Kemono: The Primer

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SRBrant
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Kemono: The Primer

Postby SRBrant » Wed Feb 08, 2017 5:42 am

A hint of things to come with my great science fiction epic, Kemono, best described as Bojack Horseman meets Star Wars meets Borderlands meets Spec Ops: The Line. I'm not going to delve into the story itself (under wraps), but I will share with you guys stuff about the setting. Or as I call it, the "Primer." Keep in mind that this is all subject to change. Let me know what you think.


ALA’A’AMBIKYAAAM
A race of humanoid serpents evolved from amphibians, the Ala’A’Ambikyaaam (Pulchra Draco) are a space-faring species having recently developed superluminal travel. Despite their gregarious nature, this race seldom interacts with others because of their unusually grooved tongues which, despite allowing their beautifully song-like language and voices, makes communication with other species (especially Humans, Eltarl and Ibane) next to impossible without special equipment.

ALPHOS
A subspecies of Eltarl resembling tall, horned, hunchbacked badgers, the Alphos (Fortis Ianthinarum) were created for hard labor during the earliest years of the Golden Empire. Having gained their independence sometime around 1992AD, this species has since spread itself across known space, associated with diplomacy and peace by Humans because of their disproportionately abundant numbers within the United Solar Republic.

CANVE
Natural born scavengers, the slender, needle-like fingers of this semi-arthropodal species have allowed the Canve () not only to survive on their brutal homeworld, but among the stars by easily crafting miniaturized technologies to earn their dominance in the Hyades Cluster. The Canve are often stereotyped as thieves and creeps, their society having little to no concept of private property or personal space. However, because of their collective survivalist mentality, the Canve are a very extroverted people and to have a Canve friend is to have a friend for life.

CLEOLOII
Undoubtedly the most advanced race in the Sargasso Sector, the Pelagia Sector and perhaps even all of known space, the Cleoloii (Anthozoa Omnipotens) possess technology that leaves even the Eltarl at a loss as to how they work, capable of producing planet-sized hypercomputers, engineless spacecraft and metals forged from pure thought among other wonders.

Resembling tripedal, twelve-foot-tall reefs of flexible white coral, the Cleoloii are one of the few alien races known to have achieved a truly perfect society, one without hunger, poverty, disease or toil. Many xenologists theorize that this is because the Cleoloii are highly empathic and possess an extremely complicated language that combines subtle fluctuations of sound, emotions and mental imagery all at once. This ludicrously advanced species is perpetually shrouded in mystery with countless theories abound regarding the numerous aspects of their race. One notable rumor is that they even reproduce through means of sonic waves.

The only confirmed information about the origins of the Cleoloii is that their homeworld, Genesis, is a large ice planet with heated sub-arctic oceans, similar in nature to Jupiter’s moon, Europa.

DAJJAL (AKA IB)
Named after the Islamic equivalent of the Antichrist for their nature and distinctive appearance (one large red eye and a sunken eye pushed to the side), the Dajjal (Gorgon Violata) were composed of the seventy-five percent of the Ibane race that ascended to a higher form of being through biomechanical means (voluntarily and otherwise) in order to survive in an increasingly violent and competitive galaxy. During the assimilation process, a fatal error occurred that resulted in the newly-created Ib race losing most of its collective individuality and the elimination of all morals and ethics that were considered “impractical” for survival. The Dajjal then proceeded to hunt down and kill every civilization that posed a direct threat to its existence within a six-hundred-lightyear radius. Mankind was one of the races spared from the Ib’s cleansing, having been preoccupied with struggling to walk upright.

After millennia of dormancy, the Dajjal were disturbed by the rise of the Golden Empire of the Eltarl and the United Planets of the Humans amongst other upstart factions. Having stirred the sleeping beast, these empires unknowingly created the beginnings of what would come to be the bloodiest conflict since creation itself: the Technocaust.

ELTARL
The Eltarl (Arena Saltator) are among the most prosperous and advanced races in known space. Resembling ochre-furred, vaguely vulpine, vaguely feline humanoids, this race ruled the illustrious Golden Empire until numerous political and social hairline fractures became massive fissures that gradually balkanized the state roughly three years before the dawn of the Technocaust.

The Eltarl are Mankind’s closest alien allies; not because of some long-forgotten peace treaty or the repayment of some ancient debt, but simply because of their incredible similarities to another in terms of physiology and racial psychology, both species evolving as bipedal hunter-gatherers. First contact between the two races in 2379AD was simultaneously pleasant and awkward; while both were elated to meet another with such similar physical characteristics, there were some discomfort relating to the more obvious discrepancies.

For the Humans, the Eltarl looked more like the many cat-like aliens from popular culture or even like those of the Freeborn culture. Some thought they just looked too beastly to be considered to be allies. For the Eltarl, the Humans with their bare skin, lack of tails and greater capacity for muscle mass made them look like they were Eltarl suffering from some sort of disfiguring terminal illness and reacted as if they were.

ESPERS
Since time immemorial, there have been many individuals of many different races across many planet that have been said to have special gifts that allow them to see, hear, smell, touch and taste things that exist beyond the senses and scientific explanation. Traditionally feared and revered as witches, warlocks, shamans, seers, prophets and psychics, these talented individuals became known as “espers” to Humans around 2034.

Espers were often regarded as gifted, cursed, fraudulent or delusional despite their talents and were not considered to be of any risk. However, as the centuries marched onwards, so did the evolution of the Human brain and knowledge of the occult. Initially limited to clairvoyance, channeling, premonitions and other anecdotal abilities, espers began to be show abilities long said to be impossible such as telekinesis, pyrokinesis, gravity manipulation and other strange feats, with reports beginning in early 2522AD.

After hundreds of reports of destructive rampages caused by espers driven insane by lack of psychic training or discipline, numerous governments began to meet with experienced esper covens and, in 2526AD, passed laws and litigations requiring such talented individuals to require legally-mandated training and to register as “SPMs” (Sanctioned Psionic Manipulators) to prevent espers from losing control and endangering public safety and sanity.

In spite of this, SPMs were still considered to be bogeymen by some communities, who regarded them as demonic or Satanic. Violent pogroms began to break out and in 2527AD, laws were passed to consider attacks against SPMs for their abilities to be considered a hate crime.

In 2528AD, numerous “covens” of espers began to form to protect another from persecution, with some specializing in particular abilities and using them to help others for a price, assisting wealthy eccentrics, trading guilds, corporations, local law enforcement and even government entities. These groups achieved mainstream praise and notoriety, collectively known as “Talent-Cults.”

THE GOLDEN EMPIRE
As the name suggests, the Golden Empire was once the most prosperous and illustrious civilization to rise after the First Golden Age of Orion in 1260AD. Ruled by the Eltarl, this kingdom spanned over five-thousand systems and was rivaled only by the Ibane in technological advancement and surpassed only by the Cleoloii. After generations of prosperity, however, the Golden Empire began to crack and shrink in size and power. The reasons for this are largely unknown, but the turmoil that ensued triggered several violent civil wars that lasted centuries on end. By 3022AD, the Golden Empire, once a byword for utopia in known space, was little more than a footnote. Countless civilizations, even Human ones, have claimed to be the true successors of the Empire; the Worldloom among them. None have ever been able to truly replace the Golden Empire, however.

HOCHOI
One of the older and more advanced races of the Orion Arm, the Hochoi (Stella Fecit) are an avian-reptilian race with almost total control over the Clarke Sector. For reasons obscure and complex, there is an intense, borderline-instinctual rivalry between the Hochoi and the Eltarl.

IBANE
Vaguely resembling hairless bipedal aardvarks or tapirs, the Ibane once possessed the right to call themselves the dominant race of the Orion Arm until they attempted to uplift their species through transferral of consciousness and biomechanical enhancement when the natural resources in their domain began to run low, resulting in the creation of the genocidal Ib race. Those few Ibane that were able to escape assimilation scattered across the known galaxy, reduced from ruling mighty empires to living in cramped, secluded colonies. Considering their history, it is easy to understand why they are stereotyped as sullen, remorseful loners.

KEMONO
With over one-hundred-and-fifty-one worlds under their dominion, the Kemono (Cogitatio Bestia) are a proud people resembling anthropomorphic Terran animals and are known for their expansionist mentality and policy, colonizing planets as a borderline hobby. The Kemono are transhumans, having modified themselves to the point where they can produce more of their kind without artificial means. Kemono culture dates back to the days of Old Earth, claiming descent from the Freeborn: an underground culture of men and women who held lavish banquets in the skins of fantastic beasts. Shortly after the end of the Technocaust, the Kemono were forced to emigrate en masse towards the Galaxy’s outer rim to escape Dajjal murder-fleets that sought to eliminate as many survivors as possible before their inevitable destruction.

Reflecting the values of their progenitor culture, the Kemono are known for their libido, extroversion and self-expression. While this has formed several strong cultures built upon proper community values, more prudent societies see the Kemono as decadent or even outright debauched. In recent years, increasing political pressures and social abrasion has slowly ground the Kemono’s collective sense of community until it completely shattered with their empire’s decisive defeat at the end of the Kemono-Dajjal War, which sent countless millions to seek solace in apathy, excess and hedonism. Only time will tell what will become of this ancient culture.

Many a social commentator have remarked about the irony that, although the Kemono changed themselves to distance themselves from the supposed “ugliness” of Humankind, in doing so they have become more Human than ever.

THE INTERPAX
Founded in 5002AD by Human explorers from the Coronet Stars, the Interpax was an empire built upon the values of knowledge, innovation and opportunism. With their cultural origins firmly rooted in the ancient Terran state of Jun-Go (modern-day China), its founders embraced the political philosophy of Legalism, guided by the notion that only the most cultured and educated individuals are worthy of positions of power and that a person was defined by their work, meaning a near-complete ban on robotics. Wedged between the Worldloom and what would become the Kemono Union, this polity grew quickly in both power and territory from the trade of both goods and ideas between its two neighbors. The Kemono offered its lower class citizens important survival skills for colonization and even the Worldloom Eltarl, known for their suspicion of other factions, offered to the Interpax their treasured knowledge of social advances such as dynamic pedagogy, consumer calculus and low-waste industrial exploitation (though historians often argued that the Worldloom permitted this for their own benefit so that a foreign trade alternative to the Kemono would be available.)

Centuries later, Kemono Union expansionism resulted in the annexation of dissident or independent colonies, cutting off several trade routes and resulting in a spike in tariff rates to compensate for the rise in illegal trafficking. With their economy hamstrung by the rise of both tariff and food prices (several of the worlds conquered specialized in agriculture), Interpax leadership was at a loss, exacerbated by their controversial “brain-chain” policies, which required a certain percentage of the population to be denied higher learning to provide a sizable pool of unskilled labor in order to compensate for their ban on automated production. Food riots turned several cities into warzones and factories were either left empty or set ablaze by enraged workers. With economic collapse on the horizon, the Interpax were left with a prospect they avoided for much of their history: war.

The Interpax made the desperate move to invade the Kemono Union in 5405AD to reclaim the worlds it lost because of the Union’s expansionism. The farm world of Tenazet was still heavily occupied by Kemono Union forces when the planet was invaded and, to compensate for their lack of proper reinforcements, the Interpax 14th Ancillary Flotilla took several derelicts and propelled them into the planet via remote control, devastating several bases and triggering a minor ice age. The Worldloom was quick to hear of this, and, when correlated with stolen intelligence describing the Interpax’s intent to wage war against them for mineral rights, the decision was made to retaliate with full military force.

With their forces divided and two powerful empires turned against them, the Interpax suffered greatly as planet after planet fell to both forces. With the conquest of the Interpax crownworld of Sandalphon, this empire had surrendered and most of its properties annexed into the Worldloom.

THE KEMONO UNION
The Kemono Union government, currently over three-hundred years old, has united a vast majority of the Kemono population under their banner and espouse the virtues of freedom, self-expression and exploration, with official propaganda claiming that they will inherit the stars themselves and fill the void with life, love and culture. State-sponsored media also espouse its “Union for the Union” rhetoric, which states that the Kemono Union do not serve or fight for a king, emperor, president or deity, but for everyone else in the nation.

Opinions regarding the Kemono themselves are mixed. Because of the empire-wide depression after the Kemono-Dajjal War, much of its populace turned to idle pursuits and personal gratification. This fact combined with the common knowledge of their loose sexual mores means that many people outside and even inside of the Union sees the Kemono as shameless and hedonistic. And while their strong will, wanderlust, ambition and sense of purpose has bred billions of strong and tenacious individuals, the Kemono Union’s expansionist rhetoric and militarism is deeply concerning to neighboring empires who are on constant alert for any prerequisite for invasion.

These worries were thwarted after the Kemono Union’s humiliating defeat against the Dajjal, who drove them past the so-called “Wall Stars” and mysteriously refused to pursue them. With several upstart factions taking advantage of their weakness, including the Almighty Solar Legion, the Neo-Interpax, the Omega Group and numerous pirate cartels, the Kemono Union faces a very uncertain future.

NULLARBOR
A desert moon just large enough to sustain an atmosphere, Nullarbor is arguably the most well-known of Jewel-of-Space’s natural satellites, particularly among archaeologists. Nullarbor has been colonized and conquered numerous times by a number of different factions for its high metallicity, each one toppling over the other for its riches. The end results are countless ruins of different nations built under and over another. It is said, however, that Nullarbor is still occupied by its founding civilization deep beneath its crust.

THE SARGASSO SECTOR
Located at the very edge of explored space and defined by numerous space-time anomalies, the Sargasso Sector is a stretch of space three-hundred lightyears wide and long, infamous for being a barely-tamed backwater dominated by only a handful of empires seeking to shelter their citizens from the seemingly endless tides of pirates, hostile alien races and far stranger threats.

THE UNION ENCLAVES
Despite the thorough colonization of their stretch of space, there are still several independent nations and political entities established within Kemono Union space. While it’s easy to think of the Union as small when it is presented as a cluster of named and numbered stars on a grid, the real thing is a difficult thing to truly grasp. An asteroid or dwarf planet could be home to a bustling, autonomous city-state, while a derelict, one-hundred-thousand-ton ship may turn out to be a nation of defectors and renegades. Lethal solar radiation may force cities to be built within mile-deep mines and there are even settlements built into the cores of speeding comets. With so many possibilities for colonization, there are bound to be brazen nations that follow their own codes. The Kemono Union cares little, however. As long as taxes are paid and laws are obeyed, these enclaves are essentially masters of their own futures.

Every empire has a number has a number of independent enclaves sanctioned and otherwise; however, the Kemono Union has a disproportionate number of polities within their borders. Xenologists believe that this is a product of Kemono values of individuality.

While there are over one-thousand-and-six enclaves officially catalogued by the Kemono Union, it is believed that the number might be at least ten times higher. The vast majority of them are incredibly small and consist of no more than two-thousand residents, though some have populations as high as thirty million. The strongest of the enclaves include Ferrous Reef, the Free Guild, the Hoshikawa Shogunate and the Anchorage of Hollow Point. These polities remain an inspiration for millions of would-be homesteaders.

Unfortunately, many are not so lucky. Stippled across the barren wastes, tangled jungles and Lagrange points of the Kemono Union are the desiccated ruins of infant civilizations. Eager colonists and founders of would-be nations have found themselves dead from faulty engineering, starvation, suffocation, exposure, disease, madness or pirate raids. On countless worlds, eviscerated habitat domes and crumbling building facades still stand as sobering reminders of the hubris of those who strove for independence.

But those who succeed will feel the paternal joy of watching a new beginning unfold before their very eyes.

THE WORLDLOOM
Bearing the coveted honor of the most powerful empire in the Sargasso Sector in terms of size, might and affluence, the Worldloom is an ancient Eltarl confederation of several minor civilizations, originating as a separatist entity from the so-called “Golden Empire” in 2940AD when the reign of the Ganterishot Dynasty began to collapse after disastrous trade reforms. The Worldloom’s people value tolerance and unity, evident in their pride over the centuries-long reconciliation between rival factions, foreign cultures and differences in values and etiquette. It was the legendary Alphos poet, Hindraw Haliley of Yohm who inspired the Worldloom’s namesake by describing the empire as a “giant loom where worlds are woven into a great celestial quilt.”

The capital planets of the Worldloom are a page out of a textbook on what a civilization should look like. Environmental damage is kept to a bare minimum, crime is scarce, healthcare and insurance are provided by the state and the average workweek is little over fifteen hours long. This is most commonly seen on the Crownworld of Song-To, which as its name suggests (an Eltarl word literally meaning “Beautiful World”), skyscrapers look less like buildings and more like elegant sculptures with gem-like summits of stained glass that glowed like lanterns above mile-long avenues lined with works of art and glittering boutiques.

This alien paradise comes at a price, however. Mass surveillance is commonplace, privacy is a privilege granted to “trusted citizens” and any sort of disorder is quickly and harshly dealt with. The Worldloom’s leaders have been rightfully painted as paranoid, evident in the many tales describing their absurdly massive shadow government with the most lurid fables revolving around the Jupy-Kasharr: the ‘Loom’s elite assassins responsible for stalking and killing both rogue espers and anyone who hinders their attempts to do so.

It is through a massive network of spies, assassins, agents and provocateurs that ensures the Worldloom’s dominance over all of Sargasso and it is a blessing that its leaders are of a largely benevolent disposition. Largely.

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Masato
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Postby Masato » Tue Feb 14, 2017 6:30 pm

Dude this is unbelievable

I will continue to cheer for you. Eventually I really think you need to find an artist to visualize some of these things. You must suffer with such rich worlds in your mind :D

What is your approach to writing the story? Are you planning it out ahead of time or are you diving in straight ahead? Everyone has their own methods for writing but in my experience there is no substitute for carefully planning as much as possible before starting to write anything. Make sure its all working, trim it down, understand your ending etc. That's my experience anyway

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Postby SRBrant » Wed Feb 15, 2017 6:12 am

Masato wrote:Dude this is unbelievable

I will continue to cheer for you. Eventually I really think you need to find an artist to visualize some of these things. You must suffer with such rich worlds in your mind :D

What is your approach to writing the story? Are you planning it out ahead of time or are you diving in straight ahead? Everyone has their own methods for writing but in my experience there is no substitute for carefully planning as much as possible before starting to write anything. Make sure its all working, trim it down, understand your ending etc. That's my experience anyway


I have a plan in mind and then work it out intuitively as I follow that path. I'm an artist, so I can do that.

But what are your favorite bits and your thoughts on them?

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Postby Masato » Wed Feb 15, 2017 4:19 pm

I will comment, drowning in work and business for a while.

In the meantime check out this thread I just made:

viewtopic.php?f=15&t=4335

- this is part of what I'm talking about, just being able to SIMPLIFY your story into a simple arc brings so much into focus, all the other details can constantly be arranged to support these simplified understandings. Its like a roadmap, without it you are easy to stray off course or even get lost

I have written with a vague vision/plan in mind and made a MESS. I have also written with absolute clear blueprints and it went very smoothly and is a stronger story. I think I have some other threads in here about writing strategies I'll try to dig em up

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Postby SRBrant » Wed Feb 15, 2017 7:13 pm

Masato wrote:I will comment, drowning in work and business for a while.

In the meantime check out this thread I just made:

viewtopic.php?f=15&t=4335

- this is part of what I'm talking about, just being able to SIMPLIFY your story into a simple arc brings so much into focus, all the other details can constantly be arranged to support these simplified understandings. Its like a roadmap, without it you are easy to stray off course or even get lost

I have written with a vague vision/plan in mind and made a MESS. I have also written with absolute clear blueprints and it went very smoothly and is a stronger story. I think I have some other threads in here about writing strategies I'll try to dig em up


That helped quite a bit, actually! Thank you!

But comments are always welcome. I LOVE feedback.

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Postby SRBrant » Thu Jun 15, 2017 10:10 pm

Still waiting on comments...


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