The world-building of "The 7th Disciple"

In The 7th Disciple, time isn’t a line. It’s a structure.

The universe is made up of uncountable Tableaus — self-contained slices of time and space. Think of them as frozen snapshots, lined up in sequence. To those inside, they feel continuous — like a film playing frame by frame.

Most people live within these Tableaus without knowing. They move from one to the next, believing their choices are free. But in truth, they’re simply walking forward across pre-set frames, their path already embedded the moment they were born.

Their souls transition linearly, locked into this sequence. They forget what came before. They don’t question what comes next. It’s not time they’re living in — it’s choreography.

But not the Disciples.

There are seven of them. Chosen. Unified in body and soul. They can step between Tableaus, carrying memory across centuries. They witness wars, births, extinctions, and revolutions — across epochs, across empires.

But they cannot intervene.

To act inside a Tableau would create a paradox. A soul that remembers too much, or steps too far, could tear the fabric of causality — not just for one person, but for all of time.

Above it all is the High Entity — an unseen force that governs the Tableaus. No one knows what it wants. Even the Disciples don’t fully understand. They only know it watches.

Every hundred years, the seven Disciples gather.
Every 1,024 years, one must be replaced.

And now, one has vanished.

This kind of world has been embedded in my mind since I was a kid, I am pleased that I manage to use it in our novel.