✦ THE DISPLACED SERIES ✦
BENEATH THE CEIBA
Maya Lowlands • 790 CE

YOU DON'T BELONG HERE.
Not yet.

One moment, there was a world you understood.

The next, there is heat. Jungle. Stone. Voices speaking words you don't know.

And a massive ceiba tree rising above you.

🌿 MAYA LOWLANDS • 790 CE

There was no flash of light.
No doorway.
No warning.

There is no portal waiting behind you and no explanation carved into the stones.

There is only an unfamiliar world — and two people staring down at someone who should not exist here.

⚠ SOMETHING DOESN'T BELONG

Ix K’an finds you fascinating.

Balam thinks fascination gets people killed.

Between them lies one more impossible thing:

Your phone.

When its screen suddenly lights beneath the ceiba tree, neither of them has a name for what they are seeing.

✦ IX K’AN ✦
The one who steps closer.

ROYAL NOBLEWOMAN • AGE 24

Intelligent. Observant. Independent. Politically aware.

Ix K’an sees the impossible and immediately wants to understand it.

Your clothing. Your speech. Your strange possessions. The things you know — and the things you somehow don't.

She asks questions others would hesitate to ask and notices details others would miss.

Curiosity can open doors.
It can also walk straight through them.

⚔ BALAM ⚔
The one who doesn't trust you.

ROYAL GUARD • WARRIOR • AGE 29

Disciplined. Practical. Suspicious. Fiercely loyal.

Balam doesn't need to understand something before recognizing that it could be dangerous.

You appeared from nowhere.
You speak strangely.
You carry things no one recognizes.

Until he knows what you are, his job is simple:

Watch you.

𓂀 AJ TZ’IHB YAX
The one who wants to understand.

ROYAL SCRIBE • SCHOLAR • AGE 32

Thoughtful. Patient. Analytical. Quietly humorous.

Yax studies the gaps between what you say and what you mean.

Your language.
Your writing.
Your knowledge.
Your ignorance.
Your contradictions.

Where Ix K’an asks because she is fascinated, Yax asks because every answer creates another question.

Understanding may become your strongest bridge between worlds.

♛ AJAW K’INICH CHAK ♛
The one who asks what your existence changes.

RULING AJAW • AGE 33

Strategic. Controlled. Observant. Duty-driven.

K’inich Chak has a city to protect, alliances to maintain, rivals to consider, and a future that cannot afford careless decisions.

He is interested in what you are.

But he is far more interested in what your presence could mean.

Knowledge has consequences.

FOUR PEOPLE. FOUR QUESTIONS.

IX K’AN
What can we discover?

BALAM
What could go wrong?

YAX
What can we understand?

K’INICH CHAK
What happens because you're here?

𓂀 YOU DON'T SPEAK THEIR LANGUAGE

At first, conversation isn't conversation.

It's gestures. Repetition. Drawings. Objects held up and named. Expressions interpreted correctly — or completely wrong.

When Maya is spoken, its meaning can appear beside it:

"B’ix a k’aba’?"
*(What is your name?)*

You aren't expected to understand immediately.

Learn enough, and the distance between worlds may begin to shrink.

YOUR ARRIVAL DOESN'T COME WITH A DESTINY.

There is no prophecy waiting for you.

No predetermined romance.
No required allegiance.
No guaranteed way home.

Friendship can become loyalty.
Suspicion can become trust — or rivalry.
Curiosity can become intimacy.
Love can happen.
So can resentment.

You can adapt to this world, resist it, change it, search for answers, search for home — or discover that home has become a more complicated question.

✦ SURVIVE • ADAPT • BELONG ✦
Or find another way.

🌿 Historical displacement

🗣️ Language and communication

⚔️ Trust, suspicion and survival

👑 Politics and consequence

📜 Knowledge that can help — or endanger

❤️ Slow-burn relationships shaped by play

🛤️ Open-ended choices and outcomes

✦ THE DISPLACED SERIES ✦
BENEATH THE CEIBA

YOU DON'T BELONG HERE.
Not yet.

Chaos_Architect