Gideon Ninth/Locked Tomb: Ancient history
Mar. 18th, 2024 09:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jackThe actual plot is really really cool but impossible to understand at first. I got sucked into trying to summarise the most important or cool points as they happened rather than as they were told in obscure hints and flashbacks. Part one of um several.
Earth is succumbing to climate disaster. Some people have settled on other planets in the solar system? Eccentric australian John discovers necromancy and collects various friends and disciples, and thinks he can save the planet. Major governments instigate a plan to get some people (but kind of themselves) off planet to perpetuate the human race. John thinks they're abandoning Earth and the majority of people.
A nuclear war happens, nudged along by John, killing almost everyone on the planet. This gives a giant burst of one-off-death-energy thanergy which makes him incredibly powerful. He tries to stop the ships but can't. He kills the rest of the solar system one sun/planet at a time to get the energy to try to hold back the ships. He resurrects the solar system one sun/planet at a time.
He tries to absorb the earth's spirit but it's too much, and puts the majority into a body he constructed, Alecto. He is very fond of her but they have a complicated relationship. She is kind of mad but we don't know what proportion of that is "unable to function safely" mad and what proportion is "doesn't do what a powerful man thinks you should want" mad. The killed-and-resurrected spirit of earth may be similar to the revanants created by killing the other planets which became resurrection beasts?
John discovers perfect lyctorhood, swapping eyes with Alecto, giving them both unbounded immortality and giving him immense necromantic powers with an indefinite power source.
John goes on to resurrect many people of the solar system. Some he keeps on ice. Some are his friends. Most people don't know what happened, only that there was some disaster and John saved everyone from it.
John can give his followers immortality and necromancy so they can help resurrect people, but the powers are dependent on him. John doesn't want them to discover true lyctorhood like he did, but permits/wants them to explore lyctorhood. They discover a version which involves the cavalier's body and soul dying. We don't know exactly, but John probably wanted to hide that his powers depended on Alecto who could be his weak point. Or hide that he wasn't just naturally the best necromancer but needed to have absorbed that power source. Or hide that he killed the earth and the other planets. Or hide that he turned the earth into a weird perfect companion. Or didn't want a rival for his power, or to risk someone too powerful destroying things again (although I'm not sure if true lyctorhood would have made them more powerful if their cavalier was a human not a planet).
Children born on the resurrected planets can be necromancers. Over several centuries, the houses become firmly established with traditions of necromancers and cavaliers.
The lyctors prevail on John to kill Alecto because she's too unstable. Although I can't remember if she had any powers herself, if not, I don't know why it was an issue. He says he has, and her body is sent to be buried in Pluto, but instead he inters her without killing her because he can't kill her without killing himself or the source of his power. John sent Anastasia, who came closest to true resurrection, to inter her, but she set up the ninth house instead of burying and forgetting the body. Not known why John let that happen, if he cared too much about Alecto or Anastasia to prevent it?
John and the lyctors discover the resurrection beasts, the revenants from the killed planets exist and are now too big to easily deal with. They decamp somewhere across the universe. John hasn't told the whole story yet.
The empire spreads out from the solar system with lyctor-created FTL widgets. It conquers other human-settled worlds with necromancers and cohort troops. Invading living planets isn't trivial, if you're not on a dying or resurrected planet you need stuff to die to fuel necromancy. They kill and resurrect the planets to make necromancy work freely on those worlds. But this is self-limiting and they need to conquer ever-more non-dying worlds to keep up?
There's a whole culture of affable military and administrative aristocrats, plus some houses who have less conquering and more necromancy stuff, who are all contributing to this wasteful conquest. There is an ongoing resistance movement spread across non-empire planets called blood of eden.
John especially, but also the lyctors, and somewhat the houses, resent everyone outside the empire for being the descendents of people who destroyed and abandoned the Earth. Everyone else resents the empire for destroying the earth and for invading everyone and for being creepy necromancers who kill everything.
While they nudge the empire along, John and the lyctors also run around the universe having immortal emotional drama, having affairs with each other, building up resentments about each other, and playing at being heroes who slay resurrection beasts. This would all make a great book but it's implied by the snippets of it we get.
I tried to stick with what was fairly clearly implied but I've probably remembered a few points completely wrongly, do check me on anything which doesn't sound right.
Earth is succumbing to climate disaster. Some people have settled on other planets in the solar system? Eccentric australian John discovers necromancy and collects various friends and disciples, and thinks he can save the planet. Major governments instigate a plan to get some people (but kind of themselves) off planet to perpetuate the human race. John thinks they're abandoning Earth and the majority of people.
A nuclear war happens, nudged along by John, killing almost everyone on the planet. This gives a giant burst of one-off-death-energy thanergy which makes him incredibly powerful. He tries to stop the ships but can't. He kills the rest of the solar system one sun/planet at a time to get the energy to try to hold back the ships. He resurrects the solar system one sun/planet at a time.
He tries to absorb the earth's spirit but it's too much, and puts the majority into a body he constructed, Alecto. He is very fond of her but they have a complicated relationship. She is kind of mad but we don't know what proportion of that is "unable to function safely" mad and what proportion is "doesn't do what a powerful man thinks you should want" mad. The killed-and-resurrected spirit of earth may be similar to the revanants created by killing the other planets which became resurrection beasts?
John discovers perfect lyctorhood, swapping eyes with Alecto, giving them both unbounded immortality and giving him immense necromantic powers with an indefinite power source.
John goes on to resurrect many people of the solar system. Some he keeps on ice. Some are his friends. Most people don't know what happened, only that there was some disaster and John saved everyone from it.
John can give his followers immortality and necromancy so they can help resurrect people, but the powers are dependent on him. John doesn't want them to discover true lyctorhood like he did, but permits/wants them to explore lyctorhood. They discover a version which involves the cavalier's body and soul dying. We don't know exactly, but John probably wanted to hide that his powers depended on Alecto who could be his weak point. Or hide that he wasn't just naturally the best necromancer but needed to have absorbed that power source. Or hide that he killed the earth and the other planets. Or hide that he turned the earth into a weird perfect companion. Or didn't want a rival for his power, or to risk someone too powerful destroying things again (although I'm not sure if true lyctorhood would have made them more powerful if their cavalier was a human not a planet).
Children born on the resurrected planets can be necromancers. Over several centuries, the houses become firmly established with traditions of necromancers and cavaliers.
The lyctors prevail on John to kill Alecto because she's too unstable. Although I can't remember if she had any powers herself, if not, I don't know why it was an issue. He says he has, and her body is sent to be buried in Pluto, but instead he inters her without killing her because he can't kill her without killing himself or the source of his power. John sent Anastasia, who came closest to true resurrection, to inter her, but she set up the ninth house instead of burying and forgetting the body. Not known why John let that happen, if he cared too much about Alecto or Anastasia to prevent it?
John and the lyctors discover the resurrection beasts, the revenants from the killed planets exist and are now too big to easily deal with. They decamp somewhere across the universe. John hasn't told the whole story yet.
The empire spreads out from the solar system with lyctor-created FTL widgets. It conquers other human-settled worlds with necromancers and cohort troops. Invading living planets isn't trivial, if you're not on a dying or resurrected planet you need stuff to die to fuel necromancy. They kill and resurrect the planets to make necromancy work freely on those worlds. But this is self-limiting and they need to conquer ever-more non-dying worlds to keep up?
There's a whole culture of affable military and administrative aristocrats, plus some houses who have less conquering and more necromancy stuff, who are all contributing to this wasteful conquest. There is an ongoing resistance movement spread across non-empire planets called blood of eden.
John especially, but also the lyctors, and somewhat the houses, resent everyone outside the empire for being the descendents of people who destroyed and abandoned the Earth. Everyone else resents the empire for destroying the earth and for invading everyone and for being creepy necromancers who kill everything.
While they nudge the empire along, John and the lyctors also run around the universe having immortal emotional drama, having affairs with each other, building up resentments about each other, and playing at being heroes who slay resurrection beasts. This would all make a great book but it's implied by the snippets of it we get.
I tried to stick with what was fairly clearly implied but I've probably remembered a few points completely wrongly, do check me on anything which doesn't sound right.
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Date: 2024-03-19 10:11 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-03-19 10:58 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-03-19 11:16 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-03-19 06:23 pm (UTC)Directly initiated by John, and a lot of the deaths are him remotely killing people before the nukes reached them. Moreover he was that powerful before eating Earth/Alecto, which AFAICT puts even his base state way ahead of any other (non-lyctorized) necromancer we've encountered.