Wednesday guided humanity’s belief in faith and industrialism to become incarnated as a God known as The Factory. The Factory, which embodied all of the toxic and destructive aspects of Capitalism, would consume anything and everything as raw material for it’s products, including other Gods. However, Mr. Wednesday’s desired war between the Gods would be put on hold, as The Factory soon came to the attention of an organization known as the SCP Foundation, who worked swiftly to contain it's products, which were the only way it could interact with the world. They had been tipped off as to it’s existence by the Fourth World Odin, who had maintained a close watch over Mr. Wednesday in order to head off any schemes. The War between the Gods would thus not begin until the Modern Day, when changes in the SCP Foundations Leadership would draw their focus more towards Superheroes, and after Odin had fallen and his son Thor took up leadership of Asgard. When that happened, Mr. Wednesday would set off this war by covertly pointing the Church of the Broken God in the Factory’s direction.
Next Chapter The man in the handsome silver shirt lifted his pistol until the end of the barrel seemed as large as a cannon. His voice was gruff, that of a man who had killed many times before and …
If you’re looking for a good book full of diverse and queer characters that focuses on mystery and fantasy in a fun new way please check out Heretical Edge by Ceruleanscrawling! Literally my favorite book ever, please come talk to me about it
[Everyone is standing around a broken coffee maker]
Avalon: Who broke it? I'm not mad, I just want to know.
Rudolph: I did. I broke it.
Avalon: No, no you didn't. Gerardo?
Sean: Don't look at me. Look at Columbus.
Columbus: What? I didn't break it.
Sean: Huh, that's weird. How did you even know it was broken?
Columbus: Because it's sitting right in front of us and it's broken!
Sean: Suspicious.
Columbus: No, it's not!
Shiori: I don't know if it matters, probably not, but...Koren was the last one to use it.
Koren: Liar, I don't even drink that crap!
Shiori: Oh really? Then what were you doing over by the coffee cart earlier?
Koren: I use the wooden stirrers to push back my cuticles, everyone knows that, Shiori!
Rudolph: Okay, let's not fight. I broke it, let me pay for it, Avalon.
Avalon: No! Who broke it?
Everyone: ...
Columbus: Avalon, Scout's been awfully quiet.
Scout: Really?!
Columbus: Yeah, really!
Scout: Oh my god!
Everyone: [starts bickering and shouting over each other]
Avalon, in the background: I broke it. It burned my hand, so I punched it. I predict ten minutes from now, they'll be at each other's throats, with war paint on their faces and a pig head on a stick. Good. It was getting a little chummy around here.
