TruthHurts22

Epithet Enchained: An Epithet Erased RP!

This still a thing you wanna do, Mintz? I'm huge on Epithet Erased, would love to see an RP come to fruition on it :b

World of Light

Raz
RANK 4
38/40 EXP

Upper Nyakuza Metro

Grinding along the electric rails really helped ease Raz's mind about all that went down the day before. Twisting and turning along with the cat-like trains gave him something to focus on. Plus, the higher the tracks led, the more of the enormous metro Raz could see. It stretched on for miles, not just where the tracks went but way further up than you'd noticed at ground level. This place might've been a section of the world all on its own. Hopefully there wasn't a Guardian around, though. Raz has had enough of fighting on trains for a while.

Sight seeing wasn't going to help with collecting pons, though Raz's method was also turning out pretty unfruitful. The problem wasn't a lack of pons - the tracks were littered with the things - it was actually getting to them! The layout of the individual rails overlapped, double-backed, and sometimes went clear straight up, making it tricky to hop onto the one that'd get him where he wanted. If that wasn't enough there were the trains themselves, too. Raz would have to jump lines to avoid becoming a kitty pancake, and every so often some enterprising shady cats would be leaning out the windows and swiping pons for themselves.

Needless to say that it wasn't very productive. But it was pretty fun.

At least until Raz got flung off the tracks. While racing towards a lone pon, a train overtook him on the neighboring rail, and one of those pon snatchers whacked him clear into the air with a butterfly net. Raz soared for a distance, the momentum of his sliding making him sail like a skipping stone, landing on a metal platform jutting off the side of a building. The impact made him lose his grip on the only two pons he was able to snag, rolling along the floor until they came to a stop against the legs of a fold-up table, manned by a particularly slimy alligator, in more ways than one.

"Whoa!" The alligator yelped. "Good thing nobody else was around for that. You came in so hot I'd've had to tell them, 'hit the deck!', which I think wouldn't be a very tasteful phrase considerin' your current circumstances."

Raz picked himself up and dusted himself off. "Thanks. I guess? Hey, those are mine!" Raz rushed to collect his pons, but the alligator didn't seem to want them.

"You got me all wrong, pal! I don't take people's belongin's that way. That's what pickpockets and pigeons are for. Nah, I only steal in the 'technically legal' way. And by that I mean I run a perfectly legitimate games business that does nothin' funny! No humor to be had here! Not even a chuckle. Heheheehh." To prove his clean-handedness, the gator picked up one of the pons closest to him and handed it back to Raz. "Name's Slick Mickey, by the by."

"I can, uh, see why," Raz muttered, holding the pon Mickey gave him between two fingers, a very clear slime patch dripping off one side.

"Guess y'got a good head on yer shoulders then! Well, anyone can see that, cuz it's big, and bigger's always better. At least that's what my dermatologist said when I went to get that weird thing on my inner thigh checked. 'Course, that was after he screamed in abject terror, but he assured me it was due to a spooky ghost he saw out the window and I see no reason to think otherwise." Mickey placed a hand down on his table with a wet thunk. "Say, I happen to, ahhh, entertain people with big and/or good heads. You lookin' to buy a Metro pass, right? If you put your pons up for a bet, you can quintuple your grabs! Two to ten in just one unrigged diversion."

Raz thought this one over. The math did seem in his favor there, but he'd had enough experience on the road to run into scam artists before. Eventually he said, "I guueeeeess I can do that, sure. But I get to pick the game."

Mickey visibly gulped. "Uh-hah, well, see, that ain't really how it works..."

"Well, if you say so. Guess I'll just take my two, WHOLE pons with me to someplace else..." Raz made like he was going to march off. He didn't even get a single step in before Mickey practically threw himself across the table.

"Ah, no no! I-it's fine, heh. What sorta gamesgator turns down a game? A bad one! Or one that's fed up with the career choice, which is perfectly valid." Mickey produced a stack of cards and set them down. "So, kid, what's it gonna be?"

"How about... you pick a card and I have to say which it is."

"Really? Y'wanna go with that?" Mickey could barely hide his joy, shaking in his gatorskin boots (which were his feet. He didn't have shoes.) "S-sure, sure! Let me just..." In a frantic jolt, Mickey rifled through the deck of cards, turned his back to Raz, did a bit of futzing about, and turned back, a single card in his hand with the back towards Raz. "Alrighty then! What do you say this card is?"

Before Raz could begin to guess, Mickey tossed the card into his gullet and swallowed it down! "Hey! That's cheating!" Mickey merely shrugged and did his worst at playing innocent. Not that it really mattered. Raz wasn't fixing to play fair himself. He'd felt a familiar tingle in his brain ever since yesterday, and now it was feeling a lot closer to home...

Power Get!

Mind Reading:
Raz is able to peek into the minds of those around him and read their thoughts in the moment. It's actually much weaker than it was in his home universe; Raz has to actively concentrate in order to pick up snippets of thoughts in someone, and his telepathy is much flimsier too, with even a moderate amount of effort needed on the target's part to keep their thoughts hidden. But if he catches someone off-guard, and they don't have a good natural mental defense, their mind is ripe for the reading.

Raz squinted and brought two fingers beside his temple. Since Mickey only just met him, he'd have no idea this kid was psychic at all, so this should be a piece of cake. The brainwaves cleared, a fog in Raz's head clearing just enough to catch what was going through Mickey's head.

"The card was... a Queen of Hearts... that you scribbled over with a blue pen and turned into the King of Clubs."

Mickey's jaw dropped so low it almost flipped his table. "That's, what, wow! I can't even be mad, that was exactly on the money! Y'got some real intuition on ya! Normally I'd be weaslin' my way out, as you do, but I'm too impressed and frankly a tiny bit scared to really scam ya here." Mickey scooped two handfuls of pons from his pockets and laid them out on the table. "There y'go, kid, eight pons with your name and my skin secretions on 'em. Don't go spendin' it all in one place! Haha, see, it's funny because you will."

Raz looked a little less than pleased as he rolled the pons into his pack. "Gee, uh, thanks for that. Good luck with the card stuff, Mickey."

"Oh, no, you cleaned me out. Only had eight to my name. Gotta fall back on my second source of income: letting people pay me to get away from 'em." As Mickey folded up his table to move on, he gestured towards the train rails. "If y'wanna know where to get a pass, just follow the lines. Eventually they loop back 'round to the stations for 'em, where you can buy one."

"Oh, thanks!" Raz waved Mickey off as he turned back to the rails. The closest one way a bright purple, so Raz figured that'd be the one he'd go on. Why not, right? And then he was off, back to his grinding.

- - -
Word Count: 1,263
EXP Gain: +3
Rank Up!

---

Wonder Red
Level 1 (XP: 6/10)

Lower Nyakuza Metro

Much, much farther below, Wonder Red was somehow having worse luck in his search. The alleys looked promising, but it seems most everyone else had thought the same thing; the nooks and crannies down here were picked clean. It made sense that not a lot of passerby would be adventurous enough to collect the ones above. Wonder Red picked up every trashcan, smashed every crate, opened every payphone's coin flap, and there was not a single pon to be found. As adverse as he was to return emptyhanded, Wonder Red needed to retrace his steps back to where they first split off and look for a different way to gather pons.

On his way through the alley again, Wonder Red heard something strange. Some sort of laughter and a bell-like jingling, that echoed off the walls, giving it a very eerie quality. His searching earlier must have masked the sound. Seeing as they were off exploring for pons anyways, Wonder Red decided to investigate. It took a bit, trying to determine the source of the sounds since the alleys were so numerous that it felt like it came from every direction, but a few right turn and several wrong turns later, Wonder Red found himself at a metal door cracked open.

Stepping inside, Wonder Red saw what looked like a big soundstage. In the center was a handcrafted set made out of fabric, cardboard, glue, tape, and other sorts of DIY odds-n-ends. All over the place where small, bouncy dolls, or what looked like them, also made out of various materials in an array of colors, decked out in costumes ranging from paper animal masks and PJs to sci-fi visors and jet boots. And they were just everywhere. Some were hopping around their personal play area, climbing walls, jumping between precarious platforms, slapping decals wherever they fancied. Others were at the fringes of the stage, trying on different pieces of costumes or collaborating on building colorful new set pieces. A few were even rooting around a huge machine, tugging at its internals as it sparked and jittered.

For a moment Wonder Red thought this was some strange underground militia of doll people, but just watching them for a bit revealed that they were only having fun. Playing, dressing up, crafting for the heck of it all. It brought a smile to Red's face - even with Galeem's influence, it seemed some worlds were able to retain their innocence and joy.

Just as he was turning back out the door, one of the little sack persons up on a high, wobbly 'icicle' stumbled. The whole thing swayed back and forth, and the doll atop it lost its balance, tumbling right off. Wonder Red, seeing it out of the corner of his high, leapt into action. "Look out!" He sprung forward, closing the distance from the door to the stage, and landed under the falling doll, managing to catch it in both arms. "Are you okay?" He asked as he set the doll on its feet.

It gave two thumbs up and a big, open-mouth smile. There was also a smattering of soft applause from the ones that were looking their way. Wonder Red nodded. "That's good. You should try securing your structures more, so this doesn't happen agai--" Above, the rickety tower finally gave way, collapsing into several pieces and falling towards them. Wonder Red was once more quick to act, jumping straight up to meet the falling debris in midair. "Hah! Whah! Pawh!" He delivered swift punches to each piece of the structure, sending them flying away from the person he just saved, or any of the others loitering in the danger zone.

When he landed, the assortment of sack people erupted into an even greater applause, cheering on Red's heroics. There was even a few shrill whistles. Red blushed and rubbed the back of his head. "Oh, really, it's all part of the job. No need to clap or anything." The sack person he had saved waved to get his attention and pointed behind him. At the other tall platforms were more sack people, looking at him expectantly, and toppling the towers again! Wonder Red was back at it, smacking away all the chunks of the set as they came, to the continuing enjoyment of the crowd. After a brief while, when there was little more on the stage for Red to punch, he was pretty tuckered out.

"Alright," he huffed between breaths, "I think I've done quite enough here. Really, you shouldn't be playing around so dangerously like that." The playful dolls didn't seem to take in his advice as most of them were already right back to work, gathering the scattered materials and setting up a new set to play on. One of the group wearing a little hardhat and vest approached him, a big bubble in his arms, and offered it up. Inside, 10 whole pons floated around. "This is for me?" After the sack person nodded, Red took the bubble. Was it payment for entertaining them? Did they expect him to punch this now?

Whatever the reason, Wonder Red saw it fit to take his leave, before they roped him into anything more. "Thank you for this," he said as he side-stepped to the door, "please try to remain safe from now on!" Of course, none of them paid him much mind anymore, their attentions diverted to something even newer.

Wonder Red hurried out the door, the large pon-filled bubble under one arm, and started to finally head back to the station proper. At least he was helping in some way, despite everything.

---

Word Count: 955
EXP Gain: +2

World of Light

Raz
RANK 4
37/40 EXP

Wonder Red
Level 1 (XP: 5/10)

Sandswept Sky - Nyakuza Metro

After Raz had went through all of that - the near-fatal mountain climb, the somehow-even-more-near-fatal fight with a giant monster, the mudslide of monster guts he accidentally partook in, the loss of one of their allies (which he wasn't really aware of until earlier that day) - Raz was glad to be in a more familiar atmosphere. For some of the team, the brightly lit, zig-zagging metro station was like another world. But, like, metaphorically another world, since it probably was an actual other world. Raz, though, it brought a sense of nostalgia to him. Hustle, bustle, the echoing chatter of the crowd, bright lights and the deep scent of cheap food. It felt like home.

Wonder Red, on the other hand, was just as on edge as he's always been, at least since the team first met him on the Virgin Victory. "Stick close together, everyone!" He said to the group at large, having taken a slight leadership ahead of the rest. "There's no telling what dangers could be lurking in this place. Complacency could get you lost. Or worse."

"Uhhhh..." Raz cleared his throat and pointed a little past Wonder Red. "There's a map right there, Mr. Red. And over there. And there too. I think that, uh, there's maps all over the place. Getting lost seems... hard."

"... Er, right you are, Junior Psychonaut Razputin Aquato. I hadn't meant to devalue the team's capabilities. These are just unusual circumstances we all find ourselves in, so... caution is key."

Whatever caution the group shared didn't matter much when they accepted the advice of a shady stranger at face value. Most of the metro inhabitants were shady, actually. Literal shadowy cat-like figures. They seemed harmless, but there was a feeling of eyes always on Raz's back that made his skin crawl. It was the exact same feeling that made Wonder Red on his guard despite the seeming safety of the metro. Something about the place was off, so it was probably best not to linger so long as they could help it.

As their impromptu informant skittered off, Wonder Red pulled out a medium-sized coin purse from somewhere on his person and popped it open. "Payment? If we all were to pool our resources together, there may be enough to afford a few passes."

Raz, however, already had his eyes on the prize. Or, eyes on the 'pons'; little green floating orbs dotted around the metro, over railways and on top of shop signs, tucked into nooks, and that was only what he could see from where he was.

"Oh, hey, I'm actually good at this kinda stuff!" Without making a gameplan with the others, Raz rushed towards a nearby hotdog stand and sprang up onto its colorful awning, bounding off of it like it was made of rubber, up towards one of the higher metro lines. "I'll meet'cha all right back there! Don't wait up for me!" He touched down on one of the rails and sped down it as if he was a train himself, gliding off into the twisting tracks to collect whatever pons floated around up there.

A little slower on the uptake than the rambunctious psychic, Wonder Red stashed his coinpurse back wherever it came from, and turned to one of the alleys that Sectonia had pointed out. "If we're to save these worlds from Galeem, Queen Sectonia, then we can't be afraid of getting our hands dirty. This is, a little more literal than the saying usually applies. Nonetheless!" With that Wonder Red dashed forward, poking around the dingiest of corners to find the pons other people had looked over. He might've been essentially digging through a couch for spare change, but he's doing his best at it!

---

Word Count: 643
EXP Gain: +1

World of Light

RANK 4
3/40 EXP

Sandswept Sky - BOSS FIGHT

If Raz had any further questions on the plan this conductor... bird.. guy had, they caught in his throat. Over the clattering of the train's engine on full blast, the whipping desert wind passing them by, and general chaos the fight with the monster was kicking up, a voice rang out, barely enough to be heard all the way up here: 'Time to tip the scales!' The sky darkened and the sound of thunder pealed over the Railway Gun.

That sorta stuff isn't something you ignore. Raz stepped to the engine room's doorway and poked his head out just in time to witness Robin's final smash, and the big-huge dragon that he apparently summoned.

"WHOA!" Raz had to stop himself from rushing straight out. "Hey, you two, check out what's happening!" One of the two was already at his side, and the other one was busy keeping the train going, so it wasn't really worth saying but, hey, something super cool was happening, alright? It didn't last long. As quick as it seemed to come, the dragon dissipated into nothingness, and Robin soon went with it in a brilliant beam of light.

Raz lingered on the moment, leaning out of the train's engine room and staring towards the back. Eventually he asked Therion, "Do you know what happened to him? Is he like, gone, or gone?" He might have to ask someone like Tora or Big Band that, since Therion was only recently, uh, freed? Un-glowy'd? Whatever the word for it he didn't know any more than Raz probably did.

He was so distracted by Robin's sacrifice that it took driving over Hollow Heights for Raz to realize they were getting close to it. "Oh, hey, what's the--" Raz began, though it was quickly forgotten once the tracks fell out under the train. In a last ditch effort he booked it towards the front, hoping to clear the last bit to safe ground...! But then the powerful winds up and yanked him right out of the air, high, high above anything.

"AHHHH I DON'T KNOW WHAT I'M DOIIIING!" Raz didn't have a lot of fancy tools to spike the Red Eye for good on the way down. He wasn't the only one, sure, but he felt particularly at risk of splatting compared to the rest. Raz tried to angle his fall towards Braum, figuring that hanging onto the big guy with the big shield was probably a safe move. He didn't have much to contribute on the way down, but it seemed like everyone else had it covered.

And then, with one final strike from (most of) the group, the Champion as slain. As the rest discussed what to do next and explained the spirit's properties, Raz just sat and caught his breath. His energy was fading fast by now, after all he'd done that day. It was mostly a mental fatigue, but if you were in his line of work you'd understand that can matter all the same. "Nice one, team," he offered with a soft chuckle. Nobody wanted to stick around there for long, so the group hoisted themselves back up onto stable ground.

"I haven't earned my Cryokinesis badge yet," Raz said, "so I can't do anything to help with the heat. Between that and all this..." he looked down at himself, still covered in the monster's blood, and even a bit of flesh stuck to his shoe. "I'm definitely going to need a shower. And a fresh pair of pants."

---

Word Count: 586
Boss Defeated!
Boosted EXP Gain: +34

World of Light

RANK 4
1/40 EXP

Sandswept Sky - BOSS FIGHT

Raz hadn't thought far enough ahead in this plan to figure a way off (out?) of the monster. Really his thought process hitched around the point where he got covered in blood. When Red Eye succumbed to the spinal assault and flung itself away, Raz was more or less expecting to eat sand. It wouldn't be that bad, really - he'd get some bruises, a bit of a burn, and itchy pants for a while, but he'd been through worse falls. Sure, he'd be stuck in the middle of a desert at that point... ok maybe it was that bad.

Luckily his teammates picked up his slack, swooping to catch him midfall. Raz stumbled for a second once he was put down, shot out a quick and mumbly "Thanks," then proceeded to hurl right over the railing. "Uhhhgh. This stuff reeks," he said, trying and failing to wipe some gunk off his jacket. That was going to need a real deep clean. And his goggles too, he couldn't even see out of them!

The fight against the Triliad restarted in full force, erupting into even more chaos across the gun's platform. Raz pitched in with some psi-blasts of his own, but between the nausea and the hecticness his aim was even more off than usual. A decision was (mostly) made on the direction to lead the Red Eye, and Raz decided to follow behind Therion as he went to inform the conductor. A second opinion was always helpful, right? And he didn't want the guy to be running into any baddies on his own.

Arriving at the head of the train with a lot less fuss than he thought, Raz took the small window of relative peace to catch himself, leaning against the control room's wall, leaving a slight him-shaped smudge of monster blood in the process. "Beneath it?" Raz pointed towards the back of the train. "You want to have that thing crash on top of the train... on purpose?"

---

Word Count: 332
Boosted EXP Gain: +2

World of Light

RANK 3
27/30 EXP

Sandswept Sky - BOSS FIGHT

Raz figured that his gambit - peppering the monster with its own creature-y bombs - would do some damage. Explosive doodads + big glowy thing = major hurt. That was Psychonauting 101. Well, 102, maybe.

What he didn't expect was that it would weaken Red Eye so much that the next shot would practically tear it in half. There was a very brief moment when Raz was going to celebrate his quick thinking, only for his fist pump to turn into doubling over at the horrendous gash torn into Red Eye's side. "Oh man," Raz grumbled, hand over his mouth, "maybe it wasn't such a good idea to... eat all that spicy Mexican food before the climb..." There wasn't any time to hurl, however! The victory came at a cost, one that threatened to upend the entire train and literally derail any chance of besting this thing.

Raz was able to steady himself on top of the Railway Gun's railing as the whole thing tilted. Before he could come up with a plan (which was pretty much amounting to a quick lesson on balancing for everyone) the more experienced Tora called for an attack on the newly exposed spine. It did seem like a straightforward idea, but with Red Eye hugged right up against the train like that, wouldn't 'giving it back pain' make it thrash and throw them off for sure?

He couldn't voice this thought fast enough. Midna was quick to follow up on Tora's idea, going all out on the Red Eye's insides, with others no doubt right behind her. Gritting his teeth, Raz reached back, digging around his pack for a certain slice of cured meat. He felt like he needed a second opinion on this.

It took a couple of waves before Ford caught the whiff, and since Raz didn't want to wait around for long he was already clambering onto the main gun when Ford popped out, nearly throwing Raz's balance right off the train. "Hahh, I'm startin' to regret givin' that to ya, I'm real peckish and-- hoo boy! That's a biggun. Who's brain cooked up somethin' like that?"

"Not in a brain right now, Ford!" Raz shouted over the wind, making his way up the gun's barrel, at such an angle that it was more like climbing a rope. "Real thing, real danger! Could use some experienced wisdom here! Big thing, train, about to get thrown off the rails..."

"Oh, ohhh nelly, that is a real pickle." Ford looked Red Eye up and down, as best one could when they were a head sticking out of another head. "And not a pretty one at that. I don't got much in the way of any monster fightin', but if this thing's got a spine, then it's bound to have a brain."

"You want me to go into it's mind?!"

"I'm not finished yet, boy! No time for a biology lesson, so the gist of it's gonna be that you might be able to get a good dig into that there spine and make it jerk around, like the reverse of poking at a person's gray matter. Obviously this thing doesn't got the same structure as you or me, this is just an estimation--"

"I'll take anything Ford!" By now Raz was far enough up the barrel to be able to jump right down into the monster's wound, nothing that he was looking forward to.

"Get at it between the fourth and fifth vertebrae from the back there! Should see it flopping away from that train of yours like a fish chasin' water. And hold yer breath!" Ford began to shrink back into Raz's noggin. "Though maybe you upchucking into that thing will help ya more in the long run."

With that shaky plan made, Raz swallowed down a lump in his throat, and shifted his goggles over his eyes. "This is gonna suck..." And then he dropped from his perch. There was a brief moment in the air where the loss of momentum threatened to have the whole battle speed right past him, but Raz's aim was good enough to see him land into Red Eye's gaping wound. He bounced, slid, and skidded along it, kicking up a lot of blood, though he managed to grab hold of some flayed skin to keep him in place.

"Urrgh. Yup. I hate this." Things were slippery and he was already woozy from the abject grossness of this, so he had to shuffle on his feet to get further along the spine. In hindsight, maybe he shouldn't have went ahead and did this, but that was probably just the smell of burnt flesh getting to him! It was a few harrowing seconds for Raz to get where he needed to be, right beside the spot Ford pointed out. With how big Red Eye was, its spine was more than twice the size of Raz, though that might be a blessing in disguise - his tiny size meant he could jab into the disks easier, right?

Raz squared his knees to hold his balance. "Alright, big guy, I... really hope this works!" He drew his hand back, psychically summoning his TK hand, fingers out and poised to jab, and with a solid thrust drove it right into Red Eye's spinal cord!

---

Word Count: 886
Boosted EXP Gain: +4
RANK UP!

Multiversal Discord: The Mass-Scale Crossover RP

Location: Paradox Engine's Control Center -> Testing Room
Mentions: @XoXKieroBombXoX & @Dead Cruiser
---
Realizing that this wasn't a stress-induced fantasy or a death-induced dying dream, Giovanni quickly flung off his makeshift ghillie suit and rubbed the dirt off of his face.

"Alright, Giovanni," he said to himself, hunkered down in a private monologue, "you've read and wrote enough fanfiction to know what's going on here. Strange place you end up in with TV screens everywhere, an unconventional assortment of strangers of varying size and number of limbs, general queasiness... I either got abducted by aliens, kidnapped by a comic convention again, ooor it's just like one of my isekai animes!" Having successfully deduced his predicament in a relatively quiet voice, Giovanni turned on his heel to address the room, giving his a cap a little swish as he did. "Of course! A new life in a new world! It's the perfect backstory! And- ahah! A "testing" room? Yes, I will be tested to prove that I deserve a place here!"

Ignoring most everyone and everything else happening - they were all losers anyways - Giovanni dashed straight for the testing room right on the heels of Asta and Terra.

---

Location: Simulated Universe 1 - Open Field

Shadow Moth held back, allowing his allies to deal with the metallic menace themselves. His brashness had caused more than enough trouble already, and he wasn't eager to repeat that mistake. It was clear to him that his usual confidence wouldn't be as effective in this new, strange place than it would in Paris. If these robots were anything to go by then his foes were much too aggressive and adapting to take head on, not on his own. As bad a prospect entrusting this lot was, Gabriel didn't have much choice. For now, at least.

With the taken-over Techadon firmly pinned beneath its much larger counterpart, caught in the crossfire (and, the literal fire), Shadow Moth raised his hand, fingers primed to snap. Static Cling, still beneath it all, faded away in the same roiling clouds it appeared from and, with that solid snap, the feathery blue Amok popped from his cane. The color faded quickly, soon enough turning back into an ordinary feather which he folded back into his handfan.

Using these powers for defending himself... a prospect he hadn't truly considered until now. His tactics would need to change.

The Wards: A Grimdark Teenage Superhero Story

"Not-Dead Ed"

---

---

"You know that, uh, people died a lot even before Capes, yeah? You can't get complacent because of... all that."

---

---

Name: Edwin Charles

Alias: Schrödinger

Nicknames: Ed. What, they can't all be creative or witty.

Age: 18

Gender: Male

Personality: Even before his Trigger Event, Edwin's always had a bit of... death anxiety. Thanatophobia. A series of close calls as a young child imprinted on his mind, etching memories that, while he can't necessarily recall, shaped the kid he is today. He's always jumpy, nervous, difficult to keep still. Think less 'tweeker needing a fix', more 'feeling eyes on his back'. He has a lot of frantic energy coursing through him in any situation save for the absolute safest, giving him a very narrow focus, a one-track mind that he does his very best not to derail. Now multiply that by about 9 post-Trigger Event, and that's a lot of his deal nowadays.

Upsides? Well, there's very few; Edwin's anxieties make him pretty rough around the edges, leaving him terse and bratty and generally bad with people. His singlemindedness makes him very effective at doing what needs doing, pragmatic in his approach, seeing as he's always on the edge of Fight or Flight. Due to a need to be heard (stemming from the idea that his anxieties have to be taken seriously) he can also be quite direct with people - blunt, honest, and not taking any bullshit... not to say that he's always able to get the words out. It's also sparked a surprising creative streak in him. If Edwin wasn't a Cape, he could make a nice living as an artist.

Appearance: Edwin is tall. Very tall. Not, like, being-tall-is-his-power tall, but tall for a normal person. A clean 6'7" in height, in fact. He's not very picky with his wardrobe, though there is a consistent theme of baggy clothing, layers, long sleeves and long pants - things that make him bulkier, that he could "turtle" inside of, in a manner of speaking. He also always wears glasses, since he's so near-sighted as to be practically blind and refuses contact lenses.

As a Cape, he gets a little flashier. A deep gray cowl and a match open-front skirt, mimicking the Grim Reaper's iconic cloak, overtop some standard protective gear - thick vest, pads on the joints, steel-toe boots, etc. His wireframe glasses are replaced with a pair of prescription safety goggles wrapped around his head. The most striking element is a bright red jacket combat jacket worn over it all, the pockets and holsters holding various self-defense gear (collapsing batons, hand taser, maybe a pepper spray or two), made to turn him into a tempting target. It wasn't his idea.

Biography: For the most part Edwin's life had been pretty normal. His mother left his father early in his life, so he doesn't really know much about her. His dad raised him as well as he could by himself, but a few times he grew neglectful, leading to a very young Edwin to end up in dangerous situations more than once. Physically he came out of them okay, but the collective near-death experiences traumatized the poor kid - the memories were repressed, barely even registering in his mind, but the feelings stuck with him for the rest of his life.

This wasn't his Trigger Event, though. Beyond those awful moments Edwin existed as anyone would, though the budding signs of his thanatophobia cropped up around kindergarten, when the very thought of sharpening pencils, reaching for books on high shelves, or sitting under a faulty light made him almost too fearful to pay attention. Things were... tough for him from then on. Every step forward in overcoming the fear was accompanied by him aging and growing more aware of everything that could be what does him in. Edwin became marked as 'the weird kid' in his schools, too anxious to hold friendships for long, and for a while he was ostracized. Come Freshman Year of Highschool, however, he met someone who understood him. Not fully, but enough. They became highschool sweethearts, and the relationship had a very positive effect on him. Nearing senior year, Edwin had most of the fears under control.

Then he got his powers.

When the school year was to start, Edwin was in the hospital - nothing major, just a broken leg and a mile-long stare. By the time he healed up, he was being investigated for manslaughter. When that charge cleared, another one cropped up. And another. And one more. The last year of his school life became an unfortunate series of terrible tragedies that left him under harsh scrutiny, as the nature of his powers were juuust esoteric enough to not be understood by civilians or noticed by Capes. After a while of having these powers (and after a handful of house arrests), Edwin grew... as close to comfortable as he could be with it all. He trained a little on his own, cultivating a very slight modicum of control, as well as picking up more mundane self-defense techniques, and spent most of his free time writing, drawing, painting, just making things from the confines of his home. Right before he turned 18, someone finally connected the dots, and he was picked up by the PRT. For his own sake, and for the people around him.

Edwin was almost too old to join the new Wards division, but between his tumultuous mental state and low grasp on his powers, it was deemed necessary.

Powers:
(Designation: Mover 5 / 1, Trump ?, Thinker 2)
Edwin has an eclectic set of powers that, despite being unrefined and unable to be controlled directly, make him a very disruptive element.
• Protective Spatial Displacement: Edwin's most notable power is the ability to avoid harm by swapping places with another person. Of course, that's just the easy way to say it. A completely passive power, it triggers at the precise moment when some form of injury would otherwise come to him, switching his position with that of the closest person to him that is clear of whatever danger there is (ie, if someone were to shoot him point-blank he'd swap with them, but if he was caught in a burning building with another person, the swap would be with someone outside, safe from the fire). The swap isn't just of placement, but also their position in space (ie, if someone shoots him while his hands are raised, the swap would have Edwin holding the gun and their hands being raised the same way). The power only triggers if significant harm will come to Edwin - it wouldn't save him from being flicked with a rubberband, but will save him from anything between a solid punch to complete body annihilation.

There are three main flaws with this power: the first, obviously, being that Edwin has no say in who he ends up swapping with, it's always the nearest, safest human being. The second is that it does not trigger entirely consecutively. A full three seconds is needed before it will trigger again - not a long time, but enough for someone to get the drop on him. The third is that it only works on things that he's aware of happening. Things that fall outside of his awareness (even something like hearing a gun click or tasting a bit of poison) won't trigger it.
• Minor Teleportation: After a concentrated effort put into training, Edwin has managed to grow a very, very slight handling on this power, allowing him to manually teleport a short distance (roughly less than five feet from his starting location). There is still a 'cooldown' of three seconds before he can do it again, but interestingly this isn't tied to the main power, meaning he can teleport and, in the same moment, be displaced from harm.
• Power Eclipsing: The full ramifications of this facet have yet to be explored, but one final quirk of Edwin's Spatial Displacement is the capability of overriding a Cape's own powers. For the brief window of time when Edwin is truly vulnerable - the three seconds after a swap - Edwin essentially usurps control of the powers of the person he swapped with, as if they're still 'catching up' to their owner's new position in space. However, this only happens if the reason for the swap was due to a usage of powers to begin with. If a Cape were to get at him with mundane means, then this element won't occur.
• Heightened Senses & Instinct: Alongside all that poofing and goofing, Edwin also gained supernaturally enhanced sense - taste, touch, smell, and hearing, but not sight. As well, a kind've 'sixth sense' has been enhanced, most likely the primal instinct that alerts people to danger (in layman's term, a Spidey-Sense). This combines to give Edwin a greater awareness of things around him, possible threats, and an extra heap load of anxiety. But, that one isn't part of the package.

Skills: Having already feared death, dying, and injury for most of his life, Edwin has learned a good amount of ways in keeping himself safe, from the use of common self-defense weapons to a hodgepodge of martial arts, namely for disarming and disorienting people. He also has a very artistic side to him, a skill he's cultivated regardless of what's been happening in his life. Painting, design, writing, he's dabbled in it all.

Other: Iiiii would like to flyyyyyyy

The Wards: A Grimdark Teenage Superhero Story

"Not-Dead Ed"

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"You know that, uh, people died a lot even before Capes, yeah? You can't get complacent because of... all that."

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Name: Edwin Charles

Alias: Schrödinger

Nicknames: Ed. What, they can't all be creative or witty.

Age: 18

Gender: Male

Personality: Even before his Trigger Event, Edwin's always had a bit of... death anxiety. Thanatophobia. A series of close calls as a young child imprinted on his mind, etching memories that, while he can't necessarily recall, shaped the kid he is today. He's always jumpy, nervous, difficult to keep still. Think less 'tweeker needing a fix', more 'feeling eyes on his back'. He has a lot of frantic energy coursing through him in any situation save for the absolute safest, giving him a very narrow focus, a one-track mind that he does his very best not to derail. Now multiply that by about 9 post-Trigger Event, and that's a lot of his deal nowadays.

Upsides? Well, there's very few; Edwin's anxieties make him pretty rough around the edges, leaving him terse and bratty and generally bad with people. His singlemindedness makes him very effective at doing what needs doing, pragmatic in his approach, seeing as he's always on the edge of Fight or Flight. Due to a need to be heard (stemming from the idea that his anxieties have to be taken seriously) he can also be quite direct with people - blunt, honest, and not taking any bullshit... not to say that he's always able to get the words out. It's also sparked a surprising creative streak in him. If Edwin wasn't a Cape, he could make a nice living as an artist.

Appearance: Edwin is tall. Very tall. Not, like, being-tall-is-his-power tall, but tall for a normal person. A clean 6'7" in height, in fact. He's not very picky with his wardrobe, though there is a consistent theme of baggy clothing, layers, long sleeves and long pants - things that make him bulkier, that he could "turtle" inside of, in a manner of speaking. He also always wears glasses, since he's so near-sighted as to be practically blind and refuses contact lenses.

As a Cape, he gets a little flashier. A deep gray cowl and a match open-front skirt, mimicking the Grim Reaper's iconic cloak, overtop some standard protective gear - thick vest, pads on the joints, steel-toe boots, etc. His wireframe glasses are replaced with a pair of prescription safety goggles wrapped around his head. The most striking element is a bright red jacket combat jacket worn over it all, the pockets and holsters holding various self-defense gear (collapsing batons, hand taser, maybe a pepper spray or two), made to turn him into a tempting target. It wasn't his idea.

Biography: For the most part Edwin's life had been pretty normal. His mother left his father early in his life, so he doesn't really know much about her. His dad raised him as well as he could by himself, but a few times he grew neglectful, leading to a very young Edwin to end up in dangerous situations more than once. Physically he came out of them okay, but the collective near-death experiences traumatized the poor kid - the memories were repressed, barely even registering in his mind, but the feelings stuck with him for the rest of his life.

This wasn't his Trigger Event, though. Beyond those awful moments Edwin existed as anyone would, though the budding signs of his thanatophobia cropped up around kindergarten, when the very thought of sharpening pencils, reaching for books on high shelves, or sitting under a faulty light made him almost too fearful to pay attention. Things were... tough for him from then on. Every step forward in overcoming the fear was accompanied by him aging and growing more aware of everything that could be what does him in. Edwin became marked as 'the weird kid' in his schools, too anxious to hold friendships for long, and for a while he was ostracized. Come Freshman Year of Highschool, however, he met someone who understood him. Not fully, but enough. They became highschool sweethearts, and the relationship had a very positive effect on him. Nearing senior year, Edwin had most of the fears under control.

Then he got his powers.

When the school year was to start, Edwin was in the hospital - nothing major, just a broken leg and a mile-long stare. By the time he healed up, he was being investigated for manslaughter. When that charge cleared, another one cropped up. And another. And one more. The last year of his school life became an unfortunate series of terrible tragedies that left him under harsh scrutiny, as the nature of his powers were juuust esoteric enough to not be understood by civilians or noticed by Capes. After a while of having these powers (and after a handful of house arrests), Edwin grew... as close to comfortable as he could be with it all. He trained a little on his own, cultivating a very slight modicum of control, as well as picking up more mundane self-defense techniques, and spent most of his free time writing, drawing, painting, just making things from the confines of his home. Right before he turned 18, someone finally connected the dots, and he was picked up by the PRT. For his own sake, and for the people around him.

Edwin was almost too old to join the new Wards division, but between his tumultuous mental state and low grasp on his powers, it was deemed necessary.

Powers:
(Designation: Mover 5 / 1, Trump ?, Thinker 2)
Edwin has an eclectic set of powers that, despite being unrefined and unable to be controlled directly, make him a very disruptive element.
• Protective Spatial Displacement: Edwin's most notable power is the ability to avoid harm by swapping places with another person. Of course, that's just the easy way to say it. A completely passive power, it triggers at the precise moment when some form of injury would otherwise come to him, switching his position with that of the closest person to him that is clear of whatever danger there is (ie, if someone were to shoot him point-blank he'd swap with them, but if he was caught in a burning building with another person, the swap would be with someone outside, safe from the fire). The swap isn't just of placement, but also their position in space (ie, if someone shoots him while his hands are raised, the swap would have Edwin holding the gun and their hands being raised the same way). The power only triggers if significant harm will come to Edwin - it wouldn't save him from being flicked with a rubberband, but will save him from anything between a solid punch to complete body annihilation.

There are three main flaws with this power: the first, obviously, being that Edwin has no say in who he ends up swapping with, it's always the nearest, safest human being. The second is that it does not trigger entirely consecutively. A full three seconds is needed before it will trigger again - not a long time, but enough for someone to get the drop on him. The third is that it only works on things that he's aware of happening. Things that fall outside of his awareness (even something like hearing a gun click or tasting a bit of poison) won't trigger it.
• Minor Teleportation: After a concentrated effort put into training, Edwin has managed to grow a very, very slight handling on this power, allowing him to manually teleport a short distance (roughly less than five feet from his starting location). There is still a 'cooldown' of three seconds before he can do it again, but interestingly this isn't tied to the main power, meaning he can teleport and, in the same moment, be displaced from harm.
• Power Eclipsing: The full ramifications of this facet have yet to be explored, but one final quirk of Edwin's Spatial Displacement is the capability of overriding a Cape's own powers. For the brief window of time when Edwin is truly vulnerable - the three seconds after a swap - Edwin essentially usurps control of the powers of the person he swapped with, as if they're still 'catching up' to their owner's new position in space. However, this only happens if the reason for the swap was due to a usage of powers to begin with. If a Cape were to get at him with mundane means, then this element won't occur.
• Heightened Senses & Instinct: Alongside all that poofing and goofing, Edwin also gained supernaturally enhanced sense - taste, touch, smell, and hearing, but not sight. As well, a kind've 'sixth sense' has been enhanced, most likely the primal instinct that alerts people to danger (in layman's term, a Spidey-Sense). This combines to give Edwin a greater awareness of things around him, possible threats, and an extra heap load of anxiety. But, that one isn't part of the package.

Skills: Having already feared death, dying, and injury for most of his life, Edwin has learned a good amount of ways in keeping himself safe, from the use of common self-defense weapons to a hodgepodge of martial arts, namely for disarming and disorienting people. He also has a very artistic side to him, a skill he's cultivated regardless of what's been happening in his life. Painting, design, writing, he's dabbled in it all.

Other: Iiiii would like to flyyyyyyy

I decided to go a direction of, a sorta 'guy at the front who does not want to be there' angle, which I think could be interesting. Not sure if the "Trump" aspect is viable, but! Suppose that's for you to decide :p

World of Light

RANK 3
25/30 EXP

Sandswept Sky - BOSS FIGHT

Despite how impossible this battle seemed at a glance and the fact that it only barely began, Raz thought they were doing pretty fine so far! Though... no, no not really. For all the efforts in keeping the swarm at bay, a few flying stingrays cut through the line of defense and bombarded the train. And when the Railway Gun finally fired a round, it looked impressive... and only barely affected the huge monster. It seemed to make it mad more than anything!

Raz had a couple other things to worry about first, though. Aiming the Railway Gun sent the little platform he was on careening sideways. He was able to stay balanced of course, but the tall, seemingly blindfolded archer, Ciella, didn't. "I gotcha!" He shouted, swooping his TK to catch her by the wrist before she tumbled right off the train. With a yank he lifted her back onto her feet. Now that the charging station was facing away from the swarm, meaning they couldn't very well keep going at it, Raz took the time to offer some advice.

"You know, your center of gravity seems to be a bit... uh, high," he noted. "When you're on something precarious like, for example, a spinning platform atop a moving train, it'd help you keep steady if you lowered it. If you crouched down or something." Anything further would have to come later, as Red Eye changed tactics, and sent a whole bunch of weird, bulb-y creatures all over the train!

Raz was prepared to start firing again, but when the first Bolsephia exploded, he had a better idea. "Oh, this thing really made a mistake now," he chuckled. "It just gave us more ammo! Cover the button for me!" Raz clambered backwards, boosting off the charging station onto one of the railings, and reached his TK hand towards the nearest creature. It rose from the ground with ease, struggling in vain in Raz's psychic grasp.

"Hey guys!" Raz cupped his hands over his mouth and hollered towards Skull, Panther, and the rest of the turret gunners. "Batter... uh, fire in the... shoot this thing!" With a big psi-push Raz threw the snatched Bolsephia right back at Red Eye - specifically at one of those big bulbous spots that were obviously an important weakpoint. Hopefully his teammates got the meaning, cuz he just kept chucking them! Plucking the ones closest to Ciella and the charging station, as well as any that decided to move towards him, throwing them one by one at the many bulges for the gunners to shoot.

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Word Count: 431
Boosted EXP Gain: +2