BrokenPromise

Grimoiric Heart

Still waiting on a response from @KoL's tuner before I do anything.

Symphony of Espers

I have a few collabs to add to, but I really wanna get this announcement out before too much time passes.

First the obvious, as you know, the current operation phase is over. You can start writing downtime posts that take place between now and the next operation. I'll have more to say about that shortly.

To my knowlage, no one but Sofron made use of special notes being "free" this operation. I can kind of understand why, but I'm going to keep them free for the time being as something that comes up that infrequently probably shouldn't cost a precious note slot.

Since the opperation has ended, you level up! Everyone can upgrade a bronze glamor to a silver one! The process is exactly the same as last time. Gold glamors will not be available to players until the completion of the next operation. We decided that an operation like this wasn't quite enough to justify getting a gold glamor. But yea, same ritual as before. Make your new glamors, submit them for approval, and VE-OH-LAH, you get more stronk. In relation to that...

Regarding the DoCS, I really wanna get to the updates I wanted to finish last downtime cycle into the rp. Note speeds, keywords, and the backup system. In fact, some of you may wish to hold off on updating glamors for the moment if you'd be interested in taking advantage of mundane gear/ powerful once per operation specials. I know Klava wishes she brought a gun.

And a note on downtime...

So I don't think it's a secret that a lot of the collabs posted during downtime involve the GMs. I don't mind writing them, and most of the time, they are justified. If you want one of your characters to converse with an NPC, I'm never going to turn that down. Especially if I'm the one who prompted it in the first place! But when I look at the posts that happen over downtime, an overwhelming proportion of them involve myself or Erode. And while I'm sure he enjoys writing with you just as much as I do, that means I can't work on the DoCS to fine tune notes, add more systems, or all that other stuff. With an important operation on the horizon, I would really like to have more time to work on that stuff, but I don't want to leave you guys twiddling your thumbs with nothing to do.

Something I like about rule sets is that they ground things. I've been in an RP that wasn't quite like this one, but it was sort of the same deal and it didn't have any rules to govern how its magic worked. You could keep casting spells until the GM said you were out of mana, everything was done by GM call and when GMs weren't involved, well, the sky was the limit. Combat was an incoherent mess, and battles were determined by judgements that were often inconsistent and seemed to serve the GMs bias more than anything else. Though one thing that RP did have was that the Players were free to do whatever they wanted. They could make laboratories, forge alliances, build their own factions, what they could do was policed as well as the combat was.

That stuff was pretty cool.

I feel that when people encounter a rule system, even if it just governs combat and little else, the temptation is to feel like your options are limited by it. Even when I started using maps to show the landscape of more complex battle areas, I feel like this has limited people's creativity a bit. Does their character have line of sight? etc. I mostly use these tools to make sure combat is coherant and not a chaotic mess. If your character doesn't see something, they might hear it or could simply move and become aware of what's going on.

But back to downtime, the world is really your oyster. You can collaborate with people outside your faction to get things set up. Maybe Finn wants to track down Justin, So he looks to Ashley for help, who brings along Marrie, as she's done research into his Chinese silk worm operation. You could do a collab deciding to form an alliance, and at a later date I could write what the group's findings are in a follow up post. You could also write solo posts trying to pursue other skills. Maybe Agent Leroux decides she wants to try her hand at being a magical researcher, or further her knowledge on blood magic beyond what Binky has told her. Stuff like this requires minimal imput from me, and lets you write posts.

Again, yea, there are going to be times I do need to write a post with you, especially for the crazier stuff. But I don't you to feel like your characters can't attempt to do things without GM supervision. @The World pretty much had Marrie attempt to hunt down Justin with minimal imput from me. They just kinda did it, leaving me posts to respond to, and it wasn't until Marrie got High Priest's attention that we jumped into a collab to sort out the back and forth with the mysterious entity.

And...

Yea, that's all for now, I gotta get to work!

Grimoiric Heart

The basic idea is that if you have any number of students, you pick the last one and roll a dice with the same number of sides as the remaining students to see who they are paired with. Then you keep removing paired students and roll for those that remain. so if you had ten, you'd roll a d9, then a d7, then a d5, then a d3.

Grimoiric Heart

If I were to do it, I would do it like this.

#1: I'd create a list of the students participating, and give them each a number. For this example, I'll just have a bunch of students that are numbered.

Student 1
Student 2
Student 3
Student 4
Student 5
Student 6

#2: I have six students, So I will roll a 1d5 to see which of the students will be paired with student 6.

#3: I look at my roll and save the link to show that I'm not a cheater acting out of bias. But it's a 4, so student 6 is going to get paired with student 4

#4: I move all of the students into their new positions. Because student 4 got paired up with 6, 5 moves into student 4's old position. Not that it matters in this example, as we will be rolling for their partner, so their position is irrelevant. And since we only have 3 students left, we can roll a d3 to see who it will be.

Student 1
Student 2
Student 3
Student 5 (4)

#5: Continue rolling as necessary. Though for this example, there would only be two students left after this selection, so there would be no reason to do more rolls.

#6: Publicly announce the results, watch people ICly and OOCly scream.

Grimoiric Heart

@TheWendil Real talk, RPG DOES have a dice system, so you could do something like roll for random teams if you wanted to. I've done similar stuff in RPs I GM, but the problem with random stuff is that while it's random, it can also be randomly unfunny.

Grimoiric Heart

I'm only on page 3 of my re-read, but I remember most everyone having more or less no problem teaming up and beating down pageless, and there was an angel nany telling people what to do there.

Real talk though, Stripes more dislikes the ministries power structure than teaming up, and we have a lot more fables now it seems. So she might be less opposed to teaming up now than when the RP started. Though as I've stated in the past, sticking her with Goodhope or some other hilarious combo is also something that would be fun to RP.

Grimoiric Heart

I didn't realize IC people hated working together so much.

Draw your OC Chance

I'm curious to see how the final piece looks.

Symphony of Espers

What was there to be said?

In a battle between humans, it was misdirection that had always become the easiest method of securing victory. One could toss as much money as they wished at a problem, but if that money went into the wrong pockets, it meant naught. And in this case? All it required was for a simple assumption to be made, before victory was Tetrad’s.

A suspension locked the airborne vehicle in place, and her Sentinel-sharpened shot sealed its fate, blasting the tail rotor to bits. Six seconds elapsed, and the helicopter spiralled out of control, too close to the ground for parachutes to be of any use. Like an aluminum can against the wheel of a car, it crumbed against the pavement, engine igniting the fuel tank before an explosion rocked its surroundings.

Explosions, of course, that Tetrad didn’t need to look at…because the smartest move to make would be to take cover inside the ditch, in case shrapnel or gunmetal eviscerated her in her moment of victory.

As tortured metal polluted the forest scenery, as a good fistful of millions out of the government budget now laid fuming in black smoke, the beat-up, shot-up Patriot wheeled over once more, one of its tires ruptured and its entire roof removed. Lenny grinned, jabbing her thumb at the passenger seat, where Jezebel laid.

“Hop in, loser. We’re bouncing before they send ol’ Binky after us.”

---

"Lady Justine...We lost the castle to the Beacon...I'm afraid...We can't return."

— Sofron

_{@The World@Ponn}

Espers lived and died by the melodies they chose to use. Ashley’s options were further hindered by Sofron’s baleful burn effect, which further hindered the type of melody Ashley could cast. But with Sofron having just blown off her arm, she did have an advantage. She would get off her melody before Sofron got off his. Ashley needed to make it count. She could go offense or defense, and chose to cast a reflect melody on herself.

Sofron couldn’t be sure exactly what sort of melody she used, but it wasn’t hard to guess. His most devastating feature was his spells after all. But did she really think her magic could stop his own? The young esper likely couldn’t conjure a barrier strong enough to absorb his melodies, and her meager arcane defenses were unlikely to get much help from a modest melody. A more sinister person might find delight in their opponent’s futile attempts to stay alive, but Sofron was only further angered by his opponent underestimating him. Though with the bruises Klava left on his face, it was hard to see his scowl deepen.

It seemed like it would be over for the GEMINI operative. Which was just as well. Sofron had dealt with the infuriating ice maiden. That other girl likely ran off. She let Justin and him walk off with Betty and Pac-A-Fist, so it was easy to assume she fled upon seeing him again. Ashley’s wand might not have had a wind up like Sofron’s melody did; it was a projectile going against an instantaneous beam melody, and Sofrom could quicken his spells. Victory was almost assured.

But Ashley and Sofron were not the only ones here.

Marrie, upon noticing Klava fall out the window, immediately pulled herself up by her bootstraps. Seeing someone who needed help was all it took to get the young esper’s mind off of herself. She decided she could do something, that she had to do something, and took off flying towards Orion. And she was moving fast. Faster than a projectile…

But not a beam.

The dragon appeared, and immediately flew into Marrie. Though the attack had been initially aimed at Ashley, so it was not aimed at her most vital areas. The dragon struck her upper thigh, biting through the limb in a single chomp. She wouldn’t be hovering on that for a while, but what need did Marrie have for her legs when she could fly?

Ashley was shoved out of the way, but her projectile smashed into Sofron’s chest. You can bet an esper of Sofron’s caliber was going to have plenty of arcane defense, but Ashley’s wand was stronger than most. The neon green projectile ruptured his heart. But someone with that much hatred didn’t need a heart to keep going. He stumbled sideways, clutching his hand over his chest before his hand caught ablaze. He was running on fumes, but he had enough mana for one more melody.

"Baleful-"

Sofron was cut off when Marrie took hold of his head. He tried to take a swing at her arm, but by that point she had already let go of him. The burning, internally bleeding, angry man tumbled through the air before falling into the ocean. A few seconds later, all Marrie could see was the waves washing to and fro, with neither Klava nor Sofron in sight. Both Ashley and Marrie would feel a dampness on their chests as the brooches Klava had made for them melted away.

The espers did not have long to celebrate their victory, nor mourn their friend. The “police woman” from earlier rushed up the stairs.

”You guys done? We have to get out of here! Oros is-”

There was a dull thud as the woman’s head was shoved into a wall, knocking her out.

”Yea, i'm right here. How about you take a nap, eh?”

With a few swings of endless eclipse, the portal and constructions Sofron had made were dispelled. It wasn’t long before all the water drained away. Without anything there to bar her advance, Oros entered the room. She had the police woman thrown over one shoulder and was still holding her sword.

”Now let’s see, I mentioned a date, which is adequate foreshadowing for WHOA!” Upon seeing the squirrel woman lying on the ground, Oros tossed the police woman onto a nearby counter and looked into her sword. ”What the hell? You killed my date!” She turned to Ashley and pointed between her and the squirrel woman she killed. ”You’re such a cutie patooty too! And you- Why? Wha- What the hell was she even doing up here? Was I one of her side hoes?” Oros growled. ”This is why I hate Non-Patron Champions as dates, it’s so hard to tell what the less important ones are doing. She was screwing around with Sofron wasn’t she?” With a sigh, she sheathed her sword. ”Well okay, I guess the only fair way to do this is for one of you to replace her, right? I mean, it’s not like we knew each other. And uh.” Her eyes wandered up and down Ashley. ”I mean my own preference would probably be Gara gura over there, hey, do you need a heal or something? You don’t look okay.”

While Ashley and Marrie were no doubt confused by this interaction, their “Patrons” knew one thing for sure.

This was going to get resolved in a collab.

”Wanna watch me turn into a shark? I could like, dive into the water and see if I can find some esper remains to eat.”

---

Refuge, from what?

Su had no problem forcing her way into a clinic, detaining the receptionist, and delving into the unknown. Dealing with unpleasant situations like that was something she was perfectly suited for,

But this required a silver tongue. Something Su believed she had, just not in english. The gun cocking on the other side of the bed barrier was not a danger to Su or her squad, at least, not directly. If this was the doctor, and he was losing hope, he might be thinking about taking his life. One of them could spawn a blink note and hop on the other side, but that was dangerous.

“Doctor Sycamore?” was all Su asked.

Jacqueline shifted Havoc in her hands, staring at the sorry excuse of a barricade. There were no strange sounds audible - nothing that would indicate the immediate presence of thralls. Only one voice addressed them, presumably the doctor’s. And he was either threatening them, was about to kill himself…or someone else was threatening him. Based on how tired he sounded, the last option actually seemed pretty likely.

“How about you tell us what’s going on, instead?” she added. There was no way they could leave. One way or another, they’d get to the bottom of this. However, they were supposed to keep Sycamore alive. So, if the doctor was sufficiently distracted, maybe he could be incapacitated before he did something unfortunate.

Fable on his end stayed silent for now. He'd have to get a confirmation of what their situation was before he dared to act. While Leroux and Breacher tried to talk down the man behind the barrier, the boy searched for any open spaces to peer through.

"That's me." There was a half-hearted chuckle. Who else could it have been, really? Through some careful maneveuring around the two big ladies crowding around the space that the elevator's doorway provided, Timekeeper was able to use his own rapier to poke a hole through a mattress. It would be too obvious if he made it much bigger, but through the pinpoint hole, the esper was able to catch a glimpse of what appeared to be a middle-aged man, resting a revolver on his thigh as he sat on a simple metal stool. The room itself was dimly lit, and yet from what small bits he could see, was made up entirely of concrete, creating a cavernous feeling.

The doctor continued to speak.

"A question for a question leads nowhere, miss. Humor me then. What do you think is 'going on'?"

Jacqueline rolled her eyes at that. "Unless it wasn't clear by us staying - no, we can't just pretend we've seen nothing and leave." Granted, they hadn't seen much yet. But clearly, there was something of significance on the other side of the barrier.

Eyeing Fable, who had just punctured a peekhole through one of the beds, and was probably planning to apprehend the doctor with a melody, she decided to keep the doctor busy listening. "No idea, doctor, but sure, I'll humor you," she conceded. "Let's see...what we know is that you've had a large number of 'patients' come in but not out. Thralls. You have this basement that's not accounted for in the building plans, so this place must have been intended for something sketchy from the get-go. Whether Justin Carnage was involved initially, or took over the 'business' later...I'd say you're cooperating under duress." She paused there, awaiting his response.

No sign of thralls. Luckily, the doctor didn't have a gun to his head yet. He could just take the coward's way out if they said the wrong thing or acted out of line. Whatever line of sight he had should hopefully be enough to cast a spawn melody. The Timekeeper would have to choose his words carefully and remain calm.

"So what are you hiding from? Justin?" The boy finally spoke up. His tone wasn't strict, but it wasn't soft either. "A crude barrier like this could only mean you intend to keep something out, someone out, or keep something in. And somehow I doubt this was made in advance for our arrival." He speculated.

It was a little disappointing that now was when they were going to get hit by a quiz. She really would have liked to have seen the top floor before making any judgements. But she could make observations based on what she did know. Jacqueline believed he was working under duress, Fable believed he was hiding from Justin, and Su…

“Barrier improvised, beds downstairs, no beds upstairs.” That was more an assumption than anything, but she’d let him correct her if he cared to. Ultimately, this was a pretty sorry barrier when compared to what some aristocratic vampire could afford. If he had a hand in this, he wasn't too concerned about it. “Elevator clean, still smell like blood. You doctor. Doctor help people, no?” Su folded her arms. “You help thralls. Maybe better? Doctor cure thralls of being thralls?” The doctor couldn’t see it, but Su furrowed her brow. “Where blood come from?”

"That's what you call them? Thralls?" The voice from behind the barricade took on a harsher tone, the narrowing of one eye noticeable by Timekeeper. "I'm not afraid of Justin. And if you've pieced it together so well, agents, you should know where the blood comes from."

Timekeeper could see the mirthless smile form. Could spy now, many somethings covered up in cheap bedsheets, dark stains splotching the fabric.

"Do you?"

"Oh, so it's like that," Jacqueline realized, but didn't sound particularly put off. This just meant the doctor would be taken down by force, after all.

A chill went down the boy's spine. He was lucky the doctor couldn't see his dread filled expression.

"H-He didn't intend to cure them." Timekeeper said, mostly directed to Breacher, yet he didn't dare look away. He had to be ready to cast a melody.

Su didn’t need Finn to tell her that. Her English wasn’t great, but it was clear that the doctor had either become a thrall himself, or was willingly working with a monster. Though she noticed that Fable was peaking through a hole he had made to the other side. Now that was something she could use.

She lowered her head in front of Finn, peeking through the hole into the other room. Su took note of the location of certain key details. The location of his gun, the doctor himself, that was all Breacher really needed to take into account. They were here to investigate the premises and capture the doctor. That would be a lot easier if she could get the doctor to come to them.

“Then we done talking.”

This wasn’t going to be an easy shot, with a narrow opening to shoot through and no line of sight while she was doing so. But Su’s extensive training as a GEMINI agent at least meant it was possible. She stood back up, put her gun in front of the hole, and fired a melody into the other room. A beam of wind struck Doctor Sycamore’s arm. Fragments of his barricade, bits of aluminum bed frame and mattress, coiled around his hand and arm. Among the debris was a spring, reinforced by the magic of Su’s melody, it stretched out from the barrier, grabbed the mass on the doctor’s arm, and yanked them closer.

Su took her shield and smashed it against the barrier, hoping that her newly acquired upgrade would help rupture the wall and create an opening. If they were fast, they could pull the doctor through before things got too complicated. After giving the wall a good shove or two, she stood off to the side so that Jacqueline and Finn could get a shot in if they were able.

Once given a better opening, the Timekeeper quickly fired a restraining melody of his own, just in case the doctor tried anything to break through Breacher's.

_{[Bronze Projectile][Restrain][Quicken] = -48 MP
(702 MP Remaining)}

Jacqueline had been waiting for the chance to do so, and went ham against that stupid fucking barricade. She swung Havoc against the beds, smashing and shattering the remaining furniture to pieces. Once there was enough room for them to pass through, she dashed down the hallway, her instrument raised and ready to knock out the doctor.

Pull, restrain, and smash. He didn't even stand a chance.

With two melodies and then just plain ol' physical force, the doctor was brought down, Leroux able to smash through the barricade while Timekeeper's melody crackled over Dr. Sycamore's entire body. Havoc swung well against an immobile opponent, and the hefty instrument struck him in the head. A dangerous move perhaps, against someone who may just be human, but effective nonetheless, rendering him incapacitated in an instant.

Now, past the barricade, they could see what exactly the room was.

No, perhaps it was too cavernous to be just a room. The elevator system had brought them down, ultimately, to what appeared to be a discontinued portion of Pax Septimus's sewer system. Medical equipment, mostly tall racks from where plastic tubes hung, laid in disorderly rows, while a few wheelchairs were toppled off onto their sides. Large filing cabinets, perhaps from the previous leaser of the property up above, stored rolls of bandages and alcoholic wipes, while metal trays atop had surtures, needles, and an array of other sharp, metal tools. Stacks of plastic water containers lined one wall, and off by another were the corpses that Timekeeper spotted, their bodies covered by stained, thin blankets.

Beyond the chair that the doctor had sat upon was a pipe, large enough for an adult human to duck through. A dislodged iron plate flat on the ground beside it, and trails of fresh blood dotted the inside of the pipe.

Su stepped back into the doorway, shield raised and gun pointed ahead. She stepped into the cavern and looked over everything. Everything made sense, save the water. If the doctor was a thrall, he probably subsided on blood alone, and if he was a human, then his food had to be stored elsewhere. What was going on? Su approached the water bottles to see if they were indeed water. Once she was done with her inspection, she looked over her shoulder at the pipeway dotted with fresh blood.

“Hard to keep shield up in pipe.” Su had no problem being the first one to enter an area, but if she was crawling on all fours, that meant that she only had her pistol and melodies to defend herself with. Though it was probably better if she went through before anyone else. “But Leroux has pick, and Time Keeper has rapier. Pistol may be best option.” Though she wouldn’t oppose her allies going ahead. They knew themselves better than she did.

But first, Su needed to make sure the bodies were bodies and not thralls lying in wait. She moved closer to the sheets and prepared to tug them off of what she hoped to be only corpses.

The room as a whole screamed "black market backroom", at least in Timekeeper's eyes. The same eyes that were drawn to the cadavers that he first saw. Thralls or not, he doubted they were still alive at this point, but he didn't stop Breacher from checking to see. He looked back to the pipe.

"I think..." The boy walked over and peered through it. How far did this rabbit hole go? "I should be able to slip through here easier. If anything, I could toss a blink back here if I need to scram." He said, pulling out the credit card statement he found earlier. The Timekeeper did want to ask Sycamore about his supplier, but that'd have to wait. He passed it to Leroux for now. "Found that on the upper floor." He told her. If there were no further objections, Fable would go ahead and follow the blood trails.

The water containers, large enough to carry many liters of water in each individual unit, were indeed filled with water. Approaching closer now, Breacher could see too an array of portable cooking stoves, as well as pots. Sterilization then, through boiling instruments in water, looked to be the main purpose of such a mass of containers. Her approach towards the covered sheets, as well as her blatant revealing of them, showed too that they were, indeed, just corpses.

Corpses cleaned and cared for, at least with as much dignity one could ascribe to former thralls. The commonalities were clear between them all, however. Malnourished youths, their wrists and ankles scarred, their bodies riddled with bullet wounds of a much higher calibre than the pistol that had been secured from the Doctor. And, most importantly, their forearms sported needle-thin holes.

Not from transfusion, but…

Timekeeper advanced alone, the most mobile of the three espers present. It was a lot more responsibility than just heading up a set of stairs and rifling through someone’s room. Now, it was about pursuit, against perhaps a whole army of dangerous thralls, all while within the complex, unmapped labyrinth that was Pax Septimus’s sewers. What monstrosities laid rest within the rectum of this city of blood and sin? What dangers awaited in every corner that he turned? Through the pipe the youth crawled, but by the time he reached the other end…

What exactly was he to pursue here? The expanse of darkness before him could not be penetrated by what feeble light his electricity passively generated, while the stench and sound of the sewers drowned out any finer details. He could either go to the right or to the left, but no doubt there would be even more of these directional decisions to make!

What was the best choice here?

Luckily, nothing's tried to kill him yet. But even the upper floors had it's emergency lighting to give him some sight. Not wanting to risk going deeper into the belly of the beast alone, Timekeeper waited for the other two to appear from the other side of the pipe. "Just a fork in the road! _{Christ it's dark in here!}" He called out to his teammates. The trail couldn't have ended here, could it??

Finn’s mumbling didn’t go unheard, and fortunately, Su had an answer.

They had everything required to make torches. Alcoholic wipes for fuel, bed sheets to keep the flame going, and camp stoves to set them alight with. The dismantled bed frames made fine handles, and shouldn’t get too warm with a small flame on top. They only took a moment to make, and would make navigating the labyrinth easier.

“Suppose we split up?” Su handed her first makeshift torch to Jacqueline. It was already lit, throwing a warm light on it’s surroundings. “I follow you shortly.” Su tore another strip of bedcloth as she prepared to make two more torches.

Jacqueline had accepted the document Fable had handed her, and tucked it underneath her esper-manifested armour. While Su did her own thing, she went to check on the doctor. He was probably going to stay out cold for a while, but she decided to tie him up just in case. It was easy enough to rip some of the sheets Breacher hadn't yet used, and fashion some ropes. While she was at it, she assessed Sycamore's wound, ensuring he wasn't in a critical condition.

When that was done, she accepted the torch from her coworker, and followed Fable through the pipe. "I'll go right. Let's keep in touch if we can," she tapped the comms Gemini habitually had on them. She wasn't convinced it'd work as intended underground, but one could hope. With a nod in farewell, she proceeded down the right path.

Time passed within the sewers, makeshift torches drawing in the attention of the sewer’s insects. Firelight exposed the remnants of rotting flesh and exposed bone, the detritus of the sinful city, but greater monstrosities, if they existed, did not show themselves. Had the GEMINI operatives taken too long in their initial investigations? Or did the labyrinthine sewers, combined with their lack of tracking capabilities, simply meant that they all ultimately pursued the wrong branch? The reasons didn’t matter. Only the results.

And as the hours drew on, as the prospects of finding those thralls that had escaped grew slimmer and slimmer, the agents could only return to their starting point once more. Empty-handed, except for a fortunate find from Leroux.

The cold body of a thrall, encountered at a far-off junction. A gangly youth with a now-limp mohawk, his stature such that he looked worthless as a combatant, his body wrapped with bandages now stained by the scarlet of reopened bullet wounds. He had collapsed, passed away. Now just an ashen corpse for GEMINI examiners to open up.

How many pieces were left? How many pieces could be put together?

As they left the Aspira Refuge together, the dying sunlight greeted them, as well as a call from Dr. Moller.

It was time to make their report.

Grimoiric Heart

Ozma better check themselves before they wreck themselves, suggesting that the solo stalk lyfe isn't the arguably better way to go.

I'll probably post after @KoL has the tuner do something, though if @Villamvihar plans on posting I'll wait for that as well.