This lesson is dedicated to xxunrxvelingxx for requesting this.

Hey, hey heyyy! This was a difficult topic to tackle, not gonna lie. From your request, 

Lesson 8 || The Art of Building a Universe

Now worldbuilding doesn't only mean setting. You're probably thinking of the skyscrapers, the landscapes, the cultures introduced in the story. Worldbuilding is very notable when it comes to sci-fi or fantasy. But in actuality, any form of fiction requires worldbuilding. Even fiction set in modern society needs world-building.

What gives a story a sense of place comes from world-building, and if done right it sucks the readers right into it. The whole space where the story occupies is the world-building. It has to be convincing. It has to exist in and out of the character(s)'s perspective.

This whole concept boils down to the entry of information: what type of people exists in your world? How do they live in your world? What is it like to actually live there? How does the world work? But just as important as the information, the way it's conveyed is pivotal for your story. 

Show, not tell.

Info dumping is an especially bad way to tell about your world. Though it might be interesting (the info I mean), but it'll easily be forgotten by the readers. Worldbuilding often focuses on the big details like Psycho-Pass's Sybil System or Fullmetal Alchemist's alchemy.  By big detail I mean the story revolves around that system or concept you've introduced. They include political or societal laws, cultural rules the characters live from habitually, the place itself, setting, era.

Another example of interesting worldbuilding would be the "after-life" in Drifters.  It's an anime set in a universe that dumps famous characters from history into a single world. Why that happens is yet to be explained, but the anime does its job so well the characters don't feel out of place despite the different eras or place they are from.

In relation to fanfiction, problems like these certain characters feeling out of place when set in an AU (alternate universe) like maybe angels and demons existing in the universe of Diabolik Lovers. Inserting angels into the mix, I believe, is not out of place actually. Diabolik Lovers has listed that ancestors, vampires, viboras, wolves, and adlers are subraces of the demon race in the superior category. They also have a inferior category. For angels to work, whoever is writing such concept, must address these races properly so that it won't flop. 

The concept of demons, angels, and vampires is far from new in anime. In fact, vampires have been introduced time and time again as either a type of demon or a subspecies of the demon race. The beautiful thing about fanfiction, as I've said over and over, is that the writers have the freedom to recreate the existing world-building of a certain anime.  Adding new concepts like zombies or pitting a set of anime characters into the universe of another anime and making all those work is up to YOU.

The thing is, it's all about EXECUTION. Did you introduce your world properly? Did you set the rules early on? Then slowly progress it, make it exist like it belongs? How you execute your world is the key to the story.

Take this instance: 

Castlevania is an anime with vampires and demons and magicians. If you've watched it, the setting implied that vampires are of higher rank or of the same rank as the demons there. The demons are hideous in comparison and can be controlled by high ranking vampires like Dracula. Low ranking demons come from the souls of humans and can be manipulated by the ones who summoned them from Hell (although it works as well if the vampires are the ones who did the summoning).

Seraph of the End is an anime who uses angels as weapons in the universe, living weapons living in human hosts. Instead of interfering on their own volition, they let the humans fight against the vampires unless they're let out. Demons also exist in this anime and are directly related to the vampires. They function similarly to angels, that being weapons humans can use but instead of having hosts, they form contracts with the humans as their cursed gear.

Hellsing Ultimate use demons as a collective term for any creature opposed to and by God, anything predatory to humans is labeled demons. Vampires, werewolves, etc are subspecies of demons. Though we don't see angels here, but their hierarchy works similar to Noblesse, the only difference being that the pure vampire (unturned ones, born vampires) are hell stronger than turned ones. Though that rule is a given.

Angels, often if not placed on the same level as demons, and there's a complication of vampires, can be seen as Deux ex Machina like in Owari no Seraph (Seraph of the End). Angels aren't necessarily out of place when placed in the same story as demons/vampires. How they're introduced and placed is what will stop them from being out of place.

Sure, some people might not like it, but that's normal. People have their preferences. But it's really gonna be like that.

Alternate Universe fanfics need to do well in this, because we know what the original anime is like. But we accept them as is, instead of thinking of it as out of place. What they did right is setting their world as THE WORLD. You need to convince your readers, keep them in their toes, keep them interested and believe in your story. Remember, execution.

Then there are the smaller details in world-building. Some of them might include what the characters eat, what are the cultural habits people in that world exhibit? The transportation, the feel. To the readers, how would they feel? What do they see? What are their mannerisms for instance? Within these small details, your world-building comes alive! 

Any story not set in a fantasy or sci-fi live off of the more subtle sense of worldbuilding. Have you noticed how some animes feel so big? Or how an anime may seem to have such a small world? That all boils from your worldbuilding: controlling the information given and choosing what information you choose to give to your readers to set your world. 

Take Haikyuu! for example. The anime centers around volleyball so much we don't actually know what the characters do when not doing volleyball. Aside from their basic info, we don't know anything else (this is based on the anime I haven't read the manga XP). But the writers chose to cut everything to the characters and their relationship to volleyball and everything else connected to that. That's information control. They've limited us to the volleyball world of Haikyuu!. 

Now that we've discussed in length what world-building is, we'll delve into the common problems writers do when they write their stories and flop their world-building. By flop, I mean readers won't buy into your world-building and find it unrealistic.

FOUR COMMON PROBLEMS

1 || RULE FUDGING

When you set up a rule you have to follow through it through the entire book. There might be situations that might be exceptions to the rules to create some kind of plot twist or a surprise. It might make the reader too aware of the writer's intentions which ruins the readers' suspension of disbelief. You wouldn't want your readers to wonder why YOU wrote it that way or think that you are TRYING to fill up PLOT HOLES. 

An example would be like, maybe you set your story in an urban fantasy one, and there's a quest to find something. But the only ones who could find it would be whoever is linked to the person who hid that something in the first place. Your protagonist, who you've established not linked to that person in any way, suddenly finds it. You, the writer, have just cheated your own rule by changing it in the end with "the one to find it doesn't have to be related. But instead, embody their same virtues or they attained the conditions needed."

Now to handle these situations like creating exceptions, it has to be introduced in the story early on. It's already been hinted so it's not gonna be like a bomb dropped.

Another is to make the characters as surprised as you. Like if they happen to have met the required conditions unknowingly, it'll be more convincing. 

What you CANNOT do is info dump and try to justify the whole ordeal. 

2 ||  NOT FOLLOWING YOUR RULES

You not following the rules set in your story will make the readers feel iffy and most especially that it's been established earlier on. Another would be if the characters don't utilize what you've established already.

An example would be like when you've set that people can easily travel because there are teleportation stations now. But instead of doing that, you decide that they go by car so that there will be a filler scene while that happens. Now the readers will start questioning because they know that there is teleportation so why car?

If you're not going to follow your rules there has to be good reasons for that. 

3 || THE WORLD IS TOO STATIC/FIXED

This one is a little more subtle. It talks about the tensions you should establish within your world. People seem too comfortable with the way things are. People don't seem to have any desire for change. Time doesn't seem to have moved on, people don't seem to have progressed in some way. Things always change, whether small or big scale. 

There just doesn't seem to be any drama or progression basically. 

4 || INTERCONNECTEDNESS IS NOT CONSIDERED

Everything that happens affects other things, whether just in the OC's perspective or in the perspective of the people around them. You have to consider the consequences of your OCs actions, and note there has to be. There has to be an effect coming from events that have occurred. Otherwise, you're not able to build tension, you're not developing your story well enough. There can be subtlety in this, it doesn't have to be huge, but there has to be an effect. It's like dropping a tad bit of ink into your water. Of course, it's not going to turn black, but you do know that it's not purely water anymore there are chemicals in it.

An example could be like, your characters had a huge fight. And maybe they couldn't resolve things properly so it affects their relationship and those around them. People will feel awkward around them and etc. An extreme example would be if there was a post-war in your story, and to see the interconnectedness from that war to the modern-day would be the victims made from it and their attitude towards that war.

After a lot of research, what I wrote above sums them all up. I enjoy worldbuilding, I really do. They're not the major kind like creating a fantasy world or any world, as a matter of fact, that isn't the modern world. 

When you expand the universe unbeknownst to readers, like for example, in one of the fanfics I'm currently working on, I expanded how Tokyo looks like. I reached Ikebukuro where the university is. You won't see that in anime, and that already counts as worldbuilding.

There's also Terror In Resonance: Silence of the Lambs, Subaru is introduced working in a bar and almost dies while fighting some creatures. That counts as worldbuilding as well.

Zombies are universal monsters that work in almost any type of genre, and them being in The Mourning Samurai doesn't make them seem out of place at all. They fit into the story narrative and they work well with the plot as well.

In the same way, you need to OWN your world. You're writing, so own it. There's no such thing as a bad story idea, just the execution.

♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

I hope you found this helpful, please comment your thoughts, suggest ideas, and good luck with your writing!!!

//hugs

See you at the next chapter! And don't be scared to request lessons or suggestions on what the next chapter should be about. I'll be talking about story pacing in the next chapter and then story technicals like preparing the story and characters :)

P.S. I'm gonna be ballsy and ask you guys to please support my works here in WP ;u; I know that some have you have been reading my stuff, and that means a lot, so thank you. 

- To Our Eternity, a Tsukishima Kei x OC, set on his second year. 

- Warmer than Black, Tetsurou Kuroo x OC, set on his second year of college. 

- The Mourning Samurai, ninjaxsamurai Naruto Shippuden AU with zombies.

- Faust Lied to the Devil, intense and dark mystery crime fanfic for the BNHA community

- Watchdog: Cries of Valor and Carnage, a BSD fic coming soon later this month!

FRIENDLY TIP: 

Label your stories properly. If it's not with the canon story, label it AU so the readers know what's coming to them. You should also label pivotal characters from the anime in your fanfic! Names, aliases, etc!