NaNoWriMo & Mapvember 2022 Progress Report
Greetings fellow Manifold explorers! The cold winds and crispy leaves of November have swept back into the world, and that means its time for Mapvember and NaNoWriMo once again.
Like in 2021 (see sidebar) and as expressed in my New Year's resolutions, I very much want to get some progress done on one or both of my novel projects during this period. Life has been throwing up some roadblocks to my creative work in recent times, but if my performance during Spooktober is any indication then the real barrier is motivation. Indeed, for the story to take place in the Manifold Sky setting, I should have ample (around 500k words) material to work from!
For those of you finding out about my long-form writing projects just now, here's a primer:
Setting & Story Primers
What: The Garbage Man steals the Menger Catalyst from the cyclotron at Vianne Tributaries, hoping to use the supernaturally powerful catalyst to destroy the world.
When: The Garbage Man Arc takes place in the present day - the year 10,000 AR.
Where: The Garbage Man Arc spans the whole of the Manifold Sky setting, a five-dimensional dieselpunk world where advanced internal combustion engines have enabled robotics, computers, long-distance travel, and powered armor.
Why: The garbage collector Cyrus A. Vinge's hometown was destroyed in the War of Reunification, taking most everyone he knew and loved with it. In his despair, he awoke to a power wholly unique in the otherwise scientifically grounded world of the Manifold: dimensional shifting, the power to see and interract with the hidden additional spatial dimensions. So empowered, Cyrus took the title of The Garbage Man and decided to use his ability to 'summon' and 'teleport' to wreak havoc on those responsible - they destroyed his world, so by the Gods, he would destroy theirs!
How: The quest involves The Garbage Man taking the Menger Catalyst to the spatial anomaly at the bottom of the Glass-Block Fortress and using it to set off a powerful enough explosion to open the Manifold to the Celestial Realms, either destroying the world or radically altering it enough to allow for a new creation. Instead, he opens the door to Oxo, the seat of The White Haired Man: the true creator, warden, and gaoler of the Manifold Sky.
What: The Revelation is a colony vessel created in response to the Armoa Incident, and act of starship barratry and human brood parasitism that sparked the Armoa Conflict.
When: The journey of the Revelation begins in 1987 CE and takes place over the course of roughly 14 years - or around 13 years shipboard time due to relativistic time dilation.
Where: The Revelation travels from Planet Evermorn in the Evermorn-Armoa binary system to the distant world of Ibren in the Falconer's Eye system, encountering both man-made and natural dangers along the way.
Why: The Revelation, as part of the Evermorn Strategic Colony Initiative, is designed to create an interplanetary diaspora population of Evermornan, Lepidosian, Feldean, human-like artificial intelligence, and other human-adjacent sentient beings as a hedge against extinction-level threats (alien attack, natural disasters, pandemics, etc).
How: The Fortress of Salt takes place in a 'hard' science fiction setting, meaning that all the action is rooted as much as possible in scientific reality (or, at least, possibility). The characters must survive the trials of long-duration space travel during a time of war by wit, force, determination, and endurance if they wish to make landfall on their new homeworld.
I will be keeping track of my progress on both challenges in the content box on the right side panel of this page. If I write any articles that don't neatly fall into the prompts but that might contribute to my overall wordcount, I'll be sure to include them in a list under the box. If a challenge submission involves an article, I will place a block link in the list columns below; otherwise, I'll try to include a link to the relevant map or map pin. Onwards!
Setting & Story Primers
The Garbage Man Arc (name pending)
Who: The Garbage Man vs. the members of the Ghostleaf Foundation, Parasol Private Holdings, and, eventually The White-Haired Gentleman himself.What: The Garbage Man steals the Menger Catalyst from the cyclotron at Vianne Tributaries, hoping to use the supernaturally powerful catalyst to destroy the world.
When: The Garbage Man Arc takes place in the present day - the year 10,000 AR.
Where: The Garbage Man Arc spans the whole of the Manifold Sky setting, a five-dimensional dieselpunk world where advanced internal combustion engines have enabled robotics, computers, long-distance travel, and powered armor.
Why: The garbage collector Cyrus A. Vinge's hometown was destroyed in the War of Reunification, taking most everyone he knew and loved with it. In his despair, he awoke to a power wholly unique in the otherwise scientifically grounded world of the Manifold: dimensional shifting, the power to see and interract with the hidden additional spatial dimensions. So empowered, Cyrus took the title of The Garbage Man and decided to use his ability to 'summon' and 'teleport' to wreak havoc on those responsible - they destroyed his world, so by the Gods, he would destroy theirs!
How: The quest involves The Garbage Man taking the Menger Catalyst to the spatial anomaly at the bottom of the Glass-Block Fortress and using it to set off a powerful enough explosion to open the Manifold to the Celestial Realms, either destroying the world or radically altering it enough to allow for a new creation. Instead, he opens the door to Oxo, the seat of The White Haired Man: the true creator, warden, and gaoler of the Manifold Sky.
The Fortress of Salt
Who: Knight-Airman Enzo Salt and the crew of the ESCI Revelation vs. Aniki Labs commerce raiders, the traitorous crew of the ESCI Dewhollow, and the existential dangers of the starry void itself.What: The Revelation is a colony vessel created in response to the Armoa Incident, and act of starship barratry and human brood parasitism that sparked the Armoa Conflict.
When: The journey of the Revelation begins in 1987 CE and takes place over the course of roughly 14 years - or around 13 years shipboard time due to relativistic time dilation.
Where: The Revelation travels from Planet Evermorn in the Evermorn-Armoa binary system to the distant world of Ibren in the Falconer's Eye system, encountering both man-made and natural dangers along the way.
Why: The Revelation, as part of the Evermorn Strategic Colony Initiative, is designed to create an interplanetary diaspora population of Evermornan, Lepidosian, Feldean, human-like artificial intelligence, and other human-adjacent sentient beings as a hedge against extinction-level threats (alien attack, natural disasters, pandemics, etc).
How: The Fortress of Salt takes place in a 'hard' science fiction setting, meaning that all the action is rooted as much as possible in scientific reality (or, at least, possibility). The characters must survive the trials of long-duration space travel during a time of war by wit, force, determination, and endurance if they wish to make landfall on their new homeworld.
I will be keeping track of my progress on both challenges in the content box on the right side panel of this page. If I write any articles that don't neatly fall into the prompts but that might contribute to my overall wordcount, I'll be sure to include them in a list under the box. If a challenge submission involves an article, I will place a block link in the list columns below; otherwise, I'll try to include a link to the relevant map or map pin. Onwards!
Mapvember 2022 Prompts
1. Crater
2. Cavern
3. Crypt
4. Gauntlet
5. Shield
6. Anchor
7. Sea
8. Island
9. Palace
10. Cemetery
11. Dragon
12. Ruins
13. Maw
14. Maze
15. Pool
16. Nebula
17. Dock
18. Mine
19. Crystal
20. Egg
21. Abomination
22. Corrupted
23. Undead
24. Abandoned
25. Demon
26. Sand
27. Haven
28. Spice
29. Harvest
30. Garden
Guild Compass Rose by BCGR_Wurth
Current Word Count
TGMA:
0
Articles:
15,967 (24/30)
TFoS:
0
Other:
0
Total: 15,967
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