pssssttt… psssstttt…. Do we have any design ideas on what bast and her foster parents look like… specifically from circle maker…
also please yap more about circle maker
I have a drawing of Golden and a Minecraft skin of Bast lol!
I haven’t done Snipes yet mostly because I’m scared of drawing bird.
I apologize in advance for the absolute thought dump about to happen below. When given the excuse to yap I yap a lot
Bast does have fox ears but they’re hard to see in her skin. She also has the long off-white hair and the random patches of fur on her body. I do plan on actually drawing her but I haven’t gotten around to it and thought it’d be fun to make the Minecraft OC in Minecraft lol
Snipes, while not shown, is named after the snipe as in like, the bird, so she is heavily based on a bird, and though she is a distant descendant of Parrot (avian features were not native to Parkour Civilization so anyone with those features, barring the Parkour God Himself, is in one way or another a descendant of him, fun fact for Mercy!) her features are more crane-like than anything else
She’s specifically designed to look like Golden’s opposite, actually! She is almost entirely feathered but her feathers are very sharp in appearance (soft to the touch) and while Golden has a round muzzle and paws, Snipes has a thin, sharp beak and completely avian legs- not in the same way that Evbo’s boots turn into talons, but in that the entirety of her legs are distinctly bird, crane or stork-like. She’s also a vibrant Royal blue color as opposed to Golden’s soft yellow
Snipes is also transfemme! She and Golden met and fell in love before her transition and Golden was her biggest supporter the entire time. I talked about it a bit in the last chapter of Circle Maker but they had always wanted kids but couldn’t have them due not to Snipes, but due to Golden being barren.
The Parkour God is extremely particular about when children are brought to his safe haven, about who are assigned as their foster parents or whether they are given fosters at all. Nobody is forced to take a child and he normally knows way ahead of time who wants the opportunity to foster or adopt. Thats probably why Snipes and Golden were immediately in love with Bast when she was brought to them. They had wanted it for a long, long, *long* time, but were kept kind of in the backburner while the Parkour God waited for someone who really needed them. Enter Bast
Golden’s full name is xXGolden_EyesXx and Snipes’ is __Snipes__Hunter__
Which brings up another bit of worldbuilding I’ve always wanted to rant about: the naming system
Because let’s be honest what the HELL are Minecraft usernames
So here’s the way I’ve kind of been writing it (drum roll please)
Names and Usernames in the Mercy for the Lamb series!
Gonna use a few different characters as examples, but I think the best ones are actually Bast and Seawatt (stay with me)
All players have a minimum of 2 names
One of these is their username, a full name typically making little sense, sometimes including weird or random letters or symbols or words. This is the name that is tied to their code, which is essentially the equivalent of their *soul*.
For example, SeaWattgaming and BastraLight. Also Evbo_, or xXGolden_EyesXx
These names work essentially like Minecraft usernames as well, which is why they are so weird. *Duplicate names cannot exist*. There cannot be two players with the same name, even if one died three thousand years ago
(An exception lies with players who have been so thoroughly erased that there is not longer anything left of their existence. These are players that cannot be revived even by the Parkour God, and it includes every Fighter who died between the fall of the Fighter Layer and the reintegration of it. People like Seawatt’s parents are completely erased from existence, and as such their names would technically be able to be used again. The Champion is capable of fully erasing player data, as is the Parkour God, but once it is erased, it cannot be brought back.)
Because of this duplicate name problem, full names have evolved like Xbox or Minecraft usernames. They include weird strings of letters or symbols sometimes to make the name work
These names are very rarely known by anyone other than the player themselves, their parents (if they are naturally born), and the Parkour God. The Champion also has access to these names though whether they use them or not changed from Champion to Champion. It’s also not rare for romantic partners to share their full names as part of their wedding vows, as it is a very deep and private part of their identity. It can also be shared between adoptive children and parents as another show of trust (Bast notwithstanding, but she is a different story)
The other name is the name the player uses in day to day life. This is the name they introduce themselves as and call themselves. This includes Seawatt, Bast, Evbo, Golden, etc.
There is nothing really special about these names, this is just the names they tend to associate themselves with more than anything. Seawatt never calls himself Seawattgaming, but if Evbo wants to look up his name in the player data, he has to use that full name.
EMF is also one of these names. It does stand for something in Mercy. I do not know what it stands for. I hide behind refusing to give his full name to pretend like I actually have a full name for him when I do not. It is not Evbo’s Master Friend
Now, there is an inconsistency here. Namely, Bast and this scene
Bast does not hesitate to give her full username to Golden when prompted for her name.
This is *extremely* unusual for players to do, but there is a reason for it
To put it simply: Bast was never given a gauge on what is considered intimate information like her full name.
Bast was not born to really *exist* in Parkour Civilization. She was specifically born because of her older sister, Dais, being the Champion, which is still considered a holy position even if the Parkour God is long gone. As such, anyone in the direct line of the Champion is also considered holy.
Bast was born to sacrifice. She was born for the express purpose of sacrificing to the Parkour God. Her entire existence is based on the idea of sacrificing a holy figure.
Because of this, she did not receive the same kind of psychological education as she would have received if she was intended to live past her teen years. Nobody ever cared to really teach her nuanced topics like the privacy of her full username. In fact, she was raised the *opposite*. If the whole world knew of BastraLight, then surely sacrificing her would mean that much more. Therefore, she was taught to always give her full username when asked, alongside her chosen name. She is simply a sacrifice waiting to be put on the block
She is not the only one who has gone through this process. Just the most recent
Despite the Parkour God knowing her full name, him ignoring the main happenings of Parkour Civilization means he had no idea who Bast was before she was sacrificed. He only realized what she was meant to do when she gave her full name upon being asked, because no player meant to live would have given up their name like that
If you’ve read this far, congratulations! You are now just as brain rotted as me.
Keep an eye on the journal entries at the beginning of each chapter. They are the most obvious hints to what is happening in the story :3
