◎ Life's rules ◎
Life has several sets of rules that define what sort of fantasy world it is. To give you a broad idea, here's the gist of its rules, what can and can't go, and what can be expected of its worldbuilding.
General
▶︎ On Life, one of the biggest rules is that everything, from creatures to events to geography to magic, must have a logical reason to be the way it is. That reason isn't always known to the ones involved with the situation, but behind it there is a solid reason, a pattern that would always yield the same results were the thing to be replicated under the exact same circumstances.
▶︎ Nearly all laws of nature apply to Life, but there is one thing that is different: mana energy exists. This energy is a raw energy that can change into other types of energy, for example kinetic energy to move an object, and as a result has a ton of applications that explain the supernatural that exists on Life.
▶︎ Keeping in mind the previous rule, everything that happens on Life should be able to happen on earth if magic existed on earth.
Creatures and species
▶︎ There are two types of creatures: naturally evolved creatures, and magically created creatures. Naturally evolved creatures can be influenced by magic to become magically created creatures, and magically created creatures can evolve over time if they are capable of reproduction.
▶︎ Naturally evolved creatures will always follow the colour schemes found in earth creatures, meaning that they mostly rely on brown pigments, or they are colourful but in turn sacrifice their survival chances.
▶︎ Magically created creatures always have something or someone that created them. Because of their nature, they can have any shape and any colours but there are a few things that need to be kept in mind:
1. Even if they were created brightly coloured, they still wouldn't necessarily survive in their habitat. Could they have as many generations as they do without being predated to extinction?
2. Even if on paper they work, if their physiology and anatomy don't work, they don't work. Floating creatures would need a source of energy to float or they'd fall even if their design implies they'd float. Creatures who are pure energy would need a way to keep their energy together or it would just disperse and be lost. Creation is a tool to construct things that can't occur naturally, but they need to be constructed so carefully that they can live at all in the first place.
▶︎ Under all circumstances, sentient creatures can't be reduced to just one trait like they are in most fantasy. Demons can be good people, bad people, or the most common a mixed bag of good and bad actions just like angels, dragons, humans, and any other race can be.
Magic
▶︎ Magic, too, relies on laws. Under the exact same conditions, two different experiments should yield the exact same results with no variation. It can't just be random.
▶︎ Magic is not sentient; just like heat energy and matter it follows certain rules. The reason that mages exist is because they have the right tools to manipulate magic the way they see fit, in the same way flint and steel can create a fire where one would need it but the fire has no idea that it was used to cook meat.
Universes and time travel
▶︎ In the story, there is an infinite amount of universes and of every existing universe, there's an infinite amount of exact copies of that universe that don't differ in any way from the current universe. It's impossible to define where, when, and how these exist because of humanity's current lack of understanding of even our own universe, but keep in mind these exist in the story.
▶︎ All universes are independent from each other. Identical universes can't be changed unless something or someone from a different non-identical universe were to go to that dimension. Even then, only that particular universe changes from the infinite amount of other identical universes, and it becomes a unique universe after that point. The only way to detect a unique universe would be by how it is different in total energy levels from the other universes, but since the differences are so small they never really get detected.
▶︎ Time travel is impossible in the time traveler's own dimension. If someone time travels, they just go to one of the other identical universes and they turn it into a unique universe. They don't actually change their original.
▶︎ There's a possibility for people to travel to an unlinked universe, usually by chance but sometimes coordinated and with a specific world in mind. Magic can make temporary links between universes, or it can establish a permanent link that won't be broken and results in more travel happening between the two universes.
▶︎ (I was thinking about changing the way universe work so that there is one template universe that has infinite copies. If a copy is changed nothing else changes, but if the template universe changes, all copies change in the exact same way. This would exclude copies that were changed before this change to the template happened. Not sure if this would make sense or not, though)
Realms
▶︎ Realms are a previously unmentioned type of universe. It's a term used to signify two or more universes being directly linked and transportation between them being possible. Because of their nature, usually different types of universes tend to be linked, for example a planet-based universe vs an infinitely flat universe. An example would be Life and its afterlife.
▶︎ The previously mentioned infinite copies of the same universe all have the exact same realm too. A cluster of two or more realms will always be considered to be one big universe when it comes to the 'copy' rule. If only one realm of the cluster is changed, that entire cluster is considered to be a unique universe.
▶︎ Most versions of Life have three main realms: Life itself, the afterlife's infinite patchwork, and Hell. There are more but they are unimportant to the story.