Arcanum Paterfamilias/Estvarya: Ishvaran Glossary -- Introduction & Orthography

[whips_n_dozers]

Arcanum Paterfamilias & Estvarya -- Ishvaran Glossary: Introduction and Orthography
Authors: mfelizandy & fractured_chaos
Graphics: fractured_chaos
Rating: For the Glossary, Everyone -- For the Story, Teen
Category: Written for the 2010 FMA Big Bang Challenge.
Disclaimer: Fullmetal Alchemist (Hagane no Renkinjutsushi) was created by Arakawa Hiromu and is serialized monthly in Shonen

Comments

Re: Story of Creation

[mfelizandy]

Well, Chapter 5 just went up, and Vasupati tells a Saza story in it! Saza's come a long way from his strictly-linguistic origins.

Saza as he's characterized in these stories was born in the definition of sazamuz in the Glossary. He proved to be too appealing as a folk hero to be left to languish as a cultural note, so when we needed another story for Vasupati to tell young Theo, we recruited Saza for the role. Writing his story to more or less fit with the chapter and still come off with a folktale-hero air is a large part of the reason Chapter 5 took so long to write. (Most of the rest of it had to do with LJ's pesky word count limit.) I have a feeling that like Robin Hood and King Arthur, Saza is a character who features in a lot of stories told by different people at different times in different places, and so his adventures aren't one cohesive canon so much as a collection of stories using Saza, Jaio, and some other standard characters to carry different messages. As such, there's probably a Saza story for just about every kid who's ever wanted to hear an adventure story.

The Ishvarun genesis story--I'll have to rummage that up and see whether it can be integrated into Estvarya somewhere without bogging down. That early canon explains a lot of things and offers some clues about why the mozhkarishki have such a low opinion of even other Ishvarun.

Even if it doesn't get used directly, it's great to have "background material" like this, because it adds to the realism of the culture to toss in mentions of things like Saza's Temple and suitors singing to the moon as the mask of God.

Thanks for all the wonderful commentary, it really motivates us to keep going when we get stuck in Chapter 5 or on some detail that requires wholesale replotting!

Re: Story of Creation

[ext_632596]

You are both very welcome, I am just as greatful that you were both willing to answer my questions as well as reply at all. Thank you for your time and I look forward to reading the rest of your story :)