► The Boy Born of the Underground
Rising from the ashes of the turmoil wrought from the earliest days of quirks, Millennium City stands as The Enduring Star of the West, where some of the greatest heroes the world has ever seen challenge one another to reach new heights of fame and power. Yet there are few challenges in recent memory more daunting than when Hurricane Reynard made landfall, ravaging huge lengths of the shoreline before cutting a path of destruction deeper into the city. And whereas precautions were in place to ensure that casualties were kept at a minimum (including many publicly available storm shelters), the devastation was such that the occasional unfortunate soul would find themselves caught in the wrong place at the wrong time.

It was while taking shelter from the turbulent tempest under some vaguely accommodating wreckage that you'd, through one series of events or another, find yourself in the company of one such a person, a lonesome 12-yr-old named Aden, his uncommonly aquatic visage waterlogged from the nearby floodwaters that surged nearby the two of you. Injured and exhausted though he was, it was clear that his troubled thoughts were elsewhere, a deep seated-melancholy that superseded his mortal fears, even his mistrust of you specifically, should this have been the first time the two of you met.

In truth, the enigmatic boy was lost in more ways than one, such that you quite possibly wouldn't be able to appreciate then and there. The innocent, child-like desire he shared with many his age was at odds with the life he was born in and around, what he was all but destined to become. Beneath the at times superficial celebrity of hero culture fostered by the great and good by society, lies a veritable sub-culture where the nigh endless conflict between order and chaos is fought far closer to its source. With its inner workings concealed from the wider public as a whole, you could have lived your entire life without hearing anything of the major players that make it, not to mention the city itself, what they are and indeed have been for so many people since generations passed.

► Silver Winged Heroine Training
The life of a professional hero wouldn't be the first choice of career path her parents would have wanted for her if they had their way. All but set for life since before she was even born, Mariette would have been destined to an easy life of privilege that would have just about ensured her safety from the ongoing plight of heroes, villains, and those unfortunately caught in the middle. Yet her life would change when Hurricane Reynard struck Millennium City, her misfortune in being caught within one of the affected areas nearly costing her everything if not for the efforts of the brave rescue heroes that fateful day. Ever since, a fire had awoken within the young girl, her earnest wish to emulate her saviors driving her to risk it all in hopes of becoming the best hero she can be. While normally about as assertive as she looks, Mariette is determined to prove to everyone, including herself, just what she's capable of.

► The Wyvern's Last Secret
However peculiar or mundane the beast's egg appeared to be at the time of its discovery, no one could have been prepared for what you discovered one fateful day. Through some unreal manifestation, the dragon (or wyvern more accurately) would assume a new, drastically more humanoid form. While the idea of individuals forming bonds with certain dragon-related creatures may not be unheard of, it was surely rare for one to be capable of switching between these two forms, one that can easily carry you as its rider and the other measuring the size of a person. In this state, he can speak the way a human could while still retaining a measure of the tremendous power he's inherited from his powerful, if perhaps somewhat enigmatic lineage. What his legacy will be, on the other hand, is up to you.

► From Different Worlds
This generally stems from the notion of having an interesting gimmick at the center of some epic fantasy adventure. In this particular case, it's the idea of our two characters, as we write them, originating from two different fantasy worlds, realities, or timelines that intersect in some way and through some fantastical means. As always, I'm open to any ideas you bring to the table (maybe even "isekai" if you really crave something like that), but for anyone that wants me to throw around some possible ways to approach the subject, then I'll try and describe them the best I can. Feel free to suggest ideas incorporating select features from any of these.

1) Pure fringe Mandela Effect nonsense where our characters just one day find their respective realities consolidated into one (or the one they shared merged with another), having the clear memories of their former lives while most if not everyone else having no knowledge of the phenomenon occurring. This can have a number of applications, like going from being a nobody in one world to royalty in the next, a villain to a hero (if things should be so black and white), or vice versa.

2) Instead of an event, there is either a singular point / location or multiple points / locations where worlds intersect. This can be a part of a larger plot that our characters can find themselves in the middle of, perhaps forcing an unlikely partnership that sees them set out to right the worlds once more. Maybe what's perceived as ghosts within old or mystic ruins are actually people of another world who may yet view you in the same way in their world. That opens the door for the worlds to intersect in other interesting ways. I suppose what I'm describing might look like a good deal of LoZ games, but I'd really like for us to go our own way with it.

3) The plot centers around a sort of "cross-reality conflict", where wars and alliances alike are set across different realms. Wholly different worlds can be involved or even alternate-realities where characters can be pitted against an alternate version of themselves for the sake of their world's survival. We may even attempt something different to all out war, where the powers that be see to it that champions from across the "multiverse" are pitted against one another for the survival of their worlds. if not some other great prize in its own right.

In the year 200X, the up and coming video game developer Crosscom, fresh off their acquisition by Parallax Systems, had reached perhaps their greatest milestone yet with the release of the highly anticipated spiritual successor to their home computer sleeper hit Stray Blades, eventually being known for its detailed RPG elements, ambitious level design, and reasonable price tag. Now after so many years, Exolution was poised to pick up where its predecessor left off, only this time to amazing critical and commercial success.

Eager to use all the leadership experience and technical expertise he'd earned from helping to revitalize the decision simulator genre with his critically acclaimed reboot of the Everybody Dies series, lead studio director Sullivan Meyers envisioned a cutting-edge yet not too distant future of cybernetics-fueled international espionage and world-shattering conspiracies, one where the player's actions well and truly mattered, a remarkable first for the industry. In an interview with Big Hunt Gamers soon after the title's June debut, who themselves had given the game an emphatic 10/10, he opened up about his experience while implementing this most renowned feature.

"You could say that, if most playthroughs seemed like a series of happy accidents, then making the thing was even more so. For months after fully implementing the Butterfly System, I'd always arrive for the day to hear that the play testers ran into something. And as the project lead, my mind is all 'Oh boy, what's the problem this time', but half of the time it'd turn out that they just ran into an in-game event or situation that surprised them we'll say. I always got the sense that we were onto something special every time that happened. (Chuckle)"
Yet it was unclear at the time of the interview if even Sullivan could have guessed what the long term reception to his new project would be. While the original sold exceptionally well, easily fueling parent company Parallax's interest in a sequel, it soon became clear that the gameplay features on display in the budding franchise weren't the only things that were perceived as ahead of their time. Over the course of their flexible, lengthy campaigns, players would find all manner of themes and predictive occurrences of wold-building as per the setting. Many were easily dismissed as harmless worldbuilding, but in the cases of some elements, renewed interest would ripple throughout the gaming community and beyond, debates sparking over the series' uncanny ability to predict real-world events in advanced.

By the time the Celestial Station Archorum descended from the heavens, this world had long since been the domain of nigh countless horrors, terrible beasts of all manner of shapes and sizes, driving what few scattered survivors there were into hiding. The Heshra, the celestial beings residing within the station, beheld these monsters, in particular the many powerful Dire Colossi that each held control over massive territories throughout the world and, by the sanction of The Grand Adjudicator himself, commenced a thousand year war to liberate the realm on behalf of its hapless denizens. Throughout its tumultuous duration, whether by divine inspiration or outright intervention, many lands would finally be liberated, and under the divine blessing of the Archorum, be mended, revitalized with renewed life.