World based on darkness and light

[bullzeye]

Hi all!

First off, I'm new to this forum, and working on my first novel size story. What I have for a world is a dark vs light world (demons and demonic beasts vs angels and angelic creatures).

The world itself will be medieval themed. The continent the story plays out in will have 5 kingdoms in it. I'm not sure if it's correct if I'm stating it's a dark fantasy, but I think so. Anyway, medieval themed. No dragons or any of the sorts.

For magic: in my world, magic will be used throughout the world, although not that heavily. Light magic can do more than just healing, they can also do damage depending on the attack. Dark magic is pretty much damage only.

What do you guys think?

 

[Gurkhal]

Ok, so what part is it that you want to discuss, want to feedback on etc.?

Because right now I've got to little info to tell very much about it, what holes there might in it or if it serves the need of your story.

 

[Reaver]

Sounds pretty cool. The classic good versus evil tale. Can't go wrong with that formula.

Best of luck with that!

 

[bullzeye]

The history of the world is roughly as follows.

At first, the demons ruled the world, but men fought for their freedom, and managed to banish the demons. From the realm the demons were banished to, the demons still had influence over the humans through whispers. However, most men could easily deal with these whispers.

Many years (an era?) later, humans found out how to summon demons. Of course, demons could not be tamed. The demons, in their own selfish way, decided to aid these humans. War was inevitable, because the kingdoms (there were 4 of them, at the end of the war this turned into 5 kingdoms) all wanted to control the entire continent. This lead to the human population being cut in half.

Peace reigned. But one group is set on controlling the entire continent. In order to do that, they plan on summoning the most powerful demon of the world. This demon has other plans, and getting summoned was a major help.

On the other side, there are 2 girls. One is a scholar, and the other was a forced member of this group after being kidnapped. Through dark illusions her true memories are blocked, and she believes that she is completely alone in the world, and was completely unwanted.

Then there's one boy who's life is going to be completely changed. This is because the summoned demon seeks refuge inside the boy to regain power.

And finally, there's a group who exists for the safeguarding of human freedom, liberties and that kind of stuff. They mostly use white magic to aid those in needs (people being attacked by bandits, political refugees, that kind of stuff).

I can't go into too much detail yet, but I can tell that tensions between the five nations are going to rise again.

 

[Gurkhal]

Ok, I think I get what you're going with and how you want to set up this story. Looks ok to me. If you have more please post or if you wish us to look at something in more detail, post away.

 

[bullzeye]

Thanks! I'll do that. I'll now continue writing soon, I'll post the first chapter, which is a prologue to the actual story.

 

[valiant12]

Dark v's light is a cliche.
That being said cliches and tropes aren't bad. If your story is original then nobody will say that it is bad just because there are some familiar elements like conflict between demons and angels.

 

[bullzeye]

I hope to be able to make it more complex than that. I want to make it more about human struggles, and how the characters are going to deal with them.

 

[WooHooMan]

I don't understand where darkness and light comes into this? Is it just the magic's monikers that are "light and dark"? I don't really understand.
I'm asking because I've also done a light-dark cosmology recently and I would like to see how other people approach this cliche.

 

[Reaver]

Thanks! I'll do that. I'll now continue writing soon, I'll post the first chapter, which is a prologue to the actual story.

Please post your first chapter in the Showcase.

Thanks!

 

[bullzeye]

The chapter is complete, but because of it's size (over 3000 words), I posted it in my portfolio, I posted a thread of it in the showcase forum with a short excerpt. Oh, and I accidentally posted it twice.

 

[Reaver]

I deleted that double post. You can break your story up and post the sections one after the other.

 

[bullzeye]

Done, part 1 is now up, going for the other parts as well. I'll try to keep the word count under 1000 for readability.

 

[Aidan of the tavern]

I'm going to be brutally honest and say that black and white morality doesn't really interest me. I'm not trying discourage you or sound harsh, it just for me carries a lot of familiarity and the potential to get too relaxed in formula. Characters who are simply good and evil can work sometimes, though it has become well-trodden ground since 'Tolkien-lite' became fantasy mainstream. That doesn't mean your writing won't be good, it'll just mean that you might have to work harder to surprise the reader. It just depends how close you stick to good and evil. I hope that doesn't sound too harsh, I just think as a reader its best to be honest. However you say that you will be focusing on humanity and their struggles; and that is what really interests me, because there you have the grey area, anything could happen. I do have faith that you will make it interesting though, so go for it, and when I get some free time I'll read your chapter.

EDIT: I should just clarify, I'm not judging for a moment that I think your work will be cliché, I'm simply stating why I think as a sub-genre it needs some careful navigation.

 

[bullzeye]

Please post your first chapter in the Showcase.

Thanks!

I wasn't able to post for some time due to some "spambot" denying me access to post at all. I'll do so as quickly as possible. In the mean time, you'll be able to find the chapter at my portfolio.