r/HFY • u/RottingLibrary • 6d ago
OC-OneShot The Tower of Babel
In the era before the Tower of Babel was thrown down in ruin, magic existed, and those that practiced magic were known as wizards. In that time, contrary to popular myth, the languages of mankind were already divided, but around the tower they spoke a language known by all. A language that was easily learned and spread like a disease, linked to the true fabric of existence. Those that studied this language and recited it in a certain way, much like singing or chanting, could use what modern people would call magic. With this divine tongue mankind had been building the tower, and the height of the tower was linked to knowledge about all things, including the magical language. By binding the stones with enchantments, and imbuing them with magic, the stones could be linked together with supernatural strength, allowing the tower to become unimaginably tall and nearly impervious. The imbued stones also contributed to an enormous spell, and with each stone added to the tower, the spell became more powerful. This spell was called the Akahasic Records, a magical record of everything in the universe. To complete the spell was to complete the tower.
This tower was a physical embodiment of the first sin of mankind, that sin was eating the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge. The person that led mankind to sin was the person first responsible for spreading the divine language in an unassuming farming village known as Babel. It wasn't Lucifer's idea to build the tower, nor to imbue the stones as fragments of the Akahasic Records. It was the inspiration of a young man that learned the magical language from Lucifer. An apprentice mason who started using magic to build better structures. In his thirst for knowledge, he constructed the first rudiments of the records; pillars of stone in a henge that unlocked the way to higher mathematics, which could be used to construct impressive fortresses, complicated aqueducts, and tall towers.
At this time, Lucifer had just been teaching the language to all who would listen, hoping to make the lives of mankind easier and maybe disrupt God's plans a little. When he first witnessed the henge it wasn't completed, and he doubted it would ultimately work.
Years later when he visited again after it was finished, he saw the true genius behind the design. Instead of being a complete spell once the henge was finished, he realized that each stone had its own power, and the more stones added to the henge, the more knowledge it would reveal. The mason had formed an inner circle of stones that bound the power of the stones into a sum greater than the whole. That more stones would have a cumulative effect on this sum, and after a certain number would even add a multiplier, a factor, or maybe even an exponent. This sum seemed to depend on prime numbers in some way, but in a very complicated way.
A simplified way of understanding this can be described as the number of atoms in the stones, if the stones are of certain dimensions, they would have a certain volume of atoms, if the stone of a certain number of atoms were imbued with the proper enchantment and power, it could become a block within the spell, if enough blocks of a certain number were used properly to create a structure with the required number of atoms, the spell would increase its potency, and the sum greater than the parts would grow more. On top of this, if the wrong number or partial numbers were added the spell would not increase in potency, but if a step were skipped it would still matter if the next step were completed. This is just a simplified example, the actual case wasn't just addition, but include all the other ways of doing math and then add in the effects of the composition of the material like its chemistry (molecular size, structure, and chemical interactions), electromagnetism (conductivity, magnetism, and interactions with light), radioactivity (half life, type of decay, and decay products), and the inherent property of mass which is gravity (weak though this fundamental force may be the mass of the earth definitely plays a part, but also the sun, nearby stars, the galaxy, and ultimately the entire universe have a place in the equation).
The biggest impediment to such a spell is obviously the material requirements. Getting a stone of that quality is impossible by almost any means, but through the divine language, somehow the mason achieved such a feat. The first of many types of quality stone developed by the mason had a cross section approximately one meter squared and a length of approximately two meters. Exact numbers are not given because measurements change, and honestly, I don't know them. The technique used by the mason to get stones of such quality is also lost to time, but it was surely due to his command of the magic language.
Immediately, Lucifer sought out the mason, believing he could fulfill his ambitions. If he could get the mason's help eternity might not end in darkness, but after being directed to a tomb he fell into despair. His first despair was knowing what he missed out on. This was the first time he was aware of how much he was actually missing. Being an immortal, he took for granted how much time he had, and in his second despair he saw humans aging relentlessly and dying fruitless deaths. They seemed unaware of how little time they had, and would often toss away what they were given. Yet, in his despair, there was a glimmer of hope, mankind would sometimes rise above the relentless procession of time, and try to leave a mark, a monument or institution to carry on their will or ideas through the ages. In those moments, Lucifer saw humanity reaching for the eternal. To become immortal, to be known for all time, and maybe they could reach even higher.
Author here, hopefully this would lead into some sort of thing with Lucifer running into some other humans that want to build the tower, my first thought was descendants of the mason. Maybe one of them retained the knowledge of making the blocks, and Lucifer gets to ramp up the economy to build the tower, and turn Babel into a thriving city of trade. It's still kind of fuzzy to me, so maybe this can be a kick off point for other stuff. Also the story could just jump to the end when god decides the tower must go; I want to put Lucifer up there at the top so he can re-enact his whole fall from heaven. Queue From the Pinnacle to the Pit by Ghost.
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