In Progress Lets write our own characters in an evolving story!

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With all the good CYOA LP's going on around here. ( root grotsnik @TheBarbarian Kz3r0 Hellraiser Curufinwe Vernydar ) Ive been wanting to do my own for awhile, but since im lazy and unsure of my own competence in this sorta stuff its mostly just been me playing with concepts. Ive come up with an idea though - that will not only let me play God with minimal effort, it could also be a neat community experiment that will let a bunch of us wannabe CYOA'ers have a go.

I am going to establish a loose world, based on history but including magic and the supernatural. This il explain through a mythology (a combination of occult history, real mythology and sci-fi) il create, that will hopefully allow for a wide range of stories to be told within it. Then im going to deus ex an eternal hero for us to use, and then once the worlds set up and peopled with enough events and personalities il let someone else take over to do his own story and then someone after that. etc etc. Il still participate and try to keep the thing going in a general direction but its more of an experiment than anything else. A universe for anyone on the codex to influence and change.



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REFERENCE:

Map - Hypothesised geography of the World, circ. Cadecus Impact

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CHAPTERS:

POST-MELIOREM & PRE-HISTORY

1. First and Last Men
2. Esoteric Pterodactyl


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It was summer in Mississippi and underneath a cloudless blue sky a Man kicked his way down a gravel road, whistling as he went. He had traveled far and for a long, long time and was finally happy with the simple aimlessness of his situation. Happy as can be. A pickup rumbled by closely kicking up a cloud of choking dust and the man coughed, shifted the guitar
strapped to his shoulder and squinted through the haze. Up ahead the truck turned a left at the crossroads and sped away, the group of whites sitting on the back giving him hostile looks till they disappeared from view. The Man smiled and spat on the ground. Soon enough he was at the crossroads as well, underneath the twisty shade of a dead Blackthorn tree nestled in one of the corners in one of the right angles of the roads, its dry and brittle roots spilling out onto the road at his feet to play with its shadows. The Man sat down with a grunt in the cleft of the tree, took out a dirty looking pouch and started to roll himself a cigarette. He was wetting the edges of the paper when his eyes settled on a figure sitting with its back to him across the road. "HO Stranger!" he called in a strong voice. The figure did not move. The Man shrugged and finished rolling his cigarette, popped it into the corner of his mouth and regarded it once more. All he could make out was a tan-coloured shirt of what he guessed was calico covering a dark black body which he could only see through the gap at the neck between his shirt and a field-workers cap. The Man cupped his mouth with his hands and called out louder for the second time "HOOO! Fella!" The cigarette dropped in his lap. He leant down to pick it up and looked up in time to see the figure - a gooey-black monstrosity with buttons for eyes and a dripping maw opening up like a portal into the void - shambling full pelt towards him. "What in the fu-" The tarman hit him hard against the Blackthorn tree knocking out his breath and trapping his limbs with its melting mass; quickly cocooning the man within the sticky black blob. Face to face with the now growing head of the tarman, the Man screamed and screamed until its formless head, decorated absurdly still with the cottonpickers hat, closed on him like a lid.

---

For a time he could not determine, the Man lost all sense of time and space. He swam senselessly within the void and his mind raged with terror and confusion. After awhile a white dot appeared in his vision but he could not determine anything else about it. Was it close and small or large and far? Just as he sensed himself going mad the dot rushed at him and as his vision filled up in its huge expanse pure terror drove all else from his mind. The Man let out a gasp and realised suddenly that he could speak. He swore and cursed and spouted raging nonsense and this comforted him until the white began to fade and the world changed on him yet again. Objects took form in the shapes of giant and ancient trees around him, inverted from the normal spectrum of greens and browns into a ghostly mix of contrasting whites and blacks and then the spectrum tuned itself and the world became clear. The Man stood on a rocky outcrop in a vast forest, a growing light was quickly illuminating the area and in-front of him lay a huge dead beast, sprawled out with its head towards him and bleeding into the rocks. The lizards head was easily half the size of him and was arrayed with a set of terrible teeth, it had a vaguely serpentine body which filled out at the hips where a set of massive legs lay broken and bit. The trees rustled momentarily and everything was obliverated by pure white light.

---

NAZIS OCCUPY CZECHSLOVAKIA

The Man chucked the newspaper onto a pile of newspapers upon a pile of books and rubbed his eyes. It was raining outside the office and he was tired. He opened up a desk-drawer and pulled out a hand-sized fragment of whale-bone fashioned into something that looked like a comb. He examined it in his hands and then sat back in his chair with a sigh. A shadow moved infront of the door - obscuring the letters on the plain mottled glass that spelled out his name and profession: Hugh Briss - P.I. "Hello..?" a shrill womans voice called uncertainly but the Man said nothing. The lights were off and he didnt have time for another case. She didnt hang around and the Man fell asleep to the sound of the rain until the phone woke him.

---


Chronologically this is at the end of the story, there wont be a choice pertaining to it till much later.

what are we supposed to do here? where are the choices?

okey, first choice:

Would you like:

a) more mythology next update

b) or for me to jump straight in (Were starting in Atlantis)

a) and then switch authors imo

wanna see this go to the stars!

What is this shit? I read it as cover your own ass with a tweest. Where is pretty picture? Where is your story?

a) more mythology next update

A, you showed us the ending first so give us more information.

a) More mythology.

A rival cyoa! Good luck with it! Good writing style, looking forward to more mythology personally. The first update said pretty much nothing and jumps back and forth with no real reason given.

bear with it, bro

the first update, besides giving a frame for the rest of the stories, is just for the :mystery:
also no need to be rivals! this cyoa is all about other people filling in for me, so if you think you got a story you'd like to write just lemme know. Gimme a link to your cyoa too.


Update should be this weekend as well, so look forward to: Atlantis! Space! and our first real choice!

Was kidding with the rival thing :p . My thread is updated daily and in the first page of the playground too, not too hard to spot

I. FIRST AND LAST MEN

Dark and violently formed glass floored a vast clearing, mirroring the setting above. Gathered was an eclectic throng of chimerical creatures, some seemed to be made of elements; avatars of earth, fire and other forces of nature wrapped up into legs, arms and heads. Others ranged from shapes of beasts in imaginative hues to simple bodies of colored matter, although in some way most trended their form after the ape-creatures of the planet who had so far displayed a certain intelligence exclusive from other animals. Above the group water lapped at a large force field that arched in a sphere and at its apex sunlight filtered through softly in crepuscular waves. At the center of the gathering, a being made out of geometric shapes of light orated to the crowd.
“Did you think to travel the cosmos forever?” a voice called out and a rabble went through the crowd.
“Yes. You wonder-struck fools. It will be a thousand-thousand years till the Meliorem passes over this space again. You have doomed us all to oblivion”
A metres tall man skinned in bark and foliage made his way to the forefront. Cavities in his flesh revealed white bones like an animals supported by tendons and ligaments that looked as much like root as it did muscle.
“Yes, to die. Is that such a bad thing brother? Or would you rather travel infinitely through space? The Meliorem would of taken us in circles until we were mad, trapped in it as fuel for the fire. No. It is better to die here, on a planet such as this.”
“And what about the other thousand souls who got spread around this solar-system in the diaspora your separation caused? Can you speak for them too?”
“We do not have to answer for anybody. There was no conspiracy, merely the lust of the right amount of souls to break us apart from the host and onto this planet. A reaction and nothing more. You cannot ask us to answer for our desires just as I cannot ask you to accept what you have been dealt. The Meliorem is gone and may it never come back.”

The rabble increased and the two speakers were drowned out.

---

He did not remember his name of where he was from, just that he had traveled in the Meliorem like billions of others and he remembered that like a dream. He sat in the cathedral beneath the waves. A way off the sounds of the speakers and the rabble continued. One group was arguing for building something to ward off Time, to outlast the millennia between the Meliorem's return. They argued that all should help in this endeavor; especially the Cadecus - as they had begun to be called, the ones responsible for the split from the Meliorem in the first place. The other group made up of largely but not entirely the Cadecus, advocated freedom. They had felt the pull of the Meliorem for too long and they longed now to do something on their own terms. He did not care. The argument was largely pointless. The Meliorem still resided in them and would so for the next 100 years or so before fading out - until then each of them was a god unto themselves and the whole solar-system was liable to their will. Anything could happen between now and the first sensations of the Meliorem's true departure, soon there would be suicides and murders, groups would form no doubt, War? The man looked into the glass and past his reflection. In the leagues thick bowl, trapped within the streaked and blackened glass he could feel the power of the first Cadecus; crushed under the weight of their brothers and fused and solidified into the soil. Death the only thing they would of felt from the earth they lusted for. The Man rose and levitated for a short moment, contemplating the glass once more before shooting up into the air and out of the hole of light at the top of the dome. A minute later he sat above the world, the curvature of the earth spread out beneath him. Black smoke drifted across the horizon, the destructive effects of their arrival still lingering. He drifted across the skyscape through the clouds until he came upon a part of the land untouched by the cataclysm, and then sent out his senses. He listened to the forces of the earth and wondered at the harmony and chaos of this strange world. There was mystery here. He watched cave-men hunt great-toothed lizards and dance upon their corpses, he watched mothers care tenderly for their young around roaring fires and he watched a young man stumble through the night stalked by terrible beats. He felt the winds on his face and the sun on his back and a hand on his shoulder. He swivelled around and was face-to-face with another castaway. This one had fashioned himself with the head of a goat, the wings of a bat and scaled reptilian feet ended in claws. Up? it motioned to space and the twinkling stars.

"There will be others spread allover in the wake of the separation. I go to look for them. Join me?"

You studied the thing and thought about it. You had lost an eternity of life in the stars to this planet, and would only have a limited amount of time to gain a first-hand account of the solar-system, but what was there that you hadnt already seen? Your brothers would find their way to here or they wouldn't, it did not matter. Yet you couldnt help thinking there was something attractive about the offer. Communication in the host had consisted of a whispered cacophony of thoughts and you had begun ignoring it long ago. It would be nice to have a friend.

Still, what motives did it have? He doubted it wanted just a stroll among the stars.

---


Go into Space?
a) Yes
b) No

Feelings about the Cadecus?
1) neutral
2) anger
3) empathy

Take on an aspect?
Wind/Earth/Fire/Hawk/Centipede etc etc (combinations as well)
this will be representative of the characters personality and will effect how I write him and the outcome of some situations.
You can remain as is as well though. (Gray humanoid looking with black eyes)

heres some points for anyone whos interested in trying their hand

AUTHOR GUIDELINES:

-the hero is immortal and you can do whatever you want with him
but: if you are shaking things up too much or progressing too fast within the timeline, I may post fluff type updates that you will have to adapt to so I can keep the story going on (its very loose) track





-you dont have to have the hero be the focal point of your narrative, you dont even have to include him, as long as the timeline progresses and you have a story to tell
-if you want clarification on a specific to help your story just ask
-referencing stories before you and leaving bits of your own story unanswered is encouraged
-try to follow the mythology, if theres one rule its dont have people doing things that are impossible in the universe. This is hard to define without limiting creativity but basically if your going to introduce something there has to some reasoning behind it. You can name your character Obsideath and have him do fire-stuff but if all of a sudden he starts shooting volcanoes out of his eyes with no explanation I might have to do something. Stuff like this we will deal with together as it comes along.
-creating mythology yourself is encouraged but make try to make it so it meshs with previous stuff
-killing characters that other authors have made up is fine
-reviving characters is fine (mythology etc etc)
-The power the character has to do supernatural stuff comes from: How far the Meliorem is away/How many souls hes taken (of Meliorem people not humans) like highlander)) he loses some power on death))) Its basically a will-enhancer. If you can create a reason for your characters power to be increased go for it. But this is the part of the story I'm going to be strictest on.
-authors can still vote when theyre not authoring
-if you want a specific timeperiod il probably give it to you. Just let me know. (No nazis sorry. All mine)
-snooze you lose - first guy to ask (unless its been reserved ^) gets the next part of the story.

also a preview of what the next 2 sections of our story might be so people can get storying:

after that its

and normal history begins

circa- 4000/3000 B.C

1) No
2) Neutral since I don't know what they are. A bit more information about the Meliorem/Cadecus or at least exactly what happened would be useful.
3) The Aspect of the Winged Serpent/Dragon

PS: I think people probably need more context/be situated better so they can vote properly. But I understand you want to keep everything as vague as possible to give the next authors leeway. Maybe you should compromise and give a global overview of the situation, or at least place the Protagonist in a situation where he takes on small decisions to build him up from there.

Thanks for the tip, if theres some things that are too vague/ambiguous just let me know and il do an edit from now on to fill them out a bit more. On regards to this update Ive expanded on some things a little and switched the narrative to You as the Man. The Cadecus are the people who wanted to land on the Earth and were the catalyst for the split from the Meliorem. What the Meliorem is im not 100% sure on, but what can be said is that it enhances the will of the people in its influence and allows them to manipulate the forces of nature and matter. It projects from the center of the galaxy.

Next update should have you getting a more global view of the situation either flying away from the planet or beginning to participate in the events that are going to unfold here.


All thats happened so far to your character: You've crashed down onto earth on the tails of the Cadecus (they're separation dragged down many who had no desire to go to the planet down with them) You've woken up and made your way to the crash site of the Cadecus, kicked around a bit there, explored the earth from the sky and now youve been propositioned by this fellow.

Il update this weekend on whatever votes we have then

1) Yes
2) Neutral

I second this choice for the aspect because I want to be a dragon

1) No
2) Anger
3) Darkness

4) Turn this into a 40k fanfic

b) No
2) Neutral
3) The Aspect of the Winged Serpent/Dragon

MAPS & LEGENDS

The Man shuffled around through the piles of newspapers and books in his office impatiently, picking items up and examining them for a second before either chucking it carelessly somewhere else or placing it back into some order only he knew. Digging in-between two piles of books he produced a quarter-full whiskey bottle and then, hidden under a six-volume history of the Roman Empire he found what he was looking for. Sitting back in the chair he unfolded the creased and dirty map, unstoppered the bottle and settled in. The map had tear marks like it had been ripped from a page and it bore indexes and connotations in rough ink scratch which were obviously not part of the original. Paperclipped behind the map were more than a dozen typed pages the first of which seemed to be something like a table of contents and a key:

THE DIASPORA OF THE CADECUS

1. Atlantis
2. Meropis
3. Mu
4. Hyperborea
5. Lemuria
6. Cimmeria
7. Thule
8. Vaalbara a) North b) South c) Polar

i) Hypothesised Cadecus impact areas ii) Straight of Leng

THE LIBRARY

Hugh Briss's office also serves as his library, case files sit side by side with tomes of esoterica, history and science each replete with scribbled notes made by himself- either on margins or clipped on separate pieces of paper.

-----

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MELIOREM :

CADECUS :

ATLANTIS :

Wait, are we voting to create a single character, or giving outlines for individual characters?

hes a single character, but hes also going to be living multiple lives. Your voting, like always, is just for the sake of the story, but the circlejerk should be getting better as we get going.

update this wknd 4 sure: factions! personalities! the Nistarim!

II. ESOTERIC PTERODACTYL


"No" you reply and the moment is over. He turns and flies away into the void.


Dipping back under the clouds you wonder about the man for a while before settling in a clearing. What will he do on the 7 other planets dotted around this solar system? And what of the thousand others scattered after the Meliorem, the ones that held on the hardest when the Cadecus split from the host? Peculiarly, for the first time you feel something like anxiety but soon enough you are immersed in the planet and the questions are pushed to the back of your mind. You walk through the forests and fly over mountains, lakes and plains observing all sorts of life and activity; Volcanoes smoke and you watch groups of intrepid cave-men brave their depths, large multi-legged insects snake there way through towering and ancient trees, beasts hunt men and men hunt beasts in a brutal circle of life. Occasionally you see one of the others flying past, or come upon structures, strange and crazy upon the landscape, made with no consideration for logistics or geometry that you know must of been left by another of your kind. Made on some impulse and abandoned. Especially interesting to you are the large reptiles which seem to rule supreme on land. Their imposing figure the model of the perfect predator. Terrible jaws supported by two large legs and balanced by a snakes body ending in a long tail; you watch for a long time and before you know it you are one of them, by your will you morph bones and muscle, map blood vessels and add improvements of your own. Soon enough you are proficient enough to hunt and for a few months you rule the territory in which you reside like a tyrant. No man or beast is a match for you. Only the birds, darting within reach and then back into the sky are able to escape your jaws and you find yourself envying them and the ease with which they tease you. One day, particularly annoyed, you use your will to take the wind out from under one and send it crashing into the trunk of a tree nearby, it stumbles up but you are upon it and break its neck quickly in your jaws. Then you lay it infront of you and begin to study, for a night and a day you crouch ridiculously over the pterodactyl and perfect the idea in your head. Morphing your body once again you decrease the size of your legs and give proportion to your once useless arms, which you also give an opposable thumb; something you have noticed the cave-men use to effect. The other four digits you arm with deadly claws. Your body and head slender efficiently to cut weight and air. Behind your shoulders, large leathery wings sprout and down your back grows a hardened spine to the tail, calculated for use as a fin. Just as the sun is setting on the 2nd day you put the finishing touches on your design and test your strength. In less than a minute you clear the area around you of trees and pounce from stumps onto a toppled trunk and into the sky. Over the next week you kill every bird for miles.

---

For the next year you spend your time flying over the land before coming to a temperate area south of the Cadecus impact, here, there forests are new and not as foreboding or wild as the ones you have experienced so although plants grow back green on the nutrient rich soil, also here, are ape-men who operate differently: gathering in permanent settlements behind walls and in buildings, they make sport in a way that greatly pleases you. Settling on a mountain nearby you carve a home into its peak and watching from the vista, you are able to observe them, pillaging when you feel appropriate. One day though, you catch sight of a lone ape-man ascending the peak and go to confront him, to inspect the valorous individual before sending him skittering down the mountains slope. Landing infront of him you stretch out your wings, putting the man in your shadow and then you roar down, your jaws snapping shut inches from his face. He smiles.

"Calm Dragon, are you such a beast now that you would not recognize a brother?" he says as he levitates up, level with your face, but now a safe distance away.

You are unable to speak, when you made this form you did not account for speech. You grunt and spend the next few minutes changing muscles and organs while the man laughs on.

"Dragon?" is the first thing you say.
"Yes, thats what the ape-men have named you. You are rather infamous in these parts."
"Who are you?"
"Prumithe, I rule some ape-men to the north of here, and this group here, the ones that youve been pillaging" he motions to the settlement with a sly smile "have asked me, their divine ape king, to intervene on their behalf in exchange for fealty"

You tense for a fight but the man continues.

"Dont misunderstand, im not here to fight you, you may continue with whatever you wish, but there is more to this world than the hunt isnt there?" He studies you openly.
"Have you seen Atlantis, the city built over the First Cadecus? or the apes of the Meropis islands, who spend more time on the sea than on land? the savage black pygmy men of Thule? Do you know of the Nistarim and their commandments? of Cain and the twisting passageways of Agartha?" The questions hang.
"You should be able to find my village. If you want to talk, circle above and I will fly out to meet you. Dont land. My people would not bode well with you walking among them and I would have to treat you as any other beast who invades my home."

You are taken aback, for the last few years you indeed have lived as a beast, and inside you an ingrained desire to defeat and kill the man clash with old instincts that tell you he might have more to offer then a hunt. Prumithe senses your confusion and with another smile points to the north, and then jumps off the mountain, skidding down its sleet covered face until pushing off and gliding into the forest at its foot.

Do you want to..

a) Take up Prumithe's offer to talk
b) Hunt Prumithe
c) I want to be a dragon
-1) and explore more of the world
-2) and keep on pillaging

a)1)

C2 I say!