ERode

Reborn in a Fantasy World, This Time I Shall...!

𖦭

STR [2] | DEX [3] | MAG [1] | DEF [1] | RES [1] | AGI [3] | LCK [4]

《 Luck of the Devil 》
Fortune favours the foul. +3 LCK.

_{@Zeroth@TheMushroomLord@PKMNB0Y}

“Pointless question to ask,” the elf replied, taking the youth’s hand in a business-like shake. “I died before the election was over.”

C proved himself to be the talkative sort, in the way that people who don’t get to talk too much are. Information flowed like a broken faucet outwards, based off of consumed media. LoTR was recognizable, at least, but he had the sense that he himself was not something akin to Tolkein’s elves, despite his heightened awareness of his surroundings, despite the curious intuition that told him that he and C both were aware of the dangling board hanging off the shack.

“And yes, I can see that.”

The status report was reasonable enough, though his physical limits felt vague at the moment. He clenched and unclenched his fists, wondering what the numbers translated into, but no matter what, they seemed on the small side of things. And Luck? His surroundings did not appear to be that of a ‘fortunate’ one, unless it was for the better they were not immediately presented before the royalty of this world. Unless? No. It was definitely for the better.

He stroked his chin still, a thumb grazing far-too smooth skin. Then, he stated the obvious.

“So we need to leave after all. And trust that the ‘NPCs’ aren’t hostile when we ask things of them. Ok.” A shallow nod, then a turn towards slime that was once-more bound to the ground. “And ‘add contact slime, C’.”

Without any further delay, he headed out the shelter, to, as C spoke before ‘get their bearings’.

Expedition to Isekai

---

//Day 3 | Location: Nameless Forest - Lakeside
_{@AThousandCurses}
Maybe it’ll be fun.

With those words, Shun broke off from the group once more, taking confident strides into the forest. It was strange, how accustomed she had grown to it now, straying from others into a forest that was nameless, yet was no longer entirely unknown. Her presence scattered the bugs and the birds nearby, prey-creatures who knew not to remain within the presence of an Awakened, and her eyes made it easy to track those claw marks high up on the trees. She could reach that height if she wanted to. If whatever creature that made those marks thought it safe to stay up above, it would soon understand the folly of its ways.

So of course Shun advanced, stepping over roots and pushing through brush, covering ground quickly even as her internal timer ticked down.

But when the allocated time came, whatever monster she pursued had yet to emerge. The signs, however, multiplied. Overhead now, far more claw marks sliced into the bark of the trees. Upon some, the bark was entirely stripped off, leaving grooves in the sapwood. And the faint smell of animal refuse could be detected too, dark nuggets on the soil. This was another group. Perhaps more numerous than even those wolf-bears. They hadn’t approached the lakeside camp en masse, but members of their troop must have scouted it out anyways.
They must know now, of the new inhabitants monopolizing the lake.

Whether that was sign of a future attack, or if the presence of the troop was more a threat for Duncan and Asahi though, was unclear.

Revue of Annihilation

@EstylwenNew day has arrived in Oratorio.

Elys gets +5 Ichor, and in terms of resources, will have garnered 13 Tier 1 Monster Materials that she can sell for profit later. The main pressing thing is that she'll definitely understand that future runs would be safer with allies + gears and supplies. Her sword has also gone through a wringer, and will need to be repaired or replaced entirely, depending on how sentimental she is vs how much she's willing to spend.

Revue of Annihilation

A day and a night had passed, just like that.

…

Talia woke up once she could no longer ignore the snoring of her merry band of thieves. Pickings were slim in the Outer Layer when it came to thievery; the best her men had done was steal from the wretched and the poor, when it came down to it. A redistribution of assets was a kind way of thinking about it, but on the other hand, it was a far cry from the sort of thievery she had engaged in before.

A bright new day awaited her, however. She smelled about as rancid as her surroundings, but her pockets were a bit heavier. She still had no real power, but that halfling was a useful piece. Everything remained in flex for the Queen of Thieves, but what of it?

The future, after all, was a coin, forever spinning.

It was her task to grasp and place it on whichever face she desired.

…

The atelier served as a good enough hideout, but only for the time being. Sleep had came fitfully for Meisa, even with Firenze standing guard. Her clash with the patrol from the Blackhand Butchers hadn’t caused any immediate ripples the day prior, but now? There was no way that the leader of that gang hadn’t heard, and if her Paladin’s dispatch of five of those men hadn’t inspired any real confidence amongst the merchants, they weren’t dealing with just a bunch of hoodlums with hatchets. It was a stroke of divinity and fortune though, that she had managed to convince a few of the merchants present to assist her in funding, if nothing else, but the fact-of-the-matter was that she had far too little time to prepare.

She had access to funds, but did not have it with her on hand. She needed adventurers or mercenaries, but she knew not who would be trustworthy. Camille’s atelier was a wonderful place, compared to what she saw of the inns in the Outer Layer, but even though the young artist could secure the doors and windows, it was all still so flammable. Today, undoubtedly, would be a decisive day.

Meisa, after all, would have to prove that Civilization could overcome crime, or her support would vanish like the morning dew upon the windowsill.

…

It was Flame-Warden O’see who roused Lethe and his followers in the morning from the communal sleeping chambers within the Ever-Burning Mausoleum. It was strange, how quickly they had acclimated to the constant dry warmth, but their faces and lips felt cracked regardless, and they could see that many of the other adherents slathering oils or butter over their skin. Coin could be earned here though, so long as they sought to toil, but that didn’t mean that they were bound to the Mausoleum either. O’see had told them after showing them around the various crematories that they were free to work for food and board, but that they weren’t bound to it either.

Whether Lethe sought work that aligned closer to his duty or settled into the role of one who swept and divided ashes was up to him. He too felt the pull of the Abyss in the same way as any other Ichor-Blessed, but his faith held strong against the impulse to descend still.

…

Theo could be nothing but optimistic.

After all, once he set everything down and counted it out, between himself, Maris, and Ezra, they had made more than triple the amount of money that Arnfinn, Sana, and Jaxon had. Their wounds hadn’t fully healed, of course, but their relationship with Samuel meant that they were only in an even better position to make money.

And there was the matter of Ichor too. Could there be any other Ichor-Blessed in Oratorio who was in a better position than the Domain of Blood to take in the Ichor of the Abyss? To grant the destitute miners of the city his blessing, to allow them to gorge their fill upon what would otherwise be entirely unpalatable, to obtain tons of that Divinity-fuelling substance through it!

Day was bright, his ambitions, brighter.

Perhaps by the end of it, that psychotic swordswoman would be mundane compared to him.

…

There was nothing but mundanity that awaited Cantor when he roused. Little had changed after an evening’s rest, after all. The weight of Ordo Benevolence’s debts was a yoke around his neck, while the work that would await him in the noon was thankless and gave the church only a pittance. There had to be other ways of making money, and there were, but such things would have to be done separate from his religious duties.

He had promised a walk with Sister Laina though. Whatever anxiety he held in the future would wait until after he got a lay of the land.

…

Elys herself understood now, just little it counted to get a lay of the land beneath. Her sword was chipped and bent in far too many places by the time the sun rose. No wonder Oratorio could expand without thought. No wonder adventurers would continue to come into the city, and find monsters, adventure, waiting for them.

The monsters were alive, but they were only offshoots of the living, breathing thing that was the Abyss.

She had witnessed it herself, after all, once the darkness fell and the Perishing Star rose, once the ground beneath her twisted and churned, rearranging itself in such a way that while the biome of a high-altitude mountain plateau was maintained, everything that could have been used as a landmark had shifted away, peeling into something…unnatural.

And the attacks had been endless too, sporadic waves that eluded any attempts to sleep. The swordswoman had tried to maintain her blade, of course, but the wolves howled on, the goblins crawling out from holes in the ground. The ogres and orcs emerged from the white fog, and she had almost lost her shoulder to the death-dive of a vulture.

It was nothing like her work as a monster slayer, and when she finally managed to secure a lift out of the Abyss, her limbs were leaden weights, her sword in such a state it could no longer be sheathed in her scabbard.

But she had gained much too. Had obtained that same ‘substance’ that she had sensed in the bloodied presence, and knew too why he possessed more than she had.

All her strength did not remove the necessity for followers.

If Elys did not find those willing to follow the Void, she would never do more than scratch at the surface of the Abyss.

…

As for Time? Time was running out, at a steady pace that could not be escaped.

As for Light? Daylight offered new opportunities, but also chance enough to revisit previous ones.

Iris Ascendis

And there's that done.

Iris Ascendis

_@Nanaya@Sifr

What was with this Academy and its ever-present danger?

From the Adapa proving itself to be easily interceptable (he’d have to look into that later and figure out how to reproduce those same effects upon others) to the danger that Chloe and Hildegunde both found themselves in, it felt as if Wingram Academy was just filled to the brim with dangers that appeared entirely separate from academic progression. At least in Strigari Academy, one could presume that the destruction of flesh and the warping of mind would enable further advancements towards the understanding of Essence. But this?

Otis clicked his tongue.

This was just danger for the sake of danger, a powder keg placed besides children who’re told to play with fireworks.

He took one last glance at the seething auditorium beneath him, and left.

---

Airborne he ascended, wind twisting around his limbs as he rose higher and higher. Otis had no wings, but that was why he had magic, elementalist spells granting him a flight far more controlled than Davil’s Ethos as he scanned the broadening horizon. What he sought was a sign, the crack of a bullet. If Hildegunde was in as much danger as that self-destroying message claimed her to be, then he would hear something, whether it be gunfire or simple screaming.

He had nothing from either of the girls, after all, so it could only be through a stroke of luck or a present stimuli that he found them.

Good thing there were both.

His own Adapa pinged, and he did not read the message. It had been only a split-second, but he had caught the direction in which that essence had been received, a beam of light through the treeline, where the canopy shook in response to something inside it. It had to be a message for an SOS. He could expect, even, that Ciara and Iraleth would respond, breaking off their silly conflict with Valen in order to do so. Funny, that the days events conspired to exhaust both of them before their own duel in the evening would begin. At this rate, they’d be duelling with pistols rather than Ethos.

The tinkerer from the Empire had no such restrictions himself, however, only the incantation of his familiar power.

“Show me wonders of this world.”

A Door opened, and through indistinct cosmos, came a board, wheeled and ensorcelled. In that moment, he cancelled his flight spell and plummeted, picking up greater and greater speed as gravity pulled him further down. His hair streamed upwards, his flesh rippled back, his clothes inflated. And his board, placed beneath his boots…sprouted wings.

Wings of canvas, like those of sailing ships, spread open and drank their fill of the air. He slowed immediately, but only because his sheer vertical descent was redirected to a diagonal dive, curving towards with a sheer ferocity! He had no wings, but owls preyed through the descend, not the ascent, and Otis’s eyes burned bright as his Personal Barrier encased him.

This would be his first test.

The board smashed into the canopy, snapping apart before dissolving into the aether and stardust that all summoned creations were made of. Otis himself slingshotted further past, a beastfolk bullet that crashed into the scene, bounced twice, rolled head over heels, then somehow, rather miraculously, found his feet before sprinting to a stop. Was it fortune, instinct, or a deliberate calculation that found him stopped right beside Chloe?

The Door manifested and without a thought, he grabbed the half-elf and pushed her through the abyssal gap, then drew his own firearm, a musical chime sounding as he flicked off the safety.

“Flee or fight?”

The Door remained open, the easiest escape route conceivable. But the pursuit of knowledge was not performed by running the other direction.

Reborn in a Fantasy World, This Time I Shall...!

𖦭

STR [2] | DEX [3] | MAG [1] | DEF [1] | RES [1] | AGI [3] | LCK [4]

《 Luck of the Devil 》
Fortune favours the foul. +3 LCK.

_{@Zeroth@TheMushroomLord@PKMNB0Y}

Monster? EXP? Video games.

The elf looked back down at the blob in his hands. He could see it now that the novelty of the yolk had worn: within was a core of a deep color, a nucleus. The center of control of a single-celled organism that had been blown up to the size of a ball. It would be easy. Just drop it and step on it.

He refrained though, as the creature began to rhythmically slap parts of itself together. An attempt at mimicking the movement of lips? Some form of morse code? But if that was the case, how could such movements somehow trigger a complex and complete understanding? How could the slapping of slime become human language?

“Ok.” He turned his gaze towards the ‘influencer’, whose excitement had mixed with anxiety now. “If you want to die, tell him. He'll do it for 'EXP'.”

It was decided, just like that. Silent strides closed the distance with a dancer’s grace, and the blue yolk was thrust into the arms of the blue-haired human. He nodded at his fellow-in-misfortune, turning his gaze to the thread-bare rags that was all that separated the interior of the shack from the exterior. “You seem to know about this situation. Let’s head out and talk about it. What's your name?”

Reborn in a Fantasy World, This Time I Shall...!

𖦭

STR [2] | DEX [3] | MAG [1] | DEF [1] | RES [1] | AGI [3] | LCK [4]

《 Luck of the Devil 》
Fortune favours the foul. +3 LCK.

_{@Zeroth@TheMushroomLord@PKMNB0Y}

It looked as if it would fall apart if he pushed against the wall. Or maybe, it wouldn’t fall apart at all, but rather end up with a new, hand-sized hole through the rotted wood. It was warm though, not hot, and he laid there for a heartbeat longer, the phantom sensation of vertigo still trying to pull his blood down past the dirt in which he laid.

The world around him was more vibrant, but only in the most unpleasant way possible. The sun seared against his skin, the fetid smell of sweat and shit struck him harder than a music festival’s port-a-potty, and as for the noise, well, there was certainly someone who was making a racket, stringing together sounds that resembled words and yet appeared entirely incomprehensible. They were excited though. Excited in the sort of way that seemed at odds with the intonations of those further beyond the shack, and perhaps, as he cycled through his own memories, that excitement was warranted.

They had died, and yet, still lived.

He rubbed his face, felt the strange smoothness, the contours where there had once been fat. Cool flesh, longer ears, and hair that felt as light as the cobwebs clinging to his mind. He lost his face then, his body too. The one crying over something being real looked to be a normal human though. Highschool-aged with a shock of blue hair that made him think of 100-sub Youtubers. And the other one crawled out through underneath a tarp, a creature that resembled the yolk of an egg, dyed a similar blue to the ‘influencer’.

Felt like egg yolk too, when his slender, improbably-manicured fingers closed over its top, pulling it up off the ground as its body stretched further and further and further…before his other hand cupped the strange entity’s bottom as well, lifting it entirely off the ground before one could become two. Its fluid flesh rippled curiously over the palm of his hand, but whatever strength it possessed seemed negligible at best.

“You.”

He blinked. The word was recognizable but the voice was alien, the expelling of breath somehow possessing the same qualities of wind off sheer peaks. Like the Alps, seen through aerial shots. Like wind chimes, rendered by a foley artist. He scrunched his face up slightly, then continued.

“Were you human too? Give a proper sign.”

What was a proper sign though, from an individual with no mouth, no face, no organs, no bones, when they once had all such things? When they were nothing but pulsating fluid-flesh, a runny egg with a human mind? He could live with a body that wasn't his, and the 'influencer' was undoubtedly happy over his own reincarnation, but this? This amoeba?

Proof that there were fates worse than death.

Iris Ascendis

Don’t worry about it, mate. It’s the end of term for me, so I’ve got plenty to occupy myself with anyhow.

Reborn in a Fantasy World, This Time I Shall...!

Cassius

_{22 y/o | Male | High Elf | 6'7
STR [2] | DEX [3] | MAG [1] | DEF [1] | RES [1] | AGI [3] | LCK [4]
《 Level 1 Bandit 》}
𖦭

Personality

A bastard, to be sure. A scornful, smug bastard, who sees those around him as nothing more than methods of advancing himself or indulging his pleasures. Really, he's nothing more than a low-tier thug, a born criminal with no future prospects other than a prison or a grave. What's the point of playing nice, in a world even more cannibalistic than the last? Here, at least, he'll take all that he wanted and fill up his stomach before it's time to leave.

Cassius is here for a good time, not a long time.

History

It's not that complicated, really.

Once he died in such a stupid, random, unfair way, he left behind every reason to remain a law-abiding, hard-working, productive member of society. In a world so fantastical, so nonsensical, that it feels like walking through a waking dream, what reason is there to pretend that it's real? What are these people, except walking flesh that are even more surreal than the humans of his past life? He was not born here. He was not raised here. He was made here, injected into this wonderland after being exiled from his home. There was nothing to fear.

After all, if he died again, so what?

He knows what lies beyond the grave.

Skills

《 Luck of the Devil 》

Fortune favours the foul. +3 LCK.