@ -ZEN- [Hell End]

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Let's Play! > @ -ZEN- [Hell End]

Randalor: Sep 4, 2011

At a glance, I'm guessing that was the best possible outcome for the black blade. Just a straight additional attack per round.

# ? Aug 27, 2021 18:41

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# ? Jun 2, 2024 16:45

Razakai: Sep 15, 2007; People are afraid
To merge on the freeway
Disappear here

Timed Hit might have a niche use against a hyper evasive enemy? Quite situational though.
We've absolutely no idea what the other brands might do but some looked potentially harmful and +1 attack per round seems fantastic.
20 WL is obviously great.
Molten Veins is... unexciting but it's a passive that might save us from dying so can't complain.

# ? Aug 27, 2021 19:32

Randalor: Sep 4, 2011

Molten Veins is "Boring utilitarian passive", which is exactly the type of poo poo that you want in a rogue-like. I'll admit I voted for something else, but this was my 2nd pick. We know fire is going to be a thing because of Burner, and the potential ice immunity is not bad either.

# ? Aug 27, 2021 19:41

pumpinglemma: Apr 28, 2009; DD: Fondly regard abomination.

Timed Hit is extremely good, actually! It is a niche use, but it's a niche that's very likely to come up: Hider. The Blue Book says she's one of the easiest lords to take down if you can get past her 99% defenses, boosted by her S-tier dexterity and her precognition. Timed Hit gives us a way through.

# ? Aug 27, 2021 20:14

Marluxia: May 8, 2008

pumpinglemma posted:

Timed Hit is extremely good, actually! It is a niche use, but it's a niche that's very likely to come up: Hider. The Blue Book says she's one of the easiest lords to take down if you can get past her 99% defenses, boosted by her S-tier dexterity and her precognition. Timed Hit gives us a way through.

And since we just got that quickling brand on the sword, both hits will also ignore defense.

# ? Aug 27, 2021 20:39

Randalor: Sep 4, 2011

So we have a plan B for dealing with Hider, now we just need a Plan A. And a way to find them.

# ? Aug 27, 2021 20:42

Black August: Sep 28, 2003

Still Loading...

# ? Aug 29, 2021 04:02

Black August: Sep 28, 2003

Seven sickstone arms with seven-clawed hands encircle into halo with a sevenfold stance.

HP: [ 21 / 21 ]
FP: [ 15 / 15 ]

ANXIETY: [10%]

The Rock Witch waits until the Archer and the Valkyrie are gone. She looks over at the corner of her cave room, and talks to the Shadow squatting there.

"Only so much I can do for you. I'll ease your pain. Doctor the assemblance."

You'd be aware, but that's hard when your soul is being studied down to the finest grains of its colours through the dense veils between Ends. The six-armed troll who is a hundred-handed horror who is a blind old witch picks you up, flips you around, drops you down. Seven points touch on your naked black crown.

"Strength like troll, fed well. Makings of the Molochine. Woundfree. Reflex reliable, though too high-wire abused. Thoughts troubled, magic raw and sorcerous. Illfree blood, able body. Senses sharp and silvery."

Momma Logon isn't going to talk about your intent. She knows there's no future but she gave her blessing anyway, and that dark point drew it up instantly. It was just one improbable degree dark. From 99.9% light eaten to 99.99%.

"Too too tall for such a so so small."

You're having a conversation while she sees you draw back together. It goes something like this.

https://i.imgur.com/wGq0HcC.mp4

The Silver Mind posted:

It's a cool and cloudy day when you go to see him again. He's in his tent, at his desk. Reading another unmarked book. Drinking indigo tea.

You browse the shelves for a while, neither of you acknowledging one another. You practice the quiet of the Silver Mind, as a show of respect to let him decide if he wants you around. It's a half hour later, when the rains begin, that he calls out that some tea is ready. You answer by taking your book with you to sit, where you fill a cup for yourself. He refills his own, and you look at each other. He speaks first.

"I said I'd give a fair assessment before I got more serious about your recovery."

The Psychic finishes his cup in one go. He touches his face where he was wounded the last time we talked. I keep calm.

"I'm going to help. You're not well."

The real palette inside of that short sentence is up to you to see, inside the reflection of the Silver Mind mind. You know exactly what is there. You're trying again to make it right. To walk out of midnight.

He asks you again, presenting a sheet of paper and pen.

"Do you remember the next step?"

You start with his name. There's so many to write and the Silver Mind will know.

"Make a list of persons we have harmed, and become willing to make amends to them all."

Neurons warm up. They reflect in a newly-bright silver reflection infinite. This reveals how many of those neurons are a mutant blue, and how many are a fungal rainbow. It traces their lineage down from a pitch black crown, provoking a conversation between everything beneath the head.

Six-Pack Subscription posted:

Swords need strength. Strength needs protein. The burger spell. Do it.

Central Nervous posted:

Skateboards = Burgers.

Compromised Cranial posted:

Gonna cast it. Gonna cast burgers. Magic burgers.

Garbage Disposal posted:

Stop wasting my time and get it done right and get it done now, or else you're going to die trying to survive this.

(IQ - CHEESE/BURGER/SPIRIT/ANIMAL) 10 - [3]+[4]+[3] = 10 - Cheese. Burger. Spirit. Animal.

Muscles red wanted some so it gets two extra dense patties of solid pork and beef, the nerves green wanted some so it gets fried fish filet inbetween, the brain blue got the spell and wanted some so it gets stimulant flavor powders sprinkled on top, the belly yellow wanted some so it gets extra extra toppings and two extra patties.

You gorge on it, and your biology manages to find the courage to believe it can handle what it's about to get into.You come aware when you finish the last bite, jolted by the waning sunlight hitting you. Arms were pulling you, and then...?

You're outside, on the otherside of the stone witchden. You broke through? Don't question it! Everything feels so clear, and the Silver Mind is here. Your intent is suddenly strong. It makes you confident in a way you couldn't quite grasp before. You know you need to start moving immediately, because the Sun is falling down within the next handful of hours. Because something made of bark and flowers is going to start looking for you. Because you've made a lot of horrible people extremely angry. There's no time for it. You have to find Megalith. Your neurons are arrow-scalded to the east, dragging you swift over coast in the wind-blown treachery of the wetland miles.

(HT - Heavy Hiking) 15 - [1]+[4]+[3] = 8 - Success

You leave behind the stone structure, and descend further into the cloudy humid dark of the swamplands. It's an excellent pace, driven by a belly well fed and legs nervous with intent. The cooling comfort of Silver is a welcome feeling, soft buzz of psi-sense keeping the edge off the worst of your anticipation. Especially when you make it a few miles east, climbing through mossy waterhole stones, and you begin to see it form.

Event Log posted:

OST: Rainforest Concordance

You know this illness. You understand red water. It's seeping up slowly from the fleshfits of the woodbark, an insistence of the productive rulership of meats. Overproductive marrow, smiling while it tells you that it belongs in the bloodstream. You move around it, but you know the deeper you go that no wound will be spared.

To keep ahead of your pursuing doom, you'll need to act without hesitation. The first demand comes when the landscape finally falls, from windswept swamp to pukewet boiler. There's a dense hedge of thorns, where still-pure plantlife fights to keep out hungry neighbors. There's no choice but to break through.

* Cut through thorn, vine, bone, meat.
^{[!Tyranny Check 18][-(2d-MoS)HP]}

* Make your intent known, and part the cutting curtain.
^{[!Darkness Check 20][-5 HP]}

* Trust the Silver Mind to show you where to go.
^{[!ESP Check 11]}

* Slowly work through the mess until you're on the other side.
^{[DX Check 11]} ^[+Time]

You relax, close your eyes, and trust the silver to reflect every empty space you can quickly walk through. You make good time, focused and slow, stepping stiffly past the enormous curving thorns shredded into the softening red of infected plantflesh. Careful...

(!PSI ESP a) 11 - [4]+[3]+[5] = 12 - Failure By One...

...ccccRAP. Ow. Ow! You slice your arm on a thorn when you finally get through, sucking on the exposed scratch while you inhale the meaty-sweet fumes of the sweaty red airs. It's so much more intense than the little swamp back in the valley. Seasoned. Assured. Dripping with liquid salts. You gag and press on, brilliant with the secret road you were shown. You just need to overcome, and Bleeder will barely know what hit him!

HP: [ 20 / 21 ]
FP: [ 14 / 15 ]
^{[-1HP] [-1 FP]}
ANXIETY: [ X ][20%]

Event Log posted:

It bulges the throat, how strong the fresh-body fluidscents are. Sloughing and slimy, everything organo-grimy, a world self-obsessed with the promise of neurotransmitters. Too obsessed, as the pride of the flesh becomes a stark challenge to your hope to find the secret cave to Megalith.

Dolls are forming. Dozens of flesh dolls, meat wrapped over a core, forming rapidly in reaction to your biochemistry.

What kind of flesh dolls have to be worked through to make it to the tunnel entrance?

# ? Aug 30, 2021 05:44

taiyoko: Jan 10, 2008

I think Strawpoll is broken again, it didn't show my vote.

# ? Aug 30, 2021 06:54

Marluxia: May 8, 2008

I think they screwed up coding and it shows the results before your vote is actually counted. If you refresh, it should increment up by one.

# ? Aug 30, 2021 14:43

Black August: Sep 28, 2003

My fault for testing it and thinking it was working before I went to bed. Here. We'll conclude the vote a little later.

https://linkto.run/p/CVQ1PRL0

# ? Aug 30, 2021 14:50

Black August: Sep 28, 2003

VOTING CLOSED - Unfolding

Rotten Ligaments [Strength] - 2
Neuronal Clusters [Psychic] - 3
Fresh Cheeseburger [Cheeseburger] - 7
Rich Oils [Undead] - 7
Compact Bone [Health] - 0

LOADING...

...LOADING

# ? Aug 30, 2021 21:21

Marluxia: May 8, 2008

The combination of those two terrifies me.

# ? Aug 30, 2021 22:09

OneWingedDevil: Aug 27, 2012

Cheeseburgers deep-fried in kerosene, my favorite. Shame we already ate.

# ? Aug 30, 2021 22:14

Randalor: Sep 4, 2011

So... fatty cheeseburgers then? Wait... is this going to put us off of hamburgers for awhile? Who the hell voted for hamburgers?

# ? Aug 30, 2021 22:27

Black August: Sep 28, 2003

The holy land! It's reacting to the magic of your delicious spirit animal!! The meat is folding... it's secreting something, bleeding black and fry-gold from a menagerie of sizzling veins. The smell is wonderful. All these flesh mounds animate with the stuff, sloughing to a darkened color that betrays the nature of... uh oh.

ANXIETY: [ X ][ X ][30%]

Deep inhale. Frycook sweet. The meat is multiplicative. It's unfolding and every time it does so it's weeping purest black oil that fades to beautiful false gold, and sickened deepfry tumor grows from it, and it unfolds, and... you can't stand witness to it, or it'll never stop growing. You have to cleave past and run.

(!Tyranny - SHRED) 18 - [3]+[5]+[3] = 11 - Success By 7.

It's not effortless, but animal, and it works. Face soaked meatspray. The oil keeps unfolding everyfrying flesh which tries to catch up to you in reaction to your chemical scents and stomach intents, mindless with consumer prayer. You use your branded blade to start swift-swinging blind every time you get caught up while scaling stained stones or wading through shin-muddy red waters. Quick cleave one two, the concrete edge catching and throwing away the soggy puffs of oily sweet warming meat.

God, it. It almost looks good enough to

Garbage Disposal posted:

EAT. EAT. EAT. EAT. EAT. EAT. EAT.

(WL) 20 - [4]+[2]+[5] = 11 - Success.

Absolutely not. Get that enchantment out of your acids. Idiot. You're full and have the fuel to make legs run against the cheeseburger tide. Does the cardiovascular work? Is it up to the task at this peak?

(HT - Running) 15 - [4]+[2]+[5] = 11 - Match Success!

It is. Perfect harmony. You take off into the soggy mire of the humid red lands, where black mountains loom and the sky begins to slowly lose all color and light. It smells of sickness, once you outpace the tide of fried flesh and necrosweet oils. God glory to lard. But you ignore it under the new iron of your pitch black intent, deadfocus on the mission. You have to stop the scythe. You KNOW you can take the Megalith's Lord. With the secret road, so little stands between you and the first relief from that white-shroud scrutiny. You must. You WILL.

(ST - Scaling) 21 - [2]+[3]+[4] = 9 - Success.

The deathcheese will catch up eventually. But you get the lead when you come up through rocky hills, catapulting yourself despite the weight of your wished-for nuclear arm. You don't acknowledge the weight of the ultratech cleaner, because that's the weight of LOVE.

It's an easy climb down from the hillcrown, leading you through the last few twilight-hour miles. It's not peaceful to be sure. The swampsoil is sick and there will be no stars, in this Lorded Lorded Land. But you ignore everything growing first aware of you, charging with both arms swung while the fryfizzle sound carries on the wind. There it is!

Warm tunnel. Dark tunnel. Dry tunnel. Joyous tunnel. Alluring tunnel. Secret tunnel. Yellow tunnel. Tattered tunnel. Speaking tunnel.

You're charging inside so hard you trip and fall, tumbling over the black stone. There is MEAT in this rock vein to MEGALITH, and it will be infected with the idea of a frycook scream, of a ocean-heated spill, of a long death march down wearing paper crown. It's going to be a wonderful time. Time wonderful time. wonderful wonderful time. wonderful. wonderful time. wonderful inside the Unliving Theater, cheeseburger hell theater, wonderful wonderful black tunnel theater, hellish low-cost final day fry theater. It's time to come inside. It's time to see the shows. There is oxygen to inhale but it will be wet and redwarmed. Wonderful shows. Wonderful wonderful wonderful shows.

Wonderful wonderful wonderful wonderful wonderful wonderful wonderful SHOWS.

# ? Aug 30, 2021 22:28

Black August: Sep 28, 2003

OST: Scream External Vomit Eternal

It's so dark.

The lobby... it's a snake that wriggles into every space of cubby real-estate from here to suburb, oh suburb, wonderful wonderful, oh wonderful suburb. So so dark. The head is a dimlit yellow stall, so tall, and there is a ticket holder so pale and so pall.

You approach.

Booth is yellow mildew yellow wood yellow mold yellow soot. Ticket-Taker asking fOR A FAIR PRICE, A FAIR FAIR PRICE

yeah yeah ok. ok. here you'll...

(!Tyranny - MAD) 18 - [5]+[4]+[3] = 12 - Success.

grab them by the tie and shake them and scream and SCREEEAAAM DO YOU SEE THIS? THIS SIGN. YELLOW AND BLACK THE MEANING OF RADIANCE. DO YOU KNOW?

no face nods of course, please, right this way, at ease. come with me, come and see, the best we wonderful can possibly be.

You step back and bow graciously.

What to do? What feels true?

Be sure to wait, before you go!

Grab a snack, for your show.

# ? Aug 31, 2021 00:10

OneWingedDevil: Aug 27, 2012

The last time I remember going to see a show was at the theater in our hideout. Good times.

Wasn't it also the way to the Back?

# ? Aug 31, 2021 00:10

t3isukone: Dec 18, 2020; 13km away

Nachos seem like the least dangerous snack. I would not eat anything locally made here.

# ? Aug 31, 2021 02:57

Black August: Sep 28, 2003

VOTING CLOSED

^{Participate in a wonderful stage play. - 4

Sit and see a wonderful movie. - 6

Plain plain yellow yellow POPPED. CORN. - 3

Icecursecream. - 1

The burger, of course! Wonderful wonderful burger! - 2

The hotdog. Ye- you heard what I said. - 0

Chocolate. Locally made. - 1

Candy! Also locally made! - 0

Nachos, natch. - 3}

Yeah yeah yeah yeah. Lemme get a uhh....... yeah the nachos AND the popcorn, the twofer deal. Neither use real cheese or butter, right? Ok good. Safe enough. Now, with this, you think it'd be smart to lay low further in by seeing one of the movies. You don't anger these tunnels. Deep deep tunnels. The humor is slow and steady. You need to step ahead of the oilburger onslaught.

So, which movie to catch?

# ? Aug 31, 2021 03:09

OneWingedDevil: Aug 27, 2012

The Kadath regalia gives us greater understanding on the motivations of Mythos beings, so maybe that translates to a deeper understanding of the plot behind Your Mythos Tour [3D]? On the other hand, I'm not sure understanding Mythos beings is necessarily a good thing for our mental state.

I wonder what our player is thinking about this theater. Assuming they're seeing it at all.

# ? Aug 31, 2021 03:36

Marluxia: May 8, 2008

Ultimate Hell Slime of Murder [Containment Breach Remaster] is too good not to vote for. I'd watch it irl

# ? Aug 31, 2021 04:52

Stoner Sloth: Apr 2, 2019

i figured vampire knight might give us some info about bleeder

# ? Aug 31, 2021 07:00

t3isukone: Dec 18, 2020; 13km away

Wasn't expecting Bleeder to be involved in a love triangle! Is he more a Zero or a Kaname?

That said, while I do really want Bleeder lore, I feel like a tie on this is going to be a hell of a thing. Which I might still be interested in seeing!

Also, apparently we can meet a Gravedigger here, which is very interesting considering the Holy End stuff have implied that that is us.

t3isukone fucked around with this message at 15:24 on Aug 31, 2021

# ? Aug 31, 2021 15:07

pumpinglemma: Apr 28, 2009; DD: Fondly regard abomination.

Oh god, my vote for Vampire Knight just broke a three-way tie. We're in dangerous waters here.

# ? Aug 31, 2021 17:41

Razakai: Sep 15, 2007; People are afraid
To merge on the freeway
Disappear here

Ultimate Vampire Knight of Murder [3D]?

# ? Aug 31, 2021 19:23

Black August: Sep 28, 2003

You have to keep moving ahead of the oils. You have to keep acting casual to fool the unliving awareness of the mile-tunnel theaters. The concession stand forces your hand, giving you popcorn bright yellow with false powders, and a side of nachos goo'd in orange fake. Safe snacks. You charge through the wide double high doors, into the pale wet theater halls. Thousands of films are playing, but only the few you saw displayed are open and allowed. You rush down the soggy rug halls, spilling popcorn and one hand near the gun. Which one? Which one? Gonna be...

^{Vampire Knight - 11

Your Mythos Tour [3D] - 10

Always Bet On 1st Met - 3

Ultimate Hell Slime of Murder [Containment Breach Remaster] - 10}

# ? Aug 31, 2021 23:46

taiyoko: Jan 10, 2008

We in this theater, waiting like :suspense:

# ? Sep 2, 2021 20:47

Randalor: Sep 4, 2011

Well, we have to wait for the pre-film commercials to end first. Duh.

# ? Sep 2, 2021 20:53

t3isukone: Dec 18, 2020; 13km away

Randalor posted:

Well, we have to wait for the pre-film commercials to end first. Duh.

I was going to argue that we shouldn't kill Bleeder, but I might have to take that back if he has extensive previews for movies...

# ? Sep 3, 2021 03:48

Black August: Sep 28, 2003

The doors are red and slit thin; you squeeze in, careful to balance your pack and buster box and cleaning bot and popcorn-nacho combo and firearm and sword. Easy easy. You're inside and down the aisle, each step body-steep and too narrow, shoes touching dry stained cursewood. You inhale and quietly choke on the hot dusty air.

ANXIETY: [ X ][ X ][30%]

Keep acting natural. You get to a middle row, and struggle to mantle up to the chairs. They're sickly with silk, irregular and rotted, so you ignore the smell and find the venerated Center Seat. The perfect height for the supermassive movie screen, grown from wet metal skins and yellow-dark. You peek around the theater while you assess. You know the tide will search and find. Cheeseburger traitor, sweetcook meat, cheeses and spices all drowned in glossy night. But you're safe for now.

Gotta ignore the nerves. This land - remember? This land alive. Black tunnel veins unliving, so heavy with curse it colds your spine. You have to play along. You have to respect. You have to relax and just watch whatever the movie is going to be.

Light seeps in from a mass array of mirrors and veils, suspended in heavenly shadow. Enough of the lights add up to create the ghost-clarity of gemhues, a fallen magic movie screen. You lean back and wait for it to begin. You have nowhere to set down your food so you keep it in your lap; the arms of the narrow wood chairs are so high they can't be reached sitting. It gives the bright idea to use the towel from the apartment bathroom as a little roof between the too-high arms. A little hidey cubby hole.

ANXIETY: [ X ][20%]

Welp. It's time. For previews, that is. Way too many of them. But it's a chance to stop thinking.

PREVIEWS posted:

The first is for a movie called 'Final Mission Restart', a remake of some much older sci-fi film. In the remake, the original plot is upset by the use of a 'Spacetime Beam' that blends the old movie's plot with new elements to change its outcomes. A bunch of space soldiers have a lot of romantic dramas and ultraviolent religious wars with AIs and parasites. Looks overproduced, but surprisingly subdued in tone compared to the camp original.

PREVIEWS posted:

Second is for 'Always Bet On 1st Met' which is a mockumentary (only it's a live-filmed actual journal documentary) about those in the Backup cult who roam all the central lands surrounding the Mountain. It's colorful, bizarre, and goes by way too fast and bright. There's only time to catch a few clips of some music-video like quip or quick in-joke or insane stunt. There's a lineup of every Backup of the 1st crew, flashing their stylized name past a split-second image of them from film. There's Pax Pills, Shattyshot, Midnight Slack, Pastel Hell, Short Straw, Mana Calx, Shark Water, the Bayroom Triplets, Kandy Kill, Marvine Mall, Paprika Blue, Play To Off, Spider Finger, and MURDERCHURCH.

PREVIEWS posted:

Third is for 'The Duke's Wild Ride', and it uhhhhh. Huh. Looks like it's some kind of- well you don't rightly know what the hell kind of movie the trailer is supposed to be showing off. Biography? Weirdly intimate live-film? Psychic predator visuals? Restaurant advertisement?? But it features him, that guy, the Duke. Sauber! It mentions his 999 Sister Sisters, but doesn't show them off. It's over before you can start to guess as to the purpose. There's a 1-900 number at the end?

PREVIEWS posted:

Fourth comes up fast, for 'Your Mythos Tour [3D]', a mummified-dry take on the current Mythos deity climate in the wake of the God, which seems to consist of (going by the idols lineup with names) what remains of the power of the God, Its avatar dying, the Sothoth, the Old Goat, the King's Ghost, Daoloth, wily old idiot Cthugha, Shudde M'ell, and fat bully Chaugnar Faugn. Even the trailer is stressful; half from radiant knowledge, half from how dreadfully dull its presentation is.

PREVIEWS posted:

Fifth is a real horror thriller trailer for 'Infinite Ops'. It's an ambitious movie about three groups of secret elite soldiers. One is lower tech anti-Mythos unit called 'Delta Green'. Another is more advanced apocalypse-enders called 'Black Ops'. The last are super advanced timeline-hoppers called 'Alternate Options'. They all meet by chance and pool their methods and resources, and produce the ultimate all-existence operatives who have the task of achieving Kadath.

PREVIEWS posted:

Yuck. Sixth is a MC&D advert. Which is to say, it's a trailer for a movie, a movie which is a hours-long advert. The trailer just has more small adverts in it. It talks about specialized weapons like triple swords, improved food-delivery superdrones, automation nanospreads, million-mood rings, neck guards and vein armor, bicycles, ultrasuits like the 'Justaucorps' series, a property which used to be a library, one of THE original magic wands, a stasis-fresh set of 200 of the rarest meats currently known, mneh mneh mneh and on and on.

PREVIEWS posted:

Seventh is for 'Ultrahuman', a real high concept superhero film about a bunch of mundane people who sign up for a program to become human capable of 'not the super, but the ultra, change not the world, but the fundaments of our existence'. There's stuff like a chisel-handsome school teacher, a punk who can become a giant crab demon, their friend who can turn into a mass parasite, a guy who constantly trips over his dead selves, and so many more. Great soundtrack.

PREVIEWS posted:

Still going. Eight is for the 'Squire Confessional'. Oh, this one is PUFFED and proud of it. Some blow piece for some teenage noble in the army, part of a disgraced house that drives him to madness. He murders someone, cursed forever, bleh bleh and now he can't actually die without reincarnating into another similar cursed existence. Cool idea, but the actor is taking himself much too deathly serious.

PREVIEWS posted:

And on to the ninth. It's-

Static, and, you think you can see...

PREVIEWS posted:

Tenth seems neat. 'Beleth & Furfur Roadfight the World' is about two demons from Hell who abdicate their thrones once they find out existence is going to just end like a turned-off TV channel. Heavy on the philosophy and drama. Feelgood award bait, but the music and production values don't lie.

PREVIEWS posted:

It's a hyena.
She's sleeping in a field.
She's dreaming of someone and it troubles her.
She wakes up startled, and looks around in alarm, before she looks at you.

You spend such a long time looking into her face.
The grass swaying in the noon wind.
That drowning silence.
She doesn't look away once across the long minutes.

You break the stare when you hiccup and your eyes sting wet; when you wipe them clear the trailer is over and the movie is finally about to begin.

# ? Sep 3, 2021 04:16

Randalor: Sep 4, 2011

... you know, I feel like I should apologize for that last update coming into existence.

# ? Sep 3, 2021 12:15

t3isukone: Dec 18, 2020; 13km away

So Bella is Beleth. Useful to know. ~~Wonder if she'll teach us anything.~~

# ? Sep 3, 2021 19:07

Razakai: Sep 15, 2007; People are afraid
To merge on the freeway
Disappear here

I figured Bella was another demon prince(ss), but not exactly which one. So that's neat to know.

# ? Sep 3, 2021 21:41

OneWingedDevil: Aug 27, 2012

t3isukone posted:

So Bella is Beleth. Useful to know. ~~Wonder if she'll teach us anything.~~

That would probably mean Frankie is Furfur. At least they kept the first letter the same.

# ? Sep 3, 2021 21:51

Black August: Sep 28, 2003

You settle in and clean the filthdust out of your nose. Finally. Your popcorn and nachos are half done. They're clearly cursed, but a combination of your terrifying garbage disposal, ironblack will, calorie-mad physique, and cheeseburger blessings means the small curses in them are torn to shreds and turned into juice for your mitochondria.

VAMPIRE KNIGHT (Out on streaming, retrocogvision, laserplay, and Dreamtime) posted:

Opening intro. There's an explosion inside of what looks like an oil platform next to a tropic island. A figure investigates, and they're horrifying. Translucent like a jellyfish, monstrous and emaciated-thin, hunchbacked and inhuman. They wear oilstained chainmail and a cloak, carrying a time-blasted sword and broken shield. Despite their looks, they react with nervous awareness, and go to find a lich, who is a fragment of a skull and a scrap of beard. Turns out dryads are trying to sink their platform, and now a bunch of necromantically supercharged oil is leaking into the waters.

It cuts from there in a neat transition where the translucent horror knight has their features rewound by countless millennia. They look like a young woman now, a royal knight for some strange-tiered city of rainy gardens and art theaters. Their past is a drama of being caught in a love closed-triangle with a Queen and Prince, but the three of them find their life plans for each other ruined by a plot by a Mythos magi and a lich who corrupts the city; they turn the Queen into a wraith, the Prince into a corrupted mutant, and the knight into a vampire in a hellacious scene where the magi infects her with the parasite.

It's hard to keep track of it from there. The knight's life goes to total ruin and violence while the world begins to end, and they end up escaping with the lich after he betrays the Mythos magi. There's a long stretch of weirdo philosophical stuff and talk about the deathspan of a universe with lots of water imagery, where the lich and vampire hide in sleeping stasis for gigantic stretches of time, before they climb out into the oil platform in the new world. The vampire has the revelation that they've starved their parasite of blood for so long that they can control their bloodthirst to some extent.

The movie ends strangely, as it loops back around to the intro. The lich tasks the vampire with escaping the oil platform to boat to the island, to make treaty with the dryads and warn those living there of the oil's danger. There's fantastical imagery of some starlit superglow party as the vampire moves in a tropic midnight to reach a displaced geothermal power plant, where they commandeer a radio.

The final scene is with the vampire sitting in a quiet office room of the plant, the window to outside troubled by a deep blue hurricane, with them looking into the camera as they tun on a ham radio. They don't react to the sounds of screams and dozens of terrified conversations, and lean into the microphone to speak. Their voice is calm with a sudden shift in tone that makes your belly drop.

"How long have I been here? In a minute, three warm bodies are gonna walk through the door behind me. One is a mouse. One is a bird. One is a giant. They heard my message on the radio, and they're responding during the crisis. They're going to walk in here, and I'm going to agree to help them, and then I almost eat the mouse. His tail is whipping around and... the giant will stop me, and offer to feed me instead. The giant has this amazing blood; I've had ironblood before, but theirs is different. It's like gold. False shiny. It'll give me clarity. Enough to make me believe it's a good idea to follow them. I mean, look at what it gets me. I Survive. I get my Knighthood. I get treated like a real person. I earn a place in the Town Guard. I finally get a new name; Galen."

The vampire knight smiles with all teeth, and they slap the table as the hurricane starts to shake the room apart. "And every single day, I get up and stare at the curtained window and the lines of light around it. I make coffee for me and the mouse, I lick my blood bucket clean, and I wish they had killed me the second they found me. The Bird would when we first meet, but they won't let him! So it's going to happen. We're going to walk out into it. No matter how far we go, its current is going to loop us back around into it. Forever."

They sit there, staring, a monstrous visage made too real with its profoundly helpless grief. The hurricane opens the building and sweeps over them, and the movie ends.

You think and collate all the casual information the movie showed you. It talks a lot about vampires and their deal. You huddle up in the chair as the credits go by, committing what seemed practical to memory.

Vampire Lore posted:

Vampires are a result of an extraterrestrial Mythos superparasite. It attaches itself to the circulatory system of any living being it infests, entering through the bloodstream where it latches onto the heart, and begins to slowly grow as it takes over the host's body.

People infected don't die or become genuine undead, but rather living beings enslaved to the vampire parasite, which drives them mad with chemical triggers and a need to feed it through the mass consumption of raw flesh and blood. The blood of biologically similar beings feeds it the easiest.

The host becomes very strong, agile, resilient, and predator-perceptive, with the ability to smell blood and its details with acuity greater than any naturally occurring animal. Teeth become syringe-sharp and capable of extracting blood and shredding meat with razor ease. Host metabolism shrugs off sickness and poison as Mythos ultracells annihilate threats to the body. Flesh becomes tough enough to shrug off stabs, cuts, small bullets; blunt force trauma is almost useless. The parasite modifies the body to be able to achieve insane feats when driven by bloodthirst, notably hyperstrength and regeneration.

But there's a laundry list of weaknesses! Vampires are glass cannons thanks to their greedy-strong parasite. Host skin tends to become translucent over time, which makes sunlight and intense heat or fire deadly. Silver is poison to the parasite, and the smell of garlic shuts down their bloodscenting with olfactory overwhelm. All things holy disrupt the more esoteric biological powers of the parasite, hurting it badly; water with holy nature is the easiest to get into the body and metabolized.

For most, like the movie showed, being infected by the parasite means your life is over and you're now a sewer-dwelling cannibal addict under the control of a sinister star-infection whose only goal is to eat all the blood in the universe.

Ok. You actually feel a little more informed about vampires and how to deal with them. Maybe this will be a help against Bleeder. You pull the towel down carefully, getting rid of the moldy wet dust staining its fabric. That was a nice distraction. You played along no-

ANXIETY: [ X ][ X ][30%]

-ooooohhhhhhh. Oh no. They're here. In the seats, there in the dark, hundreds of them. Cheeseburger meal people. Oil-drip sick people. Sloughing cancermass people. The smell is sudden and stomach-churning. Tumors being deep fried, bursting sweet with ripened fluids.

(HT - Do Not Cursepuke) 15 - [1]+[4]+[2] = 7 - Success.

You carefully stop your stomach from thinking too much about blackened crispy chunks of necrotic flesh, and fight your way out of the cursehaze to assess. You swallow more filthy dust and force down the cough, body starting to light on fire from the smothering mold-humidity of the theater. You have to get out of here, and move forward instead of getting lost. You have to act deliberate and get back ahead of the curious grease now slowly smooshing itself into every corner of the massive room.

How do you overcome? The next trial of a Lorded Land.

# ? Sep 4, 2021 17:20

pumpinglemma: Apr 28, 2009; DD: Fondly regard abomination.

Silver mind seems like a good move here, gets us out without any pursuers and it tests one of our strengths.

# ? Sep 4, 2021 18:26

Black August: Sep 28, 2003

Again with strawpoll not working. Here's the alternate poll, again. I need to figure out a solution if this is going to keep being a thing.

https://linkto.run/p/65LKVOLQ

# ? Sep 4, 2021 18:32

Black August: Sep 28, 2003

VOTING CLOSED - Usher Out

Use the power of Cheeseburger Magics to move unharmed out of the oilmeat flooded theater. [IQ Check] - 3
Move fast, and use your Red Right Hand as many times as necessary until you're in the clear. [-HP & -FP] - 1
Blank yourself and move undetected with the void of the Silver Mind. [!ESP Check] - 15
Clench your fist and walk with intent, crushing the wave with your gravity. [!Darkness Check & -HP] - 0
Sword slung, start running, keep chopping, no stopping til you're dropping. [!Tyranny Check & -HP/FP] - 0

LOADING...

...LOADING

# ? Sep 5, 2021 02:47

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ? Jun 2, 2024 16:45

Grond: Mar 31, 2016

t3isukone posted:

So Bella is Beleth. Useful to know. ~~Wonder if she'll teach us anything.~~

Holy poo poo, I can't believe I actually got this one right way back then. Wild.

Man I loved these last couple of updates. Infinite Ops sounds loving nuts, this world has so much potential.

I originally thought people reincarnated immediately after death due to that conversation with the Squire. But it looks like that's a thing only for him, from what I'm getting.

And it seems we have a picture of what happened in the island, or at least part of it. Looks like the World King and this Mythos Magi corrupted the Errant into the vampire they became back in the city. Then the World King betrayed the Magi and escaped with the Errant into the new world after the old one ended, inside the oil platform. After this the dryads (who would possibly become the Sunburners after that) caused an oil spill that would go on to cover all of the Island except maybe the beach we were in. I assume the oil was charged with the necromantic power of the World King. And then the Island would go on to create undead monstrosities like the Shale Giant. Which, if true, makes the World King responsible for a hell of a lot of bad things.

The interesting thing is that Galen knew about this. I think we're in an eternal recurrence scenario, as Buddhist cosmology dictates, but normally nobody remembers except for Galen, since I assume they're actually undead and immortal. So maybe what we have been seeing here are multiple different Kalpa in which things were going a bit differently. Like the one in which we get into the boat and are eventually adopted into the Ignatz family, and the one in which we come to be under the Miner's care as a baby as shown when we got the Wraith Rose. Maybe the Kalpas don't need to follow the exact same chain of events every time, but there might be some events that are Fated and thus always happen (like our death after a year). And the actual game the players are playing might be windows into different, particular Kalpas. Which might explain the inconsistencies between different versions, like the Miner existing in some versions of the game but not others. Or why you can only play each copy of the game just the one time. It's a hell of a long shot though.

Between this and the similarities between the Eidolons and the Lords, I'm getting serious 13 Sentinels flashbacks here by the way. Spoilers if you haven't played that: Specifically I'm thinking that the Eidolons and the Lords might be the same people from different loops. Like the 426/Juro Izumi/Juro Kurabe situation back then, where they were exactly the same person originated in different time loops. Maybe that's what the Eidolons and the Lords are, maybe Bleeder is just the Galen from a former Kalpa that somehow survived the end of the last universe into the creation of this one and kept mutating. I'd say this is very likely wrong, but it's an interesting thing to think about.

Grond fucked around with this message at 01:44 on Sep 6, 2021

# ? Sep 5, 2021 18:45

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Let's Play! > @ -ZEN- [Hell End]

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