#June Worldbuilders
- Kristina Elyse Butke
- Jun 30
- 10 min read
I've been holding onto these prompts for about a year, when I first saw them on Twitter/X. I hardly go there now, so they probably came up with a new one, but this one seemed fitting because of my book, The Name and the Key. Anyway, this Worldbuilders activity is hosted by Kira of the Wind and as always, I'm knocking out all prompts in one go to make it into a blog. Enjoy!
Entities associated with good or evil
I'm sort of taking the end of the Middle Ages/early Renaissance aesthetics to come up with such entities. In The Name and the Key, there are demons, who are incredibly interested in the human world, and a bare mention of angels, who are uninterested in human lives. In fact, the only angel I mention is a fallen one who became a demon (and his true form looks a lot like this.) I don't mention commandments or anything like that, and I don't name a god, but it's sort of understood that this world is somewhat Christian (although more Catholic) inspired. But the basic gist is demons = bad, angels = indifferent, saints = good, God = good. But again, angels and god do not really figure into this story. It's all about the bad guys trying to trick the good guys.
SNIPPET: Spirit, angel, or demon
For The Name and the Key (trilogy) I wrote a grimoire called The Book of Simoneth that's based on 16th century English and inspired by The Lesser Key of Solomon. I have entries for the demons mentioned in the book, and their domains and summoning instructions are written as rhyming poetry. I don't like sharing excerpts of the work for my own protection, but I will concede and share the first couplet to Isabelle's entry to tide you over:
Her domayne is Hidden things Amongst paupers, amongst Kinges.
There are 14 rhyming couplets that alternate between a 7-7-8-8 syllable pattern. I decided to call that pattern lullico meter in the book for when Andresh studies literature at college. He is essentially taking a survey of Medieval and Renaissance Literature class, but I don't want to use those era terms because they're from the real world and might take readers out of the story. When I get to that part of the book (The Step and the Walk) I should have it figured out.
Hierarchies
There is a hierarchy to the demons of the underworld (I'm not sure I actually want to call it hell) based on The Lesser Key of Solomon. In The Lesser Key, it states whether or not demons are princes or generals of hell...and I thought that was really interesting. However, these details might not make it into the book if I can't find a way to make it relevant. That's the tricky part. All the worldbuilding can be expansive, but only a small percentage of it makes it into the story.
Virtues and Sins
I don't really go into the seven deadly sins because that's something Hiromu Arakawa did for her masterpiece Fullmetal Alchemist. It makes sense why she did--alchemy is a refining process, where you strip away things and then recomposite them into something better--but you repeat this step multiple times until you reach the perfect substance. Instead of sins, I have things that simply make a person "human." I chose four of them, one for every step along the way in the magnum opus: desire, violence, emotion, and self. My trilogy focuses mainly on the first step, desire. Interestingly, the absence of these four traits doesn't necessarily make someone virtuous in the book, just something closer to godlike.
MC's thoughts on angels and demons
Lily, my main character, never thought magic or anything supernatural was real until things started to haunt her. She is very scared of the concept of demons but realize they are a means to an end. As for angels, Lily asks about them out of curiosity but doesn't seek them out or ask for help because they are known to be absent from human lives.
Blessings or curses
The Name and the Key trilogy is all about the curses. Lily has a curse. Her mother might have been cursed (I leave this up in the air). Andresh has a curse. The demons are cursed. I am still writing the trilogy now, so maybe a magic spell that resembles a blessing of some kind could appear, but I'm not entirely sure how that would work, so I may leave it alone.
Servants of a God or Devil
I don't have a clear god or devil named in this book. I'm more concerned with the underlings. I guess demons would serve a devil and angels would serve a god, but I have each being more concerned with themselves than anything else, although demons really adore humans (most of them used to be one).
Everyday clothes worn in WIP
The era in The Name and the Key is based on the Regency England period and vaguely around the 1820s. I looked at a lot of the clothing of that decade and thought the women had some lovely gowns. It was also the start of men wearing pants and slippers as opposed to boots, although my character Andresh and several other men wear riding boots with their trousers because they look great.
Lily would wear a dress like this, which dates from 1820 and is in the archives of The Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC:
Meanwhile Andresh would wear clothes like these (although he wouldn't wear all tan and cream like the outfit on the right). The outfit on the left dates 1810-1815, so a little old-fashioned, and the outfit on the right is from the 1820s. The outfit from the left is from the Mint Museum, and the right is from the Fashion Museum of Bath.
SNIPPET: Shirt, hat, or shoes
Andresh had a magical indestructible coat in the graduate thesis version of The Name and the Key that protected him from ripped fabric, water, and even fire...but I just couldn't find a way to work that magical item into the new version, so it's gone. I don't have an excerpt of the thesis for you, but I vaguely remember Andresh saying the fabric color (multifaceted blues) come from pachliopta kotzebuea, a dark blue butterfly that also more commonly comes in black. Of course, I didn't use that scientific name exactly but chose a close-sounding name playing off of it. In hindsight it's probably good I stopped doing that with names. Anyway, I'm sad the coat is gone, but again, I couldn't find a way to justify its use in the new trilogy. さようなら.
Cultural garments, hats, or shoes
I need to come up with a historical, cultural garment that the people of Sindalia traditionally wear. I've only described a common hairstyle and some common physical traits of ethnic Sindalians, but I need a national costume. Because I lived in East Asia and have been to both Japan and Korea, I can't quite shake cultural influences from them. But I don't want to appropriate, either. This probably won't be decided unless absolutely necessary.
As far as the clergy goes, my book has a kind of Catholic aesthetic to it. I will never forget when the Met Gala did the theme "Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination" in 2018. I was living in Japan but saw the most beautiful clothes on the red carpet. I kind of feel like the clergy and the saints in The Name and the Key look like this:
Especially saints when they are skeletons but still dressed up like they do in catacombs, and how people look in the effigies on tops of their tombstones in cathedrals and churches.
Material or fabrics used to make clothes
I had to do some historical research for this because Lily and her family sell fabrics at their shop, Bellamy Mercantile, so I needed to know what was commonly used for dresses. Here's a sample of one of my sources, Atelier Nostalgia:
The fabrics of existent dresses are most often silk or cotton. Wool and (fine-woven) linen are also seen. Although cotton and silk are seen more often, it is good to remember that the fancy dresses are also the ones most likely to survive and be preserved. [...] For silks and cottons, look for thinner fabrics. Very thin white cotton was often used. Heavier draped fabrics aren’t seen much. Silks are usually either satin or taffeta, but again, rather thin. Crepe silk was also used, very thin and and almost sheer.
What does the MC wear?
I changed Lily's appearance from how she looked in her graduate thesis. Her current iteration is a young woman with stick-straight reddish brown hair, freckles, and honey-brown eyes. I picture her wearing pastel greens and pastel purples a lot. She is in mourning for a time, so she also wears black.
What does the villain wear?
The villains are demons, and I picture them all wearing Greco-Roman togas and robes for some reason, showing a lot more skin than a proper Regency gentlewoman (or man!) could handle. I am not sure why this specific imagery popped in my head for them, but that's how it is!
Clothes worn by special classes (nobles, clergy, etc.)
I sort of talked about this above, but in terms of what the nobles wear, I think of how things aren't totally different from the reality of the Regency era. Nobles wore more expensive things. Different colors. Elegant tailoring, etc. People in lower classes wore simpler items that were less expensive. Just as long as it fits Regency clothing (with the exception of saints/clergy/demons/entities) it works.
Scary or cute?
The monsters in my trilogy are all demons. I used to have an actual wolf-snake-bird chimera monster in the graduate thesis but he got eliminated in the new version once I started changing in the nature of the magic, so rest in peace, danger puppy! Anyway, all of the demons are bewitchingly beautiful so they can tempt people into making bad deals or committing atrocities or sins. They do look a little chimeric because I give them animal traits in addition to their human ones. For example, Isabelle is a gorgeous woman with black hair, lilac-purple skin, black ram's horns, and the lower body of a black panther.
All demons have solid, jet-black eyes. Even the sclera is black. Because of this, their vision isn't normal--they cannot see anything but the Fire that composes a living being (the energy of the soul).
SNIPPET: Beast, monster, or creature
Ok, here's a simple sentence Isabelle the demon says to Lily:
You’ll need to help him soon. Nigredo. Tell him to open the Gate.
Enemy monsters
The demons are the enemy monsters! I do not have the demons infighting although I may play around with Aineiron and Isabelle should I decide to make them meet. They seem like they would be antagonistic.
Companion creatures
In Book Two, The Step and the Walk, Andresh befriends a friendly female calico cat named Saint, who follows him everywhere and sleeps in his tent.
Ecological niche
Most of the trilogy takes place either in cities, the countryside, in mirrors, or in the Magnum Opus (a path with four gates alchemists must pass through). The ecology in cities and countryside are representative of places in Europe and Asia and there is no special flora and fauna. I had originally created a flower called the "amyth blossom" but when I tweaked the beginning of the new book, I cut out that whole story. They were based off of hydrangeas...so now I simply call them by their name. The mirrors don't have anything living in them except trapped demons or demons who wish to look out into the human world. The Magnum Opus is similar to the mirrors in that there is nothing there, but a demon guards every gate to collect a sacrifice before you pass through.
Dens, nests, families
I suppose depending on what level of hell you get to, demons nest together and have families. I don't really depict that in the books, though. My demons tend to be cursed to be alone, which is why they like to watch humans and try to engage with them so much.
Myths or legends about creatures
In The Lesser Key of Solomon, demons have a "specialty" or "domain" of knowledge that often serves as the reason for which they are summoned. The same is true of the demons in my trilogy. Belloqueth has knowledge of hidden things. Aineiron's domain is music, although he specializes in a bewitching, cursed kind. Cendelamon's domain is more literal as he is the guardian of the Nigredo Gate. He is never summoned as his punishment is to watch over those who wish to pass through it, only allowing passage if they make the appropriate sacrifice.
Crimes committed in story
There was a scene in the early drafts of The Step and the Walk where Andresh murders someone in self-defense, but I don't know how to keep that scene in the new version. There will be a murder that happens in The Fear and the Flame, though.
SNIPPET: Crime
Everybody's pretty well-behaved in the book!
Organized crime/gangs
There is mention of highwaymen attacking on the Old King's Road in The Name and the Key, but only in passing.
Justice system
Similar to that of Regency England.
Unique or brutal punishment method
I can't really think of anything because there's nothing that really comes up in the trilogy for this.
Is your MC a criminal?
She does do something of gray morality in the third book, but I wouldn't call Lily a criminal.
Common punishment method in story
All I can picture are people being taken to jails and prisons.
How are you feeling about your WIP currently?
I'm happy with it but I also think things are happening pretty fast. I cut a lot of the fat from the thesis and have been hitting major points but I've been getting to them pretty quickly. I'm worried this draft will be a bit on the anemic side, and I need to get it done by August to send it off to beta readers and rewrite it before it's due to my publisher.
Was your worldbuilding pre-planned or do you build as you write?
It is a mix of both. I'm not consulting my thesis as I write, but doing a bunch of stuff from memory as well as winging it. I always knew I wanted to model the time period and customs after the Regency so that's one of the few consistencies carrying over from the thesis into the trilogy. If I need to know a fact as I'm writing, I pause and look it up before continuing. This happens a lot, so I guess overall I build as I write.
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