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Jason Ross and Gnoll's Honour · Inspiring Stories

0:04
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to the picture of the radiant.
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Speaker 2: Rat.
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Speaker 3: You readything to me?
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Speaker 4: Oh well, well say, oh well, not a bad stop.
1:09
Speaker 5: I just see.
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Speaker 6: Splashion stops it dead.
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Speaker 5: Event.
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Speaker 1: In a world where ancient empires have crumbled and new
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kingdoms rise, a young nole named Tack fights to defend
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his clan's land from invaders, but when tragedy strikes and
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he is left wounded and alone, he discovers that not
2:07
all humans are enemies, with new found allies and determination
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to unite his people, and in the bloodshed, he embarks
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on a dangerous journey of diplomacy redemption, where even his
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greatest enemy may become his closest friend. Will he succeed
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in living in peace to the land torn by war?
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Or will centuries of hate and mistrust lead to the
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ultimate destruction of all? So welcome to the show, everybody,
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and we're going to hear from the author of Knowle's Honor,
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Jason Ross, as he describes some of his motivations for
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actually writing the book and the directions he wants to
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take this in as it could become a whole series
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of books about Teck and his Noel friends.
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Speaker 5: Thank you.
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Speaker 1: All right, Jason, Welcome to the show Man. It's good
3:59
to see you again. You know, we've been trying to
4:03
do some work together and everything, and we're finbably getting
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to at least to an interview about Knowle's honor. Now,
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the graphics you sent me and everything, they look fantastic.
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But why don't we start with how did you start
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developing this story and where where's where did the story
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come from?
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Speaker 2: It's actually a story. I've been doing different variations on
4:31
this story for probably the last couple of decades. Is
4:34
kind of in my head. This is the first time
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I've actually decided to start writing it down, though, And
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I'd have to say my couple of inspirations I really
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had were from ra Salvator's Forgotten Realm series focusing on
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the draw Elf Drizz, as well as then his later
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edition of you know, the Orcish Kingdom, you know, led
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by King Obbold and kind of starting to break away
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from your traditional fantasy tropes of you know, this particular
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set of races are the evil races, so they're and
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you'll meet one of them, you know what they're going
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to be like. And these guys are the good races,
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so they're always going to be beneficial to meet them.
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And then of course then you have the humans or
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the gray morally gray people that could be good or
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bad or anywhere in between. Right right now, I just
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decided to go with you know, they're all intelligent, thinking,
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reasoning being so free will cultures will create different cultures,
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or maybe racial and species tendencies might create different tendencies
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for them that some might tend towards being more violent
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than others, some might have a culture that's more militaristic
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and warrior focused. Right, So, you know, you'll still have
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those tendencies, but everyone is still has their free will
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and they can choose if they want to follow those
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tendencies or you know, or blaze their own path in
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the world.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, well, the tokenisms are cold, but we don't have
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this strictly always follow them, right.
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Speaker 2: Like, yeah, they're always going to be the bad guys.
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Speaker 1: You know, they're going to side with the evil wizard
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or whatever. Right, we can. We can play around with that, right, So.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, certainly. I'm actually currently also doing a short story,
6:32
you know, as part of an anthology that my community
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Ready Needed Developers is working on in the fantasy genre,
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which is going to be kind of a bit of
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an origin story of the Knowles from like ancient times.
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So in the case of the Noles in Noles Honor,
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they basically are are a manufactured race that was essentially
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created to be warriors. Hence their reputation is that they're
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violent and you know, brutish. So but of course many
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many centuries have passed since, you know, the time of
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that war, and not all of them have remained that way, right,
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And that's kind of where the story picks up on is,
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you know, one group of of clans of this species
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that have you know, that set off to find some
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remote corner of the world where they could, you know,
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just get away from all the wars that had nearly
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destroyed them. And where the story picks up is is
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three hundred years after this particular group of thirteen clans
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that all took an epic journey together to find a
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you know, just a quiet place to you know, to
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live out their lives. And and then the main character
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is this goes for short by Tack. It picks up
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with him just a day before his sixteenth birthday when
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he's supposed to be going out with his father to
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do a special hunt where he's supposed to prove that
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he can support a family, and that's when disaster strikes
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and you know, some enemies that his clan has been
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at war with for the last couple of years at
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this point ends up finding their home, his clan's home
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village and attacking it. And so that's kind of where
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the story picks up in the first chapter. So this
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was allso like.
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Speaker 1: Of an emotional grabber right there. It was like tax
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family is is attacked? Is town is is uh, we're
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going to say mostly destroyed.
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Speaker 2: Or yeah, right, yeah, essentially, yeah, essentially it's you know,
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it's burned, you know, burned to the ground. And they
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end up and so his glands going to be moving
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to a new place to rebuild their village, and essentially
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they're technologically they're kind of in a semi nomad state
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where they will build permanent structures, but you know, they
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do move around periodically. When an area is getting over hunted,
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they'll move to a new place. However, their movements in
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this since the war started being constrained because about half
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their territory is now contested land. So they obviously can't
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locate their civilian population anywhere near that right, So that's
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kind of lock you know, their civilian population in the
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kind of the northeastern corner of their territory. M.
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Speaker 1: So, the so that they, of course, the civilians and
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combatants are are protected, right.
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Speaker 2: That's the idea. And so in this case though, you know,
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the case where the invading army ended up coming in
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through a route that yeah, you know, through an eastern
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route that the they're defending army hadn't anticipated, and so
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they end up getting behind the army and into their
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main village. And then and then in the second half
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of the opening chapter then switches over to the antagonists
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point of view when you start to kind of realize
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why they're at war with the Knoles and that you know,
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they've you know, been having all kinds of problems with
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you know, with you know, you know, Nolish raiders invading
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their lands constantly, and any time you've ever seen Noles,
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it's always been hostile invaders attacking them.
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Speaker 1: So m.
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Speaker 2: And as well as that, so I don't want to
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say too much more about their recent you know, about
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the thought pattern going into the assault, because that of
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course somebody spoilers. But that's kind of the idea behind
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why they were you know, the human side of it
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is at war with the Noles is is that they've
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had nothing but bad history with that race.
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Speaker 1: Yea. So in this in this particular case, through tax size,
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the humans aren't exactly the good guys exactly. So yeah, and.
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Speaker 2: Basically what you know, kind of what sparks the war
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in the backstory is the kingdom the humans come from
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is trying to build a road, you know, you know,
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a road through to you know, connect through to a
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mountain pass on it goes through mountains to the north
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of tax people, which would then connect into another kingdom
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that's kind of styled after the Scandinavian people, you know,
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up in the far North, because that kingdom is trying
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to connect to a trade a trade road to the
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ocean and a seaport, and the seaports they traditionally used
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are not you know, safe anymore because it's in a
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fallen kingdom that's you know, where that area is being
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ruled by bandit you know, robber barons and pirate raiders,
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and so that's kind of you know, in the backstory,
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that's kind of the trigger for why they're going up
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into that territorial encountering tax people, and for tax people,
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they're defending their territory from the invaders.
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Speaker 1: The humans are doing the human thing of hey, you're
13:21
not human, so you're not worthy of this anyway. This
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should be ours because you're not human anyway.
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Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, I mean there's more to it than that.
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It's also a case of you know, we need to
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get through here, this is the only route through, and
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these guys are getting in the way and attacking us,
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and to our knowledge, nobody lives here. So these and
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this is also an area that's going through this forest
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called the Blackthorn Woods that you know, the Knolls call
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home but has a reputation from hundreds of years ago
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when an empire at once dominated the area fell of
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being you know, cursed and infested with monsters. Of course,
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there's a whole story behind that that kind of you know,
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get bits and pieces of that coming out and in
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the book. So from their point of view, these are
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these are some of the monsters that infest the area
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just attacking them and and so they're defending themselves from
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you know, some evil creatures that are attacking them. From
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their point of view, yeah, that's kind of creating a
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bit of a dichotomy that early. Neither side's holly good
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or evil. They're you know, they each have their reasons
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for doing what they're doing. Yeah, And at the end
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of the day, the war what has really come down
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to is what does war usually come down to real life?
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They're fighting over territory. One side has it, the other
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side wants it.
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Speaker 1: Well, yeah, we look at the real life consequences the
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war as like in the and if they have a conversation, hey,
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we want to build a road to connect to this,
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and then they all say say yes or no or
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what the conditions are for that road to be built? Right,
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then everybody has a happy ending, you know, loss of
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life avoid.
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Speaker 2: It, right, And that's kind of what the story is
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all about, is kind of can these two people that
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you know, that are at odds with each other actually
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overcome their differences and forge a piece with each other?
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Speaker 7: Yeah, So without swelling the whole book, you know, maybe
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they do come to some sort of a piece or
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understanding or you know.
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Speaker 2: So yeah, Well, at the same time, there's other you know,
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there's other interest in the world that would rather see
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those peep Yeah, to see that kingdom continue being stuck
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in all these different wars up north. Yeah.
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Speaker 1: So, you know, I want to say this though, One
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of the things I like about the fantasy genre is
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that through through that fantasy world you can say a
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lot about what's happening in our in our real world
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without offending people, right, yeah, yeah.
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Speaker 2: For sure.
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Speaker 1: And it seems like you're you're actually your book is
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following that same exact suit about what's going on. Just
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take the territory, you know, Oh, it's nothing but but
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these evil, brainless creatures attacking anyway, so just pushed through it, right.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, so, and and in the book, I won't say
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who does what, but the you know, the uh, it's
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gonna be one small random act of kindness. It's going
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to actually set in motion the potential for peace. Of course,
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whether or not that's realized, well, that's why you read
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the story to find out.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, well it's been. Of course in real life again,
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there have been many recorded random acts of kindness that
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did help bring people together. Later that's so much governments,
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but they bring people together.
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Speaker 2: Right, yes, And of course the government it's hard for
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them to maintain a war if the people that are
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out in the front lines fighting it don't want to
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fight it anymore.
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Speaker 1: Well, yeah, that's become a little difficult, right, Yeah.
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Speaker 2: Even if you're an authoritarian, you know, ruler that rules
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with absolute authority, you still need people to carry out
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your orders. And if they just choose not to comply
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on en mass, well what can you do? Yeah? Well,
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I think there's a certain king named Louis and France
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have found that out the hard way. Oh yeah, people
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choose not to comply. It could become rather dangerous for
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the leader, right right, right, you know, doesn't give the
18:14
people what they want.
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Speaker 1: The whole French Revolution thing there. Yeah, yeah, that was
18:21
kind of disastrous for him, wasn't it.
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Speaker 2: So?
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Speaker 1: But like you said, there's a lot of parallels that
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can be drawn. And it's one of the things I
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really appreciated, going back to the token ism because when
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those when those books were written, you didn't you had
18:51
Germany attacking and stuff like that. It wasn't War War.
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It was World War one, I think it was, or
18:57
somewhere between the two or something. Yeah, that he wrote
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his books and you see the the political representation of
19:08
you know, the evil creatures versus the the good teach creatures,
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and how they had to band together to to defeat
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the evil, right, So yeah, that yeah, definitely token you
19:25
and his Lord of the Rings, you know world in
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Middle Earth.
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Speaker 2: That I really did kind of set in motion the
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overarching fantasy trope of the dark Lord, which you get
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you see showing up not only in fantasy but in
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some science fiction, like for example, in the Star Wars
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universe with you know, the Emperor and and his you know,
19:52
in his second and likely heir apparent to dark Lord
19:57
Darth Vader and all that. Yeah, and then you see
20:01
in like the Aragon series you have Emperor Galbatorix who's
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presented as this all powerful dark lord type, and many
20:12
others that, I mean, even the Wheel of Time you have,
20:15
Well that was kind of more in the overarching eternal
20:18
good versus evil battle that's never ending, yeah, which kind
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of requires you have the dark Lord trope in that
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one and the light Lord. Yeah.
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Speaker 1: Well, it's far on on on the warring end of things.
20:37
One of I actually used the quote from Doctor Who
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about after all the battles are fought and all that,
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and the mass destruction happens, lives or lost and everything,
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you still have to sit down at the table and
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talk about what's going to happen after, you know, still
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got to be discussed, and why not skip all that
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and just go straight to the conversation.
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Speaker 2: You know. Of course, sometimes there's a third party that's
21:12
stirring the pot and making that difficult. Sometimes there's hot
21:16
heads that just can't see any other way than war.
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And sometimes there's a language barrier where one or the
21:27
other side or both sides are trying to talk but
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they can't understand what each other is saying.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, I like how Star Trek eventually handled that language
21:37
barrier thing with the Universal Translator.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, even then, they still sometimes will have the language
21:44
barrier come up if there's a language that's not been cataloged.
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Speaker 1: Before traditions there was one the next generations and where
21:56
certain traditions had to be followed, or something like that,
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you know, yeah, so or else the person's internally offended
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or something, you.
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Speaker 2: Know, yeah, and then you then there's also been times
22:08
where they've encountered someone who, you know, species use language
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syntaxes quite different from anything they've encounter before. So it's
22:17
something where their language, entire language syntax has never been cataloged,
22:20
and it takes a little while for the universal translator
22:24
to start figuring out the words. Yeah, I think any
22:29
even you know, languages that use familiar syntax. If it's
22:33
a new language, it's still you know it can you
22:35
know they'd still show could sometimes take up to a
22:37
minute or two of of talking before it would start
22:42
figuring out what the words mean and then start translating.
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And even and it might be imperfect, as there might
22:48
be still encounter unknown words periodically that would fail to
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translate initially, and then eventually, after a long enough period
22:57
of time, it eventually get the entire dictionary of that
23:01
language cataloged and translated into all other known languages. But
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sometimes it would take time, even with Star Trek next
23:10
gen level computers.
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Speaker 1: Yeah. But but but when when you considered consider real
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life value to that, it's it's sometimes it takes a
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while to understand people what they want and and everything.
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So it's a It's one of the things I like
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about uh, fantasy science fiction and the art is behind them,
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is like, hey, I'm making a point here. Why don't
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we all use commerce coler heads and and be patient
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and and it works out we're all basically wanting the
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same things, some sort of security for our generations or whatever,
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you know.
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Speaker 2: So yeah, so yeah, yeah, and and actually I was
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speaking of science. That's actually something that I put, you know,
24:04
you know into the world building of Nole's Honor in
24:07
addition to you know, your you know, more magic based
24:11
fantasy triops and the way the magic works actually Nole's
24:14
Honor is it's a very I would say, it's a
24:16
hard magic system in a sense that what magic can
24:19
and can't do is quite clearly defined, but the magic
24:22
itself is designed to be working more subtle ways and
24:28
rather than flashy, which I think I kind of took
24:33
some inspiration from how the magic is portrayed here for
24:37
the most part, in for example, Middle Earth, in that
24:41
you know, you never see Gandalf throwing any fancy fireballs
24:45
or throwing lightning bolts about, or even the big bad
24:48
Souron does that their magic kind of works in a
24:52
lot subtler ways and over longer periods of time, whether
24:58
it's influencing people's moods and emotions, or or whether it's
25:04
being able to divine and foresee future possibilities and kind
25:10
of understand more of what's going on in the world
25:14
than your average mundane person without magic. Would. Yeah. So,
25:20
like in the books, for example, Lord Denethor knows a
25:23
lot about what Sauron's plans are and what his potential
25:28
allies are doing because he's using his peal ANDERI to
25:32
view what's going on in the world, and that's kind
25:36
of a contributing factor to also what mentally breaks them eventually,
25:40
you know, by the end of his arc Is has
25:46
too many tragedies too close together with losing you know,
25:49
so he thought both his sons plus you know, one
25:52
too many tests of wills with Sauron. Right. But so
25:58
in my world, the magic kind of works similarly to
26:02
that that you that it helps give you a broader
26:05
understanding of the world when you're able to use it.
26:09
You know, though it's not going to be some way
26:12
you can use that for direct combat action or anything
26:15
you're doing anything crazy like that. You know. For the
26:20
science part of it, you know, in college, actually studied
26:23
classes on geology, meteorology, climate, so what it is. I
26:28
decided to apply that knowledge to the world building and
26:31
creating a full you know, once the world building is complete,
26:35
there will be a full globe, a world roughly Earth
26:39
sized with you know, the land masses based around plate tectonics,
26:44
and a real world geology is to where a mountain
26:49
building happens, where oceans lie, where can that's lie, where
26:53
your islands are, and all that, as well as what
26:57
areas get what kind of weather.
27:00
Speaker 1: Right based on real geology, physics all.
27:05
Speaker 2: That, right, Yeah, so yeah, give me a chance to
27:09
use some science that I studied both as electives and
27:14
out of the fact that I am genuinely interested in
27:17
learning about that stuff. Just until started building the world
27:22
for Nole's Honor, it didn't get a lot of opportunity
27:24
to use it as much as out of light. But
27:29
that's you know, that's actually been a I'd say a
27:31
really fun part of the process is, you know, creating
27:35
this complete world, which means that you know, I can
27:38
do all kinds of different stories go forward and backward
27:42
in time on this world to set things into a
27:45
more primitive or more advanced time than say late Middle Ages,
27:50
which is where the time period that Nol's Honor takes
27:53
place in. Right, I can switch to very different cultures
27:58
simply by moving the story to a different part of
28:01
the world where there's very different types of people there.
28:05
Speaker 1: Right now kind of makes sense, you know, we we
28:11
we we keep dancing around this a little bit, but
28:15
is there an ultimate message that you want people to
28:18
get from those honor and and and the world that
28:22
you that you've created.
28:25
Speaker 2: I would say probably the most recurring theme is really
28:33
just how terrible war is, because well, you know, is
28:38
there a lot of cases where there's you know, there
28:42
is a battle scene, it's not just showing kind of
28:44
the glory of it that it's really showing, you know,
28:48
the aftermath of it, the loss. So I mean there
28:52
is going to be some named, you know, named characters
28:55
in there that will die as part of helping to
29:02
really drive that home as well as you're going to
29:04
see as well as there are scenes where you see
29:07
the aftermath of battle, combat and warfare. Yeah, and you know,
29:13
the terrible consequences of it, such as for example, you know,
29:20
in one of the characters returns back to his home,
29:26
his home village, and to find it, yeah, you know,
29:31
nothing left of it but to burnt out ruins for example,
29:35
and all the people have moved on. Or in another
29:38
scene where where a patrol of scouts comes across a
29:45
farm that's been burnt out and they find you know,
29:48
the family, you know, the burnt remain, charred remains of
29:51
the family inside their house, Yeah, with signs that they'd
29:55
been restrained and forced to remain in there in the
29:58
fire and things like that. And it's kind of showing
30:02
this tragedy of the wanton destruction that happens, you know,
30:06
in times of war and chaos.
30:09
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was something that the talk about named characters
30:17
being killed. In the end the Harry Potter series, the
30:23
major characters that were part of the Order of the
30:25
Phoenix died, Yeah, trying to defeat defeat Baltimore, you know, so,
30:35
and it kind of makes makes a point, you know,
30:39
they especially when we were talking about battles in war,
30:43
there's uh, they a lot of people want to say, oh,
30:49
there was, there's an honor in signing up for the
30:52
army and and of course in some political fashions. I
30:56
don't want to dive too much into US politics in
30:59
the but there balance back and forth. Well, he never
31:03
saw comebat Well, he never signed up for the draft.
31:05
It's like, so they're less than honorable because they didn't
31:10
go to war, and that's not exactly a true statement. Yeah,
31:15
the war has nothing to do with with being honoring
31:19
going to war. And coming back is more about luck
31:21
than it is about being honorable.
31:25
Speaker 2: Yeah, although going to war and being willing to put
31:29
yourself your life in danger to you know, for the
31:34
betterment of others, you know that there is honor in that.
31:38
And then the courage of yeah, you know, fighting to
31:41
defend something that you know means something to you, and
31:45
you know, being willing to face that your fears and
31:49
face that ultimate sacrifice and the chance that you might
31:54
not come back from this thing that you're doing. I mean,
31:58
there is that all of it. Now, That's actually something
32:01
I do also bring out in there is is that
32:07
at the end of the day, if somebody is attacking you,
32:09
you got to defend yourself and sometimes you got to
32:11
go to war to do that. If it's many people
32:14
attacking many people, that's when you get a war happening.
32:18
And yeah, and if somebody is getting into your territory
32:23
the land that you need in order to live and survive,
32:26
and are going to start constraining and squeezing you out
32:29
of your ability to provide, then you know what's the
32:34
outcome of that is your people are conventional you to
32:36
starve and die or you to get pushed into inhospitable
32:39
lands where you know where're gonna have nothing but rocks
32:43
to eat, and you know your life expectancy is going
32:46
to be very good. It's making to be bitter cold,
32:48
and you're so not fighting that war is just submitting
32:53
to death, just a longer slower death than you know,
32:58
fighting for what's yours.
33:00
Speaker 1: Mm hm for a good point, you know, so because.
33:06
Speaker 2: You know in our day of luxury and say, well,
33:08
this thing is just a hammer, But to that carpenter
33:11
in the Middle Ages, that hammer is his life. Some
33:15
thief comes and takes his hammer. That carpenter can't earn
33:18
a living. If you can't earn a living, he can't
33:19
get food. If he can't get food, you die. So
33:23
that thief stealing a hammer is literally stealing that carpenter's
33:26
life and that of his entire family. He's got a family.
33:32
So you know, there's a reason why people in less
33:35
affluent societies treat things like theft as a life or
33:39
death thing is because it.
33:40
Speaker 1: Is absolutely true, you know.
33:45
Speaker 2: And so you get into something like in the world
33:48
of Nol's honor, where so you're going to take someone's
33:52
land away from them. Well, in the case of tax
33:56
Klan who are called the Klug. So in the case
33:58
of the Kluge, you start taking half their land away
34:01
from well, they need that land to hunt and log
34:04
and mine, mine iron and other minerals. You know that
34:10
they need to be able to go about their life,
34:12
and you take that away from them, you're taking away
34:14
their ability to do that and survive. So you can
34:20
bet they're going to fight for that because they're fighting
34:22
for their lives.
34:23
Speaker 1: Right, absolutely, And that's not always a matter of honor,
34:30
that's a matter of survival, you know. Yeah, So survival
34:36
is a totally different story, you know.
34:39
Speaker 2: Yeah.
34:40
Speaker 1: So, and well there's a lot of examples of colonialism
34:49
where they decided, oh, well, we want that for ourselves
34:54
and you don't know what you're doing with it anyway,
34:56
so we're just going to take it from you, and
34:59
people will had to die for that sort of sort
35:03
of belief.
35:04
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, And you know, I would, and I would
35:08
say that pretty much every society, you know, every culture,
35:13
every society, and every every corner of earth has done
35:17
some form of colonialism at some point or another, maybe
35:21
the only exceptions being in really ancient times. And you're
35:25
having the first humans ever to set foot in a
35:27
particular part of the earth that maybe that you would
35:32
say is is you know, non destructive to someone else colonialism?
35:40
Speaker 1: But right, yeah, you look in.
35:44
Speaker 2: Africa, there's plenty, you know, you look in Africa. The
35:48
Zulu actually in the time of Shaka Zulu, actually his
35:52
motivation to rise to powers and and train his people
35:57
into a warrior society is because the Zoo who were
36:00
basically being taken as slaves by their neighbors constantly. So
36:05
they're essentially the Zulu people were being colonialized by their
36:09
own neighbors. And I'm not talking about Europeans, I'm talking
36:12
about fellow African people that don't like each other. And
36:16
so he trained his people to become warriors. They went
36:18
over and conquered the people that were constantly taking them
36:21
as slaves, and so then the colonizers became the colonized.
36:28
Speaker 1: At that point. Well yeah, yeah, it's and there's plot
36:35
there's stories like that also.
36:37
Speaker 2: So yeah, or take the Mongolian Empire that again they
36:42
conquered the way across all of you know, Genghis Khan
36:46
conquers the way across all of Mongolian lands, reuniting all
36:49
the Mongolian tribes. Then he conquered China and most of
36:55
you know, Eastern and Southeast Asia, conquers the way across
36:57
India and into eastern Europe and the Middle East. M hm.
37:03
And we're not for a few fortunate things. For the Europeans,
37:06
he likely would have made his way all the way
37:08
to the Atlantic coast and colonized all of Europe. So yeah,
37:13
you get different, you get you get like bates of
37:18
that from all over the place. And then of course
37:20
obviously things like the British Empire, oh yeah, Spanish Empire
37:26
and all that. So it is, yeah, that is an
37:30
unfortunate thing that happens in history, and eventually we like
37:35
to think that we're getting the point where it's kind
37:37
of starting to evolve beyond that for most of human society.
37:42
Speaker 1: We would like to believe that. And like I said, well,
37:48
I don't want to get too political because this isn't
37:51
that that that that exactly that show. Uh, but you know,
37:58
current events may be proving differently, you know. So you know,
38:06
but with with your writings, your books, your and your artwork,
38:12
did you're creating a world where you're trying to teach
38:18
people maybe to think a little bit differently, right, yeah.
38:23
Speaker 2: Some of that. A lot also is you know, there's
38:26
a want to create entertainment that's entertaining as well, yet
38:29
at the same time working in you know that this
38:32
world does have its you know, it does have its politics,
38:37
and and it's in there and there. You know, so
38:40
there's people, you know, different peoples that don't like each other,
38:44
other people that groups of people that do like each other.
38:49
So for example, you know, going back to the clue,
38:53
they basically they have you know, neighbors on four sides.
38:57
To the east, there's the other twelve ally clans, you know,
39:02
so those we obviously be friendly their allies, and that's
39:06
actually something that is meant to be a factor in
39:10
the story, you know, the fact that these twelve thirteen
39:14
clans are all allied with each other. To the north,
39:17
they've got a mountain range with a couple of passes
39:20
through it which leads to a land called Isinsland, which
39:24
is very heavily modeled after the Norsemen in their culture
39:30
and the way they're portrayed. And that kingdom is has
39:36
had you know, some clashes with another Nordic kingdom just
39:41
to kind of the northeast of them, and there's another
39:44
to the west of them, that they've generally been more
39:46
or less peaceful with most of the time. They also
39:49
are generally friendly with the human kingdom which is called Tardrell,
39:54
you know, to the south of the Knolish clans. And
39:59
that's why there and that's why those two people wanting
40:02
to reconnect that road, which is actually an ancient the
40:07
route of an ancient road back in the days of
40:08
an old empire that once dominated the northern part of
40:12
that continent. And so that and they still are friendly
40:18
with each other, and so they want that road to
40:21
reconnect their kingdoms. To the west is a kingdom called Wessel,
40:25
which currently has no king as it's basically been torn
40:31
apart in civil war to the point that there's really
40:34
no governing body Anymores is pretty much anarchy and robber
40:39
barons and you know, and other types of you know,
40:45
dis despicable types rising to power, just basically strong panning
40:50
their way into power in the in the power vacuum
40:53
that exists there. And of course the south is the
40:58
Charginal Kingdom, which occupies pretty much a large central grassland
41:04
and in plateau area of the continent, which you know,
41:10
caused that kingdom to kind of really blued out into
41:12
a large kingdom, you know, out of necessity, Yeah, due
41:19
to most of the lands around there being not very defensible,
41:23
making it something that's gonna kind of naturally coalesce into
41:26
a single land. And then to the east of the
41:32
thirteen Knolish clans is you know, some kind of more
41:36
northern you know, grassland area that's currently uninhabited, So that
41:46
would be your land that's open for the taking for
41:49
anyone that wants to colonize it. There's really nobody there
41:52
to complain about it.
41:56
Speaker 1: Just settle, right yeah, yeah, you know, nothing like settling
42:03
on sacred taking ground, right.
42:06
Speaker 2: So yeah, you know, unclean land that's just there for
42:09
the taking for the first person that comes and decides
42:13
to state their claim to it.
42:16
Speaker 5: Mm hmm.
42:18
Speaker 1: So be you're already in print right with the with
42:24
the book.
42:25
Speaker 2: Not yet. I'm actually still working on the final three chapters. However,
42:30
I do have a two chapter free preview available, okay, yeah,
42:35
so basically.
42:36
Speaker 1: Put that Lincoln in the of course the liner notes
42:39
of the of the show. Ah, so people can can
42:46
download that, right.
42:48
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, basically yeah, you can download that. You'll you
42:50
can also get onto our you know, into the mailing list,
42:53
you'll get updates on the progress of the book and
42:57
when it's ready to release, as well as he also
42:59
get some extra By joining the mailing list, you also
43:01
get some extra perks such as some of the character
43:04
concept art as well as some other concepts and artwork
43:09
that's coming out as it comes out. Yeah, we have
43:13
a preview.
43:16
Speaker 1: Yeah, you have a pretty pretty cool graphic team working
43:19
with you.
43:19
Speaker 2: So yeah, yeah, yeah, it was really Yeah, I would
43:25
say is forming that communities really you know, been the
43:29
difference maker because I've got three different artists and I've
43:34
worked with actually four of you count the cover artists
43:38
I worked with at different points during a book. One
43:40
of the artists I'm working with also happens to be
43:43
a fellow writer, and we're actually, you know, have a
43:47
you know, co authored book that we have planned for
43:52
when you started a bit of it, and we're planning
43:54
on continuing it after I've finished, you know, the main
43:58
writing for Nol's Honor h And that's going to be
44:02
an alternate history story that takes place during the Triassic
44:07
Age kind of write it the birth of the Age
44:09
of dinosaurs. Yeah, wow, And that's going to be involving
44:16
in alternate history where elves are the precursors of modern humans. Yes,
44:22
you have l So you have these prehistoric l's, you know,
44:25
living amongst the dinosaurs. So you know that's going to
44:31
be a fun one.
44:32
Speaker 1: But yeah, that sounds like a fun storyline. Yeah. So
44:38
ultimately with we're the best ways to actually take a
44:41
look at your work and get on that biling list.
44:47
Speaker 2: So the link that you will be included in the description,
44:50
that would be probably your best bet. You'll be able
44:52
to you know, learn more about the story. Get you know,
44:56
read the first two chapters and and that's reading, you know,
45:00
read all about what happens with you know, the events
45:03
I mentioned before with the attack on the main character's
45:08
home village attack, you know, the attack on his own
45:12
village and what their response is, which is what when
45:18
you get to in you know the second chapter.
45:23
Speaker 1: Yeah all right, so he Jason, thanks for joining us
45:28
today and we look forward to to seeing the complete
45:32
the book and all the perks and everything they go
45:37
along with being part of your mailing list so we
45:41
can keep up to date on latest greatest projects.
45:45
Speaker 2: Man, Yeah for sure. And of course Nole's honor isn't
45:48
this standalone book, there is going to be other follow
45:52
ups to it, as well as many other books planned
45:54
in the world of Knowle's Honor. As I mentioned, I'm
45:58
building a complete world, so there's plenty of opportunity for
46:03
additional stories taking even take place in any kind of
46:07
time period. He even think of even you know, you know,
46:10
emerging fantasy with you know, a bit more modern themes. Yeah,
46:15
are possible. I won't say what I'll what exactly I'll do,
46:19
because I haven't figured it all out yet, but you know,
46:22
I do have a kind of an overarch and story
46:25
plan in mind for the first three or four books,
46:29
starting with Knowle's Honor, and then we'll go from there.
46:35
Speaker 1: Awesome, all right, everybody, thanks for joining us today. Check
46:39
out the show notes and get the link to the
46:45
mailing list. Join in with Jason as he celebrates Knowle's
46:50
Honor in the whole world that he's actually building. It's
46:54
going to be fun, so, uh, talk to everybody later,
46:57
and please find that subscribe button wherever it is.
47:01
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's been a pleasure being on here and definitely
47:03
looking forward to being a lega talk about our the
47:07
other upcoming projects in the future.
47:10
Speaker 3: Help us to.
47:24
Speaker 5: So I don't know, so I wish your PROWN match.
47:42
Speaker 2: So what.
47:50
Speaker 1: This guess.
47:56
Speaker 3: To sit me ca chob.
48:07
Speaker 5: Wall shows.
48:11
Speaker 3: You can't dres wait.
48:16
Speaker 5: So wa got?
49:32
Speaker 1: The show has been produced by Depictions Media. Please contact
49:37
us at depictions dot media for more information