Q: Why?
Why not? I've been pretty out of it and off balance. The setting has been on my mind. Why not?
Q: No really. Why?
Initially this started as a writing contest from within a private everquest server (server code was fully legal and the game files came from everquest's own update servers so theoretically everything was kosher and aboveboard. The setting didn't really matter, though it was heavily altered compared to the vanilla game's story, other than 'Necromancer bad. anyone who is a necromancer is either delusional or a sociopath' so sayith the head monkey in charge of the server.
And I took that personally.
So Marrik was born, or at least a prototype of what would become Marrik. I've gone through several iterations of the man. Some of them he is nobody. Others he is grandson of a would-be God that broke the world. Sometimes he joined a cult ignorant of what they really were until it as too late. Others he joined hoping to make change from within. More modern iterations have him learning on his own with experimentation and scavanged books.
in all versions he is consistantly a farmer's son gone to a city to find his own life and learn about the magic he has been given.
This is his story.
I am not promising some sweeping epic that will redefine the fantasy genre for generations to come. I am no english professor. I don't have money enough to fling around to bribe my way onto the new york time's best seller list. I'm not writing some trashy 'romance' series aimed at middle aged house wives. I hold no illusions.
This is all stuff I should have done before this point. Also it is me trying to come to terms with the fact I am middle aged, still living with family due to being unable to work as well as having two special needs siblings, and utterly failing to find a place in any community I try to participate in with any long term succss.
Moving On.
Q: You've had this on the backburner for almost twenty years?
I'm a disabled shut in that tend to get thrown out of online communities. I have little faith in my ability to write convincing people. Burnout happens. Doubt creeps in. The image of a writer obsessivly working on a thing is both true and false. I've had this as a thing to write on since 2005ish. 'Now' it is 2021. That's a long time for something to stew. It is a lot of time for characters, settings, and opinions, to change and drift.
Q: Can parallels be drawn between necromancer discrimination be made to real world groups?
Not the intent I set out on, but yes; though I daresay LGBTQ+ folks can't raise an army of the damned, or steal the soul from you... no matter what Faux News or the Facebook brigades would like you to believe.
Q: Is Marrik you? Is this basically you trying to come out?
Nope! I can understand why one may think that, but nope! That said See the first question. I got told 'bleeeh necromancers can only be eeeviiiilll' and... I tend to react poorly when told a thing 'can't be.' So this is pretty much going 'Challenge Accepted' and trying to do something productive when told 'no' instead of screaming on the internet.
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/fiction/asknecro/