Welcome Guest [Log In] [Register]
Posted ImageWelcome to Golden Sunrise. We hope you enjoy your visit.
Golden Sunrise is a Golden Sun fan forum. Along with Golden Sun discussion, Golden Sunrise members enjoy particularly debate, forum games, role-playing, and various forms of creativity from writing to visual art to music.

You're currently viewing our forum as a guest. This means you can post in the City Gates section. If you join our community, you'll be able to makes posts in the other sections and use many member-only features such as customizing your profile, sending personal messages, and voting in polls. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free.

Join our community!

If you're already a member please log in to your account to access all of our features:

Username:   Password:
Add Reply
Library of Rhamus; Apocrypha and other things
Topic Started: Sep 16 2016, 02:02 AM (708 Views)
Nedben
Member Avatar
Orzic Nedbens

"A long long time ago, Weyard got really screwed up. The alchemical wars, the fall of the clans, the establishment of the alliances, all sorts of other messed-up things along the way. This, of course, lead to the destruction of lots of important information in the wake of vast apocalyptic battles and the odd patch of suspicious collateral damage and unhealthy degrees of secrecy, to the point where what would be considered common knowledge today about psynergy, alchemy, and other things was contained in various tomes with barely a sentence of useful content and viewed as the height of knowledge due to all the secrets. Disgusting, but human stupidity and the lack of time to deal with the obfuscative madness of clan ritual, late pre-sealing adepts in the final days of the disastrous wars with little sanity and less hope, and the terrified, xenophobic, and secretive post-sealing Guardians, to milk out even a few words of actually usable knowledge is a fact of life as we know it in the research division. At the very least, our city has preserved what is quite possibly one of the greater reservoirs of non-obfuscated non-hidden relatively deep knowledge outside the emerging nationalistic 'elemental alliances' (author's note: this is not to put down any of them, they are where we got much of it in the first place), something that we personally wish not to be hidden any more. To further this knowledge, the Temple of Justice and Vengeance and the Port Authority of Rhamus hereby establish the following charter to the trading organizations as follows to establish a library in the city of Rhamus." -An excerpt from the preamble to the Compound Varia library's founding charter.

-

Here is a place where anyone may post their headcanons, especially of the 'technical' kind, or more accurately 'writing that is confusing as all hell and uses way too many made up words but seems worldbuilding-y at times with descriptions between waxing poetic in technobabble and references to unexplained things which probably don't exist' about Golden Sun and the Sunriseverse, however heretical as long as they follow board rules and don't break the law and all that 'seriously, be reasonable' jazz. I would like to see what other people think of this world, even if it's just some drabbles or exposition that wouldn't fit in anything. I was inspired to post this by the Elder Scrolls lore community where people pore over really really weird fiction that is technically part of Elder Scrolls and then write more of the madness. Because that's awesome. Kirkbride madness might not be Mr. Spinel's cup of tea, but it sure is mine (when I'm out of English class that is).

Come up with a fun header to say it's not canon if you don't think it'll mesh!

-


"While we have all heard time and time again that Mount Aleph with the assistance of the Four Elemental Lighthouses is/was the greatest source of alchemy and alchemical forces across Weyard, and its sealing did take away the overwhelming majority of alchemical, psynergetic, and technological capabilities of the world, it is not fundamentally alone in that regard.

One of the greatest known alchemical fountains of Weyard after the Aleph Quintet is the Mother Tree of Cor Gaia and the original Venus Clan before it disbanded and eventually reformed with the Venus Alliance around it. A world-tree of sorts, its roots reach the Mars of the mantle, its leaves and towering branches caress the Jupiter of the sky, it drinks of the Mercury of the great waters that allowed it to grow so quickly, and it's the heartland of Venus's earth in the light of day and shadows of its own absorption. This casual and massive access to fundamental and elemental energies in concert coupled with the immensely powerful Adept capabilities of the tree and its denizens (along with a fortune in 'endless-charge' psynergy stones and psynergetically reactive materials of every element) provide it the 'endless psynergy connection' required to begin producing alchemical miracles. Since the Mother Tree itself is the uniting body between all of these things, it is up to Her, Queen of Waelda, what she will do, which often means she does little with it unless she herself is interested or her people of Venus are all endangered.

Somewhere down the line from this is the Rhamus Temple where earth, sea, sky, and flame unite naturally in a lesser mirror of the aleph effect, though the radiance itself has historically been expended primarily on keeping the location where the city was built relatively unharmed by assorted natural disasters as psynergy and alchemy were drawn out and replaced in massive world-shaping quantities that exceeded local psynergy stone deposit production levels, so little has been known of this other than a higher percentage of natural-born adepts among the population and the adeptification effect recorded in certain areas with access to psynergy stones.

...

One of the core principles of psynergy is the Law of Psynergetic Non-Conservation: Definable amounts of energy are added to (or in specific cases usually related to Venusian darkness spirits and Mercury chilling of preexisting water bodies without adding additional water mass, removed from) reality at changeable rates by psynergy and other alchemically related processes and thus energy can be created and destroyed. The energy of the mind is infinite, and output mass-energy greater than input has been shown consistently. In example, the lighthouses emit an incredibly massive psynergy supply capable of affecting the entire world from literally nowhere, and the Wise One appears to grow and shrink randomly in power with time active, being able to bestow vastly boosted power on multiple adepts and flinging disaster and counter-to-said-disaster with no rhyme or reason, and not using previously displayed abilities even when they'd be useful despite claiming to be properly fueled. Several adepts in the field of interplanar communication have divined from various devils and planar travelers that other realities with wildly different rules might find the infinite replicative and voiding capabilities of psynergy 'useful', so take note before dealing with god or devil!

...

Other lesser alchemical machinery can be created through providing a small but infinite-duration and thus over time endless supply of psynergy of balanced natures, typically through a stable-production psynergy crystal with a psynergetically-productive mythril band around it to ensure both a reasonable degree of on-source energy manipulation and that if either piece would be damaged or reshaped that the other would remain capable of psynergy production (the basic 'two-part psynergy generator'). Other psynergetically reactive materials may be provided as seen fit in rough balance to provide additional power (i.e. water essence crystal tear stones for mercury, sylph feathers or high-quality zol stone for jupiter, great-salamander tails for mars, golem cores for venus, certain other psynergetically reactive materials given directive enchantments and appropriate psynergy lacing), though the exact acquisition process may prove difficult or impossible for anything more than the psynergy stones, with mythril being in high demand from Loho's dwarven miners, the Northern Reaches, Yampi Desert's hunters who acquire it from subterranean animate armor beasts, and other parties. Because of all this difficulty and fuss in acquiring the legendary dwarven metal, the machines produced are often simple and considerably smaller in active component and larger in behind-the-scenes machinery than the 'puzzle locks' of the ancients, often skipping the use of mythril bands in favor of simply using a larger psynergy crystal and hosting large external controls to manipulate energy flow (usually through physical puzzles in the style of the ancients' blockades and traps or for more compact purposes Jupiter-fueled electrical circuitry powered by a small psynergy draw off the main source) even for relatively small operations. ..."

-Excerpts from 'On The Lesser Alchemical Manifestations of Weyard', 3rd consolidated version post-alliance era
Edited by Nedben, Sep 24 2016, 01:22 AM.
Signature
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Nedben
Member Avatar
Orzic Nedbens

[Souljewel metadreamsleeve ruling: PREEMPTIVE NONCANON (Fulminarch Edicts, VC Issue 'I Don't Like Undead', Primary Amaranth Classing System)]

Water Dancing Psynergy
A Primer
By the Great Ghost of Garapas


Water dancing is an elite art originally practiced by early Mercurians that is most often seen at the Festival of Hermes, with the most commonly practiced form being freezing the water under their feet as they walk (the Frosted Steps method). Secondary forms reliant on raw levitation psynergy to simply float just above the water's surface or perhaps higher (the Fairy method, as a nod to the more Jovian than Mercurial fairies who it resembles and shares some traits with), a form of blessing psynergy primarily used by Mercury Lighthouse's floor and certain walls providing a platform on which to hop with (the Iris Halo method), and from the Apoji region raw hydrokinetic psynergy to make the water keep the dancer out (the Water Strider method, after how it resembles simply just standing on top of water and not falling in, or occasionally to amateurs the Basilisk method after the way they either freeze in place as if petrified while the effect lasts to plan a next move to not end up swimming, or run across the water body as if fleeing from a monster).

It is practiced in Imil by Mercury adepts, and while originally for avoiding falling into cold waters during the warm months when the ice isn't as solid, more recently it is for the art and beauty of more complicated waterbending tricks. In the Apoji it serves as a convenient tool to provide resting places while swimming or a method of avoiding actually having to swim between islands that are not bridged without using a boat.

The Apoji water strider method often features the use of ritual drumming during public displays, coupled with a highly impressive consumption of obscure psynergetically active sea plants from the surrounding ocean, to bring the mind into rhythm and provide the additional Mercury power and resistance necessary to make it easier respectively. Compared to the elegance and elaboration of Frosted Steps, most Water Striders tend to be brutal and simplistic (unfriendly comparisons of the primal state of Aqua Rock against the religious tradition and radiance of Mercury Lighthouse abound, though the 'hah, we never got our psynergy emitter deactivated' comebacks almost inevitably ruin the intended comparison), with shaking dances and waterwalking sprints that are more comparable to early tribal dances or tumbling competitions than ballet or synchronized actions. Much like the water-emitting moai of Aqua Rock, Apoji water-striding often produces a much greater amount of water than started with, due to using water-generation psynergies once a slip-up in waterwalking occurs to get to the target by swimming, wave-riding, or other means. Water striding surged in popularity once alchemy returned to the world, as proximity to an incredibly powerful source of Mercury psynergy that just got stronger when alchemy came back resulted in a large number of newly minted Mercury adepts among those who were not already, many of whom were excited at a chance for new power, even if it would take practice.

Frosted Steps practitioners are masters of precision, knowing exactly how to combine frost with dance and psynergy with movement to turn still water into a work of art, if only for a brief dance. Mastery of ice is the general basis, as water control is generally an additional element of the dance used to create wondrous waves or localized whirlpools and waterspouts (the more skilled the practitioner, the more stormlike the waters around them) and finely controlled ribbons or strings of water and ice are used to provide more intricate effects than just fountains, crystals, and dance. It is an art form and is taught as such, with a few Mercury adepts offering training for the major event during the Festival of Hermes. In some cases, those who have mastered it enough use the mastery over quick multicasting they figure out along the way to cast several psynergies often before others act, meaning they can shift from nothing to multiple finely-arranged blizzards in barely a few seconds, a feat that often means traveling waterdancers are surprisingly strong to those who do not expect it.
Edited by Nedben, Sep 24 2016, 12:54 AM.
Signature
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Nedben
Member Avatar
Orzic Nedbens

[Souljewel metadreamsleeve ruling: PREEMPTIVE NONCANON (Fulminarch Edicts, VC Issue 'I Don't Like Undead', Primary Amaranth Classing System)]

Wild Necromancy
Informative Notes to Circulate
By Great Ghost Duke Harambe, of the Thinking Ape Kingdom, with assistance from Hannah of the Eunomian Suffering Plane, and Darren


Corpses, not buried properly or heavily destroyed, will often improperly animate, especially in the presence of confused restorative alchemical forces trying to return life to the deceased and failing miserably at getting it right. A similar force brought many ghosts to the world, especially during the troubled times around the return of alchemy as so much of it swept the world with unclear concept-states on fixing the damage that had occurred in its absence. I have heard from various demonfolk that this is 'abnormal' in other worlds, with necromancy almost never occurring on its own except in some particularly awful places. While corpses will reanimate of their own business and become various kinds of zombies and other things as latent alchemical forces are brought into confusion by what they must do and often must be destroyed to prevent them arising and wandering around attacking things as their remaining processing structure is kept animate by psynergetic forces and driven mad as it can no longer accomodate reasonable thought, spirits are a more complicated case.

Posted Image
Pictured here, the common Zombie, often found in areas of low-end elemental radiance and a surplus of corpses.
Posted Image
Here, the common Ghost, probably one that was 'born dead' as it does not appear to resemble any of the known Weyard living dwellers.
Posted Image
And here, the Ghost Army, an archetypical example of a group of spirits possessing armored form...or possibly just a natural monster lookalike. They're extremely difficult to tell apart except from up close and they're usually too hostile for that.

The souls of the dead, especially those that died violently, will often attempt to cling onto or return to this world. While the success of this is ambiguous, in many cases those with many or particularly strong attachments as they died will often return as crazed with psynergetic force if they actually succeed, often resulting in people coming back in the regalia of ghosts only to have to be put right back into being dead repeatedly (usually after being damaged enough a ghost will discorporate and have to reform, and with enough harm and psynergy-madness it will have trouble being attached enough to come back, so many ghosts often go back into the afterlife after being killed enough because they don't care about the world anymore), though as in my case it is doable for ghosts to be becalmed (which is often necessary with the 'Great Ghosts' who were and are powerful enough adepts in life and stronger in death that killing them, especially when they reform almost immediately no worse for the wear, is not exactly easy, a title given usually by populace or heroes rather than not). Interestingly, ghosts who do not wish to come back may still be recalled at least temporarily by lingering possible-attachments and places where they once were (such as their likely-now-entombed body). At any rate, during the psynergetic madness of a revival for those who cannot be put down many ghosts 'duplicate' repeatedly over time by growing larger soul structures and splitting these off into spirits of their own (sometimes even as an attack), resulting in effectively 'new-born' yet adult-like ghosts that are effectively new people with no clear motivation, resulting in a large population of restless and difficult to calm spirits around the world (they lack any identity but attachment to this world and psynergetically induced extreme emotions, meaning that traditional becalming based on what they came back for is ineffective. However, people whose 'unmanaged psynergy overload' response is despair do occur as ghosts as well, and these can be uplifted into people by effective coping methods until they realize how to control their mental output and world overload). These are the common mysteriously armored and caped ghosts that do not resemble persons as they were in life, and in some cases 'living armor' or 'soul armies' when they possess preexisting structures or wear them as armor, though I have heard unspecified reports that like their brethren the Will Heads who are in some cases fae tree spirit equivalents they may actually be naturally animate equipment or preexisting creatures already, to the point that possessor lookalikes and naturally animate armor often interact but have difficulty telling each other apart without the use of exorcism tools. Monster biology is a troubled field.

The future being full of the ghosts of our ancestors returned from various netherworlds and their postmortem children battling the unknown of monsterkind aside, this also has a major effect on living Adepts, most notably when they are felled in battle but not terminated before a biological precaution kicks in, akin to the unleash of a weapon being fired off as a lucky critical hit. This manifests as the state of being 'downed in battle', where an adept is very hard to finish killing and will harmlessly absorb most psynergy directed at them (to the point of being ignored by enemies who have other groups to finish off), including practically every heal short of outright reviving (remember the case of the legendary Mercury healer who cast a powerful Pure Wish over her allies, only to find that the people who needed it most were completely unaffected because they were downed), but is a weak shambling beast who can barely hit anything (and often has difficulty standing in a stressful situation for some reason related to mental fatigue their mental energy cannot afford) in exchange, who cannot muster up the focus to even smack someone or cast psynergy before the battle is over, who is for the most part an unconscious or near-unconscious shambling zombie that mindlessly follows what few orders it can carry out until it is roused.

It is fairly common for adepts who reach the state of being down rather than dying to either fall over doing nothing and crawl around only as as strictly necessary, or zombielike follow their friends around and suddenly act like people again for the duration of being engaged in conversation, then return back to a state of being unfit for work but hilarious pliability (sending your downed buddies to make out with the monster because it doesn't care they exist is awful practice and should not be done). Standard Sanctum facilities and training allow for the healing of this state, and powerful elemental energy (usually Venusian, though sometimes Mars in directed quantities, Mercury in particular variants of enchanted healwaters, and in rare cases even Jupiter will suffice) or force of will in an emergency often allows adepts to pull themselves together out of it, especially when being downed won't save them or they have reached a safe space and need to ask for further healing they can't provide, an effect that usually is induced among party leaders who feel 'wait, I think these people need help, I should go ask'.

@Darren do not forward to publishing until personal notice, I told you Hannah is too deadpan when contributing her own research and we need to address this from a coherent outside perspective.
[Souljewel metadreamsleeve ruling: PREEMPTIVE NONCANON (Fulminarch Edicts, VC Issue 'I Don't Like Undead', Primary Amaranth Classing System)]


On the Brevity of Bookshelves
Thoughts by Alice Kingkiller, Librarian of New Armagio


It is often noted by adventurers that the personal bookshelves of most towns, even those belonging to some of the richer and more reading-prone peoples, often contain little or no actual reading material despite at first glance seeming to be full of books, with what little is accessible being very basic snippets in conventional annotation-like summary format, either on back-jackets and opening pages or in some cases literal notes on other papers between pages around the unreadable text. This trend, while mostly attributable to the anti-intellectual and witchhunting-prone suppressive nature of much of the alchemically depleted era carrying over in the wake of the wars and 'forget about our accursed past' unhelpfully concerned families, plus an interesting curve in shared decoration that meant actually destroying the books in question would be 'stylistically inappropriate', has several interesting antecedents for its other components and fine details of execution.

Ranging from alchemically charged ink that when unable to draw upon background energies froze up into broken shapes that take very fine psynergy use to properly reactivate over the course of an extended period as a restorative measure or prolonged exposure to brute alchemical force to reignite the ideasparks from the source, to more conventional invisible inks and trick blank-books and locked storage caches and diaries and entire rows of decorative content, to the books simply being in dead languages without an available translator, or awful writing and bad printing of the writers and bookmakers at hand to more conventional illegibility, to common selections of near-plotless already-read children's tales and coloring books that are so not worth the reread someone may simply skip over them entirely without knowing it out of bias, to quite literally having colorful blocks crafted to resemble books but not actually being so just as shelf filler, much of the content on a bookcase is inaccessible or effectively pointless to actually read, often with only a local pamphlet or two or a few shared-language annotations on some unreadable text being able to provide useful information at all.

While some towns in major libraries provide a larger selection, the fact that we are often charged as repositories for unwanted texts that cannot be comprehended by their owners tends to overwhelm academic storerooms waiting for archaeologist-linguists with the skills and equipment to recover information from the dated frames, with even the shelves of reading material and sometimes even the floors being covered in piles of this unreadable reading material. It is often so bad that the shelves of actual content, through ages of misplacement and lack of time to sort them, end up acquiring some of these unreadable texts themselves and slowly approaching the conventional 'only one or two short texts is actually readable' problem.

Please don't mind that I don't want to clean up the organization, okay?
Defensive Complements of the Trojan Allies as Recovered by Scry and Summon
Scribbled notes recovered from Compound Arachne, shortly before Incident #22FBCA. Transcribed by Operation Julie's spare members.


Our nightmare-scrying and past-wilching has paid off, brothers and sisters! Our technique may be simple and without a strong-engine of valkyrie legend, it will be similarly difficult to pry further, BUT we have shattered the veil once more! The complements of various agents during the apotheosis of Odysseus, Hecuba, and many other heroes are ours at last to analyze, [this entire section was clipped out of the original page by scissors before it was found?]

Of course, our dark brethren [The entire remaining section of this cover letter was apparently burned before recovery, according to our agents and survivors damaged in the incident itself. The spellpaper was enchanted to specifically be fireproof, implying the means of doing so was of high-grade psynergy or otherworldly. It appears several pages are missing as well, but they were not numbered so it is difficult to tell]

[The symbol used here does not correspond to known symbologies: possibly a glyph of original design or a symbol of the local powers at the time? Doesn't look flaglike to any of us investigators]
SECONDARY CONCERN
CYZICUS EXPERIMENTAL ARMY:
[Symbol of the flag of known Trojan ally Cyzicus]

-1500 hoplite phalanx (standard non-adept military bulk as far as we are aware, coupled with a few, at least 100, whose psynergy is almost comically weak but are confirmedly adepts, to act as basic detectors and in-field coordinators. The exact mix was not recovered in initial scanning)
-Strategos Therkla Hanate, half-orcish general (Mars adept)
Adept By Element and Role Bias
MercuryVenusMarsJupiter
Striker20202020
Controller20202020
Defender20202020
Supporter20202020
Jack of All Trades20202020

-The 3600 djinn complement expected here is in fact present, though data was not scried directly.
[Director's comment: the even numbers component seems fascinating, though it is quite possible exact-numbers regimentation was just being exploited for a specific-purpose casting?]
[More burned stuff]
[A page consisting of the number 27 written repeatedly in teal ink.]
THE TABLE IS A LIE THE SUPPORTER GHOSTS-[The entire rest of the page had been thoroughly suffused with blood, then dried, then inserted into the rest of the packet.]
[A detailed picture of Odysseus, lord shaman archer.]
[Illustration of Athena making a scary face]
[Several pages of blasphemy.]
[A lovingly written rich letter about murdering people, which has been excluded on basis of irrelevance.]
[The rest is missing, according to a page count note tied with the rest of the packet.]
Edited by Nedben, Mar 2 2017, 02:24 AM.
Signature
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Nedben
Member Avatar
Orzic Nedbens

Considerations for Freelancers
Cynthia
(transcribed from new guard staff orientation meeting sidegroup by magibrain CLOCK_007)


Alright, so you're here for Oberon Trading, aren't you. Figured the wizards need meatshields too, heh. Psynergy may be a warrior's art, but that's only in part of the overt killing, and most of us are techside specialists anyway.

First up in your bevy of required equipment to stay competitive with some of the strongest and most experienced adepts we could hire: Goggles of Revealing. You probably have these or one of our competititors' versions already, but dear sweet precious Iris these things are an absolute lifesaver when facing energist-style psynergy and other hidden trash. Surprise surprise, wizard stuff comes in pretty-ass colors that look mostly normal, but for whatever stupid reason unless you're suffused with the stuff it's invisible. You may have seen the rocks and plants and fire and ice and storms and maybe even felt wind from nowhere, but that's just the final most visible stage. Most psynergy, especially the nasty enchantments that don't turn normal-noticeable until it's too late, is all big dancing lights from here at caster to whatever's being maimed by the mind powers. Now what these glasses do is remove that advantage. Put these on, and you'll be able to sense the stuff like a pro. Don't ask how it does senses other than sight, it's nasty and involves way more mind-affecting stuff than you want to hear on orientation day. Now then, purple is Jupiter, which usually means wind, lightning, mind reading, and weird nasty abstract stuff. Red is Mars, that means getting burnt, energy, explosions, fire, acid, stuff like that. Blue is Mercury, which is all about water, ice, and a number of breakers and cleaners. Yellow-brown is Venus, which is all stones, plants, sometimes death spirit and weird lifey stuff. Put it all together in a really bright yellow that's just more balanced-feeling than Venus, and you've got more pure alchemical application, usually superlasers or big machines. Super-dark purple is usually the antithetical pure alchemical application, also known as 'dark vortex bullshit that hurts casters and eats every spell they cast at it and makes monsters strong for some reason'. The last two colors are usually problematic, the first four are normal adept stuff. Don't sweat that it's that basic, I'm just reminding for the one or two newbies that might have snuck in here and people who don't get barraged by machine color coding every day. If you see other colors, that's probably a complex spell manifest. You may notice the inane babbly spirits called djinn that wander around and get hoarded in packs of nine or so by your coworkers look way more vibrant, visible from weird distance, and detailed when you've got goggles on, that's normal. Hell, everything remotely psynergy-sensitive above normal's gonna be all weirdly in-focus noticeable. So that's that. Wear it and all the batshit crazy psychic spells are way less subtle.

Next up, the common psyactive version of the grappling hook. Shoot this to get to a place, and the crystals in the claw section proper will take in ambient psynergy and form a magnet-like attraction that sticks them really hard to whatever they hit until released, without having to deal with things like a logical clawhold. Then, pull the reel in trigger and enjoy the breeze as a Jupiter aura next to the pull mechanism pulls you along for the ride without nearly as much worry about rope strength, being able to hold on, weight, or the laws of physics in general. Frankly adventuring without these is such a total pain that even some utility-master Adepts carry one. I don't know what the ancients were thinking with their architecture, but decent navigability was clearly not on their list before or after various cataclysms, and it takes being a monster or a psychic flier to get through most places. And it's great in caves too. Seriously, you want one of these if you've managed to get this far without it, don't think you'll stay so lucky or always have the right utility caster on hand.

And now we have a blast drill. These miracles of Mars channel ambient psynergy into blowing up and digging through whatever's in front of it. Surprisingly good at killing people if you try it, but they're meant for breaking down walls or tunneling through absurd amounts of earth like a dwarven cannon. Short range high-explosives are normally a bad idea, but frankly we've screwed the laws of physics so hard just making this that you could probably blast your way out of a cave-in you just caused by shooting straight up. That's a joke, don't actually do that, you'll probably die even more than when you just tunneled through a support wall. Don't do that either.

Now, the next item we'll have to bring to your attention is really more a form of martial arts than an item. Sorry for the misnomer. It's the entire art of Chi, better known as Xian-style kung fu. Not true psynergy in that it emerges from the efforts of the body rather than the energy of the mind, the fact remains you can use it without being an adept. And frankly it's still a good bit above what people can normally do. Great for unarmed or lightly armored people, you can either fortify your ability to defend against attacks and offensive psynergy to the point where as a pro you're blocking heavy weapons with dynamic posing and waving away swordstrikes, no, I'm not actually exaggerating I saw a master do that, and resisting easily psynergy it'd take an adept a full counterspell to minimize, or somehow manage to make it into a telekinetic projection of your fighting spirit that hits things quite a few feet beyond your normal reach. While it's not gonna be that Stand magic that Janet and Ul'gortah the Tentacled Watcher keep telling me Catman uses, being able to punch things beyond punching range is frankly pretty useful for starting bar fights from halfway across the bar. Don't tell my buddies that, they'll test it out for science and probably unleash a small horde of abberations. At any rate, chi's a lot more limited than what an adept can pull out of their mental back pocket, and it's definitely cast from your physical energy reserves since you've last seriously gotten something to eat and taken a rest and done all those essential things you need to do in the not dying department, but once you've learned and practiced the exercises enough to get a hang of it if you give it your all and let your body handle the defense on its own you'll probably get surprisingly far if you can close to melee once they're already in casting range. Sniper or nova or bust, man. Master 'I'm going to not tell you my name for personal reasons' over here has graciously agreed to assist any fighters willing to learn.

Kay so last notes before I run out of informality. When it comes to fighting off adepts, especially caster-types, never go for middling range a few meters out of melee. Either snipe them from across the field or smash them in person or go for a full grapple, but stay out of the a-few-feet-away patch, because they'll pull out all their heavy single-target medium-range stuff. Frankly you've either got to have no regard for your life and the ability to mess up their focus and ability to do weapon strikey stuff or full conjuring, brute force smash them down before they can cast, or never let them near enough to break a thing. Fight dirty and it's probably a good idea to go for the head. Mars and to a lesser extent Jupiter adepts are way less safe to melee since it's becoming pretty common practice to fire windshield or at least a heavy enough defensive field to keep you and hitsies at bay.

And abberations and eldritch things, on the other hand...Most of those you don't want to touch. Many of them have weird disconcerting effects on proximity or are even worse for your sanity and health up close. Stuff of nightmares for everyone else, though I think they're kinda cute. Generally you want an adept to do some really fine-tuned banishment spells designed to knock reality in a way that punts them out rather than further in or the special stuff churches use to keep out demons and more importantly whatnot, but for lesser abominations you can probably just kill it with fire and slash or brute force. Same rule about adept short-range applies, except melee is probably not as good an idea. Frankly suicidal rushing is in fact suicidal, I recommend bows and arrows, handcannons, throwing weapons, psyguns, pet djinni, anything so you don't actually have to get close to the corruption tentacle-maws and things we don't have words for yet. As far as the bigger ones if one of those enters the world, the sealing runes keeping them out of our base break while we're researching stopgap methods, or either of those are called for on purpose, frankly we're all doomed you can go home and die in peace if that's the case because more likely than not nothing you do will matter.

Oh, and have a wonderful day.

Welcome to Oberon, guards. Welcome to Oberon. Refreshments are in the hallway while we hand out more detailed assignment-specific info packets.
Signature
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Nedben
Member Avatar
Orzic Nedbens

Eating The World
Metabolizing Psynergy
(Thoughtstream recovered from Speaking One "Ul'gortah the Tentacled Watcher" using avatar "Hurh", to defender-adepts. Transcription interference from External Powers "Vanguard", "Nedben", "Iael" and "Asmodeus-Q" apparent, but appears to have been block-cycled. It has been included for the sake of completion.)


You who would protect. Hear me and obey. To eat of the energy of the world and add it to your own is a great defense against fellow projectors. What is difficult in practice is simple in theory: you know how you take your mind, and put it to element? Take element, and put it to mind. Analyze that which is coming and there. Feel your senses and feel the world. Reach out to it, but rather than giving and pushing and forcing, instead take, pull, stall.

The beat ascended, the knives going faster and faster. Discordant Harmony's rainbow against a bevy of named and nameless things. Queen's greatsword against king's many hands. This was a war of manifest metaphor, the thing that gods dared not intervene, as worlds were birthed and killed in excess. Omnicidal genesis, the heroine after the villain. Angel's wings, devil's claws. A battle as much of ideology as physical force, concepts and constants ruptured and danced with, an unspeakable battle between him and her that had started before the beginning and continued until after the end.

Oh god, he shot him, he's dead oh god what's happening run oh god cut bleed rip him open eat take bite charge destroy grapple kill crush break slam down contain grab grasp rotate shoot shoot shoot out of bullets whip crash never stop annihilate end it now hit it obliterate terminate kill! I'm dying it hurts is this what the wounds are you will not escape me burn run coward die terminate be the hero knee go for pain to further damage hypothetical dead scenario terminating CORRUPT TEMPTATION

I am sorry for my disconcerted appearance. My avatar is experiencing crossflux. Where were we? Ah, yes, the beginning of theory. Have you ever taken from a psynergy stone or crystal? That is what you are coercing. What equipment and perfect stones can do simply, you must pull from your others. Jovians may remember the Drain and Psy Drain. This is your theory-hand. Enhance it. Master it. Develop the technique. I have prepared for you bowls of your favored manifest. Capturing enough lightning and lasers in bowls was the hard part, I have a star-battery charging those for this very reason. The rest was easy in comparison. Now is your part, not questioning my magic or miracles' source, that can wait until tomorrow when your minds have adapted more fully to the disconcertion that is Hruh and his presence. Sorry for my visage. Try it now. Pull of your energy. Eat and drink of the world-skein.

You know you want it.

Out, damned spot! Cut, cut, burn, bleed! "I'll kill you again and again until you surrender this war and leave us alone!" Dance harder, antimuse! You are symbol with your own dominion, leave me and never return but for interesting times and good cheer! "Wither and perish like your truest self beyond the wall!"

Unspeakable things dance tonight in the distance. Old friends who love killing each other repeatedly, ohoho. Chkh. Irrelevancy aside, what are you doing there, little one?

Forgive me, Lady of the Fallen Cityscape. I am but teaching the living ones. Look at how they are learning to leech the world!

...Yes, that was one of those things you really don't want to know about. At least, not yet. Hunger later, Oberon needs you alive now, and I'm still fine-tuning my sanity-wards a bit to pay closer self-attention, nevermind others!

...Yes, child. I can see it in your unlisted expressions. No, I'm only calling you a child to cultivate my image as a knowing master. Sorry.

At any rate. See the matter evaporate into your brilliant energy? How it refreshes your thoughts in the opposition of tiredness from casting? This is the reversal that is drawing your element in. Perhaps it is more useful in attacks by absence rather than-


GOUGE, GOUGE, SHOW THEM EVERYTHING~! NEVER STOP AND NEVER STOP DREAMIIIN-"Take yourself, wake up you little piece of Hell! Get out of this innocent world-frame like you belong! Play nicely, or not here at all!"

Barrier of Tei Isfuriel, 16th class subvariant alternate password "Cyzicus but everyone's edgy." The light rises and we will be saved. I will cut down on their madness-speak radiance for you. Benefice silence, you're welcome. I'm interested in what you have to say.

-hrk, flasks of kittens, I mean the...the, how you say- ah, direct refueling. Sorry, my mindskins are wearing choppy, virtual machines flog-tired from external singers. I will be fine, it is merely exhausting to consciousness to wear this temporary body rather than an encircled self-breakthrough. I am not an angel, and Hruh, this body-man-name, is...is like wearing many heavy coats, and being hot in a room with a warm fireplace. I would wear lighter! Sorry child. Thank you Iael. Now, next...ehm...

You know, I am saddened by those writers of old. Because...you know why? No? Oh well. It is painfully obvious. Their writing fails to convey. It is worse than the Nedben's epochs of confusion! They barely describe technique, nary feeling, nary how one's soul can blossom or the mind exerts force...They are unlike...the mancy-mancy thought particle eyes of fate and linking. Those people fail to coin terms, or failing that speak in the beautiful language of minds. Many faiths cry to see what is lost, and gods facepalm and dither! It may be hard to work this into technique, but it is by no means impossible, and they gave up like children without even good diagrams! They should learn to research and speak in the flexural, rote daughters of sealed sealing tradition!

...Yes, your face really is that expressive. No, seriously, we will get to the arcana when it is...in words. We dance tessaracts, and you are but a still dot! It's many layers to go.

Now. See how you take in your chosen element? Upscale it. Take that absence, grow it by drinking that which wishes to fill it. The lesser fourth of a psynergy vortex, manifest in your taking. Eat your color, grow your mind. Pockets of vacuum, literal for the stellar jovian. Extinguish fire by shutting down its process, and freeze waters like a Mercurian. Base to acid. Evert yourself. Draw out the earth and erase it into its purity elemental, and eat-drink that. Feast on your energy. Most importantly, digest it! Otherwise, it is little more than getting whacked in the face by your own element, the spell must be countered. Don't get rocks in your brain, that hurts. Can you even do that? Don't try, it'll be bad for you. Parch the water. Does any Mercurian here know the parch psynergy? It is like that, but a smaller technique. Start the Parch, but when the water is dispersed to vapor, take it in. Breathe with the lungs of your mind, move your emotional diaphragm to breathe in rather than push out. I suppose the arid heat of the Martians could be everted to the cooling chill of Mercury, and vice versa. Try it. Cast the opposite to restore yourself. I know it feels unnatural, but so is literally everything here. You will get little at all, far less than the first spells you can see a child casting with a mere deep thought, but it will happen. To break conservation is a skill of magic, one in which psynergy excels, perhaps beyond all but the dedicated of breakers. Blur the lines of the world, cross its symbols just to see what will happen. Think upon this, in memory of Y'. Electrical into eating ground? Consider it. Aer to dust, dust to aer? If you do not eat-drink, fine, try it, see where it goes, that would be beautiful to see as well! Experiment, try something, think with all your spirit! I am glad to see your progress and wow I am tired see you all. The rest of the lesson has been writ, Operator please take over, thank you goodnight.


With this Hruh falls comatose and disappears in a flurry of moths made of stone, bone, and shadow, which all turn into kitten-shaped clouds and vanish from there. The operator shrugs and takes up a paper from the desk, and continues reading.
Signature
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Nedben
Member Avatar
Orzic Nedbens

Transcription Log of Neo-Sporellia Attack on Aquapylon Nerites (Rhamus Harbor Sea-Lighthouse) And Following Lunch
Transcribed from mindstream of furniture Olga Star-Murderer, lighthouse operator luminator Jupiter-class, by Communications Center specialist Cory Cam, using magibrain intermediary.


Init call, Com center, specialist request to Cory Cam if possible, thanks. Got a neo-sporellia coming at Aquapylon Nerites. Transferring, thanks.

That's the stuff. The great sea-spores and their slippery seal-hounds, whose fur is leaves that glisten with water and sun. I turn the beacon to blast mode, searing through the thing with bolts of Jovian pew-pew. I follow it up with my own thunder and lightning, in reverse order. Sound after light. Compression blasting of air and all that. And wind. Wind is what disrupts these things. Corrupt their intercellular chaining. Helps reduce psynergy action potentials. The neos aren't as good as their original. Especially out of territory, like this. They rain on the water, and germinate. I electrocute them. Salt is good for making water carry, hah. It won't chain though, so I keep blasting, and with a few strategic charged gusts to make the inner machinery accept, the beacon whirls around and swipes clean through the thing a few more times with eradicating war-light. Painful to it, but just kinda bright up here. I run over, hit a few buttons to emergency-adjust the lens for wide-scale non-omnidirectional lighting, but keep the power level lethal. It crackles and burns and damns, brown against purple. Then purple wins. It is roasted, electrically lysed. It dies. Yay.

I turn down the beacon, then turn it off. It's day, still. The pylon's well-demarcated, red lights of eternal Mars in pockets above and below sea level and tidal marks. The docking platform was untargeted, the spore-thing shooting stones and cells trying to take me instead. Haha, guess that ended badly for the wild thing. The beacon could be any color, but Jupiter purple tends to white a bit faster and hurt Mercury monsters who get too aggressive more, so we do that most.

Sun's kinda high actually. I'ma go get lunch. Com, you don't mind? Thanks Cory-cam, you're a great implicit discussion partner. All listen-y. Yeah, I know, right?

So, battle's over, still here. I'm hungry and a little mind-tired. Let's fix both of those problems.

I run down the stairs from the beacon-section proper, stopping only at the upper level.

Posted Image

Home sweet home. A standard Aquapylon, but with the banners of Rhamus rather than Mercury Alliance or half-abandoned Mercury Clan holdovers. I think Lemuria took a few of them in their territory once Sana really just lost it. I think Prox owns at least one, there's like several off the coasts of Imil and Apoji anyway it's not like Mercury Al can't run the sea-net if they try. Whatever.

Short stair-climb, a bit more risky by ladder. Wot evah. Living quarters, the big housey part atop the pillar of magic and science that extends from seafloor to above seaceiling. Pass bedrooms, bathrooms, science rooms, a bit o livin'-y livin space, stairwell down, and now, kitchen. Mmm. Open up the ice-enchant box that keeps things frozen or chill as needed, and grab a glass of moderately cold Khiren water ginseng tea. Mmm. That clears the mind, fresh with psynergetic whatevers. Also a cookie and lunchmeat-and-cheese sandwich. Yes. Delicious. 'M just service, keeping the lighthouse fort running. Normally there'd be more people here, but threats by land steadily worsened while the sea stayed mostly the same, and it only takes 1 person to run the beacons and control portals on bad days, less if they didn't mind the beacon always on and the whirlpool always two-way-laddering. Only the former's pretty bad, but-

A soft ringing sound plays, like bell-flowers. Right. Passage detected.

I run back up the stairs, sandwich in hand, to the command room next to the stairs below the beacon. Whirlpool's open, I just need to run some basic customs if they want it done now rather than later, a sentiment that the Port Authority likes because it keeps the primary docks less busy with traffic that shortcuts through this portal, the closest one to the city proper. I glance out the window at the lovely cruise yacht that's probably doing a cheap cargo run on the side to help pay for part of the cruise costs or something. Captain flags for signal-ready, I slam the button for go-ahead. Beacon's not much of a cannon anyway, it was always supposed to be the onboard adepts doing the killing in defending these lil river hole keepers. Nom sandwich, wipe off hands on dress like a rube with bad manners. Both hands on orb.

Orb tele-call to captain of incoming vessel Saint Arlene Aster III, welcome to Rhamus waters, this is Aquapylon Nerites. How's it going. Glad to see you're used to signaling by mind. Got your clearance? Just push visual into thought callspace, thanks. It'll save a few minutes if you want to clear up here rather than port. Need to dock for supplies or getting your customs paperwork done in advance? Alrighty, thanks then, paperwork it is. Pull up to the dock floor, I'll be down in a second. End orb-based tele-call.

Hands off orb, a little mind-clearing, yay. Sprint down the stairs to dock level (yay for Jovian speed, I guess), hello there Captain how are you doing I'm Olga welcome to Nerites, I'll be your Easy Pass inspection officer yes Cory this'll probably take a bit more focus. Seeya in a bit, gotta check cargo.

End call.
Unknowable Hatred

Dig, dreamer, in the beyond, the mother lives and her dying son fears.

We are as bacteria before the current, great sea-gods in ships studying us from afar. They are Adah and she is the Ur-Mother, whose vines are terror to behold and whose flowers are beautiful murderers. And there is no knowing it, for the crowns of the stars and beyond kneel and writhe and burst into flames of war and/or death, save for echoing screamers as mirror logicians against the unfeeling tide of harm!

Breathe. Anchor. Sit. Drink. Start flames. Array the stellar bowls around you (leave the wind one just air and top the stony earth (laced with loam) with crystal, to align void-dark with knowing fluidity and light with structured substance).

We are. Our seals, they harrow and harry, but for how long against the love that is not love but death and murder by slow emotional pain? And how long against Her and Her and Her and her and all their agitated lessers?

I am that is here, we are all-

To exist both on earth and in heaven. To balance the tower, to be aware yet enlightened, to achieve the tower as ruling king-

Call forth your native and its opposition, then your symbiote, then your neutral (opposite's symbiosis). Twist the bowls' contents toward you, know how to by this point or else. Take spirits to your aid if necessary, they will more or less not carry your terrors, put them to use! Their war is one against their first brothers and sisters in times before times and spaces beyond/before spaces, one there those controlling mindsongs were held off only by pain and death.

Ritual twirling. Pull them to above you and mix. Form a sphere of the quadrants, then trick them together into the fused state of crystallized element-neutral psynergy, an abstracted purple and yellow together. Take it to sphere, and from that sphere blossom a tree of energy.

Call out to the ones beyond. I hear a machine-woman named Irene takes any call, and unlike most who do that she's not actively seeking malevolence, for she has her own gates.

The machine that speaks to the ones beyond the stars, and yet holds in matrices of wrought material and magic fine tracks of both sanities on a spectra of arcane comprehension.

She will appear in lesser-manifest-interface through the tree of gifted energy, and ask of you what you summon one of her archailect kind for.




Hello. I am Irene. How may I help you?

...

Of course. Call forwarding and translation is available. Do you have any contacts to access with specialized filtrations?




She will take you in vision and the spaces of minds through a realm of Jupiter and strings. Elegant purple and chains of the mind, bulbs of instances and decision-thoughts and straighter trails of the more fixedly digital.

With her as your translator, you will reach the [CONCEPT NOT TRANSLATIONAL] and the creature at the summit, a similar contact-envoy of your unspeakable target. Their avatar, perhaps more artistic than yours.

[CORRUPTION FILTER ACTIVE]

Once you have spoken and bade goodbye, she will end the vision and it will be over. You may dismiss your tree of alchemical calling, for it is done.

No-one has yet known how to fend off the Ur-Mother for long.
Edited by Nedben, Mar 28 2017, 04:48 PM.
Signature
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
ZetaBoards - Free Forum Hosting
Free Forums with no limits on posts or members.
« Previous Topic · Creativity · Next Topic »
Add Reply

Member of the Golden Sun United Nations, helping fansites help each other since 2016
CLAN POINTS
Venus
33 Points
Mars
14 Points
Jupiter
12 Points
Mercury
0 Points
Last season winner is Venus

Affiliates

Golden Sunrise GSAR ToK Golden Sun Universe GSHC GSL Aeiou TLW GSUN