Cosmology

The Cosmology: The Song of Creation

Before existence, there were two primordial, opposing principles: The Song, a boundless vibration of infinite potential, chaos, and creation; and The Silence, a perfect, structured void of entropy and inevitability.

The universe was born not in a conflict, but in a moment of impossible harmony where the two touched. The Silence gave structure, rules, and meaning to the Song's chaotic energy. This initial contact point is where all of reality now exists, a "bubble" of ordered creation floating in the conceptual void. From this union, the fundamental forces of the universe emanated.

✨ The Three Primal Forces

Every power in the cosmos, divine or mortal, is an expression of one of three primal forces that resulted from the blending of Song and Silence.

  1. The Cosmic Weave: This is the very fabric and syntax of reality, the force that mortals call magic. It is the structure of the Silence applied to the energy of the Song. The Weave dictates that for every action, there is a reaction; that certain symbols hold power; that words of creation can shape matter. Mages, wizards, and artificers are scholars of the Weave, learning its complex language to bend reality to their will. The Elder God of Magic is not a creator of the Weave, but its first and most perfect student, a being who achieved consciousness by understanding it completely.

  2. The Great Bloom: This is the raw, untamed life-force of the universe, the echo of the unbridled Song. It flows through all living things, from the smallest microbe to the cosmic star-whales. It is instinct, growth, evolution, and the cycle of nature. The Veridian Concordance and druidic orders are its caretakers, communing with it rather than commanding it. The power they wield is not about rewriting reality's rules, but about encouraging the natural world to express its own potent, living will.

  3. The Axiom of Law: This is the principle of cause and effect, physics, time, and fate. It is the purest expression of the Silence's structure. The Axiom dictates that matter has mass, that time flows forward, and that choices have consequences. The Aeons were not gods; they were the semi-sentient immune system of the Axiom, constructs of pure law created to repair paradoxes and erase threats to the fundamental stability of reality. The Elder Gods of Fate and Time are beings who ascended by mastering their own place within this unyielding causal chain.

♻️ The Soul Stream and the Afterlife

The Law of Inevitability that binds the Saiyans is a core function of the cosmos, governing the cycle of souls.

  • The Soul Stream: The Great Bloom's energy occasionally sparks with a unique consciousness, creating a soul. This soul is a vessel for experience.

  • The Penumbra: Upon death, a mortal soul is released from its body and is drawn to the Penumbra, a transitive plane that is a grey, silent, and ethereal echo of the Material Plane. Here, the soul is stripped of its immediate worldly connections, left only with the weight of its life's actions and beliefs.

  • The Great Drift: From the Penumbra, the soul begins to drift towards one of the Outer Planes. This is not a conscious journey, but an inexorable pull, like a drop of oil finding its proper level in water. A soul defined by honour and righteous battle is pulled towards a plane of glorious combat; a soul defined by hedonism and selfish desire is pulled towards a plane of eternal, unfulfilling excess.

  • The Outer Planes: These are realms of pure belief and concept, shaped by the gods who reside there and the collective power of the souls drawn to them. This is the "afterlife." A soul will exist here for eons, but it is not eternal. Slowly, over an immense span of time, its individual consciousness dissolves, its experiences and energy feeding the conceptual fabric of the plane itself before its "raw" essence is released back into the Soul Stream to one day be reborn.

🗺️ The Planar Structure

The universe is structured like a series of concentric spheres, all floating within the Astral Sea.

The Core: The Material Plane The realm of mortals, stars, and planets. The main stage for our space-fantasy setting.

Inner Planes: Plasma, Void, Matter, Energy The elemental "building blocks" of the Material. Not just fire and earth, but the raw components of physics. Travel here is perilous.

Transitive Planes: Penumbra, Astral Sea The "connective tissue." The Penumbra is the echo of the Material, while the Astral Sea is the silvery void between all other planes.

Outer Planes: The Divine Realms The conceptual homes of the gods and the final destination for souls. Heavens, Hells, and everything in between are found here.

💥 The Great Disruption: The Nature of Ki

Into this perfectly (if complexly) balanced system, the Saiyans introduced a fourth, alien force: Ki.

  • Ki is the Power of Self. While the Weave (magic) is about manipulating external rules, and the Bloom (life-force) is about communing with an external ecosystem, Ki is the force of a soul imposing its own internal will directly upon reality, bypassing the established systems. A wizard tells reality what to do using its own language; a Ki user screams their own truth so loudly that reality has no choice but to obey.

  • A Foreign Principle: This is why the Aeons reacted so violently. Ki is not just a new form of energy; it's a new rule set being crudely inserted into a system that wasn't built for it. Their failure to excise it means Ki is now a permanent, if somewhat unstable, part of the cosmos. It represents the ultimate triumph of the individual will over the collective structure of the universe—a concept both terrifying and intoxicating to the native inhabitants.