The World
The World is an alternate reality and a faerie and something of an alternate history, discovered to be somewhat after the fashion of Tolkien's Middle Earth, but largely has gone its own merry way.
I’m not really sure where the beginnings of the World lie, except that I had a fairly concrete idea of an alternate world somewhen about 1980 or so, with a kind of diminutive people that had the ability to fly. They lived in houses in the forests of what is roughly Western Siberia *here*. You could tell what “race” or social group they were by the colours of their hair and feathers. Essentially, Red meant warrior, Black meant magician, White meant seer, Yellow meant ruler, Brown meant slave. These people eventually evolved into the Daine, who I've described on Conculture several times. The world's history eventually lost its "primary world" attachments and grew its own. So, all the countries of Europe and their colonies quietly left the room, and other histories took their place.
It is usually asked of world builders and storytellers, “Who influenced you in this endeavour?” Some can place the blame squarely on one author or another, but I can’t trace any of this back to one single source. Certainly Dr. Seuss’s imaginative worlds, almost conlangy lexicon and vivid illustrations of strange beasts and people were an early influence. While I can’t recall ever consciously modeling anything after Seuss, the early exposure to such wonderment may well be a key to all this. Other influences include, but are not limited to, Monty Python, J.R.R. Tolkien, Terry Pratchett, Kelly Winters. I wouldn't say any of them provide either a seminal or a profound influence; but they've each helped in some way to give a form and shape to the Void where the World had appeared.
The Universe
The universe, as a place, is often confused by the inhabitants of the World with the planet Earth itself. Most philosophers agree that the universe is heliocentric, that is, the Sun resides at the center of the universe and presides over a court of various small orbiting bodies: the planets, the comets and the fixed stars. This of course is not the case, as the World exists within a fairly mundane universe of galaxies, black holes, quasars, star systems, gas clouds, dark matter and other exciting astronomical bits and pieces.
The main difference between *that* universe and ours is the existence of magic as a natural force.
The World
Some philosophers aver that the world is a roundish disc rotating upon the backs of four oliphants that in turn stand upon the back of a gargantuan tortoise which swims through the vastness of space. In this cosmology, the Sun, planets and moons are reduced to very small orbiting rocks.
Most aver that the Earth is a round planet that orbits the Sun along with a number of other planets and moons. The circumference of the Earth has been measured as have the distance between Earth and Sun and Earth and its moons (none of the measurements are precise, but the scales are proportionate). Surrounding the planet, and presumably including the Sun and other planets, is the realm known as Overheaven. It is not always clear whether this realm is truly the mundane regions of space or is the spiritual realms that surround and imbue the universe.
The surface of the Earth, the Middle World is where most of the known inhabitants of the World live and where they go about their daily lives (except for miners and adventurers). But the surface world is but a part of the whole picture.
There are realms known collectively as the Underworld, and by this we mean not just the sewers and underdelvings of the old city of Hoopelle. Many are the ancient dungeons and delvings of various dark powers, but there are also natural realms under the surface of the Earth inhabited mostly by beasts, but sometimes by peoples unknown to those on the surface except in folklore (particularly Gnomes and Dwarves). There are also tales of vast underworld chasms where whole communities of peoples live; some are said to be like the Daine, others like Men. No Middle World organisation has undertaken the daunting task of fully exploring and mapping the Underworld. It is certainly too large, too diverse and too inaccessible.
There is a philosophic speculation that the center of the Earth is hollow and that the core is a small body that generates heat and light for the hollow Underworld and also drives the thaumic field of the planet. While at present this is only to be taken as speculation, it would not be inconsistent with the structure of a magical world.
The Reshaping of the World was one of the most spectacular geological events in the planet's history, probably since the Creation. The Reshaping of the World was a catastrophic event that happened some hundreds of thousands of years ago when the Dark Power was defeated. Upon his demise, the beings that inhabit the very foundations of the world were agitated and their movements caused upheavals of seismic and volcanic natures in the regions of the world particularly inhabited by the Dark Power. At that time, the Dark Power inhabited the bitter East, having raised up in the eastern Ocean a great land for his minions and servants. As a result of the upheavals, those lands sunk under the waves, causing massive tsunammis, and the whole globe of the Earth turned about 67 degress to one side so that, from the perspective of those living nearest the Dark Power's domains, the lands that once were in the eastward were ever after in the northward. Those lands, however, remained quite bitter.
The Teor record in their histories that the world turns in this way about once in every two star ages. So, it might be a coincidence that the planet turned at this time. Of course, it is also possible that the motions of the subterranean beings upset some delicate balance that simply initiated an event that was immanent anyway.
Deepest of all the Underworld's realms are the very Foundations of the World itself. No dweller of the Upper World has ever gone so far into the belly of the Earth, for the heats of the Ankanic Fires burn all flesh, and it is said that the airs of the depths of Underworld are crushing and deadly. There, it is said, dwell -- beings -- of immense size and ponderous motion that uphold the basments of the upper earth. It is said their slow motions cause the lands themselves to change place, as if playing out some great and mysterious ballet. Their agitations, it is said, are the cause of volcanic eruptions (the Ankanic fire) and earth tremors of all magnitudes. These beings dwarf even the mightiest of the World's ancient mountains, Amath, Gahalt and Zahair.
