Icta: Story

Firstly, there’s some precedents to set!

This reality is completely different from the workings of ours, and it starts with the Divine Hierarchy. At the top is God, they brung into being everything that exists and created the gods. The gods are just below God; the multitudinous gods inhabit the countless universes, in which they all strive to acquire a planet through means of neverending warfare.

To defeat a god in war, (one will) pierce their opponent's every being to which their soul is replenished upon another planetary war until victory; war is an eternal process unless you manage to win. The war is won when you have torn every god assigned to fight on that planet to shreds. By then, you have well earned the privelege of that planet-- When a god has emerged victorious, they use the holy powers given to them by God to create every being on said planet, the beings being of their likeness (although sometimes not precisely akin to each other, they will always be made in the god's image.)

Lynux is a god, having fought for a long time. In a way, they were renowned by God for their innate skill in the divine wars, allowing themselves to be defeated by other gods for the sake of improvement and battle. But soon Lynux turned their sights to God themselves. With their undefeated, innate power they believed that they had the qualities to defeat god, with this being what they believed they were meant to do this whole time, otherwise they were absolutely useless in talent & prescence. And they certainly did have the means, but fate favors God, and so Lynux attempted to overthrow God but failed. They failed to kill God, fated to be punished for sin, and God told them this:

"I will send you off to your death as you have sinned the one and greatest sin, I will send you to a warring planet and you will triumph against every god there. For I know you will, because beyond defeat for you is nothingness as of a mortal's fate. You will win, and you will not die by time, but by your own means of which you will find yourself the only responsible being."

And so they did, and in their image created Ictyfs, being forced into mortality afterwards. Notably, Ictyfs don’t have some features like Lynux (See p.3,) only Lynux has horns and the star in their Scapha, all Ictyfs have indentical shared features as a species; wings, a tail, long ears, and slit pupils. Something fun to note is that Lynux has slit pupils but his eyes are just so 'void' that you can't see them, haha (Pre-mortality Lynux didn't have those kinds of eyes, effects of descending to the mortal plane I guess!) Importantly, Ictyfs are genderless and only use they/them/theirs to refer to anyone in their language, Ictan.

Also, soon after Lynux arrived on earth and the Ictan language was developed, they were dissatisifed with 'Jeu' (they) and thought it would be in their right as a god/"God" to use a word higher than the people to refer to themselves (ie; a word the people don't know.) This word is still gender neutral in Ictan but I use "he" as a good English stand-in because 1. They just felt like a he 2. It works (lol) Also, with this origin it would be a singular pronoun like 'I' + The ictyf people don't know about this word and use they for him, but as time goes on he meets other people to which they could use the word when refferring to him. I guess with how strange Ictan is structurally it's not necessarily an issue worth pouring over, too, haha!

After Lynux created Ictyfs, they waited until they deemed the people intelligent enough, and came to the people after staying hidden for so long, using their position to be worshipped as "God." There are, of course, people with different beliefs, but it’s the most dominant belief system/religion on the entire planet of Icta. How did they feel about being sent to die by God? Well, not happy for sure. But was there anything they could do? Find a purpose for their skills, which meant ruling over the people as "God," as he should've been. He suggested a kingdom be built, and the people praised his idea and took to work. He appointed himself (to the acceptence of the people) as the theocratic god and appointed people below them to assist in anything he needed assistance with. They concluded being exposed to danger so openly wasn't the greatest idea, so he faked his death. The religion obviously stayed flowing, maybe even more so than it had been before. Lynux took absolute power in secret and has been its true dictator since, while the people believed he had really died, and they believed his subordinates had become the managers of the kingdom in his place. The titular royals get orders from Lynux, although they believe the person telling them to act was a person closest to them who's whereabouts they believe are purposefully kept hidden for privacy and safety. This concept is a little convoluted so here's a visualization:

The kingdom is considered a sacrosanct spot because it's where he "died" and religious people tend to gather there. The religion continues to spread more because of the abundance of trade within the country. Lynux dislikes working with finances and such, but understands it well, however Locus usually handles finance as the treasurer (introduced in a second.) It's a wealthy place and has exports of high value.

Fun fact!: it’s about the size of Russia, if not a little bit bigger.

Here's a lineup of the characters I've come up with next to each other for reference!! Some of these are going to be updated in the future XD

Locus is the treasurer of the allegiance. Their actual name is Iko (given the name Locus by Lynux to exert influence upon joining the allegience.) They were a high performer in several different subjects (mainly math) and lived in a small, more rural area with their parents until they were requested to live and work in the main kingdom, where they then were allowed to join Adsum Absconditus, a hidden allegiance only people trusted by Lynux are invited to join. They were the first in the group, and are highly respected by the other members for their endurance. It’s a strange kind of close relationship that Lynux and them have, although the others are close, they're strangely almost friends. Locus is not necessesarily religious anymore.

They were at war for many years before retiring from the military, and Lynux participates in a lot of wars, battles, and skirmishes. Locus is damaged by this and their mental state begins to suffer. There’s a lot of little war incidents that happened which I won’t get into ... Also, anyone’s communication with anyone outside of Adsum Absconditus is heavily restricted due to the importance of secrecy. The only exceptions to this rule are speaking to the public if it was an order from lynux. If this rule is broken, you're just executed due to the severity of the risk. (This is part of the reason why Lynux and the allegience members are close; they can’t really have anyone else. (This is also conditioning from Lynux, but they do enjoy having acquaintances at least.))

Lynux is allied with a struggling nation, which the nation they’re allied with (which Locus’s parents had moved to shortly after Locus had gone to the kingdom) had citizens held hostage by the other nation Lynux’s military was fighting. So their parents were held hostage, and Lynux hadn’t planned to interfere since they’d be released anyway if they defeated the other nation, but still sent Locus to the place where they were being held, to which he came along as well.

There, everyone was released, and Locus reunited with their parents. Lynux expected this, and as a testament to their loyalty (and heavy suspicions that Locus would reveal everything he'd been trying to keep secret) Lynux held Locus at gunpoint and asked them to either save their parents but in turn Lynux would kill everyone living on the planet, or save everyone on the planet but Locus kill their parents themselves. Locus, caught on the weight of their choices and in extreme stress, is forced to choose. And with heavy reluctance and regret, Locus shoots their parents.

Locus is traumatized by this and in shambles after this. They can't leave. Lynux tells them something like,"Hey so... this is why you had to do that, I'm really sorry do you want like a hug or something I'll do whatever it takes to make you feel better" obviously bullshitting but Locus doesn't realize and since they have nowhere and noone else to go to they confide in them.

Locus develops a light taste for alchohol around this period. Over time, more people are also invited to Adsum Absconditus.

A character we have to introduce to introduce Luns is Inajln. Inajln is a highly regarded priest who has a family history of church services. They took this role and were better at it than anyone expected; with exceptional public speaking skills, they have a great ability to persuade the public, although not perfect and sometimes they find themselves being the target of some published articles every now and again. But nonetheless, with the high standards of the public, they are still liked quite a lot, lots of people listen to their speeches. Which is why lynn likes them ... Lynn sees this as an opportunity to reach the public directly through someone other than the royals, maybe even influencing public opinion to rile up the people for some reason of his. Inajln is not easily influenced, however, and realizes he's being played (a trait lynn likes) so he tries to go against the things he's being told to say in subtle ways. Lynux notices this, and they have a passive-agressive-rival-relationship type of thing trying to one-up each other constantly from there on out. Inajln wears heels. And as the years go by, Inajln reccomends a person to Lynux that they think they will find interesting if they were to observe this person.

And that leads to now Luns. Their real name is Filyn, and they were very religious, growing up in a household centered around religion, and it was engrained in them from an extremely young age. They went to the church with their family, and while their family was emotionally abusive, the church and more importantly God were a source of refuge to them. Since lynux had connections with a priest from that very church (Inajln), they were reccomended to him by them. And lynux did find purpose for them, teaching them how to use a rifle (to which they were skilled) and deciding they could be useful for assassinations, and put them into the allegience. Luns was extremely shocked at the prescence and even sight of lynux because of their religious upbringing and was initially extremely cooperative and gullible. As with all of the allegience members, Lynux needed to find a way to make them more credulus to his orders. Eventually, however, he figured that the act of commiting necessary atrocities and the deep guilt that comes afterwards would be enough. So that's what they did, and Luns grew to despise Lynux and their position/job over time. Similarly to the other allegience members, sometimes they had no option but to confide in Lynux, making them sympathize subconciously at times; They confide in Locus more, especially as they're partners. Luns partly feels like it would be a mistake to get rid of Lynux because of their competency. They wish everything would go away.

Luns is detrimental in spreading the idea that what Lynux is doing shouldn't be forgiven. Luns realizes this over several years and asks Locus to listen to them as they try to explain. Assuming that more characters involved in the allegience are developed, Luns tells the others as well.

(( There's also this young kid I've kind of put on the backburner who was probably an outcast from society and saw the invitation to the allegience as a LITERAL blessing from god. They have little skills they lean towards so lynn can morph them into whoever he wants, especially since they're a kid. The rest of the allegience is trying to subtly protect them from lynn so that he won't get rid of them but the kid can stay sane. I can imagine the kid seeing lynn and the allegience as parental figures, and understanding what's happening with them and trying to be useful to keep their position in the allegience due to past experiences. ))

(From here on out, the story is relatively unclear and is still subject to change :) )

This all coalesces eventually to everyone in Adsum Absconditus setting up the planned murder of God. They are sick of the atrocities and decide to end the cause of everything. They don't know what he's capable of (not knowing he's mortal) and Lynux catches on to a little bit of this plan but can't figure it out before they find something to null anything he might use in confronting him. (What that is? I have No Clue :-) ) Locus says they want to talk with them about something privately. In the room, they talk, and Locus finally does lecture them about how they feel. Lynux responds by threatening Locus and injuring them (since they were extremely suspicious before even entering), but is stopped by someone before they could do anything serious. Everyone in the allegiance comes out of hiding armed, and in order to prevent Lynux from getting away, they amputate his right wing with a sharp weapon. Everyone listed their grievances with him, and he made it clear he had no intention to change the way things were, since his methods were ideal to him.

They take him, in pain, out to the large platform that is usually reserved for the fake royals’ announcements, and ask all citizens of the kingdom to gather. (It’s also worth noting that people in high positions of power have special insignias for their roles. For the allegiance, they have the highest ranking insignia, so they are respected the moment this insignia is seen without regard for past impressions.) Luns is the one who announces everything he’s done and everything that he was behind to the public. They let lynux speak for himself and threaten to shoot if he lies, to which he tells the absolute truth. This is mainly beacause this was extremely unexpected, so he has to improvise everything. He also calls Locus their real name, Iko, for the first time as they decide his fate.