The Evolutionary Tree Cosmological Model

20th of Overlight, AE 721

Spooktober Prompt: Door

The evolutionary tree model is a theorized cosmological model of the planes. Also known as meiosis model, or the daughter plane model, it theorizes that every plane current in existence stems from a singular, original plane split off into a number of similar, but still distinct planes, which themselves eventually split off, and the process continues ad nauseum. The difficulty of travelling between planes is typically determined by the number of waypoints one must travel through between their starting and ending point; moving between sister planes is quite doable, going to a different trunk is much harder.

Terminology

Root - the center of the model, the very first plane to ever exist
Extant plane - an end point of a branch, a currently existing plane
Branch - a connection between either extant planes and waypoints, or between two waypoints
Waypoint - a point once occupied by a plane which has since split, no one has yet learned how to teleport to rather than through a waypoint
Trunk - a grouping of extant planes, branches, and waypoints which all trace back to one branch connected to the root
Sister planes - two or more extant planes originating from the same waypoint, the greatest known number of sister planes is three

Complications

One of the major complications for the theory is the minor planes occupied by deities. Places such as the Obsidian Pools and the Hall of Smoke and Mirrors have no logical place within the model, especially given that the planes are presumably destroyed and remade with each changing era. It has been suggested that they could be recycled rather than destroyed, but it still does not explain their origin.