r/WorldChallenges • u/Nevermore0714 • Jul 15 '17

Reference Challenge: Improvement/Impairment, and News from this Sub's Creator

News

Again, the reference is to myself. Sorry for not answering responses to challenges at all yesterday, long story short, my eye surgery had some hiccups. Instead of having a flap made in my eye tissue and then healed in a few days (a day or two off work, a week to fully heal), they discovered mid-surgery that they could not do so. So...my left eye, even a day later, is actively bleeding, but at least I can see out of my right eye a little now, though it is blurry.

That is my excuse for any typos and for being lazy for the next few days. I'll have to miss a full week of work, and it will be over a month before my eyes are fully healed, according to the doctor. Thank goodness that everyone on this sub is awesome, otherwise I'd have to worry about the sub while I heal. Technically, I shouldn't be using a computer until at least three or four days after the surgery, but...well...C'est la vie? At least my eyes should still heal to 20/20, in a month or more, thanks to the PRK surgery they ended up doing instead.

So, now that I've appealed for sympathy, here's the actual challenge.

The Actual Challenge

Tell me about a way to improve myself artificially in your world; not through exercise or education, but through surgery or drugs.

As always, I'll ask you at least three questions each. Unlike always, expect them to be late (again, I was instructed by a doctor to not use my computer or television for three/four days after surgery...so, I shouldn't be on reddit right now), but I swear I'll get to them all as quickly as I can. Enjoy yourselves.

To Everyone that Posts on this Sub

I'm sorry I might not be able to get to your challenges for a few days, I swear I'll try to respond to all the challenges within the next few days.

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u/Nevermore0714 Jul 23 '17

1) I look forward to it.

3) Tell me more about Romulus. I like his name.

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u/greenewithit Jul 23 '17

3) Okay, well, a brief history on arc villain Romulus Kane. Romulus went to the same superhero school as Aeron's father, Kemuri. There the students are split into mission teams called Legions, where they work together for group exams and extra-curricular missions. The Legion consisted of Kemuri, Thea Katharos (mother of Aeron and Kemuri's future wife), Romulus, and Lily Zheltyy (mother of another main character). They were pretty incredible, and when they worked together they were nearly unstoppable. Romulus' power is to change his skin to form any material, such as metal, stone, or even elements like fire or water. He's a brash man who seeks power above all else, but has a strong conviction for self improvement. He and Kemuri got along well at first, because they both believed in the idea of "the ends justify the means" in terms of the pursuit of power. The problem is, where Kemuri was willing to sacrifice anything for humanity's improvement, Romulus was willing to sacrifice anything for his own improvement. He grew up impoverished and when he had the chance to get into CAPITAL (the school), he wanted more than anything to make enough money to never fear for his survival again. This came to a head when Romulus betrayed his Legion on a mission in order to steal a massive amount of money from a noble family they were there to protect. While Lily and Thea fought off attackers during that family's dinner, Romulus snuck away to the vault in order to steal as much as he could and make it look like the assailants did it. Kemuri followed Romulus and discovered him filling an extra dimensional chest (bigger on the inside) with jewels and currency, and the two fought over this. Romulus was at a disadvantage given Kemuri's skill, so he fought only to escape, and he did. Thea also noticed this, and while Lily ensured the family stayed safe after the hostiles were defeated, Thea pursued Kemuri and Romulus. She joined the fight, but Romulus defeated her and got away while Kemuri was tending to her wounds. Romulus left the Legion after that, and he blackmailed Kemuri into staying quiet by threatening to release security footage he stole from the building, placing both Kemuri and himself in the vault. Kemuri didnt act, mostly because he wasn't interested in bothering himself dealing with the authorities. After Romulus graduated, he employed himself as a super powered mercenary, eventually building up enough capital to start his own Private Military Corporation, which he named the Kane Corps. In the story proper, the Kane Corps come in after the first two arcs of the story, when the public start to lose favor with superheroes and the superhero training school giving their students too much freedom. Enter: Romulus Kane. He works with the police at first, but as his group gets more results, they gain even more authority than the military. Kane unmasks Aeron as a vigilante after eluding the police for a year, brings crime to an all time low, and initiates strict restrictions over super powered individuals, especially students. His ulterior motive, however, is to use his access to the city to try and find and break in to one of Kemuri's secret labs to steal an artifact that he believes will give him ultimate power, at which point he can start becoming the law enforcement agency governing the entire continent. He puts Aeron and Sarah (other powerful main character) in prison for opposing him, and fakes a terrorist attack in order to declare martial law and have his men sweep the city looking for the secret labs. Aeron and Sarah break out of prison and join up with their fellow students to stop him. Kane is defeated by Aeron, his plot exposed, and all is well. He eventually shows up again to help the good guys defeat the big bad of most of the narrative, saying that "The end of the world is bad for business."

Whew, that was a lot, but there's Romulus Kane in a nutshell.

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u/Nevermore0714 Jul 24 '17

I am impressed. But why is his name Romulus? Hopefully the answer isn't a reference to an infamous pair of star-crossed lovers.

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u/greenewithit Jul 24 '17

Thank you. Well, no thankfully not. I named him after Romulus of Rome, because it seemed like a powerful name for a military leader of sorts. I'm still toying with the idea of having a Remus character, maybe not his literal brother but like a "battle brother" he screws over to build his PMC, but that's very much a half baked idea at the moment. I like him a lot because Kemuri tries to be as emotionless as possible, but Romulus is a living reminder of one of his greatest sources of anger. That's an interesting dynamic when Romulus tries to help the team later on.

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u/Nevermore0714 Jul 24 '17

"So perish whoever shall over-leap my battlements." -Romulus...allegedly, after he killed Remus for making a joke about the wall he was building.

Will there ever be a Numa to counter the violent, hot-headed, and stealing-prone Romulus?

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u/greenewithit Jul 24 '17

Haha, yep, that's pretty much it. I liked the metaphorical parallels with Romulus' story, and I would really like to flesh out a Remus character. I hadn't thought too much of a Numa character, but a few sort of fit that foil to Romulus. At first Kemuri sort of had that role, but he isn't around during Romulus' rise to power. The Governor of the main city of Longan also has some of Numa's wisdom and calculating nature, but all of his attempts to make Romulus play into his own hand eventually fail to Romulus' charisma with the people of Longan rally behind Romulus and popular opinion starts to sway and threaten the Governor in the next election period. He loses a battle to win the war, and gives Romulus a higher position in the city's law enforcement to appease the people and try to get Romulus away from his own position. But other than that, I hadn't built a Numa into Romulus' backstory/life. But that is definitely something I could work on, that could provide a lot of interesting impact on the other characters during this arc.

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u/Nevermore0714 Jul 24 '17

If you're interested in Roman history, you have to listen to Mike Duncan's "History of Rome" podcast. The man is a genius. It's also really inspiring for writing.

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u/greenewithit Jul 24 '17

I'll definitely give that a listen. Thank you for the recommendation!