meri

P2e - Threshold of Knowledge

Love the intro music! How do you use the link to roll?

The Breaking of the Seals

Cherry screamed bloody murder despite the fact that she was not the one being bloodily murdered. Yet. The prophet seemed intent on remedying that. Blades rained down on her, fast as drops in a deluge, agonizing and overwhelming. Weapons hurt, but holy weapons hurt; each slash cut right through mortal flesh to Puriel themself. It was a blinding pain. Cherry stopped mid-stride to swivel towards her assailant and raised a hand—but no magic came.

Puriel! she cried, trying and failing to dodge the blows. Jesus fuck, a little help here?

It had been quite some time since the demon was subjected to holy power. Whatever callus they grew had long given way to raw skin. All they could do was think, childishly, that it hurt.

Puriel!

Ah. Clawing at their magic reserves, Puriel chided themself. Humans were not a permissible source of pain. This was a disgrace.

In an effort to remedy the situation, Puriel ripped out Cherry's ribcage and pulled the ribs up around her torso as morbid armor. Dense muscle shielded the slats—bone was expensive. They were going to need a lot of calcium after this. The fact that Cherry didn't complain about them ruining her shirt was cause enough for concern. Against her instinct, Puriel lurched the body forward, continuing to run towards the angelborn. Dodging was useless. They could only hope the armor wouldn't be shredded before they reached the girl.

What the hell are you doing? The prophet's gonna kill us if we don't kill her first!

The nephilim must not escape. We will not waste time eliminating threats when we can withstand them.

But the whole reason we came here was the prophet! Are we really just—

Holy water hit their face in a searing arc, evaporating all thought. Puriel retaliated instantly, unhinging their jaw and firing a full set of teeth in the knight's general direction. They gasped. Pushed further into a sprint. A waste of resources—they would have to pray they met their mark.

Puriel refocused, stopping short just before the girl.

But the girl was there no longer.

Wrenching their gaze up, they caught a man running away with their prey. Shit. Shit! They could not let him get away. Picking up the pace, Puriel tore after him, feet pounding against the asphalt and out of the alleyway. A siren blared in the distance. Puriel stumbled, a dozen contusions and double the slashes screaming with every step they took.

You're still conscious, Puriel said, more command than question.

Fuck, Cherry replied.

They hissed a rushed exhale. They had started the fight with a perfectly healthy body, and the prophet had nearly incapacitated it in seconds. The fact a knight had accompanied her at all seemed ridiculous, in retrospect—Puriel would be offended if they were her. That knight was a fucking joke by any standards, but compared to the prophet? Goddamn.

The body staggered again. Unacceptable. Puriel reversed the ribs and stretched them into long, spindly arcs. Like a spider's legs. They used them as such, body dangling a good six inches off the ground as they skittered down the street. Screw discretion. The neighborhood could rationalize this however they damn well pleased. Puriel was gaining on the man, but not fast enough—he ducked into a car and dumped the angelborn in the passenger seat before they could reach him. They screeched in fury. The engine stalled. The engine stalled.

Without hesitation, they dove into the right rear window and shattered it, sliding across the seat and hitting the opposite door with a thunk.

Hallelujah.

“Be not afraid,” Puriel gasped, chest heaving. “I will do you no harm. Just drive.”

The Breaking of the Seals

Love the roleplay so far, everyone's adding such fun plot points! I do have a question: are angels and demons being on Earth public knowledge, or is it something most humans are unaware of?

The Breaking of the Seals

Puriel barked out a harsh, one-beat laugh. “An honorable man would not espouse such hubris. You are a dog, yes, but a vain beast cowed by no master. To speak so frankly with your prophet is a disgrace.”

With a sidelong glance at Jasmine: “Collar his corpse.”

They struck swiftly. There must be no hesitation—Puriel now shared in their human frailty. Cherry dove forward, ducking beneath the gun with supernatural speed and slamming her body into his left shin. He stumbled but did not fall, twisting to a more advantageous position—yet in doing so, he lowered the gun just slightly enough for her to grab the barrel and yank it down. A shot went off. Cracked the cement. Echoed down the alley. Christ, they'd gotten too used to silencers… damn knights and their glory. Fingers burning around the metal, she wrested it from his hands using the momentum from a roll to the side. Puriel detested the way she fought. Brutish, instinctive, wild—she couldn't name an actual maneuver to save her life. Though they doubted the street fights of her youth ever taught her one. In this brawl as in others, they yearned for the vicious discipline of a sword… but this was no time for daydreaming. A wave of adrenaline crashed through her veins, loosed from the tap by Puriel. No use spending magic when there were biological bolsters available.

With a gleeful screech, Cherry cracked the barrel across the man's face. Infernal flame peeled from the bullet-seared chamber, boiling the skin-cartilage-blood of his nose. He cried out. Punched her in the stomach—excellent form—and followed it up with a slash from some unseen blade. Cherry giggled and hit him again. His nose was going to fall right off his face at this rate.

Guns contain bullets, Puriel advised flatly. You might consider using them.

Cherry ignored them, high on combat. Sighing internally, they let her fight (bam bam bam liver damage bam bam ulna fracture bam knuckle contusion goddamn it was gonna take a lot of effort to heal her), turning their attention to the prophet. But it was not their target their gaze caught on—rather, the body slumped at the entrance to the alley. Shit. How had they not noticed that? They were becoming as reckless as Cherry. Speaking of recklessness: she could probably handle herself. They needed to confirm the figure was not an enemy.

Unfurling a mental tendril towards the woman, they heard her speak more through the mind than the mouth. “Demon.”

Excitement fizzled through them. Could it be…?

Horrific images overwhelmed her, strobing like an epileptic's nightmare. Demons. Demons that she was helpless to stop. That she did not understand. Oh, how they wanted to probe deeper, but could not. This was no mortal mind.

Nephilim.

God must have misplaced a miracle. Here, before them, an angelborn (an angelborn!), untouched by the corrupting hands of the knights. Blessedly ignorant of God's lies. That He could demonstrate the deadly sin of pride, that He could wipe His angels’ memory and expect them to follow nonetheless… that was proof enough that the principles, not their creator, must be followed. This angel would understand. Puriel would make them.

Tuning back into the body, they gave pain a clinical ackowledgement. The knight was beating the shit out of Cherry, and having his shit beaten out in kind. Good to see humans playing fair. Puriel seized Cherry's arm, pulled the trigger, and blew his brains out with a bullet of pure brimstone.

“Hey!” she cried aloud, as if thinking it at them wasn't enough. “He was mine!”

We have a new directive. We will obtain the nephilim.

The what?

Hissing through Cherry's teeth, Puriel took a heartbeat to consider. They had killed the knight in a matter of seconds. The others would be on them in less than that—it was the grace of Lucifer alone that had allowed them what little time they'd stolen. The prophet had to die. And yet. And yet and yet and yet… they would not be granted this opportunity again.

They dashed towards the angel.

The Breaking of the Seals

Cherry put her hands up, looking down the barrel of the gun. “Geez, and people say demons are bloodthirsty. It’s rude to rush into things like this, you know.”

Etiquette is not a priority, Puriel said. Get on with it.

With an irreverent curtsy, she ignored the command. “I’m Cherry, by the way. Demon in my head doesn’t want me to say that, but I think you deserve to hear your killer’s name. Though you probably know it already, don’t you, Jasmine? Must be cool, all that prophetic magic shit. Does God talk to you? Nah, I bet he doesn’t. He’s got a lot on his plate, I imagine. Say, how many prophets does He have milling around anyway? You’d think—”

Puriel grabbed Cherry by the brain stem and yanked. Hard. Her expression went blank for a blink, quickly replaced by neutrality. Puriel did not like the feeling of the tongue in the mouth, nor the teeth in the jaw, but such indignities were necessary to properly formulate speech. “I intend to cleanse the Earth of your presence. The dog is free of sin—dismiss it, and we may conduct our business without harming the innocent.”

Suddenly, another figure rounded the corner. This alleyway was getting rather crowded. Puriel took a step back, keeping an eye on the gun and suppressing the urge to lash out now. Now. Now now now no. No. This new arrival was clearly not on their side—with one hand on a weapon and something clutched in the other, she was ready for a fight. Either this was a burglar of remarkable confidence or Jasmine called in reinforcements. Shit. If Cherry didn’t love hearing herself talk quite so much, they could have struck sooner. The faster the better—they were not going to win a battle of attrition outnumbered. Adjusting the structure of Cherry’s inner ear, they disregarded her mental wince. Pain was not damage. Hopefully this way they would be able to hear anyone else coming before they arrived.

Turning to keep their back towards the wall, they inspected the woman more closely. Signs of mild exertion—must have run here. An angelborn come to defend her shepherd? Unlikely. Her stance was steady, practiced, and experienced; she was almost certainly a knight. Which meant two trained soldiers and a prophet to lead them. Shrugging off a prickle of dread, they cracked their knuckles. What was one more foe?

And you said I was stalling, Cherry grumbled.

Puriel strangled a sigh and looked the prophet dead in the eyes. “My terms are reasonable. Obey them.”

The Breaking of the Seals

It was a beautiful morning. It was the type of morning that hymnodists could fill a psalter with and still have ink left over. After all, it was the glory of God that lit the sun, stretched its rosy fingers past the horizon and grasped the Earth tight with light. The soil of the Earth. The filthy soil of the Earth. Puriel swallowed hard, the bitter ghost of earl gray stewing on the back of Cherry’s tongue.

Caffeine is bad for your health, they conveyed. It was less talking and more conducting, waving the proverbial arm to guide the electrical web of the human brain into a thought. Sort of pathetic, really, how easily such things could be intercepted. But Puriel did not have a brain of their own on Earth, so it was Cherry’s they must deign to direct.

The aforementioned human snorted. Her tea was still a little too hot—she relished the weak burn of her palm against the metal of the thermos. What are you, Mormon?

Puriel did not dignify that with a response. They were tired of this boring stroll down the sidewalk. Cherry had lost sight of the prophet and her paltry guard at least three times—once bumping into another pedestrian, twice watching a police car blare down the street, thrice spotting a set of kitchen knives in a shop window. And that wasn’t counting the amount of times she had glanced down at her precious tea just as the prophet was about to choose one tine of a fork in the path. Honestly. Puriel understood there couldn’t exactly be a vetting program for demonic vessels, but the fact that they got stuck in this one had to be some kind of joke. It might have been, actually. One did not make a lot of friends in hell, especially not if one was an angel. Is an angel.

Focus, Puriel commanded. They’d really hoped to conserve what control they could exercise for the confrontation itself, but at this rate no confrontation would come to pass. They didn’t suppress her consciousness entirely—just enough to direct motor functions—but they received a valiant attempt at resistance nonetheless.

As they rounded the corner, catching a glimpse of the prophet entering a café, they smiled. And then schooled their expression immediately. Such a human instinct—Cherry must have been rubbing off on them. We will conduct our business outside, they said. I have no wish to involve the authorities and I doubt the prophet will either.

You never let me have any fun. Cherry tested her frontal lobes and Puriel loosened their grip on the reins.

Behave, and I may allow you.

Rolling her eyes, Cherry pushed open the door to the shop. A charming little bell announced her entry. She tossed her hair over her shoulder, platinum blonde and shining like the sunrise. So… where are they?

Resisting the urge to use the Lord’s name in vain, Puriel gritted out, Directly in front of us. The pair couldn’t be more conspicuous if they tried. The knight was alert but not on alert—clearly his sense of security had not yet been cored out. Likely armed, as well. His shirt was casually but importantly loose, allowing ample space for a gun or knife or vial of holy water. Or all of them. Yet he wouldn’t be the issue—knights seldom were, out of formation—the prophet would. If their sources were correct, she was uncannily adept at reading auras. The show would be on from the second she saw them. And she would be a fight, not an execution. Taking a deep breath, Puriel directed the body to tap the prophet on the shoulder.

“Hey,” Cherry said brightly, as if greeting a friend. “Jasmine! God, I’ve been looking everywhere for you! Why don't we do a little catching up?" She gestured to the door with a hungry grin. "It's such a pretty day out.”

Any Interest in Pathfinder 2e Revised?

Yeah, I totally get that multiple pronouns can be confusing. I don't expect anyone to switch between them as often as I did in the backstory—I just wanted to establish that they have three sets and I like the fun gender flavor lol. It can definitely get confusing when you're talking about multiple characters, though. "He" would probably be the best one to use consistently given the fact that "they" is somewhat nebulous when talking about multiple characters/things and "she" is the pronoun used by most of the major figures from Vasimiri's past and the pronoun for the other established player character so far. In the roleplay itself, I'll probably use one or two pronoun sets per post (depending on length) and make them different from whatever other characters I might mention, for clarity's sake. Feel free to just pick one set and stick with it if that's easier for you—Vasimiri doesn't prefer any over the others.

I look forward to the game :)

Any Interest in Pathfinder 2e Revised?

I added a backstory! It turned out a little wordier than I intended lol, let me know if you have any questions or concerns. I'd love to see any of Vasimiri's parents as NPCs, especially Motiauv, but that's totally up to you! I think the direction I'm going with the whole putting her sister's ghost to rest thing is that her sister didn't actually become a ghost and Vasimiri needs to stop chasing a false hope for closure/let go, but honestly a ghost fight would be rad as hell too. I look forward to the roleplay!

Updated sheet: pathbuilder2e.com/launch.html?build=8…

The Breaking of the Seals

||Name|| Puriel (Cherry Bishop)
||Age|| Unknown (23)
||Race|| Demon (Demon-Possessed Human)
||Magic|| Fleshcraft—warping and augmentation of the body of the host. Provides excellent utility in combat as well as more mundane matters such as improved sight, hearing, speed, and so on. Puriel has a particular fondness for creating swords out of the host's bones.

||Appearance of Host||
[hair color] Blonde
[eye color] Brown
[height] 5'2”
[body build] Curvy and short
[weight] 140 lbs

||Personality & History||
Perhaps no creature is more beholden to a code than Puriel. Without law, there is chaos, without rules, destruction. By any logic, they are the perfect angel—but as much as they claim to value it, logic is not something Puriel possesses. They see God's insistence that humans retain free will as blasphemy. Free will allows humans to deviate from the divine commandments and sow sin across the Earth. Free will must be eradicated. This obsession with order eventually caused Puriel to fall from Heaven and become a demon. They are wrestling with this rather violently—they are not some wretched hellion, they do not renounce the teachings of God. They just renounce God. Funny how that works… such hubris from one who claims pride to be a sin. They are formal, cold, and haughty when interacting with others, only deigning to engage in sincerity with angelborn. The nephilim must be taught the word of God not as He wrote it, but as it is.

It was a cruel twist of God's plan, then, that Puriel was crammed into such an impetuous host. Cherry Bishop has, at the achingly mortal age of 23, engaged in more heresy than many of the most tenured demons. The seven deadly sins are, to her, something of a checklist—the more she can do, the more often, the more creatively, the better. She has always been fascinated by the occult and has sought to serve Satan most of her life. Good news: now she is. Bad news: the demon He gave her is a major buzzkill. Like, how is she supposed to spread the dark one's influence when this pathetic substitute for Beelzebub won't even let her curse? Forget about Ephesians 4:29, Puriel, sometimes “fuck” is the only appropriate word!

Long story short: Puriel is a by-the-book demon convinced they're still an angel who took the first ticket out of Hell by way of a chaotic, bloodthirsty cultist. They're roommates in Cherry's head and by God (and Satan), they will get along one day. That day is not today.

||Current Alignment||
Lawful Evil (Chaotic Evil)

||Miscellaneous||
Cherry usually wears clothing that's generally normal but is desperately aiming for whimsigoth energy. She'd really like to get into the traditional goth scene, but that takes far more money and time than she has.

Puriel loves animals because according to them, animals function strictly on preprogrammed instinct and cannot sin. All dogs go to Heaven confirmed.

Cherry used to live in an apartment with a bunch of roommates, but Puriel made her move out and demon-magicked her the credit score to get a place of her own. She misses her old roommates and their toleration of her freaky occult stuff, even if they too were weird and sort of toxic. They had so much in common.

Puriel is trying to teach Cherry how to handle guns and other weapons (no, pointing an unloaded pistol at a grocery store clerk does not count) so they don't have to use incredibly conspicuous fleshcraft as often. Cherry thinks incredibly conspicuous fleshcraft is rad as hell and is reluctant to use mundane weapons because of that.

Cherry's pronouns are she/her and Puriel's pronouns are they/them.

Puriel keeps as tight a control over the body as they can, given their distaste for humans’ free will and all, but the constant focus required to prevent Cherry from running things always eventually exhausts them, allowing her to grab the reins when they can hold on no longer. As such, there is no co-piloting: either Puriel is controlling the body or Cherry is. That's not to say they won't fight each other for it. If either of them want to help the demons break the seals and win the war, they'll have to learn to balance their desires in order to function at full power.

Any Interest in Pathfinder 2e Revised?

I've made two characters! I haven't given either of them backstories yet, since I haven't quite decided which one to play—I'm inclined towards the Thaumaturge, but given the rarity of Anadi I don't know if they would fit your setting. Let me know which one you think would be better and if you have any questions :)

Anadi Thaumaturge: pathbuilder2e.com/launch.html?build=8…

Orc Investigator: pathbuilder2e.com/launch.html?build=8…