Chronicles of Peripatos

The Chronicles of Peripatos: a Dungeon Crawl Classics pulp fantasy campaign

The world is a flat disc held aloft in the vastness of the cosmos by twin brothers, themselves standing atop a narrow column of stars. Forever kicking at each other over some ancient feud only they remember, the world will someday be destroyed when one finally bests the other; the defeated brother and the world disc both toppling, falling, and finally lost in the primordial maelstrom that is slowly consuming the star column.

Or, the world is an orb of purest gold, covered in filth and traveling through the void at unimaginable speed toward the Great Goddess. Only by removing the filth around us and exposing the true beauty of our temporary home will we orb-dwellers be found worthy of the Great Goddess' love, and chosen to dwell within her bosom forever. Failure to make the orb acceptable will incur the Great Goddess' wrath, and she will cast us into the molten Sea of Disapproval where we will be painfully consumed over a thousand thousand lifetimes.

Or, the world a pile of detritus at the bottom of a shallow pit. Beneath us are hungry spirits, damned and desperate to devour our divine spark, through which they might be born again into a mortal body. Above us are our ascended brethren, the light of their divine sparks shining down upon us as encouragement to find our personal, hidden path that will allow us to join them in the great beyond.

There are as many world myths as there are individuals to dream them up. All of them are true. And all of them are false. The probity of each claim is often judged solely by the amassed and wielded power of its faithful. But what does that mean for those caught between these dogmatic conflicts? Is there a truth bigger than faith? Is there a camp of reason from which one might strike out into the world and judge each myth, each rumor, and each situation solely on observable facts? Or are all observable facts equally true and false, with only interpretation or bias to label them as such?

Do you care? When it really comes down to it, does it matter to you, the reader, what lies beneath each curtain? Is an engaging story enough, or must there be some deeper meaning to it all? Can you find deeper meaning in anything? Can't everyone?

Do these questions have anything at all to do our story, whether "our" is mine as teller and yours as reader, or "our" is us collectively? That is for you alone to judge. For each story, each moral, each experience is unique to each of you. Your self myth is constructed of thousands of disparate occurrences, thoughts, and interactions; none of which is entirely unique. Your self myth is no more or less real, or true, or grounded than any other's world myth. Or interpretation of such.

With that laid bare, I invite each of you to experience this tale as you will; taking from it as much or as little as you wish. For no story belongs entirely to the teller, or to the reader. Or, for that matter, the characters.

- Peripatos - Chronicler, Philosopher, Seer out-of-time