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Messages - Noctifer-De-Mortem

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16
Rec Room / Re: CDDA: Adventures in Cataclysm
« on: August 10, 2018, 11:17:12 pm »
“I see, so Ironwood had secured them before you could get them?”. Plague asked pacing around them room brandishing the biological sword.

“Yes my lord, they had been in the armory before hand but just before you ask for them he took them inside to secure them.”, Roxanne responded. She was genuflecting in the middle of the room with her head down and an arm crossed across her chest.

Plague stopped pacing and looked at Roxanne. “That was a risky move Luna, he might start to suspect something and might want to get involved.”

“My apologies, I saw no other way. Have I displeased you?”

“No no, you did your job and got me the items I asked of you. Just be careful next time. If anything comes of this I will personally deal with it ok?”

“Understood. No objections here.”

“Good, now raise, on your feet huntress.”

Roxanne stood up and looked forwards unmoving. Plague walked in front of Roxanne to address her directly. He unsheathed the saber, coalescence, Plague’s true identity. “Roxanne Luna, you have served me ever since you became a spirit of misfortune. You have done what I have asked you and even came all the way over here fulfill your purpose. Tonight is the night you shall; you will be rewarded for tonight we become one.”

At this announcement Roxanne broke her composure and looked at Plague with utter glee. “Yes! We will unite and be one step closer towards the goal!”

Plague nodded at her words; the sword in his hand was illuminated by a green aura. “Close your eyes and don’t move Luna…” Roxanne did as she was told. He then casted a spell of binding on her making so she could not move at all. “Now that I have right where I want you…” With a flick of his wrists, something seemed to exit Roxanne’s body; some sort of mist.

“W-what?”, asked a seemingly groggy and confused Roxanne. She tried looking around the room only to find she couldn’t move. “What’s going on? Wait since when did I… Why can’t I move?”

“Like I said, you have done my bidding all this time, obied every order without question but you know, that can get boring really quickly. I want to see you squirm a bit, right before I assimilate you… I had place you in a basic spell to control the undead; worked like a charm on you. Now I just lifted it so that the real you can experience becoming part of a greater being.”

Roxanne tried to move but wasn’t able to. No more words were exchanged; her self-preservation instincts kicked in as Plague approached with saber in hand. One he was within striking distance, he took the tip of the sword and pressed it against Roxanne’s chest right where heart would be. “Not going to say anything? This is hardly any more satisfying than if I had left the spell on. No matter, this still has to be done. By the power of the great god Anomon I claim you as mine!”

With a single thrust the blade pierced Roxanne and began doing it’ handy work; a distortion was engulfing Roxanne as the blade began assimilating her as it had done many beings before her.. However, she did not wince, or cry out in pain like the others did; nor was she giving in to the blades effect like he expected. This Plague found both intriguing and disappointed...until Roxanne made her move. You have seen it before, that cliche move where someone is stabbed so they push themselves into the blade to stab the enemy taking them down with them. However, Roxanne currently had no weapons with her so the only thing she managed to do with this maneuver was headbut Plague. This took him by surprise which she used to push him all the way to the back wall of the room; she stared at Plague right in the eyes despite the sword of coalescence effects.

“We am getting real tired of this you know? We have been pushed around for too damn long and this is where we put our foot down.” We? What the hell was she talking about? Why was she still standing; now, why was she still able to speak? Why wasn’t the sword doing its job? This and many other questions were racing through Plague’s mind.

“W-we? What they hell is going on? Why are you still standing? Give in already!” Plague managed to say.

“What’s going on you say? See, your mistake was to lift the mind control spell or whatever that thing was. I am the spirit of the void yet you thought you could just assimilate like any other spirit you have come across. Let me tell you something, better men have tried…”

He didn’t give a response, instead using his other hand to try and slash at Roxanne using the biological sword. She inturned reached over and grabbed his wrist. Suddenly his hand began to decay into a purple goo that began to drip into the floor; Plague looked with dread sketched on his unmasked face as his hand was gone. He, the augmented undead bio-weapon under the control of not one but two fragments of Anomon was being subdue.

“Now now.”, Roxanne uttered nonchalantly, “We can’t have that can’t we? Went right through your augments too huh? Did it hurt? If not it will in a minute. Come one, where was that bradado a moment ago? Squirm for me a little…”

“How are you even doing this? T-the sword should have claimed you by know… I am the rightful hei-” Roxanne slapped him before he could finish what he was saying.


“Oh shut up! Always going on with that nonsense. Listen, right now none of that matters ok? It is only you and I in this little dance of ours. I am your everything, I am your judge, the final authority...I decide how and when you die…”

“Why you! On whose authority do you say such things?!”

Roxanne’s previously empty hand now wielded the sword of the void and she pinned the tip of it right in Plague’s neck; the effects of it peeling some of the decayed flesh from him. “Well, you see. Void here has said you, Assimilation, and Despair have always bullied him; hard to believe beings like yourself would do such human actions but you know… He wants revenge now. You think you are all mighty just because you assimilated Convergence? Well, if she is in there, how about it? How about you help your brother and I teach this pretentious spirit a lessons? I call upon you Convergance, let’s take this fucker down!”

Plague squirmed at Roxannes’ grip; he was pinned down by her and his left arm was decaying as time went by. “I-I won’t let you! This is my destiny...I won’t let a bitch like you strip that away from you.”

It was now her turn to dig her blade into him; she thrusted it right into his next. Roxanne gave out a little cry of delight as she heard him for the first time scream in pain. “Oh my, you are finally giving in. How does it feel? To hurt, to face the very thing humanity has on a regular basis: your own mortality?” She held there and moved the sword around causing him to lose his grip on the sword of coalescence still in Roxanne’s chest. “A person’s last moment says a lot of who they are and I am honored you will share yours with me… There is nothing more intimate than a blade for the occasion wouldn’t you agree? Let’s see what kind of person you are…”

Roxanne let go of the blade as it was now stuck to bone and bionic in his neck. The purple goo started to ooze out of the wound which meant the clock was ticking. “Don’t worry, I will prolong this as much as I can...Haven’t indulge myself like this in quite a while...Please...It’s ok to scream…”



Victor was still mulling over what he had just read. “To the end of the world and back… By any means necessary.” Those were phrases that means nothing to him now but he felt they somehow should. If what he knew currently was correct, it was irrelevant anyways given he had completed what the main task of the note was. Then why did Roxanne make him read it? Was it not actually over? Did she need help? Then why make this whole thing so ominous? That couldn’t be it; if it was why would that woman show up and told him to back off from Luna? None of this made sense and had only given him more questions.

“Just who the hell are you Roxanne? Who the hell am I?”

He decided he wasn’t going to get any answers on his own. He needed to talk to some people; hopefully Roxanne would tell him what she was planning to at least get that out of the way. Maybe his friend Blackjack knew something? Whatever the case, what that note said was no longer him; the mission was over as well so there no use worrying over it. Still, the last part of it still lingered on his mind. “...Whatever your feelings are after all of this is up to you. Ask yourself the question and from there do what you think is right. As for me, I am starting to grow fond of her; Helen McKinnon, how about you? Those that feeling linger?”

“Very much so...seems not even memory loss can take that away from me… but to think it started b-... no, that doesn’t matter. Now of it does, it’s the now that matters...So long as the sun shines upon this earth…”


It had been a few hours inside of Plagues office by now; the night having descended upon them for some time now.. Downstairs the undead patrolling the area, as well as the ones outside, had just dropped on the spot; they were unmoving as if they had all just fainted. One of them remained up however; it was Plagues favorite toy: Bio-Weapon Psi. It looked around with new found lucidity as his brethren collapsed. After a moment that only those with new found sentience would understand, Psi gathered some items and gear and calmly exited the tower unimpeded; everyone else was in their rooms or “busy”.

Roxanne excited Plague’s office with a wide smile of satisfaction. She was covered in the purpled ooze which she seemed to be happily licking off her one of her hands while the other was behind her back. Her katar still sheathed in their place. She walked along the hall humming a familiar tune as she was heading to the stair that would lead her to the lower floor. Suddenly a figure appeared before her blocking her way.

“Hey, you. I don’t know who you are or why you are her or frankly do I care. I have had a long day now so I will give you a chance to leave unharmed. But know that you are in my way so if you choose not to you will be moved.”

The figure laughed before speaking. “We can do introductions later. For now you can call me Lucy. I know who you are Roxanne and what you just did. I am here to speak to Plague if you don’t mind.”

At this Roxanne smiled. She revealed the hand behind her back and brandished something before tossing it at Lucy’s feet; it was Plague’s severed head. It sparked from damaged bionic and it leaked the purple ooze like if it was soaked in it. Lucy simply facepalmed. “Of all the things you could’ve done Roxanne… Let me guess, you know wield the sword of singularity?”

“Guilty as charged. You seems to know your stuff. Well, then you should know it’s best for you to move along. Don’t want to dirty that nice outfit of yours.”

Lucy gave a deep sigh. “I am afraid I can’t do that… I sensed Singularity being awakened and I came her expecting Plague to have disobeyed me but… you of all people? I swear, you and Ironwood cause me so many headaches…”

“So I am taking that as a no on leaving me alone. Alright, you asked for it. Behold the power of the singularity!” Roxanne unsheathed her katar and charged at Lucy. Her response was another sigh before snapping her fingers; a bright white light engulfed the room as if a flashbang had been detonated.

“I don’t think so. You are coming with me. We need to have a nice long chat…”

17
Rec Room / Re: CDDA: Adventures in Cataclysm
« on: August 06, 2018, 05:52:35 am »
With a loud groan and a bit of hesitation, Roxanne made her way up the stairs. Everyone else down at the mess area had already gone back to their rooms despite the day being quite young. The effects of the drug Christina and Clara had given her was still quite strong but it filled Roxanne with confidence. After a couple minutes, due to impareness, she made it up the stairs and looked down at the hallway in front of her.

“Huh? What do you want?”, Roxanne asked out loud at seemingly no one. “Wait what? You are creeped out? Why? Oh… yeah, this seems a bit odd and the atmosphere is quite heavy. Still, there is nothing you and I can’t overcome; we both proven as much right? Besides, this Plague guy might be a creep but the guys downstairs seem fine with it. Come on! Void, seriously? Fine fine, we are in this together, I will keep my guard up; just lend me your strength.”

Roxanne had been walking forwards towards Plague’s office as she spoke; by the time she had said all that she was already at the door. Roxanne reached a hand to open the door knob but suddenly felt something; it was the same feeling she had felt at the mall, what she felt when she made the deal to come here in the first place, the same one when she was with Hector and Quinn, the very feeling that caused her to steal the flesh weapons. Roxanne’s now bright pink eyes flashed and she let go of the knob; her was blanc save for an unnerving smile. The door suddenly opened on its own to reveal plague sitting behind his desk; the flesh weapons laid in front of him.

“Spirit of the Void Roxanne Luna, it’s good to finally meet you in person. Come on in and take a seat. We have a lot to talk about.” Roxanne noded at the words Plague told her. She entered the room and closed the door behind her; not once did her gaze left Plague’s unmaked face.



It wasn’t long before Victor made his way back to the hall and more specifically to Helen’s quarters; his quarters too? This drug made him not sure. Still, he had had limited exposure to it in a dream so it was wearing of quite nicely and it wasn’t as severe as it was with Roxanne. Once inside the room, Victor closed the door and sat in the bed for a moment; he gave a heavy sigh as he rubbed his head and process what just had happened and what he had learned.

“When Roxanne comes back, if she comes back, she better have a good explanation… alright… what was that puzzle? Page 37? Three locks?”

Given the circumstance, Victor did the thing he had learned to do when he had questions: consult his journal. For whatever reason, he went ahead and go straight to page 37; just in case the puzzle had to do with his journal. It was good that he did for it indeed was what Roxanne meant. Normally Victor would question how she knew about his journals but after knowing she had some of his memories and could target his dreams he just assumed it was par for the course.

“Alright...three locks? Hmm”

A quick scan with the aura spell revealed three peculiarities when the jornal was flipped to this page. The contents of the page itself were no help, it was simply the continuation of something called “Phaneron Shifted Dust”. These particularities resembled the lock he used to seal the dresser but this were rather simplistic. After about 5 minutes he cracked them open and he felt the book shift a bit. Something felt odd about the last page of the journal; when he flipped to that page he found a folded sheet of paper. He picked it and unfolded it; it was rather long in size and the two size had writing in it.

“Hello, if you are reading this then you are seeking some sort of answers. You have probably been guided by someone I trust and as such I assume something has gone wrong. I cannot offer much but this should help you stay in track of what we have been working on.” Victor found it weird that the note said ‘we’ given it appears he was the on who wrote it; the handwriting matched. “We made a promise a long time ago and if anything we have to see it through. Use the back of this sheet to keep track of any progress; the rest of front is the general outline in case you need a reminder. Good luck.”

Victor was confused at this but the only way he would get any answers was to read on. Why did Roxanne want him to read this? The note continued.

“Operation Salvation” He chuckled; it seemed his lack of creativity wasn’t due to the accident where he lost his memories. “Mission Objective: Protection/Rescue, Organization: Null, Agent: Victor Ironwood, Target: Roxanne Blackmore/Luna” The word Protection and Blackmore had been scratched off and to the side of them the word Rescue and Luna had been written which rather intrigued him. He read on and found out this was about that curse Roxanne was talking about. He reached a point midway through that said “Read progress item 57.” Victor turned the page and went to item 57.

“Side Mission New Moon, Mission Objective: Intelligence Gathering, Organization: Cleansing Flame, Target: Helen McKinnon” Victor blinked a few times in disbelief for a moment before re-reading that part. He wasn’t sure what that meant so he read on. The note was a maze of footnotes and technicalities which Victor examined carefully. As he went on he got filled with more and more dread. What the hell was this? Roxanne knew of this? At the end, Victor put the note back into the journal and close the thing before putting it away. What he read didn’t answered why Roxanne did what she did but opened more questions not related to it; key among them is why Roxanne wanted him to see this and why now?

18
Rec Room / Re: CDDA: Adventures in Cataclysm
« on: August 01, 2018, 01:15:07 am »
“So let me get this straight…”, Roxanne exclaimed

“Oh, want to repeat what I said back to me?”. Rey responded.

“A small summary to see if I understood.”

“Ah, like those small reports of yours back in the day when we were partners in crime.”

“Don’t give me that ‘back in the day’ crap… it makes me feel old…”

Rey smirked stifling a laugh at the comment. “Alright alright, go ahead and report Luna.”

“Ha ha, funny… Anyways. So if I understood correctly, you spent the first few years after our last encounter running away from SoA.”

“Yeah, they always seemed to know where I was and was afraid you would show up one day and claim me as your trophy.”

“What? That’s what you think that of me?”


“Would you have not?”

“...Fair enough... Ok, so in the meantime you continued your arcane studies. You stole books and artifacts here and there, killed some SoA, Sanguine Order and Cleansing Flame operatives for gear and generally just learned through practice.”

“Yes, that got me so far though. That change when I met Christina.”

“The augmented alpha-mutant arcanist… and a founder of SoA… quite the person to just bump into in the post cataclysm. You met her after the shifting?”

“Shifting? Oh, the convergence. Yes yes, I did. The convergence hit me out of nowhere; I suddenly had an urge to go into the woods where I found a cabin. I entered, went to sleep after making sure it was empty and when I woke up in the morning I was sleeping next to her…”

Roxanne laughed a little at this before responding. “Oh my, what did she say?”

“She took it pretty good all things considered. I turned around and she was there staring at me. I jumped out of bed ready to fight but she told me to relax and that she wasn’t armed. Wasn’t too hard to determine she actually wasn’t given she wasn’t… ahem… ‘decent’ while being in the bed.”

Roxanne laugh some more this time not making an attempt to hold back. “Holy shit Rey you sure are a pervert.”

“Say the girl who worked at a strip club for extra cash given she had enough money as she was a paid hitman…”

“Fair enough but still...continue…”

“Right… so she then asked me ‘Sudden urge to come to the woods?’ I nodded and she nodded back. ‘Alright, guess we are in this together now’ We both got ready, I rather perplexed at the whole thing but then when we stepped outside the forrest was now a swamp. And that is how I met Christina...”

“That’s...rather peculiar. So from there the two of you just explored and decided to stick together in this new world; help increase your odds of survival. What about the arcane stuff?”

“Wait a minute, weren’t you going to make a summary of all this? Why are we having this conversation again.”

“Shush! It’s interesting. Go on…”

“Well, we eventually found out we were both from SoA and she let me onto the fact she was a founder of SoA in this world and the person who brought technology to the organization. From there we exchanged backstories, you might want to ask her about it, and then we made a deal.”

“You both would help each other advance in your respective ‘fields’. It became more about survival huh?”

“It did, yeah. But anyway, I know the bit you are waiting to hear, how I became a spirit…”

Roxanne simply nodded, her attention transfixed at his words.

“Well, it’s quite simple actually. I did not die the way you did, I simply ‘sold’ away my humanity. I have become what we like to call ourselves, a regulator spirit. We emulate and protect nature and more importantly we regulate it. The spirits of death are our guides and teachers… we not really, we are just a bunch of copy catters but hey! It works for us…”

“Is that why do you carry that scythe?”

“Yes, itt represents the harvest. Spirits of death use them to represent their job and as such we emulate that.”

“Uhhhh, no? I meet one and he used a tommy gun.”

“...Did he now?”

“Yeah, he used it pretty well. Scythes are actually pretty impractical in battle don’t you think?”

“Well, it is a bit unorthodox but… a gun?”

“Sure, why not? Humanity upgraded so why wouldn’t they?”

“Huh… I supposed you are right… so I should transform mine into one?”

“Heh, if you do, may I recommend a laser rifle? Lasers are the future! Add some essence here and there… some arcane effects and you get ghost busting lasers!” She stood up as she spoke as if preparing to make a grand speech.

Rey looked at her with a wary look; if she was still the same Roxanne he knew she was getting quite close to going on a rant of sorts. “Right right… I will keep that in mind. You sure have put a lot of effort into this.

Roxanne sat down and nodded. “That I have. Before I was a spirit I used to carry a laser rifle. Ballistics are too crude for me...but nothing will be the intimacy of a blade…” She gave a deep breath and smiled; a big gulp of smoke that had filled the room entered Roxanne's nose as if she was breathing. “What the hell is this stuff? Feels...nice…”

“It’s a synthetic compound combined with some arcane effects to affect the informational cortex of reality via the phaneron to stimulate the same regions Tetrahydrocannabinol would on the brain but on a spiritual level.”, explained Clara.

“It’s ghost weed; no need to complicate it. It hits right into the soul and since you and Rey are technically just souls without a body…”, Christina added.

“Well, look who decided to finally talk…”, Roxanne commented; she looked at the vial that was letting the smoke out. It looked like an urn and while the smoke was thin and you didn’t feel it, the effect certainly hit quickly.

“Well, you two were going at it and it seemed rude to interrupt.”, Christina said next.

“Since when did you care about being rude?”, Clara added.

“Hey, I can a be a nice girl, you of all people should know…”

“Which one of the two brought this stuff?”, Roxanne asked.

Christina raised her hand and smile. “That would be me, it’s a homebrew formula based off some old alchemy texts and my own research.”

“Could you hook a sister up? This stuff feels real nice… and it’s the only thing that appears to work…”

Christina did a fake expression of though as if she was considering something before responding. “Hmmm, I don’t know… what do you have to exchange?”

“Uhhh, I can let you browser my collection of memories for some hot gossip.”

“Deal! I’ll get you the recipe later.”

“Sweet!”

“Now wait a minute!”, Clara interjected standing up suddenly, her usual composure gone due to being under the influence, “I helped with the compound, I should get something too!”

“Shhhh, don’t be too loud…”, Roxanne said obviously being affected the most by the substance. “Ok ok… Listen, I will hook you up with Victor and you can talk to him. That sound good?”

Clare sat down seemingly satisfied with that but crossed her arms and pouted to which Christian chuckled at. “Fine! But how are we doing that?”

“Maaaaagic! That and some dream trickery I picked up recently. I have did a lot of reading during the storm and the days after.” Before anyone could respond Roxanne went limp; her head fell right onto the table. *thonk* Roxanne was fast asleep, a smile plastered on her face as she began to drool in her sleep.

“C-can she even do that. Do ghosts drool?”, asked Christina.

“Well, this one is… let’s see what she comes up with…”, Clara said.



Victor found himself in a strange place; there was no background, floor or any sense of up and down. No, it wasn’t black or white, there simply was no background as if space and time didn’t exist. The side of him that had awaken after the memory loss kept him on his toes; he was wary of his surrounding incase anything happened. However, another side of him, a more instinctual one, had a feeling that this was rather familiar. At the latter notion, he smiled before uttering a name.

“Roxanne Luna”

“In the flesh! Well, kinda. I sorta don’t have flesh and this is a dream so…”

“Wait, a dream? Great… not only did I pass out in your room due to some stupidity you are doing, now you are haunting me in my dreams?”

Roxanne laughed upon hearing this. Once she stopped doing so she smiled shaking her head smiling. “Our paths are linked together Vic, no matter how often we try, mostly you to be fair, to go our separate ways we can’t.”

Victor gave Roxanne a rather confused look. “Wait, what do you mean by that.”

She shrugged. “I don’t understand it very good myself. Something about a curse which is why you killed me, originally hooked up with Helen, why you have 13 IOUs for your soul, ect. You write very weird you know? Well… the other you, before you become a buzzkill.”

“What? Roxanne, you are not making any sense. What are you talking about?”

At that Roxanne simply facepalmed. She groaned and looked up at Victor. “Did you get the message in the note I left you?”

“I did, page 37? Three locks? What?”

“Your journal fuckwit! God do I have to spell it out for you? Wait… sorry, that was uncalled for… it’s just the meds…”

Victor wasn’t sure what the hell was going on. However, now he had a clue to go by. Still, Roxanne was here, he might a well try and get her to explain why she stole the flesh weapons.

“It’s fine… Roxanne, listen. You and I need to talk…”

“Yeah, we do. How about I come pick you up tomorrow morning?”

“Wait what?”

“Jeez, you sure like saying that a lot. Anyways, yeah, I need your help for a thing. So how about it, tomorrow like at noon-ish?”

“Roxanne…”, now Victor facepalmed. “Let me get this straight… You want me to drop everything I am currently doing, wait for you to arrive, go with you to who knows where while I have no idea what your intentions are?”

“Uhhh, yeah, that pretty much sums it up.”
It was at this point Victor noted Roxanne was acting strange in the way she carried herself and spoke. “Ok, what the hell is going on, what is wrong with you?”

Roxanne smiled wide at the question. She extended her arms at Victor inviting him to a hug. “Why don’t you come here to find out.” Victor stood there for a moment not sure what to do; Roxanne made a motioned for him to take the hug with her hands still extended. After a few moments of hesitation, Victor shrugged accepted the hug. Roxanne hugged tightly and giggled; immediately Victor felt something seeping into his body numbing his sense.

‘R-Roxanne… what are you doing?”

“Shhhhh… it’s called a contact high Vic… just let it happen…”

At that moment the dream started to fade and Victor soon found himself in the waking world still in Roxanne’s room but with Helen now there examining the note.
 


Roxanne woke up groaning but she stayed still. “Owwwww, I am back…”

“So, any luck with Victor?”, asked Clara

Roxanne didn’t bother lifting her head, instead she lifted her hand and did a thumbs down. “He said he was busy… and that I am a bad influence…” She said this a bit muffled as the table prevented her from speaking properly.

“What? Speak up, I didn’t hear you properly. Lift your head up.”

After a loud groan, Roxanne spoke up again, her head still lowered. “I don’t wanna…”

“Be nice to Clara.”, Rey said, “Lift your head up and speak clearly.”

“No, make me!”

Rey shrugged and grabbed a handful of Roxanne’s hair before pulling her head forcefully. Roxanne’s reaction was rather unexpected; she gave a prolonged moan as she was lifted up by her head. This made Rey rather uncomfortable causing him to let go; Roxanne’s face met the table hard with a loud thud. “Owwww... I’m ok…”

“Uhhhh, are you sure? What was that about?”. Asked Rey.

“Sorry about that… force of habit…”

Before anyone else could comment any further, one of the many undead roaming the place approached the group. This one was able to speak rather coherently but its voice was still strained. “Excuse me… Lord Anomon is requesting to speak with Agent Luna now; I know it’s earlier than expected but preparations are complete and he is rather impatient.”

Roxanne finally lifted her head enough to face the zed; with her head still laying on the desk she spoke up. “Early? Yeah, by about 9 hours. It’s ok, I can go now. And tell him I know it’s plague, no need for fancy titles; just makes him sound pretentious. I’ll be up in a minute; be a dear and carry the things I brought to his office will ya?”

“Yes Agent Luna, I will make the preparations and I will let Lord Anomon you are on your way.”

“Yeah yeah, give me a minute…”

The zombie left and Roxanne groaned loudly. She stood up and stretched a bit; it was as if she had just woken up from a long nap.”

“Are you sure you are good to go know Roxanne? The effect of the smoke is still in your system plus you don’t look so good…”, Christina commented.

“She will be fine.”, responded Clara, “She is the Blade of Sodom, she has gone through worse than whatever Plague has in store for her.”

19
Rec Room / Re: CDDA: Adventures in Cataclysm
« on: July 28, 2018, 08:52:31 pm »
Victor had bypassed the primitive lock Roxanne had set up on her door; it was fully mechanical, nothing an arcanist of SoA couldn’t bypass. Once inside, Victor didn’t waste much time looking for any clues; it did feel weird going through the room of Roxanne but he was justified right? Roxanne had stolen powerful and dangerous weaponry and went off who knows where. Besides, when someone who claims to be the actual devil gets involved...

The obvious places yielded no clues except for a few chuckles, face palms and a couple of embarrassed expressions. He still didn’t know Hector had decided to move in so he found it unusual to find a closed locked box inside the room. He went to investigate and noted the wards the locked had. “Just what the hell are you plotting?” However, his attention soon was shifted to a note left behind under some notebook on arcane basics. Victor read the note and soon realized it was addressed to Hector. From the looks of it, if Roxanne was plotting something, this note would could be used as an alibi to buy her a few days.

“An emergency involving other people huh? Why would you need those flesh weapons then? Just what the hell are you planning?”

He continued reading to find a cryptic message on the bottom of the note. They were odd symbols that would mean nothing to the average observe but to Victor they were a code. He frantically opened his journal to one of the codes field agents used to encrypt messages. After 5 minutes he decrypted the code and surprisingly it was addressed to him. It read : “Page 36, 3548, 3rd lock.”

This just confused Victor completely. Where the hell was she going, with who, why did she take the weapons and why did she leave this note to Hector and a message for him? He wasn’t able to think for too long however as he suddenly collapsed onto Roxanne’s bed and fell soundly asleep; the note still on his hand and the journal closed on the floor. Every once in a while he would murmur something as if reliving a dream.

20
Rec Room / Re: CDDA: Adventures in Cataclysm
« on: July 19, 2018, 02:41:34 pm »
The sound of the motorcycle Roxanne rode was the only other sound heard for miles apart from the natural sounds of nature; the groans of the dead and the wails of various unwanted invaders had already become part of these sounds. As Roxanne advanced forward she noticed something odd; there should’ve been a left turn here but instead there was a straight road ahead. With little more to go by and rather confused by this she decided to simply take out her automap and take a look.

The standard issue automap was one of those things everyone had and as such no-one bothered to steal it as it had no value; it using proprietary tech meant it wasn’t even useful for parts. Roxanne stopped her bike and took out her automap and checked where she was. Indeed the map said there should’ve been a left turn and that she was 12 hours from here destination. Confused she refreshed the map which only added to the predicament; the map adjusted and it now said to go straight ahead as if the left turn never existed. Furthermore, the ETA was now of 30 minutes. Having just dealt with the bandits and with the “loss” of her APC Roxanne shrugged this off for now and put away the automap only to continue down the path she was heading.

About 30 minutes later Roxanne arrived to her destination. To her surprise this seemed like more than just an office tower given the pill boxes all around and a couple of armed personnel going towards her after she stopped at a checkpoint. With a smile and keeping her hands where the guards could see them while she waited for them to arrive. Yet another surprise found its way as she realized this were zombies… and one of them was talking…

“P-papers?”, asked one of the two armed zeds extending it’s hand; the other simply stared hands gripping the rifle he carried.

“What? Oh, sorry. No sir, I do not have papers. I was just invited here by someone by the name of Anomon.”, Roxanne responded after snapping out of her confusion. Great, just what she needed, more bureaucracy and possibly having to deal with more resistance.

“V-VIP?”

“I believe so, yes. Told me to be here by morning but I am hear a bit earlier.”

“N-name?”

“Roxanne, Roxanne Luna.”

“O-one mom-ment pl-please…”

The zed stayed still after that for a few moments while the other one had not moved a bit. This was unnerving her as she had no idea what to expect. Suddenly the one asking the questions looked up at Roxanne and stepped aside; the other one doing the same.

“Y-you are c-cleared...en-enjoy your s-stay…”

“...Thank you. I’ll be heading inside now…”

With that out of the way Roxanne went ahead and passed the checkpoint; she parked the motorcycle and adjusted her weapons be it normal, arcane or flesh before she got off the bike and headed for the main door. Just as she was walking towards it it opened and Roxanne was greeted by a somewhat familiar face.

“Good to finally meet you in the flesh Luna. Glad you could make it. I see you came alone…”

Roxanne blinked a few times before answering. “Clara? Is that you? The one in dreams...that was real?”

Clara smiled at that and managed to stifle a laugh. “Of course it was. Who do you think helped you transitioned when you became a spirit for good?”

“...If you are here...that means that the one who called me was…”

“Plague, yeah. He seems to be active with his artifact hunting again.”

This time it was Roxanne who smiled. “It’s been over a year he has bothered me with that. Is Melody here as well?”

“Melody? Oh, the wielder of Despair, no, she hasn’t been summoned here for some reason. Who knows what he has in mind; don’t be too hard on him ok?... But you are not here for that are you?”

“No...I have my own reasons for being here… Is he here?”

“Of course, that was part of the deal. He is in the lobby speaking to another one this tower’s residents; follow me and I will show you.”

Roxanne nodded and followed Clara inside the building. She paid little mind to the inside of the building instead opting to ask questions to Clara who happily answered them. It was made clear she would have the rest of the day free to explore and that Plague would want her to go upstairs alone at midnight to discuss something. The conversation eventually started getting a bit more personal until Clara asked something of Roxanne.

“So, why did you come alone?”

“Excuse me? What do you mean?”

“From what I heard you usually bring Victor along with you in this types of missions yet you came alone this time? How come?”

“Wow, you really know your stuff huh? What’s your secret?”

“I have eyes and ears everywhere hun, now, answer me.”

“Ehhh, I didn’t see a reason to bring him along. This is my mission after all and I don’t think I would need what he has to offer. Besides, he lost his memories recently and from what I heard he has gone all family man; didn’t want to bother that.”

“I see. That is too bad. Kinda wanted to talk to my brother after all this years… Oh well, what about the knight? Why didn’t you bring him here?”

“Same reason as Victor minus the family bit. While he is no doubt a way better fighter than Victor in every regard, he knows very little in the arcane and I kinda need that in this missions. This is why we rarely go on missions together; different niches.”

“I supposed I can respect that. Still, I wanna talk to Victor one of these days; maybe meet the mage hunter he is so fond of.”

“After this is over I can arrange that for you; he probably is going to want to talk to me given I took this two lovely weapons from him.”

“I will hold you to that Luna. Heh, like you more than your counterpart already?”

“Thank you? Any reasons?”

“That whore is the reason Victor distanced himself for me. He claims it was the oath of SoA or what not but I call bullshit. Not that it matters anyways, she is dead and for good this time.”

From there the two just continued walking until they reached the lobby that was in the middle of the first floor. There Rey and Christina were discussing who knows what with Rey obviously annoyed at something. Roxanne freezes in place with a perplex look on her face as she look at him yet he isn’t aware of her yet. Clare rolls her eyes as she smiles and calls for Rey’s attention.

“Hey, Rey, you have a visitor.”

“I do? And wh-” His words are interrupted as he turns around and see Roxanne standing there. He smiles, gets up and walks towards her; Cristina gives Clara a confused look and she signals back to not worry about it. Rey stops once he is in front of Roxanne and speaks up.

“If it isn’t Roxanne Bl- Luna, long time no see.”

“Hey...yeah...it’s been a while…”

“It has, almost 13 years if I recall.”

“That long huh? Who is keeping track anyways?”

Rey simply laughs out loud and pat Roxanne on the shoulder. She simply looks at his hand while still unmoving and then back at him; the whole time that perplex looked still in her face.

“Fair enough. Seeing you again in person reminded me of something.”

“And what is that?

“Just how short you actually are.”

At that comment, Roxanne snapped out of her trance and her face reflected indigence.

“Excuse me?! You want to say that again to my face?!”

Rey laughed a little more and leaned in before whispering. “How is the weather down there?

“Shut up! You are just 6’2!” A now rather flustered Roxanne raise her hand to deliver a swift slap across his face; however, years of fighting had honed Rey’s reflexes and he effortlessly catched her hand by the wrist. She looked at it with her perplexed expression returning but before she could do or say anything Rey pulled her in for a hug. “There will be time for that later, let’s take it slow; glad to see you are at least ok.”

Roxanne did not say a word as many thoughts raced through her head. All of them, however, were dispersed when she realized something. Roxanne hugged Rey back and began to rub at his back. Rey was startled at this a bit and pulled back only to find Roxanne was still clinging to him.

“Having fun there?”, Rey teased.

“I can touch you…”


“Uhmm? Yes?”

“No no… you feel...real… What?”

Before either of them could do or say anything Christina intervened by clearing her throat rather loudly. “Hey, Rey, why don’t you introduce me to your lady friend over there? Always a sucker for meeting new people.”

As if suddenly realizing other people exists, Roxanne pulls away from Rey blushing. She then looks at Christina and answers her. “Ahem… Sorry about that. My name is Roxanne Luna and I am an old friend of Rey here. Wait…” Roxanne looks at Rey again and asks him, “Uhhh, you from this world or…”

“I am the same Rey you knew from your reality. I took survived the convergence.”, Rey answered.”

“So yeah, old friend of Rey here… Former Assassin for SoA and current free lance looter.”

Christina grinned and moved towards Roxanne before responding. “SoA huh? Interesting… My name is Christina but you can call me Christy if you would like. I am one of the founder of SoA as a matter of fact. Interesting meeting someone else wrapped in the mess that was that group. Maybe later we can head to my room and chat a little...you know, get to know each other a little more.”

“You're wasting your time Christina.”, Clara interjected, “Roxanne is already seeing someone.”

“Awww, Come one Clair, why do you have to be this way? Besides...they don’t have to know ~”

“That someone is the Iron Marshall, You don’t want to piss him off.”

Christina looked back at Roxanne surprised at what she heard. “Wait, you are with the Iron Marshall? That means you…”

“You are the Blade of Sodom? Ha! How fitting of you! Unexpected but not surprising.”, Rey interjected.

Roxanne just stepped back now more embarrassed than before. Clara gave a sigh before speaking up. “You two, give our guest some space. She just got here for Jupiter’s sake.”

“Sorry… you are right…”, responded Christina before she and Rey moved back as well.
“Good. Now, do you need anything Luna?”, Clara asked

“Well, I was told to bring these things but I don’t know what to do with them and I really don’t want to carry them until nightfall…” Roxanne pointed at the flesh weapons she was carrying to which Clara noded.

“I can sense some arcane signature in them but can’t discern what it is but if Plague wants them they must be useful for somethings. Anyways, I know this place better than anyone at this point so I will go ahead and take them off your hands and put them in storage; I will go ahead and examine them and write a report so that Plague is informed when you have your meeting with him.”

“Oh, yeah, that works. Gotta say, that’s awfully generous of you Clara. What do you get out of this?”

“Well, first I get Plague of my back for a while and second, well, I look good to the girl who is my ticket to seeing my brother.”

To that Roxanne smirked and nodded at Clara. “Very well. I’ll leave it to you then.” She handed over the flesh weapons to Clara whom accepted them and then signaled for Christina. “You are coming with me Christy.”

“What? Why me? I wan-” Christina’s words were cut off my Clara’s look that read ‘Do I really have to spell this out to you.’ “Oh, right right. I’ll be right behind you. I have to take care of my inventory anyways…”

“Right, Luna, Steller, why don’t you two go to the mess hall and catch up for now? We will take care of this and bring something to eat later.”

Rey smirked and shook his head a bit. “Not much of a hall is it now? Besides, I will pass on the food.”

“Count me out too. Thanks for the offer though.”, Roxanne responded as well.

“Alright, suit yourselfs. Anyways, see you in a bit.” and with that Clara went off to storage holding the flesh weapons and with Christina reluctantly tagging along.

Rey and Roxanne turned around to look at where they needed to go. “After you.”, Rey said signaling for Roxanne to go first. She nodded and started walking with Rey catching up besides her.

“So, what have you been up to this last 13 years Luna? I can tell by your aura you have certainly changed alot since we last me.”

Roxanne laughed to herself a little. “You have not the faintest idea… Lots of things have happened. Where to start…”

“Why don’t you start from the day we said goodbye? That is a good start.”

She nodded and began to tell her story; at first she made it seemed official as if making a report to her superiors like in her days as agent Blackmore and then agent Luna but eventually she slowly started to talk more casual as she grew more comfortable with her former partner in crime. She told him how after they parted ways she continued her work with SoA until her parents ratted her out. Then she met Alex and he almost helped her become a Huntress but of course the cataclysm struck before she had the chance.

Once she got to the post cataclysm her eyes lighted up and she talked in more detail. She went on about how she lived scavenging the cities living with the man she was meant to kill, how then she stayed with Quinn underground for about 2 years and the prophecy that united them all due to Catnip. By the time she was talking about the shifting and the early days of what was now walkerville the two were now sitting across from each other in a cafeteria table. Rey listened on as Roxanne explained how she met and interacted with the closest people she knew; from Victor’s arrival, her confession to the knight, the little spars with Lilith and playing video games with Dee from time to time. What he found rather fascinating was the details of her various transformations from misusing the infuser, to having her body stolen to finally her current state after a convoluted plot to free her from some curse after death.

“So he lost his memories now? Damn, can’t even explain it huh?”, Rey asked.

“Nope. Who care honestly? I don’t get it myself but I’ll just adapt like I always have. From what Melody says the fucked who stabbed me is dead so at least that is that.”, Roxanne answered.

“Ha! I supposed you are right. Say, how long have you been a spirit now?”

“Eh, about a week and a half. Why?”

“I see, so I take it you still haven’t mastered your current state. If I were to guess those are corporeal regulators?” Rey pointed at Roxanne’s bracelets.

“Oh, these? I suppose so. Victor gave them to me to help with staying corporeal.”

“Still struggling with that? You need training then… Roxanne, look at me in the eyes.”

A bit confused, Roxanne looked up at him right in the eyes. He stared back with his mind deep in thought. “You have bright pink eyes…”

“Uhhh, that mean anything to you?”

“What? No no, nothing useful really. Not now anyways. Still I see potential in you. Tell you what Roxanne, why don’t you stay awhile and let me train you with the basics.”

“Basics? Wait, how would you know any of this anyways?”

“The same reason I suspected you acted so weird when you touched me; Roxanne, I too am a spirit.”

Roxanne stepped back at that revelation; not because of what he was but thinking of how she became one and the implications of that. “Wait, that means that you… was I too late?”

“Oh no no, none of that. I didn’t die, I simply broke on of SoA’s rules: I abandoned my humanity. People have been doing this for millennia and I am simply one of the latest. I have years of experience with this so why not let me help you?”

There was a moment of silence, Roxanne looked down at the floor while Rey waited for her answer. “Rey… you know why I am here… I made you a promise and I intend to keep it.”

To that he grinned. “I know. Loyal the oath even to this day; if anyone deserved to be a Huntress it was you. But if I was meeting with Huntress Luna, we wouldn’t be talking would we?”

“I suppose not… still, it is something I have to see through.”

“And I understand that completely. But why rush it? You waited for 13 years so what is a few more hours? What do you say? Let’s talk a bit more, figure some stuff out and then I will grant you your wish.”

“...I guess I can do that. What would you even want to talk about?”

“Well, why don’t I tell you what I have been up to? Then we can figure out how I can help you not rely on that clutch. You are a cursed spirit, a living paradox, so it might take a bit more effort than I did.”

Roxanne smiled at the comment. “A living paradox huh? I like that, Roxanne Luna the living paradox… sure, so what have you been up to this years?”



“An unexpected visit huh? Had same here…”, Victor responded to Helen, “And you are pretty perceptive with that mask knowing the two weapons are gone.” He gave a heavy sigh before looking at Helen with a rather serious yet annoyed expression. “Thomas is fine, he is sleeping on the now wooden crib. Listen, I am going to explain to you what just happened but it doesn’t leave this room, not now at least since I don’t want Hector to panic or anything… So what happened was…”

Victor went on to explain about the mysterious woman suddenly appearing who went by the name of Lucy and introduced her as the literal devil. He went on about how she warned him about something going on in the works but that would find its way to him but for him to just ignore it. Then he described how he felt someone in their room bypassing the locking wards on the drawer and taking the flesh weapons; he explained how the woman stopped him from pursuing and he then finally explained who he saw it was through the aura spell.

“It was Roxanne… she was there and took the flesh weapons before taking off. I have no idea how she could bypass the locks or why she would want those things… Lucy said not to worry about and not look to much into it… Then she gave her blessing to Thomas, apparently she is very interested in seeing the next generation flourish given the previous one well… they are walking as undead. I don’t know what to make of this… any ideas Helen?”



“Owwwww...everything huuuurts…”

Melody awoke after a rather long sleeping session. She heard noises all around and could feel the place was quite busy using the aura spell. The noise was making her head hurt but not like she could complained. She notice there was a glass of water and some pills next to her; there was also a note but she couldn’t read it so she ignored it. After taking the pills and dowing the whole glass, Melody go out of the cot she had been sleeping.

“Marie… hear my pleas…”, said an unknown voice

“W-what, who’s there?”, Melody called back. No one seemed to pay her any mind as everyone went about their day. Melody eventually pieced it together and recalled just what this voice was. “Uhhhm… Miss Despair, is that you?”

“Alas she who bears my power has awakened. Why does a maiden like yourself indulge in such activities.”

Melody gave an annoyed groaned before answering. “Funny, can you talk like a normal person for once? Jeez, I thought we had been over this already…” She heard laughter from the sword before it answered.

“Right right, sorry. Anyways, good to see you are awake Marie.”

“I don’t go by that anymore… why do you insist on calling me that?”

“As a spirit bound to you, I can’t help but answer and respond to your natural name. It’s something I can’t shave off so you will have to live with it.”

Melody gave a deep sigh. “Is this what Roxanne has to deal with?”

“Well, no, the Void is very...ahem…’shy’ and gives full control to it’s chosen spirit. A wielder normally keeps said spirit in check but since she had none Roxanne is pretty much autonomous.”

“Great… anyways… why are you talking to me?”

“I have come to warn you… My brethren seem fear something far away… it’s different for each but for pieces of Anomon to feel this way… it concerns me... “

“Oh… that bad...what are we going to do?”

“Well, I am going to go dormant for awhile until this pases. I will not be there to guide you but I will lend you my power so you can use the sword at will. This way my brethren can’t track me.”

Melody gave off an annoyed looked again. And what the hell am I supposed to do then?"

"Lay low, earn your keep, don't cause any trouble. Think you can do that?"

"Earn my keep?"

"That man over there, he has a clipboard and is bossing people around. Talk to him and see if he needs any help. You can take it from there."

“But wait… I am blind remember?”

“Yes, but you can still use your aura spell to tell things apart. You will figure it out. Now take off that blindfold and go talk to that nice man. The rest is up to you. Good luck.”

And with that Despair went dormant. Melody could no longer feel it’s influence yet still felt i’s power. She gave a deep sigh and took off the blindfold before walking over to the man.

“Hello mister… My name is Melody… uhhh, do you have any work I could do?”

21
Rec Room / Re: CDDA: Adventures in Cataclysm
« on: July 08, 2018, 02:06:03 am »
Victor stood there thinking about what he could possibly say to Helen. “The devil arrived, told me to stand down from a mysterious happening, stopped me from preventing Roxanne from stealing the flesh weapons and blessed our son.” was not something he could just say. Still, Helen needed to know but he needed to find a way to tell it to her in bits as to not panic her or anything.

The aura spell picked up various auras come and go. Normal he would’ve gone to investigate but one was screaming, at least the he heard, so he let it be for now as he was deep in thought. Then he felt the aura of something similar to his own spell; if he had to guess it was Helen’s mask activating and scanning the area.

“Great...she now knows… You are out of time Ironwood. Time to face the music.” Victor grabbed the sleeping Thomas and gently carried him as he was uncomfortable leaving him alone giving recent happenings. He exited the room and went to look for Helen.



   The silence of the countryside was interrupted by the loud roar of of a massive engine moving a vehicle along. The wildlife scattered around at the sound but the more bold of them charged at the passing vehicle. Those who dared and even some of the wandering undead were quickly shot down by laser fire; The Armored Scouter continued along uninterrupted. It was sunny, hot and humid out here; good thing Roxanne didn’t really have a need for “regular” temperatures and as such the AC was unneeded. Still, the laser turrets and electric engine drained their good share of power so the fact the sun was up and the diesel engine was running made sure the batteries remained charged.

   As she drove, Roxanne thought about the good old days of the post cataclysm; it had just been 8 years but so much had happened that it felt like a lifetime ago. The first day, she realized it had all gone to shit, she had been tasted to kill someone, her last mark, yet she decided against it. Along the way she had been wounded and it became infected. Right then and there she realized she was alone; the organization that had given her purpose gone, Rey and Alex distant memories. Once she found her target, she choose to spare him; not only that but she recruited her to a common cause: survival.

   The first few weeks were your typical survival story. She and the man who she could only recall as Hilario had secured a van and found a camping site in the woods with a town nearby. They spend the first few weeks scavenging for supplies in the town and eventually resorting to eating dog meat to survive. It was rough with only a vehicle and some tents to call home, constant worries over the basic such as food and water, and the threat of the undead and other horrors.

Then she heard a message on a radio transmission. Some surviving scientist by the last name of Quinn offered supplies and a place to stay in exchange for working as an assistant. Roxanne did not know what any of that meant but she wasn’t going to pass free stuff in this new world. She made her way to the coordinates on the radio and accepted the good doctor’s offer. One whole year she spend down there, reading books and helping where she could. Occasionally she would make scavenge runs in her newly acquired APC that had been abandoned. On one of these runs she found a survivor by the name of Evelynn Rose; she and Hilario seemed to get along, maybe a bit too much…

For that whole year things had been going smoothly; there was plenty of supplies and material to work on projects and if they found more people an honest attempt to rebuild could've been made. In the search for others is how she found the flyer and how everything changed.

Ah yes, catnip’s flyer; the thing always seemed to land in Roxanne’s hands just at the right moment like a boomerang. At first she had attributed to her printing to many copies but now he understood it was something else. Even now, she had a copy of it in the driver’s compartment next to the control panel of the APC. Three people were in the flyer: Floyd Hector and Roxanne herself; “The man on a horse of steel”, The knight in a modern age, “The killer who chose mercy”. For whatever reason them three were mentioned by catnip and both now and then Roxanne didn’t questioned it given her own experiences. All she knew is there were people in need and so she followed to coordinates on the flyer to meet up whoever made this.

Once she found the place Roxanne felt sense of belonging she hadn’t felt in the year or so she had spend in the post-cataclysm new england. She learned the “survivor” mutant catnip had been the one to make the flyer and that she was still a kid. There were other’s, Floyd the gunslinger in his custom quad bike, Sir Loin of Beef the knight who drove a Tank of all things and the scientist who went by “Dervish”. All very colorful people but the knight in particular had catched Roxanne’s eye.

Their meeting was short and a couple others occurred but none too consequential but soon their live became intertwined forever. Roxanne felt an anomaly coming, one that would be known as the shifting to them, one that warned her to get moving. She packed her thing, warned Quinn and her other knew friends and was set to go to some lonely farm where the anomaly would not get them. It was then she parted ways with Hilario and Evelynn; they refused to go and instead opted to take their chances out there. Roxanne wished them luck and soon they parted ways; to this day she does not know whatever became of them.

Eventually she made it to the farm and claimed the biggest room in there for herself. To her surprises, everyone else had decided to follow her and took residency in the farm as well. From there everything is history. Many others came and went; rather recently the mislings arrived and the farm was finally given a name: walkerville. Roxanne chuckled at this and at other memories she recalled of people and events.

Roxanne recalled how slowly but surely the seeds of romance were planted for many of the residents here and how this led to the current baby fever going on. She recalled the arrival of Katherine and how everyone sought it to protect her. The arrival of Victor and how it was revealed the fate of her counterpart and her role in this world. Then there was the time she had a personal dealer for her “recreational” needs. There was all those missions where everyone gathered up to take down a common foe. Whatabout the time she flirted with Dee to get back at Mica for embarrassing her in front of Hector?

A smiled was plastered in her face at all those memories, good and back. But the ones she treasure the most were the ones she had spent with her knight in shining armor. He was there for her where it counted and the two reciprocated their feeling for one another. They had gone on adventure together and they knew that at the end of the day after a long battle or mission they would have on another. One memory that stood front and center was the lessons that he gave her. How to fight without relying in her then crutch that were her bionic. The two sparred and he taught her enough for her to develop her own style; he had even forged a new weapon for her she admittedly used sparecely: a highly decorate katar. Given her familiarity with the bionic sword this was right at home for her, and right now she carried it with her.

With one hand on the steering wheel Roxanne looked over the katar he wielded with the other. To her, this was quite symbolic; she would complete her mission using this as her weapon to symbolize the end of it. “13 years Luna, you waited 13 years for this moment… time to finish the job…” She drove on as she sheathed her weapon on her scabbard on her hip. Were things to get too hectic, the sword of the void was still in the back. There was no way she would fail… but incase she did plan had been set in motion.

After some thought, this all seemed all too familiar. This wasn’t the first “end” she had faced and overcome. She told herself every time she would settle down afterwards but the call to action always got to her. There was always the next missions, something would always get in the way and this was no exception. Hell, she and Hector had just moved in together, the perfect chance for her to settle down with him but no, she was driving to unknown coordinates on a promise given by some being for her to finish something she had not done in 13 years.

“Who the fuck are we kidding Luna… you crave this… you like every moment of this…”, Roxanne told to herself, “Why can’t you just settle down and life you life like a normal person? Why did you have to inject yourself with that damn infuser? Why did you not get treatment when your body rejected your own soul? Why?... It’s not like I don’t know the answer…”

Indeed she did. In that moment it became clear, she could admit it to herself. Roxanne had always been a free spirit; even as an agent in SoA she always sought her next target, the next mission. That mentality did not die with SoA. Roxanne craved action, adventure, adversity and so the call to action here brought her out once more.

“So many others envy what you have Luna and you just go and risk it all away on a damn whim… you are an idiot sometimes, you know that right? Heh, I’ve given shit to Victor over the years but at least he is somewhat reformed. Look at you? A literal ghost of your former self… Didn’t even bother to say goodbye…”

She drove on, the sound of the engines as loud as her thoughts causing her to go in autopilot as she thought to herself. “Don’t kid yourself, this isn’t the end of anything. Another baddy will come around and you will be there front and center… Why the hell am I just realizing this now? I could’ve told someone about this… Wait…”

A cloud of realization hit her. Going on dangerous missions for the sake of the thrill, seeking more and more power, disregard for authority, lone wolf mentality, expensive vehicle. “Holy shit, am I having a mid-life crisis?!”

The thought was interrupted by a sudden jerk forwards. One moment she was driving and the next her APC was in the air moving into the woods on the side of the road. The crash was bad, one that would’ve killed her had she not been what she was. Roxanne stayed there in here seat, harness keeping her in place. “W-what?”



“Fuck yeah it was a hit!”

“Good job! We got that bitch! Someone the boss wants her alive. I know she is fucking dead, you know what I mean smartasses.”

The men walked towards the crash scene; as single well place missile strike to a front tire was all it took to send the APC flying. They were surprised to find the thing mostly still serviceable; the armor and the tire where the impact had happened were gone but everything else could still be salvaged.

“Sweet jesus what the hell is that made out of?”

“Does it fucking matter? Just order your men to ready their weapons.”

“You heard him. Keep aim. Dutch, if she bitch gets uppity, sap her and then the rest of you shoot.”

Everyone but two of them raise rifles; one of them raised a golden badge with a carving of two swords crossed. The other man walked calmly towards the APC then stopped when he noted Roxanne walking through the totaled APC. “So you can still walk? As expected from the blade of sodom.”



Roxanne gave a loud groan. Who was this guy and what did he want? She had a headache as she adjusted to reality itself. Soon she turned around behind her and saw the APC on it’s side causing her groan to become that of annoyance.

“God fucking damn it all! Just what I fucking needed! Who are you fucks and what do you want?!”, Roxanne shouted

“Woah, someone woke up on the wrong side of bed. Regardless, who we are doesn’t matter. What matters is that you are coming with us.”, the man said rather calmly.

“You what? Do you have any fucking clue who I am fuckboy?”

“Roxanne Luna or the now Walkerville farm. Know by you alias as the ‘Blade of Sodom’. And frankly, a thorn on my client’s side. Nothing personal, just doing my job.”

“Let me guess, bounty hunter or killer for hire? Been there pal, this doesn’t end well for you.”

“I very well know your past. It was in your file.”

“File? I have a file? I gotta say, I am a bit flattered.”

“Enough talking, we are on a schedule. Are you coming here willingly or do we have to make you?”

“You lot only have rifles and I possess a fragment of an ancient god. Someone here is fucking fixing my APC when I am done with you fucks!”

“I’ll take that as a no. Dutch?”

The man with the badge raised his hand up and then suddenly Roxanne could feel a jolt of electricity. From the sky bolt of lighting came down and struck her directly; she shouted and was brought to her knees as the strike lasted a whole 5 seconds. Roxanne looked up to find not a single cloud in the sky.

“What the fuck? Who are you people?!”, Roxanne demanded.

“Like I said, not important. Now, this can end here, just give it up.”

“Bite me!” Roxanne took out her katar and charged at the man only to be stopped by another bold. It was in this second strike she noticed something; it hurt. She felt weak after every strike and was in pain. This was bad, this weren’t just normal bandits. Roxanne looked around at the men with the rifles.

“Let me guess, those things aren’t loaded with normal bullets…”

“That is correct. They are loaded with crystalline essence made to harm spirit: rapid fire exorcisms.”

Roxanne chuckled, once again in her knees. She took out the sword of the void now wielding it as well as the katar. “Going to take a lot more than that to take me in. Do your worst!”

“With pleasure. Fire at will!”

The sound of rifle fire filled the air, Roxanne activated her bracelets becoming incorporeal just. She screamed, the bullets found their mark but the crystals dissipated and became a cloud of dust that did not seemed to settle; like dust disturbed in the bottom of the ocean. The screaming stopped but the dust remained.

“Hold your fire and reload.”, ordered the man giving a gesture to them to stop, “I am going in, she should be out of commission now.” The man walked forwards with an odd pair of handcuffs in hand. Just as he was approaching the cloud, a hand reached out and pulled him in. Another loud scream was heard, this time from the man who was inside the cloud, and then it stopped after a loud crunch. The other men fumbled to reload their rifles as the dust finally settled revealing Roxanne standing with the two swords still in hand; the corpse of the man no laying on the ground mangled next to her.

“I am fucking tired of you all. No matter how many we kills you always come back like the vermin you are. “Roxanne exclaimed. “Seriously, how many have we killed?! God’s army, Hells Raiders, a plethora of other arcane bullshit and now you fucks who thing just because you have some fancy toys you can beat me?! DON’T MAKE ME LAUGH!!!”

No response was given from the men who immediately resumed firing at Roxanne with their rifles. However, this time they seemed to disintegrate just as they were going to hit her. Roxanne shouted as the bullets found their mark to no avail. The barraged continued as extended magazines unloaded their payload.

“Bitch activated the sword! Dutch, aim for the head, we need to knock her out now!”

The man with the badge raised it again to the sky but before he could activated, he let a shout himself as he was disintegrated like the bullets hitting Roxanne; his clothes and gear were intact, only he was consumed.

“What the… this wasn’t in the report! Unless…” He started to back away as more and more men shared the same fate as Dutch. Their rifles and gear fell to the ground as the rest soon grew scared and they too started to step back and then outright began to run. No one of them were spared. Roxanne shouted loudly until every last one of them was consumed leaving none to tell the tale.

Roxanne quieted down and looked down at the scene before hand. She looked at the casing on the ground and walked forwards towards the badge. “This is how things have been, how they are and how they always will be; no point in changing them. This is who I am; an ever evolving misfit who isn’t satiated with the status quo. There will alway be the next mission, the next objective...the next target. Because of that I have to make it out alive and return home; make it back to his arm and explain this to him. For now I have to get going, they need me by sunrise tomorrow…”

The badge was peculiar; upon picking it up Roxanne noticed the symbol engraved of two swords. It was made out of gold and it was oval with the wide sides meant to be worn horizontally. It had a clip for a lanyard or could be worn as a clip on. Roxanne shrugged and pocketed the thing; she was already wearing Melody’s crystal as a necklace and a bio-weapon badge as a clip on. Next she went and inspected her APC; she noted the damage and was surprised it wasn’t more. However, there was no way she was tilting that back up less get it back on the road and driving it anywhere. For now Roxanne went back and gathered whatever gear the men had.

For being “prepared” to take her down their gear was simplistic. Typical police wear and a kevlar vest each. The rifles were M4s with tacticool accessories and extended mags. What was valuable was the ammunition; Roxanne took out one of the magazines and blew on it. The ammo was colored crystals similar to what Melody had shown but they looked rather fragile. With that being revealed, Roxanne gathered the rifles and clothing one by one and put it into the APC. Then she gathered some foliage and covered the APC with it to make sure no one would get it; after making sure the coordinates of it were on her map, she made her way back to the street.

Just as she was making her way back she noted among the trees a motorcycle. Curious she approached to find a dead body next to it. “Someone who saw something they weren’t supposed to huh?” Not caring who it was, Roxanne consumed them the same way she did the other men. Why? Well, they were wearing a one piece black tracksuit, fingerless gloves and black fingerless gloves; there was also a helmet but who needed that? Roxanne undressed and put on the clothing in that was on the ground. After inspecting it more, she nodded to herself and picked up her own outfit to carry it to the APC.

Now that that was taken care off, Roxanne took the bike toward the road. She checked her map and looked in the direction of the her destination setting the bike accordingly and sitting on it. The engine turned on and she smiled as she tested it. She checked swords and other accessories, looked up ahead and then sped off. “Hell yeah, now this is what I am talking about!”

22
Rec Room / Re: CDDA: Adventures in Cataclysm
« on: June 26, 2018, 07:03:56 pm »
Five men were walking through the town near the tower plague and co called their headquarters; as a matter of fact they were heading there directly. The man leading them went by the name of Richard; he was a former GA templar who had acquired an artifact from one of their fallen bishops. The artifact had told him many things like how GA was being slowly replaced by the bots, how astor didn’t have their stated goal as his own and many other things. After a particular raid Richard stole said artifact, a shield that seemed to be woven straw but was made out of steel; it was the shape of an isosceles triangle and when it was held correctly the point that was not like the other two pointed down. It was thanks to what this shield told richard that he was able to rally a few men of GA to get the hell out after the raid and follow him. Many of those men were now dead and now only four remained.

There was Mike, Richard’s right hand, he was a no nonsense skeptic who had only joined GA because they seemed like a more legit organization than any others that offered the means for him to contribute to rebuilding civilization; besides, he had gone to church every now and then so he could pretend believe. There was Tommy; he was a very silent man but very proficient with a rifle. If anything needed to be killed in a single shot Tommy was your man; he didn’t ask any questions, he simply did his job. Then there was Erick; he was a gearhead who believed human technology could fix the “curse” that was mutants. He didn’t want them killed but sought to “cure” them and bring them back to humanity. He was an eccentric man and his gadgets were weird but he proved to be helpful in more than one occasion. Lastly there was Jack, he was a coward who joined GA for the same reasons Mike did but out of cowardice. GA offered protection and the power he craved; he felt like a tough guy wearing the sigil of the blue cross and welding a rifle. His little encountered with Plague had taken that away and he now reverted to how he felt before GA.

The shield told Richard to be careful, machines of war now controlled almost autonomously seemed to hunt them, warhunters; these were seemingly specially made to hunt down deserters and anyone GA wanted gone but weren’t that much of a threat to send the proper warwalkers. In GA’s heaven city they would be fine but outside those walls there were pray to these machines. Thankfully none seemed to be present so they walked the streets of the town they were in unimpeded towards Plague’s tower. Richard lead them with Mike by his side, Tommy and Erick keeping careful watch at anything that might sneak up on them while Jack watch the rear. Things were going smoothly so far for them since they left their little temporary base.

“So, just what the hell is the plan again?”, asked Mike.

“The shield says the man who killed the men with Jack are there. Says he is an old acquaintance of hers.”, responded Richard.

“Wait, her?”

“Yes, the shield is a she Mike. Her name is Trinity, be nice.”

“...Alright, so what does ‘She’ want from this man.”

“Apparently a powerful artifact known as ‘Coalescence’ resides there. It masquerades as a man by the name of Plague but Trinity can see beyond that. She is worried about this artifact and what it has been doing lately.”

“And that is? Just what the hell are we getting into…”

“She says it’s a long and complicated story. Trinity wants to talk to Plague and find out what is going on and go from there. Nothing too out there you see?”

“Nah, just talking artifacts with names that apparently know each other. It’s all good man…”

“I mean fair but still… Just follow my lead ok? Trinity has been nothing but truthful and has proven she has our interests at heart too. We are almost there anyways, just a little longer. Get ready for a fight...”

The groups was approaching a particular intersection. In the days before the cataclysm you would go through here daily to get anywhere in town and as such many businesses made their home here. When it all went to shit many of the people were here and this was the place in town with the most zeds. Richard knew this so he ordered his men to get ready to fight their way through; once they did it was a smooth walk to the tower. The group crossed the corner to expect many zombies charing at them but instead found something unexpected.

“Hey… Rich...I don’t like this one bit…”, Jack expressed out loud.

“Calm down...it’s just one instead of a horde… just remember your training…”, Richard responded

Where the horde of the dead should be there was only corpses. Many of them were dismembered; scattered limbs all over the place. Some of them were also partially eaten and the vast majority were too injured to get up even by the will of a zombie necromancer or lord. In the middle of it all was a figure wearing what looked to be a gray jumpsuit eating the corpse of a zombie hulk right in the middle of the intersection. Richard stood his ground with shield in front and his one-handed longsword deployed and ready to strike. Mike and Tommy at either side aiming DMR style experimental rifles at the creature; Erick and Jack each had experimental bullpup rifles of a rather powerful cartridge ready to provide support fire if needed. Jack was obviously very nervous but he held his ground embolden by his companions.

“What the fuck is that? Should we just shoot it? Rich? Hey, what are your orders?”, Mike said with an increasingly worried tone.

Richard did not as much budge or take his gaze off what he saw. Trinity was speaking to him again and what Richard didn’t like what he heard one bit. The creature turned around after it was done with his meal to reveal it was once a man; but it hadn’t been that for quite a while. The sight made the men recoil back a bit with Richard standing his ground and Jack losing his poster.

“Richard what the hell?! Fucking let’s just shoot it already!”

“No…”


“What?!”

“Hold your fire...no, lower your weapons…”

“Have you lost your fuicking mind?! That thing was eating a hulk!”

The creature looked at the groups in confusion as it tilted its head; then it smirked as he adjusted. His smiled contorting his face in ways that did not look natural. The appearance of the creature was that of a human who had begun to decay after death, then soaked in water and finally polished smooth again; no visible wounds despite this so it suggested it was still probably alive. It took a single step making the sound of gunfire erupted behind Richard who simple held his ground.

“Fuck fuck fuck! This thing is going to kills us all! We need to run!”, Jack exclaimed

Jack lost it at the moment, he witness as round after round of gunfire connected with the creature and it simply stood there. The same scene had happened yesterday with Plague who Jack knew as “Anomon” and he knew how that ended up. After every round had been exhausted and the echoing of gun fired ceased the creature simply twitched as it regenerated.

My turn...He who shall awaken...

The group witnessed in horror as the creature suddenly started to grow claws on his fingertips; one foot then two then three and still growing. They were trying to reloaded their rifles as Richard started to walked towards the creatures.

“What the hell are you doing know?! Get back here you crazy son-of-a-bitch! We don’t have time for this!”, Mike screamed

“Take the others back to the safehouse and wait there…”, Richard responded back.

“Wait what?”

The creature spoke again, “...Am the artificial fragment who stole the power from the broken god...” It’s claws started to grow after they had glown to their full size; each three yards long and they looked rather sharp. The creature had them pointed up and crossed in front of his face.

“I will hold this thing off… Trinity knows what it is… get back to the safe house now!”

“Richard god damn it! You can’t take that thing alone! Look at it!”

“We are loaded sir!”, Shouted Erick at the other two.

“See! We can take it together Rich!”, Mike said with a hint of desperation.

...I scoff at the union and envy the awakened...”, The creature’s eyes started to glow the same way his claws did as he stared right at Richard… and he stared back.

“No...I have to do this alone. Only I wield the power to stop it, your rifles will do nothing against it.”

“Why do you always have to be the fucking hero?! Listen to me for once damn it!”

...I am bio-weapon omega, the culmination of humanity's power and will...” It then assumed a peculiar stance; it kept it’s pose low while his massive claws now pointed forwards halving the distance between him and Richard who stopped walking and assumed his own stance with shield and sword ready once more.

“Don’t you trust me? I will be back...and I will have back up ok? Trinity will guide us all, we just need to trust her... “

“Rich...fucking hell I hope you are not wrong…”

...And I shall show you the nature beyond divinity... Artificial Overdrive!
” The creature gave an ear deafening roar louder than that of their weapons; their simple electronic earmuff they used to shoot their guns safely proved no match and as such they ditched them to be able to cover their ears. Once the roar stopped the creature rushed towards Richard who held his shield high.

“Just fucking run for now! Go!”

Jack didn’t have to be told twice as he was the first to book it. Tommy and Erick looked at each other and quickly followed suit after a quick nod. It was Mike who lingered a bit too long. He saw as the shield blocked Omega’s massive claw perfectly. Richard looked back and smiled. “I will be fine, now go!”

Mike gave a salute to his superior and hesitantly retreated. He didn’t look back; he kept running. He ran as he heard Omega roar again, as Richard shouted in pain, as the creature did the same soon after. Mike ran towards the safehouse where he would wait for Richard to return.



Lucy walked up the stairs and looked down the hall; Plague’s office was at the other end of it. She wanted to go and pay him a visit to check how he was holding on but something seemed strange. She felt watched...and as if Plague was expecting her. However, unlike most people Lucy simply smirked and shrugged it off. She was the devil after all; only a few beings were powerful enough to match her power and none of them would do such a thing as stalk her as they had no need to. As for Plague, that damned sword had nothing on her either, even if all the pieces were combined Anomon was no big deal. She was the 7th mage who helped sealed the now broken god and she could do it again. With all of this in mind, Lucy walked towards the office, opened the door once she got there and let herself in closing the door behind her.

“Hey there ‘Plague’, how are you doing?”, Lucy asked.

Plague was looking out the window with his hands behind his back. The sword of coalescence in its scabbard that he wore on his hip. He gave a deep sigh at Lucy’s words before answering her; he did so without as much as looking back.

“What do you want know? Come to take something else away? Let me guess, you are going to give me a curfew too…”

Lucy couldn’t help but laugh at his little quip. “Still sour over that? Listened, it’s not like I am your mom...wait, I technically am aren’t I? One of 7 parents. Well, as your 7th mom you are grounded young man!” She smiled and could tell Plague was having none of it.

“This is just a joke to you isn’t it? All of it is. How could it not? This era will pass for you like many others have. What are my ambitions are just obstacles for your own way of life.”

Her laughter stopped but she still smiled as she heard this. “Well, you are not wrong in any of that. Anomon is one of the few beings powerful enough that I broke my vow to not interfere in this world’s will. Astor is another and I don’t need both of you running around. That is why I told you to at least halt this for a while; we can have our final battle in a few eons from now.”

Plague stood there silent not saying a word; Lucy’s smile was now gone and sense of worry started to creep over before she spoke once more. “Besides, we are in a delicate position. We are in a crossroads with other worlds and the wound in the veil is getting serious. I doubt the many other beings making their presence here would appreciate that. Just why do you bring this up again?”

“The veil… the myriad of other beings fighting for this place… why should I care for any of it? I destined to become Anomon reborn, rule over this world and if that means defending it from them so be it! Why should I care about this balance nonsense?! And you! You have stood in my way for the last time!”

He unsheathed his sword and pointed it at Lucy who just stood there perplexed. There was a pulse of energy on the veil that threatened to expand the wound; anyone in tune would feel it and as such Lucy did as well. She slowly started to walk towards Plague with worry now having taken over.

“Plague...no, Coalescence, listen to yourself. Don’t do something you will regret. We had a deal ok? Don’t make me your enemy, it won’t end well for anyone…”

More silence, Lucy continued walking towards Plague; when she was close enough to touch the blade she stopped and spoke.

“Do you really think you can take me on kid? I am the fallen one, the oldest being on this reality. This is your last chance, stand down now!”

He chuckled a little. “No no, I know I can’t take on the devil herself. I am not powerful enough...yet. No, I am not trying to stop Lucifer...I am going to stop the 7th mage...” Suddenly six cloaked figures appeared in the room around Lucy; they resemble divine spirits with their face concealed by their hoods but they had normal hands rather than blade. Lucy looked around her as her eyes widen.

“What did you do?! You mad man! Do you realize what you just done?!”

“Silence!” At Plagues shout another surge of energy could be felt in the veil making Lucy stand down for the moment. “You are in no position to say anything. You will now hear my demands…”

Lucy glared at him but soon enough she smirked. “No, I won’t. I won’t be staying here for long. Know that what happens from here is your choice. I don’t know what the hell happened for you to suddenly take this route but I have my guesses… You might have just started a war… Next time we meet shoot first...”

“Get her!” At Plague’s command the cloaked figures rushed towards Lucy but before they could touch her a puff of smoke appeared and she was gone; a smell of sulfur lingered behind. Plague chuckled to himself; the cloaked figures looked at him awaiting orders.

“Oh well, it was a long shot that we would catch her. Doesn’t matter, we got what we wanted anyways; we can no freely advance with our plan. Omega has made himself know… all we need is a single piece... “ He stood there for a minute thinking something through, then his authoritarian tone returned as he started to issue orders to the figures. “Two of you gentile swordmen go and investigate Omega’s whereabouts; the other four come with me, we need to have a team meeting…”



Victor was in Helen’s quarters running a few diagnostic test on the flesh weapons after returning from having grabbed a bite to eat.; some from memory but the majority being re-discovered from his journal. Not once did he touched them as there was no need to; they just sat there as spell after spell was made after all the precautionary wards were set in place. Arcane wise this thing seemed to have an aura of its own and exhibit properties of a cursed soul rather than an item that was enchanted. Now he did not know how in the world someone was able to keep something like this alive; that was not his area of expertise. After jotting down his findings he ran one last test; this one would take a while to complete so he simply put them back in the warded drawer and called it down.

After putting his journal away and making sure everything was neatly put away Victor went and checked on Thomas. The crib suddenly being made out of wood surprised him but Helen hadn’t been screaming out of her mind and the baby seemed to be doing ok, arcane and other wise. “Hey there little guy, how are you doing? It’s your dad, remember me?” He reached into the crib and carried him in his arms. “There we go. Come here. I certainly remember you know. It’s funny, we probably remember about each other mostly the same amount.”

“Well, you have all the time in the world for you two to get to know one another don’t you think? It’s good to see you are taking this seriously now.”, said a mysterious voice behind Victor. He turned around to the source as he held his close out is instinct. He found behind him was now a woman with red hair that matched her eyes; her outfit was a business casual attire with a blazer and tie and the color of it all also matched her hair and eyes.

“And who the hell are you? Explain your presence!”, Victor demanded after giving one step back.

The woman laughed at his reaction and his words. “Oh my, where have I heard that before? Anyways, I go by Lucy; don’t worry, I am not here to hurt you. If I wanted to I would’ve done so already.”

“Lucy huh? And what are you here for?”, Victor warily looked at the woman and then noted Thomas looking at her with childish glee and laughter in his face.

“See? Your son seems to be ok with me, can you maybe trust me enough to talk a little?”

Victor’s was still warded but he was more calm by what she said, Thomas looked at him with a smile and he smiled back before looking back at Lucy. “Alright, we can talk. But any sudden movements and I will not hesitate to fight back.

Lucy grinned at his statement rather amused by it. “You are holding your kid, do you really think you can take me on?”

It was now Victor’s turn to grin at her. “No need to, don’t you notice something weird about this room?” Lucy gave him a confused look. She looked around and eventually spotted what he meant; the entire room was devoid of any shadows and a peculiar presence could be felt. It was nothing she couldn’t take on but she was still rather impress by his resolve.

“Touche, there will be no need for that. So, why don’t we exit the room real quick?”

“And why do you want to do that? We are already here…”

Lucy gave a loud sigh, rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. “Victor… Just trust me ok? I know that’s weird coming from a woman who just appeared in your room but… look into my eyes and see that I don’t have any ill will.” He did just that; Victor looked at Lucy right into her eyes and then felt a strange sensation. Her look was disarming, she seemed like the most trustworthy person in existence and any reservations he might have had about her were dispelled.

“Oh, right… Sorry about that. Yeah let’s...let’s go outside.”

Lucy smiled returned this time a bit mischievous. “See? That wasn’t too hard. Ladies first, after me Ironwood.”

“Sure, go ahead.”

The two exited the room and stood outside for the time being. Arcane effects and wards echoed in the room. The flesh weapons were secure and he had placed a seal on the drawer just in case; no one but himself or Helen would be able to open it. This seal was one he recalled from his memories Roxanne had shared with him; he seemed to use it alot so it must be really secured. With the peace of mind that brought him, he spoke up after he and Lucy stood by the door.

“So, what are you here for? You never did answered that.”, Victor remarked.

“Can’t a lady just come and visit an old acquaintance?”, Lucy answered.

“Wait, we know each other? Are you another one of my friends I can’t recall?”

Lucy chuckled to herself. “Don’t flatter yourself. We aren’t close or anything. I just happen to remember you from a certain incident and come here to repay something.”

“An incident? What type of incident.”

“Well, you tried to bargain with me after going through the trouble of summing me directly rather than one of my many servants. I got to say that really impressed me. In the end I could not help you but as a token of appreciation I promised you I would help you out one day. You know what? Explaining this is pointless. Come, hold my hand.” Normally Victor would be question such a request but he was still in a trance-like state from looking into her eyes. He nodded and offered his hand which she took into her own. “Close your eyes.”

Victor knew exactly what was happening; she was sharing a memory with him. The feeling was the same as when Roxanne did this but this time he didn’t have someone literally inside his body mucking around with his aura. However, he soon realized this wasn’t his memory unlike with Roxanne but the memory of Lucy. He was in it but it was from her perspective. There he was after having completed a ritual; Roxanne was there? Or was it the alt he kept hearing about. The memory went on revealing what had happened; Victor was quite surprised and when it was over he pulled back as if he had woken up in a cold sweat holding Thomas protectively while he took a step back. Lucy opened her own eyes and smiled in Victor’s direction.

“So, what did we learn from that?”, Lucy asked in a teasing tone.

Victor looked at her as he proposed what he had just “seen”. He finally spoke up when he found the correct words. “D-did I make a deal with the devil?”

“That you did. Sorry I couldn’t help you there but be safe assured you solved it yourself quite recently.”

“I did? It seemed serious… And was that…”

“No, she this version of Roxanne, the one you were friends with pre-cataclysm. The one you currently know if from another world. Complicated but it doesn’t really matter anymore. And before you ask, no, you didn’t lose your memory solving it those two are separate events.”

“...So the literal devil has come to pay me a visit… And you said you came to grant me that favor? The one from the memory?”

“Yes, I am here to do that. Now, I won’t be able to stay for long. I detect the signature of a certain ice-cream loving woman here and I really don’t want her finding me… so let’s cut to the chase…”

“You mean Illiana? She kept talking about vanilla ice cream when I met her.”

“Yes yes her… don’t have anything against her personally but given her job she might not be too please at my past and future actions...  Anyways, this isn’t what I am here for.” Lucy cleared her throat before speaking up again. “Well, I am here to do a few things. First things first. Can I hold your baby? He is so cute!”

Victor gave her a look of disbelief. Was she being serious? With this eldritch beings he couldn’t be sure anymore. The effect of the enchantment from looking into her eyes lingered but he was a bit more lucid now. “Sure, just be careful... “ He carefully extended his arms for Luct to hold Thomas.

“Relax, I am good with children.” Lucy took the baby from Victor and and started doing funny face as him. “How’s a cute baby? You are, yes you are.” She placed a finger close to his face witch he grasp with his hands as he gave the typical baby laughter. “I can see the resemblance with you. Hopefully he inherits his mother’s common sense as well…”

“Wait wait?”, Victor said in genuine confusion.

“Don’t worry about it. It’s all in the past now.” She played with Thomas for a bit more in the same way a typical middle aged woman would when one of her friends had a baby. “You are the next generation little one. Grow strong and healthy for me ok? Take care of your mother and father, specially your father, and make them proud. Now, here is a little something from me.” Lucy flickered her fingers and light red particles trickled down into Thomas; he laughed to which she smiled in return.

“W-what did you just do?”, asked Victor a bit concerned.

“I just sprinkled him with my essence; in the same way animals mark their territory with with their scent, I have just marked him as being under my personal protection. No hostile being would dare lay a finger on him less they be willing to face the my wrath… It should also give him a slight affinity with the arcane so teach him well.”

“Uhhh, I am not so sure about this… what will Helen say when she uses her mask?”

“Don’t worry about that. This doesn’t change his aura or anything. It is only detectable by those things that would want to cause him harm in the first place and I doubt his own mother would do that. This is my first favor to you.”

“And why would you do that?”

“Well, I have an interest in humanity increasing their numbers you know… it’s not fun just having a bunch of undead and aliens wobbling around. So I have a personal bias in making sure this goes well. Plus with so many people being alive I can afford to get to know a few; and like I said, you caught my eye all those years back with your bold action. Skipped all the red tape and called the manager directly. Secondly, this ties back to my second favor… I come to give you a warning and some advice…”

“A warning? That can’t be good if it’s coming from you...what is it?”

“Victor, another incident is coming. The whims of an arcane being have put me in an uncomfortable situation and it will eventually come knocking on your doorstep. Now this is my advice… don’t answer. You will be tempted to respond but it’s not worth it. You have a family now, your responsibility is with them first. Let the world burn down to the ground; it is my job to prevent that from happening.”

Before Victor could respond his Aura Spell detected something in their Quarters. He was about to rush over but he was stopped by Lucy by placing her hand on his shoulder. “Let it happen. Your son is safe here with us and that is all that matters. This is the first time it will knock on your doorstep and also the most direct. Stay here with me, with Thomas.”

Victor clenched his fist at her words; she was telling him to just stand idly by as something was rummaging in there. He then let loose and his expression was that of shock. “I-is that…”

“It is, let them. It will be ok.”

“B-but why would they?”

“Everyone has their reasons. If I do my job you will never have to find out.”

Thomas was quiet, not scared or anything but very curious at the scene in front of him he could not understand. Lucy smiled at him and gently pinched his cheeks making him laugh slightly again. Victor then felt a certain seal be broken and he panic a little; so now understood what they were here after and that confused him even more.

“They are taking them! I can’t let them get in the wrong hands!”

“Shhhh, stop worrying about every little thing. It’s fine. Trust me ok?” The way Lucy spoke was rather nonchalant; she held Thomas and played with hi while she did so. It was as if the scene in the other room wasn’t happening at all. Eventually, the aura of the thief along with what they took disappeared from Victor’s Aura Spell. He stood there perplex wondering is what had happened was not just some illusion.

“Good job Victor. You did the right thing. Come on, let’s go back inside.”

Victor didn’t know what to think so he simply followed Lucy back inside the room. She carefully set Thomas back on the crib as Victor looked around the room. He eventually saw the drawer the two flesh weapons had been in and he sighed; it was opened and the two weapons gone. Lucy waved her arms around Thomas and he quickly fell asleep.

“I took the liberty of feeding you son and check if anything was wrong with him.”

“Do I have to ask?”

“You wouldn’t understand.”

Another sigh escaped Victor’s lips as he crossed his arms looking at Lucy. “Not to be ungrateful but...what now?”

“Live your life. Next time you see Helen give her a hug, spend time with her and your son. Of course, you don’t have to do any of that but it is what I recommend. Remember, this incident will come haunt you again and I will not be there to stop you.”

“And what about you? I take it you are leaving now.”

“Yes, I am. Have to get started with somethings. But before I go, take this.” Lucy materialized what looked like a business card; it was a black with white text giving her basic information. On the right corner a semi-circle in golden font.

“Lucifer Morningstar, Personal Assistant.”, Victor read out loud before looking at Lucy, “Your business card? That title seems too underwhelming.”

“Well, it works given I don’t specify in one thing. Feel free to contact me sometime; even eldritch beings get lonely sometimes… I would like to meet Helen some time, haven’t dealt with the Cleansing Flame all that much, should be fun.”

“And how would I do that? This has no contact information.”

Lucy chuckled and pointed at the circle on the corner. “We do it the old fashion was of course. A drop of blood in circle and the contract is sealed.” She winked at him and then laughed. “I am just kidding. The drop of blood is to just know who is summoning me so I can find them. Anyways, it’s been a pleasure seeing you again but I must be off. Au Revoir!”

With that being said, a puff of scarlet mist enveloped her and once it dissipated she was no longer there. Victor sighed one more time and pockeded the card. “And just what the hell am I going to tell Helen?”



On the way back to the farm from the trailer park Roxanne felt a familiar sensation once again. That same nagging feeling from the mall and yesterday, but this time it was different; it was calling for her but it seemed to be trapped, for a lack of a better word. This though lingered in her and it was anything she could really focus on so the entire trip back she seemed distracted and lost in thought.

Eventually they got back and she bid farewell to Quinn and Hector as they got off the tend to the trailer. “Well, it’s been fun guys but I have to take care of some stuff that came up; it’s uhhh, ghost stuff, yeah. Anyways, be seeing you guys later.” And with that she took off not waiting for their reactions.

She was now back at the farm and she noticed something was different; new vehicles? New people? She couldn’t tell or cared at the moment. She needed to get back to her room and take care of this nagging feeling. Roxanne walked back to her room and didn’t bothered opening the door opting to simply cross it as the bracelets made her momentarily incorporeal. This would be quite the sight for anyone who happened to walk by the back side of Roxanne’s room.

Once inside she got to work on something she hadn’t done in quite a while. Roxanne closed the blinds on her windows, turned on two three tier candelabras and began to undress carefully setting her garments on the bed. Inside her stash under the altar was the robe she put on when doing this particular ritual; she put it on and kneeled in front of her altar. The ritual was well known to her but this time she had no “tribute” to accompany it; and even if she had she would be unable to consume it. Roxanne hoped her calling alone would suffice.

And suffice it did. The nagging feeling in her grew stronger and stronger; it soon became almost painful but it never reached that point. Instead it too a different form, a voice; the voice was at first a whisper but then it too grew louder and more coherent with time. Roxanne stayed silent with her eyes closed and listened and when she could finally understand it the candle light turned off and then the flame relit itself with a purple flame. She opened her eyes, eyes that were now an ever-changing hue of pink; just as her eyes as a mutant did with the color green.

“There you are… finally got through to me did ya?”, Roxanne said out loud. The voice responded and she smiled. “I see, no no, I summoned you so it’s fine. But I have to warn you, you are not the first to have come to me; I know how to deal with you kind. Now, tell me why you have seeked me out?”

There was silence for a moment; the voice spoke to Roxanne in private. After few moments Roxanne interrupted the silence with her laughter. “I appreciate your honesty; I like that. Ok, but you must understand there I am quite comfortable right now. Besides, I have gone through a rather dramatic change and I am still getting used to it. Will you be taking me by force?”

More silence only filled with Roxanne’s audible reactions. “Oh? An offer I can refuse? So you are going to try that tactic? Alright, tell you what? I will allow you to muse me but if I don’t like what I hear I will expel you out. Seems fair? Good. Now, what is this offer of yours?”

What could a spirit offer someone that would cause them to give up to the whims of said spirit? Victor had offered his soul to a spirit of harvest to attain power from a higher dimension; Plague was took wielded a weapon that offered enough power to rebuild the world in his image and paid the price of assimilation. What would you give up for power? For some grand ability? For wealth or health? Well, Roxanne was offered no of these things. What was offered to her was much simpler; something she did not expect to hear. Roxanne stood up from her position and exclaimed her response lossing any facade of sophistication.

“Bullshit! There is no way you could poss-” Her words were interrupted by another voice, one that confirmed what the first one said was real. Roxanne collapsed onto the ground. “I-it really is you… after all these years… you are still alive?”

There was more silence; this time for a solid five minutes before Roxanne answered again. “You want to talk? Sure… if what you say it’s true then I will be there… just give me the rest of the day please… I need to do a few things… See you in the morning.”

The voice went away and so did any feeling it might have given her; the candle light went out again and it returned to its normal orange glow. Roxanne stayed on the floor for a couple more minutes simply thinking things through. She eventually picked herself up, composed herself and then started to get to work. First she took of the robe and put back on her outfit; the black dress a golden rose on the left side of it as well as a pair fancy dress shoes that were she was rather mobile in. Also her two golden bracelets she received as a gift.

After she did so she went through and packed items she would need; her journal, some material for arcane rituals and a couple outfits. Both her red divine cloak and robe of discovery were packed inside as were her laser rifle and laser pistols. She also packed a coupled books for the road and the last of her RX-12 as well as some red potions; not like either would do any good on her. This contents were put in a couple of duffle bags; she put them on and she then grabbed the gift Catnip had given her: the desert triffid known as Little Jim.

Roxanne went to her APC making sure no one spotted her. Once inside she put the contents of her duffle bag in their appropriate cargo section. When she went to open the driver’s compartment she laughed at its contents: A couple of playboys, some cocaine, a vibrator and an atomic lamp. The tools of the trade from herself not too long ago. She took them out of there and put inside some books, the RX-12, the potions and her journal; the previous items properly organized in the storage as well. With that being done Roxanne carefully got off the APC with only Little Jim in hand. Making sure not to be followed Roxanne made her way into the woods up north to a certain clearing she liked. The day was still young but it wouldn’t be long before the sun would start to go down.

After about 30 minutes of walking, Roxanne reached the clearing; the hurricane had changed it to make a small and thing stream go through the middle of it. The plants here bloomed as the soil was rich and they had a constant source of water. Roxanne smiled and got to work. She burned a little circle using her divine flames to burn any plants inside said circle to the root; this way nothing would compete with Jim for nutrients and the ashes of the burned ones would serve as nutrients for him. Then she dug a hole inside the circle with her hands and gently placed Jim inside of it covering the whole with the soil. Once he was secured Roxanne petted the him as it gave a yawn.

“Grow strong for me Jim ok? I will come back for you one day so make sure you get big and healthy until then. I am sorry I can’t take you with me but maybe this is for the best. This isn’t goodbye but a until next time…” Roxanne facepalmed and laughed to herself. “What a I doing? I am saying farewell to a plant…” She stood up and gave a final glance to Jim “Plenty of food for you here. See you later.” And with that Roxanne turned around and headed back to the farm.

She made her way back and boarded the APC again. Should she leave a message? Nah, why would she? Catnip left for an entire year and Dee bailed on Mica out of nowhere so no one had any reason to judge her if she just got up and left. Besides, she had already left a note for Hector in her room stating she was going a little trip; that should buy her a few days. There was no time to delve on it, she had a destination in mind; but first she had to make a stop. After sitting on the driver’s seat, Roxanne turned on the silent electric engine of her APC purposely not turning the loud diesel one. She drove the APC out of the parking space and headed for The Hall; hopefully Victor nor Helen would be a problem…

It didn’t take long before she reached the Hall; she got off the APC who was till on the road and left it running; she wouldn’t be here long. Roxanne snucked her way inside Helen’t room after her sense told her it was empty. The voice had said something about special weapons made out of flesh? Roxanne searched but nothing matched their description. Eventually the only place left to look was a drawer but it wouldn’t budge. After some examination she noted it was sealed off but luckily she knew how to get it open. Unknow to Victor was that the seal he had used was a special drop zone seal used but member of SoA to leave supplies on the field for other members to open. As such it didn’t take long for Roxanne to open revealing the price inside.

“Oh Victor… never change… makes things easier for me.” Roxanne grabbed the weapons, looked around and went back to the APC; for some reason the effects of said weapons didn’t seem to affect her, not that she would know they had any effects in the first place.

Once back in the APC Roxanne examined the sickly looking sword and rifle made out of flesh. She didn’t know what to make of them but if the voice wanted them then so be it. Roxanne put the things in a special compartment and then got into the driver’s seat. She gave a sigh of relief and then started to drive towards her destination; it would be a long drive.

23
Rec Room / Re: CDDA: Adventures in Cataclysm
« on: June 04, 2018, 10:46:59 am »
Roxanne had not slept or whatever passed for sleep in her current state. Instead she had spent the night making plans for what needed to be done. She had yet to present herself for the “court date” on that document she had found under her name. Whoever this prankster was Roxanne would most surely have a pleasant time if their humor extended beyond this. She also had to visit the location marked in the former SoA intranet she hacked into when in the mall; who the fuck from SoA was still alive? When Alex and her alt didn’t just who might these people be? Lastly she needed to start working on “interfacing” with Victor as they had planned. She needed to find some armor for that and Victor the correct settings. This one was the lowest priority since the two had plenty of time now.

Hector woke up and told her he would check things around. At his question she nodded and smiled. “Sure thing. If anything comes up I will gladly tag along with you. I will be here or fetching something around the farm. See you around!” Indeed seeing him without armor or shield was strange for her but she didn’t question it. For now she went ahead and experimented with both the bracelets and the reactor system upgrade for the sword of the void.



The night had been fairly relaxing for Victor; no dreams or anything, simply a night’s rest. When he awoke Helen was still asleep; he let her sleep for now simply taking out his journal and reading a bit. Things made more sense now with the partial library of memories he had gotten back. As he read he felt a sudden presence spying on them; he used his aura spell to discern who it was and he smiled. He looked in the direction it came from, gave a thumbs up and the presence disappeared. Afterwards he simply shook his head in amusement and went back to his journal as he awaited for Helen to wake up.



Rey, Clara and Christina opened their eyes to find that not much seemed different. They looked around as Lucy smiled and went back to admire her nails. It was then they spotted it: sunlight coming down the door. They had closed their eyes for a mere moment yet the entirety of the night had gone by. And as Lucy promised they didn’t feel tired and actually felt both full and slaked.

“What did you do?”, asked Clara.

“I used the debug menu as I said I would. You should all get ready for the day. Plague is back and he seems a bit moody; I will deal with him but been on your toes ok?”, Lucy answered.

“Wait, Plague is already back?”

“Of course. We skipped the night so he already came back.”

“How does that even work?”

Lucy shrugged. “I don’t know honestly. Not even I will understand the workings of the story tellers. Now go, stop waiting time. Prepare for the meeting with Luna.”

“You know about that?”

“I do, there is very little I don’t know. Now excuse me, I have a bio-weapon to quell.”



Somewhere in a town nearby three men were inside a house sorting through recently acquired loot. A fourth was sleeping while a fifth was looking through a pair of binoculars at an office tower.

“So Jack said fucker ambushed them in the woods?”

“Yeah, shrugged of their bullets and then summoned the dead.”

“Shit man… that sounds like either more of that magic bullshit or one of those mutties.”

“Seems so. Who care anyways. Whatever it is I am sure we can take him.”

“Why so confident all of the sudden? We are wanted men… if even one of those machines finds us…”

“Will you relax? We have the shield… no more will we be pawns for the blue cross or anyone else. We can make our own future! This thing lets me see many things Mike and where to go next is one of them.”

“Oh yeah, and where the hell is that?”

“You are looking at it Mike. That tower there house that thing that killed our men.”

“Wait what?! Are you sure? And you want to go there?! Are you fucking nuts?”

“No, I told you I can see beyond. This shield doesn’t lie… It tells me there are plenty of juicy things in there. Weapons we can use and among them a particular sword we can use…”

“Shit man… I don’t know… sounds very sketchy to me.”

“Listen, who was the one who led us to escape the assault in the first place and evade those damn machines? GA was going to shit and I knew it before hand! This shield will guide us Mike, have some faith…”

“...Alright… I trust you John. Just be sure of what you are saying ok? That damn shield isn’t ev-”

“Isn’t mine, I know. Stole it from the corpse of one of those fucking bishops after the Iron Marshal and the Blade of Sodom tore the fucking place down… That seems like such a long time ago… Oh well. Pack your shit boys! We are moving out!”

24
Rec Room / Re: CDDA: Adventures in Cataclysm
« on: May 27, 2018, 02:00:07 am »
Even if Roxanne had needed to sleep, she wouldn’t be able to as excitement took over her. She had acquired the means to feel again, her relationship with Hector was moving along despite them taking it quite slow for a while. She had helped Roxanne find and move what little items he had; she offered him whatever clothing she had that would fit him which was admittedly not much. Why she had clothing the size of Hector was explained to him simply by Roxanne saying she liked the style despite it not fitting her.

In the back of her mind something lingered. She had been contacted the day of they stayed at the mall by someone who claimed to be former SoA. They had settled on meeting within the week, no set date but it had to be one day this week. Still, she had a choice to make; lots of things had happened and no doubt Hector worried over her. Would she go there alone or offer him to go with her? He would no doubt have his own issues and she still had some days to make good on her “appointment”. Maybe the next day wasn’t the time to go either; maybe she just wanted to spend lost time with the knight. But if he had his plans maybe getting her appointment out of the way would be prudent.

Well, Roxanne decided things would happen as they did. No used in stressing over the little details. Whatever the next day held she would be ready! Just this little thing and from there she was free. They said they knew more about her sword, maybe she could get the answers she needed; answers Victor could no longer give and she would find a way to enjoy her time with her beloved.



Melody nodded at the Corpsman at his offer to help her with her rifle. Once he checked the chamber and returned it to her she slung it back and held it close to her back as if being protective. “Y-yeah. This one has been through a lot with me. It’s speshial…”

She noted the way the bird was positioned through her aura spell and the way the sun was getting low. Both irritated her a bit due to her current stated. “A-are you guys gonna help or what?! It’s getting laaate! Maybe we can do medical stuff later id birb is ok. Find a place to sleep too. My room is gone and birb doesn’t have one. Victooooor! Roxaaaaane! Heleeeeen! I need a house!”



Things have finally settled at the hall. The slime who had called herself puddle had disappeared in suddenly while Helen and Illiana were talking. With that and Illiana being told she was free to stay, she went and looked for a place to stay as well as probably assist with dinner as her powers were a bit out of commission. That left Helen and Victor alone in the room after a few things were taken care of. At Helen’s comments and questions Victor payed his full attention to her. He was standing overlooking the drawer where the weapons he had brought were stored but he made his way to her by the bed standing in front of her.

“Ah yes. Well, first, that wound of yours concerns me a bit but you said it’s fine so I trust you on that. But if you need anything for that just let me know ok?” He then looked back at the drawer where Solomon had told him to store the odd flesh weapons; the “evil” they emanated not being felt by even his aura spell as the wards safely contained them. “I also found some peculiar weapons you might want to take a look in the morning. Right now it’s getting late for a good examination and frankly there are more important things to discuss in my opinion. Solomon said to place them in that drawer and whatever seals that has seems to be doing a fine job at containing them.”

Next he looked down at his right hand, specifically his wrist. He smile at the slot and plugs that were the UPS Bionic installed in him. He now knew he would have hated this at one point in his past but he didn’t know; the reason why was no longer relevant or even known to him and he wanted to keep it that way. That was the one memory he did not want back. Victor then looked at Helen again, smile still in his face.

“Thane Helen McKinnon of the Cleansing Flame. Once my sworn enemy and now my life partner. Purifier Victor Ironwood of Shadow of Arcane; I have been nothing but but a fool and a burden to you who has the patience of a saint. Yet, you have not only forgave me, you have always been by my side. Well, no more! Roxanne apparently had some of my memories with her and she gave them to me. I have seen who I was back then… I would like to ask for your forgiveness and offer you the assurance I will not make the same mistake. I vow to make things right; for you, for your son... “

“But this is not a plea for forgiveness, it is a plea to move forward for a better future. I know how you are Helen, who we are. And if you allow me, I want to cement our future together. I talked to friend of mine yesterday who I would like you to meet one day and he told me something. He said life is too short to hesitate and I agree. Now I want to give you something. I hope you accept…”

Victor went and reached inside one of his pockets and reached for a small box. He held it out in his hand for her to see as he opened it to reveal to rings. One golden with a red gemstone as its jewel; the other a black one with a purple gemstone as its jewel. He let them see them as he spoke.

“A ring made out of gold with a sunstone as its jewel. You are like the morning sun that brings light to this world and cleanses it. This ring fits you perfectly; an agent that brings order. The other is a black ring with a moonstone as it’s jewel. I am one who lurks in the night with the moon as their guide as they traverse the unknown to learn more from it. Sure what they find is not always pretty and trouble lurks but it’s necessary. Quite the contrast to yourself wouldn’t you agree? Still we have proven with our union that anyone can find common ground and peace can be made. This rings are a symbol of that and I want them to also be a symbol to official seal what is already an unspoken truth.”

Victor took a knee down in front of Helen as took one of her hands, box clutched at his chest. “Helen, will you marry me?”



It was getting dark, Plague knew he should start to head back to the tower. The tower would need a name too as just tower was not good enough. He would give it though later as for now something else occupied the mind of the blade-controlled bio-weapon. After fantasizing about achieving literal godhood and adopting Roxanne as his personal pet, his mind went to more immediate and achievable goals.

He was in a clearing now; something was lurking by the trees but Plague payed it no mind. This body was hard to kill and the power of Coalescence enough would fill any gaps. If he wasn’t allowed to acquire the true power he craved then he would have to secure his place in this land. Authority would make it easier to keep on eye on the other two pieces he need for when the time came for assimilation. But how? The answer was obvious of course; he would focus on building an empire. He would start simple of course: turn the tower into a fortress, then take over the town next door. Then he would get a commodity others would want in this ruin world.

Drugs, weapons and supplies were all to common nowadays as well as being so cliche so he would not go into that. No, he would focus on something else. His colony would be known in the art of dealing in the arcane. The highest bidder would get what he wanted and he had enough power in knowledge in this area to make it work. Enemies would be made of course; the likes of the cleansing flame and other organizations similar he no doubt knew existed despite not being able to name one. He would just deal with them like he dealt with anything else: assimilate them or destroy them, simple.

For now there had to be a first step, something to kickstart everything. He had to get his name out there; it was time to come out of hiding and what better way to do it then by the opportunity in front of him right now? The bushes moved and the light from a gun barrel reflected the shine in the sun. This were amateurs; not worthy of being assimilated. Plague stood there and let them make their move.

“I know you are there. You picked on the wrong person.Come out and face me and I will make it painle-”

*poomb*

Plagues vision went blurry for a moment. Something warm was flowing from his forehead. The sword of coalescence activated and changed to an orange hue. He stumbled back as he saw blood and brain matter splatter before him as armed men started to exit their cover in the bushes. Directed headshot. Before he could regain his footing they began to fire their weapons all at once; they were 6 of them in total all of them brandishing what looked like assault rifles, the same kind plague’s zombies used.

*bratatatatatatatata*

Automatic fire could be heard all over the once quiet landscape. Each bullet finding their mark as they tore flesh,bone and struck metal from bionics the former bio-weapon hadn’t used in years. It was all over in less than 15 seconds; shots had more done their fair share of damage. Yet, Plague was still in one piece somehow. He was brought down to one knee as he used his sword that was dug into the ground in front of him to keep him from falling over. His left hand hanged barely still attached to him; his breathing was erratic and gurgly as he wheezed due to struggling to get air into his lungs.

The other men smirked as they stepped forward seeing their handy work. The man they had shot at still was still somehow alive but he wouldn't be soon enough; another shot to the head would put him out of his misery while they looted whatever he had that had not been damage by the gunshots. That sword of his would looked like it would be worth something. The men took out their magazines and dropped them to the ground before loading a new one and then chambering a round. They were getting close to their kill; the middle one was closer to the other ones.

“Y-you… have done a grave mistake…”, said Plague in a rather strained voice.

The other men laughed as the one in the middle pointed his rifle right in between the eyes of Plague who was for some reason not wearing his mask. “Whatever you say old man. Just hurry up and die!”

A gunshot was expected from the men who were behind the one about to dispatch Plague but the shot never came. A strained groan was heard instead as the orange saber pierced the man’s chest and came from his back. Plague looked at him in the eye as panic set in to the would-be-killer.

“You tried to kill me but you forgot to factor something… You can’t kill what is already dead…”

The man shouted as he suddenly combusted into a bright orange flame and soon became ashes blown into the wind. Plague was standing giving the other men a defiant look. Without missing a beat they started to shoot at him again but this time their bullets did not find their mark. It was as if some force field was shielding him but it wasn’t like that once CMB that did that, no, this bullets seemed to disintegrate in a  puff of fire and smoke. Plague started to walk forwards and the man soon stepped back as they continued to shoot.

The bushed behind them where they had hidden rustled again and four zombies emerged. They looked odd though, as if they had never been human. No exaggerated figures but it seemed as if instead of skin they had been made of flesh who had no hardened due to necrosis.  The men turned around to focus their fire at the undead but it was too late; they were grasped by the zombies who went and bit down on their necks severing major arteries. One of them was spared and he ran in the opposite right towards Plague as his peers were divorced while screaming in agony. Plague grabbed him by the throat and pointed his blade at the man’s stomach; he was now fully healed with no signs of ever having been injured.

“Bio-Weapon Anomon, The Plague Bringer; know the name. I could kill you right now but there is no need for that. Go, go and spread the word of what happened today. Tell everyone this area is now under my command and protection now and anyone who dares stand in my way will suffer the same fate.” Plague dropped the man down who was now crying and looked him in the eye while putting his sword away. “I SAID GO!”

The man screamed and stumbled himself as he got up and ran away. Plague smiled and looked over as his zombies had finished their meal and he called them back. “It’s good to have eyes and ears everywhere… they thought they were stalking me, how quaint.” He gave one look at the sun through the trees as it began to set over the horizon. It was rather late now and nightfall would soon be upon him. It was time to go. His zombies looked at him awaiting orders. “Loot their corpses for anything useful. Let’s go home, it’s getting late.”



Lucy was now reclining back in her chair as she looked at the other three a bit perplexed at Christina’s advances. She tried not to think anything of it as she awaited any questions they may have. Clara and Rey looked at each other in as if asking one another what they could ask the literal devil and to reaffirm the fact Christina was crazy. Christina rolled her eyes at the three’s reactions and decide to speak up once more.

“I have a question.”

Lucy winced a bit. “Just don’t make it weird kid…”

Christina chuckled. “No no, nothing like that. The offer still stands by the way.” She winked at Lucy before asking her question. “Tell me, how do you summon things out of nowhere? Didn’t know that was a thing. I don’t notice any changes in aura’s or any residue like with any other spell… it is as if you are violating the law of equal exchange. Care to explain that?”

At the question Lucy smiled wide and with glee. She was quite passionate about this topic. “That is a very interesting question with an equally interesting answer. You see, I am as old as I am powerful and the two are linked to one another. In my day I have had quite a few encounters and discoveries. Things that take a lifetime to discover and another to master are trivial to me. This ability here…” Lucy placed her hand out and summoned a golden coin with an eagle on the front in her palm; she handed it to Christina who examined it with excitement as Lucy continued. “...This is one of those things.”

“As you may know, there is quite a large number of things going on behind the scenes. Somethings a select few know about, other things no mortal has any business knowing and things no one, not even the likes of me, will ever know. Things like the veil, the portals that gave us the alien invaders we have fought for years now and many other things. Now, there is a great barrier that will never be breached. Beyond there lie powerful creatures who we will never meet. This beings wield the power to shape our reality on a whim; I call them the story tellers. They are not evil or good, they just are… and they left something behind… A hidden tool to correct their mistakes. They call it ‘The Debug Menu’.”

Rey and Clara looked at each other again this time in just pure confusion; they understood what she was saying somewhat but not fully. Christina on the other hand was in awe. The implications of this overwhelming her. Her full attention was on Lucy now as she spoke. “Wait, you are saying you control the means to alter our world?”

“No no, not control, simply have access to. The debug menu isn’t something one can control; it is just a tool the storyteller use to correct and test many things. I have gained access to it only after centuries of experimentation. It is quite powerful too but not omnipotent. It is through it I can summon whatever I want to my whim.”

Rey looked at Lucy, not in confusion anymore but both awe and dread. “So you mean… What else can you do with it?”

“Well, I can alter the weather, create and destroy life, alter the traits of various things, give titles to others that grant them certain privileges, control things like hunger and thirst and even control time.”

Clara was the one who spoke this time. She was nervous as what this meant was finally sinking into her mind as well. “C-can you show us what it can do?”

Lucy smiled softly this time and she close her eyes. “Sure thing. Why don’t we skip to tomorrow then? Close your eyes; when you open them you will feel well rested and fed as you witness the sunrise…”

25
Rec Room / Re: CDDA: Adventures in Cataclysm
« on: May 22, 2018, 04:48:07 pm »
At the kiss Roxanne all hesitation and doubt was gone. The previous pull she had experienced for the last to day that had made her act strange could no longer be felt as if her own free will had been restored; and right now all she cared about was this moment. She pulled back and nodded at Hector’s comment.

“I will let you know if I do. Thank you.” Then she looked around hesitantly for a bit before she looked back at the knight. “Well, there is one more thing I would like to ask you about...”

Roxanne walked away from hector towards the middle of the room and looked around again. She saw all the way it was ll organized for her needs; everything was the way she wanted but that was the issue, it was just hers. Little Jim made a slight noise which drew Roxanne’s attention; she went and picked it up turning around with it in its hands as she spoke up to Hector.

“Look around you. This is my room; I keep really weird things here like Catnip’s gift. This is the only place I can truly call my own you know? No matter how hectic the day can be I can count to come back home and shake it off here. But there is one thing that has been missing and I am now seeing it… I have my room, you have yours and we go to them after each day… Maybe, if you would be ok with it, maybe we could make it the same place? You know, you and I, moving in together… would that be something you would like?”



Victor gave a sigh of relief as Helen said she was fine. The little memories he had of her reminded him of the cloak she wore and he knew she could shrug of wounds; what he didn’t remember was just how painful it was to do so as he associated the pain he witnessed in the memories given to the wound itself. “I am glad you are ok. And sure, there is a couple things I want to talk to you about in due time.”

He found it odd that Illiana seemed a bit stressed at Helen not being so bothered at she wearing her clothes but he thought nothing of it other than just an amusing character trait. The way she spoke of the blob who called itself “puddle” also amused him. A being who claimed to have as much power as she did reduced to a school girl at the sight of the blob.

When Helen put on her mask another memory popped up to Victor. He now knew Helen used it to “see beyond” but didn’t understand how since he had no memories of wearing it or having it explained to him. Instead he assumed it might work similar to his aura spell he was calling his “6th sense” now. He activated the aura spell and was surprised to see he detected no signature on the blob. This concerned him as he was reminded Melody used this spell exclusively to get her way around now; if things could hide from it the poor girl might get sneaked upon.
The sudden change in attitude from Illiana as she answered puddle’s question unnerved him a bit. That was the attitude he expected from the embodiment of acausality. However that feeling didn’t last as she casually asked for a place to stay causing him to chuckle a bit.

“Hey, puddle right? Tell me, are you hungry? What do you eat?”, Victor asked her in order to both seem friendly and out of curiosity.



Melody was hearing people saying things, the bird was screaming someone had been hit by something judging by the way the suddenly stopped talking. “Don’t be such drama queen, this thing is unloaded. I used all my ammo up fighting an old man. Look!” She resumed to rack the bolt and indeed nothing was coming out but she was too drunk to realize that was not the point.

“So you people will help me? I think it’s the mechanism needing a tune up… should’ve gone a better base but nooooooooo, I wanted a challenge converting a civilian rifle” She then slung the rifle onto her back again as she wobbled back and forth but still on her feet. “Where is birdy? He was here a bit ago. Is he with medic finally?”



Lucy was sitting in her chair doing her nails with a file she had conjured out of thin air like many other things she had so far. Clara, Christina and Rey were sitting adjacent to her across the round table. Each was reading a letter from an envelope Lucy had given each. The envelope was crimson with a black seal depicting an eagle what held it close. The letter was made from papyrus paper and had a strong whiff of sulfur; the writing in the letter just as perplexing as the material it was housed in.

“You guys are fairly quiet.”, Lucy spoke up breaking the silence, “Do you really not have any questions?

The trio looked at each other momentarily and then at Lucy. Confusion and disbelief in their faces. Finally, it was Rey who spoke up. “It’s just, that claims here are a bit out there…”

“Says the man who gave up his humanity to become a spirit of smokeless fire. Is it really as far-fetch as the dead raising up and beings from beyond the veil asserting themselves here?”

“When you put it that way… Ok, assuming what is here is corrected, let me ask for clarification.”

“Throw it on me.”

“So you say you are among the original creations, a being fallen from grace due due to granting humanity a gift. That you were cast out of your home unto the realm humans were cast out as well. You are telling us free will was granted because of actions you did and you were punished for it; and given the chance to rule over earth you choose not to so that said gift of free will would not go to waste… This story seems very familiar to me… plagiarized even…”

Lucy smirked at the statement putting down her file. “Maybe it is not plagiarized. Maybe it is the exact story you are thinking of. Perhaps the story has been told countless times by different cultures this being the most recent.”

“Well, if that is also true… from what it says here that only leaves you with one possible rule your could’ve played.”

“Oh, do tell what is if you will. Enlighten us women here.”

Rey looked nervously around the table. He realized that yes, he was the only male present and that somehow unnerved him simply due to the fact that it was pointed out as if it was relevant. He gulped down nervously and then proceeded to speak. “So this letter says you are The Devil. As in Satan himself.”

“Herself, I am a she if you couldn’t tell.”, Lucy interjected before flashing a smile at the trio. “It is more complicated than; the story of Satan is one of many interpretations of the truth. Hell, what is in that letter is my version with my own biases. Technically I am the devil, but I am also Prometheus; the poor soul who defied the gods and gave humanity the gift of fire and was then punished for their sins. That story is my personal favorite interpretation. But humanity had to portray me as a man… Oh well.”

The trio looked at Lucy in silence not knowing how to react. It was quite the claim but as it had been pointed out it wouldn’t have been the weirdest thing to happen in recent years and she had shown great power so far. This time Christina spoke up. “Is that why you go by the name Lucifer Morningstar?”

“It is, yes. It is easier to tell a mortal I am the devil than explain the nuances of what I am. It is technically correct and it saves time for when they inevitably fuck up and I get to keep their souls.”

“And why do you want souls? Are you gearing for the final battle foretold in the book of revelations?”

Lucy laughed at that question. “No no, I have no interest in ruling over earth. Let the mortals here sort that out. I just want to protect it because it too is my home. As for why I want souls…” She looked away shyly and started to blush a bit; the last thing you would expect from someone who claimed what she had done today. “A girl gets lonely sometimes ok... “

The trio blinked rapidly at the response not remotely expecting that. Clara and Rey were utterly confused but Christian saw an opportunity by god would she take it. “Well, you don’t have to be. Why don’t we go back to my room later? Maybe you could use a little company...”

Everyone else, including Lucy, turned to look at Christina with shock. “Wait, did you just say what I think you just said?”, Lucy asked.

“Maybe I did and if so, would the morningstar grant my request?”

“...We will talk later… for now, any other questions?”



Plague had been walking for a while now and had ended up inside the woods. Well, not really plague anymore. The sword of coalescence had harvested his mind and soul a long time ago and now it’s will was imposed on his body as it masqueraded itself as him. And now this sword was walking in the woods in the body of a mortal it had tricked to wielded years ago thinking about its future.

Now, Coalescence might be a fragment of the long defeated god Anomon but it was it’s own will. Forged by human hands it had inherited their qualities; it had goal and ambitions, felt joy and frustration, it made mistakes and let emotions get the best of him. Spirit of ancient god or not he was in a human body with a mind crafted by them; and right now he was thinking like one.

“Who the fuck does she think she is! I am a fragment of the mighty god Anomon! I will collect the pieces and resurrect it. Then I will assimilate him all the same and will become the broken god himself. It is my destiny, my purpose and I won’t let some had tell me otherwise!”

He was speaking of Lucy of course. She had told him to stop with his little game of puzzle building for now. He understood the dangers of the veil, that is why he had called her, but didn’t expect this outcome. It frustrated him that he was no closer to the piece than ever but couldn’t do anything about it. To calm down he did the one thing many people do to escape their troubles, fantasize about something better.

Coalescence was fantasizing of his goal; he imagine gathering all the pieces and becoming one with the broken gone. The final piece, the key of it all, the sword of anomon in his hand as he wielded it’s power. Maybe he would find a better body than plague’s by then or maybe not; this one had proven quite resourceful and finding someone else who was both powerful but naive enough was going to be though. At that his mind wandered to another thing he would need: the spirit who would channel the sword’s power.

In assimilating the sword of the void, the sword of anomon would inherit the property of requiring a spirit to channel its power. This spirit would be subservient to the will of it’s wielder who in this case was the sword itself in the body of it’s chosen mortal. But what spirit? A divine spirit? Nah, he could just create those at will if they were needed. A spirit of harvest? While that would compliment the sword quite well the story of Victor and Roxanne made that a no go. Wait, Roxanne… she was the current spirit of the void. Why not keep her?

As said before, Coalescence had the qualities of a human and as such craved many of the things they did; one of those things was companionship. What good was to rule over an empire when you had no-one to share it with? Most spirits he could use are just too different from himself to be anything but a tool. Roxanne was different though; she had been human once and had the same ambitions as he did. Better yet, he didn’t have to do anything but make sure she stayed in the sword until he was allowed to assimilate it. Yes, he could picture it. Bio-Weapon Anomon the Plague Bringer and Spirit of Anomon Roxanne Luna. He could work on the titles later, he had a literal lifetime to do so. For now he was looking forward to that talk with Roxanne Lucy told him to have.

26
Rec Room / Re: CDDA: Adventures in Cataclysm
« on: May 16, 2018, 03:58:02 pm »
Roxanne grinned at both the display of skill and power Hector was giving and the energizing feeling after each downed spirit. The one she took down gave her a hint or it; the first one Hector took down energized her and finally the final one satiated her fully. This energy was hers to use as she would like; the sword might have it stored but both it and she knew who was really in charge. The misling girl looked down in awe as Hector did his handy work not taking her gaze for a moment. When the knight approached and asked his question she simply nodded slowly.

“I think you killed whatever fear she might’ve had to Hector. Good job!”, Roxanne said in excitement. “We should head back to my room and finish the reactor; I have enough essence for it.” Roxanne’s thoughts were interrupted by the little girl tugging at her dress. She looked down to find her with a pleading look.

“I wanna go home… I am sorry I ran away…”

Roxanne gave a sympathetic smile; the only thing she knew to do in this situation. She wasn’t used to dealing with children at all and as such looked at Hector to see if he might know. Then an idea came to mind; Roxanne lowered herself to look at her face to face.

“Ran away? From the center I assume?” The little girl nodded timidly. “That is a bit far from here. Tell you what. Lets go back to the farm and find someone to take you there. I sorta have to do something else right now so sorry about that...”

“It’s ok… it’s my fault anyways. But, can we maybe play again sometime?”

This though made Roxanne chuckle a bit. Play? This was this girls idea of playing? She looked at Hector and smiled playfully then looked back at the little girl. “Sure thing. I’ll make sure to visit you sometime and I am sure Hector will do the same. Maybe we might do so together. Does that sound good?”

“Yes! That sounds great!”

“Good. Let’s go back to the farm for now.”

“You mean Walkerville?”

“Walkerville?”

“People at the center have started to call that to the farm. In honor of Miss Walker herself. You know, Catnip.”

Roxanne knew nothing of this but still nodded in agreement. “Alright. Let’s go back to Walkerville then.”

Once they reach the farm the girl tugged on Roxanne’s dress again and pointed to a misling man standing around smoking a cigarette. Roxanne knew what she meant and simply nodded. The misling girl ran for the man who looked toward them and then shook his head playfully; he then addressed the girl and riffle her hair. They both of them said something neither Roxanne or Hector could hear but noticed the man looking directly to them. He then smiled and gave a gesture of gratitude and acknowledgement before he and the girl went towards the path to the center.

“Well, that takes care of that. Let’s go finish what we started tin can.”, Roxanne told Hector before guiding him back to her room. Once inside, Roxanne closed the door and took out the book and note again; she told Hector to stay back a bit just in case. With everything now in the altar, she got to work.

The sword was laid across the altar when Roxanne took the bowl with the crystal and odd power. She poured the contents of the bowl and everything went inside of it as if it were a drain despite no entrances visible in the sword; the crystal was the last thing to go but it went inside just as easy as the power. Once that was done, Roxanne touched the sword by the handle and it started to glow. This caused Roxanne to scream slightly and fall to her knees as she let go of the swords handle and it stopped glowing.

Hector rushed to see if Roxanne was ok and placed a hand on Roxanne’s shoulder; her reaction was to place her own hand on his own and squeeze tightly. “I can feel your hand Hector… I can feel your warmth…” Slowly she stood up and looked at him with a smile before pulling him in for a hug. “I missed this so much… I missed your touch...”



Victor wasn’t sure how to properly react to this. Between what Roxanne did earlier, the flesh weapons, the supposed embodiment of acasuality and now a slime girl this day had been quite the sober awaking to what he assumed was his life before amnesia. He gave a little smirk at Illiana’s reaction to the smile girls responses; it made her seems like she was one of them, just another person, rather than some abstract concept.

Then came the knock on the door. Victor dreaded it a bit not knowing if yet another eccentric thing would come in. To his surprise and relief it appeared to be just a young girl; he didn’t recognize her but her aura was not out of the ordinary. Then Illiana’s comment was heard and it both confused and amused him. He chuckled a bit at the clarification and Alice’s expression.

Finally Helen showed up and he lit up upon seeing her; memories of her had come back to him and he wanted to share it. However the bandaged arm triggered a sense of worry. Whatever he had in mind was substituted by the need to confirm she was alright.

“Are you sure you are ok? Seems like you had quite the encounter…”, Victor said as Helen approched him.



Melody assisted as best she could in the examination of Cardin despite her state by translating as best she could. Still, she didn’t understand the question herself and then she gave up when it was obvious it was going nowhere. She didn’t know what she had drank so she didn’t know if ‘thunderbolt’ was stronger or not.

“What’s thunderbolt? I drank the first bottle I grabbed… that was probably a mistake in hindsight…” She shrugged and out of nowhere reached for her slung rifle. The bolt pulled open and the magazine ejected as it fell in the ground. “Can someone pick that up for me please? Thanks…” The sound of the bolt opening didn’t sound right to melody and so she closed it and opened it again a few times until she frowned.

“My baby is dirty… and I don’t have the tools to clean here… anyone can hel- *hic* help with that?”

27
Rec Room / Re: CDDA: Adventures in Cataclysm
« on: May 13, 2018, 08:58:10 pm »
As soon as Hector took hold of the sword of the void Roxanne gave him permission to call upon it’s power. Now, the word permission here is used loosely; it was more akin to Hector being placed in a whitelist to wield the sword’s power. Only the sword of the void could do this as the whatever spirit was trapped in it had complete control of the sword and in turn the chosen wilder had control over said spirit. Had Victor not lost his memories he would still technically be Roxanne’s owner but now the race was on to find someone else actually worthy of that title, at least in Roxanne’s eyes.

Hector would no doubt feel the rage and bloodlust the sword instilled in him; however, the spirit in charge was not malevolent so his clarity of mind was still there. While Hector began his charge, two of the spirits charged at him as well; each deployed 3 long claws on each arm like appendage and raked in Hector’s direction once the three met. The third ghost lingered behind a bit and then circled the commotion towards Roxanne. Then it too deployed it’s claws and charged at Roxanne.

“Stay back… it’s fine, we can handle this…”, Roxanne told the misling girl softly as she now cowered behind Roxanne. She then charged at that spirit as well and caught one of the clawed hands when the two meet. The spirit let out a screech and looked at Roxanne with it’s golden eye right into Roxanne’s own two now purple eyes. “Do you know who I am? I am the spirit of the void… one fourth of the broken god… Did you really think you can get rid of me? Dream on!”

A purple aura surrounded Roxanne and then the spirit as Hector took care of the other two. The spirit let out a haunting wail as it started to phase out like a flashlight running out of battery. When it fully disappeared, so did the purple aura around Roxanne and her eyes returned to their normal black color. She then check on the milsing girl who was still standing there both scared and with admiration. Roxanne gave her a wink and turned around to Hector.

“Need any help or do you go this sweety? One hit should be enough! You can do this; show them why they shouldn't have messed with the Iron Marshal!”



Victor gives a nod of acknowledgement to Solomon. The way Illiana was going on about was rather eccentric but she still carried a dignified aura around her and he could respect that.

“I she did, then she must have the patience of a saint...but given the stories of what I have done before my little amnesia… I got to say she definitely has.”

It was then he noticed that the stomping around from Illiana wasn’t just a random act and that it had served a purpose. The slime coming from the edges and corners of the room a bit cornering but not alarming given a what he had seen just today. Once it coalesced into the shape of a girl with a knife stuck in her stomach, Victor facepalmed a bit.

“So this is the type of stuff we deal in a regular basis? Alright? What is your name miss? A-and how long have you been there?”



Melody took the pills given and drank the entire cup of water. She then faced the man talking and heard his questioning. “No, none of that! Nothing hurt before. I was in a dark room, an old man came in and beat me with a stick, he then looked at me in the eyes and I fainted. When I woke I could’nt see anything and a friend put a scarf- *hic* a a scarf on my face. Now I have this blindfold and we are here! So yeah, that helps?”

The sudden line of questions from dervish made Melody nod and then frantically shake her head in no specific direction. “Yes, no! Uhhh, b-both? I don’t knooooow! Well… he speak in these cute bird noises but no one seems to understand him but me. I can’t explain it but I just do… And no! We are not a c-couple, we just met too…” The sudden confusion and slight embarrassment sobered Melody up a bit but not by much given her intolerance of alcohol and the drink she choose to indulged in.

“Oh, and he is saying he can’t take the pills by himself… S-some one help him. I would myself but I might hurt him if I miss… Melody is drunk! Woooo!”



Plague had gathered some material and was currently down stairs walking towards the main door. He was wearing his mask so his expression and mood was a mystery to all but the undead he had under his control. As he walked he was approached by Christina.

“Plague? Hey! Where are you going?”

“I am going for a walk. I need to clear my mind and do a few things.”

“Oh? Something is wrong? Do you want to talk about it? Everyone else is with Miss Morningstar and we are sharing stories. Want to join?”

“I’ll pass. Have fun all of you; don’t let that woman dig into your brain to much though. She has a silver tongue. Has she told you what she is yet?”

“No, not yet. She was about to but I ran for something real quick and told her to wait for me.”

“I see, well, have an open mind about it I guess… Anyways, I will be seeing you some time later on. If anything happens the zeds will let me know so don’t worry on that department.”

Christina nodded and excused herself as she returned to the table where everyone else was gathered. He in turned continued his path to the main door and then exited the building as he went on his walk.

28
Rec Room / Re: CDDA: Adventures in Cataclysm
« on: May 10, 2018, 10:37:47 pm »
The misling girl did not notice when she reached the farm, she did not notice when she ran into its property, and for a moment did not notice the man clad in armor asking her what was wrong. All that had been in her mind was to run and did she run alright. The man in the armor was besides a woman wearing a black dress; she was in a complete panic and while finally staring at Hector she did not speak.

Roxanne joined Hector’s side and gave the girl a sympathetic look. “It’s ok, whatever it is you are running from can’t hurt you here. He is Hector Lowe, the center’s marshall and I am Roxanne Luna if those names mean anything to you; tell us, what happened to you? We will take care of it so relax ok?”

It took a few moments but the girl finally did calm down. Her breathing was still frantic but now she was at least willing to speak. “G-ghosts!”

“What was that? Ghosts?”, Roxanne asked a bit confused.

“Yes… by the path, three ghosts. The told me it hurt, then they screamed, I scream and then I ran. What’s going on?!”

A little smirk formed on Roxanne’s face upon hearing this. “Are you sure they are ghosts?” She wasn’t too sure she could trust this girl but whatever it was she saw would most likely be something that would yield at least some essence.

“I-I think so...I didn’t look at them so much… My teachers had told me they weren’t real but… You guys believe me right?” The girl said this pleadingly and looked at the too for confirmation.

Roxanne gave a little nod and ruffled her hair. “I do. I believe you 100%. And you know what? We will take care of them for you. I don’t like seeing such a pretty thing like you cry.”

The girl’s face went from sour to hopeful and enthusiastic. “Will you really?!”

Another series of nods from Roxanne and then a smile. “Of course! I might not look like it but I know a thing or two about ghosts. And the knight her would be happy to help a girl in distress, wouldn’t you tin can?”

The girl wiped her tears and then laughed a little at Roxanne’s comment. “Like a can of sardines!”

Roxanne joined in her laughter. “Exactly like that! I like you… Anyways, where are this ghosts?”

“Right! Follow me!” The girl started to run towards the scene with glee and excitement common with kids of that age. Roxanne rolled her eyes and ran as well to keep up.

“Hope that armor isn’t to heavy for ya!”, Roxanne yelled back at Hector to tease him a little more.

The run didn’t take to long and suffice to say a few heads were turned at the sight or Roxanne and Hector running towards the woods. Once there the little girl stopped and hid behind Hector. “T-there they are…”

Roxanne looked towards where the ghosts were. Well, she was right in a sense, these were Anomalic spirits; their signature goldeneye was a giveaway. Not too dangerous but their existence was an omen. They were still circling the camp that was about 30 yards from them across the wooden railing. Roxanne stood next to Hector and explained the situation.

“She is right, those are spirits. They are known as Anomalic spirits. As their name suggests their existence is an anomaly. They come come about when something in reality is quite right and it begins to re-adjusts; when this happens sometimes consciousness comes about and take the form of those things. They were seen as omens in the olden days because their sight was often followed by bad happening. However, they are not the cause but a symptom… But you wanna know what the best part is? They are essanse piñatas. Killing all three should give me what I need and it might help stop spreading whatever is going on…”

Roxanne looked a bit more carefully at them; they didn’t seem to be paying attention to the three at all this time. “I was told there was a distortion happening...might be tied to this whole veil thing...going to have to read some more later…killing them might help alleviate some pressure in the phaneron...whatever that means...god, why did Victor have to be so cryptic...Anyways, they are quite unstable so your sword might do the trick here...however, if it doesn’t...the safer way is to use the sword of the void here since it can harvest them and we can get that sweet essence.”

She paused again as if hesitating to mention the rest. “However...we would need to activate it… as is it is just another sword… I could go and do it but those things deal spiritual attacks...the one thing that can harm me… their attacks against the living aren’t too powerful, nothing your shield can’t handle… so, what is it gonna be? How do you wanna play this?”

While they were discussing this, the spirits slowly turned around and looked at the three. Their golden eyes each focusing on one individual. The girl gave a little squeak and tugged on Roxanne and Hector. “T-they are looking at us…”

The three spirits then spoke at once. “A human, a transcendental and a cursed spirit… What an unusual sight… How are the two biological ones holding up to you sister? Being around you cannot be healthy to them, your kind spreads misfortune wherever it goes like radiation… I bet it was your doing that is causing our pain… if we get rid of you maybe we can rest… we share kinship to you sister, neither of us belongs in this world…”

Roxanne pause for a second simply staring at the three spirits. She didn’t like what they were saying, she didn’t like it one bit… “Hector...they are getting a bit too aggressive for my taste...so what is it going to be? I don’t think we have much time...



Victor looked on to Illiana and they way she was behaving. He was both impressed and a bit put off by it but he assumed that was the intent so thought nothing of it beyond that. Her warning on the items he held was interesting. Dangerous to the use, attracting unwanted attention… That would explain what he was feeling  when he used them… He was glad Solomon offered a place to store them. With a little nod as a response he walked towards the spot and placed the weapons inside.

“Dangerous to the user huh? I don’t think it’s safe for anyone to handle them… Glad they are somewhere secured for now, I’ll talk to Helen when she gets back.”

It wasn’t long before Illiana took the stage again. Victor listened on but was confused in certain bits; he wasn’t sure if it was his gaps in memory or just the subject matters she brought up. Then she started talking about something else he didn’t understand. Delta’s maid? What? The jumping around seemed a bit concerning.

“Easy there… you might hurt yourself more if you do that…”, Victor said as he reached over to calm her down not aware of what she was trying to do.



Melody stood around in bewilderment as the new people spoke. It wasn’t until they handed her the pills that she snapped out of it. “Stop drinking? But it’s fun… what do this things do? I was told by people not to accept drugs from strangers…” Despite saying this, her programming to obey authority kicked in her drunken state and subconsciously consumed the pills.

“A check up? T-that would be great! Can I have them take a look at my eyes? I went blind yesterday and it sucks! Maybe get me some more pills or something... owie...my head hurts…”

The fluff from Cardin semi-smacking her woke her up a little and she reached to hug the wing before it was pulled aways and she felled forwards just barely missing the vomit on the floor. She quickly got up and acted normal, as normal as a drunk could, to save face.

“I-it’s fine Cardin… you are fine, we are fine. Let’s go with these nice people over for a little adventure…”



“Luna huh? Wonder where she got that from… Back when I knew her she went by Blackmore.”, Rey said in a curious tone”,  Anyways, that’s irrelevant now. I will refer to as Luna now to avoid confusion. So I guess I will start from the beginning… Are you aware of an event known as the convergence?”

Lucy nodded at the question. “Of course, though some might know it as the shifting; Roxanne Luna does anyways…”

“Well, I come from the world that merged with this one and I hear Luna did as well; her counterpart still going by Blackmore and died twice as well. That girl surely gets around...”

A small chuckle was let out by Lucy. “You have no clue… She did find a partner but seems to refuse to settle down.”

“A a partner? Really now… Never saw her as the type? Who might be the lucky gal?”

The last statement provoked a Lucy to choke on her drink for briefly from sudden laugher. “Sorry? Gal? She has a boyfriend you know...”

“What? A boyfriend? I always assumed she swung for the other team…”

“You really are blind aren’t you? Humans can be so amusing sometimes…”

“Blind? What do you mean?”, asked Rey in confusion.”

“You were Luna’s first love interest. That is why she spared you… And here you go thinking she was a lesbian… Where do I even begin with that?”

Rey looked even more puzzled now; he tilted his head briefly. “She what now? That would explain some stuff… Huh...interesting?” He spent something seemingly lost in thought until Lucy snapped her fingers to make him come to his senses.

“Hello? You were telling me a story. One I already know but am trying to make a point…”

“Oh, right right, sorry. Where was I? Yes, she and I come from another reality via conveyance. Back in our world, things were a bit different. We both were part of the organization known as Shadows of Arcana under the title of ‘Cleansers’; glorified assassins really with the promise of graduation to the rank of Hunter and introduction to the arcane.”

“The two of us met early on after we both took on the same freelance target; The organisation let us take hit jobs from the private sector as a way to earn extra cash and keep their sponsors happy. From there we learned about each other and bonded as co-workers if you will. The life of a hired gun is a lonely one so you cling to the friends you know and trust; we could trust each other since if one ratted the other then they could do the same.”

“To make this part short, we became friends outside of the job too. But professionally I took her under my wing; a mentor of sorts. You see, I was offered bionic augmentations but refused; my skill set was enough. Roxanne lack said skill set and relied on her bionics way too much. As my friend I sought to correct that; kind of morbid if you think about it… ‘You are my friend so let me show you how to commit serial murder easier.’ Anyways, that went on for a while until...until I was offered the rank of Hunter…”

Lucy was sitting with her legs crossed now and the cup of wine in one hand as she swirled the liquid on it. A smirk visible on her face but not once did he interrupt until now. “You learned about the arcane way too early didn’t you? At least SoA arcana thought so. Tell me, how did that go?”

“It started off as a fairly regular day; Roxanne and I met up to have a few drinks on the club we frequented to before we laundered our money there. Then I got an alert on my phone. I was to report immediately to a very specific location; a warehouse if I recall after all these years. I parted ways with Roxanne and went to check it out a bit worried on the back of my head…”

“Thing was, SoA used the assassins they recruited as grunts to do their dirty work; that was the main reason they didn’t trust us with the arcane. We were not trusted enough; only their hunters and above could dabble… So I went to the warehouse where a couple people identified as SoA recruiters were waiting. To summarize I was offered the rank of Hunter...no, not offered now that I looked back…”

Lucy’s smirk turned into a wide smile as she heard him tell the story; the human touch to it was amusing to her. “And why was that? What do you mean it wasn’t an offer?”

“I had been dabbling in the arcane on my own accord in secret. No one was supposed to know yet higher ups in SoA found out anyways… Don’t let anyone tell you SoA didn’t have a hierarchy; it didn’t officially but give someone a fancy title and they will start acting as if there was...and people will listen… Anyways, I was told I had a chance to redeem myself; to accept bionic augmentation, the rank of hunter and they would relocate me. All would be forgotten as I proved useful elsewhere. It was a tempting offer…”

The pose of Lucy changed; she sat straight and leaned in a bit as if to hear his words louder. “And why didn’t you accept?”

“One reason really, I woke up. I realized SoA sought to control me. If they had the power to seek me out and then find out my actions what was stopping them from doing it again? What was stopping them from doing worse? Here they were giving me an ultimatum, accept their terms or else. I didn’t want any of that; I wasn’t going to become the puppet of anyone. So I refused. They let me go, sure...but not for long.”

“When you do something SoA does not approve of, they label you as impure. It was their way to make their devote members see us as evil; it felt like religious doctrine and for some it was. My actions qualified their criteria for ‘impurity’ and they needed to get rid of me. Now, they can’t have their hunters do it; nooooo, they are too busy to deal with low scum like us. It was up to an assassin to do it...and guess who was the one chosen for the job?”

Lucy’s expression and tone became serious for a moment. “Luna. It was her wasn’t it?”

“She was… I only saw her once after I saw my name in the list of targets. I hid in some abandoned house to make my next move as a fugitive of an organization that held no authority… Somehow she found me; she told me she was her to finish the job. I told her I understood but I wasn’t going down without a fight. But she said no.”

“Roxanne said she would finish the job but not on that day. She would give me a headstart out of respect for our history and I was desperate enough to take it. There was a couple of conditions; first, I was to explain to her why. I did, spared no detail as there was no need to. The second one was a promise. She made me promise to stay alive; she told me I was not allowed to die but by her own hands. I accepted and we parted ways for the final time. I have kept my promise so far and it seems she is close to finally catching up to me…”

Lucy gave a nod of understanding and filled her own glass of wine again; rey hadn't touch his save for a couple sips but she refilled it anyways. “Aren’t you afraid? What if she does indeed finish the job?”

Rey scoffed the idea with amusement. “I would like to see her try. I have abandoned my humanity in my years of running away and transcended. My skills in the arcane have been honed through need and use. I doubt she could take me. And if she indeed does...well, then I guess I would be proud that she too has found the power we both once craved.”

“Then why do you want to me her so badly? Well, badly enough for you and your friend Christina to send her a message. That part I don’t understand.”, Lucy stated and asked.

“Well, it would be the end of a chapter. Roxanne is the last ties to SoA I have left. The nephilim are gone, one of the founders of SoA has joined me so Roxanne is the only one left. Whatever happens once we meet is up to fate but one way or another it will be the end of something…”

Lucy simply stared at him not quite satisfied with his answer. “And what will you do once you do meet her?”

“I will finish the job myself… By any means necessary…”

29
Rec Room / Re: CDDA: Adventures in Cataclysm
« on: May 07, 2018, 08:42:06 pm »
Roxanne noded almost stoically at his choice; she was almost certain that would’ve been his answer but wanted to put all the cards on the table anyways. Indeed, it seemed the two would have to gather some essence. What did take her by surprise was Hector producing the jar with blood essence. While not exactly what she needed, it would prove useful in powering the sword for a bit longer without affecting her while the reactor was made. She eagerly accepted the vial and started to load it into the sword as Hector spoke. It was quite the process for anyone who hadn’t witness it; the red power was poured into a very specific part of the handle and it seemed to drain inside as if there was a funnel. Once all of it had been poured, the sword gave a slight red glow before settling back to normal.

“Thank you! This should buy us some time! And also thank you for helping me… I know I’ve haven’t been the best person lately… I hope I can fix that...” She then paused for a moment and recalled a very specific thing while she was dreaming in the mall; something the voice had told her which caused her to smile slightly. “Well, it seems I know where we can find some creature. Long story short, there is a slight disturbance going on among spirits. Being one, I can feel it too… Don’t worry, nothing serious, more like a slight discomfort. Now, this should rile up other spirits as well; maybe we can find some of them causing havoc? I think we should talk to people here and find out if anything strange is going on.”

She grabbed her sword and looked around for a moment as if looking for something and then shrugged. “Gossip spread really quickly now. I doubt anything that happens would go unnoticed… that can be easier to keep tabs on someone you know? That can be both good and bad; though I should let you know. For now let’s go out and talk to some folk huh?”



The storm had finally cleared but the center still didn’t let her go out. It was so boring inside and so were all of her peers. She missed miguel the most but at least this place had clean water and food; best still, she didn’t have to work herself to sleep for it. Still, he wanted to explore this place, wanted to see all that it had to offer. The older kids were allowed to visit the farm and help around; she wasn’t allowed for being “too young”. Bah, she was going to turn 10 in a couple months! Whatever, if they weren’t going to allow her to go, she would go by herself!

It wasn’t so hard to slip away; there were so many misling, children and adult alike, that it was easy to just walk around outside of the room when one of the doors was opened and then walk down the halls. From there she just followed anyone who looked like they didn’t quite belong until she was led to the main entrance. Then it was just a matter of tagging along with some people exiting and the guard was none the wiser.

“Yes! Freedom! Now, where to go…” The girl took out a chocolate bar from her light jacket and took a bite eyeing the landscape. “They said there was a path in the woods… in that direction? Yes, that one!” With her destination settled, the misling girl turned around and marched triumphantly towards it. It was a long walk but she was quite energetic and the excitement of disobeying the adult feed that even more. Eventually she made it to the makeshift path on the woods to connect the center and the farm; or as she had heard it referred to “Walkerville”.

The path was wide and some makeshift wooden fences had been placed along either side to prevent wildlife or the undead to cross when transports were being made. Still, she wondered why it was so wide when the cars weren’t that big. Regardless, the journey continued. It went rather uneventful until about midway through.

The fur on her back stood up and she paused when a feeling of fear and of being watched came over her. She turned around to her left and found what looked like an abandoned makeshift camp. The fact that someone was campting so close to two settlements didn’t cross this girls young mind and what she saw there made it even more unlikely to register. Standing there what appeared to be three white shadows. They circled the place as she stared until the eventually noticed. Then they slowly turned to face her; where the face should be a single yellow orb was in its place. The voiced then started.

“The headache...make it go away...please...make it go away...is it you? Are you doing this? Are you?! HOW DARE YOU! GO!”

The three white shadows then disappeared but a strong gust of wind picked up towards her causing her to scream and run the rest of the path towards the farm.



Victor stood there in his confusion as Solomon examined her after him. She didn’t appeared to be injured at least. What she had said was swirling in his mind. Deus Ex Machine? The concept? Did that mean she was tied to acausality rather than causality? Or maybe even not tied at all. He did indeed have more question but Illiana shut down his first.

“Right… I guess you can keep the clothing for now if you say you don’t have anything else. You will have to deal with Helen once she get her. And you say you can’t answer that… I would like to ask more questions but you seem in pain… If there anything a being like yourself would need from us? Apart from vanilla icecream…”

It was then that the sword and rifle he had slung started to shake a bit; it did so slightly but enough to be felt. Victor reach to touch the rifle and it felt odd; it felt like a cat purring. This was rather disturbing to him as it seemed this things were actually alive and they were reacting to something.

“Ok...I can’t wait for Helen to get here to talk what to do about this things...unless anyone here can make heads or tails of them… Because I don’t..”



Melody was sitting down taking in how the world changed around her; she found hw everything was meshing and modeling together. Her movements added to this causing the whole thing to become a kaleidoscope. She wondered what would happened if she took her blindfold off right now… That thought was interrupted by the sudden appearance of another person; or at least Melody assumed it was another personed. She felt judged and for a moment she was about to ask them why the hell they were looking them like that despite the fact she wasn’t even sure that they were but that person had gone and left. With a shrug Melody was about to do the oh so smart idea of taking another swig but was interrupted by Cardin.

“Wha? What you mean sick? You are going to wh- No no, turn around! Don’t get it on me!”

Too late, Melody could feel the warm vile in her feet protected by a simple pair off boot..

“Ewwwwwwww, I told you to turn around… Why di- New person?”

Melody’s drunk attention shifted to what looked like more people approaching. She waved in their general direction and then held the bottle up.

“Hello! Do you guys want some! It makes you feel awesome!” She then took another swig and then stood there for a moment before throwing up herself. “Ok...ok...maybe I need to sit down or something...Cardin...dear, are you alright?”



Rey was still in the armory and supply room looking at the collection of weapons looted from the nearby town. The collection consisted of popular civilian grade rifles, shotguns and pistols. A few military rifles an launcher here and there but not enough ammo to feed those for prolong use unlike their civilian counterparts. In the melee department there was hardly anything. Makeshift weapons and antiques were put with tools that were now passed as weapons such as machetes and crowbars. Thankfully the undead that needed to be armed already were so and he along with Christina were allowed to keep their weapons.

He smirk a bit at their weapons of choice. For her a damn yoyo… yes it was made out of superalloy, was conductive via bionic power and had deployable blades but it was still a damn yoyo. He choose a scythe; a highly decorated at that. The power of the aura of harvest had been implanted on it using a sword of the void as it’s blueprint. However, these two weapons were for show, if things got serious then they had backups.

Christina had two laser pistols that she had become quite the gunslinger with; she could shot down then targets in about one and a half seconds. It helped that she didn’t have to reload for taking down large numbers of targets. If that failed, she had in her a CQB Bionic, the same one Roxanne had as well, so with the flip of switch in her BUI Christina was proficient with hand-to-hand and any improvised weapon.

Rey would ditch his scythe go unarmed. You would know he was serious when said scythe would seems to burn into ashes. Then a simple brawling stance would be assumed by him. Rey would not attack first; his style was always reactionary and adaptive. An attacker would go after him only for Rey to also seem to vanish into smoke and ash. The opponent would then be utterly confused for but a second before they felt an agonizing heat consume them and from it Rey would emerge with scythe in hand.

Despite all of this, he did like and study the weaponry humanity had and still used; he felt it signified the times and a bit of character would be imbued in them. Every single weapon here was once owned by someone who for one reason or another saw fit to wield them. Oh the stories they could tell if the could talk…

“Rey Steller… the arcane assassin, you got a minute?”

He turned around and looked at who was talking to him. A woman in business casual attire was leaning on the door frame looking at him. Rey didn’t recognize her but didn’t feel any ill-will.

“And who is asking?”

“My name is Lucifer Morningstar, you can call me Lucy for short. Nice to meet you.” Lucy approached him and extended her hand to offer a handshake.

Rey smirked and shook her hand. “You do realize those two mean the same thing right? Choose your name yourself?”

“Yes and no. It’s a complicated story…”

“I bet it is… so, you are this Lucy woman who both Plague and Clara have been talking about you. Tell me, what makes you so special?”

Lucy have a hardy laugh at how nonchalantly she was being addressed. It was rather refreshing to be treated as one of their own rather than having the ground she walked worshiped like many before had. “Yes I am. Now, I am sure you have many questions about who I am and what not. Tell you what, answer some of your own and I will tell you everything you need to know...sound like a deal?”

“Sounds fair to me. Why don’t we take a seat and talk a little?”

“Lead the way then.”

Rey showed Lucy to the waiting area nearby. A round table with six chair was there to which the two took a seat across from each other. Lucy manifested a bottle of wine from out of nowhere.

“Want some?”, she asked.

Rey smiled but shook his head. “I can’t indulge in that. Haven’t been able for a long time.”


“Don’t worry. This is spirit wine, should get even the most incorporeal of beings at least a buzz. I like it since it targets my soul…”

He wasn’t quite sure what she meant or what accepting entailed but being rude was not an option right now. With hidden hesitation he nodded in acceptance of the offer. Lucy nodded back and two glass cup appeared; she went ahead and filled both and handed one to Rey. He looked at his for a moment and took a sip skeptical...he could taste it...

“It’s to your liking I hope? Anyway… about those questions…”

“What do you want to know?”

“Tell me, what is you relationship with Roxanne Luna?”

Rey chuckled and took another sip of his wine. “Oh boy… Something tells me you already know and just want to hear it from me. Is that correct?”

“Perhaps… Care to entertain a lady?”

“As long as you keep your end of the bargain… relax, it’s gonna be a long story…”

30
Rec Room / Re: CDDA: Adventures in Cataclysm
« on: May 05, 2018, 02:42:39 pm »
A little nod of understanding was Roxanne’s reaction to Hector. She turned towards the altar and kneeled to access her secret stash on the floor under the altar. A smile forms as she looks back and up to Hector. “You saw nothing ok? A lady needs a place to store her stuff...” This is followed by a wink before she went back to retrieve her material. “I am glad you been reading on it then; should come in handy.”

Eventually everything she needed was on the altar; after closing the hatch she stands up and signals Hector to come closer. On the altar were what looked like a bowl with some odd dust looking thing and a crystal in the middle of it, a book opened to a page on how essance worked and a handwritten note. Roxanne cleared her throat and began to explain.

“Right, so what you are seeing here is a side project of mine. To be honest, I am working on limited knowledge and resources...it literally came to me in a dream when we were at the mall… Anyways, I am not sure how much you know about Randael but he was very fond of using what is dubbed ‘life shards’. The are pure arcane energy codenced by harvesting a human soul… I know, very morbid… Melody used them to fight us back when… sorry, going off track again…”

“Now, this note here is from Victor; it is a theory on what would happen if you got five of this shards together. Creating a soul shard is has an efficiency of 20% meaning the other 80% is wasted… but if you combine five then you would have the power of an entire soul… Why would I want that? Well, the sword I now call home is unstable...every time I call upon its power it eats a little bit of me but when I do I get to feel… like literally feel… I can smell the roses, feel my own skin, taste food again… But I really can’t go letting it corrupt me just for this. However, what if I put a ‘life crystal’, 5 life shards in one, as it’s source of power? Then it could eat that instead… I could call upon its power and feel whole again…”

“I know what you are thinking and no. I am not willing to take the lives of five people just for such a selfish need… Instead another of Victor’s ideas is at play. The note also describes something called ‘prime essence’. I don’t understand how it works but it says here that combining dull, blood and normal essence will yield it… Then I can use that to create an artificial life shard according to this book. It works, I have created one of the five shards so far… Just need the other four. That is where you come in.”

“I have plenty of blood and dull essence, you can guess how, but am lacking in the normal one. There is an easy way to get them so and it involves two ways; though I can guess which one you will want to do. One way is to go out and seek supernatural beings out in the field and slay them. Something something the veil makes it so they drop essence… however there somes to be something fucky with it at the moment. That is where the second option comes in.”

Roxanne hesitated a bit, she knew Hector would not like to hear this but she did tell him she would tell him everything. “I am a supernatural being now you know? My own second death would create essense… I possess a life orb inside of me with two charges left so harvesting me once should be fine… I am not tied to the veil so it should be fine in that respect… So, you have a choice, do you want to help me? And if so what do you want to do?”

For now she kept quiet about the voice. There was no need to say that now; it would come as less of a shock once the reactor was built. Maybe perhaps Hector would trust that it wasn’t all crazy talk. Thing was, she was beginning to not trust in it herself.



“You are not stealing huh? You admitted those are Helen’s clothes; and what kind of question is that? I mean they do good fine but that is not the point... “, Victor responded to the strange woman. She didn’t seem to have any qualms at what she was doing. He didn’t question her more due to something that was distressing him: she was completely invisible to his aura spell. Granted he still did not know how it worked but he did have enough of his memories back to know that it was best to leave her alone for now.

“So you are getting clothing because you lacked any before? I guess that is fair… Wait, how did you know of my memory issues? You say we are strangers Ms. Illiana. So how do you- “ His line of questioning was interrupted by her little display. The clothes seemingly moving on their own and being organised surely impressed Victor who know firmly believe this woman was not to be messed with. Then he heard Illiana’s screeches of pain and saw how she clutched her stomach. He rushed to her seeing if she was ok.

“Are you ok? Are you hurt? Did something go wrong?, Victor asked as he offered to be used as a guide for her to find a seat. “Want me to get you something?”



Melody sat back waiting for her drink to take hold. Having only ever drank alcohol twice in her life, a beer when she was 16 and a cup of wine when under the wing of Randael, she though maybe she needed to drink another swig when nothing seemed to happen. As she did she heard Cardin struggling and calling for her help opening the bottle.

“Come here, let me help you. No? Alright…” Then she felt something happening and started to giggle a bit; for ‘good’ measure she took a third swig while Cardin was still struggling. “Let me hel- oh, you go it. Yeah! Cheers!” She was about to take a fourth swig when the effects finally hit her. The bottle was set down on the floor and then she began to laugh hysterically.

“Holy shit what is going on? Everything moooves… Are you ok?” Despite it just beginning to take effect the drink was so strong for her due to not being used to this that she was already out of it. And it was beginning to mess with her aura spell too.

Now the way it worked was it told her where things were. Imagine a tree was in front of her and instead of seeing it, getting a silhouette or what not the word tree was in its place. She looks down and all over the place words like “ground”, “dirt road” and whatnot littered the landscape. She didn’t really see words but it’s the best way to describe it. Following this analogy, the alcohol was beginning to make her dyslexia and such the words didn’t make much sense. If she concentrated she could make out what they meant but it was still messy.

“Caaaaardin! That’s your name right? Are you seeing this? Well, I am not… Is it pretty? Am I pretty? Another!” Melody takes a fourth swig and then lays back a bit to watch everything unfold.

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NOCTIFER IS A FAGGOT