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rueyeet β Basic Shadowlore
Published: 2010-01-03 19:12:11 +0000 UTC; Views: 1290; Favourites: 17; Downloads: 34
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Description
A quick explanation of the #Zelda-OC-Club 's shadowkin and the Zalmunna. Intended to condense the basics down to a single page.(alternative title: Shadows, The Executive Summary
)I borrowed this page from Allister's journal, so keep in mind that this contains only common knowledge or a little more. Pardon the Hylian in the background; the translation spell leaves traces like that.
Please fullview to read.
For lots more detail than you probably EVER wanted to know about all this, you can go read my own field notes. Only true specialists or the shadows themselves would have knowledge this extensive, and some of it might be outdated/not vetted:
Shadow Field Notes 1 : Power and standing among shadows
Shadow Field Notes 2 : The Zalmunna and their servants
Shadow Field Notes 3 : Markings (the glowy bits)
Shadow Field Notes 4 : Lycoris and the Bridge
Shadow Field Notes 5 : Physical nature of the shadows
Shadow Field Notes 6 : Life and times of a shadow
Credits:
This version of Majora belongs to *Lock-of-Hyrule
Abyss belongs to =pettyartist
The other five Zalmunna belong to =Asraniel
The Siderans (the seven Spirits of Light) belong to ~tessy-chan
Parchment texture [link] by ~Teeth-Man
Page font Aldorath Serif by *TheGeef
Allister's notes in Something Olde by ~davymeykens
and also Hylian Modern by =pettyartist
Hyrule and its creation myth (c) Nintendo
General geekery ALL MINE.
Related content
Comments: 47
I've been having so much fun going through these old concepts. Β this is just delightful Rue, I'm so glad you captured it all so wonderfully!
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Shit, disregard my comment. Realized the WW poes have red and blue eyes. *facepalm*
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And well, the Poes in any of the games are undead spirits, and not shadow-kind.
Think of the ZOCC's shadows as being like the opposite of the light spirits in Twilight Princess -- living things whose physical form is basically made of shadow-stuff. "Organic" shadows if you will.
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So I don't have to worry about the Shadowkin 
Hmmmm... perhaps I can pester you with something else then. The idea is that the character is a poe spirit that became powerful enough to be bound to a mask. I like the idea of the Shadowkin consuming other individuals to gain power. Would poes gain power in a similar way? Though not necessarily through consuming their shadow, but maybe their "poe" (soul) itself? Perhaps shortly after killing a victim they eat their "poe" and gain strength.
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Well, now, that'd depend on one's theories about Poes. The club more or less communally invented the shadowkin, and I'm sorta one of the primary folks to ask about that, but the club has no official stance on how Poes should be done.
With that said, here's my own personal two cents (which, in case you haven't noticed, is usually more like twenty-five):
I think it might've been OoT that mentioned something about Poes being spirits of "concentrated anger/misery". Basically that if the deceased had enough negativity in them, that it could sort of take on its own life and go roaming as an evil ghost. This may or may not be a reference to the Chinese concept of one of the parts of a person's soul (or one of multiple souls) being the "Po" soul; I think it was the part that bound them to the baser earthly things, or something? I forget. Google it if you're curious.
But anyway, that basic Zelda idea of something collecting enough ick to become monstrous. Shows up in the game Okami, too. I think it's probably a Shinto concept, at its roots.
Other club members have different takes on this -- some have Poes that were made of sadness, others' Poes are just spirits that sorta kept on keepin' on after they died, etc. Mileage totally varies, here.
But. Since you asked, this is how I'd do it.
In a scenario where a Poe was made when someone died with so much anger/regret/pain/grief/etc that this part of them went a-haunting...well. It would seem to me that such a spirit might gain power by collecting that sort of thing from others. Not their soul, per se, at least not in the common Western usage; but just those darker and potentially corrupting bits of it.
Yin needs yang, though; so instead of this freeing the victim from those things, making them all positive and happy and whatnot, it drains them, makes them incomplete. In the short term, the victim could probably recover well enough, given the ups and downs of normal life to balance them back out.
In the long-term, though, if such "draining" continued, the victim would be likely to become ill, physically and/or mentally, and eventually waste away or go insane or what have you, and die. Possibly becoming Poes themselves, and starting the cycle over (or worse, become what was called in the folklore a "hungry ghost". -shiver-)
I would definitely imagine that a Poe that hit upon this method of increasing its power would get to a point where it would need to be dealt with, and a mask would be a tried-and-true Zelda-esque way of doing that.
All of this is just how I'd do/look at this sort of thing. Feel free to take any of that and run with it, or do something else completely.
However, and this is the "big IF" part:
You'll have to make sure that even though the character was horrifyingly awful and powerful enough to need to be sealed away, that they aren't over-powered and can still be used constructively in an RP session. That will be the tricky part. If your Poe is just looking for lunch, as it were, than there's no real reason for them to be hanging around the other characters that doesn't get ugly really fast.
If you can do all that, you ought to end up with one hell of a character, no pun intended.
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Oh but the pun was totally appreciated XD.
Hmmmm... going on the whole emotion-feeding idea, perhaps the spirit in its stronger days tried to create as much chaos as it could without being identified as the source (he is eventually caught, but of course he wants to keep the fun going as long as he can.) Causing all this chaos, maybe he feeds on the negative energy (anger, sadness, fear, greed, etc.). At first he just targeted individuals that were already "dark", per se (spelling?). But over time, he himself grew to want more and more. Thus where the chaos begins. Of course, eventually the people figure out that there is some evil force behind all this and seal the poe away. As to how the poe spirit returns, I'll work that out.
Abilities. *sighs* I am slightly concerned about going god-mode. That's the last thing I want to do. So... what if I could find a way to give him purpose NOT revolving around pure chaos? Say, collecting poes? Like the poe collector from OoT. Poes are filled with anger and rage themselves, so logically, wouldn't that be the perfect source of energy for someone like him? Maybe he doesn't CONSUME the poes themselves, but all the emotion they hold. Would that mean the poes would be left behind empty, or would they pass on to... well, wherever they go after?
I partially propose the whole poe collecting thing in order to tie in with another FC I submitted here, Karth. He's supposed to be an alchemist of sorts, mixing potions, etc. He's the one that wears the mask; alchemist by day, Poe Fiend by night (though he has no memories of what actually happens during the night, he is very aware of what happens when he wears the mask.) He has a unique way of making some potions and poisons, creating elixirs that the potion-making field has never seen (I didn't go overboard there, I made sure to limit myself to items reasonable enough.) There is a secret ingredient he uses in those potions... I was thinking poe essences would be perfect. Something that has to be kept quiet from the public or the guard for fear of being sentenced to death or kicked out of the city. Something people wouldn't really like to know was in their potions. What do you think, thoughts, concerns, comments? I really don't want to push what we do or don't know about the Zelda universe too much, but at the same time I want to try and explore it more, have fun with it.
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I would guess that if Poes are made of negativity, then your spirit would likely been drawn instinctively to the "already-dark" folks you mention at first, and progressed from there to the idea that it could CAUSE such negative feelings in order to feed from yet more people. That's when it would have stepped outside the bounds of a normal Poe and become the Poe Fiend, and when people would have taken notice and sealed it away.
The idea that this is what's bound inside the mask Karth wears is where this becomes intriguing, and a great story opportunity, and also where you can impose the limits.
If I'm reading you right, Karth is aware of what's happening when he has the mask on, just doesn't remember after he takes it off? What if the Poe Fiend trapped in the mask is actually the one in charge when Karth has the mask on? Kind of like Majora influencing/controlling the Skull Kid in MM.
So your Poe Fiend, maybe, is trying to collect enough Poe Souls (which are, after all, a sellable commodity in the Zelda games, if a shady one) to gain enough power to break free of the mask and roam the world to wreak its havoc. Until then, though, the Poe Fiend is bound to the mask and its powers restricted, and so it needs to remain undetected.
So it's using Karth, making him forget and making him think he's collecting the Poe Souls for his potions; but in reality, he has to figure out a way to remember, resist, and stop the Poe Fiend from being loosed on the world once more.
You'd have a wonderful chance to RP this as almost a split-personality thing, where masked!Karth behaves juuuust a little -too- differently, and see if the other characters can figure it out; and you could play out Karth discovering what's going on and trying to come up with a way to defeat the Fiend.
...okay, I totally get carried away sometimes. I really should change my signature to, "Give me but a grain of sand, and I shall bullshit you a mountain."
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I didn't explain Karth's awareness levels right, sorry
No, frankly, you nailed all that to a T. I'm just not good with wording things XD. You typing all that has given me like a sort of excitement, if you will. It isn't just stupid and confusing, it's genuinely interesting to someone other than myself. Your long box of words is appreciated C:>.
Also: DO IT. Sounds pretty witty to me.
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EXCELLENT (on all counts).
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Probably annoying the shit out of you guys with all these comments, but here goes...
I based an OC off of mine partially off the WW Poe designs. The poes there have yellow, swirling eyes. If this is so, then would the poes of this alt. dimension perhaps be allied to Dimas? Or are they just following the Poe King... though he could have allegiance to Dimas if we're following the whole "servant's-servant" idea still.
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Comments are good! I like comments.
Answer to your question on the other comment, though.
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Ughhhhhh, I wanna know about this stuff so bad, but you have written soooooo much. *sighs, and saves every written zeldawhatnot in gallery*
...hrm, I wonder how long it'll take to read all this. *is a slow as crap reader*
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yeeeah, I got a little over-enthusiastic. 
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Eeeeeeee, I always love it when you post this stuff. It makes me happeh. 8D
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Well, but there's nothing new in here, really.
I assume Abyss' description meets with your approval, then. Bad rep your boy's got, doesn't he.
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Oh of course, after all, he's the worst shadow there is. -snort-
XD
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Yeah, I figure the common mortal perception of Abyss goes something like, "worst of a bad lot, thank the Goddesses he's sealed away for all eternity."
*restrains Dimas and his opinions on the subject*
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Ffffffff, Dimas. I can only imagine what he was going to say. XD
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You're posting more as of late.
This mythos is great. It's right at home in the Zelda universe, if you ask me. 
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Being back in the swing of the ZOCC is prodding me to get more done, I think.
Heh, you can see from all them other notes that I like this mythos ENTIRELY too much. And, if you remember Allister...these would be the shadows he's chasing, and the Zalmunna are what the Luxicari want to, ahem, "seal".
That's two votes for toning down the Hylian, then. My Mac's screen is lighter, so it throws me off sometimes as to how something's going to look on other screens. Good thing I did save the layers for the main text, but I'll have to redo the sidenotes I think.
BTW you can find that Hylian font here -- [link] -- it's based off of my "localization" of WW Hylian.
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Ooh, that's a custom font? 
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Hmm, looks like mtda did the same thing there that I did (make the katakana-based WW Hylian into an alphabet). Probably not the same way, though.
But yeah, I bullied it into being an alphabet instead of a syllabary, and Petty was nice enough to make it into a font for me.
I should grab the Twilight Princess Hylian font at some point.
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I wanted to see what you were up to...this is truly amazing...if not a little disturbing. *too early for deamons* I love the shadow Hylian...esp on the notes.
*hugs*
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OH MY she posts!!
Hee, this is what I was so late yesterday to finish. Just drawing the warrior guy and getting the two drawings scanned colored and noted took longer than I thought it would....
Shadows, though, are not properly demons; except perhaps in the sense that any malicious spirit can be labeled with the term.
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Yeah I know...
I'm going to be better about checking in on your stuff. I really enjoy to see your new creations.
At some point I'd love you to teach me that layering font trick...I'm thinking it would be neat to do some spell stuff with Theban.
*hugs and love*
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You'd need Photoshop, or some other graphics program capable of handling layers. Preferably Photoshop 'cause that's all I know.
I did find a Theban font here on dA, by the way.
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awesome!!
thanks a lot for using it!
it looks great!
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Awesome work, Rue. You might go back in and lessen the fill on the Hylian font a little bit so that it doesn't compete as hard with the English <3
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I already flattened the layers. O: Hopefully it's readable enough!
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It is *pets* 's why we save unflatteneds.
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I did for the main text, but not the scribbles. Ah well.
Also forgot to give YOU guys your credit for all this stuff. D'OH.
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:3 Is cool.
Hah, I don't care personally, dunno about the others, I'm just happy to see it up in sensible form. And honestly, you have the better overall picture a lot of the time than I do anyway.
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I am bad at raw creation, good at organizing information.
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I really like this! It makes it so much easier to understand!
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Good! that was what I was hoping for!
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Huh... This is quite interesting actually o.O
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My favorite part is, this all came from the contributions of at least five different people....I always like that sort of serendipitous, collaborative creation.
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i had to make up the Guardians in my fic mostly on my own X-x It was hard.
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Aaaaand I just realized that I utterly failed to credit ANY of those people. Ack.
There's a lot of room for expansion in the Zelda cosmology, especially that Nintendo's always throwing in "new" legends themselves.
I was so happy to see them actually make the one in Spirit Tracks perfectly logical and firmly pinned in the timeline, I can't even tell you.
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Heheh, you can always edit that in I suppose
Yeah, there really is. And here I was freaking out about my idea of introducing the Guardians in my fic... XD
I haven't actually played ST yet though.
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Hey, your story, you can do what you want as long as you can make it plausible!
I just put this up because the shadows turn up/are mentioned in club RPs a lot, and there were folks who were confused.
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Ah, I see... Hm, interesting... Unfortunately I'm not too much for Rping in groups like that XD I prefer just IM
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I have a really hard time keeping up, when there's lots of people. Can't read and type at the same time, and I type slower than the rest of 'em to boot.
But it's fun to try.
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XD I see, I see... As I said, I just prefer IM
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