For over 20 years, I have dreamt of the changes happening in a world closely sewn into the fabric of the same dimension as our own. This world is so close to us; sometimes we can feel its rhythmic hearts pounding in our veins. At times, we can even taste the sweet and bitter flavors of fallen warriors and gods that moisten our tongues like blood and sugar. Unlike you, however, I get lost in the dreams; my eyes are open, my hands are moving, but my mind is shrouded in the cries of survival, rage, love, and passion. Sometimes the shroud lifts long enough for me to hear screams echo into my consciousness. The screams are not always of terror; equally, they are screams of feats of excitement and outrageous joy.
Some of the vestiges I see in my dreams are of men and women basking over the pain and miseries of others. They have blood dripping from their lips and skin, and all the while they dance, their shadows move in directions that were not the result of the light from the funeral pyre in the center of them. This is a cycling vision that reminds me of the unknown power, definite evil, and possibly the mystic nature of the world I am viewing.
Other times, the visions were of triumph, victory, glory, and freedom. I saw men or women in suits of metal, not steel or titanium, standing in pools of thick red mud. They held and often would wield weapons with fantastic glows of color and light. These weapons were the likes of swords and rifles, the more impressive ones with lines of energy running down them or encrusted with glowing jewels of power and purpose. Others had these marks of ability or enhancements embedded in their flesh. Even the heroes of this world have shadows formed from the light of the stars but don’t move as they should.
There are so many faces that are smoky blurs of varying emotions. Misty hues of colors that mix into black, like the shadows that move against the light that gives them strength, I am bombarded by the flashes of faces of countless adventures, politicians, and servants of peace and chaos. These flashes of faces strobe before my eyes, only clear enough to know something about them is displaced or uncertain. I float amongst the people seeking refuge, trying not to be seen, although I see them. I breathe in the stagnant air of perfumes, soot, and countless ages of funk. The smell is enough to make my eyes water with tears of discomfort. My insides start to burn, and the taste of cooked meat stabs my tongue as I have once again been thrust into reality. The other world to me in glimpses is as real as the gasping breath I take when I awaken.
At that moment, years ago, I had been taking out the two bags of trash on the road. I have been standing there for at least a few minutes. The evidence of this was the plastic strap of the bags painfully digging into my hands. It normally never gets to that point because the road is just a few feet from my door. These waking dreams happen to me time and time again. I have been pulled deeper and deeper into this other world. However, now that I have aged and grown to be accustomed to living in two realities, the faces I have long seen are now begging me for clarity. I extend my hand of creativity and imagination forward to you to give this alternative world its face and stories.
You will be the actors, or the characters, of this new world made visible for our interaction. You are the Adventia, which will inhabit the vessels of the beings that walk the land of Darnya. The vessels are called reliquaries, and with an unknown connection to our realities, we can inhabit them and control their actions. The majority of humanoid beings in this world are called skapions, and they are very limited in the fields of creativity, emotion, and imagination. They also exhibit limited free will, being locked in some sort of preordained structure of their existences. As your interactions make you the leaders, heroes, and villains of Darnya and beyond, the world in which you are involved will begin to unfold and become a part of our reality.




The way this story is told is going to be a bit unusual. It’s going to come from a number of perspectives, including video and audio submissions for all involved.