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childrenofbahamutlogs2025-02-01 12:10 pm
diceofthegods) wrote in childrenofbahamutlogs2025-02-01 12:10 pm
EVENT #2: BRAIN BOGGLING
A CRASH IN THE NIGHT
In the dark hours of a snowy early morning, a sudden BOOM can be heard all across Town. It is swiftly followed by sounds of warping metal and then a screeching crash. Curious, albeit groggy, residents emerge only to find a smoking wreck just a mile outside of Town.
The strange craft appears to be almost nautiloid in shape with wrenched, broken tendrils streaming out the opening.
Much of it is metal although some of it almost seems... organic.
Those who with to get a closer look will be met by Charlie and Dimitri who are already on the job. They request curious onlookers keep their distance since this craft is, without a doubt, tremendously dangerous.
Later in the day, there appears to be an outfit of officials coming from the west to investigate and clean up the wreckage. Thankfully(?), you will all find out soon enough what's going on.
The strange craft appears to be almost nautiloid in shape with wrenched, broken tendrils streaming out the opening.
Much of it is metal although some of it almost seems... organic.
Those who with to get a closer look will be met by Charlie and Dimitri who are already on the job. They request curious onlookers keep their distance since this craft is, without a doubt, tremendously dangerous.
Later in the day, there appears to be an outfit of officials coming from the west to investigate and clean up the wreckage. Thankfully(?), you will all find out soon enough what's going on.
INVESTIGATION & PROTECTION
Deathcard Cabin by Jonah Senzel
4:07 / 13:06
▶︎
From the Inscryption OST: A unique and haunting sound paired with a unique and haunting game.
Charlie reports to the citizens of Town that an Illithid cargo transport. The pilot did not survive the crash, but they appeared to be transporting some kind of new breed of Intellect Devourers.
"We do not yet know what this new breed is capable of, but..."
Charlie does give everyone a rundown of what an Illithid and what an Intellect Devourer is, what they are capable of, and a keen warning to tread lightly. Many dead ones were discovered in the cargo but several of the enclosures were damaged in the crash and the likelihood of escapees is high.
Charlie reiterates: These creatures are to be killed on sight, or contained until someone can kill it. If you are not confident in your combat abilities, please remain in your homes as much as possible and seal all openings to your dwelling. Those who are capable though are urged to begin patrols of Town alongside Slayd, Dimitri and himself to ensure that Town and the surrounding areas are safe.
Please travel in pairs or groups, do not be alone! Attack from a distance when possible. Hoshiko will offer her assistance as a markswoman as well by picking off any Intellect Devourers from a distance that she can for those that are forced to travel alone. (Don't worry about any jokes she makes of her service not being cheap though. Charlie wouldn't actually let her charge you anything.)
Unfortunately, not even they can predict the blizzard that rolls through Town in the midst of all this. If you happen to see anything skittering through the snow, don't panic too much. It could just be a tiny woodland creature looking for a warm burrow to hide away in!
At least you hope it is.
"We do not yet know what this new breed is capable of, but..."
Charlie does give everyone a rundown of what an Illithid and what an Intellect Devourer is, what they are capable of, and a keen warning to tread lightly. Many dead ones were discovered in the cargo but several of the enclosures were damaged in the crash and the likelihood of escapees is high.
Charlie reiterates: These creatures are to be killed on sight, or contained until someone can kill it. If you are not confident in your combat abilities, please remain in your homes as much as possible and seal all openings to your dwelling. Those who are capable though are urged to begin patrols of Town alongside Slayd, Dimitri and himself to ensure that Town and the surrounding areas are safe.
Please travel in pairs or groups, do not be alone! Attack from a distance when possible. Hoshiko will offer her assistance as a markswoman as well by picking off any Intellect Devourers from a distance that she can for those that are forced to travel alone. (Don't worry about any jokes she makes of her service not being cheap though. Charlie wouldn't actually let her charge you anything.)
Unfortunately, not even they can predict the blizzard that rolls through Town in the midst of all this. If you happen to see anything skittering through the snow, don't panic too much. It could just be a tiny woodland creature looking for a warm burrow to hide away in!
At least you hope it is.
PROMPT #3
Hybrid intellect devourers are unique from the regular ones in that the goal is not to kill their target, but to gather intelligence and act as a kind of spy network.
They will flee when confronted directly by greater numbers, but will attack a lone target. They do this by jumping at the target's head and wrapping a wet tendril around their neck. They will choke who they've wrapped around if anyone tries to remove it. They are also far more likely to try and attack sleeping target (hence the advice to keep your homes closed!).
These hybrids emit spores that will keep the target asleep during feeding. Their primary goal appears to be infiltrating the targets' minds and absorbing some of their memories. The target will have their mind left mostly intact... though they may suffer short term memory loss, confusion, distress, fatigue and head pain.
Here's where the fun starts!
Once one of these critters has fed on someone, they are onto their next target. When a fed Intellect Devourer feeds from another target, that target may absorb some of the previous target's memories. This can span across multiple victims and be erratic in whose memories taint whose mind. The memories will cross-pollinate in the form of dreams or waking visions and hallucinations.
If one of these creatures is killed, it will explode, releasing a powerful psionic wave and the memories it had absorbed from any recent targets. Anyone within ten (10) yards of the dying creature will be afflicted with extreme head pain in the short term and also witness the memories of it's previous victims.
Enjoy your muddled memories and leggy brain-hunting!
The outfit of people who have come to investigate are from New Svihelen's disaster containment squad and are investigating the hybrid creatures and the possible reason for an Illithid ship to crash here of all places. Right now, the running theory is that interference from the selfsame summoning circle that brought you all here could have caused the interplanar navigation systems of the ship to malfunction but nothing has been determined yet.
Eventually, these creatures will all be rounded up and taken care of. They are persistent and stealthy though in their efforts to survive above all else. Charlie assures that they're doing all they can to make Town safe once and for all but it will take some time.
They will flee when confronted directly by greater numbers, but will attack a lone target. They do this by jumping at the target's head and wrapping a wet tendril around their neck. They will choke who they've wrapped around if anyone tries to remove it. They are also far more likely to try and attack sleeping target (hence the advice to keep your homes closed!).
These hybrids emit spores that will keep the target asleep during feeding. Their primary goal appears to be infiltrating the targets' minds and absorbing some of their memories. The target will have their mind left mostly intact... though they may suffer short term memory loss, confusion, distress, fatigue and head pain.
Here's where the fun starts!
Once one of these critters has fed on someone, they are onto their next target. When a fed Intellect Devourer feeds from another target, that target may absorb some of the previous target's memories. This can span across multiple victims and be erratic in whose memories taint whose mind. The memories will cross-pollinate in the form of dreams or waking visions and hallucinations.
If one of these creatures is killed, it will explode, releasing a powerful psionic wave and the memories it had absorbed from any recent targets. Anyone within ten (10) yards of the dying creature will be afflicted with extreme head pain in the short term and also witness the memories of it's previous victims.
Enjoy your muddled memories and leggy brain-hunting!
The outfit of people who have come to investigate are from New Svihelen's disaster containment squad and are investigating the hybrid creatures and the possible reason for an Illithid ship to crash here of all places. Right now, the running theory is that interference from the selfsame summoning circle that brought you all here could have caused the interplanar navigation systems of the ship to malfunction but nothing has been determined yet.
Eventually, these creatures will all be rounded up and taken care of. They are persistent and stealthy though in their efforts to survive above all else. Charlie assures that they're doing all they can to make Town safe once and for all but it will take some time.
Notes
⁂ The partner plotting post for this event/quarter is also up!
⁂ Additionally, we have a state of the game post available for people to read about updates, clarifications, and housekeeping items!
⁂ If you have any further questions or feedback about this event specifically, please comment here!
⁂ For even more ambient event music, you can check out this this playlist!
⁂ Full Navigation ⁂
⁂ Additionally, we have a state of the game post available for people to read about updates, clarifications, and housekeeping items!
⁂ If you have any further questions or feedback about this event specifically, please comment here!
⁂ For even more ambient event music, you can check out this this playlist!
I'll share in your suffering to make you well, to make you well(Ravus)
Her gaze is focused back on the road, watching, tense and trembling like a skittish chocobo. The thought almost makes him giggle. He can still smell the distinctive scent of the birds on both of them, imagines he'll never forget the feeling of their feathers beneath his fingers. But he's exhausted from a long day and until Amelia asks something of him he really has no idea what's going on. Maybe there was an animal on the road?
Another smile from him at the idea of the little chick he'd gotten to hold chasing after him, demanding to come home with him. Surely Dad would let him have a bird, right?
That's when the first car explodes.
It's all chaos after that. Amelia pulling him in against her before he can see more than the brilliance of the fire. Commands shouted. Members of the crownsguard rushing to the battle. The shrieking of some daemonic thing behind them.
Amelia's arm around his shoulders, trying to keep him down as they slip out of the back seat and begin to move away from the caravan, away from the danger. Another cry of rage, another of pain, one guardsman sailing past them in a crumpled heap. Amelia's fingers at the side of his face, trying to force his gaze forward but not daring the risk of covering his eyes entirely.
It's all flames and noise and fear pounding in his ears until suddenly there's nothing but Amelia's scream in his ears and his face in the dirt. There's pain. At least... He thought there was. Can feel something hot and wet seeping into his shirt, his pants, the weight of Amelia above him. Tiny fingers curl in the dirt but he doesn't move. He tries so hard to scramble to his feet but his legs don't even twitch in response. There's just more blood. Too much blood. Even his childish understanding knows that much and when he manages to lift his head Amelia doesn't respond, doesn't put her hand over the back of his neck to keep him down as she had done a hundred times before when they'd practiced for something scary just like this.
"Miss 'Melia?" his voice slurred and slow, his head hurts, swims uncomfortably like it had when he had a really bad fever last year. There's still no answer but he can see additional headlights on the road, the Regalia at the head of the procession and even though he hurts he knows then it will be okay. The Regalia means his dad is coming. His dad and Cor will be driving and maybe even Clarus and Drautos will be with him.
He barely understands what's happening but the blue flash of the King's magic is familiar and safe and the horrible screaming creature can't get closer now. He reaches out, fingers curling in Amelia's dark hair, surprised to realize it is splayed out over him. Hadn't it been in a braid earlier? Had that monster cut Miss Amelia's pretty hair?
It's only then he begins to understand. All that blood. Too much blood for one small boy. Too much even for one small boy and the delicate young woman that laid atop him. Not for them both to be safe, to be okay. His shirt clings to him, soaked in it and he's suddenly very aware that it's not his.
Even though it should be.
It's only then that tears begin to trickle down his cheeks, thick and hot and his Dad is calling his name but everything seems to spin, his vision blurred with tears until suddenly everything goes dark.
What comes after is the strangest dream one that is odd but not as scary as it could be. Not with the fluffy little creature that guides him through it. He doesn't understand it, the weight of what it means to have such dark creatures in his mind. Years later, a decade in the future, Noctis will wonder if it was a hint even then of the darkness that lingers in his mind, the slow dragging agony of depression. A few more beyond that, when he meets those same creatures in the flesh, he will wonder a great deal more about what it means.
But he never doubts the things Carbuncle said to him in the dream, could never argue that the Regalia felt more like home to him than any room in the Citadel, than his apartment, than.... Anything really. She was the steadiest constant in his life, even more than Ignis though not by much.
The reminder, suddenly brought to the fore in his dreams, only makes the pang of loss all the sharper when he wakes in the wee hours of the morning. He slips carefully out of bed, drops a reassuring kiss to Prompto's temple, and moves through the house like a ghost. His eyes sharp as an owl's thanks to the dragon slumbering within him.
It's only once he's outside in the crisp pre-dawn air, the snow settled for the first time this week, the sky velvet dark and flecked with stars, that he sees the tracks in the snow. One of those little brain creatures had been skittering around the house. The tracks disappear into the attached cottage his father and Cor had been sharing. He should hunt the beast down but he finds himself staring into the cold dark glass of the windows and unable to urge himself to go to the door. And it's there he stays, frozen and feeling his heart breaking all over again when Ravus' patrol brings him near.
no subject
Yet, being the keyword, because as he nears the cabins the others from his world share, a searing pain lances behind his eyes. Ravus bares his teeth, stumbling to a halt as the memory comes crashing down on him like a roaring avalanche.
There’s a pang of almost childish confusion, one that feels so foreign he knows it can’t be his own thoughts. It takes a moment to focus through the sudden change. And then, chaos.
But that feeling is familiar. In horrible, earth-shattering ways, he knows the screams of panic and pain, orders being called out over the roar of fire and singing of steel. The daemonic beast howling in the memory is not the same as the cold, hellish whirring of the MTs, but it’s a minor detail. In his own body, there’s a phantom pain in his magitek arm, where a bullet had struck him years and years ago. But it fades quickly, the foreign memory overpowering his own as the terror and fear whips up like a storm. The reek of blood burns his senses and the back of his throat, until it slows again. Slows and quiets until the memory is more of a dream, and fades with the dark pall of night giving way to dawn.
He shivers, right down to his tail tip, realizing what he’s seen. So when he comes around the corner of the next cabin, following skittering tracks, he’s not surprised to see Noctis there. His forlorn expression is in the glass, and Ravus slowly walks behind him so that the younger prince can catch his reflection there. Despite the jagged length of his tail, Ravus uses it to gently brush Noctis’ back as he comes around to his side, higher up, and closer to his shoulder, than nearer to the scar. The rest of him keeps close, just a wisp away from touching, but leaving that up to Noctis if he wishes for the gap to remain.
“You were always quiet back then; we never pushed you to relive the daemon attack from that day. No one wished to reopen a wound whose physical impact we could barely heal as is.” Ravus speaks low and soft, only the ghost of his breath in the cold giving away he speaks to anyone but them. “I would not have pried given the choice.” A beat, and Ravus looks to Noctis instead of his reflection. “Has it been bothering you more as of late?”