08-19-2017, 12:07 AM
Quote:Gate in the Deep
Location: Vasty Deep
Requirements to complete (can be started earlier). May be completed alone or as a group.
5+ ATK between entire group (may use powered-up stats as basis). Requirement lowered by 1/2/3 if you have a Tier 1/2/3 Super Attack.
7+ SPD between entire group (may use powered-up stats as basis). Requirement lowered by 4 if you have Flight, 1 for each other Movement power.
Difficulty: Extreme (20,000-40,000 words dependent on writing quality)
Reward: Void entrance in the Deep.
The name of the deep is not hyperbole; it is the largest of the ‘light’ verses, beaten only in size by the Underverse. One could spend years travelling around and exploring the many islands that dot its vast ocean. But the further one goes from the gates, the greater the ocean seems to stretch on. Until finally, nothing but emptiness.
You sail on. But the ocean grows dark, and the seas dead. The storms grow fiercer and the nights longer. Until you cannot remember the last time you saw day; only a perpetual kind of twilight. You feel yourself being watched. You remember the sailor’s tales and their warnings of the dark ocean. But you press on; for what reason?
And finally, when all you can see is ocean in every direction and the sea seems unnaturally still, the ocean swells as though a great ancient evil rises from the depths. A being of such age and intelligence that to stand before it is to feel your soul flee your body. The Kraken.
Defeating such an ancient being would take amazing power and inhuman bravery. Fight it. Beat it. And sail on through the fog. A small island lies, as though you were meant to find it. The next world awaits.
Quote:5+ ATK (REQUIREMENT MET!) 7+ SPD (- 4 for flight, - 1 for Burst Movement, = 2) REQUIREMENT MET!
Charlie Jagrobe was a man prone to thinking, which was out-of-character, for a pirate. He enjoyed the romance and the shanties and the robbing and the bars, just as any 'proper' pirate would, but he also liked to consider things. He considered his crew, his mates, most of all.
Former crew, now.
Ol' Carlson Thul was well-liked in the area, Delilah Thul, his daughter, was even more well-liked. Among the hidden community of pirates in the Vasty Deeps, being well-liked was a benefit one couldn't go without. Ol' Captain Thul had been summoned along with a small town on a no-name island. A thirteen year-old girl had been summoned alongside him, and the two of them, then and there, decided they were father and daughter.
A thirteen year-old girl in the life of a pirate was a dangerous one, but her existence was a stabilizing one. People were willing to help out a Pa and his child, where they wouldn't help out Thul or anyone else alone. It was strange, Charlie always thought, that if you walked into a house with a salt-crusted stolen jacket, a filthy beard, minus an eye and smelling of old wounds and new rum, you were a filthy miscreant and should Git' our ma' home! But if you had a pretty young girl following you around and calling you Pa', well, then that same man was 'Grizzled and world-weary'.
Carlson Thul knew that. And Delilah knew that. She was the weakness and the hidden heart of every low-down and rotten scoundrel in more than one harbor in the Vasty Deep. Not that the girl slept about- she didn't have to. She was everyone's daughter. And the few scoundrel's who were more than that- those men were rats, and 'proper' pirates didn't associate with that type.
Everyone wanted to be a proper pirate. The romantic kind, not the filthy robbers and murderers.
A proper pirate... he helped out a young girl when she asked, since she was a pirate too. It made robbers feel like gentlemen.
Charlie had respected those two for that. They were street-savvy and sea-savvy. They lived by making friends and keeping the crew small. They sold far away from the empire, and they didn't get into much trouble.
Then there had been Pard. Good ol' Pard. A quiet man who called himself Delilah's uncle, and he had a gentle face. When they needed errands done, needed to buy something they couldn't simply steal, they always sent Pard. Pard looked like someone's uncle, he looked like an accountant, maybe. When people saw Pard, they didn't think pirate, not unless he had a jacket and a tricorn and was sticking them with a cutlass. He liked Pard. The two had shared some drinks, shared the same room in a brothel in Camelot, once.
There was also Dallen, a pirate through-and-through. A simple guy who had the entire thing down pat. He could respect that, too. Dallen didn't consider anything. He said "Arrrgh" cause' he felt like it, and followed Captain Thul because Thul had an eyepatch and a mustache, and that was enough. Not much more to say about Dallen, other than that he had never had a poor night's sleep after murdering people. He didn't have a single regretful bone in his body. A pirate's life for him.
Lastly, had been Jim. Jim, now Jim was Charlie's best friend. He didn't consider much, but he was a good listener. Jim looked the part- he was tough, he had muscles, he wore a bandanna and had a mean expression, even when he was happy. Jim didn't carry a sword, because he was a coward. He killed people with a gun, or not at all. Jim and Charlie spent night after night together, in every sense of the word. As brothers, as lovers, as friends. They went to the bar together, to brothels together. If Charlie spent the night with a girl, Jim would too. They were practically joined at the hip, except when fighting.
When fighting, Jim would stay in the back, and watch Charlie's behind. Shoot any bastard who thought he could sneak up on Charlie.
And now.
Now they were all dead, weren't they?
And Charlie would be next, he was sure.
Charlie Jagrobe was having the worst day of his life. Just two weeks prior, he had been a mildly-successful pirate under the so-called Captain Thul. They stole from Costa Del Sol and the smaller, less protected islands nearby, hoarded their ill-gotten goods, and then smuggled it across the Nexus to Camelot.
It had been a good gig. Just the six of them, sometimes more, if they convinced some folk from nearby bars.
The six of them had just spent a week at Camelot, spreading their meager riches around, getting drunk, having fun, and relishing in the rewards of careful piracy. As their funds slowly dried, Captain Thul decided it was time to head back for the Vasty Deeps.
It was a matter of some debate, among Secondaries, what was safer.
It was well-known that whenever a Prime died they would revive in, and, while debated, were first summoned into the Omniverse within the Nexus. Bandits, scouts, wild Primes, agents of the Kingdom and even more agents of the Empire were everywhere. You couldn't go a month, often, without hearing of some brawl between self-acclaimed gods that had occurred there.
It was dangerous, for sure.
But the other alternative could be just as much so. Gate-hopping, it was called. Things tended to be more-or-less calm within the Gates, but that also meant more people. Checkpoints, guards, bandits, and bountyhunters aplenty laid within the towns that seemed to grow around each Gate.
The various verses also had inherent dangers to them. Ghouls, scorching heat, freezing cold, wizards, imperials, cartoonish freaks.
A short walk through a usually-empty place where danger could be seen coming from a mile away and the terrain was absolutely harmless looked good, in that case.
And so, the six pirates decided to cross the Nexus, rather than go gate-hopping.
They came across a strange creature. It was furry, and had a face like a goat's, but with tusks like a boar. It had a human's body, and it was clinging tightly to something made of gold.
They were five men and a woman. All armed to the teeth. They surrounded the thing, and threatened it. They were high off the fun of their little vacation, and didn't consider what should have been common sense for any Secondary in the Nexus: If you see a freak acting weirdly in the middle of the Nexus, leave them the hell alone.
Now Delilah and Jim and Pard were eerie orange ghosts, bound to that demon's lantern. The captain and Dallen had been crushed. Maybe they were ghosts too.
He just didn't know.
All he knew was, he wanted to live.
And the thing, the Beast, that was following him, didn't want him to.
Not much more to consider, there.
Larfleeze howled as he rushed into Costa Del Sol, flying at top speed down the street, spooking tourists and shopkeepers alike as he passed over their heads in a streak of orange energy. The Construct Lantern Delilah was dismissed, and returned to his ring.
"There's- there's so much STUFF!" Larfleeze said, overjoyed. He dipped down at a sunglasses stand, and then grabbed a pair. As he pushed it over his eyes, the rims turned from blue to orange, becoming part of his uniform. "Look at this! It's mine now!"
"Um... you have... you have to pay for that..?" the shopkeeper tried, hesitantly.
Larfleeze turned his gaze on her.
"...If... that's... uh..."
"These. Are my- what are these called?"
"Sunglasses?"
"These are my sunglasses now." Larfleeze ordered. He moved on, darting from one stall to the next, grinning like an idiot, grabbing trinkets, and shoving them into an Orange Light Construct bag emanating from his ring.
Several more people complained, or even tried to order him to pay, or threatened to call the police, but the Orange Lantern didn't give a damn as he grabbed thing after thing.
After all that time in the Nexus without any stuff at all, it felt sooo good to have material possessions once more.
"Hey! Are you making trouble?" Larfleeze turned in mid-air, looking at the person who was shouting at him. The man was another like he had seen in the Nexus, wearing the white armor.
"Oh! You're that guy!" Larfleeze darted down, his glowing bag following behind him, "You helped me in the white place!"
"The... Nexus? I've never seen you before. You're probably thinking of another stormtrooper."
"Well, he told me about Omnilium, and I got my Battery back!" Larfleeze said, gesturing with his head to the Central Power Battery hooked under his arm.
"Well... sir, you're... a Prime, correct?"
"Yes." Larfleeze said, in perfect confidence, not knowing at all whether it was true or not.
"Well, then I understand you might not know how it works around here." the stormtrooper said. "Stealing is illegal."
Larfleeze good mood promptly vanished, and his symbols glowed brighter, "Okay."
"So..." the stormtrooper looked pointedly to the bag, and Larfleeze instinctually moved it closer to his body.
"This stuff is all Mine."
The stormtrooper decided he didn't want to die today. "Look, all you have to do is pay for it."
"...I have to give something away?" Larfleeze snarled, "Something that belongs to me?!"
"Sir-"
"No! It's mine! All my things are mine!"
"Look, just give the shopkeepers you've stolen from the necessary Omnilium, and that'll be that." the stormtrooper said, his hand slowly moving closer to his laser pistol. "And don't steal anything else afterwards. We'll consider this a first warning, and there'll be no trouble, right?"
Larfleeze glared, "Give people MY Omnilium!? My shiny stuff?!"
"You did it before, didn't you?" the stormtrooper said, his hand now in contact with the pistol.
"I never gave anything away in my life!"
"It's not giving it's- It's trading!"
Larfleeze paused, "...Trading?"
"Yeah! Trading." the stormtrooper saw a possible lifeline and grabbed onto it, "You just said, that you used some Omnilium to get your-" he gestured to the Battery, "-thing back, right? It's like that. You took something from the shop keepers, so you need to trade them, some of your Omnilium back."
"...I don't like it."
"Well... it's the rules."
"I don't like the rules!" he complained.
The stormtrooper shifted in place, "Look, either pay them, or you'll find yourself in a lot of trouble. You don't want to go to prison, right?"
"...Ugh." Larfleeze frowned, drawing forth some Omnilium. "FINE! But just this once. Got it!?" Larfleeze winced as he dropped the small glob of glowing material on the floor. He looked at the glob regretfully, "But... this is only because that other guy in white helped me get my lantern back, okay? Don't get used to it!" he snarled, before flying up into the air, and heading away from the little market.
The stormtrooper let out a sigh of relief. It wasn't quite following protocols, but he held up the law- kind of. And avoided a bloodbath with an angry, obviously not quite-all-there Prime.
He bent down to pick up the Omnilium.
It was enough to buy maybe one pair of sunglasses.
The stormtrooper sighed.
Larfleeze landed on the top of one of the sky-scrapers of Costa Del Sol, and turned the orange bag upside down before dismissing his Construct.
"I love it." he said, looking over the beginning of his new hoard. He picked up a small plastic dashboard ornament of a hula-dancing twi'lek and gave it a small flick, watching as it danced, "So refined!", he picked up a painted shell, and held it up in the sun, moving it back and forth, "Glistening!", he tossed a bead-and-shell necklace over his head, letting it fall onto his chest. The beads turned black, and the shells turned a rich orange, absorbed into his 'uniform', "Majestic!" he opened a brochure for a hotel in southern Costa Del Sol, "So informative!", he laid out three postcards, "Works of art!" he set a plastic shovel meant for children down next to them, and grinned, "Useful!"
His treasures were then pulled into his last remaining treasure, a small orange children's backpack. Zipping it shut, containing his precious Stuff and Things, he looked down at his fingers and thought things over.
"Let's see... there's something... missing. Hm."
"Hssssssssss"
He looked towards the Battery, where the Ophidian informed him of what he was trying to think of, and his eyebrows furrowed, "Oh yeah! That thief! He's mine! But he's not here." he said, regretful, touching his ring, "And I didn't turn him into Omnilium either!"
"SSSssssS!"
"You're right. I'll find him!"
"Sssss"
"He can't have gone far."
Charlie Jagrobe was heading as far away as he could possibly get.
He barged into the small bar that usually had a few regulars from less-reputable harbors. One of them recognized him straight off, and got up to ask what was wrong when he saw the expression on Charlie's face.
"Delilah's dead." he said mournfully. Truthfully, if he said what he was most emotional over, he'd have told them Jim was dead. But these men didn't care for Jim.
They did care that the sweetheart of the poorer harbors was gone.
"No!"
"Not dear Delilah!"
"How'd Ol' Thul let it happen, the bastard?"
"It was a Prime." Charlie said, spinning his tale. It was all true, even, he just needed to make the story into something that would help him stay alive, "We were crossing the Nexus, and the Captain, Ol' Carlson Thul, he sees this sickening devil. Lying on the floor. Now, we go over, to see if he's alive."
"And to steal his boots, perhaps?" a drunkard added, before quickly being hushed. He might have been encouraged by this crowd, if the story hadn't started with the death of a girl they were fond of.
"Aye, I'll admit it. But it wasn't boots the Captain was after, damn his soul, it was the Lantern."
"The Lantern?"
"The Beast's Lantern!" Charlie continued, looking into their eyes. He would have grinned, but that would have lost em', "The Beast's cursed lantern. The captain asks the devil if the Lantern was valuable, if it was gold, and the Beast said to us- 'No! Yes! Go away!', but our Captain, he doesn't listen. He tells Ol' Pard to kill the foul thing, and that's when it began." Charlie let the tears fall once more, and they were genuine, "Good ol' Pard, the Beast, he grabbed him and pushed him into the ground, and kept on pushing, til Pard was dead!"
"God!"
"And then, he reaches into the Lantern, and he drags by the head a serpent, and he has the struggling devil snake bite Pard's corpse... and then, Pard's soul was gone, trapped in that Lantern. Pard began glowing orange, and his body put itself back together... and then he got turned into a gold ring, that's still on the Beast's finger. Then he killed Jim, my brother Jim! He just murdered my brother, cause Jim, he turned around, and he was gonna shoot the Beast, but then the Beast killed him, and pressed the ring to his skull, and then Jim was orange too!"
"No!"
"And then Jim, poor tortured Jim, he sent the orange ghost to run down dear Delilah!"
"Not Delilah!" Charlie shook his head. They were eating the story up, at the very least. He kept his eyes on the windows, in case orange light drifted by.
"Jim's ghost, the Beast has him lift Delilah into the air, up and up, higher than a mast, and then, Delilah, she doesn't stop fighting, you know?"
"We know!" a man cried mournfully.
"Delilah, she knocks the ghost's arm off, and banishes him with her sword... but she was high up, and then she fell... and the Beast put his ring to her too. She turned orange, and her ghost went after her own father! And poor Carlson, he couldn't fight his own little girl, not even her phantom!"
"Oh gods!"
"And the Beast killed him, and killed Dallen, and then it was jes' me." Charlie finished, "Not even twenty minutes ago." he said, quietly, "I think it's after me, brothers."
"..." the bar quieted, looking to each other, looking to the windows. Looking to him. Charlie knew, he knew, that many of these men were murderers. Killers. Robbers. People who've taken daughters from mothers and fathers from sons, and vice-versa. They were criminals and filth, just like Charlie.
But they were pirates.
And pirates, they thought they were rogues. Proper pirates. Pirates with romance and freedom and all that. They need to believe that, need to believe they're not just worthless scum of the sea. That's why they were kind to the young girl and her Pa'. That's why they sung songs, and told stories, and believed the stories they heard.
Charlie Jagrobe was a man who considered things.
The Captain and his daughter, they considered things too. They understood, that every pirate in the room believed that they were false pirates, and that the others around them were proper pirates. They all told their tall tales, and they believed them all. Believed in all the ones except the ones they told themselves.
Helping him, Charlie, out. That'd be the proper romance pirate thing to do.
"Of course we'll help ya' Charlie." a grizzled sea dog said with conviction, "For the sake of Ol' Thul and dear Delilah!"
Charlie let out a sigh of relief.
"How do we kill the Beast?" a pirate shouted.
"We cannae." another sailor threw in.
"He'd just become a ghost, like Delilah and Jim!"
"But Delilah, she stabbed Jim's ghost and banished him, didn' she?"
"But e's a Prime! Primes, they don't stay dead!"
Charlie frowned, this wasn't the direction he wanted them to go in, "Aye" he began, "they don't stay dead. But I know that the Beast is chasing me, and I know my time is up. I think, what I need to do, is sink that Lantern of his into the sea. Deep, deep into the sea, so that Delilah and Jim and Pard... so that they could be at rest. Killing him here int' city, he'll just come back, mad, and he'll kill us all eventually... but if I can lead him far enough out, and we kill him there!"
"...How far out, lad?"
"Farther than we've been before." He wanted to run. He would run until he couldn't chase after.
That was another thing, about Primes, that he had considered. They're all children, basically. Or act like it. They fight cause' it's fun. They kill people and get surprised by the consequences. This creature, the Beast, especially. If Charlie got far enough out into the sea, the Beast'd get bored of him. Forget all about him.
There are so many islands in the Vasty Deep, and many of them have people. He should know, he had been born like that, already an adult, on a nameless island with a tiny port town.
Born as part of the setting.
He had tried being a pirate, and he had lost his mate to it.
He was ready to go back to being part of the setting again. Other Secondaries, they were always looking for extra hands, extra guards to protect against the horrors of the Omniverse.
He'd let this merry band of brigands, out to avenge a young pirate lady who they had all pretended to hold precious in their hearts, ferry him out into the depth of the Deeps. He'd slip away, and leave them all as feed for the Beast. A consolation prize.
And then the Beast would grow bored, and he'd slip away to the next big conflict. And then Charlie would be left in peace, to mourn Jim and his crewmates on his own terms and on his own time.
That was his plan.
"...I wanna steal." Larfleeze complained to the Ophidian, sitting on a roof, looking down at the carts. "But I don't wanna give up my Omnilium. And I don't want to kill that guy who- well, who's related to the guy who helped me."
"Hsssshss"
"I know. It's confusing. I want two things, but I can't have both." he sighed, "It's dumb... Hey, have you found the scent of the thief yet?"
"ssssss"
"I know my nose is better than yours, but I'm too busy looking at STUUUFF." he complained even more, "Make yourself useful for once."
"SSSS! Hssss! HSssHsss!"
"Drama queen." Larfleeze muttered.
He watched, in fascination, as a tourist below, a child, walking with his parents, held up a small stuffed animal.
He watched, in confusion, as the child dropped it, and it fell in the mud. He bent down to pick it up, and then was pulled away by his parents.
The child complained, before forgetting about it.
Leaving that precious toy behind!
"YES!" he dove from the roof, snatching it up, and covering it with orange light. It was once more in pristine condition. He delivered it to the backpack, and hovered back up to his roof "Ingenious! If they already drop it, it's not stealing!"
"....sssss"
"No, you're pathetic. Now sniff! I want my thief!"
Quote:3,560 words 20,072 characters according to wordcounter.net
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