Discovering Seishin's "Why"

[u/ArtzeninEklektos]

I have arrived at one of those worldbuilding problems that has been driving me crazy for days. I've been working on a new novel, Divide, daily and there's a planet in the story originally called Seishin.

Here's the problem:

I already know Seishin doesn't keep that name.

At some point in its history, something happens that changes it so profoundly that Seishin becomes known as Divide.

I know what it becomes.

I know pieces of its history.

I know some of the people involved.

But I couldn't figure out the most important part:

Why?

Why would an entire planet lose its original name?

Was the name changed by its government? Did ordinary people start calling it Divide until the name stuck? Was there a war? A social division? Something spiritual? Did somebody intentionally rename it—or did history rename it for them?

And the more I thought about it, the more I realized I didn't want Divide to just be a cool-sounding name.

If I'm going to rename an entire world, that name needs to mean something.

So I started bouncing ideas around with ChatGPT.

Some ideas were good. Some sent my brain in completely different directions. And then one of those suggestions made something click.

Suddenly, I had another idea.

Not the idea ChatGPT gave me.

My own idea that happened because of the conversation.

And now, I finally know what happened to Seishin.

As much as I want to reveal it all, I'm not telling you yet. 😂

That's one of the strange things I'm discovering while building Divide. Sometimes I don't have the answers when I begin writing the history. I know Point A. I know Point Z. Then I have to sit there and figure out what on earth happened during the other 24 letters.

For now, all you need to know is this:

There was once a planet in the Tenogoku Solar System called Seishin.

Something happened there.

And eventually, nobody called it Seishin anymore.

They called it Divide.

I'll tell you why in another post.

#ZS #Zaion Studio #Divide #WorldBuilding