jeriendhal | Nanwrimo World Notes

Magic: It exists in the world, but it is wisely viewed with suspicion by most. The primary problem being that magic never, ever creates, it only destroys. The pseudo-scientific explanation for this is that magic is the act of unraveling the basic atomic structure of things. A powerful enough wizard could tear down a wall, or (if they had knowledge of the scientific elements) remove atoms to change one element to another. You could even kill cancer cells or disintegrate a tumor if you knew what you were doing. The problem is having enough control to make such things possible. Most mages though, at best, are really good at making things go boom.

One consequence of this is that some time in the future, once scanning technology grows more sophisticated, mages will prove very useful at small scale applications as outlined above. So ironically the march of science will make magic all the more powerful...

Wazagans: Will be slightly different than they're portrayed in my Terinu stories. One tweak to their biology I'm considering is actually making them more lizard-like, primarily through being cold blooded. This makes equatorial or desert regions (mostly the latter, they like a dry heat) their preferred environment. I've got a scene in mind where one triumviriate of heroes (one human, one The Other Race and one Wazagan) are forced to try and go through a mountain pass as winter closes in. Faced with the Hobson's choice letting his friends waste their precious body heat trying to help him stave off hypothermia, the wazagan ends up stepping outside after his friends fall asleep in exhaustion. They find him the next morning, frozen solid and curled around his holy book.

Also in this universe they tend to be divided into large clans, the most sensible arrangement given their biology. There's a perception in non-Wazagan areas that females are something of an underclass, since they're rarely seen in foreign lands. This is incorrect. Females act on pretty much an equal basis with males at home, and notably tend to be more likely to become priests, scholars or shopkeepers.

Males however, have an almost exclusive lock on being traveling merchants, explorers and diplomats. The reason for this is, again, a matter of biology. Wazagan religion has some very sensible taboos about clans fertilizing their own eggs. As a consequence it's traditional to get another clan's males to do it, preferably from far away as possible. So its considered the only polite thing to do when visiting another clan to go to the local the egg chamber and do one's manly duty. Making a healthy profit along the way is only sensible.

One further note: Wazagans simply Do Not Get Sex, at least in the mammalian sense. They tend to look at human and others' biological urges with mild scandal at best, pitying horror at worst. They have a full range of emotions, the same as any other sentient being in the world, and form deep friendships. But when someone starts discussing being physically attracted to someone, they tend to look at you rather blankly.

The Other Race: I'm currently stuck on these guys. I wanted to use Peta's Vulpine, but I can't if I want to eventually self-publish this story. So I'm going to have to come up with something else, and God help me it's likely going to be anthro kitties. I've a mind to make them a slightly darker version of the Vulpine, very much matriarchal, but utterly obsessed with status. If you don't have a patron, if you're not wearing a uniform, if you don't have some kind of badge of office hanging from your neck or pinned to your breast, you're a nobody. Very hierarchical and class conscious, very, very Victorian, in the darker sense of the term. As Peta's Vulpine are described as what happens when you get English monarchy and love of pomp combined with Aussie laid back sensibility, the Others are what you get when get Victorian prudishness combined with a Prussian love of order.

Not sure if I like them like this, though it does provide for some dramatic hooks. I imagine my troubleshooter group (working across international borders to stave off an existential threat to all three races) gets most of their Other recruits from individuals who have a hard time fitting in Other society.