From: Alex Ferguson (abf@cs.ucc.ie)
Date: Fri 14 Apr 2000 - 04:18:00 EEST
John Hughes:
> If we use the (literal) Gloranthan metaphor of
> psychological/spiritual/redemptive states as geographic locations on the
> Other Side, if you 'die' in said keel hauling you may emerge from the water
> in another, 'worse' hell, on another ship. There are many, many more-or-less
> unique hells.
I'm not sure which keel-hauling is the said one, so I may be missing
some important context, but broadly speaking I agree, if you die in
a particular way 'mundanely', you'll presumably end up in an
'appropriate' Hell (though according to Orlanthi belief, say, your
god will get to put in a good word first), and if you do (and have done
to you) the mythicly-same 'act' on some part of the God Plan, then
that certainly ought to have the same effect, though probably even
more directly. (None of this seven days inward mystic journey
namby-pamby stuff.)
> More generally, dying in hell will take you to another place. Its not so
> much death is terminal, but that death is *a* terminal.
More like a (general) node, if you ask me... Dying may just be
a 'stage' on your quest, especially by the sounds of some of this
funky deep-masochist Pelorian stuff...
> The Golden Age (a nice place to visit, though boring, lethargic and probably
> overrun by pokemon) has by definition no hell: if Humakt kills grandfather
> mortal there then grandad is suddenly somewhere else. Death is primarily
> separation, and a journey to somewhere else - these have always been deep
> threads in Genertelan mythology.
>
> (And Humakt/humakti HQer is suddenly in the Storm Age?
Definitely, definitively, decidedly. I was about to hit 'reply' to
your last paragraph to comment to that effect, but unusually my attention
span lasted out until after I scrolled down a page. There are probably
untold ways of getting from the Golden Age to the Storm Age, but at
least from an Orlanthi PoV this is pretty much the defining one.
(Well, that and the death of Yelm -- you wouldn't want everything to
be _too_ clear-cut, would you now?)
> There are different kinds of death: death of the body (separation), death of
> the spirit (non-existence of self), and death of the soul or souls (still
> largely unexplored, dependent on systematic exploration of concept of
> Gloranthan souls, but usually related to loss of will, volition or
> awareness). And death of all three - total annihilation.
I don't see any systematic differentiation between the latter two, other
than in the sense of having one cultural concept instead of/as a form
of the other. You mean souls in some poetic sense that loss of same
wouldn't physically kill one, but would instead leave one in some
sort of parlous moral or spiritual state? (Perhaps true of some of
the DH 'soul-parts', though this is not clear, and may (or may not)
have been denied by Greg...)
> I recall Greg meandering on some years ago now that beings were
> hunted/wounded/killed/skinned etc. before Death, its just that they didn't
> die: skins remained animated, dismembered bodies remained aware etc. This
> must still be the case in at least certain areas of the Other Side, or when
> certain (ritual or magical) boundary conditions are in effect. Harrek's
> skinned Bear God is perhaps one example. Thanatari magics are another.
From the casual nature of death and resurrection implied by trollball
For HQing purposes, it certainly poses a puzzler or two. If I go back
rules, I've often wondered if the pitches were little enclaves sacred
to Kargan Tor, and thus, 'Humakt-free zones'. In the modren mundane
world though, I don't think this really works simply be 'excluding
death' -- you have to subvert the normal process in some manner or
another, and pretty much stuff that unfortunate spirit back on it there,
etc...
to the Golden Age, and cut some fellah's head off, what happens? Am
I weilding Death, with consequences as above, or am I just having a
bit of harmless dismemberment fun? What is it that determines the
difference: is it the act sword that I brought with me, which has a
little bit of death inside it? Is it in my own person (my soul, my
lethal intent, my spirit, whatever...) in some manner? Is it more
to do with the manner of the decapitation, and what 'story' it appears
I'm here to perform (or am performing, regardless of my actual intent).
Cheers,
Alex.
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