The Word Wars

Living Forces

In The First Word War, literomancers fought the Undead with whatever help they were able to recruit along the way — mostly scattered remnants of devastated military units and the occasional small town or state cop. While the surviving literomancers swore an oath to defend the world against any return of the Undead Horde, and other supernatural threats, nobody really believed it would be necessary on such an apocalyptic scale ever again, until The Second Word War was upon them.   By that time, the Tome Knights, as they were now known, had organized along the lines of ancient Houses that had once maintained literomantic traditions, and those Houses had become the ruling powers in nations carved out of the remnants of the old world. As a result, once the war was underway and the Great Houses realized what was going on, they were able to martial significant military forces.   When The Third Word War came, the populace still was not convinced that the Undead would continue to be a threat — but Queen Sable Aradia of the Lapin Protectorate was, and she managed to convince her fellow House Leaders to at least prepare for the possibility. Thus, the Houses were able to muster vast military forces in addition to the literomancers on the field of battle. By The Fourth Word War, this process had become almost routine.   In The Fifth Word War, the Night Monarch changed tactics, and offered undeath only to those who asked for it. This hampered what the living forces were able and willing to do. On the other hand, very few chose to accept the offer, so armed conflict tended to be limited in scope, and relatively few civilians fell into the line of fire.   The Sixth Word War primarily took the form of small unit military skirmishes, since the Night Monarchs were actively trying to avoid turning anyone who was not a literomancer. Were it not for the involvement of interdimensional interlopers, casualties would likely have remained quite low.   Undead are usually Resurrected when the Night Monarch is defeated, by means of the leader of the victorious living House writing in the Iron Tome. Three Tome Knights have been resurrected over the course of the past several years by the magic of Queen Sable of House Lapin, and thousands were raised from the dead by Filking while the living were in possession of the Iron Tome. The resurrections brought about by filking were imperfect, however, and resulted in many simply dying from their wounds a second time.  

Undead

Each Undead Horde has begun with one, or two, Night Monarchs — that is, an undead, possibly demonic, literomantic dark lord, who is granted nearly godlike power and the ability to raise anyone they kill from the dead, regardless of the method of death. Those bitten by zombies are known to die from the curse or infection and become zombies themselves within a day or less.   Most of the Undead are mindless zombies, nothing more than eating machines that seek the brains, blood, or life energy of living beings. It appears to be possible for any organic sapient being to become a zombie, but not animals or sapient AIs. They spread quickly and in great numbers, like a plague. Their primary tactic is to swarm and devour, though they may maintain some rudimentary muscle memory that allows them to wield simple weapons, such as bats or clubs.   However, any literomancer who is turned becomes a Tome Zombie, an undead being with apparent sapience and intelligence, and magical powers... although they appear to be compelled to follow the commands, or the will, of the Night Monarch, so arguably they lack free will. Some Tome Zombies become savage monsters or psychopaths, or even develop completely separate alter egos, while others change their personalities very little, or not at all — though they are still driven by hunger and still subject to the Night Monarch's will.   Tome Zombies also crave the brains or life energy of the living, but more than that, they crave Literomantic Power. They will seek out any being who has it with a predatory instinct.   Anyone killed by a Tome Zombie, regardless of the method of their death, also becomes Undead, but only literomancers become Tome Zombies. Like the Night Monarch, Tome Zombies are also capable of commanding and controlling zombies and other non-literomantic undead, and this is often used to devastating effect by the Night Monarchs.   In 6WW, two methods of raising undead appeared that had not been seen before: cursed funfetti cake, and corrupted Litroballs. However, neither one was used on anyone who was not a LitMon or a literomancer, and it is unclear if these methods would be effective on any creature that lacked literomantic power.   Necromancers seem to be able to get more intelligence out of "regular" zombies from time to time, as Prince Galakrond did when raising undead soldiers during 3WW. These soldiers were capable of making full use of all of their military skills. It is believed that there was a limit to how many undead soldiers could have been raised with these capabilities, however.   Occasionally, other forms of undead appear as well. These have included vampires, ghosts, draugir, wraiths, and poltergeists, and there may be others. An attempt by Commander DM Stretch to destroy his body so he could not be raised as a Tome Zombie proved unsuccessful, even though there was not enough of his body left for resurrection after 4WW.   However, as long as the living forces are victorious, it seems that it is impossible for undead to exist outside of November, unless they are bonded to a specific location. A few ancestral undead beings, such as Riona the Chiroptera Library's ancestor ghost, Aunt Martha, a fossilized ancestor of Regent Dazzlinkat of House Sauropoda, and Jamie the Undead Pirate, bartender at Krakatoa in Aberdeen, Scotland, are present year-round, but all are bonded to specific places that they cannot leave the remainder of the year.

The Night Monarch dies and begins raising undead no later than the stroke of midnight on the first of November, in whatever time zone they happen to be in, and no earlier than October 31st. Sociologists have pointed out that festivals of death, such as Samhain, Halloween, and the Day of the Dead, may be cultural memories of previous Word Wars before all knowledge of literomancy was somehow erased.   The ultimate conflict between the undefeated living House and the Undead Horde appears fated to occur at the very end of November, although this battle is sometimes not fully resolved until the 1st or 2nd of December. Theories as to why abound, but the most commonly accepted is that some condition of becoming Night Monarch requires that they successfully conquer the living literomancers within a calendar month. Since the longer the war goes on, the more power and troops they naturally acquire, it is tactically sound to wait as long as possible before attempting the final push for the Iron Tome.

Critics have pointed out that were it not for the existence of literomancers, there would likely be no Tome Wars, since magical power is such a key element in the conflicts, and the Night Monarchs seem to have all been literomancers before their corruption and undeath.   Literomancers have agreed this is probably true. However, literomancers don't seem to have any more control over that than anyone else, and while they have learned how to be better at reading the signs, Tome Knights are never sure themselves who might be next.   Some have argued that this proves that "burning the witches" was a good idea. However, it has also been pointed out that this has been tried before, and was clearly ineffective as a means to solve the problem long term.   Whatever the case, magic is often the best way to fight magic, and Tome Knights usually find themselves in the role of living artillery against the zombie hordes. However, previous experience has shown that they cannot do it alone, so most military forces also train in anti-zombie tactics. The Armed Forces of the Protectorates train to work in conjunction with literomancers, and the populations of many Protectorates also participate in the Reserves or other militia forces, ready to take up arms every November against this mutual existential threat.

The impact of the Tome Wars on society has been significant. The political landscape has completely changed as a result of the Protectorate governmental structure. Creatures thought of as mere myths have become almost commonplace. Other worlds and other dimensions have been definitively proven to exist, and indeed, there have even been mass immigrations from such alternate realities.   However, aside from the disruptions caused by zombie invasions in the Tome Wars themselves, the everyday life of the average person remains surprisingly normal. People still go to work, aspire to most of the same careers they did prior to the Word Wars, and raise families. Although it does happen, and no one's life has been completely unimpacted by the catastrophic changes, most people are still far more likely to hear about magical events on social media, or the 6 o'clock news, than they are to encounter them.   Perhaps a silver lining to all the change is that most of the world remains at peace, except when the Undead Horde rises. The world is far too busy trying to survive to worry about fighting each other much.

Technology has seen significant advances since the onset of the Tome Wars. Literomancy in combination with modern technology has led to such wonders as advanced maglev transport and shipping, public teleporters, green energy technologies that integrate with their environment, and engines that literally run on ideas. It has also led to some lighthearted creations and some fun magical things that are available to the general public. While none of this is yet common by any means, it is beginning to have a noticeable impact on the average person's quality of life.