Vigil: Destiny CallsVigil will call Donovan to his destiny.
There is justice to get bring in this world !
You can hear voices coming from the floor above you. It sounds like someone is at the door. You can hear Bob and Edana talking, as well as one deep and guttural voice you don't recognize...Probably one of the Dragon's Collectors. They are too quiet to make out the words, but it sounds as though Bob is upset about something. Then Edana starts shouting.
"What gives you people the right to barge in here and demand my father's work in the first place? Go back to the pond you crawled out of!"More voices. Then the sound of scraping and the clatter of metalworks being knocked over.
"Unhand me, you fish-smelling bastard!""Let go of her!"
More thumping and the sound of fighting, then a loud
crash. Bob screams out in pain. The unrecognized voice says something else, then the door slams.
More talking, that goes on for quite some time. You recognize Donovan's voice. Then the cellar door opening, and footsteps coming down the stairs.
"Father, you're hurt! What do you plan on doing?""I'm doing what I should have done a long time ago. The Dragon's thugs have gone too far, this time. Your sister was right all along. It's time we strike back and take back what's ours."
"But they outnumber us! And we don't even have any armor or weapons.""That's where you're wrong." He throws open the hidden panel and looks at the you. There is a stain of blood on his side. "This is Vigil, my finest work. I made it years ago, with the blessings of the White Guard. That was back when we were allowed to have our own militia, of course. Back before
this Dragon's Cycle began." He lifts up the chestpiece and starts to fit it over his head. "You might not know this, son, but we're the descendants of the very same family that destroyed the Dragon the
last time he rose, one hundred years before. That means it's our responsibility to...Augh!" He stumbles and drops the chestplate.
"Father, you can't do this! Not in your condition.""I...have to. I thought your sister was going to be the one to do it, but now..."
"I'll do it.""I can't let you do that. You don't have any combat experience!"
"Father, neither do you.""No! If I fail, you have to go on. Someone has to keep the old blood alive."
"Stop." Donovan takes hold of his father's shoulders and pushes him into a chair.
"You're injured. You stay and rest, and I'll take the armor to save Edana. Don't worry about me, I'll be fine.""I..."
Donovan picks up the chestpiece.
"Now, show me how to get this thing on."Spirit Evolution - You may acquire one of the following abilities:
Inspire: You plant new ideas directly into the mind of your wearer.
Encourage: You empower your wearer's spirit and drive them to engage a target. Adds combat bonuses, but less direct control.
Call of Destiny: You create a small compulsion in someone's mind, calling them to your location.
Soul Seeker: You cast your mind adrift, seeking out a person with particular qualities of your choosing.
Bound Form (Armor): Your presence is currently bound to a suit of armor. This increases your influence, but renders you unable to move independently.
Unseen Movement. Prostration pose. Please, have mercy upon me! It was just a prank!
The boy pauses for a moment, then walks over and picks you up. "You're really real, aren't you?" (
+3 +1)
Then he pauses. The constant talking from the tavern downstairs has gone completely silent.
Then, voices from downstairs. It sounds like the boy's mother is talking with someone at the door. Then you hear them coming up the stairs, and suddenly the sound of a girl shouting.
"Let go of me! I swear before the Unbroken Light, I will chop you up and serve you as sashimi!""Is that Bob's daughter?" The boy's mother. "What are you doing with her?"
Then, a terrible, inhumanly guttural voice, like a frog that has learned to speak.
"It is no business of yours. This child has transgressed the Law of the Dragon with her defiance and will be executed in the morning as an example to the rest of your community. Now stand aside, woman. Or we shall take your son as well."You hear the sound of a nearby door opening in the room beside yours, and a sound like a heavy weight being thrown inside. Then the door slams and you hear the sound of a lock turning.
You hear a door open and close downstairs. The boy's mother says something downstairs, and then the talking resumes, though in a more hushed tone. The girl continues shouting and pounding on the door for some time, but nobody seems to notice.
Spirit Evolution - You may acquire one of the following abilities:
Semi-Imaginary Friend: Young children who believe in you see you as a real, live person, and they find nothing strange or alarming about this - you may appear to move and talk to them freely. Others only see a doll.
Mental Voice: For the cost of
1 Red Mana and
1 Blue Mana, you may cause a single person in your vicinity to hear a voice as if it is coming from your location.
Mana: 3 4 1
Joint Lock: When being played with or jostled, you may choose to make particular joints stuck or unstuck to position yourself in a particular way.
Unseen Movement: You may move your puppet body slightly under your own power, but only when not being watched.
Inception: You may plant a simple idea in the mind of a person who looks into your eyes.
Soul Gaze: You can read the thoughts of anyone who looks into your eyes. Works passively, and can be used actively to read more deeply at a cost of 3 blue mana.
Bound Form (Puppet): Your presence is currently bound to a particular puppet. This increases your influence, but renders you unable to move independently.
Soul Bond with the Mother, empower her to work her ass off and earn more money in order to off this damn collector.
There isn't enough time for this, but you gain some mana from the attempt...
+2 +2 +1There is a knock on the door. The boy's mother opens it.
"Dues for the Dragon," he says in a menacing, hissing voice. The Collector is entirely concealed in a drab, hooded cloak. He is wearing gloves, and the hood covers his face in shadow. You cannot make out any features. He smells...wrong. Dry and musty, and walks with an odd, lurching gait.
The mother opens a drawer and takes out a bag of coins, handing them over. The Collector opens it up and pulls them out one at a time, counting them as he goes. When he is done, he looks up.
"You are six silver pieces short.""No! I counted them. Fifty-two silver pieces."
"The tax has been raised. My master is building his army and requires more resources. Fifty-eight silver pieces is the new total.""But...but that's everything I have! Surely the Dragon would overlook such as small amount. Please, I..."
"This is the Law. The monthly gold, or the price in blood. Where is your husband?""He's dead. He was killed this week. Please. I'll get the money next month."
The Collector pauses for a few seconds.
"No. My master requires resources. I shall take the boy.""No! Please, you can't! I'll go instead!"
"This is the Law. The monthly gold, or the price in blood. You will come with me, child." He draws a large sack from behind his back, and begins to lurch forward.
"Desmond. Please."
The Collector flinches, but does not stop.
"I am sorry, Lara."Nix:
HP: 30/30
John: (Paralyzed with fear!)
HP: 30/30
Lara: (Paralyzed with fear!)
HP: 45/45
The Collector:
HP: 60/60
Mana: 8 5 4
Corporeal Form: A medium-sized dog. You have all of the natural abilities of a regular dog.
Power: 40
Defense: 30
Agility: 40
Comforting Aura: Your presence brings a sense of safety, instilling confidence in believers.
Soul Bond: You spiritually empower to a believer, enhancing their senses and physical abilities.
ahhhh heck I'll sneak into the camp, hope I don't die. After I'm in, try and figure out if they're hostile to all spirits or only malignant ones
You enter the camp. There are a few guards wandering about, but none of them are able to see you. You feel as though the ones in blue might be able to sense your presence, so you avoid being seen by them.
You stop outside a tent, where two guards are talking.
"Look, the fact is that when you get right down to it, everything comes down to Power. Knowledge is only worthwhile because it gives you power. Kindness lets you make allies if you're too weak and stupid to survive on your own, which gives the group more power. Neither of the other two forces has any value by itself, but enough raw Power can still destroy any opposition. All this talk of 'balance' is a load of dog turds made up by weak people so they don't feel bad.""Well, sure, if you think that life is a competition.""Life is a competition. Why do men fight? Why do men work? Money and women. That's what it all comes down to in the end. Anyone who says otherwise is just buying into the lies.""Okay, let's say, hypothetically, you had all of the power. You can do anything, take anything, destroy anything. What would you do then?""Well, take everything I wanted, obviously.""And then what?""Don't try to confuse this with philosophical rambling. Nobody ever has all of the power in the world so your silly hypothetical has no bearing on reality.""Maybe not in the cosmic sense, but there are certainly leaders who - wait.""What?""Something tripped my ward. There's a low-level presence next to the tent.""You put up a personal ward? I thought we had perimeter guards for that.""Obviously not enough. It's probably just a wisp. I'll go check."Knowledge influx: These particular guards are not an immediate threat.
Calming Aura: Your presence creates a powerful sense of calm, reducing the likelihood of conflict in your presence.
Wood Shift: You may move roots and tree branches as if they are being manipulated by invisible hands. Only works on living wood still attached to a tree.
Danger Sense: You passively gain a bit of knowledge about the future as it pertains to danger.
Tree Affinity: Your influence increases among trees, but decreases away from trees.
Nymphwalk: You can separate from your home tree and move around, but your influence diminishes as you move away from your home tree.
Scout the peripheries of the camp. Try to locate where my chicken brethren are .
You listen carefully to the noises of the night, and soon pick out the faint sound of clucking coming from inside the camp. You follow the noise into the camp.
A pair of guards spots you from a fair distance away. But since you're a chicken and it's too dark to make out any details beyond that, they don't seem to care that much. You hear them say something, but you can't make out the words.
It doesn't take you very long to find where the chickens are being kept. They are still fairly close to the boundary, stuffed together in a rather cramped wire cage. It seems they are being held as rations for the soldiers.
The cage is unguarded, but without hands, you don't think you can open it...
Poultrygeist:
HP: 15/15
Chickens: 1
Mana: 4 0 3
Corporeal Form: A large, bloody chicken. You have all of the natural abilities of a regular chicken.
Power: 20
Defense: 15
Agility: 15
Command Chickens: You may influence the behavior of any chickens in your vicinity.
I Walk directly into the camp, and stand near the fire for now.
You approach the fire. The man sitting next to it is dozing off.
Since you are incorporeal, you have nothing to fear from mundane attack. It does, however, make you especially susceptible to magic.
Aximodus (Incorporeal)
HP: 50/50
Redshirt (Dozing)
HP: 50/50
Mana: 5 0 4
Strife Sense: You passively gain a bit of knowledge about the future as pertains to creating and encouraging conflict.
Strife Aura: Your presence increases egoism and anger, increasing the likelihood of conflict.
Inflame: You may cause flames to increase in strength and increase the likelihood of objects catching fire.
Spectral Form: You may choose to appear as a hazy apparition at a cost of 1 red mana per 6 seconds.
Will o' Wisp: You may create a small fireball. Costs 3 red mana.
Add 20 to agility, and find some cover near the camp. Behind a rock perhaps?
You hide behind a rock, watching the fire warily from outside the boundary of the camp. A blue-cloaked man approaches from the side, leaving a trail of short-lived floating eyes behind him. The sun has set, but the night is fairly new.
The Grue (Light level:
Dim)
HP: 45/30
Perimeter Warder:
HP: 60/60
Mana: 8 0 1
Corporeal Form: An unidentifiable black creature of some description. You have all of the natural abilities of a creature with this size.
Power: 40 -> 60
Defense: 30 -> 45
Agility: 40 -> 60
Fear Aura: Your presence creates a sense of terror, making believers panic at the slightest sound and increasing the chance of injury.
Darkness Affinity: All of your stats scale based on the light level. The darker it is, the stronger you become.
Use my calming aura to stop the panicking creature and calm calico down, then let calico's curiosity take over.
Outside, the storm continues.The creature scuttles off and crawls inside the woman's bag, making chittering noises as it begins to throw clothing all over the room. Calico approaches curiously, but the creature crawls out quickly, a stocking attached to its back, crawls up the wall and across the ceiling. Calico watches from below and follows as the thing crawls out the door.
"Hey, little guy. What are you up to?" It's the big man. He doesn't notice as the creature crawls across the ceiling over his head. Calico silently dodges around the man's feet, still keeping her eyes on the creature.
"Oh, all right then. Off you go," he says moments before a stocking falls on his head.
It enters another room. Calico follows and finds the creature scurrying around on the floor, sticking to the corners. It seems to be ignoring her now. It opens a drawer with its claws and empties out the contents. Then it crawls over to a canvas bag and tears it open with its claws, scattering books across the floor. Its single eye narrows, and it makes a frustrated chittering noise.
"Hey! You'd better not be making a mess in there, too!" You hear the footsteps of the big man approach the room. The creature looks up toward the sound, then quickly takes off in the direction of the hiding space behind the dressers.
You gained a new ability:
EncourageCalico:
Power: 4
Defense: 1
Agility: 20
HP: 5/5
Unknown Creature (fleeing):
HP: 3/3
Curiosity: You may make a believer curious about something.
Comforting Aura: Your presence brings a sense of safety, instilling confidence in believers.
Encourage: You empower your wearer's spirit and drive them to advance against danger.
Confusion: You cause a weak-willed target to become momentarily confused.
I think it’s time for Octavian to maybe be a bit curious about that “religious text” of Sky’s.
Before Time began, there was only the Unbroken Light, eternal and unchanging. Omnipotent, but without a world to shape, Omniscient, but with nothing to know, Omnibenevolent, but with no living beings to receive its goodwill. And so from the Light, the First Darkness was formed - a thing that was Not the Light, for it had neither Virtue nor Presence, but could receive the Presence of the Light wherever the Virtues were made manifest, and thereby serve as an arena for the Light to do, to know, and to be.
First was formed the Well of Creation, the Beginning from which all things come, and the Flame of Destruction that consumes all things. This was the Beginning of Time. White, Black, Blue, and Red, Air, Earth, Water, Fire. These were the Four Elements...
Green harmonized between the Past and Future, and created Life, which remembers the past and anticipates the future. Only such creatures can know the meaning of pleasure and pain and thereby experience kindness. In Life, the Will of the Unbroken Light was realized.
But where Time exists, there must be change. And therefore kindness could not be eternal, lest it lose its meaning.
In the absence of contentment, Mankind sought to improve their lot. And so was born the color of the Ego, the color that is not a color.
"Color that is not a color? What does that mean?"
"Oh, it's just an expression we use for Magenta." Sky reaches into his robes and pulls out a pendant with a small prism on it. He holds it up to the light, projecting colors onto the floor.
"If you've ever looked at a prism or a rainbow, you'll notice that while there is a continuous flow of hues from red to blue, there are no shades of purple or magenta in it. That's because unlike other colors, purple isn't truly a part of white light - it is a color that exists only in the human mind, an illusion created from the mixing of red and blue light. An apt metaphor for the quality of the Ego which drives humans to shape and control the world around them.""I see. But this doesn't really answer my question."
"I'm sorry, what question was that?""Your book is called
Fixing the Unbroken Light. But that doesn't make sense. How can one
fix what is
unbroken?"
"Ah, yes." Sky smiles and puts away his prism.
"Well, it's a bit hard to explain without a background in the history and philosophy of psychochromatics. The philosophy of the Eight Colors is only a modern teaching - there were periods in the past where only White, Black, and the Three Chroma were taught, and they were mostly seen as being separate philosophies. It was only the advent of centralized teaching that people began to question the practice of teaching Black magic to students, and so the more moderated Magenta school was established to meditate between Red and Blue. A split in the doctrine of the Temple of the White that occurred around the same time led to it largely being replaced by the predecessors of the Cyan Monks and the Golden Knights, which ultimately led to these same philosophies being adopted by the practitioners of Virtuous Magic as well - ultimately leading to a more holistic and flexible view on chromatics as a whole." He pauses, fingering his prism.
"This was all well over a thousand years ago - long before the rise of Queen Iolaion. But there have been other splits in the Order of the Unbroken Light since then.""To keep things simple, you must understand that one of the central doctrines of the Order is that the Unbroken Light remains unbroken. Just as a prism may split apart the light of the sun, yet the sun itself remains unchanged, the different manifestations of the Virtues are qualities of the world and not of the Light itself. How one chooses to translate that into living may vary from one person to the next, but as a general rule the Golden Knights fight for preservation and the Cyan Monks study the past in order attempt to see the Presence of the Light throughout history. The Order, in general, opposes active efforts to change the world, as this would imply that the power, wisdom, or benevolence of Mankind exceeds that of the Light itself.""The book...does not teach these ideas. It teaches that the Light shattered itself in order to create the world, and that its fragments are manifest within the hearts of humans. That means that, rather than have faith that everything will turn out all right in the end, Mankind must rise to the occasion and actively improve the world. Among the Cyan Monks, it is considered heresy of the highest order." He smiles wanly.
"And yet I must say that it has a certain appeal to it."You gain a new ability:
Inspire Mental Influence: When a believer wavers on the edge of a choice, you can directly influence their decisions.
Inspire: You plant new ideas directly into the mind of a believer.
Money Sense: You passively gain a bit of knowledge about the future as pertains to business deals.
Face Reader: You become very good at reading faces. It's hard to hide secrets from you.
Bound Form (Coin): Your presence is currently bound to a particular coin. This increases your influence, but renders you unable to move independently.
I will take the form of a floating eye made out of ink
"An...eye?"Kevin shrugs. "It's what came to mind."
"Hey, I didn't mean to judge. Actually, eye-based familiars are a common design for Wards and Scouts. Maybe your familiar will help you see the invisible.""What does your familiar do?"
Use green mana to say hello to Abelia and Kevin. No need for soul bond when people are just chatting anyways.
"Not a whole lot, yet. Mostly he just talks.""Hey! Hey, Esme!"A girl with red hair and a short white dress comes running out of the building. Behind her are two boys, one with a dark red suit and the other in a brown coat, and a girl in black with a purple steak in her hair.
"Oh, hey Karin. What's up?""We're heading out to UV. You want to come?""Already? We've only got here yesterday. I thought we weren't supposed to be leaving the campus for the first week in any case.""Oh, my father needs some help at the club and got us a pass," says the boy in the red suit.
"Actually, we're full up. But maybe another time. What are you three janken doing out here anyway?""Oh, we were just going over familars. Kevin and Abelia here wanted to take a step up.""Cool," the boy grins.
"I'm Radish, and the other two are Pyro and Hex. You ever want a ride into town, hit me up."There are three major wings of the school:
The East Wing houses the library and laboratories.
The West Wing has the cafeteria and gymnasium.
The South Wing has the dormitories. It also has a large, open courtyard and garden.
Surrounding the school is a city. Sometimes, students head into town after school. Known locations:
Club UV, a rave nightclub
Kevin (First Year, undecided)
Abelia (First Year, undecided)
Esme (First Year, aspiring Green)
Amy (First Year, aspiring Magenta)
Cole (First Year, aspiring Blue?)
Karin (First Year)
Radish
Hex
Pyro
That boy with the troll
Headmaster Fintan
Professor Iris (Teaches Introductory Chromatics)
Professor Basil (Teaches Second-Year Shamanics)
Kevin returns to his room for the night.
Spirit Evolution - You may acquire one of the following abilities:
Scout: You may fly around freely and observe things for the cost of 1 Blue Mana per five minutes.
Ward: You may place a Ward at your current location for the cost of 3 Blue Mana. The ward lasts 1 day. It will passively alert you if anything moves nearby. You may observe events through the ward's location for free.
Mana: 0 5 5
Attention: You can draw a believer's attention toward a particular location or item.
Guide Hand: When a believer is using your pen and opens their mind, you may influence what they write or draw.
Butterfingers: The pen becomes slippery, causing it to fall out of someone's hands.
Danger Sense: You passively gain a bit of knowledge about the future as it pertains to danger.
Abelia returns to her room for the night.
Spirit Evolution - You may acquire one of the following abilities:
Telepathic Bond: Passively gives you information about the thoughts of all your believers. By expending
2 Green Mana and
1 Blue Mana, you may send a basic thought or feeling from one believer to one another, even when they are not present. (Current believers - Abelia, Kevin, Esme)
Shove: You may create a small force on a physical object.
Mana: 0 8 3
Mental Pull: You create a minor compulsion for a believer to look or move in a particular direction.
Spirit Link: You form a link with a new individual, allowing them to recieve basic thoughts and feelings from existing believers.
Esme returns to her room for the night.
You gained
+2 Green Mana.
You are close to achieving a Corporeal Form.
Mana: 6 19 12
Soul Bond: You spiritually empower to a believer, enhancing their senses and physical abilities.
Spectral Form: You may choose to appear as a hazy apparition at a cost of 1 red mana per 6 seconds.
Speech: You may speak to a human at a cost of 1 green mana. If used along with Spectral Form, there is no extra cost.
Cole is sleeping. Some of his books are still open on the table. The window is open, and a light breeze passes through the room, rustling the pages of
An Introduction to Chromatic Magic Cole has already gone through the whole text multiple times, but never seems to tire of reading.
You can probably control which pages will open up. Perhaps there is something
you would like to review?
Mana: 3 3 3
Shove: You impart a small physical force on an object.
Soul Bond: You spiritually empower a believer, enhancing their senses and physical abilities.
Scout: You may fly around freely and observe things for the cost of 1 Blue Mana per five minutes.
You will now be playing in
vaguely accelerated time. In addition to plot events that occur, you may make general decisions about how your human will choose to spend their free time at the Academy.
Hitting the library will gain you
blue mana and abilities, and improve your grades.
Hitting the gym will gain you
red mana and abilities, and improve your willpower.
Socializing will gain you
green mana and abilities, and help you make new friends.
You may also choose to
head into town in the evenings. You might encounter more interesting developments there.
You have 100
Free Time Points which you can distribute among these options. These may be re-assigned each turn.
Shah: Not Necessarily ConcurrentThe prudent thing is to upgrade to Mindsurf.
Shaa will mindsurf among all visible students and other lifeforms in order to take in his surroundings from as many angles as possible, because knowledge is power. Perhaps learning little scraps about their own minds in the process.
You need to remember who you are. Knowledge would be helpful, so you jump into the mind of the reading boy, seeing out through his eyes. He is reading what appears to be a history book.
have been largely lost to time. The events of that period of history - and the precise details of Iolaion's rise to power - remain concealed even to the most skilled of retroseers, and the mass scouring of memorabilia and iconography associated with the leaders of the Lost Kingdom means that attempting to divine the details of the Forgotten War through mundane methods is also out of the question. This is particularly frustrating to historians and the Seekers of Eternity alike, since it is likely that the secret to the Queen's longevity remains locked away in these lost texts alongside the forbidden knowledge. Nevertheless, it is widely acknowledged that such measures are necessary for the endurance of peace within the realm, as indicated by the horrors of periods when these measures broke down such as the Conflict of the Light in Anno Regina 348.This is all very interesting, but tells you nothing of your current situation. The girl is standing up to leave this section of the library, so you jump into her mind. She looks back for a moment, showing you that you are leaving a section of the library marked RESTRICTED. Further back, perhaps leading to the room where
your book is stored, is a padlocked door marked FORBIDDEN.
This section of the library is far more populated, with students of all ages reading or searching for books. Most are wearing blue, cyan, magenta or gray robes, but you spot some greens and reds as well. The girl whose head you are riding in walks toward the exit and passes under an arch near the door.
BZZZZZZZZZZT!A horrible buzzing noise fills the air, and the entire library goes silent. A swarm of small, translucent eyes appears in the air, spinning rapidly around your host. Everyone in the library, as well as a passing boy in red robes just outside, turns to stare at her.
The librarian turns to the girl. "Open your bag," she says.
Author
Topic: Chromatic Spirits RPG: Ghosts to Gods (Chapter 2 - Strange Creatures) (Round 8) (Read 34129 times)