November 2021 Q&A

Time for another Q&A again! This time around the theme was Eve of Destruction, and I got a few solid questions to answer, so let's have at! For next month's Q&A... let me see here, what series have I not done one for recently... eh, let's try something different. What questions do you have regarding the different protagonists? Now, on to the Q&A!

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Pyro Hawk Asked:

So we know that there's some form of a 'Heavens' and 'Hells' going on.  But just what is up with that?  How often do Gods/Devils or Demon Lords or whatever actually appear in the galaxy, and how do they affect things when doing so?

That's a hard question to answer, because it varies significantly. People can summon fiendish lords, sure, but the advent of modern technology has been a decent equalizer, even if it isn't perfect. Like Vaneryth explained in Adept of Chaos, it's traditional to not rely on external augmentation for immortals, but that doesn't mean there aren't some who don't follow that philosophy. Can you imagine how devastating an archangel with appropriately-built power armor and high-tech weaponry could be, or magitech weaponry that can properly power their magic?

These sort of beings can equal or exceed the power of Evelyn, which is definitely a problem. However, most of the time demon lords or the like are more... localized than it'd be in most fantasy settings. The universe is big, but gods/fiendish lords can only be in one place at a time. There are theocracies, though, and some of them can be absolutely devastating on crusades, especially when they summon angels/fiends to assist their troops.

What are the important/commonly known/famous/infamous Deities and Demon Lords whilst we're at it?

I haven't decided yet, honestly. If they haven't come up in the story, I haven't seen much need to flesh that part out. Heck, I haven't even named the one former demon lord that's technically in Adept of Chaos.

Anyone that's actually equivalent to them?  Any of those 'natives' to the 'Prime Material' plane of the Galaxy?

This is much easier to answer! So, the issue is that you have varying powers of deities, demon lords, archangels, and the like. Lesser demon lords or demigods are weak enough that someone like Fya could beat them, and Evelyn could take on two or three of them without trouble. Greater demon lords or the average demigod could probably crush Evelyn with a bit of effort. Peak demon lords can challenge lesser deities, but could crush Evelyn easily.  Greater deities are pretty much impossible for anything but another deity to challenge, though.

That said, deities can't exactly enter the universe casually. Their power level is such that reality would probably fracture around them, so they'd have to use an avatar, which is weaker than they are, so... yeah. Evelyn is in the most powerful tier of beings in the mortal universe, but she's at the lower end of that tier.

...  What's the worst Holy War or Demon Invasion that's happened?

Like with the infamous/famous demon lords, I can't really answer this fully. However, the story which spawned the Eve of Destruction universe (I was going for a retired super-spy story) was going to involve a planar invasion, so... concurrent with everything, most likely?

Kev Asked:

Do the bee folk/apis or similar species exist in the universe of Eve? Not necessarily Joy and her hives, but I'm curious if when the God created the Apis in Joys' world, if they were simultaneously created across your various universes...though I'm more doubtful of them showing up alongside Lilith. Space faring versions of the hives just seem awesome.

That's an excellent question! When you asked, I had no intention of having them in the setting. However, there are enough unique species that there's no reason that they couldn't exist in the universe. I'm not going to say they do exist unless they appear in the setting, but I've put in some basic thought on how they'd fit in if they did. Hive ships would be among the largest ships in the setting, I suspect, second only to unique vessels and draconic warworlds.

Do mega-corporations exist through the Eve universe? Beside the dragons and their gate, everything seems to run on a planet to planet system. When I imagine our/earths' future in space, companies like amazon have their hands in every industry. Amazon might not be the best example, more like the Weyland-Yutani corporation from the Aliens series.

Oh, most definitely. In Adept of Chaos two separate megacorps appear, Issek Industries and... oh, I can't remember their name. The one that runs the arcologies that Evelyn visits.

One of the things you need to understand though is that Evelyn is on what amounts to the frontier in the universe of Astral Skies. No, she's not on the rim, but she's... well, in terms of the Wild West, she'd be in Kansas or so, while the Core Worlds would be the equivalent of Queen Victoria's court (I only recently became aware that the Victorian Era and the Wild West overlapped). But that's also not the whole story.

A large focus when I set up the setting was to make sure that I could have a single person or small group make a difference in larger plots. Going back to the Wild West comparison, Evelyn is like a lone gunman meandering from town to town (planet to planet) where each is mostly independent, with a few connections between them. Yet the Core Worlds have larger polities, such as the confederation that Evelyn mentioned in Chosen of Chaos when talking to the engineer off Nebula Runner. Yet even with that I tend to restrict the size of polities to rarely more than a dozen star systems to keep them from being so large that they overly restrict the way plots can develop, and give more room for a small band of rebels to make a difference without being utterly crushed. Which is why while megacorps exist, they tend to be active in a single sector at most (a sector being a set of roughly 3-4 clusters). This allows them a huge range of power without being overpowering, in my opinion.

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Hopefully those answered the questions reasonably! Now, like I said for next month we're looking at questions for each protagonist of my series as the theme, but feel free to ask any question you want.

Now, pardon me while I try to scrub the thought of Evelyn dressed up in a Christmas-equivalent costume (by Fya, of course) out of my brain.