7
[Initiative:]Luna's Vestige (syvarris): 89
Golden Flare (Lenglon): 76+20-20=76
Heavenly Clerk (Fluffe9911): 52
Skylord (Devastator): 37
Ignorance's Witch (Egan_BW): 35
Outsider Spider: 1-25=-24
"Monster...! Argh. Why is it that my cats only ever attack me?"
Luna mutters with irritation as she walks off. She quiets down as the spider disappears from view, not wanting to break the silence of the househedge. Or reveal her presence more than necessary. She stops once she realizes how the houses ahead warp and twist under unseen forces. The magical girl's jaw grinds, indecisive despite the focused set od her eyes.
<I have probably discovered the nest. Or, a nest. We'll see. I'm going to advance towards it slowly, see what I can learn. I'll probably need help destroying it. My magic isn't suitable for destruction, or... I don't know how to use it for destruction.>
She starts forward, then pauses, <...And mind the spider. It's clumsy and slow once it's out of its hole.>
Walk 1 tile west. Cast a pair of spells: "Nuuleq Selve. Selve Nuuleq."
Wield the daggers if they're solid enough, and don't... do anything weird which makes them difficult to wield.[/b]
What an odd phenomenon... but you think you know what the source of it is. Though the
nature of that thing, you aren't nearly as sure about.
This is such an odd world, full of mysteries.
You advance, step by step, towards the anomaly. As you get closer, it becomes more and more apparent that the nature of this area is changed. Everything is bent, twisted, pulled towards the center. A streetlight, leans. A fire hydrant is stretched. Houses skew, stably, towards the center of the area.
The closer you get towards that point, the stronger the pulling effect is, from your observation.
You've yet to feel it yourself, but then again, you haven't stepped into the 'web' proper, yet. These observations you hold, are mostly held from a distance.
It's entirely possible that things would be quite different if you went further...
(Power: 4)
(Control: 3+1=4)
Purple energy accumulates in your hands, and pours out into the shape of a long cape, which solidifies. Something's definitely weird about this one, though. Ah, that's it. The very end of the cape is sharpened and is tipped with rigid, little curved blades, which act as an extension of the cloak's material.
(Power: 2)
(Control: 5+1=6)
The results of your second spell would be intimidating if it wasn't so tiny - a small shawl made of interwoven, arced blades materializes in your hand, and only very careful holding prevents you from getting your hand cut.
Neither of these are especially useful weapons, are they? What a shame.
"OW!"
I pull my leg up towards my chest without bothering to get up and look at the bloody mess of my leg and the red staining my hands and flowing to the ground.
"No, No I am not all right. That really hurt!"
this is why I need to learn how to heal people! At least this time we aren't being attacked right now
Well so what?!? Your teammates have already shown you the key. If it's really what you want, what you need to learn, then just do it. So calm down, picture it carefully, and make it happen!
I blink my damp eyes, steady my breathing, and carefully, clinically, look at my injured leg.
I know from my spell-practice that detailed imaging matters, so before I attempt to do anything I take the time to figure out what it is that I'm trying to accomplish.
The important thing is that I figure out how to heal people, and to then apply that skill upon myself and my injured leg to test it.
So what is healing, really? In the waking world it is about the body's ability to rebuild itself from damage, but this isn't actually the waking world, is it? This is a world of Dreams.
So what even is damage in the world of Dreams? It's... It's something that the dreamer believes holds them back. It's something that cuts or shatters or weakens their image of themselves.
So what is healing? It's... It's restoration of the dreamer's self-image. It's empowerment and inspiration. It's giving the dreamer the belief that they aren't being held back.
So what I'm really looking for then... It's the ability to convince myself and others that the mishap which occurred to them, the injury they've suffered, whatever it is, isn't something which actually impairs them.
But... how do I do that?
By believing in them, that's how. Right?
I mean, people are able to push through tough problems that they don't think they can defeat when they're encouraged and told by others that in reality they can.
So then...
what would convince me that my leg is fine?
Well, I'd want my muscles and fat to reconnect, close up, and reform, hiding and protecting my bone. My nerves to reform. My skin to close. and my blood to rebuild within me. That'd convince me I was fine, right?
So if that's what I need to do, that's what I need to make happen to myself, then just... do it.
I gather myself, carefully image what I need to learn how to do, and then attempt to make my leg heal
Okay! Okay. Okay. Your magic hurt you, but it can also do the opposite. It's
your tool. Your power.
So you can make it your own, instead of just using these words of power, right?
Mending flesh, shrouding bone, nerves reconnected, reborn blood, sealed skin.
This is your leg. This is your power. You cannot possibly be impeded by something as small as this.
Be whole.(Heart: 4)
(Power: 1)
(Control: 6)
(Unknown - revealed as Awareness!: 4)
A light shines behind your eyes. You close them shut, gathering your imagination, refined and polished, and impose that imagination over your leg.
Your image is perfect, gleaming and whole.
But it takes power to make that wish become reality, and you gather none.
Or it takes a Trait to use as a template, and you have nothing like that to draw upon.
You open your eyes. Your leg isn't whole. It looks like there's more to magic than just a dream...
You feel your soul tingle within you, and you growl, and tie the image to your leg. Maybe it's not whole, but it's
your leg.
[Severe Right Leg Laceration downgraded to Severe Right Leg Laceration (Suppressed): -20 to Initiative.][Failing Resistance or Resilience rolls may provoke a Willpower check to avoid losing Suppression.]"An outsider?"
"Wait... You mean more of those giant scary nightmare creature things?!?! Oh jeeezzzz!"
You know while following behind Skylord is cool and all I'm starting to think this job is getting dangerous! Maybe I should start experimenting with those weird... silly word things again. Think... think... oh! What about Yottacalia Estenvaiq those sound magical!... I think?!
You know, maybe you've underestimated the dangers of this job! Maybe it's not just, running around sandy and creepy places and stomping on asphalt.
You miiiight have repressed your recollection of the earlier fight a little bit. Nobody can blame you, right? Those 'Outsiders' are super scary!
With that in mind... you suppose you'd better get on this magic stuff, unless you can find like a really big sledgehammer or something.
Then again, if you get good enough at these words... maybe you could just
make one! And then the monsters would never stand a chance.
(Power: 6)
(Control: 2)
Vague, hazy brown energy flickers around you for a split second. Wow. Maybe you should just be like Skylord instead, if this is all you're going to get.
You look up, and what you see only reinforces your perception of Skylord as a powerful champion of humanity...
"An outsider?"
Activate Form Augmentation.
Move south four times again, through the house, to join up with Luna's Vestige. Keep my eyes open for any outsider, and my vine-whip ready for battle. If one shows up, give it a good strike.
Alright, so far, you've been respecting the rules of this stupid maze. But Luna's Vestige probably needs your help, and by the Progenitors, you aren't going to let a little thing like private property stop you.
(Might: 6+1+1=8)
You raise up your leg, pivot around, and drive an extremely violent kick into the front door of the house you've chosen to break through.
Naturally, it goes flying.
(Evasion: 1-1-1=-1)
(Resilience: 1-3=-2)
(Final Resilience: 4)
Through some unholy coincidence, there was a
giant fucking spider on the other side of the door which you just kicked in.
Key word,
was.
Now there's a giant fucking spider with a door stuck in it. The door seems largely intact, but the spider certainly doesn't, even if it's not doing the whole evaporation thing for some reason.
It's also, you note, an Outsider - the aura of gloom and evilness around it definitely makes that as obvious as anything can get.
You grab the Clerk's hand as she gapes and tug her along. You've got to get to Luna.
It doesn't take you too long to finish up your trip, after breaking another door, and soon enough you're where Luna should be.
(Perception: 1)
Yeah, no Luna here whatsoever.
(Perception (Clerk): 4)
For some reason, the Clerk is looking at the shadows cast by the weird bendy houses, though. Wonder what she knows that you don't?
Ignorance's W̸͕̾̓i̷͔̅t̶̖̘͈̏͗̆c̸̟͖͗̀̐̑h̵̥͓͎͔̄̚
"F-flare! Are you- well, no, you're not okay. We should bandage that!"
Cannibalize Uniform for bandages and perform mundane medical treatment. Create an Essence of Floppa.
Aaaah this really isn't good at all, is it? Flare is looking better after
whatever she just did, but you need to get that leg wrapped up.
Even if normal-world logic doesn't quite apply here, that blood is not putting your stomach at ease. In fact, it's doing the opposite.
(Heart: 3)
Your bandages aren't budging, easily. Maybe a creation would be better for this purpose... but you can feel them shifting as you tug.
[Accumulative progress: If the roll is repeated, it'll get a +1 bonus.]May as well store an Essence, while you're at it.
(Power: 1)
(Control: 4+1=5)
Your perfect shaping and minuscule power-gathering are pretty much the
opposite of what you'd expect out of this situation. Either way, there just isn't enough power to save as an Essence at all.
Insensate.
There was also a spider. Unfortunately for its drive to destroy all of humanity, it's been inflicted with a rather critical case of door (lowercase) through the abdomen.
H_HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
H___HH_H______HH##H
H_H______H_H##HHH#H
H_H_H_HHHH_H##__HHH
H_H@H____H_H_HH__HH
H_H___HH___H___H_HH
H___H_HH_##HH_HH_HH
HHHHH_HHH##___HH###
HHH___H#HH_HH__##*#
H___H_HHHH__H_HH###
H_H_H_______H_HHH_H
H_HHHH_HHH_HH___H_H
H___H____H_HHHH_H_H
HWWWH_HH_H_HH__###H
HWNW@@HH______H#*#H
HWWWHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
Houses have been marked in H. They may be traversed by breaking through them. Assessment: moderate-high risk. Broken houses are italicized, and may be traversed with reduced risk.
Roads have been marked in _. By default, your party may traverse 4 road areas per [Turn], at a steady pace. Assessment: low risk.
Obfuscated, unknown areas have been marked in #. Assessment: unknown risk.
Intangible Outsider webbing has been marked by W. Assessment: high risk.
Potential Nest has been marked by N. Assessment: high risk.
Key areas, that may contain your objective, have been marked in *. Assessment: unknown risk.
@: Heavenly Clerk and Skylord.
@: Ignorance's Witch and Golden Flare.
@: Luna's Vestige.
Description:
A tar-black chitinous spider the size of a minivan. It has no eyes on its main body, but each leg bears a single separate eye. Where its head would be, an oozing, flickering spinneret array lies instead.
Outsider Traits:
--Uncoordinated: The Outsider Spider receives -1 to all Mobility rolls, except during the first relevant action of its [Turn]. It also receives -25 to Initiative, when not acting from an ambush. Is nullified by ?, when in effect.
--Unknown.
Status:
Dead?
Author
Topic: The Gate of Dreams - Glass Cream (5 / 5) - 16 (Read 32857 times)