Aridaw Illustration: Rachel Arndt
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Journal of 'V':
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​From the 2017 BFA Student Thesis Exhibition display
​
"Through Fire We Crawl"

​​​"THROUGH FIRE WE CRAWL" is an illustration thesis project designed to be a collection of artifacts from an ancient, technologically advanced civilization that was destroyed in a series of natural disasters of apocalyptic proportion. The journal is from one of the very few survivors.

The journal will continue to be updated.

​Please keep check
ing back!
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!! Important !!
​About the Journal & Foreword
​This journal was found in the Tersian Caverns by a phantom researcher, whose name will not be disclosed. This phantom/rogue researcher had collected multiple clues to help him/her solve the journal's mysteries and find proof of the Order of the Amber Lotus's underhand dealings, as well as the strange origin of their leader, Embrias. The latter goal was not accomplished in its entirety, since many crucial details and pages toward the end of the journal have been torn out or burned. 

Months after discovering the journal, the researcher mysteriously vanished. 

In the next tabs are all the clues that have been gathered by the researcher and below is the journal in modern blog format with adjacent annotations by the researcher.

Unfortunately, due to the blog format, the journals will have to be read from the bottom up, from oldest to newest.

Researcher's annotations
Underlined items were underlined in the physical journal
Two stars (**) means that the researcher had deemed these particular sections
 important. Entries with stars will have their own section.
​The spiritual beliefs in the journal are not intended to be declarations of religious truth. It is a fantasy world steeped in metascience and various branches of philosophy, please remember that. 

The views and beliefs in this journal do not necessarily reflect the views of the author.

Comments and questions are encouraged.
Example pages from the Physical Journal
"Through Fire We Crawl" BFA Student Thesis Exhibition Display
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Story Concepts: Amira and Channeling
Amira: Can be roughly translated as 'Heaven', although this translation does not imply religious association, but instead an association with metascience. Amira is essence, it is energy (both spiritual and physical).

There are two classifications of Amira: Inactive and Active.
Inactive Amira is also known as The Collective. It is the place from which all souls come and where all souls return to be recycled. Active Amira is found in spiritual forms as Essence, and physical forms as Matter. Essence is most prominently in mediums such as blood, spinal fluid, magma, and sap, to name a few, and can also crystallize into powerful storage devices over thousands of years in remote caves, creating the crystals used in all Crystal Technology. Matter is anything we deem as 'real' in our world. Light, heat, atoms, bodies, wood, etc.

​
Channeling: This is a type of magic casting, but with a certain science to it. In this society, the minds of the people run at their optimum capacity. They have the ability to channel energy from the Collective and set it to complete a specific task. Most often, the unique behavior of their channel allows them to be able to accomplish certain tasks easier than other tasks.

Channeling, however, comes at a particular price. If you imagine the channel as a wire linked to a large power source, and you send energy through it long enough, it wears out. This is the same way with the soul. The more one uses channeling, the shorter the duration of their life.


There are two classifications of Channeling: 
Automatic and Specialized
. The main difference between the two is that Autos have little to no control of how much Amira they use or when. Specialized Channelers are simply Autos who have undergone training to improve their control and extend their lifespan.
Story Concepts: Crystal Technology
​Automatonic Channeling Crystals (ACC’s): These special crystals are considered automatons themselves, even though they have no physical working parts. This is because they still run on a specific ‘program’. The task being to act as a gateway to the Collective and, in most cases, interpret data stored in the target crystal. Contains Amira that has been programmed to complete a specific task.
  • it allows for one to bypass one’s own natural channel and prevent its overuse, allowing for a longer life.
  • Allow those without channeling abilities to access the Collective by acting as an artificial channel. (i.e. Reader Crystals)
  • Can allow for different channeling abilities, depending on the programming of the crystal.
    • More powerful programs can allow for more difficult channeling abilities, such as specialized channeling
  • Automatons: Can be used to give function to a limbed automaton via task programming.


Data Storage: can be used to permanently store information found in various states of Amira, such as memories, physical attributes, environmental data, or 
  • Codex (Plural=Codices): Storage of books and texts permanently into facets of crystalline structure via focused light. Read either by using projection or seen directly in the mind via Reader Crystals.
  • ADC’s (Amira Data Crystals): Storage and retrieval of memories via an embedded Reader crystal. (Reader converts Amira in spinal fluid into data, and transfers the data to the ADC)
​
Multi-program crystals- (self-running, do not require a channeler to use data: Cut into even parts and each part programmed with something different, and then recombined and secured.)
  • Solar/ Energy Crystals: Storage of energy as data. Data transferred into another part of the crystal with a specialty ACC program designed to manifest data as it would have originally existed. It is more of a playback of daylight than the emission of its own light.



Story Concepts: A Little Mureian History
​The Mureian civilization (pronounced moohr-EY-ahn) is tens of thousands of years old. So old, in fact, that their calendar includes six Eras of 500 to 4000 years each. New Eras begin at major turning points in history, such as social revolutions or major catastrophes.
  • The year is written as [# of era]E [# of years since the beginning of that era], for example 4E 376 would mean 376 years into the 4th Era.
 
​The dawn to the 5th Era (5E) came at the end of a 100-year war which crippled the world's capitalistic economy enough for societies to find it necessary to move to a new type of economy. The 5th Era was the birth of resource-based societies and a boom in human ingenuity, technology and enlightenment. The warring countries of Erocoss decided to work together and join as a union of Provinces for the betterment of all; all still individual, but of one nation.

​The Province of Soh'beq (so-BECK) was the original home of the Mureian people. 
​Even though they’ve long since expanded beyond the boundaries of the city of Mureia, they have adopted the name of their original city as their heritage and culture. 

Extra Information:
​

University of Rue:
 The center of learning and study in Erocoss. It is ageless and no one can remember when it was originally built, since records of that time was destroyed thousands of years ago in a fire.



↓ ↓ ↓---This way to the journal---↓ ↓ ↓

4th Entry: 'Tod'

5/8/2017

0 Comments

 
Researcher Annotations:
Isn't it still slavery of some sort if it is a living, humanoid creature? Perhaps their society was just that different from ours. Really, though, are they that far off from humans? On a personal note, it is slightly unnerving that these people had brainless, humanoid creatures as servants and they didn't think twice about it.

Profit-oriented society: Did they not have any need for a monetary system? I tried to ask my source about this, but I was only met with a smile. 
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Traveling through the many tunnels and passes on the road west from our advanced city, the spring snow still clings to the mountainsides and makes me somewhat nervous. There are homes and terraced farmlands covering the lower mountainsides, either dug from the stone of the mountain or made out of blocks of native and imported stone. Many of the homes are painted bright colors around their windows and doorways. Ladders and ropes link levels of homes together. Yet, with all of these homes, many of them are abandoned. The people all have Readers embedded in their skin, just like in Mureia, and one or two automatons help serve the village. What surprised me, however, is the appearance of the automaton they call ‘Tod.’

The automaton is made from the retired organic material from 60 years ago, rather than plated orichalcum. I see why the organic ones are so rare to find… It is difficult to discern how to behave, although Somin seems to be fond of the thing. It’s not human (it barely looks human) and still runs on the basic task-programmed Amira as every other limbed automaton. Nonetheless, because it has had an actual lifespan… I hate to say it, but it is almost like I’m being served by a monster. It makes me uncomfortable, so I can see why they retired such a creature… I suppose it is better than to have mechanical automatons doing work than automatons with the bodies similar to people. By the Hand, the simple thought of it is repulsive! The notion of returning to human slave labor is equivalent to setting the clock of our society back to the middle of the 3rd era, over 7,000 years ago! To think we actually had slaves back then, the barbarity! Everything about back then is barbaric. Even only about 2,500 years ago were we able to pull ourselves from the equally barbaric profit-oriented society, and into the enlightened, resource-based society we live in today. Even the religions of the past were a joke. Despite all the lessons learned in the academies and in Primary, I still can barely grasp the notion of so many people blindly following some dogma without questioning it.
Ah, but it seems I have digressed to some pointless history lesson to empty my troubled mind. Somin seems to enjoy ‘Tod’s’ company and climbs on his large, inhuman shoulders. He does not seem to understand that ‘Tod’ is just another automaton when I tried to explain it to him. It must be nice to be a child again.
 
Somin drew a picture of ‘ Tod ’ before we left the village, and asked that I put it in the journal to keep it safe for him.
~V
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