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Thanks Napp!
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Dec 9, 2022 06:10
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| # ? Jun 1, 2024 07:49 |
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thnapp
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Dec 9, 2022 15:25
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 You spend a long while just staring at the stuff before you, with a thousand times the criticality you'd afford something like the MC&D mart. You finally find yourself willing to give it up- the violent looking potion of fluorescent orange oils, the bag of cool black lemons (you keep one small one to try later), the lovely metal apple, and then... you longingly hold up the little bottle of warmglow whose name promises 'JOY'. You can't bear to let that go. But you can smash down the enormous cannon of those silted golds, the thing's weight and elder menace making you uncomfortable in ways you didn't need to deal with what with already holding a nuke fridge and atom suit. You let the evil thing be the main currency while you consider, and then tell the soggy merchant your hopes for barter. "Eunmmmm... mm." He's looking at the orange oil and the fireworks cannon, approving of what he sees. The lemons and apple are scooped into a lovely-colored net lined with Manavine, holding an everfresh of many exotic fruits and vegetables. The cannon is placed with the bottle into a side-cart of bolted metal, slid with blast shield lock into a dark corner. Then he sweeps his return, looking at what you've asked for. That array might be good for your gun, or one to be found. That nasty looking little tank promises a lot of security, but the cost is that you'll have to do creepy medical stuff to get it working. There's another one of those cool gold plates that you want for sure, a white belt that radiates a certain sense of anonymity, and most of all an offer for an armor fitting that you could easily turn into a quick refit of your suit's wretched inserts. You get to buy all but the gun array, which disappoints you. drat. You didn't have a whole lot for sale this time. Oh well. You scoop up what you did get, but Napp takes a second to tie a tag to the glittery little gemstone array. "Ease. You can claim it fer another seeing with me. No plan to sell it anywell soon." - the price is marked down as a credit, and you smile enough to appreciate something to look forward to. You don't mind that. MC&D says "Anytime you want" but Napp has allure enough to say "Not yet; but maybe next time". It's a string to follow along, on your suicide walk. So you pack up the belt and tank, let the suit get a quick refit with some carefully bent iron slabs, and pocket the gold plate to think over what you have that could use a kick-up. You're happy to hop off along the north shore, both you and Napp looking for an excuse to let this have been a brief and cordial meet, so the next greet can be more friendly sincere. You're off, waving once in thanks, shroud back around and head far down as you casually limp-lope along the rocks of the river's ascent from the holy valley. Gotta be hidden. Ogres n' poo poo. You do not want to walk into them again after the last time, and you must NOT see Paprika again right now. None of them can know you're on this walk. You need to stay as out of all sight as you can manage, now that the world is ravenous with alert. You already have to worry and wonder about Sunburners trying to zinc your skull, you do not need any of Backup, MC&D, other Lords, remnant Congregation, ogres or wolves - ESPECIALLY the Kings - none of them can savvy to your intentions. Nerves are winning. ANXIETY: [ X ][ X ][ X ][40%] You sit down and shake for a while, huddled with sword hugged and feather pressed to cheek. You need to keep walking. You must wear your crown. You can't psyche yourself out. Okay. You'll try. You have to try. Please. (PSI Clouding ɑ) 13 [1]+[4]+[5] = 10 - Success! ANXIETY: [ X ][ X ][ X ][40%] HP: [ 30 / 30 ] FP: [ 14 / 15.▒ ] ...fade away, and then, inhale, and... (Technique - The Silver Mind) 13(-4) [1]+[4]+[4] = 9 - Success! ANXIETY: [10%] [Silver Mind] ...it's okay. You're okay. You're not in danger. You're hidden, and you can move quickly and quiet with your terrifying strength. Isn't that a security? How strong you are? You'll make it. You have to get to the apartment, and then the holy of night will be yours to hide in. Tomorrow is the true walk. Right now is just reaching the goal before dark. So you jet, scurrying down into the dense whorled woods that mark the way into the wilds. You let the power of your silver ambience guide you away from the noise of minds, allowing you the peace of knowing you're not going to walk into camp or mural. Just weave it clean between. Sail under the irondark sky, forever more a wraith, sword hidden within Red's care while you weave down through the terrible silence of the Rivergreen. You exhale again with the breathing exercise. Relax. Gentle yourself. Think. Which way? (PE - Remember?) 13 [1]+[5]+[2] = 8 - Success! Okay, yeah. It's coming back. Because you did it, and you did it twice, and you carefully walk around what that's saying because this is a Third after all. So out you go, over longwalks now so easy you walk them casual, through woods and quiet densities. You want to forage, but you decide to try something else. (IQ - CHEESE! BURGER! SP-  There's a disgusting burst of superior gold, and a shower of hot gilded grease sprays out and murders half the surrounding foliage. You wince and duck, startled, feeling the magics then realign themselves in a slow reboot. poo poo! What was that?! You... huh. The spirit was trying to manifest, but it hit some kind of unintended turbo and shorted its own summoning out. You're left with a burst burger on a rock stained gold, all of the meat and cheese and bun also gilded, but uncomfortably lumpy and deformed. You walk away quickly, using the shroud to clean up, decided that maybe you'll just stick to whatever is in the apartment and some rations. At least it's cleared out for next time you use it. ANXIETY: [ X ][20%] [Startled] You're somewhere down out in the softlands between valley and Rivergreen, brushing off the last of glittercheese gold, when you nearly walk right into them. There, in the clearing, leading to the treewalks that wind down into the green-gray surround. Towering, towering, towering. Thee witches three. You know them, by the one you have met now three times - but these are the Fifth Lord's most mighty, so there would be two times for more, of the one standing Thundering King. ANXIETY: [ X ][ X ][ X ][40%] [poo poo] See her there, once again? Once in one night forgotten, once in one night unreal. But now she's undeniable, towering God-awful MIGHTY with oak, leaning bent with a dryad's creak of rage. She's slamming about with her bent metal rod, thunderdrinking wand, body singing to the winds with the crashing of her manyfold bangles, her masked head always bent to face the Sun. Her electrical-tape wrapped hand, gnarled and long, clutches her unworn crown to use it in gesticulation. She is dancing mad, moving with the languages without words to speak with her two lessers of the greaters. See her there, not nearly as tall as the King, but surely one hundred times the shine? Surely she is the Solar Flare. There was no mistaking the utter blessed that was ultimate solartech; immaculate cleans of hyperdense starry black glass, run through with winding streams of solar gold, gemstone liquid in form and aesthetic. It was monstrous with magics and prayers, technology transformed to a union of natural and ultranatural. The solartech was irregular throughout the amboyna body of the Sunburner, dense and glory-polish strong, hidden by her robes of ashen white. Was her face still there? Was is solar-run? No telling from the hide of her strange-colored mask. Nor was there telling from the dense mask of the other dryad, the most lethal looking of the three, ebony and wrapped in metal-dirted black robes. Metal Fire. She was smallest of them but still a tower over your stand, and with her she easily dragged a freakish hate of a weapon; a magnesium slab-sword, hilt-fitted to a nasty lock-work apparatus to power an enchanted striker. She was taking in the rant with the motions of swaying, an easy-breeze agreement to the King's storm-rage of rattling. The amboyna was still, growths blossoming to draw out as much sunlight as possible from the stingy skies. ...no, okay, no. It's okay. You keep holding your infinite breath anyways, but you're sure they haven't seen you through your clouding. Full throttle stopcut on the Central Nervous. They're so QUIET. Oh sacrifice silence. You fight mad to minimize every living function and thought, sending passive the Silver and now-interested mushrooms, forcing slow heart and bubble-bracing your lungs. STILL. Like a shaded flower. Just observe passive. See? You managed to keep your silver and your cloud, so you get to keep your cool and live through three Sunburners openly walking the lands with a show of fury. You can't remember- why did she smash your head again? The Backup explained, but you were way too scrambled. You touch it again... dense midnight, atop your skull. What will you do, should you ever find out what's hiding behind your watery eyes? ANXIETY: [ X ][20%] [Silver...] They're done. The Thundering King makes the air crack with a final workout of her fury, swinging the rod so fast the air splits. You try not to flinch. watch her tall-stalk away over to the bridge, where the other two follow after while giving the King some distance. It's when you notice that they're actually carrying something that was lying next to them while they stood and spoke. Cases. Weird sized ones bundled up with cables and ropes, easily plucked up and carried away as they leave. You keep still for a very long time, and find yourself dead thankful you're taking the long up-round way down to get to the apartments. They're going right down hard south... surely towards the Lands they called Lorded, where the sky ran dark. You lie in the cooling grasses and let your body unfurl another anxiety attack, the Silver catching your racing thoughts about the eventual confrontation with those powerful cultists and sending them back to the black, gifting you one respite from reality. Get back up. Go. You can't slow. Not while on walk. Not when night wasn't all that far away. You just lucked out and avoided a real terror, so now you need to make right and keep to the plan. Up. Check again. They're long gone. Curve around, stay to the trees, and go. You remember the way. Just lope and go long. Don't look around, don't make sound. Try. With silver, clouding, and the way known. Try as gently as you can. (DX - Stealth) 11 [1]+[2]+[4] = 7 - Success! Yes. You can. See? Ease up, one last time. STRETCH your body and rehaul your weight. Crack your weary bones. Lean, and then move with the kind of grace only felines could pretend to. ANXIETY: [10%] [Silver] You're true terror now, a Ghost of Hell, blackwraith shimmering sungilt under the absolute greengray of the Rivergreen, the waters sing masking your runs while you move out over the long of the lands. You vanish past the mural heights. You deft away from the ogre camps. You steer from any sight of Salt Lone or Savannah, ignoring sightline that could betray the shape of the Mountain. You're just adrenaline speed. You're just this incredible strength. (ST - Freedom) 11 [2]+[4]+[1] = 7 - Great Success!! You're so happy. You can just leap over entire rivers, step over every longwalk, monkey up trees to jump right over entire detours, and throw yourself aerial over and over to record paths of time and shadow. You're unseen, unheard, unfelt, unbound. You're so much greater than you were when you first walked! You have to pray to your intent for this love of overcome. This prayer for the win of Megalith Solar. [The Tyrant approves.] It's not too much further into the day, evening only beginning to arrive, when you finally hit upon the most familiar of paths.   ... You huddle inside of a familiar bush, for the third time. You rest for a bit and just allow yourself to cool down comfortable. You'll need to gorge your subscription soon to keep it happy for this longhaul. The garbage disposal is ready and willing, having gained a strange kind of thinking ever since the blood transfusion. Your central nervous is warmed and primed, maybe approaching a new comfortable of coordination, happy after the lean walking, and hopeful for a third grind of the board soon. Your poor cranium is doing well, healed after the incredible stress of the tyrannical superthought. It was happy it was capable of that degree of free unbounded thinking. But it was a very horrible experience to feel blood boiling in the brain. The silver - you're inside of it, warmed in a clean hall of infinite mirrors. You feel something strange about it, really. A familiar, deja vu, knowing before knowing before knowing. Does a psychic remember a vision before it even happens? Can you remember a dream you had as a child, and realize it was one you were meant to have when you were seventy years old? Silver is there, and then it looks at the kind of things Doubler thought about, and it thinks about being Silver twice. We did that, didn't we? Here, outside the apartments. We were, and then we were twice. But now we're thrice, because the land is strange now. See? You're hiding in a bush, but the bush is blossomed with tourmaline flowers, and the leaves are a warm velvety pink-black. You dip hand to soil; warm dark brown, and glittering with gem colors. Soil so immense with nutrients that it could support the life of Heaven. You fall over and exhale with tears, thinking about threes, while you touch your crown. Your intent. You rub it as careful as you did when you first woke, and you try not to choke when you think about falling to your death, before a winged arm grabbed you with such confidence that you couldn't think of it as anything but love. You exhale with another little cry, and burst from the bush to see how incredible the land is stained with all this colorful life. It's a gentle walk to the front of the apartment gates. You have to take this slow. You're sifting through mounds of the softsand soils, glittering and rife with little plants able to grow, knowing it was ash once upon a time. Softer than snow. You sift through the gemaline foliage, standing once more where you've been twice before.  You sit down and inhale the cleaner airs. Look. The sky in earliest evening- it's stained glass scatter, the grays tinted by solar hues, turning to black and gold. You bask in the warm river winds and repose, sleepy sad under the dense foliage. You're dreaming of the hot shower while you rest, begging for this calm to stay with you until morning. You can just have this one little oasis, before the terror of nuclear landfall. One last pretend of civilization. You stand up after a big yawn and stomach-growl, turning to stand tall and face what's within the gates of your illustrious wishfallen apartment complex. You're a big deal in the only way that matters - PROPERTY & WEAPONS. Okay. Actually. There's one last thing you need to do before you're through. You got here in record time and inside the absolute of silence; does that keep up? Do you just roll with that and into your sanctus sanctum? What will you do with the evening given to you?
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Dec 12, 2022 07:45
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I know the MC very much does not want anyone to know they're going for the walk, but I think they deserve a moment to have fun.
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Dec 12, 2022 16:36
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Bah, we clearly need a solid 8 hours of sleep and a quiet night of rest and recuperation to prepare both mentally and physically for the ordeal we're about to undertake.
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Dec 12, 2022 17:02
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ehhh. i think we're in a pretty good place right now as far as rest and recuperation goes. aside from our chibby sanctuary the apartment complex is about the safest and most welcoming place we've created for ourselves. what it has that the sanctuary *doesn't* is people -- and people who are p. cool with us, to boot i agree that doing rager of a party wouldn't be a good idea, but having a chance to just be a person seems like a solid way to go for the evening. these people are the closest we have to friends outside the Dream World and Red/Blue themselves
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Dec 12, 2022 23:36
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Figured out the google docs problem, it was all one windows and firefox update away from a fix, game update nearly done. Meanwhile- VOTING CLOSED - Dead Green Night Self Care Let's go through the usual long route with the clouded stealth. - 10 Look around the place for fun or company before going to the apartment. - 24 LOADING...  ...LOADING Six-Pack Blue Booking posted:MONSTROUS STRENGTH
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Dec 15, 2022 08:40
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I want someone to pronounce "Chchuurjanaire" Also wtf is an "Ultrarapier"
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Dec 15, 2022 09:15
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Regallion posted:I want someone to pronounce "Chchuurjanaire" I'd guess the first 'ch' is ejective, and the rest of it sounds perfectly pronounceable to me.
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Dec 15, 2022 09:43
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My new goal now is to be as strong as a DRAGON now tbh. We can't skip leg day.
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Dec 15, 2022 16:29
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ultrarapier might just be a toothpick for giants also: we've got a ways to go yet, but we will get strong enough to wrestle that moloch not because we need to or anything, but because suplexing a moloch is a goal worthy in its own right
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Dec 15, 2022 16:58
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Marluxia posted:My new goal now is to be as strong as a DRAGON now tbh. We can't skip leg day. Put it this way, if at any point we get the option to drink some kind of dragon blood, I am going to slam the vote button on that no matter the downsides on that.
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Dec 15, 2022 18:12
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Marluxia posted:My new goal now is to be as strong as a DRAGON now tbh. We can't skip leg day. 
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Dec 15, 2022 19:42
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Several parts of the Tyrant-Child's brain, chanting in unison: STRENGTH, STRENGTH, STRENGTH, STRENGTH!
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Dec 15, 2022 20:50
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Arcanuse posted:not because we need to or anything, but because suplexing a moloch is a goal worthy in its own right moloch is bigger than a train, ya?
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Dec 15, 2022 22:57
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Listen to you all. What is wrong with all of you? 50 IS ROOKIE NUMBERS. WE GO 100 OR DIE TRYING. SUPLEX MOLOCH? gently caress THAT, I WANT TO SUPLEX MOULDER. I WANT TO POWERBOMB MC&D TOWER SO HARD IT COMES BACK OUT INTO REALITY. NOT ONLY DO WE NOT SKIP LEG DAY, WE TREAT EVERY DAY LIKE LEG DAY.
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Dec 15, 2022 23:19
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I wonder what stats we need in order to suplex Smiercia...
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Dec 15, 2022 23:28
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Randalor posted:Listen to you all. What is wrong with all of you? reminded of that one fists-only run that punched Moulder to death 
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Dec 15, 2022 23:41
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tFUCKINGmesis posted:I wonder what stats we need in order to suplex Smiercia... Think we're gonna need Dragon grade Will just to try 
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Dec 15, 2022 23:43
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Marluxia posted:Put it this way, if at any point we get the option to drink some kind of dragon blood, I am going to slam the vote button on that no matter the downsides on that. The Bloody Parasite strongly approves. tFUCKINGmesis posted:I wonder what stats we need in order to suplex Smiercia... Getting too dang strong for Death to take you is certainly one way to attempt immortality. Now I'm picturing Smiercia attempting to scythe the soul out of the protagonist's body, only for the scythe to bounce right off the ol' six-pack.
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Dec 15, 2022 23:44
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Well challenging death to a contest is traditional, let's just make sure it's arm wrestling.
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Dec 15, 2022 23:49
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mystery bug posted:reminded of that one fists-only run that punched Moulder to death
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Dec 16, 2022 18:46
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You get off the bench and begin an aimless wander into the tropical foliage overrunning the complex. You decide to try to ease yourself into the third time instead of just bulling through to go hide in your apartment, especially in case Backup are wandering who might get spooked not knowing you're around. It's nervous, but it's necessary to be able to sleep soundly tonight; it's still early and you're restless enough to justify it. You're not going to go into the southwest or southeast buildings, but you will blunder around the booths until it's dark. Most of the gemstone ash has been blown away, revealing the glittering remains of the great carnival art space now all spackled with rainbow. You feel drawn out into it, eyeing up the menace of the ferris wheel once more. You peer into the pit of paint unending, seeing colorations of pinks, blacks, golds, and tropic greens. You feel strange, but the mushrooms are being quiet and passive-observant, and the Silver is over your troubled lobes in the voidsoft of mind. So what is this unusual feeling? It's not the awful of the after and before, since the Moloch Buster is firmly resolved in your backpack cargo. It's something to do with the tropic heat of it; the sky is even coloring a strange hue from the lovely of the miracle you can't quite remember. While wandering about in this confusion, you walk by one booth that stands out to you. It's small and pseudo-gothic, heavy with themes of water, demanding a squat for even you to be able to access. It's all deep dark gem drapes and bonsai water-tube upholdings, with the nameplate of 'LUCY'S SAD' on the small circular entry. You look at it for a while as you sit on the ground, puffing in and out with bubbles in the lungs as you gentle on to the Silver coating your nightmare-scorched neurons. So, what is it exactly? There's no name or any payment for the booth. You just crawl in. So you do, and find yourself able to stand up in a weird lobby where the ceiling is gemstone drapes that rise and fall in a soothing motion. You look around and realize light is given off by the gemstones and hidden amber brights, illuminating a set of chairs to sit on and wait with a little sign over a very narrow door that says 'Wait For Seating'. You seat to wait to seat. There's a warm lavender hum, and you watch a light clearly pop in front of your line of sight, dragging your enfelined attention over to where it stops near the access sign, and then waits as more gemlights coalesce into a messy and strange approximation of a woman. You pay attention pretty fast, wondering if it's real or an enchantment, and watch silver curious as the gemlight hologram waters about to get cohesion, just enough to reveal what she looks like; if anything she's more underslept and ill-done than you. Her face, under somber shredded shag of sight-cloying raindull hairs. Eyes perpetually unfocused and watery weary. Motions dull and labored, resentful and weakened. She has a suit on, though! Some kind of host outfit, shades of grays and whites through the colorblur. You wish you could see it more clearly. The apparition waves, and your Silver sparks with the sensation of a psychic prerecord. She's speaking. Raw driven choking tones deliver casual sarcastic. Fatally ill. Gentle.  "Hi. I'm Lucy. I'm a wish-ghost that will help serve you while I complain. Like a lovely Alma. Nobody is going to use this so I'm using it as an art and journal dump. If somebody is using this, then come sit down and get lovely wishfood and my cocktails. I'll start talking and ignore a lot of what you say. This wish-ghost is mostly repressed resentment since there's nobody to share any of this with. I hope you like the drinks; come on." ??? You stand up since Lucy is holowalking through the narrow door, ducking the gem curtains to follow her. It's a sudden hard corner right past, and everything is an overwhelming totality of blue. The gem-hologram of Lucy says "It's really dark on purpose. Sit down in a drinkgrip and wait for a minute for the wish-ghost to tether and start talking properly." You do so, looking to see that the bar is a real strange exotic deal where you sit inside of one of three immense cabinet-booth-chairs, luxurious with wishsoft leathers and leans, turning a simple seat at a bar into a strange personalized superexperience. You ensconce into the superblue pod, seeing before you an easy-adjust tabledesk that hooks up into the serving portal for the bartender. You relax, the chair swelling with cooling gels and sound-damps, sending you into a Silver-loving semi-deprivation silence while you wait for Lucy. When she appears it's with the grace of making you feel it with a wish-blue spark through your mitochondria, and wake in time for her to lean into the portal to your pod. "I used a really emotion-charged hack of a wish to figure out what I'd should mix and make for you, so that's why there's no menu. I did it while you sat there. This is kind of strange, the wish-ghost doesn't really know what to do after having looked at you, so a lot of this is being done by guess and emotion. I used to work as this awful place in Anidus, after we got dumped back there from the Island. It was in the Aion District. Not a whole lot of us got to be in that district, but I did from luck. I helped support a lot of us, which meant nobody had to fully starve while our funds went to Mireth's life support, or Jez's infection meds, or the wildfire of rent highs. The pod can simulate the place I worked, but I'm going to skip that part of the planned experience for you. Hold on." You keep trying to follow the warbly-warm tired voice of the wish-ghost, barely catching up when she suddenly shifts the intense deep blue lights to be a more bearable rainbowshift of subtler hues. You relax in the colorful dark, her hologram more legible and audible as she leans on the counter and keeps chatting as she thinks. "You don't need addictions. You do need a cocktail nobody likes me mentioning or making, and that's a Bloody Bloody, Bloody Mary. My own take." She leans back and adjusts her collar, and reaches around to start pulling in the right wish-orb synths for the right recreation. She sing-songs strangely with a cough while she works ultramagic. "My Bloody Mary you're acting quite contrary and maybe more than a little scary~" by the time you think what she's saying through, there's already a ridiculous lunchdrink set down before you. It's a bizarre trophy-glass brimmed with a bloody saucy mixture, speared sacrificial with a little meatstuff sandwich, a gross of turnip-like greens from one of Lucy's remembered Anidus markets, and then a long wrap of sinister spicy curlvines, apparently from Jandoubi-indigenous trees. "Eat, use drink as dip, finish, then drink to wash it down. I'm supposed to call it a 'Jandoubi Heat' but gently caress you, it's a Bloody Mary with fancy garnish. Just like I'm supposed to be Lucy's Sad. But I didn't want to give my name up, I didn't want to forget the worst, and I made Melinda compromise or else. And NONE of you backed me up. You treat me like poo poo and I don't want to go to Paradise. I want us to stay here and make art and talk about this, but none of you are going to do that."  The sandwich is sublime, and to be honest, it's spiced further on by both sauce and your sheer arm-lean interest in what the wish-ghost is ranting about. This is an incredible drink, made with some hidden magic that convinces the parasite in your heart that you're supping on some strange spiced vitae vintage, sating its growing bloodlust for another night as it settles in satisfied. Your subscription and compactor are both happy too, and the ABV is Just Enough by some wish secret that you manage to get a warm relax that stops exactly before it becomes genuine inebriation. Lucy is real good at the wish stuff. She's also still grousing, under the rainbow hues of gemlight. You feel as though you might be the first to have ever crawled into this space and heard this. "I just hate that I'm not allowed to talk about anything that's happening, or happened. I can miracle through Paradise but I can't talk about how being able to drink until my liver bursts and then regenerates somehow isn't dealing with how much I want to kill myself. But I'm not supposed to want to kill myself, because I have everything I could wish for." You chew slow on the greens and stare. The gemshade is leaning on the counter and resting her head, eyes watering and voice clearly expressing a confidence she does not and cannot show around her peers. "I don't know what's wrong with me and I think I'm not the only one who's like this. It doesn't make up for the Island. It doesn't make up for Anidus. I just want to stay here instead of moving again but we have to go and I hate that I can't talk to anyone like how I used to or about what we went through." The last of the drink goes with the weird curly spicevines, which sore your throat with the harsh of their tremendous scoville assault. It's really good, though. Kind of like an unreasonably planty mustard. You wait for Lucy to keep on, but you freeze up when you realize she's looking right at you, with a completely clear face and defaulted pose. "Sorry. You're reading as Backup Null. You have no ID but you're cleared for Paradise. The wish-ghost also reads that you're one of the Knights of the Arcade. I don't know how to react, so I can't really talk about anything else with you, so you can finish your drink while I reset out and let you go. Sorry for the error. Thanks for coming. Since you're here to the end, I'll let you have my special bonus where you'll be allowed to use my options on any wish-garbage I or someone else made that's still lying around. Bye." Huh? You finish up fast as the lights flicker back down to superblue, the pod sliding as you exit and see the wish-ghost is gone. Well fed and drank, you climb out and through the gentle lobby to a twilight night, the ash glittering even more brightly with self-luminescence. That was a strange experience. You're just glad it meant a quick free meal. You think over what the Backup hologram said, realizing you still know very little about the Sixth Lord and her cult. But it was all about the Fifth Lord right now, and dodging any suspicion that you're gunning for her soul. The longer they think you're some fun hoipty-doipty tourist...  ANXIETY: [ X ][20%] The silver is brittle a little. But you keep your nerves down because you got a buzz and a good meal, and the air is clean and half the machines seem powered and active. Wow. You haven't been here when it gets darker. Neon lights, glittering minibulbs, beautiful signs and hand-made art installs, arcade cabinets next to vending machines strewn near tent with games of might or hidden art spaces; what was it like, to have been here with everyone when it all began? Every cult together and firstblessed with their holies? You think back suddenly on the pizza plush disaster, and meekly skulk around to stare at things without touching them, until you find one that's Just Right. So many designs with names you mostly don't recognize. A red starsilk-draped fortune telling booth, sevenfold in design, meant to reveal 'One Fun Useless Fact' about your near future; made by Alma. A beaten-up dispenser for candy in a monstrous riot of fluorescent rave shades, where you need to smash your fist into the dispenser to get a handful of hard pills that promises to be 'your favorite fruit flavor, with magic sugars to make you feel young again'; made by Kandy Kill, vendor design by Marvine Mall. An ingenious recycling mechanism that acts like a slot machine for every metal can or glass bottle or whatever you toss in, with the promise of genuine fabulous prizes if you win; all done proudly by Soupkid. A down-for-repair and abandoned booth by the one and only Jenny Invincible, housing a complex showstage supermachine that once had a Megalith fragment in it for power. It was able to let you feel like her, which is to say, rainbow gutted with starshine-genuine invincibility, but only by staying perfectly still inside of the poorly designed gadget. A shootdown range named 'Hogan's City' that you'd absolutely love to try, as it promises an endless variety of shooting situations and wishcustom popup targets... but it's broken and half-blasted, never to be redone; the name is still owed to Dead End Sunday. A more dire telling of your fortune, in terms of your potential for villainy, which you think is cool but you can't use it; not because it's broken, but because Clubber, who made the dark goat-sigil tent, needs to be present to make his wish gimmick work. He is not present. You move on to a few more while fighting over what to do with the time left. Someone named Sueynami made a very cool looking little slimtent designer waterbooth where you can get deep sea specialty sushis, but you're not hungry. There's an incredible still-working ultrabaroque tracker that's showing the real-time wealth of the Backup named Treasure Infinite. A jumpscare darkbooth game of Red Light Green Light done by Redboy. Indoor Field using wish-ghosts with Play To Off. An unfinished bunch of, uhm, something, not really sure what, but the nameplate reveals it was Beach Bae's idea. Oh, poo poo! There's even a ministage with a lot of nameplates, one of which includes Dancer!!! But the goddamn thing is broken. It needs some kind of stronger powering wish-crystal to work, but it's gone and the stage is in disrepair. It's supposed to be some kind of dance game where you can learn from Dancer and her star students how to do each of her sixfold styles of freedom of motion. poo poo! You skulk on. It's darker yet, a tropical pink haze staining the clouds black and their cracks a solar warm. There's a breeze, herald wind, warmer and whispering to the back of your neck with hellcall to Megalith. But something more is present in it, isn't there? Something that was you taking a pill before a shower which was the last time, which was the first time, which meant it was going to loop full circle over and over until it became something improbable.  「Many-Coloured」 Your racing thoughts are broken when you pass by what you thought was a black-tarp machine, broken and done, but now gleaming through the cover with colours that might only be found in Paradise. You startle and grab the tarp with a pulled gun, as if it was going to answer for the machine, grunting as you yank down to stare at a massive arcade cabinet that's in reality a sorta-slot machine where you see what Backup action figure you get. Hm. There's a red button, which looks like it's broken, a blue button, and a green button. Who made this? 90 Cross. You danced with them, right? You- the thing is, you, it's just, yeah you danced with them and it felt right and good to move it out, but, but you danced once before- on the ship. You danced with him because you said you wanted to know how and he said he did too so you decided to teach each other and you will never in your entire life have words for what that felt like and meant to you, and you can't bear to remember that truth for more than a second before you're gone again.  Gone to Megalith. ANXIETY: [ X ][ X ][30%] Face pressed to the gemglass screen. What's it showing? All these flashy arcade previews of... nonsense, to your eyes. Stylized art of ragged people moving around in weird tropic environments with some horror theme? It just keeps flashing to an insistence you roll the dice to see 'who survives' and then you get an action figure and a pamphlet. Sure. Sure. You finger down to smack a button, so you can grab a prize and then begin to work your way back slow to your room with the time left, maybe risking a game if there's light left. What color button do you press?
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Dec 21, 2022 02:23
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The Silver Mind posted:
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Dec 21, 2022 03:03
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that's a lot of lore!! wow
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Dec 21, 2022 19:36
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that's some spicy stuff.
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Dec 21, 2022 19:46
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-about those who left for the city that's always dark. - 13 -about those still there, still down in Paradise. - 17  Oh. You pressed the green button. There's a long series of alchemical slot reels that plays through the autogame, and you end up 'winning' the survivor's action figure as they graduate to cultism. There's a rare chance to win one for the other cults and some Lords... but that's so low chance you'd be here for months. You're happy to get any easy win, and the bubble-pod of glittery glass at the bottom swings open with a pop to spit out the figurine and its informationals. You grab it and stare at it and its little action card. Huh. Okay. Psychic in Paradise. He looks pretty superstar, a thought which makes you itch with the wish for the starry little pill. Is that what Jenny Invincible feels like all the time? You tuck the figurine away and look at the other side of the card to study what it says about the other Paradise Backup you can collect for the set.  You have to not think about how many names and low-quality figurine images are there. You can't think about every promise you made to not End. The demand of Hell that takes, to be mighty enough to break every wave of overwhelming adversity from not obeying the necessity of swording survival. Just tuck the figure away and throw out the info card and start to skulk back to get to the apartment. You have an eerie feeling, and you want a hot shower and a quiet cower under clean blankets. [Got 'Backup Doll'] LOADING...  ...LOADING
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Dec 22, 2022 05:10
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[ f l e s h ] is certainly an interesting power, race, and technique
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Dec 22, 2022 06:22
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Remind me to avoid the dirty flesh guy at all costs. Eden you however is interesting, i wonder how that works and if it's related to BoI's Eden
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Dec 22, 2022 07:51
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Well Engelgänger kinda sounds like a mix between Engel and Doppelgänger, so maybe he works like a doppelgänger with Paradise backup powers or something. I guess...?
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Dec 22, 2022 14:26
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Or they can become a doppelganger of an angel. I... don't want to see the angels that dwell in Hell End.
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Dec 22, 2022 14:34
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i wonder how Psychic Psycho feels about the current owners of the Starmetal System, and the person who gave it to them 
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Dec 22, 2022 14:40
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Regallion posted:Remind me to avoid the dirty flesh guy at all costs. i read it as a pun of "eatin'" so uh idk maybe encountering f l e s h would be a better way to go lol edit: could also be a pun of 'even' like, "even you can be a ~~star~~" but either way the pun is strong(er than the already high level of most of the Backup names) with that one
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Dec 22, 2022 16:37
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Part of me wonders if Dirty Jack's Flesh is supposed to be a reference (Jumping Jack Flash).
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Dec 22, 2022 16:42
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You walk away from the prize machine and outdraw your sword, staring up at the shape of your apartments against the wane of strange sky. Is this nice? Feeling just the most gossamer tensile of safety among an ocean black? You don't know, because so much confliction is piling up in your overheated brains that it makes you lose grasp of basic emotions, save for when they sneak up to chokehold backstab you with pure overwhelm. When the only emotions left are the peak extremes, everything else just fades to soupy gray. It's too much, to think you'll be that way. ANXIETY: [ X ][ X ][30%] Just get to the weird tunnel and start the hike to get inside. Tomorrow is the first day of the unknown arc of the walk. The walk south, to Solar. Just pray action figure luck and a good dinner is enough to make it safe. You walk down around in loop through the warming of the thousand arcadian lights, heading back by the pit of paint. You look down and the paint is black, which forces your vision away and back to the hurry of escaping int̥͓́͗͢͜o͋̑҉̖̖͝ ̜̫͊͆͢͡ ̵̨̫̞͒̃ ̃͆͠҉̯͖ ͂͂҉̵͕͔ ̵̰̹̎̎͠ ̧̰͉̒̓͝ ̭͔̿̐̕͝ ̶̟͒̇͞ͅ ̆ͧ͡҉̟̣ ̹͆͞ ͙ͩ̀ ̢̮̄ ͍͌͜ ̥͆͜ ̨̬̋ ̰̇̕ ̢̫ͫ ̷̤͑ ̴͙ͬ ̙͐͠ ̉҉̼ ̝̪͊̄͡͡ ̷ͯͯ͏̥̪ ̷̵̣͎́ͩ ́̅͡͏͔̟ ̴̪̳̈̌͠ú̶̷͕͖ͯ ̶͇͉͌̋̀l͍ͤ͞o̢͖͗o̐҉͚k̟̃͢ ̮ͨ͡d̸̘ͨō҉̥wn and the paint is ̨͇̚ ͖̄́ ̸̪̿ ̵̮ͧ ̭̾͟ü͏̺ ̨͉͒l̢̖̙ͫ̽̀ǫ̫͙ͪ̂̕o̖͙ͪ͋͡͡k̨͓̠ͫ́͡ ̊͑͏̸̲̞d̛̝͎ͦ̚͘ŏ̢̈҉̪̺wn and the paint is ̻̍͘ ̩ͩ͟ ̝̐͟ ͕̂͜ ̢̼̯̐̀́û͉̹̉̀͝ ̍͐͟҉͓̻l̆̋͌͞҉̸͎̟̼o̵̶̫̰̐̓ơ̘͇ͥ͗̕ķ̴̖̥̂ͩ ̸̮̾d͉̿͜oͧ҉̗wn and the paint is gold̆҉͇  ███look down and the paint is the most stunning shade of tourmaline. It roils with the gemstone shade, glittering facets of the impossible colour, casting an illumina to the plaza of dancing shadowlights. You marvel at them waterflowing over the sides of the buildings, and take a minute to watch it happen, knowing the paint pit will change from this too soon. You wait in quiet, again enjoying how warm the air is, making your breathing easy and calming. ANXIETY: [ X ][20%] Because you were staring at the paint, you were hanging around for a moment longer. Because the paint was gemglown, you could see down the alley leading to the southwest of the great green underground, now collapsed and quiet with tropic overgrow. Because you were staring and were around longer and could see, all because you decided to stay out, you... saw. Motion. Near the grasses of the alley. Where Bloodshop called you Burgersong. You don't reach for your gun, your goldgloam sword already out and chipping absently at the pavement. You don't tense up too hard, either. It's probably Backup, and while it means social, it can be brief since it's getting dark and you can claim to needing a wash. So you go it slow and predator-aware, making sure of what's walking weirdly through the tourmaline shadows. You flick another look, sharp with silver and nutrition. You freeze up when it hits you that you're pretty sure you're looking at something robed, bangled, and walking stiff-stride; you're positive that it's one of the three from before, and you hope it's the Thundering King to beg your pray for peace. But this one isn't as tall. Likely the one with the poison swords, then. Ugh. Awkward. Just slow it. Keep on to the remnant of the silver soothing, and the enjoyment of a nice night. Smooth it. Wait for the collision of two ships in the deepcloud night; never shall the twain have a choice in their meeting. They're stumbling for sure. They... (!First-Aid - Base Assessment) 12 [5]+[5]+[2] = 12 - Success. An exact success. A single glancing look of passive experience. That's all it took. For you to realize they're wounded, and that you should make yourself known enough to offer help. So you move around the pit and call out lightly, waving with your sword tucked away while you size their gait up. Exhaustion, numerous bodily stresses and strains, excess of power used too often in too small a window... your mind wanders over those early early years of intensity maximum, and all the nightmares, the nightmares that came with the comprehension of bandagin'. You call again before your tyranny can catch it in your throat, and the figure pays attention. They do so with terror. They stumble back and cast a hand, raised clawed and warding, pressed to wall and supporting their creaking stature. The lights are so colorful dancing, it smears all vision of clear away. But now? Here? In this moment one million? Your silver is clean. Your eyes are clear. The tourmaline is gentle, gentle enough to let you see it. The red robes, stained and torn. The dozenfold charms, most of them broken or torn or cast away. A mask, slippery in the callous-bled hands as it presses back on. Their body language struggles mad, losing coherence as one last riproar of effort sees them collapse to sitting, their robe torn open, pointing inside with desperation as the other hand extends with begging.  The shirt is bloodied. Little mangled. Sap-hardened. Burnt. But it's real, and it's proof, and once you understand what you're seeing you bite your hand to bury the scream as your emotions find that terrible mountain peak once again, tears shook from your eyes as you fight to clearly see and confirm. It's a Camp Counselor shirt. It's Counselor Red. She's real. She's real. She's here. She's hurt and she's scared, and, all you can think about isn't "I need to kill her now and secure my safety" or "I should run and hide and let the Backup get her" or "I should be nervous about meeting her again considering what I'm going to do" - you want to think that. You should think that. Your crown is weighted, perfectly, to think all of that with critical insight. But you're crying gross and quietly while you walk-run awkwardly and fall over to grab Red's outreaching arm so you can hug it and hold it and whisper her name with the vehemence of a soul who knows without a doubt that Heaven listens. She holds on with her waning strength as you crush her arm and rock back and forth, delirium-sick with the fear she's going to vanish again. But right now, right now, she's REAL. REAL. REAL! But she's hurt! She's not safe. You have to help her be safe. That's all you can think, and your crown's weight is dragged with untold force in the direction of that imperative. Your intent. The force of that ocean black! (WL - Get It Done) 20 [1]+[6]+[1] = 8 - Success. Effortless. You stand, summon her shroud, and wipe your face with it fierce, blowing nose and coughing spit which the silk instantly evaporates. You shake yourself and lean down, and tell Red that you have a safehouse here, and that you'll help her recover. You don't give her time to explain as you hoist her up with your monstrous strength, using your medical recall to carry her without injury as you cargo her and squat so you can step quickly without dragging her legs. You're off, and she just hugs on - whatever protest she has can't be vocalized. You're mad with the militant, already ducking through the rows and grounds as if every corner has another horror waiting, whether mundane or mythic. You have wounded and they need to get respite. You're so thankful for them - your wonderful lungs, your endless strength. You're moving with the gremlin's manic, teeth bared eyes flared, sniffing the air with a stare as you confirm over and over that no flesh draws near. You have to save your Counselor. She's counting on you. If she survives, it means the picture was real. It means the shirt was real. It means that hell was real and the love that waited at the end of it is still waiting for you somewhere out there. You can finally be certain of something. But she has to live. So you have to run, and your intent is so strong that in your wake the gravity spills with ripples. You're at the tube. Now think. You need to be clear. You can remember the way, but you can't afford to freeze up. So calm down, and think. Recall. Let your mitochondria attempt that ridiculous art - never will you truly know how difficult diamond magics are, and how casually you force your biology to understand their process; superminerals in the blood. (!Diamond Magics - Grace Under Pressure) 10(+2) [6]+[3]+[3] = 12 - Success. HP: [ 30 / 30 ] FP: [ 10 / 15.▒ ] [-5 FP] Status: Diamond Mind PRESSURE: [ ♢ ]  Yes. There. You are at peak. Your crown, midnight, dusted with starlight. You are diamond-might. Your muscles may not be quite that tier of exotic ultrastrength, but they're climbing there faster with every day of your subscription. Your will, yes, it is diamond. So now too are your nerves, your panic, your emotions sealed into a glittering stone as diamond makes your veins sparkle through your skin. You leap into the tunnel and tell Red to hold tight and quiet; you need to work your way up to the apartments through a lot of nonsense first. You come down into the undertunnels, sensing an immediate change in their demeanor. What was once and then twice (twice) a hostile overgrowth among unbuilt ruins is at peace now, a water-dripping lonely love of vibrant mosses and dense waterleaves, the killing foliage relaxed. You don't make much scene or sense of the change, just happy to have safe passage you commando through in a hurry while you pass by an exotic of flower walls. The escalator is heavy with the gemstone ashes, and then you're soon back, the third now, back past the lost projects of art, each time sadder than the last but with a different complexity of color than before. There was something here, something that might have been a more quiet kind of holy - but then, the call to Megalith. You slow down enough to let Red be reshouldered, and she rolls her masked face to weakly peek at the neon lights that shadow your scuttle towards the apartments. You're gone before long, almost casual about your subterfuge, now inside the dimly lit backhalls that take you to the lobby familiar. Yes! Only one more hurdle! You rush to the intercom and gently set Red down, and then stand tall to stare at it. Wait. Wait. Wait. poo poo. Wait. PRESSURE: [ ♢ ][20%] You need to get up and in. But you don't know how. Because first time, Shattyshot did it. Second time, Pax Pills was on the other end of the line. Wait... so... if someone is up there... but they won't be is the thing, this is YOUR place now unless Shatty has to crash there, which you hope isn't a thing right now. Okay. So you need to just try the thing and see what happens. You pick up the receiver crystal and grip it, establishing the triple-link. There's a pause. You then hear a voice speak; a woman, her tone at once both attention-demanding professional and chirpy-friend social. It's a query codeline. "All-Call." You blink. You begin to explain that you're Singer, Burgerson- *click* Uh? Why did she hang up? Oh no. PRESSURE: [ ♢ ][ ♢ ][30%] What do you do, what do you do... you need to call again, an- Red tugs on your pantleg. You stare down at her, where she lies curled up on the cool carpet floor. She waves for the phone. You don't get it, but you hang up, pick up, and kneel down to let her have it. She holds it to her hood, but also rolls a little to keep the fingers of her other hand near her mask. You watch and wait, listening; there's the voice again, saying "All-Call". As soon as Red hears that, she taps on her mask, loud and hard, in a specific pattern. Knock, tap, tap, knock knock knock, pause, knock... but she does it so fast you can't count past that, only that she alternates them rapidly. The voice waits a second and then replies, but you can't make out what. Red abandons the tap-knock to finish with a more easy response, by punching her fist into her mask twice, making a dull bang. You wince and ask why she did that, but then the doors to the elevator open, and Red tries to hand the phone back before she fails in collapse. You rush to hang it up and then drag her inside, hauling your cargo to be a throne as you sit with the Sunburner and wait out the long climb to your floor. Oh, you thank God, oh Heaven, thank God, for just the edge of luck to help you skirt by. Oh, the peace of a hot shower. Of a warm bed. Of Red finding safe! You saved her. Right? You feel the car slow and you burst back with diamond-smooth. PRESSURE: [ ♢ ][20%] Cargo shouldered. Red carried careful. The hall... gentle blue, not open screaming ashen. Don't go to the bathroom. Run down the hall, quick! To the door! Set Red down once again, and dig- the key is right here, buried into the carpet with a tiny slit you were shown to dig into to get it. Unlock the door. Locked is good. You lock it behind you, and then rush to the second door down the entry hall. Wait. PAUSE! AT THE DOOR! (PE- LISTEN) 13 [3]+[1]+[3] = 7- Success. ...do you hear it? Red, her breathing soft and like burnt paper. Do you? The wind howling outside with the come of night, the last of pinkgloom light pouring down from the window. Hear it? The creak of plant and stone, the rush of Rivertree bending to the airs. Nothing. Nobody is inside. You enter at last, and rush Red to the bed. You're here. Your safe away from valley hide. YOUR earned apartment.  You step dazed to the living room and stare around the dim, your bags dropped and one minute begged to just let your body stop shaking. You're here. It's night. Red is here. She's safe. Don't go past that. Stay right here. Inside this moment. Look at the table. There's a plate of something just old enough to start suggesting mold, and a bowl with the dregs of some saltpeter chips. You ignore them and let your mind quiet without pressure. You'll help stabilize Red. You'll take a shower. You'll get some sleep. Then, tomorrow, you'll be outside of the diamond, and able to deal with the pressures of what to do. PRESSURE: [ ♢ ] Tomorrow.
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Dec 25, 2022 07:42
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I'm just so aaaaaaaa at the fact that it would have been so easy to just finish off Burner, but they don't know Red is Burner, so they're happy at being able to rescue her. And crying in advance at the heartbreak they're going to feel when they finally find that out. I just want them to find some way to be able to help Red and Blue and take care of Kwiat and get Smercia to gently caress off forever. I know this story is extremely unlikely to have any kind of happy ending, given that it's meant to be the "Hell End", but I can't help myself. (Much like I cannot help myself with the memes...) 
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Dec 25, 2022 09:26
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Boss wants the lords souls, but... I don't think they need them, just the color, a sliver of soul to do what they want to. Unfortunately, we, uh. don't know how to get that from a soul. Or who could teach us, at least in [Hell End].
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Dec 25, 2022 09:40
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If anyone could, I’d guess it’s the old man living in the walls. Or at least that’s where we need to go when Smiercia comes to collect.
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Dec 25, 2022 09:43
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Here it is. Did some poking, and Bella + Coven + Ex-Celestials (and the Doctor for soul anesthesia :v) seem to have all had a hand in it over there. Which given the number of persons involved to make it happen isn't ideal for us doing it all ourselves, but it's the best lead I can think of.
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Dec 25, 2022 10:08
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| # ? Jun 1, 2024 07:49 |
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None of you are freaking out about the right thing - WHY is BURNER, a LORD, wounded and in rival cult's territory? What the gently caress managed to wound burner this bad?
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Dec 25, 2022 14:37
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