Name: Ru Bain
Nickname: "The Witch"
Gender: Female
Age: 512
Species: Ascendant (immortal human)
Homeworld: Earth
Social Status: Independent faction leader
Items:

• A black steel pike with a bladed head and hooks for dismounting riders. She's quite practiced with it. The weapon is enchanted with the power to destroy Void matter, a useless power in modern magical warfare. More concerning is its divine blessing, which grants it the power to banish the spirits of those it kills. While it's not any more powerful versus mortals than any other weapon, it's a whole other matter versus immortals. Anyone with supernatural longevity, like herself, is vulnerable to permanent death if this weapon deals them a mortal blow.
• A former Imperial Sage named Linus that- "Hey, I'm not an item!" -knows countless powerful spells and- "Don't objectify me! Are you even listening?" -rivals the greatest mages in power. He thinks he's an independent person, but we all know he's just a tool for- "Why don't you come a little closer and repeat that?" Oh, fine, he can be an NPC then. Just so long as he...stays over there...
• A featureless bone-white mask that covers her entire face. It's surprisingly durable. It is held in place by an enchantment, and can be removed by touching all five fingers to select edges of the mask.
• A black hooded cloak that is fire-resistant, water-resistant, insulated, and doesn't conduct electricity. Not terribly useful in a melee fight, but it'll withstand elemental magic in a pinch.
• Enchanted chain-mail armor, because she'd rather not be cut to bloody ribbons and have to respawn butt-naked. The pain is unpleasant too. Dying would ruin her evening.
• An enchanted "bluetooth" device for remote communication with her subordinates. Ru designed it, Linus enchanted it.

Powers/Abilities: She is immortal. That's it. She has no magic ability, no powerful talents, nothing to make her stand out (besides uncommon beauty granted when she became immortal). She knows and understands the principles of magic a bit better than most, around the level of sages, and she can hold her own in a fight with most types of weapons, but that's more due to her long age than anything else.

No, her main strength is that she cannot be killed in any way that matters, as she is fundamentally a spiritual being (like angels or sprites - hence the label "Ascendant"). She materializes her body with any select non-living matter from the surrounding area over several hours, and if wounded, can restore it to full health in similar fashion. She cannot dematerialize. The only thing that can truly harm her is a Baneblade, a special kind of magic weapon blessed with divine/miraculous power to banish spirits to the afterlife. If such a weapon deals her body a mortal wound, her spirit will be immediately banished, permanently ending her physical life.

Appearance: Commissioned art of her outfit awaiting completion by Sho Minazuki. Wears a black cloak and hood, and a featureless bone-white mask covers her face under the hood. Beneath all her coverings, she is a stunning silver-haired beauty with a voice to match.

Personality: She almost doesn't fit the profile of a villain. Kindhearted, soft-spoken, and a little too romantic for her own good, she would seem better suited to the role of a priestess were it not for her drive and intimidating posture. This woman wants power, as much as she can possibly get, of both political and magical kinds. She has begun a campaign of conquest against all the major powers, recruiting as many isekai'd summons and talented individuals she can get her hands on. She's been tight-lipped about her reasons, but rumor has it she saw something horrifying when she became immortal that drove her to such measures.

Backstory: Unbeknownst to the rest of the world, she was summoned here like the others. Emperor Dragan, Lord of the Seven Realms and Master of the Mystic Arts, summoned her out of time and space to become his servant. She was previously a computer programmer for a major developer, so when the summoning spell looked for an individual with superior knowledge of "magic," she was a logical target. The assessment proved accurate. The skills she developed for programming carried over to the writing of magic spells, giving her a natural talent over any other mages.

There was just one problem: being from the modern world, she could wield no magic of her own. So the king contracted her with a powerful spirit, putting immense, unfathomable power at her fingertips - at a cost she never would have accepted had she known. At first, she was overjoyed; who wouldn't be happy to wield incredible fantastic powers? Over time, however, she noticed dark, voided splotches forming on her body. Magic instructors told her it was a good sign, that it meant she was attuning to her contracted spirit and was thus getting better at magic casting. So she ignored them. The splotches got bigger and bigger, until they covered entire limbs - at which point she realized they were not merely covering her body, but consuming it. There was no flesh within the darkness.

Frightened, she tried to stop using magic entirely and sought for ways to reverse the corruption, but it was too late. The fiend had consumed enough of her body to seize control over it, and began using her against her will for its own agendas. The darkness continued to spread until the last cell of her flesh belong to it, after which the fiend dragged her down to the dark underbelly of the world.

There she witnessed a hell on earth. Millions upon millions of shadowy fiends, each stronger than the Emperor's mightiest warriors, writhed within the world's core, growing in both power and number with each passing day. Daemons possessed the bodies of monsters and animals to bring death to the living, while Reapers stole the departed souls to bring them back for the horde to consume. The few individuals they brought back alive were devoured, healed, and devoured again for as long as their minds could withstand it.

Unwilling to consign herself to such a fate, Ru struggled desperately against the fiend to regain control of herself. She spent years just learning how to stay alive, and many years more fighting back against a being far stronger than her. She did not regain mastery of herself until centuries later, when she finally ate away enough of her captor's soul to kill it and consume its mana. Now wearing the "skin" (so to speak) of her defeated foe, she fled the underbelly of the world and rose back up to the surface, where she determined to build an army capable of stopping the fiends should they ever decide to venture out of their hole.

While we're waiting, I'd like to make some additional lore proposals.

Voidspawn: Spirits from a higher plane of existence, freed from their dimensional Void prison (hence their moniker). While they are not inherently evil, the vast majority have no qualms resorting to underhanded means to acquire physical form (part of the reason they were imprisoned in the first place). They cannot materialize a body without first consuming one, and they generally can't consume one without first killing it (except in special circumstances). They possess no inherent magical powers of their own, but they can acquire them if they possess a body that has such powers. They possess sapient intellect and are theoretically capable of intelligent communication, though they do not see any benefit in talking to their food.

Once they acquire a mortal body "blueprint," it is imprinted on their soul and becomes their own, to be used and materialized at will. Death is meaningless to them, as they can always regenerate from surrounding matter when damaged. The only way to permanently end them is by dealing them a mortal blow with a Bane weapon.

Empire of Hume: AKA the "Human Empire," this domain was conquered by the legendary Emperor Dragan over 500 years ago, and remains a world superpower to this day. Emperor Dragan pioneered the first uses of magic in the New World, and is considered the Father of Modern Magecraft. He acquired functional immortality (agelessness) through human sacrifice, which prompted the development of Bane weapons to kill him.

Since then, both his descendants and usurpers have sat on his throne, and it was only recently that stability was re-established by the current Emperor Jaelhorn Dragan. The Empire has fragmented a little since its inception, with various races breaking off to establish their own nations, but its human population has remained largely unified.

Zodiac Tribes: Twelve monster tribes live in the inhospitable Badlands, each named after a sign of the Zodiac.

• Aries Tribe: Dragonkin (kobolds, dragonborn, dragons, etc.)
• Taurus Tribe: Home to a number of animal-headed beasts, including the titular Minotaurs (bullheads) and Orcs (pigheads).
• Gemini Tribe: Home to the various fey races, such as faeries, dryads, nymphs, sprites, and such like.
• Cancer Tribe: Despite the name suggesting it consists of crustaceans, it has instead become a home to the smaller "cancerous" races like goblins and gremlins. Hobgoblins, or "Uruks" (what we usually think of as orcs) are also part of this tribe.
• Leo Tribe: Home to a variety of furry mammalian races, including Leonin, Lupin, Ursa, Ratmen, etc.
• Virgo Tribe: Elves (high elves, dark elves), long-lived humanoids. Contrary to popular belief, they possess no inherent magical powers, but unlike humans, they are capable of acquiring it naturally with meditation and practice.
• Libra Tribe: Primarily Halflings (dwarves, hobbits, gnomes, etc.), a race of short, underground dwellers
• Scorpio Tribe: Home to a variety of insectoid races, including Formics and Driders.
• Sagittarius Tribe: Home to the various four-legged beasts, like Centaurs, Fauns, Manticores, Griffins, etc.
• Capricornus Tribe: Home to a variety of goatlike races, particularly Tieflings and Satyrs.
• Aquarius Tribe: Home to various aquatic races, like Sahagin, Merfolk, Selkie, etc.
• Pisces Tribe: The twelfth "lost tribe" said to have consisted of demigods. No one is quite sure what happened to it.

What if the players each got a crucial role to play in the story? This might sound obvious, but it's probably not what you're thinking. Like, each player needs to have a crucial, plot-driving role, kind of like my Witch. For example, someone could be the Emperor of Hume, or the Elf Queen's champion, or the Witch's right hand. Each role should be important to the plot, such that the story would not work without them. That way, each player feels important and motivated to write.

This would require a bit more worldbuilding, though.

If we're looking for something more balanced, elves could be "prey humans," so to speak. They'd be ageless, but more fragile, with delicate bodies more prone to serious injury or illness, so they'd die off at about the same rate as humans. Monsters and animals alike might hunt them due to their physical weakness and softer flesh, so elves would have to resort to magic, rather than physical strength, to protect themselves. Their vulnerability to disease might also explain why they would 1) stay in their forest, where the climate is ideal for them, and 2) reject visitors into their cities, who could be carrying diseases that are deadly to them. Adventuring elves would have to be particularly powerful and skilled with magic, able to cast vitality spells to survive hostile environments, and combat spells to fight off the most dangerous threats.

I was also thinking over the isekai process, how the characters are getting to the New World, and it occurred to me that we may want to give the players some freedom in how it goes down.

Let me explain. For starters, there's several different "prompts" and several different "destinations."

Isekai Prompts

• Death: Whether you were hit by Truck-kun, drowned in a toilet, died of cancer, or a 101 Other Ways to Die, your passing prompted travel to the New World.
• Movement: Your body was moved to the New World somehow, whether by summoning from someone in the New World, magic dreams, MMORPG gone wrong, or you walked into a wardrobe and found a lamppost.

Isekai Destinations

• Same Old Body, Brand New World: You arrive in the New World as yourself. Whether you arrive unchanged or with new features is up to you.
• Brand New Body, Brand New World: You arrive in the New World in a whole new body. Whether it's a better body or a worse one depends on the story you want to tell.
• You're the Demon, Actually: You possess an existing individual's body, like in those "Reincarnated as a Villainess" novels, and kick out its original owner.

Any combination of these can result in a very different character and story, and I think it could be a whole lot of fun to let players decide on how they got here. Heck, it could be fun to let them decide when they got here. Adding all these variables to the isekai process would make searching for the reincarnations an interesting challenge, the kind of struggle players might want to engage in. I know I would. The Witch would have to really put on her Thinking Cap and put a strategy together in order to locate all the reincarnations, and I'm really looking forward to writing that. I imagine other players would enjoy that challenge too.

I intend to play as the main antagonist, The Witch. Her goal is to build the most powerful army in the world in order to fight off an even greater threat. To that end, she needs to recruit as many reincarnations as she can and conquer the world.

As for worldbuilding, there's definitely opportunities for growth. We've got one major power so far - the Empire of Hume - but humanity tends to fragment more than it tends to unite, so there's definitely other nations in the world vying for power. Feel free to propose some! I've got a few ideas of my own to build upon; maybe one of them will spark your interest.

• Empire of Hume, an imperialistic, orderly, and slightly villainous nation.
• Zodiac Tribes, a loose association of nonhuman groups.
• An avian nation would be fun. They could be birds, but not necessarily. Floating islands are, like, the definition of high-fantasy.
• A pirate nation! Cliche, but fun. Maybe they're just islanders or something. In a couple RPs I hosted, they were the Coronal Islands, a confederation of surprisingly advanced islanders, kind of like dark-skinned tribal British in a way.
• A desert nation that has to get creative to survive. The Uruks (think Saruman's Uruk-hai) of the Cancer Tribe would probably be the most developed here. They're not necessarily evil, but they may be prone to serving any charismatic leader who promises money and women.
• A traditional medieval kingdom with adventuring guilds and stuff, to ease players into the New World. I imagine they might come into conflict with the Empire.

About leveling systems, I have a few notes.

We could do this Zelda-style, where accomplishing major objectives gives unique powers or items. In one story I'm (trying) writing, the main character has a time-travel power that initially lets him reverse time by five seconds once a day. Accomplishing key objectives allows him to improve this power a little, either by letting him go back further in time or do so more often. We could do something similar for the player characters; whichever power they choose for themselves, completing story objectives will let them improve upon it. They could also acquire important items, like a Baneblade or a new form of Plot Armor.

Name: Robert James Avant

Nicknames/Titles: The Automated Sorcerer

Gender: Male

Age: 29

Species: Human

Social status: Independent Contractor

Appearance: A thin and frail eccentric gentleman with steely silver-colored eyes sporting an unusually seen combover hairstyle. He kept his dirt-colored hair short and over his head to leave his forehead bare. Despite being dubbed the sorcerer, he does not wear the typical cloak and hood associated with wizards, but instead prefers a rather aristocratic black wool gambeson worn over a dark-blue tunic and black breech. The gambeson would be long-sleeved whenever he goes out for long, and sleeveless when at home or muddling around his neighborhood.

Personality: On the one hand, Robert is very self-confident, arrogant even, most often expressed in his humor. He is witty, sociable, and does not shy away from most topics, except for a small project that he will only say he's working on. Quite a man to have a conversation with. But this only really happens when Robert is well-engaged in the conversation. If not, then his response will be terse, awkward even. After all, despite the social savviness, Robert is an introvert at heart, often reclusive and a little paranoid when it comes to things he love doing.

Powers/Abilities: Robert is knowledgeable in all forms of magic, and can perform almost all the simple schools of magic at an intermediate level, but comparing to well-trained wizards, he falls behind on pretty much all aspects. He relies on his craftsmanship and engineering knowledge in order to best these individuals.

Skills/Talents: When it comes to spending weeks to create magically-powered piece of machinery that can do the job of five wizards, or an automated magic sensor, Robert is the man to call. He is weak magically, but incredibly efficient and pragmatic whenever he applies them.

Personal possessions:
- Double-edged knife
- A set of simple tools like hammer/axe/ropes
- Crystals for restoring mana

Backstory: He is 29 years old, but his last traces only dates 8 years back in this world. The first time the public knew of his presence was when he introduced a magically-powered heat sensors to automatically guide ballista towards its targets. It was a surreal experience for the onlookers, both commoners and wizards alike. Magic users have long been able to sense heat, but to be able to help guide weapons automatically was unthinkable, and honestly quite unsettling for some of the wizards. He was invited to work on various secret weaponries from various factions, but sensing the discontent amongst the magic-world, Robert politely declined and instead switched to working freelance and on more...positive public work.

This does not really ease tensions between him and the wizards. Their fear was driven by jealousy and elitism that a man of weak magical prowess could do the things they can't do. His eccentricity attitude and appearance made him stand out, while his often high demands from his customers didn't help him. He ran into various incidents with them and after a particularly nasty one decided to move out entirely and set up his headquarter near a small village. There he lived reclusively, working almost obsessively on a project that he refused to speak about, but would still entertain anyone who would pay him a visit.