Resilience
Survival
Community
Ambition
Social Hierarchies
Faith & Divine Absence
Cost of Knowledge
Tech vs. Magic
Humanity vs. Divinity
Unity in Adversity
Dungeon Ecology
Adaptation / Evolution
Claustrophobic Grit
Ancient Ruins
Shadowed Depths
Decay & Ruin
Subterranean
Overgrown Dungeons
Liminal Spaces
Bioluminescent Fungi
Moss & Mildew
Alien Flora & Relics
Labyrinthine Tunnels
Light as a Destructive Force
Dark Urban Fantasy
Survival Horror
Dungeon Crawl
Low Fantasy
Ecological Fantasy
Folkloric Exploration
Industrial Fantasy
Social Intrigue
FORTUNE'S REST
The city of Fortune’s Rest (福安港, fú ān gǎng lit. fortune peace harbor) draws inspiration less from books and media and more from real-world places that have always captivated me, along with my own experiences growing up.
Kowloon Walled City
Kowloon Walled City was a densely populated and largely ungoverned settlement in Hong Kong that developed into a complex network of narrow alleyways, corridors, and staircases within a grid of high-rise buildings.
Home to over 30,000 people within just 6.4 acres, it became infamous for its overcrowded conditions, lack of central governance, and high rates of crime—becoming a self-contained community with a unique internal ecosystem.
Gunkanjima
Gunkanjima ("Battleship Island") was once a coal mining community off the coast of Japan. Built in the early 1900s, the island’s peak population density reached over 5,000 inhabitants within a tiny, fortress-like area, housing workers and their families in tightly packed, concrete apartment buildings.
With the decline of coal in the 1970s, the island was abandoned almost overnight, leaving behind haunting remnants of the community that once thrived there.
Urban Asian Slums
Growing up, I saw the resourcefulness and unity of people living in cramped, rough conditions. These communities relied on each other, creating strong bonds and informal networks to get by.
It wasn’t always peaceful—there was violence, tension was high, and the smog was thick enough to chew. But people endured, helping each other out of necessity and building a fierce sense of survival.
I want to bring this into Fortune’s Rest: a place where resilience and community are forged from necessity—but are there all the same. A rough, cutthroat city full of people who have each other’s backs as much as they watch their own.
SUNHALLOW
While Fortune’s Rest drew a lot of inspiration from real-life places close to home, my life has been blissfully and thankfully free of abyssal pits teeming with alien horrors.
As such, the dungeon of Sunhallow (日蚀渊 rī shí yuān lit. eclipse / sun-eroding abyss) draws inspiration from a plethora of media and games with themes and genres that I want to explore in my own storytelling.
Made in Abyss
Made in Abyss follows characters as they explore a seemingly endless pit filled with strange, ancient relics and dangerous creatures. The pit is a world of its own, with a unique ecosystem that changes and grows more deadly the farther one descends. Needless to say, Made in Abyss served as a major inspiration for Sunhallow’s layered structure and the concept of alien beauty within each level.
However, where Made in Abyss centers on the horrors of the pit as a living, organic force, Secret of Sunhallow focuses on the people desperate enough to dive, and the world they’ve built around the descent. I hope to instead highlight social dynamics, religious conflict, and the struggle to understand the divine—and place the culture, community, and enduring mythos around the dungeon at the forefront of my story.
Lethal Company
Lethal Company shaped Sunhallow’s sense of gritty helplessness, and the feeling of diving into a deadly place unprepared (and with comically shitty resources). Survival is purely a matter of teamwork, luck, and sheer willpower; and each expedition is filled with a raw desperation, where one wrong move can spell instant death.
I’m also inspired by Lethal Company's approach to monsters—creatures that defy standard fantasy tropes, unsettling in both unpredictability and intelligence. That said, there is a consistency to their hunting, patterns to their behavior, and everything has a weakness.
Over weeks, my Lethal Company group went from panicked novices to a focused, methodical team with practiced systems for each monster. I envision Sunhallow similarly: a place where experience is worth its weight in gold, and veterans can easily dispatch creatures that would completely overwhelm a group of rookies.
Dungeon Meshi
Dungeon Meshi focuses uniquely on the survival aspect of fantasy dungeon-crawling—specifically, how adventurers adapt to and interact with the ecosystem within. It heavily stresses themes of dungeon ecology, consumption, and the cycle of life.
In Sunhallow, I want to explore realistic ways that both the monsters and divers adapt to the dungeon’s environment. I hope to make the dungeon’s ecosystem more than a backdrop; but rather, a living, breathing place that demands resilience and ingenuity from both predators and prey alike.
Dungeon Meshi also keeps a small, focused setting, but delves into intricate details of its world, from racial relations to the societies, cuisine, and culture of those who live there. It captures the complexity of character interactions, openly portraying their flaws and the biases shaped by their backgrounds without softening the edges.
As I develop Sunhallow, I aim to achieve this same layered richness—a world that feels authentically shaped by those who inhabit it, in all their good, bad, and complicated realities.
Underdark (Forgotten Realms)
The Underdark in Forgotten Realms is a vast, dark, and hostile world beneath the surface, filled with its own ecosystems, civilizations, and dangerous creatures. It’s an environment that challenges adventurers both physically and mentally, with a darkness that is both literal and metaphorical. It's also my favorite D&D biome!
In Sunhallow, I want to echo the Underdark’s relentless darkness—a world where creatures and denizens have adapted to thrive in an alien environment that intruders are ill-prepared to face.
Thank you for dropping by! 💗