@Zeroth Make the cool thing your PC did fundamentally impossible without someone else's PCs. Like someone with super strength throwing your pc at a giant monster to fuck it up at point blank range.
3
likes
2 mos ago
Mahz has a desk?
1
like
2 mos ago
no
3 mos ago
What the fuck are you people talking about
Bio
I invented necromancy and the windmill. I beat the sun in a poker match during the summer of 1273 and God hasn't felt the same since.
Under Black Stars is a side story set within the Skyrose Multiverse, taking place over a decade after the end of Inferno. This story is based on the lore and worldbuilding of the Skyrose universe, but does not interact with it, as it is separate from other stories in the main timeline.
More than a decade after an army of demons tried to destroy Earth, Annika lives with her foster father, Jack Hawthorne, who has raised her as his own despite the circumstances that brought them together. For years, they have both searched for answers to an unanswerable question: Where did Annika come from? Jack has taught her many of his mystical secrets, but even he does not know everything.
The two have a long road ahead of them, and some questions are best left unanswered…
Far from the bounds of the cosmos, in between the stars and deeper down in a place so few can find, there sits a realm cast in eternal gloom. The backdrop of the universe, a rift between all other places. There have been less than a hundred people to ever set foot there, since the birth of this reality. It has gone by many names, the Void, the Shadow Realm, but most know it was the Everdark. It is the abstract, the place where all things in the material world are deigned to elude. There, the cracks and little forgotten places throughout reality tend to vanish, and fall through a distance without measure. Often, these are physical fragments of other worlds, which eventually "smooth out" and diffuse into their new environment, giving way to forests eternally in bloom and oceans without a floor.
But other times, life slips through the cracks.
Across human history and even further, dating back to the earliest times in which there were living things that could reasonably called intelligent, a small fraction of the already small population that finds this place can draw power on it. When something with a soul enters the Everdark, one of two things can happen. Often, the strange energy that constitutes it "denies" their presence. In this case, they slowly lose themselves in a delirious miasma, as their soul erodes and they become a hollow creature of madness. But the rare few who are "welcomed" by the Everdark feel a presence in their soul, taking a small sliver and replacing it with that magnificent darkness. These people, few as they are, have no academic name to classify themselves, but they can learn to bend the shadows as sorcery.
To find such a person is a rare sight indeed, and the Everdark is a fickle thing. There may very well only be one or two of them alive at this very moment, if even that many...
It is difficult to fathom the Earth when you only study one continent, and more difficult to understand the universe when you only understand one galaxy.
Knowing this, as he knew many things, Jack Hawthorne dedicated his life to the study of reality and the transmundane. Across time, and across the endless sea of realities that most would never see, he wandered on a never-ending journey. He had always been a scholar of the unknown, of the supernatural secrets old and new. Ever since the day he fell into a land of starless skies and autumnal voids, and left the mundane behind, it had been his calling in life to walk an endless road.
And for more than a decade, now, he has taken to a new purpose.
An old friend has grown furious with the world and sought to bring Earth to ruins. And in the aftermath, there may two defenseless children: Ananym of Limbo, and Annika of Earth. It has not been an uneventful time, raising Annika as his own. In the years that followed, the two had found that the shadowy land he called on for power was safe for her, they’d discovered the magical abilities she was capable of, and most of all, they’d spent her lifetime wondering where in all the universe she had originally came from.
For a man who could move across trillions of light years in a single step, it had been an impossible task. But one that they had accepted they might never answer. And so it was that Jack embraced his role as Annika’s guardian for as long as was needed.
In recent times, she’d developed her first spells under his guidance. They were simple, but it was a start of something powerful. They stepped between universes, trespassed into realms unknown and learned what one another was capable of as he shared an unending journey with her.
Morden was silently like the grave during the walk on foot to the meeting place. The “Spooks” were subtle, but something he found strange was the fact that they were doing things in a particularly obvious way. Dunbarton was a sleepy city, and there was only so much justification for armed personnel around a building like this. On the surface, I could very well just be a police raid from a civilian’s standpoint. But then, the average civilian would’ve expected a truck or at least a cruiser to be here. There were none of these things outside the meeting place, it was as if a bunch of federal agents had just walked in. To his trained eye, Morden could see their weapons and their armor, but they weren’t really trying that hard to conceal those things, why hide them at all if they were going to be lazy about it?
He had to wonder what the angle of that was.
Inside, it was more what he’d expect. obvious force. And yet they were actively loading and checking weapons, not simply enjoying a relief period. They were actively preparing for something.
There is something unusual about this, He commented, wordlessly. Still, Morden followed them up the stairs to where “Dirk” waited.
She/Her | 27 | White | 5'7" | 186lbs _______________________________________________ Dignified _______________________________________________ Skills & Talents "I have my methods." ___________________________________
[REMOVE THIS. A list of everything your character is good at... just, uh, keep it realistic. If I see one judo black belt with survival skills training, cooking, and rifle training, I'm gonna slap a bitch. REMOVE THIS.] Magic Mastery ⫻ Selena considers herself a "master" level Adept. This is ultimately hubris and confidence, but she is quite talented. Having a mix of formal and independent training, Selena is well-versed in the greater paranormal world, and can easily keep a conversation going about any subject ranging from the Ancients to the Night of Broken Clocks.
Connected ⫻ Selena has amassed an interconnected network of paranormal allies, contacts and associates that that assist each other for mutual benefits. If she needs, she can call upon them and ask for their help in procuring artifacts or information, or information about something. Thanks to these connections, Selena is highly resourceful, and rarely has to work things out alone
Social Graces ⫻ It turns out that being from a family of rich, influential Adepts with international sway puts a lot of expectations on someone’s shoulders. Selena was taught how to hold a conversation, read a room and be strainingly charismatic in her interactions with people. She can lie like a snake, put on a brave Dave and negotiate with professional competence.
Appearance ▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔ "Looking for something?"
Selena's entire aesthetic screams "I'm fucking magic." An odd mix of cottagecore and whimsigoth themes thrown together haphazardly, from old and stiff fabric to long cardigans with curious patterns printed over them, no one would immediately look at Selena and think she's secretly rich. She tends to go for comfort first, style second, and practicality third as a result of her confidence in a dangerous situation. Selena's hair a bright, vibrant shade of red, falling down in thick locks that she only occasionally ties up into a coherent style. She is in shape, but is built somewhat like a toothpick, which isn't very obvious due to the way she dresses. Her body language sends a message that she has a high standard for herself, exuding an untouchable and uncaring vibe in the direction of anyone who might be looking to start something.
Psychology ▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔ "I like to get things done."
MAIN GOAL ⫻ Selena wants to set herself up to live the rest of her life comfortably. To do this, she seeks out connections with people to form her own “family,” like a mafia without the moral bankruptcy. Selena wants to develop enough connections and working relationships with people that neither she nor they have to figure things out alone. All of this stems from her personal history, as her younger brother recently became the head of the Gallagher family, and is looking to tie up loose ends.
PHILOSOPHY ⫻ Selena sees life as a chessboard. The wrong move can leave you hopeless, so it’s always important to thing ahead a plan carefully. And someone has to lose in order for someone else to win. Anything that can’t survive scrutiny shouldn't, and though Selena may seem cold to those who aren’t familiar with her, she simply thinks realistically about the paranormal world. Having any amount of magical power is dangerous, because someone else will decide what to do with you if you don’t decide for yourself. Selena is less concerned with the right and wrong of it all and more concerned with not being the one who gets trampled. It’s a dog-eat-dog world, and Selena refuses to go hungry.
SECRETS ⫻ Selena stole more than just the Greymoon Cloak from her family, and knows more about what they’ve been up to since her departure than she lets on. Over the years, she has regularly undercut the Gallaghers and spied on them to ensure they can’t get to her.
SEXUALITY ⫻ Pansexual
FEARS ⫻ Selena fears being helpless, unable to win a situation that she’s found herself stuck in. She knows that despite her capabilities as an Adept, she isn’t perfect. Her goals make other people’s enemies her enemies, and she doesn’t want to be in an impossible situation.
REPUTATION IN OLD COVEN ⫻ Selena was known to be a no-nonsense voice of determination in the old coven. She did not have any patience whatsoever for stupidity, or people trying to be something they weren’t. She took the coven’s purpose seriously, and didn’t respect anyone who thought it was a joke. Selena cared about saving the world, and considered it much more important than partying or being dumb kids.
ROLE IN THE BATTLE AGAINST THE STYGIAN SNAKE ⫻ Selena worked to keep the coven from imploding by ensuring the right people did the right thing, with as little error as possible. If someone fucked up, she got on their ass about it. Of course, Selena wasn’t a hypocrite, so she often stepped in to do things herself and show others how it was done. Sometimes this meant laying waste to mindless Apparitions by the dozens, and other times this meant doing proper research, but she often found herself filling multiple roles.
FLAWS ⫻ Selena's pride means a lot to her. She worked hard to get to this point, and she'll be damned if she lets anybody take that away from her. She has an ego, and that means she doesn't believe she has anything to prove to anybody.
Backstory ▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔ "That part of my life is over, and it’s for the best."
Selena’s story begins at the age of eight, when her parents worked tirelessly to dove a Kindling Event. Before she found her way to St. Portwell, because she found her way into the Sycamore Tree Coven, there was no Selena Phoenix, only Selena Gallagher. Born into a family of elite adepts with international connections and power, Selena was raised to be the next generation of a longstanding legacy; A legacy marred with cruelty, political subterfuge and aristocratic influence. The world of magic has always been one ruled by the strong, and Selena was just next in line to take the proverbial throne of high society. From a young age she learned to channel her Lux as was taught to her by masterful Adepts, and she was forced to learn the political landscape of the entire world by the time she was 10. Selena had everything, but she hated all of it. Learning so much about so many things and so many places, she resented her ruthless family, and it only got worse as she grew older and understood them better and better.
So when she was 16, she snuck out during a "party" for all of the family's close political allies. She made it look like an accident had occurred, to distract and throw people off of her trail. She broke into her mother's room and stole a priceless artifact, the Graymoon Cloak, and vanished into the night. Having the foresight to think ahead, she manage to steal plenty of money on the way out. Then, Selena got on a plane and never looked back. Her journey took her to St. Portwell, a city she had heard much about in the clutches of her family. It was here that she encountered a minion of the Stygian Snake, which she quickly dispatched with her red Lux. It just so happened that a certain heroic Adept with a knack for lightning found her and got her into the coven.
She made allies who became friends, discovered a world that the Gallagher family would have never told her about and did something that really made the world a better place. She was there for the coven's downfall, and made sure to keep contact with some key members after she left. She went on to work up a network of her own connections in the paranormal world, and fell into a life of freelance living, where the people she met and established a relationship with insulated her. She wanted to be untouchable, and wanted to share that quality with the right people to have as much freedom as she wanted.
One such person she wanted to work into her “family” was Goro Hatanaka, one of the best members of the Sycamore coven, the gold standard. She booked a flight to Japan, and began her search for him.
Abstraction ▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔ "Cross me, that will be fun."
TYPE ⫻ Adept
ABSTRACTION ⫻ Red, White and Purple Lux
ABSTRACTION DESCRIPTION ⫻ Selena is a classically trained Adept who learned a wide range of spell at a young age. Many of her spells collectively revolve around her affinity for knowledge and study. As such, Selena has amassed a well-rounded spellbook for combat, everyday use and support in a group effort.
Book of Shards ⫻ The Book of Shards is a tradition passed down through the Gallagher family, consisting of spells that turn Lux into a solid, glassy matter. The Book of Shards is vast, and includes over a hundred spells across all forms of Lux that have entered and left the family throughout history. Selena, however, only concerns herself with the spells among its list that are applicable to her red Lux. Selena has developed her own variants of these spells, which use white and purple Lux to supplement their capabilities on the battlefield.
Magic Missile ⫻ A simple bolt of red Lux shaped into searing light. Those struck by the spell are burned, and mundane matter can be completely vaporized as a result. This spell can be cast in large numbers by Selena, allowing her to carpet bomb an area in quick succession.
Celestial Spear ⫻ Red Lux crystallized into a long javelin, which Selena invented as a way to pierce emotional fields and defensive magic. Celestial Spears do not inflict much actual damage, but can leave a target defenseless for a brief windows
Shooting Star ⫻ Shooting Star is a spell similar to Magic Missile, only instead of being used like bullets, this spell is more like a guided missile. A pinch of purple Lux allows the Shooting Star to curve around corners and readjust its flight path to produce a hard-hitting explosion.
Glass Wave ⫻ Selena crystallizes her red and purple Lux into a silvery, glass orb. When she gets close to something, she launches it outwards, causing it to shatter and release a wave of telekinetic energy, similar to a shotgun blast. This flings people backwards, and can cut through a brick wall as if it were paper thin.
Diamond Glare ⫻ Selena produces a handful of crystallized Lux, and disperses it into the air to blind people. The magic dust acts as a flash-bang, and glitters and refracts all light for a few seconds before fading.
Cosmic Hailstorm ⫻ Selena charges up a wave of red Lux, and releases it in the form of a meteor shower. The spell rains Lux crystals down in a radius around Selena, which explode on impact to vitrify their surroundings. This can cause the crystal to build up and provide cover, or immobilize someone by weighing them down.
Lexicon ⫻ The Lexicon is a collection of spells that Selena uses to solve problems. These are less destructive spells, and more productive, often used to bridge the gaps between groups or outsmart someone standing in her way. This discipline of spells represents her breakaway from the Gallagher family, striking out on her own as a kid and finding her own way in the paranormal world. As such, none of the Lexicon's spells are particularly similar to the spells of her family.
Psychomancy ⫻ Selena taps into her purple Lux to telekinetically lift objects within the nearby vicinity. This done by channeling purple Lux into physical matter, giving Selena the ability to move it as if it were an extension of her body. A side-effect of using Psychomancy on things is that the longer Selena uses it on something, the more control she will have, as her Lux settles into it more.
Tesseract ⫻ The Tesseract is a cube-shaped pocket of distilled time. It acts as a small pocket dimension, bigger on the inside than it looks from the outside. Selena uses the Tesseract for storage, and for containing things that are time-sensitive, such as a bomb or an artifact that loses power over time.
Chromatic Clairvoyance ⫻ Selena channels her white Lux into her brain to perceive the world through a layer of grey and highlighting the paranormal in vibrant colors. Spells that have been cast in an area will leave behind trails of their respective color, and Adepts will radiate the colors of their Lux when observed. The more powerful the spell, the more intense the colors.
Moonstep ⫻ Selena surrounds herself in purple Lux to defy gravity. This spell makes her move like a helium balloon, meaning she can jump incredibly high and move as if she were lighter than air. Using Moonstep, Selena can scale a building in seconds, or jump off of a skyscraper to land like a feather. It also allows her to cushion the impact of a particularly hard-hitting blow, if she gets into a fight.
Glass Eye ⫻ A combination of red, purple and white Lux in the form of a crystalline orb no larger than a baseball. A Glass Eye acts as an extension of Selena’s senses, allowing her to move them telekinetically, and perceive the world through them. This lets her see things that she is not physically present for, making it a good tool for spying on others.
Vitrify ⫻ Using her red Lux, Selena fires a beam of light that condenses into magical crystal, just like any of her other spells. The crystal can be built up overtime, or dissipated back into nothing as she pleases, but the crystal acts as a defensive material. Selena can use it to build barriers, construct rough bridges, or simply weigh something down. With a burst of purple Lux, Selena can telekinetically shatter this crystal from the inside out, causing it to explode outwards.
LIMITS ⫻ A common trend among many of Selena's combat-oriented spells, the Book of Shards, is they don't use Lux to be cast. Rather, they are Lux, pulled from her soul, directly from the source to give her spells more substance. As with all Adepts, her Lux is the source of her Emotional-Field. These two things mean that, in practice, prolonged use of her offensive magic will make Selena temporarily less paranormal, resulting in her Lux weaker and her natural resistance to incoming magic weaker. There are two ways to manage this. The first is to simply avoid using the Book of Shards to fight, and the other is to flee the fight while her magic recovers from the strain.
WEAKNESSES ⫻ (DO NOT FILL THIS OUT, I WILL PROVIDE IT FOR YOU)
He/Him | 23 | White | 5’8” | 184lbs _______________________________________________ Violent _______________________________________________ Skills & Talents "What, did you think I was just a one trick Adept? Fuck off." ___________________________________
Weapons Expert ⫻ Swords, pistols, rifles, grenades, knives, hammers; If it’s a weapon that he can wield in his hands, Connor doesn’t have much trouble putting it to good use. He’s vicious when his hands are kept busy.
Mechanic ⫻ Befitting his paranormal skills, Connor knows his way around a car or a busted microwave. He’s not going to back into the Pentagon any time soon, but he’s self reliant enough to get by.
Survival ⫻ There are places where the toughest bastards in the world of magic will never go, and those are the places where Connor is at home. He thrives in the worst environments, in the most unwinnable conditions that human beings could find themselves in. Many of his earliest memories were of self-preservation, surviving is in his blood.
Language Knowledge ⫻ A little known fact about Connor is that he taught himself how to read and write when he was ten years old. He picked it up quickly, and it became a way to pass the time between fights in the old coven. He’s a far cry from one of those white Lux paranormals who can speak any language in the universe, but he’s a quick learner.
Appearance ▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔ "Looks can tell you a lot about a person, that’s why I try not to look like much."
At a glance, Connor’s fit is plain as white bread. Loose street clothes from sweatpants to faded sneakers give off the look of someone lazy and a few years younger than he really is. A closer look shows a guy with faint traces of many, many battles on his skin. Faint traces of burns, nicks and cuts race up and down Connor’s arms, and his expression is a permanent steely gaze that looks right through you. His body language flips between relaxed and on guard at random, implying he doesn’t really have an off switch.
Psychology ▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔ "Slow me down, I dare you."
MAIN GOAL ⫻ Connor doesn’t have much he wants in life. He just wants to outlive his enemies and see them dismantled before they can hurt good, honest people. To that end, he and Sirus have made plans to come home to St. Portwell, only to be held up by a certain orange Adept on a quest for artifacts.
PHILOSOPHY ⫻ Connor lives by the belief that the strong are responsible for the safety of the weak. As someone who considers himself one of the strong, Connor makes it his goal in life to stamp out threats to the people who don’t deserve it. The Morningstars, the Dollhouses, and the corrupt PRA directors of the world are his targets, like a shepherd defending the herd from an angry wolf.
SECRETS ⫻ Connor’s Abstraction has significant impacts on his mental state, something he keeps close to the chest in case anyone exploits it. All of his constructs amplify a specific emotion in him, making him more aggressive, more stubborn, or more protective, or any other emotion depending on which are active. This isn’t the most groundbreaking secret to have, but it is something that someone could use against him.
SEXUALITY ⫻ Connor has never allowed himself the time to explore the part of himself that feels such things for others, so he never found a name for how he feels. He simply chalks it up to “something or another thing,” and leaves it at that.
FEARS ⫻ Being truly alone in the world is something Connor never wants to return to. That state of being against the entire universe, where it was impossible to be any closer to rock bottom on countless levels, still haunts him to this day. Even if he doesn’t admit it.
REPUTATION IN OLD COVEN ⫻ Connor was dependable in a fight, albeit not so dependable when feelings were hurt. He took no shit and rarely gave any in the first place, unless someone really deserved it. But above all else, Connor was scary. Once, an Apparition made by the Stygian Snake had set a building on fire with him inside, and several members of the coven found him covered head to toe in burning clothes, still fighting the culprit like he wasn't even phased. Many people in the coven thought he was clinically insane, an actual psychopath, or some combination of the two. Despite his unhinged nature, Connor always got things done when he set his mind to them. He was honest, hellbent on keeping the coven alive to the end and outliving the Stygian Snake, and he never held back.
ROLE IN THE BATTLE AGAINST THE STYGIAN SNAKE ⫻ Together with his masterwork machine, Sirus, he led a whole squad of constructs into battle against the Snake. Massive guns firing on it to beat it into a corner, grenades turning whole swathes of its minions into ash, drones flying overhead in entire flocks to treat the wounded... Connor came alive during that battle. He supplied the other frontline fighters with their own weapons of all shapes and sizes to compensate for less offensive Abstractions, and pushed himself to extremes that most wouldn't dream of, a mix of quartermaster, commander and soldier.
FLAWS ⫻ The same violent, unhinged nature that got Connor so far is the same thing that holds him back. People have died because they drove him over the edge of a cliff that he’s always close to. Deep down, Connor always has been a fundamentally damaged person, unfit to live a normal life among the Blind. For him, snatching one more day on earth from the jaws of death is the only thing that makes life feel like it has any meaning. That’s all he’s ever known.
Backstory ▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔ "I was born in Hell, and I clawed my way up to Earth. I fucking earned the air I breathe, the ground I walk on."
In a place far from St. Portwell, beneath the notice of the greater paranormal world, there was a town known as Felton. In this town, a cruel being known as Lady Razorback ruled with an iron fist, stamping out every trace of hope anyone had for rising up and taking control of their lives. Felton was a place where the weak suffered, walled off from the outside world by a mix of magic and mundane factors. Starvation and sickness were an everyday fact of life, right alongside fresh victims for the field of crosses in the heart of town. To an outsider, Felton was in many ways similar to the Pit; Cruel, a monument to terror and suffering, home to atrocities that should never be named.
And it was in this hell that Connor Bray was born.
Connor’s earliest memories include running through bombed out warrens, climbing through desolate ruins to find shelter, and seeing visions of incomprehensibly powerful entities he could not name. From before he was old enough to understand the world itself, Connor understood the existence of magic, and of the things that went on in his home. Ever since he could walk, he fended for himself, cutting and running when someone bigger than him thought he’d be a cheap kill. By the time he was roughly 10 years old, Connor realized that he, too, could use magic. So he scoured the ruined stretches of Felton, beneath the foothills of Lady Razorback’s “kingdom,” to gather up materials that he needed for the visions he had.
He didn’t fully understand how he was doing the things he did, but they worked. Day after day, Connor would go through immense physical pain as his body burned up from the inside out, casting Lux into the shape of a machine without a channeler, something he didn’t know he needed at the time. The pain was debilitating, but like a solid block of marble being chipped away at over the course of a lifetime, he finally created a magic construct that called itself Sirus.
No longer alone, the two of them survived together for the next few years. Sirus watched Connor’s back, and helped keep him safe from the occasional starving animal that got too close. But eventually, Lady Razorback discovered that a new Adept was running around her little territory, so she sent her enforcers down into the trenches to look for him and his creation. An offer of power was extended to Connor and Sirus, but they both refused. They hated everything about Lady Razorback’s authority, having heard the countless whispers of her history by other “subjects.”
This wasn’t good enough for the ruler of Felton. Though she gave Connor time to consider the offer, she eventually came down hard on the child. Her loyal soldiers were sent to hunt Connor down for sport, using powerful magic to bring him to heel. But together with Sirus, they survived. Perhaps it was by sheer luck, or the fact rang no one truly understood Connor’s magic abilities, but they managed to beat the soldiers back and retreat deeper into the ruins. When they were safe, Connor an Sirus realized they needed to fight their way out. It was unthinkable to do so, Felton was all they had ever known. But the choice was clear, stay in hell or claw their way out.
And so, through great pain and meticulous planning, Connor created a a pair of weapons that would make their escape far more easy. A blade of burning steel, and a pistol that fired explosions instead of bullets. Side by side, they cut a bloody path out of Felton. An Adjoined bound to the soul of a dead military captain was split down the middle with the sword, an Agent with a spear of solid light was reduced to ash, and over a dozen more fell victim to them as they carved through Lady Razorback’s forces.
They found a vehicle, one of the jeeps used to move supplies and “offenders” around the town. Sirus took the wheel while Connor stuck to shooting, and after a seven hour struggle, they made it past the walls of Felton. They escaped and drove down endless roads for days. They lost track of just how long they were out there, but it felt like no one else passed their car until they reached a city on the west coast: St. Portwell.
Their lives changed for the better as they met the coven. Connor came alive, grew up and met so many people. He learned so much in so little time, it was like becoming a whole other person in the year that he spent with them. Connor quickly made himself known as a dangerous person to cross, but he always did right by the coven members who deserved it. Those like Ashley Stone, Kari Wilson, and Goro Hatanaka who acted as the foundation of the coven. But once it was all said and done, after all the damage was mended, Connor and Sirus made it clear they had unfinished business to take care of outside of St. Portwell. The violent kind that only they would walk away from.
But before they left, Connor got in touch with Sloane for one last act of coven business. He handed off most of his more powerful weapons, and several duplicates of his constructs to her, saying that he wasn’t sure how long he’d be away. If there was an emergency, or if the Stygian Snake came back, Connor said that he trusted her to use his work however she saw fit.
The coven has not seen or heard from Connor or Sirus ever since.
Abstraction ▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔ "Sirus, find me the grenade launcher."
TYPE ⫻ Adept
ABSTRACTION ⫻ Red, Gold, and Orange Lux
ABSTRACTION DESCRIPTION ⫻ Connor’s Lux has a strong affinity towards the creation of weapons, and mechanical automatons that have enough intelligence to make their own decisions. Where most Adepts have spells, Connor has an arsenal of energy-based weapons that answer a variety of questions. The process that most Adepts go through to invent new spells is instead a process that Connor uses to construct a wholly new weapon, or a new drone with specific functions in mind. This progress is more along the lines of mundane engineering, and includes a great deal of back and forth, designing and redesigning. Orange Lux is the cornerstone of Connor’s entire “spellbook,” which is then supplemented by either red or gold Lux depending on which of his two affinities he is working with.
ARMORY ⫻ Connor’s red Lux-infused weapons reflect those used by mundane fighters, from swords to firearms. These weapons reflect Connor’s combative, violent nature.
Many of Connor’s weapons have been entrusted to Sloane Faris, ever since his departure from the Sycamore Coven.
Inferno Blade ⫻ The Inferno Blade is a longsword with a blade that heats up to roughly 1000 degrees Fahrenheit, allowing it to cut through many obstacles and flammable paranormals with ease. The weapon is also enchanted so that the heat can be regulated with a thought, allowing it to instantly cool down for safety in an instant.
Skeleton Key ⫻ A shotgun that fires waves of electrical energy, created after a bit of shocking advice from Drake Blackmore. The Skeleton Key uses electrical energy to break up molecular bonds, causing a target’s defenses to be broken. Magical barriers and emotional fields crack, and grow brittle whenever applicable, in exchange for the ability to do devastating damage with a shot.
The Falling Glacier ⫻ A spear with a blade of frozen light. The Falling Glacier’s blade saps thermal energy from a target, resulting in numbness that will eventually lead to hypothermia with enough slashes and thrusts. The blade itself is sharp, but not so sharp that it could amputate a limb or completely skewer someone.
Funnelweb ⫻ The Funnelweb is a compound bow, made to synergies with special arrows produce a small amount of nuclear radiation. When a target is struck, the effect is subtle at first, but will slowly make them nauseous and weak, escalating into acute radiation sickness if they don’t pull the arrow out. The Funnelweb’s arrows have just enough energy to be a threat to someone who has been impaled by them, and do not contaminate the environment.
Rime Grenades ⫻ Small canisters of highly concentrated red Lux, aligned to cryomancy. When a Rime Grenade is detonated, it plunges the air into bitter cold temperatures well below the freezing point of water, in a 3 foot sphere. They can be used to immobilize and incapacitate, or shut down fire-based magic in an emergency.
Corona Grenades ⫻ The exact opposite of a Rime Grenade. Corona Grenades detonate and flood their immediate surroundings with a shower of searing red light, similar to a flashbang, which can cause second degree burns and dramatically heat up the environment.
Black Anvil ⫻ The Black Anvil is a grenade launcher that channels red Lux into energy bombs, which explode in a cloud of fire and brimstone on contact with a surface. Though slow to charge up, the effects are devastating when used against Apparitions.
Polaris ⫻ Polaris is a floor-deployed emplacement that unfolds to reveal a heavy duty hard light cannon. This thing is big, and must be manually set up and operated by someone who doesn’t need to move. But in return, it offers a method of blasting targets with semi-solid bolts of burning plasma that behave similarly to napalm.
Earthbreaker ⫻ A large, heavy and implacable hammer of solid steel. Connor created the Earthbreaker as a way to control battlefields. As such, the user is granted a form of localized terramancy when they wield it, allowing them to shatter huge boulders and reshape the ground on a whim. Its heavy weight was necessary to house the red Lux that powers it, so it is hard to use if you’re in a long, drawn-out fight. Which really defeats the purpose of a melee weapon, but someone had to make a territory-control tool.
Zephyr ⫻ Zephyr is a combat knife enchanted by Connor to channel aeromancy magic. The blade is supernaturally sharp, able to cut through Apparitions like they’re made of paper, and the knife can be thrown really far. If this is done, an air current will return Zephyr back to its wielder like a boomerang.
Forge Blaster ⫻ An unassuming revolver with heavy discoloration, the Forge Blaster fired bullets of condensed heat that rapidly expand to create a small, controlled burst on impact. There are no fancy gimmicks with this weapon, it simply puts a considerable hole in whatever it is pointed at.
Azrael’s Burden ⫻ Once, the legendary bastard of St. Portwell known as Scott Reese got under Connor’s skin. Badly. So he invented a sniper rifle that he hoped would keep him dead for good. Azrael’s Burden draws in particles from the air, and reconfigures their atoms until they stabilize into atoms of iron. This progress takes several seconds, and supercharged the newly formed bullet with red Lux. This Lux is tuned to destabilize the molecular bonds between elemental matter, resulting in a target’s body being violently disintegrated where the bullet lands. Azrael’s Burden managed to do significant damage to Scott. But unfortunately, it wasn’t quite enough.
Final Judgement ⫻ The Final Judgement was Connor’s magnum opus, his greatest work that he has ever made. Styled after a mundane gatling gun, it featured eight rotating barrels that were fed from a heavy power supply of solid quartz. This crystalline engine existed in a state of entropic superposition, contained by a heavy enchantment of orange Lux. When fired, Final Judgement created beams of antimatter, violent projections of energy that halted molecular movement, prevented reality itself from functioning for a brief window. In practice, this means that the air the beams travel through, as well as the target they hit are simply unmade. Matter ceases to exist, allowing the Final Judgement to slowly and surely erase major threats from the world entirely. Sirus carried the Final Judgement into the battle against the Stygian Snake, and used it to assist Ashley Stone in weakening the beast to a point where it could be sealed.
THE FLEET ⫻ A long list of mechanical constructs, powered by a mix of gold and orange Lux, with a pinch of red thrown in. These constructs often take the form of small, floating drones with just enough intelligence to facilitate their main functions. The “brain” of these machines is a sophisticated crystalline growth that refracts light signals off of its interior structure to approximate fiber optic processing, much like a mundane computer.
Before his departure from St. Portwell, Connor made duplicates of his constructs have been trusted to Sloane Faris in case an emergency happened while he is gone.
Sirus ⫻ The first creation that Connor built with his Lux. Sirus is Connor’s oldest companion, with intelligence on par with human beings. Free-thinking and wise like a old man, Sirus fought alongside Connor through some of his darkest days, and saves the lives of many coven members.
Raptor [RAGE] ⫻ Raptor was built to detain and capture paranormal entities. To do this, it launches nets of solid electricity that can stun and weigh down its targets. Once caught, Raptor will try to ensure that the target stays immobilized until Connor says otherwise.
Rampart [VALOR] ⫻ Rampart is slow to move in most cases, like a stubborn mule that only moves when it wants to. But once it decides to plant itself in a position, Rampart defends it by firing bolts of lightning at anything that gets within 30 feet. Rampart is, in a sense, a free-thinking turret that Connor can leave to guard an area.
Warhorse [FREEDOM] ⫻ Warhorse is a much larger construct designed to act as a vehicle for Connor. True to its namesake, the Warhorse drone fears nothing, and will fly into battle at a speed of 15 miles per hour no matter what, as long as Connor is there to take the reins.
Protector [DETERMINATION] ⫻ Protector is a small construct that floats near whoever Connor assigns it to, acting as a personal shield. When someone attacks Protector’s assigned paranormal, it will produce small barriers of hard light to block punches, kicks, bullets, and other attacks that would hurt them.
Caddie [STUBBORN] ⫻ Caddie is a mechanical pack mule, which uses gravity-based red Lux to store weapons and carry heavier things with a tractor beam. Caddie is almost always seen with Connor, ensuring he always has what he needs.
Servitor [ZEN] ⫻ Servitor is what Connor calls a “pseudo-Adept.” It was built with a pair of dexterous limbs, fitted with an array of tools that allow it to perform maintenance on all of Connor’s creations, and assist him in the construct of new ones. Servitor acts as a conduit for Connor’s Lux, so as long as it has some instructions, it can build things while he is occupied.
Angel [COMPASSION] ⫻ Angel is a combat medic. Similar to Servitor, it has arms fitted with several tools for versatile use. Angel has everything from stitches and disinfectant to surgical tools available in case of an emergency. Though it struggles to give medical attention to people with more unusual biology, such as some Adjoined, most people are in safe hands when Angel is present.
LIMITS ⫻ A major flaw of Connor’s Abstraction is that he does not cast spells. Rather, he creates material conduits of his Lux to use as weapons or as answers to a problem. Because of this, a clear weak point in his capabilities lies in the fact that once you take away his weapons, he’s effective a One-Eye-Open. Connor is as magically strong as the weapons or backup he has at his disposal.
WEAKNESSES ⫻ (DO NOT FILL THIS OUT, I WILL PROVIDE IT FOR YOU)
With Sully alive, and a fucking dragon fading into the background, that was two less major variables they had to worry about. There wasn't a lot the Aggros squad could do beyond push past the Magma Titan. Right now, it was the priority, so the squad took to focusing it. Hallow Blast, Ride the Lightning, all the good this the Adepts had for hitting hard technically worked. But the fallout meant that Amara's phantoms had to get back away, which wasn't an issue since they were carrying firearms.
If they didn't get that thing taken care of, this would spiral out of control quick. One of her phantoms stayed with the artifact squad through the blizzard, and helped them along. One of them focused mostly on Adora, who seemed to be in the worst state. A draw, huh. Sure.
While they ran, the Veil squad got down to Alex, Rien, a phantom and Jack. The storm was keeping them from suffering a rain of hellfire. Amara herself had an idea for how to do this, but that goth ass twink beat her to it.
"I know what to do. The Veil must be deactivated, but we'll return it back to the field immediately after," She heard him say through the phantom connection.
"We will shield you. Do what must be done."
Over in Jack's part of the island, darkness whirled around him and the ghostly fighter. A few bullets here and their picked off the zombies, as Jack prepared to banish the Eustis Veil to oblivion and back. He felt the entire world turning sideways as the vertigo and the nausea set in, blurring his vision and threatening to send him into a deep sleep. The portal was going to big, more than he usually created.
"Listen up! Hawthorne's got a plan, Veil's! Going down!" Amara announced over the radios. "Be ready to obliterate the shit out of that fucking titan!"
"...Now."
Interactions: Everyone
The Island
The Hallow Blast rocked the Magma Titan and put it flat on the ground. There was good news and bad news in that. The good news was that this thing had a limit to how much punishment it could take at once. The bad news was that they couldn't hit it with another one of those for at least another fifteen minutes. That was how long it took an Abjuration aura to burn out, and that wasn't factoring in how much time Aaron needed to recharge his Spirit Bomb. So they had to pick up some momentum.
"We can't use that again for now!" Stormy warned. "Drake! We can cast Barrier Storm to keep it knocked down! I'll-"
The sky over the island flickered back to normal. The storm of the Eustis Veil was off again.
And off in the distance, Stormy saw something black split into view, high in the air. And it was at that point that he watched a 40 foot tall stone fall, like a meteor, and pick up speed before crashing right into the skull of the Magma Titan. That was the Veil. Amara's phantom had disabled it, and Jack had banished it into the Void, letting it fall and fall and fall before bringing it back to Shimmer to land flat on the apparition's head.
"What in the god damn..."
The radios crackled to life, and it was Jack's voice.
"That... Should open a window for the rest of you..." He didn't sound like he was in good shape.
"The Veil is likely destroyed, use this time to rain... Hell down on that beast."
Well, damn. "It's stunned! Get him!" All of Stormy's barriers dropped, now that there was a window to breathe and reposition, and he hauled ass forward. "We're not done, yet!"
Member
Megatron
Courtaud
ctrlsaltdel
LanaStorm
Andre Valias
Forsythe
TheMushroomLord
KazAlkemi
Zombiedude101
