Latest Posts by 48lexr - Page 4

Introducing: Néndisfas

Consider this post a very brief introduction to my in-progress conlang, Néndisfas.

In summary, Néndisfsho is a fusional language with phonemic pitch-accent, personal agreement in verbs, and split-ergative based on animacy.

Phonology

Consonants

/p/, /b/, /m/, /t/, /d/, /n/, /k/, /g/, /ŋ/, /kʷ/, /gʷ/

/f/, /v/, /s/, /ʃ/, /z/, /xʷ/, /h/

/w/, /j/, /ɾ/, /l/, /ʎ/, /ʟ/

Not much to say here but for the three way /l/, /ʎ/, /ʟ/ distinction held-on from the protolanguage.

Vowels

Five-vowel system with length distinction, making 10 vowels. Not interesting at all here.

Phonotactics

Max syllable: CV(C)(C)(C) / CV(C)#

Indeed, this means that the maximum size of a consonant cluster could be 4-consonants long,

Morphology / Syntax: Grammar

Verbs

Verbs (and predicative adjectives) are simple, comparatively, to the syntactic nonsense going down with nouns.

Verbs take a prefix for perfective and passive, and a suffix for past or present and to agree with the subject in gender (animate, inanimate).

Due to sound changes, verbs fall into one of six categories, but classes II, III, and IV all have alternate forms.

Nouns

Néndisfsho nouns take on one of two genders: Common or Neuter. Common nouns were derived from old animate nouns, and neuter nouns were derived from old mass nouns. The nouns which didn't fit with either were grandfathered in.

Due to sound changes, nouns take on one of six endings depending on their class. Classes I, III, and V have alternate forms.

Nouns also inflect for one of 5 cases: Nominative, Genitive, Accusative, Allative, and Commitative. The Allative, though, is beginning to be used like an Ergative, marking an animate subject of an intransitive verb, and an animate object of a transitive verb.

Take, for instance, the following sentences:

Yés-e váw-i ve-kát-ur-o.

Yessei.C-NOM car.N-ACC PRV.drive.PST.ANIM

"Yessei had driven the car."

Since the car is not animate, Yessei is rendered in the nominative, and the car is rendered in the accusative. In the following sentence, however:

Yés-ivā búm-pe kéht-us

Yessei.C-ALL dark.N-NOM hate.PRES.INAN

"The dark hates Yessei."

Here, the nominative case is reanalyzed as an absolutive, and the allative as an ergative.

This structure could be rewritten with a passive, like

Yés-ivā (búp-ko) ver-kéht-o

Yessei.C-ALL (dark.N-GEN) PASS.hate.PRES.ANIM

"Yessei is hated (by the darkness)."

Here, the genitive marks the agent, and the allative (ergative) marks the subject. Yessei, in this context, is treated as the object of a transitive verb, rather than the subject of an intransitive verb.

The reason this is so messy right now is because the language is in the middle of evolving the ergativity.

Other Notes

Néndisfas has no "true" 2nd or 3rd person pronouns, because pronouns are a completely open class in Néndisfas. The general 1st person pronoun is "gémse, géra, gésho" (I, me, my).

This is probably a language I'll wind up using as a meme language throughout my writing. It originally started as a language used in the deserts of Southern Atepsi, but now it's Yessei's first language, so I decided it can be both. In the context of Meiste, though, this is a long-dead language.

Paging the usual suspects: @quillswriting @oldfashionedidiot @ominous-feychild

Also if y'all have translation suggestions don't hesitate to drop them in my asks or as a reply/reblog to this post lol.

Clickbait WIP Titles

A tag game from @ominous-feychild (but I'd seen this tag game go around for a little while now, so it was about time anyways.)

I'll do a couple titles a piece.

Meiste

🔥🔥🔥🔥 RICE FARMER BECOMES EMPEROR ❗❗❗❗AND GETS MAGICAL POWERS 🗣🗣🗣🗣 (⛔⛔NOT CLICKBAIT⛔⛔) (REAL)

😂😂😂STUPID ANTI-HERO SIDES WITH VILLAIN 📢📢📢 (GENUINELY THOUGHT IT WAS A GOOD IDEA) 😂😂😂 (GETS HER SHIT WRECKED ON PAGE 112 😳😳😳) (COPS CALLED)

It Will Hurt: and There Will Be No Fire

😱😱😱VEGAN VAMPIRE ABUDUCTED ✋✋✋ (GONE WRONG) (ENDING WILL SHOCK YOU) 😳😳😳

🚀🚀🚀 SPIDER-VAMPIRE RESCUES ABDUCTED SISTER 😵😵😵 (REAL❗❗❗❗) (⛔⛔NOT CLICKBAIT⛔⛔)

These were surprisingly fun to make. Brings me back.

The Usual Suspects: @oldfashionedidiot @quillswriting

Paging: @foxgloves-garden

Day 46 (1:22) of rewriting my novel

Yeah I finally wrote the Izi and Taguchif meet with governor Bunthun scene, which I decided was a lot shorter than I originally thought it might be?

Like, I make it very clear that she's pretty much just a power-hungry warlord who's jumping at the chance to assume complete control over Zenée adn start turning it into an enthostate and consolidate power by knocking out Tolftorrijv and the Middle States/Sedroste.

She's also a hard-ball. She demands control over Ir Nouzonif City only to immediately call back and be like "yeah, actually, just reparations and bordering land is fine."

The Usual Suspects: @oldfashionedidiot@quillswriting

If you'd like to be added to my taglist, please respond to this post or DM me.

I swear these prompts always get me thinking about the most meta stuff.

Like, I don't think we talk enough about how the human brain is engineered for language acquisition? Most people will start developing the ability to process questions by the time they're 8 months old. They can't even speak by that point because their mouths are not fully developed enough.

Second language acquisition, like first language acquisition, requires thousands of hours of input, a thing many people in the U.S. may never get because of how much English is spoken here. Also, actually speaking a second language terrifies many adults into not using it at all.

All that to say, if I were an alien, dragging my human around, and they started speaking my language, I wouldn't be surprised.

I think, also, that an alien phonology would have sounds humans wouldn't be able to pronounce (duh, but I'm assuming their mouth shapes are different, which makes it literally impossible.) I feel like humans would have to approximate some alien sounds.

This post has become longer than I anticipated, but yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if a pet human acquired an alien language from thousands of hours of contact with it.

After feeding your pet human, you are shocked when it says “thank you” in your language.

Day 45 (1:21) of rewriting my novel

No piece of writing of mine would ever be complete without the 4-legged table theorem. So, I added it in today in the 1200 words I wrote. And I'm still not done with Part Three (but getting closer!)

Speaking of Part Three, I'm getting close two being done, I think. I have a couple gaps left to fill, but that's about it. I'm surprised I haven't managed to write the actually important last scene (that being, the meeting with Governor Bunthun.

I still feel bad about romanizing her name, but nobody (except people who read Cherokee in its romanized form) would figure out that it's pronounced [ˈbə̃.ˌθə̃] and romanized as bvthv. So, preying on the fact that English speakers (mostly) nasalize their vowels and <u> can represent the "strut" vowel, so [ˈbʌ̃n̪.ˌθə̃n] will have to do. It's close enough.

Meanwhile, outlining Part Four looms on the horizon, nebulous as it was before. I know how I want it to end, and the major points in between, but that's about it. Somehow, Part Five seems to be more fleshed-out in my mind than Part Four.

I still have to derive Modern North Zeneth, whose closest living relative is supposed to be Low Zeneth. It's derived from a northern dialect of Old High Zeneth that split away from Old High Zeneth about 800-600 years ago. Maybe then I'll have a better name for Bvthv, but it wouldn't make sense for Governor Luwbefê to call her anything other than Bvthv.

Character names are hard.

The Usual Suspects: @oldfashionedidiot @quillswriting

If you'd like to be added to my taglist, please respond to this post or DM me.

Lmao sure, you're absolutely welcome to the idea of Yessei.

Would you also like names and descriptions of the regulars that come into Yessei's shop? I wrote them down somewhere in an earlier version of It Will Hurt.

“All those centuries, and you haven’t learned how to use a cell phone?” “I am 800 years old! Unless you know how to work a 15th century printing press, you can stop laughing and show me how to do the Twitter.”

Man, I don't care about learning NatLangs any more (Mandarin, Spanish), if given the choice, I want the ability to speak everyone's a priori Naturalistic ArtLangs. (IALs be damned.)

I am begging to see any corpus of the Sekaran that has been produced so far.

Info Post: Current Writing Projects

The Sekaran Tales:

Currently, the Sekaran tales are a loose collection of myths and folktales about the Sekaran people and the world they inhabit. The tag also includes the Sekaran conlang. I like to say I'm in my Silmarillion phase - just laying the groundwork for what I hope will be an epic story.

Oak, Ashe, and Thorn:

Oak, Ashe, and Thorn is a planned trilogy about found family, being Othered, and the power of supportive allies. Book one, Coffee and Curses, follows the adventures of the enby empath Quin Quercus, the lesbian werewolf Ashe Thompson, and the "not a prince" Bramble Brokenthorn as they discover a insidious Fae plot to steal people's Names.

Pataphysics 101:

A sci-fi anthology set in Keystone University, where a chaotic Fae-ish scientist named Dr. Kori Cyfrin¹ teaches classes on, you guessed it, pataphysics. The anthology includes/will include both lectures and short stories, and art if I can learn to draw better.

¹Yes, it's me. This is my source - well, part of it. -Kori

not only are there no bad languages there are also no bad or annoying dialects

I don’t talk about her very much, but this prompt is definitely the MC from It Will Hurt: And There Will Be No Fire. Her name is Yessei, and she’s a vegan and a Vampire and runs a coffee shop but can’t work a cell phone for the life of her.

“All those centuries, and you haven’t learned how to use a cell phone?” “I am 800 years old! Unless you know how to work a 15th century printing press, you can stop laughing and show me how to do the Twitter.”

Day 44 (1:20) of rewriting my novel

Today I didn't log many words, but that's ok.

Today I continued my journey in writing Part Three in reverse. Instead of writing the long, boring car scene, I skip to the good part-making the plan to convince Governor Bunthun to help, only to have the plan ripped away violently from underneath the New Heroes. Classic storytelling, but interesting nonetheless.

I don't know why, but the idea of post-novel canon has been living in my head rent-free. Like, I think I know how I want the rest of the novel to go:

the Coalition grows in number,

they take Ir Nouzonif only to find that President Sluwfa has run off with the remaining two Old Heroes' magics,

Izi and Tagif go and stop President Sluwfa while Hota and Lozef remain to keep the remains of Ir Nouzonif stable,

and Izi and Tagif return and restore the Old Heroes, balancing Magic and bringing Meiste back to having a physical representation when They want it (don't ask.)

The outcome of all this is a couple things:

A bunch of power-hungry warlords control most of the Old Confederacy

The situation in Odapir is particularly dire, considering the country will have been in full-blown civil war for several weeks.

But, as of right now, I'm not sold on writing a sequel.

Writing process taglist: @oldfashionedidiot

If you'd like to be added to any of my taglists, respond to this taglist post, or DM me and I can add you that way.

Considering Meiste is being written from a 1st person limited point of view (that POV being Izi’s exclusively) I think it would make more sense if it felt like he were naming the chapters, himself.

I.e. Chapter 1: That was Where it All Started

(Henceforth, I’ll use X to denote a digit of unknown value)

Chapter XX: Ruining my Own Coronation

Chapter XX: Odapir City is a Crazy Place

Chapter XX: The Big Lie, Revealed

Chapter XX: Look Who Came Crawling Back for More

Let’s go back to naming our chapters!

Here are some examples of chapters names I’ve come up with!

- Break you out of your shell

- A plot to make the girl happy again

- Yesterday is a memory we can't all forget

- Regret is something we get over by doing

Lets hear some more unique chapter names!

Nine Lines, Nine Tags

A tag game from @authorcoledipalo (that I totally didn’t forget about, sorry!)

The rules: Post nine lines of dialogue, and then tag nine people. (I will tag less because 9 is too many.)

1. “You two [Izi and Hota] are cute,” Tagif chuckled, sitting on the extra bed, undoing her gauntlets.

2. “Hang on, let me get my foreign relations advisor on the phone with you.” I waved for Tagif who leaned in while I held the phone out.

3. “That was the last [syringe]. I shattered the other two.”

4. “You already took away our only chances at saving our world. Why come back to rub it in our faces?”

5. “Goddammit!” She stomped her foot, throwing her fists down. “Do you think I wanted to do that? I’m here to get her back, too.”

6. “No. Mistake is too light a word. Try murder?”

7. “It doesn’t kill magic, it just makes it unusable. Happy?”

8. “She already brainwashed everyone,” I hissed, “what more does she want.”

9. “All I want to do now is help you. All I want to do is retake Ir Nouzonif and stick it in President Sluwfa’s face.”

Tags:

@foxgloves-garden @ominous-feychild @theothersideofthewoods @moonsbetween @oldfashionedidiot +open tag!

OC Questionnaire Tag

Another fun tag game from @authorcoledipalo.

I'll use Izi, Hota, Taguchif, and Lozerief all together at the same time.

What would you do if your enemy asked for help?

Izi: Yeah okay so that happened once and I would've ground her to a pulp then and there if Hota hadn't stopped me.

Hota: Izi's too impulsive, and it can be a strength when in dire straits, but a costly mistake in other environments. I try to make up for that wherever I can.

Tagif: I'm not normally with Izi on these, but yeah. Definitely grinding Lozerief to a pulp if I ever get the chance.

Lozef: I'm not a fan of questions as broad as this, or being reminded of how I allowed myself to be used for the benefit of a literal tyrant. Obviously, I've been the enemy asking for help many times. Never have I expected any help, and yet somehow it all works out.

Would you ask your enemy for help?

Izi: Depends? Like, I asked Governor Luwbefê for help, but we didn't know how vicious he would go on to be.

Hota: No, but like Izi, I was duped into believing in the goodness of the Governor of Tolftorrijv. I was sorely mistaken.

Tagif: Yeah totally. The ends justify the means. They say that in English, right?

Lozef: Another very complicated, nuanced question. Like Hotautebz and Iziser, I didn't know President Sluwfa would be such an evil person, but I went along with her plans to remain unobtrusive. So, when she built the anti-magic bubble, I left and begged Iziser and Hotautebz to retake me.

Do you act on impulse, or do you think before you act?

Izi: Well, Hota already answered this question for me.

Hota: Yeah, I did. At least Izi's honest about it.

Tagif: Premeditated plans are the best, especially when building stuff. I'm probably more impulsive than Hota, and less impulsive than Izi.

Lozef: Hard to say. I would say I'm spontaneous but not impulsive, if that makes sense?

Paging: @oldfashionedidiot @theothersideofthewoods +open tag!

Taglist?

Would anyone like to be tagged in any of my posts? Reblog/comment if you'd like to be included in any of the following lists:

Conlang Translations

Writing Updates

WIP Exerpts

Linguistics/Conlanging Ideas/Inspiration

@ominous-feychild

All

@oldfashionedidiot @quillswriting

Day 43 (1:16) of rewriting my novel

Today, Part 3 cracked 20,000 words!

Part 3 is finishing up nicely as I bridge the gap between the New Heroes leaving Tolftorrijv behind and the scene where Lozerief comes to them in Obizoe.

I'm not convinced that the ending to Part 3 is my best work, but for now, it just needs to exist until the novel is done.

Plus, there's a lot of Part 5 planning that I need to do before this whole thing is complete. And even then, I don't know how far into post-novel canon I'm willing to go before I deem the story complete. This is just a thought that's been on my mind as Part Three (hopefully) comes to a close, soon.

Ok, so, when reconstructing natural proto-languages, those protolanguages are almost never attested. Historical Linguists are basically making educated guesses and throwing darts against a wall when making the Proto-Indo-European hypothesis, it was just that the evidence was so compelling that linguists (and, most humans) believe it. For all intents and purposes, it's a really good guess.

The issue with my conworld? Classical Zispoel and Proto-Ytosi-Itaush are still fully attested languages with exactly 2 and 1 native speakers each, all still technically living.

To make matters worse, Lozerief is kind-of a scientific genius, and Pagjom is the literal Hero of Language. Together, they could reconstruct Proto-Zispoel and see what a god-awful, horrifying shit-show it was.

The idea that my characters could derive my god-awful, good-for-nothing protolanguage is, somehow, deeply disturbing to me. I think they would realize they were in a simulation if they did that.

Cursed Low Zeneth Translations

Consider this a makeshift guide to how Low Zeneth works.

Overview

Low Zeneth is a language and group of dialects spoken Southwestern Zeneste (the state of Tolftorrijv.) Its last common "ancestor" with Ipol was Classical Zispoel, but it had already started to diverge before the time of the Hero of Life. Low Zeneth is radically different than Ipol in many ways, though it's been influenced substantially by Ipol, too.

I will focus here on the prestige variety of Low Zeneth: the kind spoken in the city of Tolftorrijv.

Phonology/Romanization

Rendered Phonemically:

Stops: /p/ /b/ /t/ /d/ /k/ /g/

Nasal Stops: /m/ /n/

Affricates: /t͡s/ /t͡ʃ/

Fricatives: /f/ /θ/ /s/ /ʃ/ /h/

Approximants: /w/ /l/ /j/

Tap/flap: /ɾ/

Trill: /r/

Vowels:

/iː/ /i/ /yː/ /y/ /uː/ /u/

/eː/ /e/ /øː/ /ø/ /oː/ /o/ 

/ə̃/ /ə/

/a/ /ɑː/

That makes 34 total phonemes broken down from 20 consonants and 14 vowels.

Romanized:

p, b, t, d, k, g

m, n

ts, q

f, th, s, sh, h

w, l, j

r

rr

ij i üü ü uw u

ee ê öö ö oo o

v e

a aa

If you can't tell, I had fun deriving this phonology from the restrictive, Classical Zispoel phonology. Maybe a little too much, but oh well.

Morphology and Syntax - Grammar

Technically Low Zeneth is a VSO language, but that's not the full picture.

Basically, auxiliary verbs get sucked up into the (head-initial) tense-phrase. The tree below describes the translation "fijsesê bv hijfrê" which literally translates to "have I money" and means "I have money."

The result is that most subordinate clauses have the structure SVO, while the main clause has structure SV(A)O.

Low Zeneth has very slim morphology, only inflecting for a simple plural in nouns with -o, and no morphology at all in verbs. A series of sound changes rendered the T/A distinctions of Classical Zispoel basically indistinguishable, so to compensate, speakers of Low Zeneth employ heavy periphrasis.

Cursed Translations from Today

Fijatsia bv io dv luw êraanva ijrenva

Phonemic: /fi.ˈja.tsi.a ˈbə̃ ˈi.o ˈluː e.ˈɾɑː.nə̃.a ˈiː.ɾe.nə̃.a/

Lit. Translation: Will I give you of news urgent.

Meaning: I will give you urgent news/I must give you urgent news.

Üümen ijnvth Dvrr Ilaajote hijthen-luwario

Phonemic: /ˈyː.men ˈiː.nə̃θ ˈdə̃r i.ˈlɑː.jo.tə ˈhiː.θen.lu.wa.ɾi.o/

Lit. Manages Zeneste Emperor Tolftorrijv fight-people.

Meaning: The Emperor of Zeneste (now) manages the Tolftorrijv army.

Conclusion

I just figured I'd talk about Low Zeneth today because I haven't talked about it a lot but have been producing a bunch of translations. I realize only now that I didn't go over forming questions in this post, but maybe later I will. Feel free, as always, to request that I translate random words/phrases into this language.

Day 42 (1:15) of rewriting my novel

Today, I wrote Izi's address to the city of Tolftorrijv.

Sidenote: I realized that all my translations for place names are super inconsistent. Tolftorrijv, for example, is named in Ipol, but Ir Nouzonif is named in Classical Zispoel. Zenée is (probably) named in Zeneth? Then Odapir, Atepsi, Ytos, and Itaush are all named in Classical Zispoel, too.

Anyways, one of Izi's character traits is that, despite being relatively shy and stage-scared, he's still very charismatic and popular with most Zenestians. I suspect he'd be a major political force in the chaos that is post-novel canon.

Sidenote 2: I realized that, in post-novel canon (actually, during the duration of Part 5, too, which includes the aftermath of the fall of Ir Nouzonif) Izi doesn't have to relinquish control of the Coalition's armies, due to some weird wording in the Coalition's founding document. Would this potentially lead to a united Zenesto-Odapirian macro-state? Possibly? That's a tale for another day, probably.

Find the Words Tag Game

Thanks to @authorcoledipalo for the tag!

My words: ache, slash, bounce, wink

Your words:

Ache

Tears blurred my vision. My head raged with a headache like no other while I choked on my sobs. Mucus stained my tongue with salt while I struggled to keep my head up. He loved me. He loved me unconditionally, up until his dying breath. No, he still loved me. Even in death, his immortal love remained deep inside of me. My head finally fell.

Slash

"No," I decided. "It's-" A foul stench slashed at my nose, popping my eyes open. "What the hell?"

Bounce

I laughed, flying along the ceiling so that I could see the inside of the crystal chandelier. The crystals bounced light from electric bulbs around the center of the chandelier. I stuck my hand through it, seeing if my hand would glisten.

Wink

"The Emperor's request," chef Siz added, sending me a grin with a wink.

Paging @foxgloves-garden, @ominous-feychild, and @oldfashionedidiot, +open tag. Feel free to ignore as wanted.

Side note: Does anyone else use "bounce" as a transitive verb? I.e. "I bounce the ball" where "bounce" takes an object. (An intransitive verb is a verb which doesn't take an object: "I bounce." Is perfectly grammatical.) I feel like the transitive form feels... old? Archaic?

Help my family to get out and search for what is left of life. The war is devastating. Death is approaching every person and destruction is everywhere. We hope that there is hope before it is too late.

Go support!

Day 41 (1:14) of rewriting my novel

I didn't write a lot today, but that's okay. Any progress is progress.

I'm still thinking about Izi's speech in Tolftorrijv, and about what he might say. For the three-man band that is the "New Heroes," Izi fills both the Heart and the Leader, and Taguchif overlaps with him in the roles of Lancer and Smart one. I guess that makes Hota the tank, while also fulfilling some leadership roles because they're good at making plans. A well-balanced team.

I now plan on breaking that balance in Part Four, though, splitting them up. It's time for Zeneste to come under new management, anyways.

To get inspiration from con-sports (only tangentially related) I watched sports like rugby and cricket, which I knew nothing about and just tried to follow along. If your character knows nothing about baseball, perhaps they learn about it at the game?

I have been notoriously stuck in my story because of a section involving baseball. One of my main characters has his character development during a baseball game, but

clears throat

Baseball who?

I don't watch, play, or am interested in most if not all sports.

I only know baseball because of my mom lol.

So, question. What do you all do when you're writing about something you have little knowledge in, but can't just search it up?

Day 40 (1:13) of rewriting my novel

I hit 50K today! For that I'm very excited.

Some liked my previous Low Zeneth translations, so I'll share another here.

Hior bv puw ijsonvn bivq

IPA: [ˈhi.or.ˈbə̃.ˈpuː.ˈiː.so.nə̃n.ˈbjə̃t͡ʃ]

Lit. Translation: wish.PRES.SMP 1ST.SNG 3RD.SNG is good.

Translation: I hope you enjoy it. (Literally: I wish it is good.)

Some notes on this: ijsonvn /ˈiːsonə̃n/ is a dummy verb for non-predicative adjectives, like the word bivq /ˈbjə̃t͡ʃ/, which can be "good," or used independently as an NP to mean "goodness."

Syntax in subordinate clauses switches to SVO, as you saw in the example above. A grouping of it might look like this.

[VP [V hope] [NP I] [VP [NP it] [V' [V is] [NP good]]]]

Maybe one day I'll get around to making a syntax tree to describe what's going on, because that grouping isn't quite accurate, but it's good enough for right now.

Ok I figured I'd reblog this bc my most developed conlang, Ipol, is the source of the names for the six Meistian magics: Cognition, Mind, Doom, Earth, Language, and Life. The English names don't really lend themselves to the poles that the Zenestians derived.

Lozerief coined the first three terms: Earth, Language, and Life. She translated them as meiete, lozezonif, and iboelzon.

Hota, then, coined the term "espool" to mean "anti-language" magic, or "Mind."

Izi, following suit, coined the term "emeete" meaning "anti-earth" magic, or "cognition."

Tagif, finally, coined the term "eleerif" meaning "anti-life" magic or "Doom."

I just thought this was cool.

Worldbuilding and Magic Systems: Things to Consider

Have a magic system in mind for your fantasy world? Here's a list of things to consider to help you tie this system into the rest of your worldbuilding, so that it feels more believable and realistic.

Source

What is the source of magic? Is it natural or man-made? Can humans use magic or is it a force of nature that only animals or other races can use?

Does magic originate from inside a person or does it require external items to use? If it comes from items, can the items be made? How long does it take to make the items?

Does the magic cost anything- money, stamina, health, etc.?

Can a person be cut off from being able to use magic? If so, how?

Prevalence

How common is magic in your world? Is it so common that everyone has seen it or is it a subject of myths and rumors?

How long have the people in your world known about magic? Has it always been there or is it a new discovery?

How much does the average person know about magic? How much do experts know? What do people not understand about this magic? Are there any common misconceptions? Myths?

Is magic revered or feared? Or if it's common, is it taken for granted? Are there any taboos surrounding magic?

How many types of magic are there? Are some more common than others?

Are there dedicated schools of thought surrounding the study of magic? Is it taught about in schools? If so, is it taught to children or only at the college (or equivalent) level?

Accessibility

Who can use magic? Who can't? Is it something that only the rich and powerful can use? Why? Or do genetics determine who can use it? Wealth?

Are there any physical limitations that might restrict who can use magic? For instance, maybe old or sickly people can't use magic because it requires a lot of physical effort. Does your society provide accommodations for people who can't use magic? Is a lack of magic ability considered a disability?

Does education level determine capacity for magic?

How easy is it to gain access to magic? How easy is it to learn about magic?

Power/Usefulness

How powerful or useful is magic for different parts of society? Military? Medicine? Entertainment? Art? Childcare? Government? Communication? Business?

How does magic affect the politics of your world? How does it shape the economy? Are there feuds over the use of magic? Do powerful groups in your world have an incentive to limit the use and accessibility of magic? Why?

What happens when people no longer have access to magic? Does this cripple their ability to go through their daily lives? How?

Mix, match, and cross-reference these with other elements of your worldbuilding to form a believable magic system that lives and breaths just as the rest of your world does. For every answer you give to the questions above, consider and build upon the implications of what that might mean for your world. A worldbuilder's best skill is the ability to ask "How will this affect ___?" So make sure you're always considering the ripple effects of each element you add to your world.

Happy worldbuilding y'all!

I’ve never read this book, I only watched the series on YouTube. I must read it at some point. David J. Peterson’s content on linguistics is immaculate.

I FOUND A BOOK

Look what we got from the library!!! Look at it! Look!

Now that we have The Book, there's no stopping us. You will all be drowning in words and grammar and scripts >:D

But seriously. If I had a flappy hands emoji, I'd be using it right now.

Day 39 (1:12) of rewriting my novel

No crazy Low Zeneth translations today, although I'm very proud of its crazy analytical grammar.

Today I'm thinking about post-novel cannon, because I find those events just as fascinating. After the novel is over, the Empire of Zeneste is completely disbanded, leaving just the state of Ir Nouzonif with Izi as its "Emperor."

Meanwhile, the White Army definitely does not finish retaking Odapir, so in post-novel canon, Izi definitely helps Heja'umak reclaim her home city of Odapir City.

Furthermore, the ruler of Tolftorrijv is pretty corrupt in the same way that President Sluwfa was...

And about her, I haven't even decided what happens to her yet. Perhaps out of desperation, she tries to combine the magic she stole inside herself? Lozerief did say it was like "replacing your lungs with lungs that were 10 liters."

I feel like the states of Ytos and Itaush would reunite, since Itaush was one of the Twin Duchies, but left the Confederacy.

Find the Word

A tag from @theothersideofthewoods.

The goal is to find these words in my WIP: charm, bubble, poison, kiss

Your words are: gloom, shimmer, muck, home

Charm

Tonight, the chef had left a couple sliced apples with grilled salmon next to it. Irotijv, I thought to myself. The national dish of Zeneste. Definitely a good-luck charm for tomorrow. The apple was sweet and juicy, and the fish was seasoned and seared perfectly. I fell into my bed soon after having supper.

Bubble

I jumped back, ducking beneath the stream of flames when she turned around. Hota crossed their arms and closed their eyes. “I’m casting a blanket of tranquility,” they yelled, spreading their arms. A blue bubble enveloped the whole train car, dimming the flame in her mouth, but not the orange in her eyes.

Scar

[Taguchif] was sitting by a large window in another empty train car, staring out at the coast while the moon shone over it, reflecting over the water. Her gauntlets laid beside her, exposing her scarred hands. She did nothing when I sat beside her.

Poison

(Is it bad that this word literally doesn't show up in Meiste in the first ~50,000 words???)

Paging: @foxgloves-garden and @reedandstorm, along with open tag.

Day 38 (1:11) of rewriting my novel

Ok today I gave in and started writing Part Three in reverse.

That's mostly because I know where Part Three is headed completely. I'm still debating how I want Part Four to go. I'm now anticipating (but can't predict) a Part Five. A sort-of last-ditch effort for the evil President Sluwfa.

I also wanted to write Lozerief again because she's more fun to write than most of my characters, I think. She's dark and brooding, but she's not evil by any stretch of the imagination. It's also fun to see her at her weakest: for a long time, she was regarded as the strongest Hero. I think it's fun to see her come crawling back to the people she hurt the most.

Heads up, Seven up!

Thanks from @authorcoledipalo for the tag!

Take these seven lines of dialogue from Part Three:

"She killed her ... in front of us. In front of me." "Izi ... I'm not doing this because you can't, I'm doing this because you can." “When you get back in power, make it so the train is free.” "Too late...you're cooked." “Obviously not! The layers of deception with her go so deep it’s not even funny anymore.” "Do you even know how you feel?" "We're going to get our mother back and beat the shit out of her for lying to us."

Plus seven tags:

@theothersideofthewoods, @oldfashionedidiot, @flurrysahin, @the-letterbox-archives, @eternalwritingstudent, @koinotfish, and @moonsbetween