Rihaku
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Can we send the rift to a hour in the future, or does that also enter in the purview of time-travel?
The Inner Temple is the Dimensional Rift. That's why it's so much bigger on the inside!
Can we send the rift to a hour in the future, or does that also enter in the purview of time-travel?
Revolting.Grants a major effectiveness boost in physical or romantic duels (1v1 encounters) against beings with corporeal blood, and a minor bonus in physical and romantic conflicts of any kind against such beings.
Though she is not personally formidable, Larissa Alynne commands House forces numbering dozens of Marshals, as well as High Marshal Wyvernford and two additional Soul Evokers of equivalent power used to conduct off-the-books operations.
Combat Strength: High. High Marshal Wyvernford alongside the remainder of the Alynne forces might be a match for one to two Immortals on their own should they receive blood enhancement.
Combat Strength: Significant. Aristeia Fairbright is only moderately weaker than Hunger himself. Blood enhancements can augment her significantly. Her followers are useful for causing general pandemonium, though they are hesitant to employ violence against the innocent. One or two might be Marshal-level.
But while that covers the power front, there's no answer to the consequences of the theft of the Ring outside of "Hope for the best". Maybe we can gamble Fairbright was in on some stuff and had insider knowledge of some kind; but that isn't enough to cover us.
Fewer, more heretical minds have proposed a different question - what if the Forges were turned to the harvest of the moon itself? The Council, as befits its dignity, has not seen fit to answer so ludicrous a query. Star-stuff suffices to power all but the most esoteric applications of Inner Ring society, from power and lighting to the time-twisting Calendar Engine and even the carefully regimented Dimensional Vortex upon which the Inner Ring sits.
So three High Marshals and a few dozen Marshals are roughly equivalent of 1.5 Immortals, presumably depending on matchups. More importantly, if we use them to fight an Immortal, we probably can't use them to effectively evacuate the place due to casualties. At best, we can take the three High Marshal equivalents with us and hope they can keep up.
On the other hand, Fairbright herself is roughly High Marshal level and is significantly empowered by our buffs due to the metaphysical potency of our bloodline. More importantly, she can also buff us. Combined that with the +++++Might, +++++++++Agility and ++ Wits of Fierce Quickening and Weapon Defeating Stance and I'd say we're more than capable of taking on an Immortal. We don't even have to fear bad match ups because we can resist bullshit teleport ambushes through Guile-Defeating Stance and a Sublime Gisena could easily hose whatever magical enemies we face. More importantly, taking out one Immortal would likely be enough to get us Ferocity Incarnate, which if its Vigor equivalent was any indication, would likely provide enough power for us to carve our way through the others.
If we've butchered our way through the Immortals, we can evacuate the citizens in question in our own sweet time, especially with our speed and ridiculous degree of Charisma. Considering Guile-Defeating Stance, it really wouldn't take that long to filter through the forces of the remaining houses to find someone worthy of ruling this place; certainly it's much safer than leaving it in the hands of a random stalker willing to throw in with us because we're very pretty.
This is going off pure gut feeling, but I'm sort of getting the feeling that esoteric plans to forestall the collapse and (presumptive) death of those within the false space aren't really our best bet, and we'd probably get a lot more mileage out of "hijack hypothetical PA systems and use charisma/bare threat to convince/scare everyone into leaving" plans, assuming we've got to do whatever we're trying ourselves.
Plus, just letting the Ring sit there is a bad idea given they might be driven to desperate measures while faced with the downfall of their civilization. Especially if they do have a Diagram lich there, I wouldn't underestimate those. The safest action would be to just remove it as soon as possible to avoid any tricks and to just power our enemies; something we can't do if we need the Ring there for safe Evacuation. It just introduces too much risk when compared to just taking the safe route of Alynne now.
I don't think we'd need Wo-DS with Alynne, given she would have information on the Ring's defenses and could warn us about specific anti-Ring measures, which we could then smash with Gisena. She is just such a convenient option! Leave the complicated stuff for her and let us do the smashing.World Defeating Stance is significantly better than the Magic- or Weapon- Defeating Stances. World Defeating Stance respects the fact that we're heading to a containment cell designed to suppress and extract power from a Ring of Power. We are a Ring of Power. Fighting an Immortal while suffering from their Anti-Ring measures is a quick ticket to a bad end describing Hunger's eternal stay in the Temple of the Blood Moon.
As I said, I really liked your plan. In fact; I'd go so far to say that it was the best possible plan for choosing Fairbright, and that if anyone's interested in her still they should copy your former Vote. 9 Agi, 5 Str and Con, 2 Wits and 6 additional protection against weapons all buffed by Fairbright, blood and Edeldross is insanely strong and a crazy boost in power and best suited to the snowballing strategy to deal with the Immortals. It's just what comes after that's iffy.