Origins

The Cosmic Academy is a pretty new RP group. We all originally met in a group called Zen University. Due to various issues, however, many of us became discontented. The response to the concerns we voiced were just a defense of the current system we hated, without anything changing.

A lot of this requires having been in the initial group itself. Regardless of our thoughts of him, we credit Donovan and Zen University itself for the premise of Cosmic Academy.

## The Declaration of Independence

EVENT:ANNIHILATION

Donovan, and many others.

I’m speaking to you through proxy, but this isn’t my voice alone. This is the voice of many. The messenger is Alexander Wilson, who I suspect, like too many messengers throughout history, will be kicked down a well for it. But in that well, we will find our redemption.

The author is Ulysses Maurer. You may know me as the player of Damian, who is being destroyed for the sake of many others. More importantly, you may know me as Baldwin, the one who used to fight to bring up his organization, but then began to see the darker, flawed side of it. It’s in this second tone that I speak to you - You in plural. This is for everyone.

The reason I need a messenger is because I’ve been banished by High Principal Donovan. People can be exiled, but never ideas. It will soon be buried among the great swarm of messages, but it cannot be deleted from others to witness.

No matter how old this is to the one who sees it. Listen. It may very well still be relevant.

I speak on behalf of a new group which has tired of Donovan. The train of abuses is long. Here are some.

Your character Alt is, by your own unabashed admission, the main protagonist of Zen University. This is reflected in the current system of Events. Alt gained a new body; Plot Event. Four other characters die; normal Event. In the end, you cause your character to be objectively more important than the rest, which in turn reflects your view on how to run Zen University.

Your other characters, Mode 2 and Area, have access to powers that the rest of us are entirely banned from possessing. You claim that you use more powerful characters as a way to keep things under control, but if that were the case, your characters wouldn’t be the exact same way as you yourself towards the members: A bully, who does so because you know you can get away with it.

It’s disappointing, but not at all a surprise when one considers the eventual fate of Zen University: a game. You’ve put a lot of time and energy into this, and the blog reflects it. This I do not deny. However, it’s clear from your actions that you do not pay attention to the story that the participants themselves create. The roleplay itself has never been your concern. Your true motivation is shown through your behavior in the OOC chat, and in terms of your characters. Attention. You want an audience to witness your storytelling and your worldbuilding; the roleplay, in essence, is a way to keep us as that audience.

We know this motivation, no matter how you try to deny it. It’s the goal of many people who run projects like this. And we could stand it if you didn’t use your position of power out-of-character to access a power fantasy in-character.

I have brought these issues up several times before, both in private messages to you and in the group. Your constant response to complaints: “No, you just have a shitty perspective. Nothing’s changing. Be careful of your actions.” My response: even if you’re not actually being an attention-whorish control freak, you must do a much better job of presenting it that way.

It’s not just me seeing things this way. It’s many of us. For a long time, there’ve been jokes among us of starting a new ZU for ourselves. One without Donovan, with its own similar yet different system that corrected some of the mistakes of the old. Then the problems kept piling on and the jokes became propositions, and propositions became organization. Now, here we are.

You had chances. We brought up the problems, and rather than make changes, you just assured everyone they were looking at it the wrong way. Despite the negative will of the common people, nothing has changed. You’re lenient where rules should be enforced, and controlling where people need freedoms.

You didn’t listen. Now, we will no longer listen to you.

We are leaving. Sam Jabbar and I have been exiled. The rest of us are willing to follow that path if it means a fairer system.

To any readers. Even Don, or those who support Don. We invite you to join the new group. We have established our own site with details about the different powers available, one undergoing constant improvement and updates. On this site, we will mention Don and Zen University as being the group ours is based on.

The new group will still be divided into two tracks, but you’ll be able to be present in both and play one character in each. Your character(s) don’t even have to be good, they could be enemies of the school! In this way we will organically create our own plot, instead of just being particles of sand that get pulled along in the river Don creates.

We will be a group free from tyrants, and we will listen to all complaints. We will come to compromises if need be, instead of silencing those who dissent. Such as what has happened to me.

If you’re interested in joining, please contact Alexander Wilson, Sam Jabbar or Ulysses Maurer. We will accept you even if you choose to remain in Zen University.

How is the transformance going to work? Basically, we’re going to kick things off with our own event, seen in the title. For awhile, I’ve been planning this event as an invasion of the school by a group of eldritch abominations. It will be a tough battle, but in the end we’ll win against them. The cool nicknames in the OOC were prophecies, predictions given by the Prophets of the Flame about this coming end. Most of these names have since been changed, forgotten. Signs which are only clear in hindsight.

Isn’t this how you’re feeling, Donovan? This great tragedy, this movement for independence, which in hindsight was so clearly going to come? Maybe if things had changed, comrade. Maybe if things had changed.

In this new group, we’re gonna be kicking it off with this. The eldritch creatures have strange abilities. They cannot destroy one’s PK, if it’s a common one, But the strange connections, such as the ones had by the Cross Members Area and Alt, and by Mode 2, will be severed. Maybe now the characters will be balanced!

The staff and students will take their own vengeance against these characters as they see fit. Area, however, will escape, and become a new antagonist against the renamed school. He will be reworked, of course. We’re not going to word-for-word steal from ZU, after all.

We’ve already reworked the system of PKs, for example! Old ones have undergone spicy changes and cool new ones are currently being constructed on the assembly line! If you were to join, we’d help you adapt. We’re friendly and would love more company. Many of you who aren’t in on it yet are awesome roleplayers and we will miss you. Just not enough to get us not to leave.

If you’re currently in ZU and aren’t part of our new roleplay, your character will be considered MIA, and assumed to be dead, killed in the fighting against the beasts. Feel free to return though! I mean it, we’d love to have you!

With these characters gone and aside from mourning for them, we will then continue on as if nothing changed, aside from a new system. A fairer system. A system which does not hold the people lower than the administration. We’re together.

I’d like to give some words of thanks.

I’d like to thank Donovan for creating this system, even if he’s butchered running it. To anyone currently in ZU who is named at the end of this message, I’d like to thank you all. Remember when in the beginning we were just making jokes about leaving and starting our own? Now we’ve made it real. So many of us thought we were alone in seeing the problems with the Zen University system. The moral here: when you see something wrong, speak your damn mind. There are others who will stand alongside you.

This is a message from all of us. Again, if you’d like to join us, contact Alexander Wilson, Ulysses Maurer or Sam Jabbar.

Abraham Siggles (“What’re you gonna do, ban me?”)

Alexander Wilson (“You like thicc? Great, I always knew you were into Thicc dicks. Also, fuck you Mode 2.”)

Alice Bradford ("I don't know you personally, but I can tell by the way you act that you're a class-A douchebag.")

Amanda Chiaki

Amy-Lee Van DeMissi

Ashley Parkerzard

Atta Hikari

Brian McTavish (“Deez nuts! Ha, got ‘im!”)

Ceyleen Paulino

Connor Barley

DeJaun J. Edwards ("You're nothing but a pathetic excuse for a body made of flesh.")

Fernando Fuentes Martins (“Claude: I shall paint the moment of your fall using your blood.”)

Hamano Ito

Ivan Hernandez

Kian Kirby (“Your thicc is obese.”)

Layla Tsuyami

Lily Strauss

Lucas Jurgens

Mark Kozlowski

Nathan Richards

Pete Dibello

Quinny Falchion

Sam Jabbar (“"Looks like you didn't talk to enough people who agree with you, so I'd suggest watching your back."”)

Trevon Sanders

Ty Catalanotto

Yaoyorozu Momo

Zoey Maykins

And 6 other anonymous members who are ready for a new dawn.

Let the annihilation begin.