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Why do problems exist?

This is a question that scholars have been asking since the dawn of time. Why is it that no one seems to be able to be content with what they have? Why is it that nothing ever remains constant? Wouldn't it be so much nicer if we could all get what we wanted, and live in a perfect utopia without strife? Many authors have written about the subject, and the conclusion is unanimously: No, it wouldn't be nicer at all.

See, life needs problems to exist. Problems give life something to do, something to strive towards. From the moment you are born, you are fighting a constant battle to secure your position in life, and even when you think you've got it all, Fate comes-a-knocking and sets you back to square one. A problem does not necessarily have to be something grand, something world-shattering; a problem can be as simple as making a sandwich because you are hungry.

If life were to eliminate problems completely, then there would be nothing left to do. Everyone would merely sit around, doing nothing much, until the Gods that created them got bored of poking around at them and trying to get something to happen, and flush the whole universe down the toilet. To them, it would be as if they were a child who's pet had one day stopped moving, and suddenly became completely uninteresting.

To prevent this fate, life has a handy built-in ability to create problems wherever it goes.

The universe, perhaps even Existence as a whole, would be a much more orderly place without life around, but it would also be so very boring. Who wants to watch a whole bunch of rocks spin around in circles around each other, ad infinitum? Certainly not I.

And this is why Existence was built to be inherently flawed.

Every world floating out there in the void is granted the gift of life, at one point or another. Often, these gifts are spaced so far apart that they do not notice one another, but there are peculiar instances where a God got bored and introduced many different groups of life to one another. These introductions usually lead to war and the subsequent death of all species, a scale of problem-creating that gets much out of hand. The God, now displeased, starts over again, and makes a mental note for next time:

If you're going to have many forms of life coexisting, at least let them grow up together.

Thus, in many worlds, life is now thrown into a melting pot, and whatever happens, happens. Usually the instilled balance and fate inherent to most universes is enough to keep this life in check, though there are still sometimes events of total annihilation.

But I digress. I've been rambling for far too long, and you're probably wondering why you're here. Certainly you didn't come along to listen to a bored goddess ramble about the machinations of her little universe, no? I thought not.

We will be taking a peek at the next world that has made itself narratively interesting. Hypothetically, all worlds have a certain level of narrative interest, but many do not quite meet the quota to become full-fledged stories. Luckily, this world faces not this problem, and instead faces many problems in its own design. The world and its people are both inherently flawed, and the levels of narrative interest these flaws have generated have finally reached the point of coalescing into a story.

It is that story I will be telling you today.

We focus on the world of Orium, a quaint little planet orbiting a red-giant star and endowed with a pink moon. Orium, unlike many planets, was lucky enough to be placed in that which you may call a "Goldilocks Zone." Not too hot, not too cold, but just right for the development of carbon-based life.

In this world, magic is real, and it has caused a great deal of problems in its very presence.

Without further ado, I welcome you to read on and discover just what these problems are, and how they are to be solved.

Welcome to the world.

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