[closed] Mission: Don't Wake the Deity

[couldkillthedevil]

who: Akihiko Sanada, Nico di Angelo, Edward Elric, Alphonse Elric, Rin, Keith, Lyle Dylandy, Khisanth (Onyx), Jason Todd, Ava Orlova, Morgana, Takashi Shirogane, Yuffie Kisaragi, Chloe Decker, Lucifer Morningstar, Thor Odinson, Link
what: Mission: Don't Wake the Deity
when: Friday, July 28th - after the scouting party has returned and shared their information
where: The Abandoned City and surrounding woods
warnings: Violence, probable monster attacks, mind control/people being compelled, etc. Will add more warnings as needed.



[Taken from the June TDM, with some additions:]

Whether you've just arrived in the city or you've been here a while, and you have a sensitivity to the spiritual, magical, multidimensional, or anything else outside the realm of everyday normal, you've probably noticed a distinct uptick in weird feelings, strange nightmares, or daymares - hallucinations of scary things that are lurking just behind you.

You're not the only one who's noticed it.

There are rumors going around that the psychological and spiritual disturbances are due to the emergence or re-emergence of a deity. Some people say that it's something new that's come through the portal with the sharp increase in new arrivals recently, and others say it's simply an ancient spiritual presence or some ancient incorporeal monster that's been somehow awakened. Gramarye, the top-tier magic research center in Riverview Quarantine, has been studying anyone who's felt this presence, and have recently confirmed that whatever it is, it's being fed by all the extra energies and prayers and thoughts as the city's population increases. The one thing everyone agrees on is that, if the expanding community is feeding the entity, then the entity has got to go!

A scouting party recently travelled into the Abandoned City and forests outside the walls to search for leads or any other evidence of a way to solve the problem. After a day of searching, the team stumbled upon an abandoned temple. While it didn't seem like much, its exterior run-down and wood rotting amongst the centuries' old mulch and muck, it felt... unsettling. Alive, almost. One member of the party could feel a powerful presence emanating from it; realizing they were out of their depth, the team returned to the Quarantine to relay the information and obtain reinforcements.

Teams are now being assembled across the city to travel into the Abandoned City or the forests outside the walls and find this temple once more. The mission might be dangerous, though - there are the usual dangers of venturing out into the wilds, but this time, characters may also face booby traps, spectral or physical guardians, and if the entity itself gets awoken? Someone may have to kill it.

[So this log will be set up in 'stages'. The first few headers will be closed to each of the teams for initial travel meetings, camping, monster fights, etc. Feel free to post your own top-levels underneath and tag out, mingle, whatever you'd like. Headers for further 'stages' of the mission (such as once all the teams meet up at the temple/deity hideout) will also be posted so that teams can intermingle/have more CR.

Since there are so many people involved, consider this one big mingle thread in the vein of the TDMs. Here's a link to the google doc for those interested as well.]

Comments

ii

[alkahestic]

Al's been up for a while, having decided to keep watch. He's used to long nights without sleep from the time he was armor, and though sleeping is a luxury he now has, he doesn't sleep too often. So he immediately notices when Chloe begins tossing and turning, pulled out of sleep by something he assumes isn't too pleasant. A nightmare, perhaps?

He quickly scoots closer, looking her over for anything that might give him a sign as to what's bothering her before tilting his head and giving her a sympathetic look.

"Brother gets nightmares sometimes too. Do you mind if I ask what it was?" he asks softly, not wanting to wake the others.

[couldkillthedevil]

It's not surprising that Al's awake to keep watch, but she can't help but start a little at the abrupt sound of his voice breaking through the lingering fog of sleep. "Alphonse," she murmurs a bit breathlessly, jaw working as she let herself calm down.

Another hand wiped back the sweat from her brow before she sat up a bit further to regard him. Even in the dark, she can make out the concern settling over his face. "I saw... people," she says, a bit helplessly. "Just standing around in front of a temple. I've been seeing it a lot recently. Almost too often. Sometimes not even in my dreams."

[alkahestic]

Al lets her have her moment to calm down and reorient herself. It's important to give people that space and time, something he knows from experience with his brother's nightmares, so he waits for her to explain and even gives her a small, encouraging smile.

The smile soon turns into a frown, however, as he hears her description of her dream. People standing around the temple can be either a good or a bad thing and he wishes Ed was with their group so he could bounce ideas off his brother. For now, he can only nod and concentrate on possibilities.

"It might be nothing. But if you're experiencing it when you're awake, maybe it's a warning. At least it's just people standing and not fighting, right?"

[couldkillthedevil]

"Maybe," she says slowly, something like consideration settling over her features. She agreed with his assessment on the surface, but she can still feel the tight coil of tension and anxiety in her belly. It's a feeling she knows well from the many cases she's been involved with. Intuition may not be foolproof, but it's rarely steered her wrong. And something felt off. "It felt... abnormal, though. Unnatural. I don't know how to describe it."

She shook her head, trying to quell the memory of those images. "I don't want to sound like one of those crazy people who say they can see the future, but... I want to make sure we avoid unnecessary risks, if we can."