Mystery/maybe-fantasy Fiction World Building Stuff For Funsies

Mystery/maybe-fantasy fiction world building stuff for funsies

Rowena "Winnie" Hart was accepted into a prestigious fantasy school. Her primary motivation is to find the people who murdered her parents and restore justice to her family. She believes that the murderers are linked to a secret society connected with the school.

Her parents, Jacques Hart and Lorelei Hart née Preston, used to study at the school. Her parents were part of the secret society, and were very prominent, high-ranking members. Therefore, Winnie was very famous in the school. The Hart Family was a very prestigious family with good standing. The Preston Family, Winnie's mother's family, was a family of renowned Healers and Potion-brewers.

Jacques and Lorelei had a very romantic and happy love life together, but tragically died young (for a reason that I am still trying to figure out, BTW. I'm also tryna figure out the circumstances of how they died, and whether they died when Winnie was a baby, or more recently).

Lorelei also used to be the Poisoner for the secret society; she was very good at Healing, but found Poisons to be more fascinating. She therefore exercised this talent (secretly, of course; only the society knows about it and they themselves gave her that job) to take out the enemies of the society and the school (the rest of the school didn't know about it). Of course, Lorelei also used her Healing talents publicly when needed.

Fantasy school world building for fun

Rowena Snow is the name of a distant ancestor of Winnie Hart's. Winnie was named after her. Rowena was the youngest of seven Snow children, with one of her sisters being Hildegard Snow. Hildegard Snow was very influential and remarkable in her day (for whatever reason I don't know yet). Winnie Hart looks and acts very much like Rowena Snow, but Hildegard Snow is the direct distant ancestor of Winnie Hart (whether through Winnie's mum or dad, I'm not sure yet).

I fell in love with the Olivia Rodrigo song, "Can't Catch Me Now" so I couldn't help imagining this song in one of my story scenarios. It's just so hauntingly beautiful, I couldn't help it hehe

Gus remembered the song his mother used to sing to him, either when they were dancing in the fields outside their cottage or when she was rocking him to sleep, soothing away his fears about his father no longer being around to protect them both. He remembered not understanding the words in the song as he waddled around in the grass or as he lay in bed with his eyes half-shut. He also remembered thinking that his mother sounded angry as she sang the song, though he knew it wasn't directed at him.

There's blood on the side of the mountain

There's writing all over the wall

The shadows of us are still dancing

In every room, in every hall

"What does that mean?" a wee little Gus remembered asking innocently.

"It's...it's hard to explain, honey," she smiled sadly.

"Is it about Daddy?" he piped up. His mum's smile faltered, and he knew he'd struck a nerve. "S-sorry, sorry Mummy, never mind--"

"No, it's okay, dear," she said, though Gus thought he saw a glistening tear threatening to escape from her eye.

Oh, I'm in the trees, I'm in the breeze

My footsteps on the ground

You'll see my face in every place

But you can't catch me now...

The tune was haunting to him, yet strangely soothing. He never quite understood the song, but that wasn't what he cared about. It just somehow felt like his mother would always be there with him, even if it's just a ghost of her.

Dystopian world-building for funsies cuz why not

Cordelia and her Batch-mates were raised by Caretakers after they were Produced by the Producers. They have no parents, no family. Just the Caretakers and each other.

When they are old enough, they are brought to the Academy as Students. Cordelia is especially fascinated by Pre-Disaster Studies, a subject taught in the Academy.

All babies, both boys and girls, have been pre-conditioned during their Production (as zygotes, during their gene arrangements) to have only straight hair, never curly. Girls wear their hair down, nice and straight, with no tying or accessorising. Boys are expected to keep their hair trimmed short and tidy, but with no curls or styling.

More dystopian just-for-funsies stuff cuz I'm bored

Cordelia runs for her life in utter terror when she sees the barbaric procedure of Chipping, an integral part of the Integration. It involves a lobotomy, with that section of the brain responsible for making autonomous decisions being replaced with the Chip; ostensibly for identification purposes, the Chip is actually meant to monitor your every thought, and serve as a system override should you even entertain the mere notion of rebelling or anything remotely un-Colony-like.

So this is the price of Integration.

She chillingly remembers all the times she and her Batch-mates Misbehaved*, and the Caretakers took on a robotic gaze, eyes blank and unfeeling, as they reprimanded them in an uncanny, robotic tone. Those blank stares, those blank scoldings, the kind that deterred her and her Batch-mates from their prying curiosity with their inexplicable creepiness; they were all the same. Did their own minds even belong to them anymore?

Cordelia escapes, unwittingly to the Surface, where she finds that not everything was what she was taught it would be.

POV

I see a bright light at the end of the tunnel. Strange, how this exact same sentence is used to describe one's last moments in pre-Disaster literature. I shield my eyes from this strange, new sun and...

"Whoa."

*Misbehaved = not referring to mischief in general, but to "Untrustworthy" behaviour indicating distrust of the Colony or outright rebellion

Dystopian fiction stuff just for funsies. Do whatever you want with them (as long as you credit me even tho I'm just another amateur hehe), I'm just throwing out ideas here and there. Cuz I'm bored.

Cordelia gets to the Surface, and during her stay there, she learns that a group of Surface-dwellers, the Rebels, are planning to overthrow the Underground Colony she came from, due to the Colony leeching off resources from the Surface. Cordelia feels guilty that she implicitly gave the Surface-dwellers information about the Core.

Earlier, Cordelia saw some of the Surface-dwellers in poverty and desolation, with some even fighting each other for food. She briefly considered bringing them back to the Colony for a better quality of life, despite having seen the Chipping procedure that takes away one's free will. A trade-off, basically. Trade in your free will for a roof over your head and a decent meal.

Cordelia feels torn. She's thinking of staying at the Surface to help improve the Surface-dwellers' way of life, but she's also worried that the uprising against the Colony would cause chaos, and in her worst-case-scenario imagination, possibly even destroy the Core and wipe out all life, both on the Surface and in the Underground ("which is NEVER gonna happen so STOP thinking about it," she scolds herself).

Cordelia had been taught, during her childhood Underground, that there was nothing good on the Surface. That it was literally uninhabitable; totally unfit for any and all life. As it turns out, there actually have been people living on the Surface. Now, she's just trying to keep everyone safe. She doesn't want to be caught in the crossfire. She doesn't want to have to take sides. She never wanted to betray the Colony, either. She just wanted to escape getting Chipped.

Cordelia had learned about this topic called "families" in her Pre-Disaster Studies. Where there was such a thing as a "mother" and a "father", instead of just Caretakers. Where there were "brothers" and "sisters" instead of just Batch-mates. Where this thing called "love" was supposed to thrive. She sometimes wondered what it would be like to be part of a family, instead of just being one of the 1,000,000 Batch babies looked after by Caretakers. She sometimes wondered if her Batch-mates could be considered "brothers" and "sisters". Some of her Batch-mates shared that sentiment, but were quickly shut down when their Caretakers reprimanded them with that creepy robotic tone. Other Batch members laughed at the mere idea.

When Cordelia went to the Surface, she saw how some of the Surface families behaved. She saw the loving and affectionate families and felt a sense of loss in herself, for something she had never had. She saw the cold and distant families and was reminded of her own Care Unit (a group made of Caretakers and their respective Batch members). She thought that their reasons of their aloofness were the same as those of the Care Units in the Underground Colony; that is, to avoid any attachment, especially love, that may be a detriment to the collective wellbeing of the Colony, or in this case, the rest of the Surface-dwellers' society. Still then, there were downright cruel and abusive families, making her perplexed about the complexity of families.