Ashgan

The Darkness Encroaches

Lucienne Desrosiers - The Seeker

Name

Lucienne Desrosiers

Occupation

Though named a knight of the crown, she is effectively a foreign agent on a secret mission.

Physical Attributes

Lucienne is a woman who carries herself with pride and dignity wherever she goes. There is something regal in her measured stride and her azure blue eyes carry the slightest hint of arrogance and disdain – although she is good at hiding her thoughts. Her attire also reflects an origin of certain prestige, consisting of a dark blue coat and skirt richly emblazoned with a complex but tasteful pattern of black embroidery and gilded buttons. On occasions where her skin might show, it becomes clear that she must lead an active lifestyle as can be gleaned from her toned body and athletic build. It is somewhat difficult to estimate her age, though she is likely no older than forty at most.

Other than the clothes on her back, her only other possessions appear to be a small, key-locked suitcase and, most unusually, a very elegant, bladed rapier.

OOC: Honestly, I'm not super at describing clothes, so here's a reference I referred to.

Mental Attributes

Above all else, inquisitive and secretive. Prying information from others and guarding her own come as natural to her as breathing. Lucienne comes across as somewhat aloof, largely due to her foreign nationality and detached upbringing as a servant inside an aristocratic household, but is not altogether unsympathetic. Attempts to be dutiful and ethical when appropriate, but is very willing to discard her scruples when it is advantageous to do so. Occasionally shows a capricious side that is prone to morbid humor.

History

When men look upon the white castle of Blanc-Rochelle, they are taken by thoughts of antique knights who once roamed these lands in ages past, fighting the forces of evil with righteous steel in hand. Valence is an old nation, so mired in its traditions that it is unable - or unwilling - to cast off the yoke of Feudalism and adopt progressive technologies and reforms. Indeed, were the land not so well-defended by its naturally mountainous terrain and myriad fortresses, it might have been conquered by one of its distrustful neighbors long ago. Even so, the white banner emblazoned with a blue rose had always stood as a symbol of valor and virtue. Few would suspect what long and dark shadows it casts.

What is the meaning of ancient runes in every aristocrat’s family crest? What oath does each and every one of them swear before the king and queen? And what terrible flowers bloom in the white queen’s unseen garden?

Lucienne is one of the few who know the answer to all of these, and more. A devotee of the white queen, she serves as her personal retainer and aide and, so some decadents whisper, private plaything. In truth, the bond they share goes much further than this, but the true nature of their liaison is known only to those who hold the keys to her arcane garden – and there exist a mere three of those.

Find me the Key to the Eclipse. That was the order given to Lucienne when she was last permitted to taste the garden’s dark and sweet nectar. A command as difficult as it was esoteric, but one she could not deny. The euphoria burned still upon her lips and in her veins when she accepted and kissed her liege’s hand. Lucienne would find that which should not exist and bring it back to her queen. Everything to please her. Everything to taste the nectar one more time.

Months later, Lucienne’s research brought her on board a certain train bound for Temnorapool, where she hoped to find a clue as to the Key’s location. With the train’s sudden stop, she now finds herself caught in a foreign land amidst a foreign people, searching for the occult whilst driven by unnatural addictions. But she would not be daunted by this; she was her majesty’s loyal knight and she would not be found wanting.

Abilities

9 Vitality | Can exercise and healthy nutrition truly account for the uncanny radiance of her skin, the depths of her endurance?
6 Strength | Pale and tender skin hides unexpected force.
7 Finesse | She is well versed in the delicate footwork of the dancer and the duelist.
4 Perception | Cannot boast of any particular feats in sensory perception.
7 Intelligence | Very well educated by Valencian standards. Decently educated by any other.
3 Wisdom | Fanatical devotion and mind-addling addiction are a powerful antidote to wisdom.
4 Faith | Nominally an adherent of the Light, Lucienne has found a new religion in the unseen garden.
10 Occult | And in that garden, terrible vistas of cosmic insight revealed themselves to her.
---------------------
50

Equipment

• [5] Royal Rapier – Hideously expensive weapon handcrafted by one of the most esteemed artisans of Valence. Decorated in gilded detail and inscribed with occult runes, this roughly 120 cm long weapon seems as though its purpose were decidedly more symbolic rather than practical. It is nonetheless sharpened to a razor’s point, and its wielder is a practiced duelist well versed in martial history.
• [n/a] The Heptaméron (Copy) – Faithfully recreated copy of the occult tome Heptaméron, describing the harrowing seven-day journey of a man as he descends into the depths of hell. Written in complex verse, the book holds precise instructions on a variety of magical rituals if one can decipher the lyrics’ true meaning. This copy is annotated to make it easier to use, and contains circle diagrams in various annexes to aid the aspiring occultist. Possession of the book is probably considered heretical enough to constitute an offense against the clergy of the Light.

The Darkness Encroaches

All right, here's my submission. Honestly not the best writing style on display, some paragraphs in the history section feel like way too sudden cuts, but I've spent enough hours thinking about how I wanna turn it. Guess I need to practice my ability to write concisely more. Either way, I hope the added world building I made is okay by you.

The Seeker

Name

Lucienne Desrosiers

Occupation

Though named a knight of the crown, she is effectively a foreign agent on a secret mission.

Physical Attributes

Lucienne is a woman who carries herself with pride and dignity wherever she goes. There is something regal in her measured stride and her azure blue eyes carry the slightest hint of arrogance and disdain – although she is good at hiding her thoughts. Her attire also reflects an origin of certain prestige, consisting of a dark blue coat and skirt richly emblazoned with a complex but tasteful pattern of black embroidery and gilded buttons. On occasions where her skin might show, it becomes clear that she must lead an active lifestyle as can be gleaned from her toned body and athletic build. It is somewhat difficult to estimate her age, though she is likely no older than forty at most.

Other than the clothes on her back, her only other possessions appear to be a small, key-locked suitcase and, most unusually, a very elegant, bladed rapier.

OOC: Honestly, I'm not super at describing clothes, so here's a reference I referred to.

Mental Attributes

Above all else, inquisitive and secretive. Prying information from others and guarding her own come as natural to her as breathing. Lucienne comes across as somewhat aloof, largely due to her foreign nationality and detached upbringing as a servant inside an aristocratic household, but is not altogether unsympathetic. Attempts to be dutiful and ethical when appropriate, but is very willing to discard her scruples when it is advantageous to do so. Occasionally shows a capricious side that is prone to morbid humor.

History

When men look upon the white castle of Blanc-Rochelle, they are taken by thoughts of antique knights who once roamed these lands in ages past, fighting the forces of evil with righteous steel in hand. Valence is an old nation, so mired in its traditions that it is unable - or unwilling - to cast off the yoke of Feudalism and adopt progressive technologies and reforms. Indeed, were the land not so well-defended by its naturally mountainous terrain and myriad fortresses, it might have been conquered by one of its distrustful neighbors long ago. Even so, the white banner emblazoned with a blue rose had always stood as a symbol of valor and virtue. Few would suspect what long and dark shadows it casts.

What is the meaning of ancient runes in every aristocrat’s family crest? What oath does each and every one of them swear before the king and queen? And what terrible flowers bloom in the white queen’s unseen garden?

Lucienne is one of the few who know the answer to all of these, and more. A devotee of the white queen, she serves as her personal retainer and aide and, so some decadents whisper, private plaything. In truth, the bond they share goes much further than this, but the true nature of their liaison is known only to those who hold the keys to her arcane garden – and there exist a mere three of those.

Find me the Key to the Eclipse. That was the order given to Lucienne when she was last permitted to taste the garden’s dark and sweet nectar. A command as difficult as it was esoteric, but one she could not deny. The euphoria burned still upon her lips and in her veins when she accepted and kissed her liege’s hand. Lucienne would find that which should not exist and bring it back to her queen. Everything to please her. Everything to taste the nectar one more time.

Months later, Lucienne’s research brought her on board a certain train bound for Temnorapool, where she hoped to find a clue as to the Key’s location. With the train’s sudden stop, she now finds herself caught in a foreign land amidst a foreign people, searching for the occult whilst driven by unnatural addictions. But she would not be daunted by this; she was her majesty’s loyal knight and she would not be found wanting.

Abilities

9 Vitality | Can exercise and healthy nutrition truly account for the uncanny radiance of her skin, the depths of her endurance?
6 Strength | Pale and tender skin hides unexpected force.
7 Finesse | She is well versed in the delicate footwork of the dancer and the duelist.
4 Perception | Cannot boast of any particular feats in sensory perception.
7 Intelligence | Very well educated by Valencian standards. Decently educated by any other.
3 Wisdom | Fanatical devotion and mind-addling addiction are a powerful antidote to wisdom.
4 Faith | Nominally an adherent of the Light, Lucienne has found a new religion in the unseen garden.
10 Occult | And in that garden, terrible vistas of cosmic insight revealed themselves to her.
---------------------
50

Equipment

• [5] Royal Rapier – Hideously expensive weapon handcrafted by one of the most esteemed artisans of Valence. Decorated in gilded detail and inscribed with occult runes, this roughly 120 cm long weapon seems as though its purpose were decidedly more symbolic rather than practical. It is nonetheless sharpened to a razor’s point, and its wielder is a practiced duelist well versed in martial history.
• [n/a] The Heptaméron (Copy) – Faithfully recreated copy of the occult tome Heptaméron, describing the harrowing seven-day journey of a man as he descends into the depths of hell. Written in complex verse, the book holds precise instructions on a variety of magical rituals if one can decipher the lyrics’ true meaning. This copy is annotated to make it easier to use, and contains circle diagrams in various annexes to aid the aspiring occultist. Possession of the book is probably considered heretical enough to constitute an offense against the clergy of the Light.

The Darkness Encroaches

Having trouble getting the Discord link to work, by the way. Dunno if it's just me.

Darkness Encroaches: A Gothic Survival-Horror Game

Wew that's a bunch of people already. But uh, well. That line-up of inspirations is like a best-of reel of all the things I love, only missing Berserk in there somewhere. I can't say no to that and I'll be game, if you'll have me.

The Jericho Road

Yo, in order to reduce the need to skim through Discord, I compiled all currently known facts about Ichor. If you want, you could add this to the OP or link to it @Flagg. This way we have some resources for concepts we worked out over time, and can expand as we discuss more things in the future.

As a side-note, I added some miscellaneous notes to my "character sheet" to provide some information I wasn't able to place anywhere else. Said section may or may not receive additional stuff in the future, should the need arise.

Ichor

In its natural state, Ichor is an viscous, oily black liquid, found in deposits above and below the surface, though likely originating from the depths of the planet. Pools of it can occasionally be found in the wilderness and are usually associated with the presence of mutants. The city of Terminus Est is located above the largest currently known deposit and has become the primary producer of the stuff.

It is a highly dangerous substance as the fumes it gives off act as a deliriant that can potentially render a man permanently and violently insane. Worse still is its effect on unprotected skin: organic matter touching it can be subjected to chaotic and disturbing mutations almost immediately. A plausible theory posits that the mutants which plague the wastelands are all originally men or beasts that became exposed to Ichor and have changed into their present shape. Because of its properties, harvesting Ichor is best left to professionals or labor corps with plenty of cheap bodies to spare (likely the case in Terminus Est).

Psionics, or magic - however one might want to refer to the ability to locally break the laws of nature - is a supernatural ability that becomes latent in creatures that have been exposed to Ichor directly or indirectly. Indeed, simply being born in an area that has a lot of ambient Ichor bears a small chance that the child will be gifted. More direct exposure will only increase these powers. This also means that every mutant is not only a horrifying amalgam of body parts, but also a magical monstrosity capable of warping reality to a degree. Vice-versa, though this is not always admitted, it means that every mage is technically a mutant. The line is thinner than most realize.

A process exists by which liquid Ichor can be refined and hardened - perhaps baked - into a solid, crystalline state. Crystallized Ichor is less potent than in its liquid form, but retains the basic properties still. Generally speaking, crystalline Ichor is much safer to handle and has become the de facto way to distribute it for use. Mystics in particular enjoy consuming crystallized Ichor in various ways to amplify their sorcerous and unnatural powers, but it can also be used in the creation of Ichor-infused metal alloys or even the construction of unspeakable machinery, such as Black Pillars.

A final property inherent to Ichor that bears mentioning is that it is completely immune to the Rot. This makes it the only known material on the entire planet that is not disintegrated and consumed by the apocalyptic catastrophe that is devouring the earth. The two forces seemingly cancel each other out, with the Rot being unable to devour Ichor, and with Ichor being unable to manifest any of its magical phenomena near the Rot. Speculations on the reasons for any of this run the gamut, but none of them could claim to be founded on any true science as neither the Rot, nor Ichor is understood on even a fundamental level. These are things not meant for mortal minds to know...

The Jericho Road

Merrill, the Ranger

The starless sky loomed above endless dunes like an all-devouring abyss. It was dark even by day, but at night the rotten wastelands became shrouded in perfect darkness, as if the whole world were buried in a tomb. The air was filled with fine, colorless sand, whipped to and fro as if by tempest gales; only there was no wind at all. Even the air was thin, and one might feel tempted to think oneself stranded on the moon or some other alien world if one did not know any better.

What drives one to seek this dreadful domain out of their own free will? She has often asked herself this very question but could never find a satisfying answer. If it was simply a desire to be free, to bond with nature or to shun humanity, there were many wild and abandoned places one could go to that, in spite of myriad deadly forms of wildlife, were vastly safer – and far more wholesome. And yet here she was again, stalking across the drifts like a predator on the hunt. Or, perhaps, like prey hoping to slip away. Whatever the truth might be, there was something out here amidst the lightless dunes that called out to her like a mother to its lost child.

Her boots left gentle imprints in the dead soil, shallow enough that the shifting dust would wash them away within five to ten minutes at most. But it was not the risk of leaving tracks that made her step so softly; rather, it was the fear of being too loud, of sending tremors into the earth. All manner of hideous, infernal monstrosities burrowed beneath the dunes, feeding on the ashes of cities, forests and mountains that were turned to dust. To attract their attention was to invite certain doom – and was likely the fate that had befallen her quarry. She was close now; the distress signal had originated just ahead.

Slowly manifesting out of the ash-choked darkness in the visual feed of her helmet, she could make out the contours of a disabled Type-6, a kind of tracked vehicle the size of a small house. Their ease of maintenance and generous interior space made them desirable for many types of caravans to transport their goods between settlements, but only a madman would have chosen to drive one into rot-lands. They were too slow, loud and heavy to ever make it through in one piece. More than likely the cargo was either supremely valuable, or supremely illegal, to warrant such a decision. If she was lucky, she might even find out.

She slowed her pace now, approaching the wreck with apprehension. Gently she pulled a contracted, gunmetal device from underneath the tattered cloak wrapped around her shoulders, which unfolded and extended into a long-barreled type of rifle at the press of a discrete button. Weapon at ease, she halted just a few steps from the vehicle’s rear end where the open cargo hatch yawned at her like a great maw. The metal ramp extending from the opening was already covered in little holes where the Rot had eaten into the material. Unsurprisingly, there came no light from the open cargo bay, implying that the interior was as lifeless as the dunes she had come from. Stepping onto the ramp, she steeled herself to dive from one type of darkness into the next.

The inside was a long hallway filled with nondescript crates and bags tied down onto the floor and the walls using the myriad attachment points distributed throughout. A narrow pathway was left open in the center to slip in between the large containers and she slowly made her way through while casting nervous glances to the left and right, fearing to spot something dangerous lurking in the dark spaces between two boxes. Above her, the ceiling was a tangled mess of pipes, ducts and cables coiling around, over and under one another in a dizzying fashion. How any technician could find their bearing working on this machine was beyond her.

Towards the end of the room, around the time she spied the iron staircase leading up into the second floor of the Type-6, she picked up a strange audio signature. Only on the feedback graph at first, going up and down in almost rhythmic fashion. Too quiet to be heard by ear just yet; perhaps it was some kind of vibration from the engine? Cocking her rifle, if only to reassure herself and pretend that it afforded her safety, she pressed on towards and up the stairs.

Emerging into the lightless, cramped corridor of the personnel deck the noise became even more audible and she could finally hear it – it was a voice. Weak, rasping and, so she thought, trying to speak. She could not make out any of the words just yet, but found the tone of voice strangely melodic and almost pleasant. Standing at the end of the corridor and staring towards the opposite, she called for thermal optics, knowing that her voice would not penetrate outside of her helmet. The walls and floors were mostly cool, but there was a whiff of faint heat emerging from the second door to the right, perhaps indicative of something warm inside – like a survivor. Switching back to darkvision, she pressed on into the lightless bowels of the vehicle and hoped that she would make it out alive.

With every step she took, it became more and more apparent that the voice she was hearing was not simply trying to speak. It was, in fact, singing, and there was more than one singer. By the time she reached the door, she was certain there were four, maybe five voices, repeating the same chorus in a disturbing sing-song. She recognized none of the words and could not even guess at what language – if any – they were singing in, but they were consistent all the same. Her heart was pounding now, and she had to take a big swallow as she pressed another button on her rifle to contract the barrel and make it more wieldy in the cramped interior. The shorter rail length would lessen the exit velocity of any fired rounds, but it would still be sufficient to punch through meat. With a final, calming sigh she pushed open the creaking metal door.

Seated in a circle inside the pitch black interior, four naked men squatted around a bizarre, organically shaped growth that sprouted from the ground. The thing had the appearance of a dozen veiny tendrils coiled around themselves and twisting upwards, like a strange tree sapling. The men were haggard and suffered obvious wounds from Rot exposure. When the door creaked open, they turned to look at her but did not interrupt their song for even a second. Their sunken faces were hollow and lifeless, as if they were corpses animated by a puppeteer. She had to take a step back into the corridor and trained her rifle against the opening.

“Can you understand me?!” she nervously called out, her voice sounding strangely robotic through the vox-caster. The nearest man extended his half-dissolved hand towards her, as if beckoning her closer. “Hello?” she tried again, but still no answer. But things subtly became clearer to her. The words they were singing in, the rhyme of the song, the meaning of the next verse. She could not explain how, but all these things suddenly came flooding into her brain as if opening this door had opened a valve that had always been present, only forgotten.

Before she knew it, her lips were moving all on their own, and she too was softly singing the hymn of the elders. As if in a trance, she did not stop to question her actions even once as she sang with ever more confidence, and stepped into the room. It felt so liberating to let go of all fear and doubt and immerse herself in the beauty of what she had found. She stopped in front of the coiled artifact that had grown from the ground and stared at its surface through the grainy, black-and-white image of her visual feed. To her flanks, the men staggered closer to her, clutching at the steel-reinforced composite fabric of her leggings and staring up to her through bloodshot, decaying eyeballs as if she were a messiah. In a flash of remembrance, unsettling thoughts of her childhood played out before her and she forgot about the song for a brief moment – long enough to catch herself and send a jolt of panic through her body.

She shrieked in horror and, before she could rationalize her decision, pressed her rifle against the man clutching her left leg and pulled the trigger. A bright blue flash illuminated the rotting bunk room for a split second before the unfortunate man’s upper torso was ripped to shreds to the sound of a high-pitched coil whine. She pulled the other leg free from the feeble, decaying hands of the second man and stumbled backwards, hitting a bunk bed with her back. “Get away from me!” she yelped, heart pounding and breath wheezing. But then it came back to her, words and verses and melodies worming their way into her brain. These motherfuckers wouldn’t stop singing! If only she could-

“Audio, shut down!” she yelled into her helmet, and near-instantly all audio feed from outside was cut out. All that remained was the rhythmic thumping of her own blood in her ears. She clumsily fumbled her way towards the exit, almost tripping over the doorsill, before she tumbled into the corridor. The visual feed became blurry, or so she thought. It took a moment for her to realize that she was crying she knew not why. Every second she remained in this tomb threatened the partial or complete loss of autonomy over her body. Out – she had to get out. Awash with panic, she ran and stumbled towards the staircase, hurried downwards and pressed her way through the heavy boxes anchored in the cargo bay. Whatever racket she was making in her escape, she could hear none of it through the silenced audio.

When she emerged into the ashen desert she collapsed onto her hands and knees, shivering all over. Her eyes were still watery, but there was nothing she could do to wipe them dry. The alien melody was still stuck in her mind, and would remain with her perhaps for the rest of her life, but at least her lips were not moving, not singing. She was quite sure of that. Rising to her knees, she gazed around herself and beheld nothing, save for a thick fog of airborne dust, a pitch black sky and endless dunes comprised of the ashes of the world. A fresh tear rolled over her cheek, and now she knew why it was that she cried.

Additional Notes

Merrill's Background

• Originated in a settlement farther away, where a lot of naturally occurring Ichor is present.
• The threat of mutant incursions is slowly whittling down the settlement, until they are forced to abandon their home and leave.
• Having crafted a vehicle with a mobile Black Pillar*, the populace is escaping through the only route possible – across the Rot-wastes, into the unknown.
• During the arduous journey, many become lost. This include’s Merrill’s brother Harlow, with whom she was extremely close. She never recovered from this loss and still thinks he is out there somewhere in the Rot-wastes.
• Crestfallen about the losses, she and the remaining villagers eventually reach the other side and emerge into the locale around Jericho’s Reach.
• As everyone has to be useful to the village, she chooses to become one of the commune’s scouts and trackers, learning the lay of the land and its creatures and helping to guide caravans to and from it. She yearns to venture back into the Rot to search for her missing brother.
• As the years go by, the commune becomes a bit better established and conducts some friendly exchange with Jericho’s Reach. Merrill becomes better at braving the wilderness, and is able to go into the Rot every so often to scavenge for lost supplies, or simply to explore in the vain hope of finding signs of her lost brother.
• The recent mutant invasion catches the commune as one of their first targets and wipes it out. Merrill is able to survive unharmed, but is now without a home, friends or family. She travels to the city to warn them of the grim news and find purpose in life.

* A Black Pillar is an obelisk-like construct of varying size made from refined Ichor. One or more psionically gifted individuals can be chained onto such a structure in order to be drained by it and provide it with the necessary power to project a force field that will specifically push away Rot sand in a generous radius, and act as a deterrent to the creatures born from it. Black Pillars are expensive and difficult to construct, and the exact origin of the science behind it is a long lost mystery. Rumor has it that it was no human mind that conceived of it; a single look at this diabolical engine is enough to confer some credibility to this.

Helmet Design

A rough idea of what I picture the oft-mentioned but seldom described helmet to look like. Wrapped in fabric to aid in camouflage and in absorbing harmful Rot sands.

The Jericho Road

A yearning void gnawed at her insides. The scorched earth beneath her feet was warm, but her blood ran cold as ice through her veins. A haze of black smoke wreathed the burnt-out ruins surrounding her, blown-up husks of metal shacks once haphazardly put together to provide rudimentary shelter. Crooked metal bars jutted out of myriad piles of iron rubble, forcing her to move cautiously to avoid their deadly points. Some of them had bodies impaled on them, mangled beyond recognition. She could not gaze upon them for long, lest the sight of it make her puke into her helmet.

Some fires still burned amidst the smoke and shadows, ignited power generators in collapsed homes and incinerated vehicles in the devastated streets. Under the midday sun, the heat was almost unbearable. She felt every inch of fabric stick to her body like glue, felt thick droplets run down her face and into her eyes. At least, she told herself it was sweat that tasted so salty upon her lips. Long ago, she had been told, a great war had ravaged the entire world so badly that, where once there were forests and meadows, there remained now only dustbowls and wastelands. A war so terrible it reduced continental cities to ashes. A war so brutal it almost rendered the race of men extinct. She could not imagine something so harrowing, but as she looked around she thought that it must have been very similar to this. If such a war had indeed happened, then it seemed that the world had learned nothing from it. Nothing at all.

With every step she took, her hopes of finding signs of survivors dimmed. All she found were signs of struggle, craters left by explosions, holes left by bullets, burns left by laser fire. Her people had been driven from their homeland once before, had been forced to flee to lands unknown at great cost. They had not been willing to run a second time, it seemed, and so died on foreign soil. At least some of them did; she could not help but notice that there were not nearly as many bodies as there should be. Dead men were certainly plentiful, as were the loathsome bodies of their mutant enemies, but not enough to account for the entire village. For some reason, the lack of corpses disquieted her more than finding them might have. Her mind told her to remain optimistic, to expect to pick up their trail outside the village and encounter a handful of survivors. But her trembling heart told her to steel herself for a worse outcome.

When she crested the hill upon which the settlement had been constructed, and where the market hub used to be located, she beheld something that forced her knees, made her ball her fists. Her veins felt cold and hot at the same time, her heart felt like a reactor on overdrive. Erected before her, rising above the remnants of merchant stalls, was a great metal pillar with three prongs at the top. From every prong hung a nude body, strung up by the hands, the shoulders dislodged: an elderly woman, a middle-aged woman and, worst of all, a little girl. Each of them had a pitch-black shard of crystallized Ichor rammed through their chest, just above the breasts, and a sickening, inky growth had formed from the rim of the grisly wound. She knew enough about the wandering hordes to recognize the fiendish idol as a shrine dedicated to a three-faced goddess, worshipped among some of them: Maeve, the goddess of change, death and rebirth. It was not the first time she had to witness such a shrine, having encountered others like it in temporary camps, or in the wilds where the mutants had passed. But it was the first time she had to endure the sight of her own mother shackled to one.

Merrill unstrapped and took off her helmet, carefully placing it on the ash-covered ground beside her. The acrid smell of burnt material choked her throat and she succumbed to a coughing fit as her lungs struggled to find clean oxygen amidst the flames and the anger in the air. As she recovered, her eyes travelled upward once more, beholding the emaciated, despoiled body of the woman who had caused her so much grief. She hadn’t spoken to her mother since their arrival near Jericho’s Reach, although she had always planned to one day make up with her. Surely their feelings could have been reconciled one day. One day… a day that, now, would never come. She grit her teeth and folded her fingers around a random piece of debris on the ground.

She rose to her feet, screamed desperately and threw the piece of junk off into nowhere, where it clattered against a burnt façade. “How much more can you take from me?!” she yelled at the ash and flames. “What else?! Was Harlow not enough? Was Mama not enough? Did you fuckers take Daddy too? Did you?!”

Her voice cracked up and she lost herself in uncontrolled sobbing. She was certain that, somewhere, sadistic evil gods were laughing at her plight. Were punishing her for her sin. Whether they be gods of men or beasts, there must be some transcendental entity that was watching her, some kind of intelligence that hated her for what she did. But she did not regret it, nor would she ever. Piss on the gods, if she had to.

After many minutes of agonized crying and screaming, Merrill had recovered enough to climb onto the pillar and cut down the bodies. She could not avoid them plummeting to the earth like sacks of meat, though it was better than to leave them hanging. Later, she straightened their bodies and placed them in as dignified a pose as she could, before arming herself with her rail-gun and obliterating the pillar-like shrine with a single, well-placed shot through the trunk. When she donned the helmet again, her eyes felt sore from the tears and the smoke.

As the evening sun painted the sky a hellish red, she prepared a funeral pyre outside the ruins, atop a smaller hill gazing out across the barren wasteland. All three bodies were placed on it, and she watched them burn long after the flesh was gone, long after the sun had vanished behind the bombed horizon. She watched the embers still when sleep washed over her like a tide.

And in her dreams, she lost them all. Over and over again.

Only blood could heal the poison in her heart now.

The Jericho Road

Hey, I wrote a... thing. I basically just wrote something to help me explore the setting (specifically, the rot-infected wastelands), my potential character, and just in general help me find a tone. It's rough and certainly can be improved by much, but I reckon it might be interesting for y'all to get a glimpse at what I'm thinking about. Have fun :P

The Ranger

The starless sky loomed above endless dunes like an all-devouring abyss. It was dark even by day, but at night the rotten wastelands became shrouded in perfect darkness, as if the whole world were buried in a tomb. The air was filled with fine, colorless sand, whipped to and fro as if by tempest gales; only there was no wind at all. Even the air was thin, and one might feel tempted to think oneself stranded on the moon or some other alien world if one did not know any better.

What drives one to seek this dreadful domain out of their own free will? She has often asked herself this very question but could never find a satisfying answer. If it was simply a desire to be free, to bond with nature or to shun humanity, there were many wild and abandoned places one could go to that, in spite of myriad deadly forms of wildlife, were vastly safer – and far more wholesome. And yet here she was again, stalking across the drifts like a predator on the hunt. Or, perhaps, like prey hoping to slip away. Whatever the truth might be, there was something out here amidst the lightless dunes that called out to her like a mother to its lost child.

Her boots left gentle imprints in the dead soil, shallow enough that the shifting dust would wash them away within five to ten minutes at most. But it was not the risk of leaving tracks that made her step so softly; rather, it was the fear of being too loud, of sending tremors into the earth. All manner of hideous, infernal monstrosities burrowed beneath the dunes, feeding on the ashes of cities, forests and mountains that were turned to dust. To attract their attention was to invite certain doom – and was likely the fate that had befallen her quarry. She was close now; the distress signal had originated just ahead.

Slowly manifesting out of the ash-choked darkness in the visual feed of her helmet, she could make out the contours of a disabled Type-6, a kind of tracked vehicle the size of a small house. Their ease of maintenance and generous interior space made them desirable for many types of caravans to transport their goods between settlements, but only a madman would have chosen to drive one into rot-lands. They were too slow, loud and heavy to ever make it through in one piece. More than likely the cargo was either supremely valuable, or supremely illegal, to warrant such a decision. If she was lucky, she might even find out.

She slowed her pace now, approaching the wreck with apprehension. Gently she pulled a contracted, gunmetal device from underneath the tattered cloak wrapped around her shoulders, which unfolded and extended into a long-barreled type of rifle at the press of a discrete button. Weapon at ease, she halted just a few steps from the vehicle’s rear end where the open cargo hatch yawned at her like a great maw. The metal ramp extending from the opening was already covered in little holes where the Rot had eaten into the material. Unsurprisingly, there came no light from the open cargo bay, implying that the interior was as lifeless as the dunes she had come from. Stepping onto the ramp, she steeled herself to dive from one type of darkness into the next.

The inside was a long hallway filled with nondescript crates and bags tied down onto the floor and the walls using the myriad attachment points distributed throughout. A narrow pathway was left open in the center to slip in between the large containers and she slowly made her way through while casting nervous glances to the left and right, fearing to spot something dangerous lurking in the dark spaces between two boxes. Above her, the ceiling was a tangled mess of pipes, ducts and cables coiling around, over and under one another in a dizzying fashion. How any technician could find their bearing working on this machine was beyond her.

Towards the end of the room, around the time she spied the iron staircase leading up into the second floor of the Type-6, she picked up a strange audio signature. Only on the feedback graph at first, going up and down in almost rhythmic fashion. Too quiet to be heard by ear just yet; perhaps it was some kind of vibration from the engine? Cocking her rifle, if only to reassure herself and pretend that it afforded her safety, she pressed on towards and up the stairs.

Emerging into the lightless, cramped corridor of the personnel deck the noise became even more audible and she could finally hear it – it was a voice. Weak, rasping and, so she thought, trying to speak. She could not make out any of the words just yet, but found the tone of voice strangely melodic and almost pleasant. Standing at the end of the corridor and staring towards the opposite, she called for thermal optics, knowing that her voice would not penetrate outside of her helmet. The walls and floors were mostly cool, but there was a whiff of faint heat emerging from the second door to the right, perhaps indicative of something warm inside – like a survivor. Switching back to darkvision, she pressed on into the lightless bowels of the vehicle and hoped that she would make it out alive.

With every step she took, it became more and more apparent that the voice she was hearing was not simply trying to speak. It was, in fact, singing, and there was more than one singer. By the time she reached the door, she was certain there were four, maybe five voices, repeating the same chorus in a disturbing sing-song. She recognized none of the words and could not even guess at what language – if any – they were singing in, but they were consistent all the same. Her heart was pounding now, and she had to take a big swallow as she pressed another button on her rifle to contract the barrel and make it more wieldy in the cramped interior. The shorter rail length would lessen the exit velocity of any fired rounds, but it would still be sufficient to punch through meat. With a final, calming sigh she pushed open the creaking metal door.

Seated in a circle inside the pitch black interior, four naked men squatted around a bizarre, organically shaped growth that sprouted from the ground. The thing had the appearance of a dozen veiny tendrils coiled around themselves and twisting upwards, like a strange tree sapling. The men were haggard and suffered obvious wounds from Rot exposure. When the door creaked open, they turned to look at her but did not interrupt their song for even a second. Their sunken faces were hollow and lifeless, as if they were corpses animated by a puppeteer. She had to take a step back into the corridor and trained her rifle against the opening.

“Can you understand me?!” she nervously called out, her voice sounding strangely robotic through the vox-caster. The nearest man extended his half-dissolved hand towards her, as if beckoning her closer. “Hello?” she tried again, but still no answer. But things subtly became clearer to her. The words they were singing in, the rhyme of the song, the meaning of the next verse. She could not explain how, but all these things suddenly came flooding into her brain as if opening this door had opened a valve that had always been present, only forgotten.

Before she knew it, her lips were moving all on their own, and she too was softly singing the hymn of the elders. As if in a trance, she did not stop to question her actions even once as she sang with ever more confidence, and stepped into the room. It felt so liberating to let go of all fear and doubt and immerse herself in the beauty of what she had found. She stopped in front of the coiled artifact that had grown from the ground and stared at its surface through the grainy, black-and-white image of her visual feed. To her flanks, the men staggered closer to her, clutching at the steel-reinforced composite fabric of her leggings and staring up to her through bloodshot, decaying eyeballs as if she were a messiah. In a flash of remembrance, unsettling thoughts of her childhood played out before her and she forgot about the song for a brief moment – long enough to catch herself and send a jolt of panic through her body.

She shrieked in horror and, before she could rationalize her decision, pressed her rifle against the man clutching her left leg and pulled the trigger. A bright blue flash illuminated the rotting bunk room for a split second before the unfortunate man’s upper torso was ripped to shreds to the sound of a high-pitched coil whine. She pulled the other leg free from the feeble, decaying hands of the second man and stumbled backwards, hitting a bunk bed with her back. “Get away from me!” she yelped, heart pounding and breath wheezing. But then it came back to her, words and verses and melodies worming their way into her brain. These motherfuckers wouldn’t stop singing! If only she could-

“Audio, shut down!” she yelled into her helmet, and near-instantly all audio feed from outside was cut out. All that remained was the rhythmic thumping of her own blood in her ears. She clumsily fumbled her way towards the exit, almost tripping over the doorsill, before she tumbled into the corridor. The visual feed became blurry, or so she thought. It took a moment for her to realize that she was crying she knew not why. Every second she remained in this tomb threatened the partial or complete loss of autonomy over her body. Out – she had to get out. Awash with panic, she ran and stumbled towards the staircase, hurried downwards and pressed her way through the heavy boxes anchored in the cargo bay. Whatever racket she was making in her escape, she could hear none of it through the silenced audio.

When she emerged into the ashen desert she collapsed onto her hands and knees, shivering all over. Her eyes were still watery, but there was nothing she could do to wipe them dry. The alien melody was still stuck in her mind, and would remain with her perhaps for the rest of her life, but at least her lips were not moving, not singing. She was quite sure of that. Rising to her knees, she gazed around herself and beheld nothing, save for a thick fog of airborne dust, a pitch black sky and endless dunes comprised of the ashes of the world. A fresh tear rolled over her cheek, and now she knew why it was that she cried.

The Jericho Road

Yo, I've exchanged some world building details with Flagg over PM; I'm putting that here now for everyone's benefit. Have fun :3

The Rot

Yo Flagg, sup?

Since you encourage world building so much I wanted to pitch an idea for the symptoms, if not the cause of the disaster that has and is ravaging the planet. It's an idea I halfway developed for something of my own but haven't finished yet, and is loosely inspired by the Color out of Space. I don't know your plans, but I figured I'd let you in on it, perhaps you'll like it or it'll inspire you. The hope is to have an end-world scenario that is less generic than the norm (such as ye olde nuke-doomsday).

In my world I called the phenomenon "the Rot". What happens is that a 'disintegration' of sorts is spreading across the land. Everything - and I do mean everything - is falling apart until only a fine dust remains. Exposure to this dust directly leads to exposed objects also starting to disintegrate. Imagine a form of sand that turns everything it touches also into sand. The process isn't hyper quick, and only parts of the planet are consumed. Also, different materials are broken down at different rates, with organic matter generally being eaten up much quicker than inorganics, especially metals and minerals. Now, the 'weird' part of it is that in the deeper parts of the wastelands, the dust is reforming into new solids. Specifically, shapes resembling veiny cathedrals, heavily inspired by the paintings of Beksinski. Diseased lifeforms might develop a form of insanity (or is it?) where they believe to hear and feel a pulse in the earth, that they will one day follow until they arrive at such a cathedral. There they lay themselves to rest, to be eaten and reborn into the new world.

That's the gist of it. Considering the tone of this setting, I suppose creating weird, new lifeforms born from the dust wouldn't be amiss, and I would also say it should be possible to cleanse exposed wounds to stop the Rot. This way, exposed characters and NPCs could have a chance to "just" get away with some ugly scars, similar to acid burns perhaps. One could develop a cool aesthetic of protective gear that is needed to travel through Rot-lands, including some neat vehicles to make the journy quicker. It would also encourage a certain nomadic tendency for many civilizations, given that they might have to reposition every so many decades to avoid the Rot catching up, which I feel suits the setting quite well.

Also, there does not need to be any explanation known (to characters in any event) for where and how the Rot even began. All we know is that it's there and it will, one day, perhaps far away, consume the planet. Certainly there could be a lot of myths and theories though.

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Since we have some high tech going on, there could be a type of generator that can create a force barrier to prevent the dust from swooping past. This would essentially be a shield generator against the Rot, and could allow people to prevent a zone from being attacked, provided they can maintain the generator. These things could be as rare as they need to be to keep things exciting.

Bonus points if the technology comes at a severe price for the relative safety from certain doom it afford. Like, say, a pillar that you have to chain psychically/magically gifted people to so that they can power it, but they can't leave and will have their minds burned out over the years.

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Sure. On a global scale I imagine that there are basically "blotches" on the world map, which are spreading in all directions over the years.

The Jericho Road: post-apocalyptic science fantasy

Yo! It's a bit different from my usual go-tos, but going out of the comfort zone every so often can't hurt. I've always had fun in the brief stints we had together Flagg, so I'll give this a shot :D

Edit: Given your current inspirations, maybe you want to look at the tabletop rpg Cthulhutech, could suit the themes present.