China DOS Union

World setting: This is a world called "Keken." According to ancient tradition, it has already passed through the periods of the Three Sovereigns: "Heaven, Earth, and Man." In the time of the Heavenly Sovereign, (whether this Heavenly Sovereign really existed is impossible to verify. Perhaps it was only a name later historians assumed in order to divide out a period) people lived for eighteen thousand years. At that time, flowers and fine fruits covered the land, ready to be picked and eaten. The climate was mild, people's hearts were pure and kind, and birds, beasts, fish, and insects lived together with mankind. Things were beautiful and abundant. No one suffered illness or all those vexations. The people's intelligence had not yet opened. The qi of Heaven was at its purest. History calls it the "Golden Age." After who knows how long in this period, little by little there arose this thing called "power." Humanity began to think itself the master of the world. There came the desire to rule, and distinctions of high and low. So Heaven punished them, reducing human lifespan to nine thousand years. This was mankind's "Silver Age." At that time, they chose a man of high virtue and great prestige to be leader of the lands in all ten directions. History calls him the "Earthly Sovereign." Thus it went for one hundred and eight thousand years. Then disorder appeared in the world. Once this thing called power existed, there was struggle for it. From struggle many byproducts arose, such as cunning, conflict, and so on..... By this point the human heart had begun to go bad. Many species were destroyed in this period. Because the harmony among living things was gone, the climate also gradually began to change, and thus the four seasons came into being. Human lifespan also fell to four thousand five hundred years. (This was the result of the environment acting upon man.) At this time, a wise man rose above the rest of humanity and became their guide. History calls him the "Human Sovereign." History calls this the "Black Iron Age." Why "black iron"? Because this period made humanity feel for the first time a kind of "fear" like darkness. Once there were four seasons, there came blazing sun and hurricanes, floods and mountain collapses. Those delicious wild fruits once so easy to pick were no longer always to be found. Humanity's food chain was put to the test. After passing through a fairly long half-starving period, one day, under the inspiration of a wise man, greedy humanity began attacking its former companions---"fish, insects, birds, and beasts." Thus mankind became the most omnivorous of creatures. While animal fattened human bellies, it also brought its side effects: disease began to appear. Many unknown strange illnesses began to plague humanity. Great masses of people began to die. It was at this time that mankind created a word: "plague"! This period also roughly lasted one hundred and eight thousand years. (Why such a similar number? Could it be... that in the unseen there truly is some kind of will? Or is humanity merely a toy of some being that possesses this will? Everything is unknowable!) The result was that the lifespans of those who survived in miserable fashion dropped sharply. Ordinary people had only about a hundred years to live, and with natural calamities and man-made disasters, anyone who truly lived to fifty or sixty was considered to have died well enough. The most common thing in this period was war. War originally began because of food scarcity. It was war between men and beasts. But excessive hunting reduced the number of birds and beasts, and the lack of resources caused war to arise among humans themselves. Later leaders discovered that killing people was easier than killing beasts, and more enjoyable. The reason it was enjoyable was that they could, in the most grandly proper fashion, seize for themselves the women, property, and produce of those they killed, without having to endure the nagging of tribal elders. And so humanity delighted in it without end.

Continental setting: This world has two great continents, "Darou" and "Taiding." Since the main line of the story we are telling takes place in "Darou," for now I will only talk about the geography of "Darou." In "Darou" there was a remarkable man. It is said his name was "Feng." His footprints crossed the lands between five waters and seven mountains, and it is even said that to this day he still drifts by boat beyond the "Great Tang." Vaguely he resembles the "travelers" of today. He "wrote" (it was only passed on by word of mouth) a strange book that recorded in full the mountains, rivers, geography, products, spirits, and marvels, and strange tales. It was named so because the continent has more water than land. This world has two moons, rising and setting together, following each other like shadow and form. They are called: Elder Moon and Second Moon.
The book records: within Darou there are the five main waterways, Yuan River, Salt River, Li River, Feng River, and Ruo River; beyond them lies the Great Tang (that is, the great ocean). There are also the seven great mountains: Lin Mountain, Wei Mountain, Gu Mountain, Ji Mountain, Lu Mountain, Wu Mountain, and She Mountain. There are the six great settlements: Xiong, Miaodi, Fanghe, Queteng, Jiuqi, and Yanlong. (At that time there were not yet cities; people lived by following the waters. Places that were relatively rich and had many people were called settlements.) Living on Darou were eleven great tribes. Their leaders were called "Di." The one with the greatest prestige was the central Di, called "Lie." Lie's tribe was in Fanghe. The name of the tribe was "Queteng," and it took the ancient divine bird "Qizhong" as its totem. It is said that Lie himself was a gigantic "Qizhong" (a three-legged bird, able to control the essence of yellow earth and use the divine power of earth).
As mentioned earlier, because humanity had lost its natural instincts and stood on the edge of hunger, and because the products of nature were ultimately limited, the ancestor of the "Queteng" tribe observed the habits of birds and saw that after eating wild fruit, some birds buried the seeds in the soil, and the seeds grew again into trees. Greatly inspired, he invented "planting," allowing mankind to pass from fishing and hunting to farming. Through the choices and elimination of several generations, the seven main crops of present cultivation were established---( ) Lie gave them the collective name "Seven Grains."
And in the course of thousands of years in which Lie's clan dealt with plants, they also discovered the healing value of many plants. Humanity no longer relied solely on the true words of shamans and priests to cure illness. After all, the energy of the shamans and priests in any tribe was limited. Only a very few people could receive their treatment. So one can imagine the value of these medicinal plants. Lie's achievement was to sort out the painstaking work of the ancestors of many generations and teach it to the medical officers of other tribes. This teaching material was later called the "Classic of Hundred Herbs."


Worldview setting: The people of the age believed Heaven to be square and Earth to be round. Heaven, being square, is still; Earth, being round, moves. The qi of Heaven bears aloft, the qi of Earth generates. Its form is like a sparrow's egg, and there is the theory of the five qi of hardness and softness.
The Way of Heaven is still: it gives rise to the ten thousand things, yet does not nurture them. The Way of Earth is active: it nourishes and brings the ten thousand things to completion, yet does not possess them. Heaven and Earth, in their numinousness, blend hardness and softness and give birth to man. Man receives the two qi of hardness and softness, and so possesses tremendous latent potential. But alas, being born amid the five qi, and receiving them unevenly, his spirit and intelligence are obstructed. There were those who observed Heaven, Earth, and the ten thousand things and were transformed by them. Gradually hearing the utmost Way, they created a method of cultivation by which one may seize the creative powers of Heaven and Earth and return them to man. It was handed down in the world, with four branches: "principle, speech, strategy, and number." The Lie mentioned above—his clan, in the long years of healing and saving people, also discovered that there was a mysterious and wondrous connection between the qi of the human body and the field of Heaven and Earth. Thus they formed a complete theory of the human body, used in medicine. This part of the teaching was later called the "Inner Canon." Those who cultivated according to this were called "xingmin." Xingmin often possessed certain special abilities. The shamans and priests mentioned above were one type among them.

Types of life setting: Yao---Although this continent appears to be made of earth, mountains, rivers, and streams, in the eyes of the xingmin it is all made up of fields of differing attributes. The energy of these fields may be great or small. They sustain the things on their surfaces. Once the energy declines, those things collapse and decay. Among them are certain wandering fields which, over tens of millions of years beneath Heaven and Earth and the sun and moon, gradually developed spirit and some consciousness, becoming able to use those energies on their own. The xingmin call these yao.
Jing------These are alternative life forms evolved over hundreds or even thousands of years, when all things in the world (which themselves have fields) and the energies of other fields, for some reason, suddenly blend and are tempered together, gaining autonomous consciousness. They need not be living creatures; they can even be a stone. (Mr. Cao's Jia Baoyu should belong to this type.)
Gui-------Usually these are humans, though there are a few exceptions. After such beings die, through an accidental fit, most often by merging with certain fine wandering energies, they retain their own consciousness for a certain period without being extinguished. How long depends on the amount of energy they have merged with. This can also be attained through cultivation: that is, by merging with field-energy while still alive, so that after death one can endure forever without perishing. (This type is called a ghost immortal.)
Guai---------Certain strange and uncommon creatures, and in themselves they possess tremendous power. Some of those with autonomous consciousness are of the high type, and are often used as beasts controlled by the xingmin or as beast-bodies. (Di Lie's true form, Qizhong, is one of these.)
Mo-----------A realm attained among the xingmin by cultivating according to the laws of darkness; it has ten levels.
Xian----------A realm attained among the xingmin by cultivating according to the laws of light; this too has ten levels.
Wu----------This is a peculiar branch of the xingmin, and also the oldest xingmin. Their position in the tribe is of the utmost importance, and they receive the greatest respect from the Di and the people. Through a method called "speech," they control the greatest energies between Heaven and Earth. The calendar and medical treatment are in their hands, and the history and knowledge of the tribe are all stored in their wise minds. Because of their cultivation, their lifespans are generally very long.

Major Events of the Moonless Era

Year 109 of Emperor Lie: Diyu, who controlled the power of wind in the southeast (a superb savage beauty, y'know), and Di Ji of the northeast, who controlled the power of the mountains, fought a great battle. In a fit of rage they damaged Bamu, said to be the ladder to Heaven. Thus Heaven and Earth were cut off, the four supports split apart, and sun and moon went off their courses. Elder Moon thereby vanished without a trace. Only a solitary Second Moon remained, patrolling the sky each night. After this the continent entered an age of chaos, known in history as the "Moonless Era." Emperor Lie arrived in time to support the divine tree, sealed Diyu, and transformed himself into a high platform called "The Platform of Emperor Lie."
Spring of the following year. A young girl named Xi wandered east of the Imperial Platform and bathed in the Marsh of Fog Spirits. She saw a strange bird in flight, mistakenly ate a fallen egg, and thus became pregnant. This was the first year of the Moonless Era.
Moonless Era year 4, a great flood broke out.
Moonless Era year 7, third year of the great flood, the three great tribes of the Fanghe settlement held a sacrifice. Xi, of the Tong clan, pregnant for seven years without giving birth, was regarded as a demonic and inauspicious being and taken as a sacrifice. At the sacrifice Xi gave birth to the twins Haijun and Ji. Haijun was born first, and the tribesmen abandoned him in the wild. Ji remained in his mother's womb and was taken away when the leader of the demons, Xingkou, cut open his mother's belly. Junhai in the wild was adopted by a female winged leopard. Moonless Era year 8, Fan was formally named leader of the common people in controlling the flood.
Moonless Era year 10, Junhai met his first teacher, the Great Shaman Peng.
Moonless Era year 12, after Fan's wife Zi gave birth to him a daughter, she turned into a tree. Fan named the girl "She'er."
Moonless Era year 14, Ji fell into the Prison Abyss of the demon domain. He fused with the wounded true body of Xiang Gun, the greatest evil beast of the great flood (nine heads with a serpent body).
Moonless Era year 18, the Great Shaman Peng died at the age of 891. Junhai first began to reflect on the impermanence of life.
Moonless Era year 19. The great flood ended. Fan, the leader in flood control, was honored by the people as Hongfan and became the new central Di. During the flood control Fan had once obtained a marvelous mathematical book from the belly of a divine fish in the Yuan River, and named it the "Yuan Diagram." According to the numbers of the Yuan Diagram, he established a capital city and four cities with eight supporting regions. Thus there was a state. (And so the state came into being.) Seven bells were cast and placed separately on the seven mountains—Lin Mountain, Wei Mountain, Gu Mountain, Ji Mountain, Lu Mountain, Wu Mountain, and She Mountain—to distinguish their landscapes and products. The following year, prayers were offered to Heaven at the Platform of Emperor Lie, and the state name was fixed as "Daqi."
Moonless Era year 20, which was also the first year of Daqi, She'er was 8 years old. The people requested that she be given the title "Imperial Daughter" and her name changed to "Se."
In the ninth month of the same year, Qi Se happened to meet Junhai and Ji.
Moonless Era year 23. In the fifth year of Junhai's wandering, an accident led him into Diyu's seal.

This chronology isn't finished yet. I'm posting it for everyone to have a look. Give me some opinions..

Continue.

Give me some opinions first!

? If nobody praises you a little, you won't let us read it?

In such a mysterious world, there are bound to be many moving stories. It's very attractive. At least I really want to read what comes next.
To think you could come up with a Moonless Era like this, master, I admire you.

I want opinions. Not this.............

Suggestion one: Strange is fine, twists are fine, just don't make it too tragic.
****Two: More characters is fine too, but it'd be best not to exceed Water Margin and Dream of the Red Chamber. My head can't hold that many.
****Three: Let me keep reading first before asking for opinions, okay?

I've no idea how many times I read it before I finally managed to connect all those threads. This chronology is clearly just bait. What kind of opinions are you looking for, master? If there are too many opinions, won't that affect how the later story develops? My brain isn't very sharp, so I'll just wait until the work is finished and enjoy it then.