Latest revision as of 17:25, 8 November 2015

The Shinma

Of the Before

In the ur-time Before, there was absolute Nothingness. No matter, no space, and no time. Nothing. Truly, it is impossible to imagine, because we, as mortals, have never known an existence without these basic things. Perhaps we could imagine a world without substance. The void of space perhaps? Nothing there, right? Wrong. The void of space is empty, but it is not Nothing. With a void, there is the possibility of being filled and there is time for this to happen in. Nothingness does not even allow for those hopes. Nothing will remain Nothing for all of its non-existent eternity.

Now consider that Nothing is, in fact, a Something. By its very non-existence, it defines its opposite. And Something is greater than Nothing. This is the dichotomy between Shinma and Primordial.

The Shinma do not, technically, predate the Primordials. Before the Primordials sprang into being, there was no time. Nothingness, remember? But once Nothingness had defined Somethingness, that Somethingness needed a Where and a When to Be in. At the instant the Primordials were birthed, time and space were similarly born. There was one Primordial then: its name is lost, but it embodied Existence. Its twin was the Shinma that savants name Nirguna, and Nirguna defined its sibling. This was the Wyld. Existence was whole, constantly changing and without change.

As time passed and the Wyld roiled its in immutably mutable stasis, things appeared. These things were concepts too great to be reassimilated, so they continued to grow, adding on substance with each random fluctuation of space that produced things similar to them. These are the other Primordials, Existence's children-siblings. As these aggregations of event and consequence slowly built themselves, their Shinma twins similarly built themselves. Thus did the other Shinma come to be.

Of the Shape of the World

Imagine all matter and space and time as a gleaming bauble sitting on a black velvet cloth. The outmost line, encompassing everything, is Nirguna. The black velvet is primordial Nothingness. Nirguna, as the definition of existence, holds back the Nothingness, allowing Somethingness to prosper. If we look closer at the bauble, we see that it has other facets, other boundaries within itself. These are the lesser Shinma, and they are incomplete. In the spaces between Nirguna's outmost line and theirs, we see cloudy, imprecise matter. This is the Wyld. The gem's center, defined and beautiful, is Creation. It lies within the boundaries of all the Shinma, from whom it derives its order. The Shinma are the boundaries. The Primordials are everything else, or were.

Of Those Things

What are the Aspects? Some, often the most concrete and easily-understandable to mortal perceptions, were once Raksha. Using the Charm Extinction of Desire, these Fair Ones delivered themselves bodily into the non-existent hands of one of the Shinma, ensuring their own immortality and gaining a protection against the inevitable end of the world. How they did this is beyond the knowledge of all but the most puissant of the demons beyond the world.

Other Aspects are embryonic Primordials, birthed from a Shinma's emptiness and embodying some new concept or permutation of an existing concept. These creatures flail blindly and writhe in the amniotic fluid that yet surrounds them, from the perspective of one of the Yozis or Malfeans, still clutching tight to the non-entity that created them and cradling, within themselves, the stirrings of a new Shinma, their twin.

Aspects are also, more rarely, true aspects of a Shinma. They are facets of its personality, if it can be said to have such a thing, and aid in its definition of self and the world. They are the things which the Shinma is not, thus making the Shinma's non-existence mean something. After all, one's non-violence is made all the more significant when one is surrounded by the finest weapons in the world, just as one's abstinence and virtue is glorified by the banquet of vice laid out in one's own honor.

The Things Themselves

The Shinma, in their own context, are impossible for mortals to comprehend. They are passive principles of the world, less personable even than the dead Malfeans. They have never been alive. They have never known the sting and caress of existence, like their Primordial twins have. They are isn'ts.

Each Shinma is only known by the tales and songs of infant raksha, which they mindlessly sing and chant for that eternal moment when they shake off the amniotic fluid of non-being and shape their desires and will into something coherent, by Wyld standards. Then they forget and move on.

Nirakara, Shape

Once there was a god
She was beautiful beyond compare
Everyone wanted her
No one could have her
She went to a party
And gave everyone a new face
Her twin was not there
And did not notice

Nirguna, Existence

Once there was a god.
I AM WHAT IS
Said she.
Her twin
Wasn't

Dharma, Dissolution

Once there was a god
She knew nothing of the world
And inflicted her terrible wrath at whim
Suffering and torment and ignorance followed in her wake
She supped on sin and the loss of self
Her twin was not there
And did not partake

Nirvishesha, Identity

Once there was a god
She knew everything that was in her heart
She knew what she wanted
She knew where she was going
And she knew, above all things,
That she WAS
Her twin was not there
And did not know

Nirvikalpa, Communication

Once there was a god
She walked among the people
And loved them
Or hated them, depending
On who they were and what they wanted
She talked to them all
And they chattered in return
Her twin was not there
And did not speak

Nishkriya, Conflict

Once there was a god
She cut open her boy
And bathed in his blood
And skipped rope with his guts
Later, she went to war
And did some things that ought not be mentioned
She died on a demon's sword
Her twin was not there
And did not fight back

Comments, please

Hmm. I tend to view the shinma, myself as being.. Okay. A shinma is a boundary without form, exactly as you have said: THe primordials, then, are those shinma who redefined themselves, creating somethign - creation - in order to change themselves from boundaries, into archetypes. To give themselves definition: as opposed to being 'that which is not', they created something to be 'that which IS'.

Molikai

I don't know. I don't really like the idea of Primordials being neo-Shinma. They're opposites; the Shinma came first, defined things, and the Primordials were born from those definitions. It's Yin and Yang. The Shinma, and by inference the raksha, are, ultimately, passive. They are "that which is not." The Primordials, on the other hand, are active, along with their Creation. They are "that which is," as you said. And after all, how could a Shinma redefine itself? -- OhJames

You might have noticed that that's exactly what the aspects of the shinma are, if you look up their names, and read the description of Ishiika. I have my thoughts here. -Xeriar

I have looked up their names, and I'm confusing myself. Because it seems to me now that the Aspects of a Shinma shouldn't just be smaller Shinma. However, neither should they be mini-Primordials. Let's take Ishiika as an example. What does it define? It should define some aspect of conflict, which would mean it couldn't be violent. But it is. In fact, all of Nishkriya's aspects are violent and full of conflict. Therefore, if they were definitions, they would define aspects of peace, not conflict. And if they did this, why would they be aspects of Nishkriya? This leads me to believe that the aspects aren't definitions, but some form of embodiment. Maybe they are unavoidable side-effects of great, non-existent boundaries. Maybe they're just unshaped drunk on their own insane power and completely given over to their chosen Shinma. But somehow, these possibilities don't satisfy me. I'll need to think more. -- OhJames

Oh! What if they're really powerful raksha who used the Extinction of Desire Charm, then somehow delivered their hearts into the hands of a Shinma? That could lead to some interesting possibilities... [Note: This would make all the aspects of a Shinma Wyld Artifacts, just like Ishiika] -- OhJames

Well, Ishiika means 'senses'. It doesn't seem like it's either blind or all-sensing. Regardless, they definitely seem like a step between Shinma and Primordials. -Xeriar

I've been considering this for a while - why would Nishkriya, by definition the precise absence of action/violence, need weapons? It occurs to me that you can't be blind if you don't have eyes - Nishkriya has the greatest of all weapons because it needs the finest tools to NOT use, in the same way that, for example, one can't create an ascetic ideology without creating a body of 'unsuitable deeds' - without 'what can't be used', there can't be a meaningful absence of use. ~ BerserkSeraph Late night thought

This, then, helps us comprehend the other Aspects. Drawing on your inference, we can surmise that Dharma's Aspects would be corrupted corrupters, Nirvishesha's Aspects would be self-assured identities, and Nirvikalpa's Aspects would be suave communicators. I don't know. Something to think about. -- OhJames

Incidentally, Ishiika's bigger than Creation. If made manifest, it essentially fills all available space with its image, its hideous noise, its horrific pain, its acrid scent... the senses of all Creation would BECOME Ishiika, because Ishiika is all that they could process (Very briefly, before they were flayed to nothing).

No... I think when something enters Creation it gets redefined, and does so again if it takes shape. Bringing Ishiika into Creation and forcing it to take shape there would have changed it. Perhaps, to not be Ishiika anymore. IMO, he would become a Primordial. -Xeriar

In case no one has noticed, I absolutely adore Rebecca Borgstrom. -- OhJames

Nirguna's sutra is really cute. - willows

That means a lot, coming from you. I love just about all your wiki-stuff. -- OhJames

::blush::Thanks, man. I've been enjoying this page for a while now; I really like the list of aspects. When are you going to flesh out the subpages? - willows

Oog... when I find the time / inspiration to do so. I've got ideas for a couple, but they aren't... concrete yet. -- OhJames