History Main / PrimordialChaos

In all mythologies, there exists a time before time, where the world had not yet been made. All that existed was simply Chaos (usually), and from here the [[OurGodsAreDifferent gods]][=/=][[OurTitansAreDifferent primordial entities]] would form, and shape the world as they saw fit. In other cases, [[VoidBetweenTheWorlds there was nothing at all]], and in others still, [[EldritchLocation it was someplace indescribable by mortal words]]. It may still exist in some form, either as a (strange) part of the reality in question, [[AlternateDimension or as a connected but separate reality]].

* ''{{LightNovel/Slayers}}'' has the Sea of Chaos, from which the four worlds arose at the beginning of time.

* Another hypothesis for how this universe came to be includes this universe being the remains of another universe that shrank and expanded in a Big Bang, which could be followed by another universe going Big Bang after ours had shrank and so on perhaps ''ad infinitum''. Interestingly, this idea was echoed in some Hindu beliefs, with the idea that even the universe begins, is grown, dies and then will be reborn, just like mortals do.

* The Earth itself was like this 4-3 billion years ago, especially when it was a molten rock, and when the planet Theia smacked into Earth, which formed the Moon. Also, about 3 billion years ago the entire Earth was under water or just about, with the continents Ur and Columbia later forming. This was about the same time that life is known to have first existed. Whether or not the entire planet was under thick clouds to make darkness cover the world is still unknown, though if that was the case it did not last long.

* In Creator/AlanMoore's ''Comicbook/SwampThing'', during a tie-in to ''ComicBook/CrisisOnInfiniteEarths'', a cult called the Brujeria summons up something far, far worse than the Anti-Monitor: this very chaos, called the "Original Darkness". It's likely the most powerful supervillain DC has ever thought up: its ''fingernail'' couldn't be dented by ComicBook/TheSpectre, and, again, this is during ''Crisis'', meaning this is the same Spectre who fought evenly with the Anti-Monitor ''after'' the latter had absorbed the Infinite Earths. Despite its power, however, the Darkness is a rather innocent being, very ignorant of the ways of the universe. It absorbs ComicBook/{{Etrigan}}, ComicBook/DoctorFate, and the Spectre, trying to get information from them, but they just end up making it worse when they tell the Darkness that it is "evil". ComicBook/SwampThing then convinces it that it is what it makes of itself, and finally [[{{God}} the Presence]] ''Himself'' descends from Heaven and merges with the Darkness, equalizing it.

* The [[Creator/MichaelMoorcock Moorcockverse]] ispredicated on the eternal struggle between Chaos and Law. A higher force called The Balance ensures neither gets absolute dominion: even in an aspect of the {{Multiverse}} apparently ruled solely by Chaos, there is still a little pocket of Law, and vice-versa. Thus Primordial Chaos always, inevitably, settles into stability as Law gains more and more of a foothold. Eventually Law turns everything into an unchanging grey waste - we call this Entropy - until a little pocket of Chaos emerges. And the cycle begins again.

* [[Myth/AboriginalAustralianMyths Arrernte cosmology]] holds that the first things to exist were the Inapertwa, which like the Chinese Hundun were featureless blobs of flesh. The gods then shaped them into the various animals, plants and people. You may share an ancestral Inapertwa with a kangaroo, hence they are also vaguely analogous to other cultures' concepts of "totems".

%%* The Void from ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyV''.

[[quoteright:350:[[Literature/CthulhuMythos https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/rsz_azathoth_the_nuclear_chaos.png]]]]

* The true BigBad of ''Anime/FutariWaPrettyCureSplashStar'' [[spoiler:Gooyan]] lived in the Primordial Chaos long before the Big Bang that created the universe. The entire reason he wants to [[OmnicidalManiac destroy the universe]] is because he thinks life is too noisy and he wants to return to peaceful nothingness.

%%* The Other Place in "Literature/TheBartimaeusTrilogy".
* In the ''Franchise/CthulhuMythos'', Azathoth is described as this. As Lovecraft wrote: "the ancient legends of Ultimate Chaos, at whose center sprawls the [[AlmightyIdiot blind idiot god]] Azathoth, Lord of All Things, encircled by his flopping horde of mindless and amorphous dancers, and lulled by the thin monotonous piping of a demonic flute held in nameless paws." Creator/RamseyCampbell makes Azathoth an inversion: as it wasn't always ultimate chaos. It became that way when it lost its intellect.