Only You Exist
Premise
Low Fantasy Tone | High Fantasy World | Dual Protagonists | Deep Magic System
Power Fantasy | Horror | Dysfunctional Romance | Mutual Obsession
An anachronistic, early 21st-century equivalent setting.
When does a human stop being human?
| Eli | Cecelia |
|---|---|
| Deterministic Fatalism | Deterministic Absurdism |
| I’m tired. This sucked way more in person than I thought it would. I’ll go back a week and cancel the trip. | |
| Ugh, this “poor family” life is so boring. I’ll be a model in the next one. | |
| Seriously? They’re crying? What did you expect from texting and driving? | |
| The parents here actually care about me. How quaint. Why do the poor cling to each other like bugs? | |
| Snap. “Sigh…” | |
| Clap. “Cut!" | |
| "Hey, sorry. I’m not feeling well, so I’m not coming after all." | |
| "Oh, look at that. I’m drop-dead gorgeous now. How boring. Being ugly is funnier." | |
| "You’re right, it’s an excuse. I don’t want to deal with your fucking problems, kay?” | |
| Wow, this mansion is huge. Kind of wish my old family could live here. Shame that they’ve forgotten all about me. | |
| ”Stop. I’m not going to argue with you about this. It’s this shit that makes me lie to your face about why I can’t go. I’m done. I’m leaving.” | |
| This new set of parents is insufferable. Maybe I should have their jet crash. Actually, having father cheat on mother might be more entertaining. | |
| For fuck’s sake. At least now I don’t have to deal with the police when they run over that stupid kid. | |
| Why is wealth so poorly distributed anyway? Why don’t these pathetic little humans just give each other money? |
Oh well. It doesn’t matter. After all, I’m the only one who is actually worthwhile.
All of you are just background noise in my world.
That’s right.
That is the only truth.
Only You Exist.
A god cannot bleed, but they can rot.
The human mind cannot bear isolation. When godlike prowess lifts you far above the crowd, the crowd ceases to look like people.
This is the story of two teens burdened with abilities that irreparably alienate them from the human condition, powers that erase all risk, all consequence, and ultimately, all meaning.
After all, if cursed to know the fate of all monuments, what is the point of ever building them?
One decides there is no point in building what must fall. The other decides to build just to watch the collapse.
| Eli | Cecelia |
|---|---|
| Deterministic Fatalism | Deterministic Absurdism |
| Every road, no matter how well paved it is or what destinations it leads to, will inevitably reduce to ruin. Eli cannot live in the present, for time is a two-way road that leads to places he already knows. Choice is nothing more than picking your poison’s flavor. His indifference isn’t born of malice; instead, it is the product of being blessed by certainty, or rather, it blinds him. If a castle’s fall is destined, choosing whether to defend the gates or burn them down is merely switching which laid rail the train travels. Life is not about living and agency; it is about deciding which written fate is yours. | Every road will break eventually, so may as well travel them while they last. If destiny is a branching network of rails that cannot change after laying, then Cecelia will see them all ridden. While she knows where all rails end, she has yet to see where they bend; if agency is choosing where your train goes, she is a magician who can alter what paths we’re taken, and thus, where that train is now. No fates created or destroyed, simply their agency hijacked. To her, no achievement retains value, and no mistake bears any consequence. Yet, she refuses to despair. If the universe is a meaningless playhouse, she will play the meaningless game. |
But what will it mean for the world when two players of the same game clash? When Eli meets a road with too many paths to understand, and when Cecelia meets a piece she cannot play with?
This is their story; those bestowed with godhood learning what it means to be human in a meaningless world where only one person can understand them.
It is,
Only You Exist.
Closing Note
Only You Exist is not the primary, actively written narrative. While all four are being developed, as they are one large, intertwined story, any updates here will be slow and done on a whim.
The current primary narrative is To Bleed a Demon.