My character grew up believing she had a pretty good life. Her family owns a guild which she works at, she has great friends, and she even believes that she is a demigod. The town she lives in knows her because the town is a small yet tight-knit community. Though there are two things that make her stand out from the others in her town. She hates winter and always feels that her “good life” isn’t all that it seems. It takes her to leave the town and her life behind to realize that her life before could be a lie. However, she returns back to her town at the age twenty-two (she left at the age eighteen) to learn she was left her grandmother’s will.
I’m trying to piece together why she really left in the first place. Something had to have happened for her to want to leave. She never got all of her memories back to a less jumbled and vague mess.
The town should’ve been stricter on her leaving, but she was able to get freed somehow. The town is a seemingly lovely place, but they hold a dark secret that ties in with a deadly national conspiracy.
The questions that I have for you all are; What kind of dark secret could a small town have that is tied to a national conspiracy?Would calling this town a front for some non-religious “cult” activity make sense?
Maybe using the word “cult” is probably wrong in this context. Sorry in advance.
Maybe it’s because I just watched a Silent Hill III playthrough, but cult activity is usually a good reason. You could also make it a secret military base doing experiments on people to unlock psychic powers.
It would make sense more with also HOW you would write smth like that. you can make the town almost… too perfect. like, everyone is always smiling, no problems, no one ever disagrees, there’s no conflict like…ever. it’s uncanny and supper unnerving.
thing is, it makes sense that something dark is hidden there, because it’s natural that the darkness has to go somewhere.
Cult is only limited by those who deny it’s use in their pet peeves. “Extended meaning “devoted attention to a particular person or thing” is from 1829.”
So, for almost 200 years, RELIGION and GOD had only so much to do with the definition.
For example, the KKK is clearly a cult. Yes, it does claim Christianity, but the cult aspects are the devoted rituals extending to the hatred of any race not white enough (with a focus on African Americans) and hatred towards Catholics (which they dropped to be able to spread in Louisiana because coastal Cajuns (mostly white) are predominantly Catholic). So, a common hatred/obsession, hiearchy, rituals, without a God, but certainly with a charismatic leader is really all that defines “cult”.
It’s just easier if there’s some sort of ephermal “god” to it because a cult dies with it’s leader, if there’s not something that can outast their death: which is easy to see in like Charles Manson. He’s dead, there’s really nothing to his cult at this point.
So, if they are NEW, a godless or “I am God, listen to me!” approach works. The older they get, the more mystery it needs to continue.