the great escape.The Circle has quite a lot on their plate, this time around. Multiple players are fighting for the control of Akvos, and many difficult choices to make. No matter what path you choose, though, one thing is for certain: it is a bitter fight to the death to ensure that Akvos remains standing, one way or another. There are three main areas for the characters to explore in the final log of Akvos: (1) The Kingdom of Akvos, where the King is fighting to seize control; (2) The Rift, where the characters will encounter the Dreamscapes; and (3) The Kingdom of Polankos, which is where King Ka'pouli has reigned since his arrival in the pocket dimension. Decisions made in all there areas will affect the outcome of Akvos, so get to exploring.  THE ASSAULT ON WAHINE.The King’s forces will attack in three different fronts. There will be mermen attacking from above, riding saddled giant seahorses and manta rays, launching spears at the mermaid-warriors below with terrifying precision. They seem to be indiscriminate, in their aim -- the weaponry, charged with the same dark energy that the shadow creatures seem to be made out of, find their target in civilians and warriors alike, raining down a sea of terror upon the central stronghold of the Kingdom of Akvos.
The mermen will also be attacking at the ground-level, attempting to burst their way through the Palace Gates to flood the city with numbers. While the mermaids outnumber the mermen, the mermen are certainly more brutal than the mermaids. Some of them, though, in finding the city, are more concerned with looting it than with senselessly murdering everyone inside. Indeed, this is the most food they have seen in a long time -- and markets are destroyed in grabbing as much food and riches as they can, pressing closer to the Palace, and toward the Queen's stronghold.
And, finally, they will be attacking from below, navigating their way through a network of tunnels meant to transport goods and bursting their way into people’s homes, to sneak their way closer to their ultimate goal, which seems to be the Palace itself.
The Circle's main goal, here, is to protect civilians, usher theminto the underground strongholds beneath the Palace, and fight for their own lives should they attack the mermen first. Man the wall, if you so choose, to attempt to block the air attacks from the mantas. Fight on the ground, to protect Akvos from destruction. Or make your way to the underground strongholds and tunnels, to block access to the Palace. All of these will certainly assist in keeping Akvos safe.
In addition, please remember that shadow creatures (which can only be killed by magical means) are still making their way through the entirety of Akvos. While King Ka'pouli's forces are targeting the Palace of Wahine, the shadow creatures are still present everywhere. Get to killing!  INTO THE RIFT.Some of you, however, have elected to traverse into the mysterious rift that appeared in the midst of the Fields of Akvosia. It looks like a black hole into nothingness, crackling with odd energy . . . and passing through it feels as though you have stepped through an icy waterfall. For a moment, you cannot breathe -- and then, you are treated to beauty.
The gaps between time and space are full of sparkling lights, bolts of rainbow starlight winding around you as you move through the uncertainty that is the void. It seems endless, but something inside you is tugging you forward . . . and, suddenly, there is a soft voice in your ear. A familiar one, to those who reside within the Circle . . . the confused voice of Astoria.
 "Hello? My Travelers? How are you within the Void?" The Void? That word hadn't been used to describe whatever this magical place is before, but . . . well, a witch with the ability to send you all across the universe probably knows what she's talking about, right? "That should not be possible . . . who opened this doorway?"
You can tell her, or you can not. It seems to matter not, because: "Is this not getting through? Why can I not hear you . . . but I can feel you, I can -- please, if you can hear this, be careful. The Void is not something for mortals to interact with, and it can show you terrible things -- terrible things, so please--"
And, right before you have the opportunity to respond to our benevolent witch (or captor, depending on your point of view), you see a bizarre glass-like surface in front of you. It looks like a mirror, and you see a perfect reflection of yourself. It is absolutely captivating, and it beckons you . . . almost urging you to touch it. And Astoria's whisper grows a bit louder, more urgent:
"My dear Traveler, be careful what you encounter here -- can you hear me? Can you see me? I am trying to get you out of there, to bring you back home--Akvos is--"
But it is too late.
Your fingers graze the edge of the mirror, and you are pulled -- a sensation that is familiar to you, the same pull in your stomach that you feel whenever Astoria thrusts you across the universe, into new realities. And, when you blink your eyes again, and look around . . . you are no longer in Akvos, or the Void. You are somewhere entirely new.
Welcome to the Dreamscape.  THE KINGDOM OF POLANKOS.Once the Circle emerges from the Rift and the Dreamscape, they will stumble into another world . . . but this one's wateris shallow, in comparison to the massive depths of the crystal-clear kingdom of Akvos. You can quite clearly see the surface, here, and there are shallows that allow you to come up onto islands, tropical in nature with fruit, odd creatures that appear to be multiple-headed monkeys and parrots, and sandy shores. It's a bit jarring to see, after spending so long underwater. Indeed, you emerge to trudge onto land, and look around, somewhat mystified that the deep-dwelling mermen would be from a place like this.
However, exploring the islands (which is not very difficult to do, as they are all small and will not take very much time) will yield the discovery that on the islands themselves are tunnels -- underwater caverns that thread through the islands to much deeper water. It's almost as if the islands themselves are barriers to the underwater caverns below -- shallow water, a layer of land, and then a (mer)man-made bubble of water below the barrier of land. And that whoever lived on these islands tunneled through them to find deeper water. Princess Kea, (who will attend on these journeys, while remaining in the water), will tell the Circle members that King Ka'pouli told her that when the mermen were cast out, they landed on solid land, and had to slowly dig deeper to their salvation.
Navigating through these tunnels will be somewhat perilous -- and the Circle members will need to carry Princess Kea to the nearest tunnel to get her into some water, because while she can breathe on the surface for a certain period of time, she cannot navigate the land as quickly as you people with legs. Additionally, underwater caving isn't exactly a blast, but the deeper you go, the more clues of civilization you can find. And, eventually, once you go deep enough, you emerge into a massive underwater cavern to find the small Kingdom of Polankos.
In comparison to the Kingdom of Akvos, Polankos is witheringly depressing. It is not brightly colored, nor open -- indeed, it is tiny, with mermen huddled together waiting patiently for the forces that went through the rift to return. There is not a lot to find here, save for some interesting weapons that possess a dark energy, versus a lightning energy -- and those weapons will be given to the Circle members who ask for them, because those who wield them are in no condition to fight. There is little food, little room to sleep, and these are a people clearly in need of assistance.
In order to get them out of Polankos, you will need to usher them through the tunnels back up to the Rift above -- it seems that King Ka'pouli opened the Rift on the surface, rather than risk the city below in case it did not work. The mermen there (who seem to be elderly and weak) will be eager for the assistance to get out Polankos, and at the promise of being brought into Akvos, they will happily go. There will be no resistance from them.
You may also see Princess Kea, who has filtered in and out of the Rift to assist on the journey -- teary-eyed, heartbroken at the sight of these individuals who require rescue, organizing the mermen with the promise of keeping them safe in Akvos.
"Hurry," she tells you, as she rouses another merman into getting to the nearest tunnel. "We do not have a lot of time to pull this off, and we must work quickly." Additionally, please feel free to write up and work with your own prompts! These areas of the world are presented as jumping off points for your characters, not limitations. The idea of this world- as with all the others- is to explore -- you may use as much leeway as you want in order to come up with what your character will do, especially in the Dreamscapes. If you have any other questions, please feel free to ask them back on the various threads back in the OOC post from before! |
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acatalepsy_logs2019-01-04 10:22 am
no subject
He doesn’t want to look at 9S, but he doesn’t want to look at a diagram of the repellant body he has to go back to when they get out of here. He preferred the mental game of telephone he was in the middle of, where he hadn’t seen this long enough that he could fudge it, into something still horrible, but maybe a little mistaken.
Yes. It makes sense. Think about it. Now Catherine sounds almost excited about it, about this discovery, or about explaining it, maybe.
It’s faded into noise. Simon looks away, face white, not wanting to answer, not able to answer until his voice unsticks from his throat. He wants to jump out of his skin, and he’s not even in that body right now. ] Yeah.
[ All those simplistic minds we've run into... just reviving a dead person doesn't seem to work that well. A robot body seems to make people a bit... unreliable. It’s a hypothesis. She’s musing to herself. You are the best of both worlds. A sound mind in a sound body. He barely hears it, now, but it sounds even less credible.
Then it goes quiet.
What the fuck else does he say? He’s using all of his brainpower to feel weird and guilty for concealing it to everybody he’s met in the past year and also justify it to himself simultaneously.
He settles on, hollow, ] Yeah, something.
no subject
The conversation around them finishes, shedding more light to the scenario; if the diagrams before him weren't enough, "body of an old colleague" and "half a dead person" sure add to it. It's hard to know how to respond even without Simon going utterly still, paling. 9S has a tendency to dig deeper into the unknowns that face him, no matter how detrimental doing so may be, but this time, he thinks he may need to leave this one alone.
Still, it's a shock, to put it lightly, and grappling with his feelings on the matter is a tough one. How? No, he knows; the WAU, responsible for the state of everything in this dying place. 9S eyes the barnacle-like growth across the room with disdain. ]
... Simon, you—
[ 9S stops short, then shakes his head. It seems he's still at a total loss, but at the very least, he circles away from the monitors in lieu of saying he won't read any more than he already has. ]
no subject
He responds, quickly, as soon as 9S cuts himself off. ] We should keep moving.
[ Behind them, the monitor goes black. The Compound Examiner’s lights go off, and a few of the overhead fluorescents go dark, enough to dim the room.
Almost immediately, noises start coming from the robot on the table, of motors and attempts at movement. Its eyes move, the same incandescent red as Simon’s with that same consistent tick of actuators, back and forth, up and down, as if trying to understand its surroundings. Its limbs are almost toy-like — like the Helpers’, but smaller, simpler, with rudimentary little claw-hands that twitch at its sides.
Another one. Simon steps toward it, cautiously.
It’s soon apparent that the sounds are coming both from its mechanical parts and from the microphone, but for a few moments, the latter are so garbled as to be unintelligible. Then it resolves into something fuzzy, like a bad recording, and for a few moments more it’s strangely modulated until it becomes recognizable. It’s still overlaid with static, but not enough to drown out the familiar adolescent surliness.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, yeah—doesn’t matter—matter—Yeah, yeah— It’s like a collection of soundbytes, cutting abruptly into each other. Simon looks up at 9S to see if he’s, you know, hearing this shit.
The machine fizzles, its LED eyes shifting quickly, most of the rest of it seemingly unable to move.
—eams. Dreams. 2B. Sweet dreams. 2B. ]
no subject
After the initial surprise, 9S grits his teeth, muttering a low, sharp 'shit'. The kind that's figured out there's definitely a problem happening here, and why. ]
What the hell do you think you're doing?
[ 9S' voice is suddenly several volumes louder in its direction, and no less razor-edged, like perhaps he's expecting something beyond this machine and the growth its connected by to hear him beyond this room. Potential proxies lingering around this floor be damned; sorry not sorry about that, Simon. ]
no subject
So he gets it. He understands the yelling. But also, even as Simon moves to touch 9S’s arm, to try to stop him, there’s a distant screech, neither human nor animal. Heart in his throat, he immediately changes course and circles around the table to yank the WAU-cord from the robot, which goes still and silent, eyes dimming. The intermittent sprays of sparks stop.
Simon pointedly raises his finger to his lips, trying to catch 9S’s eyes through his blindfold, then looking at the door, posture a stiff, hunted slouch. No Yelling Holy Shit.
It does mean 9S is spared a discussion of whether or not having your memories absconded with by a machine feels as fucked up to him as it does when it happens to a human, though. So like... there’s that. ]
no subject
If nothing else, he does stop yelling, but that doesn't mean 9S has taken into consideration why Simon is quietly hushing him while looking like a spooked prey animal. Voice lowered, he hisses out: ]
—What?