Bonus Content - Sequel Storylines III

Hey everyone!

Welcome back to the spoilerific bonus contents about the plotlines of the character arcs for Blood of the Living. As always, major spoilers to follow, so stop reading here if you don’t want to have to deal with those just yet.

This month, I’m saying a little bit about Alekto and Hades.

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Alekto’s subplot could best be summarized in the sentence: “The past always comes back.” It’s about dealing with some of her not fully resolved trauma, and examining how that ties into the very difficult job she does presently, and whether she can go on doing it if she doesn’t see it as just ‘punishment’ for her transgressions.

The big spoiler here is severalfold: firstly, Alekto was once a Muse, as were her sisters. They worked closely with, and in some cases for, Apollo. Apollo was in a relationship with a woman named Coronis, and Alekto was meant to watch over this woman while Apollo was away from her. A bunch of things happened, including Alekto herself falling in love with Coronis, and at the end of it, the woman was dead by Apollo’s hand, and Alekto smote and banished to the Underworld.

As she bears some responsibility for this chain of events, and in a great deal of pain, Alekto volunteered for one of the most difficult jobs in the Underworld: punishing mortals who break the laws of the gods.

Here’s the subplot itself in list form:

1: About Apollo and I… (backstory)

2: The Rebuilt Tartarus - more complete idea of how Alekto relates to her job

3: The Hounding/Trial of Orestes - Apollo involvement

4: A meeting with Apollo

5: Sometimes it’s okay not to forgive people, actually. Perhaps I was drawn to punishment because no one will ever punish him, or because I needed to feel like I had atoned. It’s not for me now, it’s for everyone who is like the me I was.

The central question of the arc is twofold, but the two are quite strongly tied together: can I forgive what feels unforgivable? Can I go on doing this job?

This of course, will involve a fair amount of blending and adjustment of myths, but as always, the core remains the same, even if what the story is really about becomes completely different.

And last but not least, we have Hades!

I haven’t gotten more messages about potential character arcs for anyone than I’ve gotten for Hades. Part of this is a little frustrating, because at times the suggestions can seem a little demanding, or like the person making them doesn’t trust that I can see the very obvious potential in themes about life and death and so on. But on the other hand I know it’s because people are invested, and so I do sincerely hope I can do justice to those themes, and Hades’s character as well.

The one-sentence summary of this subplot would be something like: “Death tries to cultivate a positive relationship with humanity.” And that’s, really, what it’s about. Hades has plenty of trauma in his backstory, some of which will naturally come out as he interacts with the PC, but it doesn’t form the locus of the story in the same way it does with, say, Alekto or Charon. I’ve tried to make everyone’s stories feel different, in mood and atmosphere and themes, but what carries through them all is meant to be the power of relationships with other people, and this one tackles that perhaps a bit more literally than the others.

Let’s take a look at the outline:

1: For as much control as I have over humans here, out there they barely know me (backstory)

2: Tentative venture out to solve some problems; awe-terror reaction.

3: Oddly, a small cult seems to have sprung up; please help me think of something to do to help them.

4: My cult is being chased out of their area by people who don’t want to invoke me. I should help them find somewhere safe to live.

5: Maybe for now it’s better if I don’t have too much contact with living humans, but I’m glad I could do something positive for those people because I’m death.

The central questions here are, again, intertwined: Is there anything good about death? Would it be okay for me to have more contact with humans?

I hope this framing gives ample opportunity for character development, and for the PC to have a big impact on things. It should also dovetail quite nicely with possible developments in the PC’s own cult, if they wound up with one as a result of their actions in FoA. That subplot, along with one about Demeter and Iasion, will be the subject of next month’s spoilerific plot bits.