Oh no I didn’t! :eek: Oh yes I did! I started my own Cosmological article!!
Hey, everybody around here is doing it these days! (Well, Galloway and Manus are, anyway.) Not to steal their thunder, but I happen to have been working on my own ideas for purposes of writing fanfiction stories again soon. So, why not post them here? It would be fun, and the feedback might be useful!
Don’t worry, this isn’t going to be anywhere as complex as Galloway’s stuff- it’s just some musings of mine. Oh yeah, feel free to use any of this stuff, if you wish, too.
Ok, let’ start with the basics:
THE OMNIVERSE
The Omniverse refers to EVERYTHING THAT EXISTS. To be specific, to the infinite number of universes that coexist. Each universe, of course, represents a fictional universe, everything from primitive Caveman beliefs to the latest Webcomics. Yes, for my story purposes, EVERYTHING IS REAL! gasp! BUT, that doesn’t mean things are just going to crossover madly. Let’s look at the Omniverse’s structure.
First, we have to establish that Time and Space are constants throughout the Omniverse. If it’s 12 AM in New York City on Earth One it’s also 12 AM in New York on Earth M as well. Of course, that doesn’t mean an interdimensional traveler will realize this. If the New York you visit happens to have been destroyed in a nuclear war, you might think you have been transported to the far future… or if it was never built in that world, you might not even realize you are in the New York area! And if we add things like different languages, calendars etc. well, you can see how it is not always apparent. Still, the point is: unless other forces are involved, just shifting between dimensions won’t shift you through space or time.
Of course, not all universes are parallel- many universes have versions of Earth, but not all do! In this case, you’ll pop in that universes’ closest physical equivalent location to where you left… usually another planet.
Note that, again unless special forces are involved, each universe is completely unable to affect the others in any way. Its inhabitants cannot see, hear or otherwise affect those of the others. Think of them as radiowave signals, each carrying its own TV Channel, but you can’t tune in to more than one at a time. In fact, most sentient beings assume their universe is all that exists. Telling them otherwise is usually not a good idea, as reactions can range from laughing in your face to having you committed to (if proven true) the total collapse of their way of life. That’s why most interdimensional travelers (dimensionals, for short) just keep this fact to themselves. Not to mention that it can be a useful secret to have- dimensional travel is a good way to disappear without a trace, or to go where nobody can ever know who you are. Of course that can be a bad thing too, IF you find yourself stuck in a dangerous world…
The Omniverse is actually subdivided into multiverses. A multiverse is a group of related universes- that usually means that they are connected in such a way that travel is easier between those universes, or that they contain similar worlds. The setting for my RPGC stories is such a multiverse, though it does overlap others (such as Galloway’s) in spots. Continuing the TV analogy, a multiverse is the equivalent of a Cable TV Channel Block, with all the Movie Channels being located in the same number range, for example. Note that, by the same token, travel outside of a particular multiverse is very difficult. This often causes a Multiverse’s Dimensionals to wrongly assume that their multiverse is all that exists. The heroes of the DC Universe, for example, currently assume that their 52 Parallel Earths are all the ones there are! (So most Dimensionals aren’t THAT smarter than their fellow natives, though many think they are. )
CREATION
OK, so, how many universes are there, and who or what created them all?
Nobody knows.
Many people assume the Omniverse is infinite. It might be, though there is no evidence for or against it- all that is known is that there is an impossibly large number. It might just be that there is only a Trillion universes- but who’s ever going to see them all? Nobody mortal, that’s for sure. It’s the same thing with space- the number of Galaxies known to exist might go up only to a few million- but that’s more than we can ever hope to visit.
And did somebody create all of them? Or was it just random chaos?
Both, actually.
It is known that there exist beings with the power to create entire worlds, and some even entire universes. Most people call them gods, though other names, like “Cosmic Entities” apply as well. It is known that some of these beings were created by other gods; other claim they were born spontaneously. In either case, most gods cannot create out of sheer nothingness- they need materials to work with: matter and energy. In that case, where did the first materials come from? We are getting into the Chicken or the Egg territory here, and nearly every culture has its own beliefs on the matter (and not all can be true at the same time.) So let’s just move on.
What IS known for certain, is that there is a Hierarchy between the gods. It goes like this:
-Above all gods, there is one recognized as Supreme. He (or she, or it) goes by many names- God, Brahma, The Creator- again, depends on who you ask. The only thing known about it is that it is a mystery. Even the other gods don’t know what to make of it. All they know is that he’s The First, The One Who Started It All. The only other thing known for sure about it is that it NEVER acts anymore- except in the absolute most dire circumstances for the Omniverse. The rest of the time, the Creation is in the hands of the rest of the gods.
-Below The Creator lie the second generation of gods. These are beings who are of lesser power than the Creator but are still unimaginably powerful by mortal standards. Each is usually the creator of his or her own universe. These beings never work together; in fact, they seem to be competing with each other. This is why most universes are so similar- the gods are stealing each others’ ideas! Of course, some gods insist on being original, resulting on some really strange worlds. Haruhi Suzamiya and the Lord of Nightmares (from Slayers) fall in this category.
-Below the Second Generation lies the Third (duh.) These are even weaker gods, but they still have power to create or change entire worlds. That is usually their duty. Althena, from the LUNAR RPG series, and Grune (from Tales of Legendia) fall in this category.
-And of course, below the Third Generation lies the Fourth- these are the weakest gods, who may possess powers that frighten mortals, like control over the weather, but are still small potatoes in the cosmic hierarchy. They usually busy themselves with sustaining Nature and such, but many just lounge around, getting those poor mortals to worship them, often with blatant lies about their importance. Most mythological gods fall in here.
One thing you notice is that, the lower you come in the scale, the more human (in personality, not necessarily in form) the gods are. The highest gods are all business and no emotion, while the lower ones have all of our passions. Perhaps its better that way. I really wouldn’t like to see a universe-shaper throw a temper tantrum, if you catch my drift! (Though many gods often find themselves conflicted between their duty and their emotions- see Althena for an example.)
Next: We focus on the RPG Multiverse proper.