Modern Inheritance

by aryaelvinsword

When children are sent to war, no one escapes unscathed. A collection of stories in a lightly modernized AU, generally following the books with several major deviations. Explores the effects of war and trauma on the characters and the world around them, with some slice of life. Rated T for the obvious, with appropriate warnings for each chapter. (Mass Upload from tumblr complete!)

1. Introduction

Welcome to Modern Inheritance!

Modern Inheritance is not a fully fledged 'write chapter by chapter' type project, but more series of short stories and snippets/slice of life chunks and occasional art/drawings.

While many characters remain the same, I've significantly changed up the plot, timeline, and a lot of the characterization of the 'mains' to help…solve issues? I've had with them and their actions/reactions to things. MIC originally started as a way for me to explore the effects that PTSD (mentioned sparingly by Paolini despite the books centered around a nearly 100 year old war and staring a 16 year old…), trauma, war's effect on people, and other topics that I felt should have been touched on much more frequently and in depth to help some characters become more realistic and 'humanized.'

Most of these focus on Arya (war prisoner/tortured for half a year as well as a soldier for nearly 70 yrs), Brom (lost many, many people extremely close to him, driven by revenge, most of his past in the original series is a mystery), and occasionally Murtagh. I'm really trying to branch out from these characters though, since I need to become more comfortable writing and analyzing others in the series to flesh it out. Since I've began, several of these stories have featured original characters (the Torin series), so there's hope yet.

Modern Inheritance is certainly not for everyone. Many of these stories touch on subjects that could be triggering for people. At the time of this revamped introduction, I've written about both the immediate and long-term effects of torture and captivity, civilian casualties caused by the main characters, the pain of losing loved ones when there's no time to grieve, traumatic wartime injuries, and the general overall trauma and effects of war on the Inheritance characters in the Modern Inheritance world.

However, Modern Inheritance also touches on other, somewhat lighter topics. Murtagh doing his best to step out from his father's shadow and Brom's grudging approval. Torin's series works with a man who is trying to do good while working for the Broddring Empire. Others are slice of life or focus on scenes that would be different had Brom survived (Eragon learning of his true heritage earlier, etc).

If you're interested in the worldbuilding or have questions about Modern Inheritance, my profile page has links to my tumblrs where I'm open to questions or to just have a chat at any time.

Thank you for reading!