I was curious what other people have made as far as creation myths and stories.
Here is one of mine:
The Void awoke and thought. From its thought came Chaos. Chaos was and is and is all there will be. Void saw this and heard this and hated it, so the Void created Imortos, a being of perfect order. Imortos also hated Chaos, but did not understand how to stop Chaos. So Void thought one more time and created a being that understood both chaos and order, Kelaster. Kelaster looked at Chaos and Imortos and came up with an idea. He began whispering things to Imortos and dropping hints here and there, sowing the seeds of what was to come.
It was then that Imortos came to Kelaster with an idea. He would build a great machine that would finally transform Chaos into order. He poured over the details, explaining it to Kelaster. Kelaster would interject only to offer suggestions and make minor corrections. When Imortos finished, Kelaster asked Imortos what he would build this great machine out of. “You,” replied Imortos.
“Now brother, do you really think that I would make good materials for this machine? I would muck it up, ruining the perfect order of things,” replied Kelaster. His words resonated with Imortos, and Imortos asked Kelaster to aid him in becoming the machine. Imortos wrote out all the instructions for the machine and then instructed Kelaster to cut him up and reassemble him as Mechanus, the Cosmic Clock. Kelaster killed Imortos and did as instructed, but tweaked the design somewhat as he did so. When Mechanus began, time did as well, killing Chaos and splitting it into the past, the present, and the future. Because Kelaster tweaked Imortos’ design, chance now exists and the future is not fully realized.
Whew, that was longer than I thought it would be. Thanks for staying and reading. Can’t wait to read some of yours.
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ok ill go, eventhough i just started building and dont have such a well written origin and only placeholder names. but it goes like this: the fist thing the world knows is how Infinity has created it. back then the world was quite diffrent. everything was infinite and neverchangeing. out of this premature world Change started to exist. a god equally powerful to Infinity. with Change came day and night, life and death, happines and sadnes. since then those two creators have been fighting an everlasting fight over how the world should be.
there will be like god champions around the concepts of destruction, creation, order and chaos who fight on either side of the two creators. the idea is that the humanoids and animals merely life inbetween this fight on their battlefield. ofc the audience wont notice this godly fight but there are still churches and cults formed around them.
my idea was that i wanted necromancy in my game and it shouldnt be seen as evil. so i came up with the idea that a follower of infinity would see it as a good thing to extent life forever.
thanks for this thread. your story gave me some inspiration to flesh my idea out.
I like the idea of necromancy not being evil! That’s a cool one to expand on.
AvengersPantheon: Civil War, I like it! Could make for a baller Capcom-esque fighting game. But I like the vibe here, though a question. Was Change being born the impetus for these other gods to come about? Like, Change peeling out of the cosmos ripped up some “divine magic gunk” and these other beings were born? Or is that not quite right?
My world doesn’t understand the concept of origins. The world is static and unchanging. All that is, always has been. And always will be. The story is the process of them discovering this is not true, and of discovering that their very thought processes have been altered to prevent them thinking too much about it. It’s a very “we have always been at war with Eastasia” setting.
That is fun! I think it is very natural for people to believe that things don’t change or that they cycle instead of changing so I could see how whole populations can get convinced of this. Are there any fringe groups who are trying to find the truth? Some shady cult somewhere that is trying to defy the entire world order?
There is a shady cult but it’s more like the outcasts of society. They’re not so much trying to defy the world order but rather avoid its attention.
There are two main warring factions on the continent (roughly the size of Australia) and also this 3rd group of outcasts, which both sides see as fair game for impressment and harassment. They exist on the fringes, both literally and metaphorically. They’re nomadic traders similar to gypsies.
The two interesting things about them is that 1) the programming doesn’t work on them. They don’t know the truth, and they’re too harried and poverty stricken to seek it, but they know what the other people believe doesn’t make sense. They also know the two factions will kill them for pointing this out. And 2) there’s a lot more of them than anyone realizes, including them. They’re just scattered.
Indarra - Industrial Revolution Low Fantasy
The Maiden, first of the darkness, set out to achieve her works, though none were around to witness, to praise. She lit the Great Forge, the Sun, and went to work forging a powerful blade. Assembling floating specks of matter from the darkness, the Maiden created Indarra, the First Blade. As she quenched the gleaming metal in the void, the slag from the blade took form and the world was created as she pulled Indarra free.
Great elemental beasts of fire, earth, and air were born to the molten orb, thrashing about the surface in a frenzy, dazed by their sudden creation. Intrigued by her accidental creation, the Maiden took her blade and cut into the void, drawing its ichor, and the liquid poured forth onto the world becoming water. The last elemental beast was born, and its balancing influence calmed the skys, contained the earth, and extinguished the flame.
There’s a bit more going on after this, another sword created, etc. But that felt long enough for a comment. Came up with a bit of new stuff while fleshing this out for typing, thanks for the post! Also quite liked your story, the creation of Mechanus in particular. Kelaster gives me Loki/coyote trickster vibes, but not to be scorned by mortals.
Kelaster is absolutely a trickster deity, but it is understood that eventualyl all things will collapse because of him and the Void will consume everything, so I guess the Void still gets what it wants in the end.
I like your story a lot. It feels very mythological. The accidental creation of the world is a fun idea that I think I am going to ruminate about now.
Sounds like a piece of work, this guy… Might as well enjoy the ride in the meantime I suppose!
And thanks! Definitely was going for a high mythology feel for the creation. And history always seems to be quite accidental in our world, so why not superimpose our fantasy conceits upon it?
For my world, there is the Creator that created every universe and plane within them, then they disappeared and never interacted with its creation again.
For the universe my story takes place in, magic used to run wild and beings hoarded it and became more and more powerful. A small group became so powerful that their war between themselves for sole control of the world began to destroy it entirely.
During a battle, the lover of one of these beings was killed, fracturing their psyche. Their split personality allowed them to see things from a more neutral perspective so they slowly convinced the other 8 beings that were left in the war to make a truce, rebuild the world, and rule it together from a far. So they each created their own plane and created their own life forms, many in their own image.
Over time, they came to be known as gods by their creations and each was shaped by their followers beliefs until each represented a different alignment. And the one with the fractured psyche became the True Neutral god and ruled from two planes, each for half the year. Their planes were the two closers to the prime material plane so she could help guard it from the other gods. In the Feywild, she rules as Melora and in the Shadowfell, she rules as the Raven Queen.
Almost no one in the prime material plane knows that Melora and the Raven Queen are the same being and none know their gods didn’t actually create their world, they just reworked it.
The gods restricted the use of magic to prevent power growing out of hand, but something left behind unleashed some of it, leading to chaotic storms that ravaged the world.
One of my favorite things about this question is everyone has such different and interesting ideas. Thanks for sharing! I think the idea of some false creators is captivating
I don’t really have a “true” origin story for the setting of my fantasy ttrpg home game. But of course everyone that lives in the world has their own theories about the origin of everything. I like the creation myth of one of my dwarven cultures best/have it the most worked out, so I’ll share that here:
In the beginning the world was just an empty ball of clay. And nothing was and nothing could be. For noone was there to make it be. Yet still there was the Craft in the world and it was so great, that the First Beings arose, shaping themselves from the clay of the world.
There arose Noble Dhum. And so great was his Craft that he made himself the greatest toolsmith and the greatest stone cutter tat ever could be. Lord over all the mountains he then raised and everything thereunder. Ruler of everything in the newly made world.
And there arose Wise Erdake. And so great was her Craft that she made herself the greatest fountain of knowledge that could ever be. Knower of all secrets and most learned in the languages and runes she created. Cleverest engineer of mills and machines. Misstress of the rain and all the bodies of water she set flowing.
And there arose Exuberant Kruf. And so great was their Craft that they made themself the origin of all plants, the sun and moon and all the forces of nature that shook the world from its stasis. Driver of every storm, fuel of every fire, passion of every bolt of lightning, the hammerstrike behind every shake of the worlds stone.
And there was Wild Naveg. And so great was her Craft that she made herself the strongest warrior and the fastest hunter that ever could be. The bringer of all death, the champion of all fights. Most dangerous predator of all the animals she created.
And so these Four-that-created-themselves shaped the world, each according to the nature they had made themselves to posess. And each they united with each of the others. And from those unions arose their descendants, the six original clans of the dwarves. Seeing that these descendants posessed only a small fraction of their Craft, Dhum took to leading them and Erdake took to teaching them. Kruf however made new beings by themself. However, almost devoid of Craft they went of to live among the plants of their forests and graslands. And so the humans and halflings came to be. And Naveg as well made new beings by herself. However, equally devoid of Craft they went off to fight against another in lands far from the lands of the first dwarves. And so the elves and orks came to be.
And for long the Four-that-created-themselves lived among the dwarves. But the dwarves grew lazy and instead of striving to better their craft so they might one day reach the greatness of their creators they demanded their gods solve every problem for them with their great Craft. And so insolent and bothersome grew the dwarves that the gods retreated from their lands and withdrew to the far reaches of the world. Noble Dhum went far beneath the moutains, deeper than any dwarf could dig, to practice his Craft in peace. And Wise Erdake sank far beneath the ocean, deeper than any dwarf could ever dive, to practive her Craft in peace. Exuberant Kruf went to walk among all living things, present in every gust of wind yet never showing themself to any dwarf or other mortal being, to practice their Craft in peace. And Wild Naveg went to roam the battlefields and graveyards of the world beyond deaths door, only to be reached by dwarves and other mortals after they left behind their lives and troubles, to practice her Craft in peace.
And ever since then the dwarves have to strive to regain the Craft. And only if they are diligent and virtuous may those-that-created-themselves look apon them with grace and aid them in the perfection of their Craft.
Wow, that sounded shorter in my head. Anyway, long story short: four beings made themselves then made everything else. The dwarves are their children but then drove their own gods away by being lazy.
