Wait, All For Who?! (MHA Jumpchain Quest)

FixerUpper · May 10, 2017

Wait, All for Who?!

An MHA Jumpchain Quest featuring

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Ochako Uraraka
artist: niro (Pixiv8537417)
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World 0: My Hero Academia (USJ)

'Home'

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Sirens blared, surrounding UA's USJ campus in a cordon of flashing red and blue light. Villains, in what had to be one of the most poorly thought out, brazen attacks in all of history, were being marched out the door and into the waiting containment vans. Capture equipment surrounded a few who had clear strength-enhancing quirks, be it of a mutation type or not. They'd have all been done up similarly, but there were literally too many criminals and not enough capture equipment.

Tsukauchi sighed, tapping the rim of his fedora with a finger. If you overlooked the one disaster, it was a bit of a miracle.

Two teachers and a class of first year kids, even if they were from the Heroics Department, managed to hold off a villainous attack made by over sixty villains of variable-strength quirks for fifteen to seventeen minutes – eyewitness accounts still disagreed on the exact timing – before All Might arrived.

While the teachers had been gravely wounded, no students had been injured.

It would have been a perfect victory if not for the disappearance of one of the villains and one of the students. While the villain would have been bad enough, the disappearance of the girl was much, much worse. Every resource was being brought to bear, but until otherwise confirmed, Uraraka Ochako was now missing and presumed kidnapped.

He'd already been given her student profile. A cheerful looking child, and according to All Might, hard-working and earnest.

While kidnappings on TV were things of high stakes drama, either financially or politically motivated, kidnappings in real life were paradoxically more humdrum and more horrific. Custody disputes, sexual predation and exploitation, and the so-called 'stolen adoptions' were the reasons that topped the lists.

Given the circumstances, this was more a thing of TV-land and had to be politically motivated.

But, even so, he had to interview the witnesses and confirm.

He wasn't looking forward to it.

He took a pad out of his pocket, and followed it with a pen. The kids were huddled outside, sitting down, huddled next to one another, most wearing an eye-catching assortment of costumes. They looked both utterly miserable, and in the middle of a clandestine meeting, eyes snapping onto him as he approached, their voices going still.

Huh. Interesting.

"Hi, kids. I'm Detective Tsukauchi-"

He was immediately bombarded with questions.

"Is this about Ochako?" "Do you know where she is?" "Sir, have you found her?"

He held up a palm. They went silent.

"Yes, this is about her. No, we don't know where she is, that's why I need to interview those of you who saw her vanish."

A boy wearing glasses, his costume bearing more than a passing resemblance to Ingenium, stood up.

"That would be Ms. Ashido, Mr. Sato, Mr. Sero, Mr. Shoji, and myself. With their permission, I would like to start." He took a breath, looked around, but the other students nodded encouragingly at him. Tsukauchi wrote down their names.

Iida nodded to himself. "Right. I was informed by Thirteen that our communication equipment was being jammed and I was needed to get help from the other teachers. We were located near the entrance and so I started to run to the door. A villain with some sort of warping quirk attempted to stop me. At this juncture, Shoji interfered-"

"It was badass," a boy – Sero? – broke in. "He jumped on the portal."

"Yes, but-" said mini-Ingenium.

"It was necessary," Shoji said calmly.

"Badass all the same."

"I think he can't make portals willy-nilly," a girl broke in. Mini-Ingenium gave up on speaking and settled down. Her pink skin and pink hair set her from the rest of the class, which, with the exception of a boy with a bird's head, and another boy that looked like he had rocks beneath his skin, mostly resembled bog standard humans. "Because then he tried to grab Iida using his smoke head. Ochako grabbed his neck armor and 'blip!' they were gone."

Tsukauchi wrote that down. Hopefully, Thirteen could corroborate the story. It'd be even better if there was video footage, but he wasn't holding out too much hope in that regard: they'd jammed communications, video footage would have probably been erased or garbled as well.

"Is there anything else you remember?" he asked.

A boy, the one he was pretty sure was All Might's disciple, raised his hand. "Sir. I – I don't think they meant to kidnap Ochako. According to their leader, they were trying to kill All Might. With how flexible it was, the warping quirk was probably one of their trump cards. I don't see why they'd try to kidnap one of the students first, instead of prioritize -"

He headed him off. If true, it was worse than the alternative. The kids didn't need to hear it.

"The fact remains she's been taken," Tsukauchi said. "Anyone else? See anything? Hear anything?"

The kids shook their head. Then one, wearing a costume strongly reminiscent of a frog, asked, her voice a croak:

"Sir, where do you think they took her?"

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World 1: Tower of God (Evankhell's Hell)

'The Battlefield'

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Uraraka and ducked as an arrow whizzed by her head.

She'd probably be worried about where she was, if not for the fact she was more worried about getting shot. The sky was blue, the wind was pleasant, the scene was beautiful and the tall yellow grass would have been great camouflage for someone not giving off greasy, purple-black smoke or busy trying to emulate a parade float. It weren't that great for the gal trying to tether said villainous balloon to the ground neither, but who was counting?

She looked up. Yup. There he was. Looking for all the world like a dorky, super-polluted raincloud pretending to be a bartender.

She winced as another arrow tried to skewer him.

"Cancel! C'mon, cancel!" Uraraka muttered, her Kansai dialect peeking through as she mashed her fingertips together. The villainous warp gate continued to float serenely above her head, almost three storeys up now. An arrow was sticking out of somewhere that, in a cartoon, would be funny, but here just underlined how badly she needed to get him down. While an arrow to the butt was probably not fatal, one to the gut was going to be.

A thin, black-red smear across the visor of her helmet was the most visible evidence of his distress. Still, he'd been attacking her entire class so her sympathy for the villain was kind of limited to making sure he didn't die and then sending him straight to jail. Not that she was sure there was a jail to send him here. From the looks of it, this was an active warzone.

She'd already seen three people die.

For some reason, one of them had a ball the size and color of a child's bowling ball floating around his head. It was now, for some reason, floating around her head.

Their weapons were an anachronistic and eclectic mix: some clearly had guns, other spears, other knives and machetes and this one asshole with the bow and arrow was starting to piss her off something fierce. She knew that, later, she'd have a right good crying jag about this because what the absolute fuck, but right now, right now, she couldn't afford it.

So she wouldn't.

Something had happened when she'd touched the villain, intending to toss him away and give the class rep enough time to run. Quirk interactions were not always predictable – but they were usually not this extreme, either. But somehow zero gravity and this shadow warp gate or whatever had combined into an uncontrollable long-distance teleportation and completely knocked out Mr. Villain over there and apparently severed his relationship to gravity.

Hopefully that'd be temporary.

Uraraka glanced up: Mr. Villain was at four storeys and climbing. Grah. She regretted not requesting a grappling hook for her costume. If she had she could… but she didn't, no ifs and buts about it. She squinted: the sky here was all wrong, the sun was missing, replaced instead by eight far fainter orbs hovering in the sky, but it was still vividly blue. She bit her lip: there'd be no other way, she'd have to grab onto him.

Oh god, she was going to regret this. She was so going to regret this.

She looked around wildly: out of the corner of her eye, she caught another mutant-type quirk go down to an arrow, and another duo fighting it out with, of all things, a giant hook and a machete.

She clapped her fingers together, rushed forwards and jumped.

Ochako has five stats, currently Power (2), Speed (1), Technique (3), Intelligence (3) and Cooperativeness (4). Most actions that are of a certain level of difficulty require a die roll (jumping across a chasm, surpassing your quirk's limits, making a dire wolverine back off, etc.). Actions can use at most Two Attributes or One Attribute and One Skill.

Here, Ochako needs to get as close to Kurogiri as possible so she rolls Technique (3), 3 die, and as fast as she can so she rolls Speed (1), 1 dice and ends up with a pool of 4d10. All rolls of 7 and up count as a success, all rolls under 7 count as a failure.

Here, the difficulty is set at 3. It's possible for Ochako to succeed, but nevertheless quite unlikely.

Technique (3) + Speed (1) = 4 dice (3, 1, 5, 9) 1 success

Dang, well, that went pretty much as expected. The roll Failed.

For a moment she thought she was going to make it. Then an arrow slapped her across the face, making the visor of her mask crack, and sending her spinning wildly in the wrong direction. Weightlessness plus a sudden, uncontrollable impulse equaled barf bag. She canceled her quirk, still spinning, and then hit the ground with a shattering impact, dragging a long furrow through the dirt and grass before coming to a rest, her mask's visor tinkling around her.

Dammit.

She felt something warm trickle down her face: she was bleeding too now. Great.

Don't worry about the blood - that damage was purely cosmetic. Still, what's poor Ochako to do?

I know, she'll do a stunt. Stunts either let you add dice - or outright decrease the difficulty of a roll. For example, if the problem here is that people are trying to shoot her, if she can stop them from shooting her, the difficulty goes down. Here, Ochako is going to use her quirk Zero Gravity to create a smokescreen made out of bits of grass and dust. It's not the best idea ever, but the QM's going to be generous and let you take the difficulty down a notch.

Now it's difficulty roll of 2.

Technique (3) + Speed (1) = 4 dice (7, 6, 2, 10) 2 successes

It succeeded!

Beneath her fingers, stalks of long, golden grass lay scattered all around her. She realized a second later that she had been going about this all wrong.

A moment later, the air was full of floating stalks of grass. Dispersed, they weren't hugely dense, but every bit helped. And the dirt beneath the grass was nice and dry, crumbling at her touch. She blasted it into the air and tried not to breathe.

She jumped again and didn't get hit this time. She even managed to get her trajectory right, no easy feat at this distance.

"Alright, you dumb, stupid, floating, villainous piñata, we're go-"

When she touched him, they vanished once more.

This being a Jumpchain, Ochako Uraraka is supposed to gain something during each 'Jump.' Unfortunately, most of your gains must either be objects of powers, or gifts of power. Simply because Ochako is in a universe, does not necessarily mean she'll gain the protagonist's abilities. For example, Uraraka won't magically become a shinigami by going to Bleach, nor will she become a wizard by ending up at Hogwarts, or a Planeswalker by heading to Phyrexia. However, she can magically become a magical girl because she'd be making a pact (hopefully not with Kyubey), or one of those Megaman ZXs with the biometals because it's a ~~magical~~ technological transformation trinket.

For now though, she's gained an E-Grade Pocket from 'Evankhell's Hell and 1 xp.

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World 2: Diablo I (Tristram)

'The Nightmare'

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When the world resolved itself once more, into a dimly lit expanse of stone, Uraraka gagged.

While no stranger to the scent of blood – there had been a man bleeding right next to her, just a second ago - the scent here was overwhelmingly horribad. When ripened, death had no close competition when it came to nightmare scents. Here, the miasma was thick enough to choke on.

She coughed a few times, waving the smell out of her face and inadvertently causing the floating ball around her head to wobble. She had to – she had to get out. Where was was that rat butt, warp gating bastard? Anywhere had to better than this horror show –

Someone laughed.

It was the grating, low-pitched chuckle of a horror movie monster. It turned her bowels to ice and made her look wildly about until she spotted it and wished she hadn't, a shadow against a wall, exiting from a doorway. He was huge – bigger than even All Might, with vicious, mountain goat horns jutting from his brow and tusks curving from his lips. His skin looked scaled and orange in the light and he wore an apron that was just about splattered with blood. His skin was blackened and peeled in places, like someone had taken an oven to him.

In one hand he carried a cleaver larger than she was. It was a vicious, jagged weapon, looking like a lump of metal nailed to a stick. As he started walking out of his doorway, she saw what looked like the shadowy profile of human bodies, swinging from chains – she looked away.

"Ahhh… fresh meat!"

Oh dear, it's the Butcher. And here's poor Uraraka who doesn't know the first thing about fighting him (open door, cast wall of fire, close door, and hope he dies). Fortunately, while the Butcher is formidable (Power (4), Speed (3), Technique (1), Intelligence (1) and Cooperativeness (1)), he can be beaten.

Uraraka Initiative Roll: Intelligence (3) + Speed (1) + Act First Merit (2) = 6 dice (4, 5, 9, 4, 1, 8) 2 successes
Butcher Initiative Roll Intelligence (1) + Speed (3) = 4 dice (3, 3, 7, 2) 1 success
Success

Phew, Uraraka gets to act first. This is helped along by her Act First merit. Merits are like feats in D&D, they add situational bonuses to certain rolls. The Act First Merit lets Uraraka gain 2 dice during initiative rolls.

Uraraka Attack: Technique (3) + Power (2) = 5 dice (10, 4, 7, 5, 5) 2 successes
Butcher Defense: Technique (1) + Speed (3) + Weapon (-1) = 3 dice (9, 3, 5) 1 success
Success

Now, normally, beating their a defense roll by 1 would only mean that you dealt a measily 1 Health Level worth of damage, and bashing damage at that (and that's not even taking into account armor!) and his blistering counterattack (13 dice (speed (3) + power (4) + weapon (3) + Overwhelming Attack Merit (3)) would quickly reduce you to a fine red mist). Fortunately, you are Ochako Uraraka and the moment you touch anyone who's restricted to melee and unable to fly, you've kind of forced them to learn how to operate in zero gravity, and unless you're in a sci-fi setting where spacewalks are common, that comes with a host of penalties that turn the fight into a complete non-issue.

Uraraka screamed – and, much to her own confusion, charged at him, her thoughts a litany of castigation, all of them yelling at her for being insane. Luckily for her, it seemed to take the villain by surprise too – he clearly didn't expect such a tiny foe to attack in turn – and while his defense was a slash of incredible strength, it missed by like a mile, the dark metal sending up sparks against the stone as it chewed the stone beneath their feet to powder. She got a touch on him, area glowing slightly where she had reached, and then pushed him up, flinging him upwards.

He tried to slash at her again – the wind of it nearly cleaving her in two, mussing her hair and sending him spinning helplessly backwards, roaring as he went. Uraraka breathed raggedly, hands trembling as she watched him tumble in mid-air, slamming into the far end of the room. In a confined space like this, her quirk was going to eventually make him ascend to the ceiling – her quirk's name was not, strictly speaking, one hundred percent accurate – but in the meantime, she wished him the joy of being mostly unable to move and hoped his inner ear gave him as much grief as hers did.

In the meanwhile, she had people to rescue. She burst into the room he'd been in, the one where she thought she had seen people swinging on chains-

She stopped. She had thought right.

But these… people… were a little… beyond saving.

She didn't remember walking out of the room, of the abattoir, but the next thing she knew, she was staring at the grimy stone floor outside the room.
She threw up.

On her knees, she retched until her stomach was empty and there was nothing left in her to purge. On her knees, she felt her eyes begin to burn and started to rub at them. She felt dizzy and weak. The events of the past hour were catching up with her and now – now she really wanted her mom and dad. She really wanted to go home.

Beyond the hideous noises made by what had to be one of the most monstrous villains ever, she heard something, from the room. A moan, maybe.

Her head craned back, almost involuntarily.

Could someone really...?

Yes, someone could. One of the bodies, more muscle than skin, got off the table it'd been on, practically falling, eyes spinning wildly in their sockets before becoming pinpricks of red, angled straight at her.

She strangled a scream, and tried to put a smile on her face. It wasn't their fault they looked so-

"Sir, I think you should sit down and let- oh shit on a stick!"

Sometimes extras are going to attack you. When they do so, unless they present a genuine threat due to sheer numbers, Ochako is going to auto-success that nonsense because the QM can't be arsed to roll the dice every time some two-bit thug tries to jump you. Similarly, if you try to jump someone way out of your league, you're not going to get very far. Rule of thumb is, I'll try to roll the dice no more than three times in an update. Everything else will run on narrative convention.

It had picked up a knife and tried to stab her. It even managed to get a glancing hit in – fortunately rebounding off the tough kelvar-weave of her suit - before she tapped it on the shoulder and threw it up to the ceiling. It groaned angrily at her, still clutching the knife.

Looking up, she realized that the shadow villain guy was actually there too. She hadn't seen him because she hadn't really looked. No doubt touching him would involve another long-range teleport, but at this point, she wanted to be anywhere else. She looked around for something helpful, ID, dog tags, found a book, a few scattered coins and some knives.

She picked the book up – probably a diary, maybe something she could give to the families of one of the victims, or whatever, she didn't care, she just wanted to go – and touched the shadow villain again.

There was another flash and they were gone.

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Gain: 3 xp &

Choose 1 Horaldric Spelltome

[x] Fireball Lv. 1
A potent attack spell, it explodes upon impact, dealing significant damage to enemies. Uraraka can cast it 1xIntelligence times before tiring. Adds +3 dice to an attack roll based on intelligence and technique, does splash damage, and turns the damage to Lethal.

[x] Telekinesis Lv. 1
A simple spell, telekinesis allows the caster to exert a certain amount of force on an object from a distance of about fifty feet. This would be enough to throw a switch, pull a trigger or grab a book, but not much more than that. Uraraka can use this spell 2xIntelligence times before tiring. A utility spell, telekinesis can be used to justify certain stunts.

[x] Healing Lv. 1
A spell of variable potency, healing allows the caster to heal themselves – but not others. Uraraka can use it a 3xIntelligence times before tiring. Heals 1-2 health levels per application.

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Pick a World:

[x] 'The Bestiary' (Pokemon) (META)
[x] 'The Marvel' (Marvel Avengers DISK Wars) (META)
[x] 'The Mirror' (Kamen Rider) (META)
[x] 'The Tarot' (Card Captor Sakura) (META)
[x] ~~'The Battlefield' (Tower of God)~~ (KNOWN) LOCKED. Requires: ???
[x] ~~'Home' (Boku No Hero Academia)~~ (KNOWN) LOCKED. Requires: ???

Note:
Worlds will be given tags. 'Known' words are worlds that Ochako has visited before. Meta worlds are worlds that she knows of as works of fiction. She thus has a certain degree of meta-knowledge regarding them and any discussion had about the worlds may reflect in the choices she makes during the update. While this will not always be true, it is true for this update.

For this first arc, Worlds are going to go by fast as Ochako experiments in how to choose worlds and ultimately get back home. You will be leaving within three updates, if not sooner, so keep that in mind.

And don't tell anyone, but I'm not actually all that familiar with jumpchains, so, uh, I'll be making up the Jumpchain rules as I go along. And if the mechanics start changing, well, this is the first time I'm trying to shoehorn actual mechanics into a quest that are more than just narrative window dressing, so yeah.

FixerUpper · May 10, 2017

Ochako Uraraka Character Page

Health: [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ]
Initiative: 6
Experience: 2xp

Attributes
Power oo
Speed o
Technique ooo
Intelligence ooo
Cooperation oooo

Equipment

Hero Costume: Ochako's Hero Costume was made for the sole purpose of helping minimize the negative effects of her Quirk. Adds three dice during resilience rolls to resist Zero Gravity.
E-Rank Pocket : A small black ball about the size of a child's bowling ball. Allows for the trait 'Universal Communicator.'
Sealing Staff: A staff that can seal 'outside context villains' - villains that have hopped universes - into 'villain cards'. Villains must first be defeated or immobilized. Strongly resembles the sealing staff of Cardcaptor Sakura. Maximum merits: 3.
- The Butcher (o): A villain from Diablo.
  - Merit (o): Butcher's Skin: Holders of the card gain 2 Armor at will. Skin takes on a reddish, pebbly hue when active.
  - Stats: Pwr 4 Spd 3 Tech 1 Int 1 Coop 1.
    - Weapon: +3 to Pwr rolls, -1 to Defense rolls
    - Overwhelming Attack Merit: +3 to attack rolls
    - Terrific Madness Special Ability: Mooks in groups of 3 or less will automatically flee. Mooks in larger groups must roll coop and intelligence and achieve 2 successes or more or flee in fear.
- The Warp (???): A villain from MHA.
- The Crimson Alchemist (ooo): A soldier retrieved off the streets of Ishval in the midst of war.
  - Merit (o): Good Memory. +1 xp to each jump.
Dog Talisman (Active): An incredibly powerful talisman, it confers upon the wearer immortality and eternal youth. The bearer can still feel pain though.

In game terms, Ochako now cannot be killed, but she can still be knocked out. Her Health Levels refill at a rate of 2 per round of combat, but if all her health levels are knocked out before that point, she is overwhelmed and KO'd and must wait for about a minute before reviving.
Horse Talisman (Inactive): An incredibly powerful talisman, it confers the wearer the power of regeneration. Up to 1HL of aggravated damage, 3HL of Lethal Damage and 6HL of bashing damage can be cleared per round of combat. Damage exceeding the holder's health track will still kill them, though, and the horse talisman cannot bring back the dead. With both the horse and dog talisman, the wearer becomes virtually invincible! However, without the tiger talisman to balance the two talismans, Ochako cannot simultaneously equip both talismans so she is limited to one active talisman at a time.
Flask of Silvery Metal
Mysterious Red Stone

Merits

Merits can be purchased as either a minor merit (3xp per die - max three dice) or a major merit (6xp per die - max 3 dice). Minor merits adds dice to a specific situation, whereas major merits will add dice to a broad series of actions. For example, the Butcher's Overwhelming Attack Merit applies to all melee attacks, and thus would cost 18 xp, whereas Ochako's Act First merit only applies to initiative rolls and thus would cost 6xp. Only one merit can apply at a time, so don't try to double up. That said, there are also 'legendary' merits. These merits can be stacked upon another merit, but cannot be purchased, only earned.

Act First (Minor): Adds two dice during initiative rolls.
Barf Bag (Minor): Adds two dice during resilience rolls to resist Zero Gravity.
Fab Friends (Minor): Adds two dice to cooperative attacks done with close friends.
Guts! (Legendary): Adds three dice to all actions against an opponent she acknowledges as superior to herself, but that she has to beat anyway. Cannot be used against an opponent she has no knowledge of.

Powers

Quirk: Zero Gravity (Lv. 1 (0/16xp))
Ochako's Quirk gives her the power to manipulate gravity, such as making objects weightless or making objects float upon touching them. With this Quirk, she is also able to fly, though this ability is limited. A drawback to this Quirk that if it is used too much (around three and a half tons) or if she makes herself float, she will suffer from nausea and possibly vomit as a result. Those affected by her quirk and not in possession of a 'Spacewalk' merit, or some means of flight, are instantly reduced to speed 0 and cannot move under their own power.

If she surpasses her limit, Ochako must make a resilience roll at (Power + Merit + Equipment) and overcome a difficulty roll of 1 during the first round, 2 in the second, 3 in the third and so on and so forth. Successfully surpassing her limit gives her quirk 1 xp.

As her quirk, Zero Gravity is Ochako's most potent ability. This is represented mechanically by it being a dice-adder. Once leveled, it adds dice equivalent to its level to any action that reasonably includes it (for instance, just because she decides to float while playing Mario Kart will not magically make her a better Mario Kart player, however, if she tries to impress a bunch of peasants from Westeros by floating down towards them or dropped an I-beam on a villain's head, she could apply this bonus).

Magical Powers

Telekinesis Lv. 2 (0/8xp) (HORADRIC)
A simple spell, telekinesis allows the caster to exert a certain amount of force on an object from a distance of about sixty feet. This would be enough to throw a ball, trip a person, or grab a few books, but not much more than that. Uraraka can use this spell 3xIntelligence times before tiring. A utility spell, telekinesis can be used to justify certain stunts.

Allomancy Powers

Lerasium Soothing Lv. 1 (0/9xp)
In Allomancy, brass gives the ability to soothe the emotions of others.When burning brass, an Allomancer can target either a single person or a group of people. Additionally, the Allomancer can target specific emotions to dampen. As this allomancy was gifted from Lerasium as opposed to genetically inherited, it is very powerful. At level 1 its range is four city blocks in radius, and allows the allomancer to add or subtract 1 dice from any number of enemies in that range as an instant action, or 3 dice as part of a specific mental attack using Power + Soothing Level. Those without appropriate mental merits or powers to resist such powers triple the dice penalty. Must consume brass beforehand.

Special Attacks

Special attacks are the essence of flashy superheroics. They are also extremely potent. A special attack allows you to add a lot of dice to an attack, but are restricted in some way. Either they consume a lot of stamina (making it a one-off attack), can only be performed under certain circumstances (Ochako Uraraka's Home Run Comet can only be used in an urban environment with intense structural damage in cooperation with another hero), or carry important consequences (Midoriya using One For All at 100% severely injures him, Iida overclocking his engines for an extreme speed boost disables his quirk during a cooldown period, etc.).

Special attacks cannot be purchased normally. Instead, they must be first developed as a stunt and then purchased for 15xp per stat that is doubled, and 30 xp per stat that is tripled.

Home Run Comet
After applying her Quirk's power of making objects weightless to some rubble and a pillar, Ochaco then uses the pillar to hit the rubble at her enemy. This particular special attack can only be used cooperatively in an urban environment. Triples Ochako's Power for a single attack.

FixerUpper · May 10, 2017

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THE CHAIN OF WORLDS

'The List'

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1. World 1: My Hero Academia ('Home')
2. World 2: Tower of God ('The Battlefield')
3. World 3: Diablo I ('The Nightmare')
4. World 4: Cardcaptor Sakura ('The Tarot')
5. World 5: Jackie Chan Adventures ('The Talisman')
6. World 6: Mistborn Series ('The Ruin')
7. World 7: Fullmetal Alchemist ('The Sacrifice')

FixerUpper · May 11, 2017

[x] Telekinesis Lv. 1
[x] 'The Tarot' (Card Captor Sakura) (META)

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World 3: Card Captor Sakura (Tokyo)

'The Tarot'

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The world changed.

Fresh air. A high place. The sound of a city at night. And there, standing tall and proud in the moonlight, Tokyo Tower.

The sight of it hit Ochako like a slap across the face, sweeter than water, and sweeter than wine. She felt something on her cheek, and lifted a hand to her face, blinking. Tears.

She laughed, a little shakily. And then she let herself sit down, rump hitting the roof of the building. Back. She was back.

She took in deep, grateful lungfuls of air that an uncharitable person might have mistaken for sobs, and a charitable one laughter. The noise of traffic humming beneath her feet was so damn familiar, and so damn soothing.

Around her, the world continued to spin. Peacefully. Without war. Without meaningless death.

Something about it was off, but she couldn't think about that right now.

The book she'd been holding, fell onto the ground, pages spilling open.

She looked down. Spidery script filled the ancient tome, so dense that the pages seemed more ink than blank space. The symbols seemed almost alive, in a way. Silly, of course. She shook her head, sniffed, then wiped away her tears. She reached down to pick the book back up and -

Got a glimpse of infinity.

Ochako's eyes disappeared up into her head and she collapsed.

A faint white light began to burn from within the book, starting with a single word, then spreading throughout the book, like ink dropped in water. It grew, feeding upon itself until it blazed, too bright to look at directly.

When the light faded, the book was gone, replaced by a small mound of ash. A mark shone briefly on Ochako's brow, a stylized eight, its base missing.

On a different world, a world of extremes, it was a mark of the an ancient order, a mark of the Wise.

And through it, on this one, something reached forth.

-----

Ochako dreamt and knew she was dreaming.

Massive clockwork gears surrounded her. It reminded her of an old cartoon, one of the early Disney ones, before the company had been more than a hundred years old. The climax of the movie had been in a giant clocktower from before the famous Chessman Incident, with gears much like this one, big enough to stand on, teeth as big and thick as her arm.

She looked around.

A short figure, stood on a higher gear, watching her.

The robes were so ornate that they trailed across the ground, spreading in six different directions like jellyfish feet. Ochako didn't have to see them to know it, just as she didn't have to see the starburst marking on the long earflaps of her hood. It was the sort of costume only someone with the slightest idea of what a superhero was would design.

But the one that lay before her was not a superhero.

She was, in fact, completely fictional.

Ochako frowned.

"Wait, aren't you -"

The figure lifted a long, voluminous sleeve to its 'lips'. Then it blew lightly. A shining star, trailing silvery dust, flew forward, landing in Ochako's palm. It was a small charm, like the kind you'd put on a keychain, only there was a tiny key on the end. The star and two wings design made it absolutely undeniable.

Her dreams was cosplaying as-

-----

"-Card Captor Sakura?"

It took her a moment to realize she was awake, and another to realize she had spoken out loud. Below her, the roar of late-traffic was a murmur. She raised her right hand, almost in awe: it was, after all, holding Kinomoto Sakura's sealing staff from the Clear Card Arc. Or, as it had been known, for some reason, lost to the mists of history, as the Kingdom Hearts Arc.

In her other hand she held a card. It was large, rectangular and mostly transparent, except for the art and text box. The art was of a shadow, the text the word Warp.

"Wait, what?"

She looked back down at the two objects.

"Seriously, wait, what?"

-----

Gains
Uraraka Ochako's Sealing Staff: Looks suspiciously like Sakura's sealing staff. Abilities are currently unknown, but presumably include sealing rogue magical cards.
The Warp Card: A card that looks suspiciously like it represents a certain villain. Abilities are currently unknown, but presumably include making warps.

-----

Voting Options
[x] Attempt to use the Warp Card.
[x] Attempt to use the Sealing Staff.
[x] Go confirm that this is actually CCS.
-[x] optional write-in: what do you think you should do if it's indeed CCS?
[x] Ignore this nonsense, go find UA and sleep for like a week.

FixerUpper · May 15, 2017

[x] Attempt to use the Sealing Staff.

-----

World 3: Card Captor Sakura (Tokyo)

'The Tarot'

-----

-----

Ochako closed her hazel eyes, and took a deep breath. When she cracked one open again, both of the impossible objects were still there. Neither of them were as pink as she remembered, but it didn't take much to be less pink than her glue-and-glitter childhood memories.

Below, the gentle flow of nighttime traffic was interrupted as someone began irritably honking on their horn.

Ochako, entranced, didn't hear it. Dim light, extending from the streetlights below, gently wreathed her as she turned the staff over in her hand. It might not have been as pink as she remembered, but it was still like looking at a pickax made of the distilled spirit of the little princess aisle in toy store. There was, for starters, the cherry-pink haft, about as long as her arm, topped with a goldish knob. Two white wings extended backwards from the gold, screwed in by a polished pink sphere, while a chunk of carmine crystal, about as round and dangerous looking as a doctor's rubber hammer, extended forwards. Taken altogether, the effect was rather like the head of a bird. In her mind's eye, she could see a small girl doing cheerleading tricks with it, spinning it around like a baton.

Between, yanno, using it to seal away dangerous magical cards and use magic.

The insistent honking of multiple cars brought her out of her contemplative reverie and she hastily lowered the staff. Down below, it sounded like there was a bit of a traffic jam going on. Odd, considering the late hour. Good timing though: if she had had a mirror Ochako had the sneaking suspicion that if she looked into it, she'd resemble Deku at his most starry-eyed and adorable. TV might have raised some of her classmates, but when her parents were busy she had to make do with the free, time-worn comic books inside the library, which, incidentally, had also come with the advantage of free air conditioning.

Calm down, she told herself sternly. You're only holding the most badass magical girl's weapon in the history of mahou shoujo, no big deal, right? Right. She took another deep breath. It helped more than she thought it would, but less than she needed it to. It'd probably be easier, of course, if she could get her hands to stop shaking. And sweating. And generally acting like a bunch of little girls about to ask their crushes out on a d-d-date.

Breathe. In and out. In and out.

Phew.

Ochako Uraraka did not have the advantage of knowing about the obscure, short-lived twenty-first century light novel genres known as tensai and isekai, let alone the far more obscure internet storytelling conceits that had been in vogue among certain pits of depravity in the English-speaking world, but she did have the advantage of being sensibly optimistic.

Being sensible, her first thought was not 'this can't be happening!' but rather, a far humbler 'Huh' that acknowledged she might not be in possession of all the facts and was going to wait for them before making up her mind. Being optimistic, she assumed that all of this was, at worst, a particularly vivid dream, and not a product of her fevered imagination or a sign of incipient psychological issues.

You could get a lot done with sensible optimism. Get into the top heroing school in Japan for starters.

So, until reality proved otherwise, she was going to act like this was all really happening. She, Uraraka Ochako, had stumbled into the Cardcaptor universe, and by extension, the CLAMPverse.

And she was holding Kinomoto Sakura's sealing staff. And a mystery card.

She put the mystery card away in the handy-dandy storage unit around her hips: it could keep until later.

The sealing staff on the other hand...

In the original series, Sakura had used it to seal away the nineteen escaped Clow Cards and prove herself the successor of a famous magician. As was the usual for these sorts of stories, Sakura'd stumbled across her magical heritage in her basement and, after an amusing series of accidents, immediately set the more mobile bits of it free to roam around Tokyo causing mostly minor inconveniences like rampaging lightning beasts, homicidal weapons that could wield people like puppets, and tests of courage that erased small, inconvenient children from existence.

Ochako frowned.

Given all that, the first thing she needed to do was find out if this were the real sealing staff, and the second thing she needed to do was give it back to a certain middle schooler who probably needed it more than she did. If, of course, Sakura was in middle school: given all the facts, the timeline was a little wonky. The cloaked figure she'd seen earlier - and darn if she couldn't remember who it was under there - was from a much later arc, far past the original series, when the sealing staff (spoilers!) had already become Sakura's Star Staff and she'd been confirmed as Clow Reed's successor.

The stick in front of her, however, was clearly the original sealing staff, back from the original series and when the protagonist had been in fourth grade.

Hrm.

Well, no time like the present to try and-

The wail of police sirens made her shelve those ideas. What she had earlier taken for a traffic jam was beginning to take on less pleasant connotations. A series of gunshots, firecracker loud, even here, made her run to the edge to the edge of the roof. She looked down, scanning for any obvious signs and immediately spotted one: a bunch of cars, all piled up in one area including a police cruiser. Stepping off the roof, she touched her face with all five fingers and floated gently downwards, hoping this wasn't a Cardcaptor thing.

As she got closer, somehow able to ride the breeze so she could get where she wanted to go, she realized it wasn't.

It was worse.

It was a her thing.

----

Igarashi cowered behind his police cruiser.

Being a beat cop in Tokyo you saw a lot of weird shit. It was part of the job description. Protect, Serve and Occasionally Piss Yourself while running from Horrible Things From the Great Beyond. Back in the good ol' days apparently the weirdest things that happened involved people. Monstrous people, to be sure, but people nonetheless. You knew where you stood with people. You knew, specifically, that if you shot them in the head with a service pistol, they wouldn't chuckle in a voice that sounded like it was gargling rocks, pick up a weapon heavier than you were, and proceed to beat your partner to death in front of you.

Because, and here was the important part, they were human.

The guy in front of him, approaching with slow, ponderous footsteps... well, let's just say Igarashi had his doubts. He had horns. He had pebbled skin. He had rings embedded in his flesh. He had a cleaver the size of a small child. He had, and this was the the part that would make his supervising officer think he was on something when he wrote up his report, a series of bullets lodged in his head and across his chest that hadn't managed to penetrate much farther than skin deep.

Igarashi wanted to run. His entire body was a tensed spring, ready to uncoil and take up the flight half of fight or flight. Parts of him were, in fact, already well on their way: his boots were wet. As were his trousers.

Igarashi would be the first to admit he wasn't a particularly good cop. He wasn't even a particularly good person. To him, being a copper was all about having a job that paid better than that of a dead end convenience store clerk, let him carry around a gun, and got him free food and coffee from suddenly respectful shopowners.

But he'd seen his partner reduced to mince. That wasn't something he could just let go.

He peeked around the corner of the car, gun out, ready to fire - and nearly pissed himself again as a girl plummeted from the sky, landing right next to him, boots making a funny little sound. She was a high schooler, if he was any judge, wearing a costume with some sort of spacesuit motif. Appropriate.

"Sorry, I need to borrow this," she told him, sounding slightly out of breath. She was clutching, for some reason, a bright pink wand.

Igarashi blinked, feeling slow.

"Borrow wh-"

She picked up the entire police cruiser with one hand. Just grabbed it and lifted it up. He gaped at her.

Then she threw it at the monster.

Auto-success initiative: The Butcher is suffering from confusion brought upon by target saturation.

Uraraka Attack: Technique (3) + Power (2) + Telekinesis Stunt (2) + Unwieldy Weapon Penalty (-2). 5 Dice. 4, 1, 1, 10, 5 (1 success) DV8.
Butcher Defense: Technique (1) + Speed (3) + Weapon (-1) = 3 dice (6, 2, 4) (0 success)
SUCCESS

It hit the monster like a truck, metal bending, accordion-like, glass shattering, and a god-awful squeal of colliding metal and meat as the two tumbled and rolled across the street. When the mess came to a stop, the Butcher was clearly bloodied, but incredibly, unbroken. The hood of the police cruiser popped open, steam billowing outwards. A massive, bloody hand, attached to an equally massive body, twitched feebly, pinned beneath one of the wheels. Then, apparently gathering strength, it began to push.

Behind him, he could hear the sirens: backup was arriving.

Igarashi snarled. Gun in hand he approached the monster.

And then the girl said...

----

[x] "Wait." Try to Seal the Butcher Using the Sealing Staff
[x] "Be careful." Let the Butcher be taken into custody

----

No matter what your choice is, you'll be heading to a world soon after. You can propose pretty much any one you like, up to and including quests on this very forum, though please be aware if it's a setting I have no knowledge of, I'll most likely butcher it. I hope you found my cursory depiction of CCS adequate even if it got invaded by Diablo near the end there.

[x] write-in world

(You can add details, for example, a legitimate vote could be:

[ ] Discworld during the events of Night Watch or
[ ] Quest X during Update Y)

FixerUpper · May 16, 2017

[X] "Wait." Try to Seal the Butcher Using the Sealing Staff
[X] Jackie Chan Adventures

-----

World 3: Card Captor Sakura (Tokyo)

'The Tarot'

-----

The car flew, weightless through the air.

Ochako canceled her quirk.

The crunch of metal against flesh may have sounded awful, but Ochako knew, instinctively, that the monster was less crushed than inconvenienced. Its bloody digits, resembling burnt, claw-tipped sausages, twitched. Then it began to push, vein on its arm standing out like corded pianowire wrapped around boulders. The police cruiser groaned and began to rise.

Dangit.

The ball from the golden grasslands whirling about her head was making her slightly dizzy. At some point she was going to have to make it stop doing that.

The policeman moved forward.

"Wait," Ochako said. The staff was warm in her hand, and, she felt, instinctively, trying to tell her something.

The policeman stopped and waited, but not quietly. Behind him, the sound of sirens was growing louder.

"Kid, I don't know who the hell you are, that thing needs to be put down." Ochako noted, out of the corner of her eye, that he hadn't taken his finger off the trigger, even if he was aiming at the ground.

"I know," she replied grimly. "He's a villain. But I think I can... help."

She approached the Butcher. A squawk of involuntary protest emerged from the policeman's throat.

The Butcher stared calmly at her from beneath the wreck with its one visible yellow eye. Ochako breathes in and raised both hands. The sealing staff solidly thwacked down upon his head. Silvery light appeared around him, trapping him in rotating rings of magical-looking characters.

The words came to her.

"Villain of Another World,
I, Holder of the Contract, Bind Thee!
SEAL!"

There was a 'pop' and the police car crashed down, suddenly cut from its support. A card, clear as glass spun in the air, trailing sparks. A brutish, tusked face glared at her from within, the words 'The Butcher' stencilled to the bottom.

As soon as Ochako touched it, she felt a surge of energy flow into her.

Gained: One-Dot Villain Card 'The Butcher.'

Choose 1 Card Merit:

[x] Terrific Madness: Holders of this card can emit, at will, a subtle but insidious aura of fear. Mooks in groups of 3 or less will automatically flee. Mooks in larger groups must roll COOPERATION and INTELLIGENCE and achieve 2 successes or more or flee in fear. Cannot be used against boss characters. Cannot be used against mindless mooks. Smell like blood when active.

[x] Butcher's Strength: Holders of the Card gain +2 Power at will. Muscles bulge and small horns grow out of head when active.

[x] Butcher's Skin: Holders of the card gain 2 Armor at will. Skin takes on a reddish, pebbly hue when active.

Ochako has received a Villain Card!

Villains sealed by the sealing staff can be unsealed and commanded to fight for her. At the moment though, her magical power is extremely limited so she can't voluntarily unseal the card. Instead she gains a 'card merit' that can serve as a bit of a power boost during a fight. Ochako can use, at most, as many card merits as she has levels of her quirk AND levels of magical techniques. (atm 0+ 1) Once she can use 3 card merits, she can, instead, unseal a 1 dot card like The Butcher's and have him fight by her side. Each dot doubles the previous dot's requirements (so a 2 dot card requires 6 merits, a 3 dot card 12 merits, etc.). Ochako can only seal villains that are in the wrong world (villains who can travel between different universes are, by definition, always in the wrong world, even if they are in their home setting).

Ochako can purchase minor merits to bring the cost of unsealing a specific card down, but cannot purchase a major merit to bring down all their costs.

But she felt, as well, a surge of power - and then darkness, tinged purple, began to creep up around her.

"Sorry," she called to the police officer as cars began to skid to a stop behind them, having finally arrived, adding their red and blue lights to the mix. "I-"

The world vanished.

-----

World 4： Jackie Chan Adventures (Bavaria)

'The Talisman'

-----

-----

The steady rumble of a massive gears replaced the sound of sirens. The sound was so loud and low it made her teeth ache to hear it. She squinted: through the clear face of an enormous, inverted clock, she could see the setting sun, painting the sky in a gradient of pink to purple.

This magical clocktower thing was starting to become a theme, she felt. The pig holding the cymbals near the rafters was an odd touch, admittedly.

Then the doors behind her burst open.

She turned around, immediately on guard... but then relaxed: it was clearly a normal family of three generations, grandpa, son, and granddaughter. Grandpa wore an old vest with too many pockets, his son was a well-built man in a blue shirt staring at her in undisguised surprise, while the daughter was ten or so and clearly had 'tude.

"Hey! Where did you come from?" the girl exclaimed, pointing an accusing finger. Then her eyes sparkled as she took in her appearance. "Hey, hey, Uncle, is she magic? Do you think she's the Pig Talisman, but brought to life?"

Ochako was affronted. A pig?!

"No. She is something very different," Grandpa said slowly.

"I know! She looks just like a magic girl!"

Ochako guiltily hid the card and staff behind her back.

"Umm," she began, wondering how to explain all this, but then, behind them the largest person she'd ever seen (and wow, hadn't she just said that about the Butcher?) accompanied by a red haired man entered the room behind them.

Things went a little crazy after that.

Ochako had known some heroes were skilled at martial arts, but the guys in front of her blew her away. They moved so quick she was sure they had to have a speed quirk of some sort.

She still didn't understand what the heck was going on though. The girl had begun climbing upwards, treating the gears as some sort of playground while the big guy chased her and the red haired guy fought with the blue shirted one. The old man, meanwhile, had walked towards her and taken up a quiet stance, arms at his side like he was guarding against her without actually looking like he was guarding against her.

Ochako knew where her sympathies lay, but, she still wasn't sure what was going on: it'd all happened too quickly.

"Ummm, it'd be really helpful if I knew who the good guys were!"

"We're the good guys! We're the good guys!" The blue-shirted man - Jackie, she was sure someone had named him - called desperately, as the red haired man chased him, screaming gibberish.

"ScreamingEagleClaws! LeapingElephantPunch! RumblingRhinocerosStomach!"

"RumblingRhinoceros wh -" Jackie started, clearly confused, before getting bodyslammed. "Oof!"

He rolled and flipped up to his feet a second later, dodging more high speed attacks shouted at equally high speed.

Dang!

She tore her eyes away from the spectacle as Uncle spoke.

"The question is," Uncle said, peering at her suspiciously, "are you a 'good guy'?"

Ochako nodded vigorously. "Of course! Can I go help them?"

"...yes."

She smiled and rushed forward, only for a hand that felt like it was made out of teak clasp around her shoulder before she could get past. "One more thing... why do you stink of demons, girl?" His cane thundered down. "Answer me!"

-----

World Gains: Sealing Staff, Warp Card, The Butcher Card, 3xp

How do you answer Uncle's Question?
[x] Don't bother: there's an adult man chasing a little girl, you need to help save her
[x] Don't bother: blue-shirted guy is getting his butt whooped, you need to rescue him first!
[x] Tell the truth: You're pretty sure you are a magical girl and also a 'slider' someone who jumps between worlds.
[x] write-in?

FixerUpper · May 18, 2017

[x] Butcher's Skin: Holders of the card gain 2 Armor at will. Skin takes on a reddish, pebbly hue when active.
[x] Tell the truth: You're pretty sure you are a magical girl and also a 'slider' someone who jumps between worlds.

-----

World 4: Jackie Chan Adventures (Bavaria)

'The Talisman'

-----

Different world, Ochako reminded herself quietly. Different world, different world, different world.

However, unbeknownst to her, in response to the hand gripping her shoulder, Ochako's skin had begun to take on a strange, pebbled texture, like there were tiny, river-worn stones crawling up out of her skin, making it flush in turns red and orange. Uncle, holder of the Dog Talisman, and, right now, arguably one of the greatest martial artists alive, nearly knocked her head off. But even Uncle, who was quick with a backhand, didn't go around hitting people that hadn't yet actually answered his question, even if they were demons.

Well, maybe if they were really bad demons, sorceror demons, for instance, but he doubted this one was.

2 successes needed

Cooperation 4 + Stunt (Embarrassing Explanation) 1: 5 dice = 4, 3, 8, 7, 1 (2 successes)

2 Successes

Ochako, unaware of her alarming appearance, glanced around herself, trying desperately to think of an explanation for what was to her, nothing more than superstition. 'Demons' weren't something you tried to think other people as, not if you knew anything about historical quirk discrimination. Had she been Deku, she'd have likely apologized and tried to get to the helping, prioritizing the safety of the little girl above the kooky old man's peace of mind.

But she was not Deku. She could spare fifteen seconds to prevent a snowballing series of amusing, yet potentially and exasperatingly fatal misunderstandings.

But what could she say...

Hrm.

Like a bolt out of the blue, inspiration struck. It was so simple! All she needed to say was the truth! But, y'know, a bit bombastically. Something like: 'Earlier I... fled across time and space and encountered a Villain. We faced each other in heart-pounding combat, to the terror of civilians before I finally sealed him away using my magical staff. I'm Ochako, hero-in-training!'

It was a speech she could imagine a magical girl - well, maybe not Sakura, maybe Sailor Venus - making.

She did her best, but the words got all tripped up in her throat and she ended up only managing the: "I fled through time and space and..." before Uncle was treated to the sight of seeing a demon go even redder before her skin went back to a normal color.

Ochako gave up on the speech. It sounded better in her head.

"I," she said, hands moving from where she'd them behind her back to her front, showing him her card and sealing staff. "I think it might have something to do with this."

The Butcher glared malevolently at them both.

Uncle snatched the card from her, examining it critically. Somewhere in the background, Jackie yelped as red-haired man tried poking out his grapes, or something along those lines.

"You keep a demon as a pet?!" Uncle demanded.

Ochako vigorously shook her head. "I sealed him away, using, er, magic. I think... I think he's not from this Earth. I think I'm not from this Earth. He's, well, I don't know if he's a demon, but he's a bad person."

Uncle stared her in the eye for a moment before grudgingly giving her the card back.

"I should not trust such a loony story, but like my nephew keeps reminding me, everything I say sounds made up. And you do not look like a liar." He shook a finger at her. "I should still smack you one, messing with the space-time continuum like that. Who knows what consequences that may have!"

He turned his back on her before she could answer, still muttering to himself. Then he looked up, as if realizing the dire straits his family was in for the first time.

"Jackie! How is that redheaded motormouth beating you?"

Jackie avoided a rapidfire finger, sidling away clumsily, arms pinwheeling before he got his balance back. "Uncle, he's really strong!"

"Nonsense, Jackie! He announces all his attacks ahead of time!"

"AngryLionSwipe!"

Jackie blocked the attack with a mop he'd found somewhere. It broke in two. He twirled the two halves like an expert, fending off SnortingZebraCharge and ThickBaboonBomb.

"Oh, yes, because my English that good!"

"I thought you were a professor!" Uncle cried before surprise attacking the redheaded antagonist with a solid kick that sent him sprawling to the ground.

"Amateur archaeologist means amateur professor! And amateur linguist!"

If they could banter like that, they'd probably got the situation under control. Ochako looked up to the rafters: girl was still climbing and the big guy was still following. Ochako touched her face and floated upwards. Somehow, she had greater control over her quirk than ever, and managed to land in front of the girl.

"Magical girl!" the girl squealed. There were stars in her eyes. "I'm Jade, nice to meetcha! Please, please, pleeeease tell me that you're from an ancient kingdom that have fought the Shadowkahn since the dawn of time and secretly protect the world from devastation."

Ochako guessed that her earlier attempted speech would have gone down really well with this one.

"Errr, no. But I am a superhero. In training."

Jade considered this. Looked disappointed. "Eh, I guess that's nearly as cool."

The beam of wood beneath their feet trembled, reminding Ochako why she was up here in the first place. "Graaaah!" said the big guy, arms outstretched, reaching for them both with hands that probably could have encircled their waists.

"Tohru!" Jade grumbled, before Ochako garbbed her by the shoulders and leapt straight upwards.

They bumped against the ceiling. Ochako got her feet beneath her and kicked off, angling back towards the beam. The big guy, surprisingly, apparently wasn't after the girl and had continued running. He was now almost at the platform where a painted, cheerful wooden pig holding two cymbals lay.

"Okay, this is super sweet, but you just let Tohru get a free shot at the pig talisman," Jade pointed out.

"What's a pig-"

"That pig talisman. The one on the pig. Over there. On the hat. See it?"

Oh. Oh yeah.

"Bad news if he gets it?"

"Got it in one."

"Okay, hold on."

Ochako Attack
Speed 1 + Technique 3 + Telekinesis Stunt 1: 5 dice = 2, 5, 5, 7, 9 = 2 successes
Speed + Technique + Lumbering Giant Merit - Surprise: 4 dice = 9, 10 , 1 ,5 = 2 successes

Tohru gets a conditional win

She set her feet against the ceiling and then pushed off. There was something a little extra in how she zoomed forward, hand outstretched: if she could but get a single touch on him, she'd have won...

Her hand settled on his massive shoulder, like a plane descending upon a cloud. He began to float.

"Oh no," Jade said.

Ochako didn't know why until Tohru turned around: in his hands were clutched a green cap. His eyes blazed with fire. Despite all the usual associations, he looked more surprised than angry.

"Oh no," he whispered.

Time slowed.

Ochako grabbed Jade and spun her around, covering the little girl her with her body. Her skin turned red.

It helped a bit.

But the fire still burned her.

-----

When she woke up, she was in the dark and her back felt like one hideous bruise. She reached back, gingerly and then with confused horror as her fingers brushed against blood and exposed bone and then a... her mind blanked out. When it came back, the impossible thing was still there. There was a hole in her back. There was an actual hole in her back.

Around her neck, two unfamiliar items jostled against each other.

She touched them, glad to focus on something else. One was her sealing staff, reduced to key form. The other...

The other was a dog talisman.

----

QM Note:
Errr, okay. This was always going to be an either-or sort of situation where victory meant you picked up the pig talisman, and defeat meant you picked up the dog talisman as certain good samaritans tried to save your life. I honestly didn't think Tohru would be the one to do it though, that kind of cut the scene short and probably traumatized the poor guy.

World Gains: 3xp, Dog Talisman

Dog Talisman: An incredibly powerful talisman, it confers the wearer immortality and eternal youth. The bearer can still feel pain though. In game terms, Ochako now cannot be killed, but she can still be knocked out. Her Health Levels refill at a rate of 2 per round of combat, but if all her health levels are knocked out before that point, she is overwhelmed and KO'd and must wait for about a minute before reviving. Due to the incredible damage done by the pig talisman, she has lost three health levels that cannot be restored save through magical/sufficiently advanced technology healing and suffers a -1 penalty to all actions while her wounds remain unhealed.

The dog talisman is not particularly sturdy, so even if Ochako is now immortal, the dog talisman can still be damaged.

----

Choose another world.

The theme of your choice must correspond to a strong feeling of 'Protectiveness.' For example, Lily Potter defending an infant Harry Potter from Voldermort would qualify, as would Sturm Brightblade's attempt to duel a dragon in the second Dragonlance book and just about anything on the Heroic Sacrifice page in TvTropes.

I'm offering a few possibilities, but it's more to give you an idea of the breadth of what I'll accept than asking you to pick them:

[x] Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen shouting "I volunteer!"
[x] Asura during... err, basically all of the events of Asura's Wrath
[x] Generic mother character protecting her children in any tabletop/rpg setting
[x] The Stormlight Archive, Kaladin vowing: "I shall protect those who cannot protect themselves."
[x] Tadashi, running into a burning building during the events of Big Hero 6
[x] Jackie Chan Adventures: Good Jackie convinced to fight evil Jackie to protect Jade

FixerUpper · May 22, 2017

[X] Jackie Chan Adventures; Uncle towards us.

-----

World 4.5: Jackie Chan Adventures (Bavaria)

'The Talisman'

-----

Something creaked behind her, the noise startlingly soft, like the rasp of a knife in the dark, and Ochako went through a full body flinch that sent twinges of agony shooting through her back, so sharp and sudden that, for a moment, even taking a breath was beyond her. Around her head, a faint ball of darkness wobbled slightly en route around her head.

Then the lights turned on and the black sphere snapped into smooth, high-definition detail as it passed by her eyes towards the back of her head.

Ochako sucked in a grateful breath as the pain went away. She was in a fairly standard, if somewhat primitive hotel room. There was a flatscreen TV, and a bulky diskette player so thick that she suspected it still played tapes. Beds were timeless, however, and hers looked comfy enough with their herringbone-patterned red and beige. She turned her head, then let out a little mewl of pain before she could complete the motion to see who was by the door. Dang, but this wound was inconveniently excruciating.

"Do not take that off," a weathered, voice snapped authoritatively.

Ochako raised both hands, letting the impromptu necklace clatter back against her chest.

"Um, what?"

"The dog talisman. Do not take it off." She could hear footsteps approaching, and then a blue mug of something clear and steaming was thrust in her hands. It was clearly medicinal: her eyes watered to see it, and her nose immediately started blocking itself up out of sheer self-defense. All she caught was a whiff like a Chinese herb store run through a strainer and then joined to drain cleaner. "Here drink this. Good for you."

"...thank you?" Ochako said, accepting the mug. She looked up to see Jackie's uncle - looking tired and more careworn than she remembered. She tried a cautious sip and nearly spat all over him. She wouldn't have thought it possible but it tasted worse than it smelled. If medicinal teas were judged by how awful they were to the palate, this one would have her running marathons by the time it took to finish.

Uncle did not notice her distress and took a lecturing position in front of her, finger thrust towards her chest.

"That is the dog talisman, made from very powerful magic. It can give the bearer eternal youth and eternal life. It is what is keeping you alive. Do. Not. Take. It. Off."

Ochako nodded, eyes wide.

Speech finished, he seemed to grow smaller, somehow, and leaned heavily on his cane as he sat down on the bed opposite hers. There was a slight up and down motion as the mattress settled. "So, 'magical girl'. Please, tell me your name. I must thank you for saving my niece."

"Uraraka Ochako, sir."

He bowed his head gravely. "Thank you, Uraraka Ochako. You have given this old man-"

Finally her brain caught up with his words and she did spit her tea, fortunately missing him. "Wait, what?! Eternal youth and eternal life?!"

He smoothly finished, despite her interruption. "-a priceless gift." He raised his head and grinned, though the smile was faint. "But yes, amazing, no?"

"I'm not taking it off," Ochako said fervently.

He rolled his eyes, but they still twinkled a bit. "Well, do not get too used to it, once we have you healed, I am sure that Mr. Black will ask to keep it like all the others."

Ochako felt a pang of disappointment, despite the fact that she knew she shouldn't have expected any less. It wasn't like people routinely just gave out things that granted immortality, even if she was in a different universe.

Uncle stroked his chin. "Unless... you said you are from a different world, correct?"

"Yes...?"

"Could you return there, with the dog talisman?"

Ochako's expression fell. "I'm... not sure. I can't control the jumps very well. When I woke up, honestly, I'd thought it had happened again, haha." She looked at him curiously. "Why?"

Uncle began to explain about the Dark Hand. Apparently it was a shadowy criminal organization with ties all around the world and it was collecting these twelve relics with magical powers for some nefarious purpose. It kind of sounded like the plot of Card Captor Sakura except less 'collect all the Clow Cards with magic' and more 'collect all the Talismans with martial arts.' And instead of 'claim them as your power' it was more 'lock them away in a vault forever.'

(Okay, so there weren't that many similarities beyond the 'collect em' all' bit, and if that were enough to declare two stories as being exactly the same, everything might as well be a variation on Pokemon.)

"So Jackie... err, Mr. Chan's an archaeologist?" Ochako asked dubiously. "Why is he...?"

"That's what I want to know," complained Uncle. "But no one believes in magic! So Jackie has to do all the work."

Ochako considered that. Then she looked down at the extremely magical talisman dangling from a loop around her neck. The obvious connection was made.

"Couldn't you show them...?"

"Well, yes, we could," Uncle said, sounding rather put out that Ochako had discovered this flaw to his argument, like a crotchety grandpa responding to a child pointing out that you could very well take your hearing aids out if the music bothered you so much, "but... it's probably best if we didn't. Only magic can be used to defeat magic, but really, magic shouldn't be used in the first place. There will be no end to it if we started using magic to fix everything."

"Really?"

"Really."

"Hmmmmm."

Ochako was about to ask another question when the door flew open and Jade practically bound inside. "Magical Girl! Oh my god, oh my god, ohmigod you're awake!" She looked so happy. And like a light being switched off, her entire expression shut off and huge tears started pooling in her eyes and just like that she started wailing and blubbering and collapsed into an embarrassingly soggy mess right there on the floor

When Jackie came in, he joined her, though this might have been due to the fact that Jade, embarrassed beyond all measure, had picked up one of the mugs of Uncle's herbal tea and tossed it right into his face.

-----

"So you're saying you're... magic."

Captain Black was not what Ochako was expecting. For starters, he wasn't actually, well, black.

Not that Ochako was racist, she just expected a certain conformity between name and appearance. Maybe it referred to his coat?

"No, I'm not," she said lightly.

"You touched something and it started floating," the man pointed out patiently, flicking one of the floating coins with a finger. It shot across the room, hit the wall and jarred to a halt. In a corner of her eye, Ochako saw a video camera pulsed redly. "Far as I'm concerned, that's magic."

Uncle had told her to try and keep the whole magic thing to a minimum, but it was apparently quite difficult for Jackie to justify sending a top secret plane to Bavaria so that it could extract her ID-less, passport-less butt to Los Angeles so it could be healed by a magical horse talisman. They needed to get the people in Section 13, in his words 'interested' and Ochako had volunteered her floaty ball for the cause. Then she had immediately un-volunteered it when it turned out it actually translated everything people told her and further experimentation revealed it could go invisible on command. The series of events that led to this discovery were both fortuitous and unlikely in the extreme and will be glossed over before we run out of room and the author just has to just plain admit he kept forgetting the TOG ball was there.

So, now was Plan 2: the quirkening.

Quirks weren't magic, but they weren't explainable either through what common sense said was possible in this universe. Section 13, it turned out, was very interested in it. Maybe too interested. As far as Ochako knew, Jackie had successfully retrieved the horse talisman, but she was still stuck down here with Captain Cueball. If they gave her a full-body search, she'd be in trouble: she wasn't sure how to explain the gaping hole in her side either.

"Where are you from, Ms. Uraraka?"

"Japan."

"That's funny. We looked: there's no record of your existence."

"Ummm..."

The door to the room opened. Captain Black snapped his head backwards: "I thought I said no inter- oh, it's you Jade."

His last few words were said with a peculiar flatness common to those who knew Jade and worked in Section 13. Ochako had seen it happen on more than one occasion. Usually their faces looked something like a wrinkly, frowning prune.

Jade Reaction Face:

Jade grinned at him. "Heya Captain Black. I'm here to pick up my sis."

"She's Japanese."

"My adopted sis, then."

"I think that until further notice-"

"Nope, not gonna fly, she needs to get home, growing girl and all that, byeeee!"

Before Ochako knew it, Jade had taken her by the wheelchair and wheeled her right out of the room.

-----

Later, horse talisman in her hand, vitality infusing her, Ochako realized with a blink of concern that her butt was vibrating. When the black mist spilled out around her, she went: "Oh, daar-"

-----

World Gains: 0xp, Horse Talisman

Horse Talisman: An incredibly powerful talisman, it confers the wearer the power of regeneration. Up to 1HL of aggravated damage, 3HL of Lethal Damage and 6HL of bashing damage can be cleared per round of combat. Damage exceeding the holder's health track will still kill them, though, and the horse talisman cannot bring back the dead. With both the horse and dog talisman, the wearer becomes virtually invincible! However, without the tiger talisman to balance the two talismans, Ochako cannot simultaneously equip both talismans so she is limited to one active talisman at a time.

[x] Activate Horse Talisman
[x] Keep Dog Talisman Activated

-----

[x] [world] write-in world

Cannot be any of the previously visited worlds.

-----

Also, you can, at any point, assign xp through a vote. For example:

[x] [xp] +9xp to Telekinesis

FixerUpper · May 23, 2017

[x] Keep Dog Talisman Activated
[X] [world] Mistborn

-----

World 5: Mistborn (Luthadel)

'The Ruin'

-----

-----

"-aaaaaarn," Ochako said.

But she was already elsewhere. Uncle, Jade, Jackie were gone. In their place, wind, sharp, stinging and thick buffeted her face. Almost immediately, she began to cough, eyes forced closed, beginning to puff. She put a hand around her mouth - began to float, oops - coughed hoarsely and canceled her quirk, dropping back down on a sloping, metallic surface. What on earth...?

Her eyes stung as she opened them.

Ash fell from a blackened sky, whipped around by the wind. A lurid, orange sun sank towards the horizon, piercing the gloom of the dark clouds above. She stood on a domed roof.

It was like looking at a dying world.

In front of her, a steel edifice, built like videogame's final boss' idea of a citadel, rose from the ground, towering, soaring, scary. Whatever its original color, it had been blackened by ash, and now, backlit by the sun, it glowed menacingly around the edges, like a weapon of molten iron just before it cooled. Spiky turrets and towers surrounded one large central building that seemed to be hewn of one simple, if incredibly large block of metal.

Just looking at it made Ochako feel a little numb inside.

She grasped the dog talisman, rubbing it between her fingers before clipping the horse next to it.

Environmental Penalty: The air of Scadrial is incredibly polluted due to the Ashmounts. Unmodified humans take 1 level Bashing Damage per minute spent here, up to a maximum of five, and 1 level per round of heavy physical exertion. After a week of exposure, normal humans lose a permanent HL, after all HLs are lost, the humans dies.

They didn't both work, not both at once, she'd known that instinctively, so she had to choose which one to leave 'on'. The horse might mitigate the effects of the ash, letting her breathe normally, but the dog conferred immortality, right? So the ash was just... an annoyance. Pain. This place seemed dangerous. She had to be prepared for the possibility that someone would try to hit her with a bazooka or dragon or something. This place had that kind of look to it.

"A new tactic, Ruin."

Ochako pivoted on one foot, suppressing a scream. How were people sneaking up on her all the time?

Behind her, a man stood on the top of a nearby turret, his gaze studiously elsewhere. Ochako's first impression of him was... tiredness. Incredible, overwhelming tiredness. He was broad of shoulder and long of limb and stood easily upon the comparatively small metal roof, balancing upon it negligently, but despite his appearance of vitality and strength, you could tell he wasn't doing well. His clothes were fresh, his face well-groomed, but his eyes were... like...

Well, sort of like Todoroki at his moodiest. Now that she thought about it, the parallel was striking. The two were even built along similar lines: dark, handsome, brooding.

"Are you okay, sir?" she asked quietly.

He looked up at her, and Ochako felt the stirring of alarm in her gut. Then, without warning, the weight of the world descended upon her, an anvil forged of pure apathy. Her knees buckled and she fell, staring down at the roof. Her thoughts were fog and mist and a blank, pitiless absence. She couldn't care, and then she realized she couldn't care that she couldn't care.

He didn't seem to notice.

"You ask me if I am okay. You ask me if I am okay. I am their god, and behold my might! Behold what wonders I have wrought! Behold, Ruin, what you have made me do. All of them still live because of my actions. And still they come, these wretched skaa, still they ask me to slaughter them by the hundreds, by the thousands. When will it all just end. When will they finally listen?"

The pressure let up.

Ochako gasped, crying, choking on ash, on her tears, on her suddenly restored emotions. It was the sweetest, most painful thing she could imagine.

"Begone," he said, without looking at her. "Begone, Ruin, with this mummer's farce, and leave me to my work. It is very nearly done. You... are very nearly done."

----

[x] Leave. Right now. This man is too dangerous.
[x] Stay. Convince him that you're not Ruin.
[x] Warp. Try to use Kurogiri's card and get as far as you can from here.
-[x] write-in at least three worlds. QM will collect the complete list, assign a number to each and roll to see which one you land in.

QM Note: Scadrial's a tough place! I'm making this slightly AU in that if you can become buddies with the Lord Ruler, he can reward you handsomely, whereas getting involved with the canon crew will involve different rewards.

FixerUpper · May 27, 2017

[x] Stay. Convince him that you're not Ruin.
-[X] "I'm not ruin. I don't ruin anything, or at least I've tried my hardest not to so far in my life and I don't plan to either. My name is Ochiko Uraraka and I'm a superhero in training. My job is to help people and, no offense sir but this world seems like it needs a lot of help. What happened here to make things so horrible?"

-----

World 5: Mistborn (Luthadel)

'The Ruin'

-----

Ochako wasn't sure where she found the strength. Maybe it was the dog talisman and its promise of invulnerability, maybe it was the 'demon' stuck in the card, or the fact she was probably a magic girl now, or just the past few hours, but Ochako didn't run from this obviously unhinged man with a mind-affecting quirk. No one had told her, but in the way that some heroes are born, not made, she knew she couldn't walk away.

Either he was insane and needed help, or he was insane and had killed thousands. Either way, she couldn't just run.

"I'm not ruin," she told him.

He turned, gazed at her flatly.

Then he gestured, it took a moment for Ochako to understand that he was pointing at her costume. "Plastics, Ruin? Unaltered human physiognomy? That low buzz, circling your head? I may not understand the how of it, but that does not mean I do not recognize it. What, will you tell me that the men in the South have already achieved flight and radio?" His lip curled. "Leave."

"I told you, I'm not Ruin." She started quietly walking towards him, balancing delicately on the slanted roof she found herself on. Just a touch and he'd be neutralized. She kept up a slow running murmur to deflect his attention. "I don't ruin anything, or at least I've tried my hardest not to so far in my life and I don't plan to either."

He scoffed, and she froze as the roof around her feet vibrated. Then a loose tile tore off with a metallic shriek, flashing away near her head: she yelped and ducked, but it missed her, ka-laaaaaanging against something else instead before ricocheting away.

"Hm."

Ochako raised her eyes to see him staring at fascination at his own hand. He raised it: it was like he was holding a... Ochako patted the air around her head desperately, but the communication ball she'd gotten from the golden grass battlefield wasn't there anymore. It was, she suspected, held, invisibly, in his grip.

She saw him raise his eyes to peer at her, and it was like he was seeing her for the first time. Years melted off of him and she could almost think of him as being human.

"What are you?" he whispered.

Well, at least the ball was still working. She coughed lightly into her fist.

"My name is Ochako Uraraka and I'm a superhero in training."

He blinked, nonplussed. "What is a 'soo pah hee ro?''"

Apparently the ball had limits when it came to communication: it couldn't actually translate alien concepts.

"Well, basically, my job is to help people and, no offense sir but this world seems like it needs a lot of help. What happened here to make things so horrible?"

3 successes needed (-2 difficulty, clearly not a Ruin-type self-introduction + ToG pocket) 1 success needed

Cooperation 4: 4 dice = 9,5,3,8 (2 successes)

PASSED

He smiled. It was awful.

"Me."

-----

"Stay by my side. Ruin is everywhere."

Since the man then launched himself off the tower he was standing on and towards the big, central, villainous looking spire in the distance like an impeccably stylish clown shot out of the mouth of a cannon - Ochako found this to be a little difficult. Still, with a little zero gravity and a running start she could all but fly.

"Who or what is Ruin?" she asked, after she had caught up. This had taken several minutes. She was pretty sure the man had backtracked to make sure she could keep up.

From above, without the sun in the distance making a mess of her vision, Ochako had noted how torches had burned clear lines from the city towards what she could only think of as the 'palace.' The clearly evil palace. Up close, the more distant lines resolved themselves into a multitude of spike-ridden towers. They came in all different shapes and sizes: some nothing more than finger-wide spars of jutting metal, wide enough to accommodate people.

"Everywhere," he replied cryptically.

Ochako, whose legs were much shorter than his, had to run to keep up with him. Her footsteps clanged roughly on cold stone, while her eyes couldn't quite make out fine details. That might explain why she nearly ran into a man before she noticed that his eyes had been replaced by bloody spikes.

"OHMIGOD," was her reaction.

"Master?" the thing said, presumably staring at Ochako. He turned his head to the man and yup the spikes went all the way through his head. Instant nightmare material, right there, all nice and ready to join up with landing in a warzone, seeing a villain cannibal butcher, seeing a skinless man get up, getting hit by a laser and meeting a man who claimed he'd killed thousands of people.

Oh, she was not looking forward to going to bed tonight. If sleep was even a thing she could indulge in anymore.

"Kars, this is a... Superhero. She is a guest, and not to be harmed. Have it be known."

The spike-headed man looked like he was about to refuse, but then he bowed his head. "As you wish, master."

"I do."

After the apparition had gone, and they had traveled some distance through cavernous corridors, the man spoke.

"I realize I have not introduced myself. I am the Lord Ruler. You may refer to me as Lord."

"Kind of you," Ochako replied, with instinctive sarcasm that she regretted the moment it had left her lips.

He ignored it.

"To be surprised by my Inquisitor... to not know who I am... to be frightened, but for the wrong reasons entirely, you lack fundamental knowledge of this world, I think. You are a traveler?"

She stared at him. How had he...?

"When I can be bothered, I am quite intelligent," he said dryly. "I have known for some time that there are other worlds. Travelers between them I have... suspected, never proven. An exasperating conundrum. Until you. How did you come here?"

The question was innocent, but she could grasp, instinctively, a hunger.

"An accident," Ochako replied apologetically. "This is my fifth world in as many hours."

"Ah? Unfortunate. If it were a known process I could... but nevermind. Another question: has anyone else managed to come with you?"

She thought of The Butcher card burning a hole in her pocket. "Yes. Once."

"Was there anything special about this person's circumstances?"

Ochako thought back. The taste of fear in her mouth, the way he'd tried to chop her in half. "I... we had fought. I'd managed to touch him and..."

Was it related to her quirk? Had activating her quirk and the portal at the same time sent whatever her quirk had activated alongside her?

"...I think I know how he followed me."

"Good. We are here."

They had made it to a wall. A blank wall. Well, not blank, it was made of piled up stones, but the point still stood. It was a dead end.

The Lord Ruler touched a few stones in exactly the right places and then twisted the air with his hand. The entire wall caved in like a giant, pebbly flower. Inside was a very ordinary looking room, if you thought of ordinary in terms of holes in the wall that contained little more than a storage closet worth of space, a small wooden desk and a small wooden chair were normal.

The Lord ruler opened the drawer of the desk. Inside were eight flasks of some pale, shimmery ball floating in water.

"I offer you two boons in exchange for two boons. First..." he gestured at the desk. "These are eight fragments of power alloyed to another. Slivers of divinity. Swallow one and it will give you a mastery over one aspect of allomancy. I will choose one for you, and then you may choose one for yourself."

"In exchange, however, I would like for you to take an... observer with you when you next travel between worlds, and return him when you are capable or ready. Can such a deal be struck between us?"

-----

[x] Refuse.
[x] Accept.
[x] write-in

-----

If you accept, choose one of the Eight.

[x] Steel (push)
[x] Iron (pull)
[x] Pewter (body)
[x] Tin (senses)
[x] Zinc (riots emotions)
[x] Brass (soothes emotions)
[x] Copper (hides allomantic pulses)
[x] Bronze (detects allomantic pulses)

-----

[x][world] write-in following world

Wait, All For Who?! (MHA Jumpchain Quest)

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