Animus Ex Nihilo - A God Quest
[X] Bruh Land and Agriculture
-[X] Bless the goats by spending 1 power.
-[X] Bless the settlers by spending 1 power.
--[X] Herald Assistance
-[X] Explore the land by spending 1 power.
-[X] Find the village near the mountains by spending 1 power.
-[X] Learn more about the Devourers nature and where it came from by spending 1 power.
Another day, another vote without land or farming or agriculture nor expansion upon said land. Not the clearing of forests or explanation of our home base, not even a hint of it.
Anyway nice battle.
-[X] Bless the goats by spending 1 power.
-[X] Bless the settlers by spending 1 power.
--[X] Herald Assistance
-[X] Explore the land by spending 1 power.
-[X] Find the village near the mountains by spending 1 power.
-[X] Learn more about the Devourers nature and where it came from by spending 1 power.
Another day, another vote without land or farming or agriculture nor expansion upon said land. Not the clearing of forests or explanation of our home base, not even a hint of it.
Anyway nice battle.
This is not the right time to think of expanding beyond our domain. We have just received a painfull reminder that we do not even have our only domain secure. We have to deal with the monster and see if there are any other monsters in our slice of the ocean before I feel confortable enough to turn our back's on it.
I didn't say expand beyond it. Colonizing what we already have is fine, and it's in the physical world.
You guys are the ones arguing for more domains, with Life/Healing vs Death. If I was a Naruto Villain, I'd be pain, because honestly: This world shall know Farming.
I see only good things coming from tilling the land and expanding our living space, but I don't think you get what I'm trying to say. The ocean and sea are vast things, unpredictable, and it's depths go on and on. The island we're on isn't the same as that, not to mention that the goal isn't as big as the goal to takeover/become the sea. Just to get land, expand, have money change hands, supply and demand. All that jazz.
[X] Healing and Devouring
The thing is, we are a sea god first and foremost. If we don't know what's on the sea things like the devourer are going to keep happening. We need to secure homebase first.
Also, where does it say we are on an island? I thought we were on a continent.
Turn 5 - Results
- Location
- Germany
Turn 5 - Results
There was no time to waste on tracking the creature that attacked you. For one, you had no place to store the remnants you had gathered, and they were bleeding the fell energies that animated them quite quickly. Carefully you unravelled them, prying the power from bone and flesh as if they were an offering to you, but without taking it into yourself. It was different from what you were offered by the Sea People. When they prayed for good catches and calm waters, the power you drew from their sacrifices felt like the waves you had made your home within. It felt right, as if it belonged to you and it came to you without much prodding. When they prayed for health and other things, the offerings were dull and formless. You had to draw on it with some force, but it came readily enough.
This though was different entirely from either, and you were quickly reminded of the strange feeling when you had tried to draw power from the dead. One part of it felt calm and empty, the other colder than the deepest winter. And there was a rage and hunger woven into it that knew no bounds. All the beast wanted was to kill and to consume, of that you had no doubt, and once the dead would no longer suffice to sate its hunger, it would likely have started to devour the living instead. Yet there was another thing in it. A tiny sliver that felt far too familiar yet was easily missed among it all. You drew it out and this one you could barely stop from being drawn into you. It was your own. Had it taken something of you when it wounded you? Or had it acquired that spark by some other means? You could not tell.
Despite how alarming this discovery was, it gave you an idea how to find the beast. You could sense every creature you had imbued with your essence and if the Devourer still held some of it, then you could exploit that. Gathering the power you had taken, you wove it anew, this time around that sliver of yourself and more yet that you drew forth. You knew not what you were doing, merely following some instinct, yet you could tell immediately that it was working.
Far away, you knew not precisely where, you could feel the beat of wings. The air rushing past your decayed bones. Beneath you stretched a large archipelago. The land was full of firs and animals. The sea was full of fish. It sickened you to behold, and so you drew forth your power to smother it. The trees died under you gaze, ice shards growing out of their bark. The animals tried to run, but their blood cooled and soon their hearts were beating frantically on the frozen blood. Now it was a good place to rest. And then your wings were gone, and you were beneath the waves again, the power of the Devourer consumed in its entirety.
Learned the Devourers domains: Death and Cold
Gained approximate location of the Devourers lair.
4
The experience was strange and alarming, especially since it was hard to distinguish between your own thoughts and the beasts even after it was over. There was something cloying and possessive about its nature that could not be easily shaken off. Given what had happened to your herald, you decided to see to its wounds again and indeed, there was something that you had missed on your first examination. Like poison the power of the beast had flooded the fishes wounds and even now that they were healed, it still lurked below and drew some of its power. You could not tell what would have happened had this been left to fester and you are glad to not have to learn. Carefully you drew out all you could find, even the most minute remnants, and instead replaced it with your own might to heal instead of poison. Much of the weariness lifted from your servants mind and body as you worked. Though the black marks on its skin would not disappear, they would be all that would remain of the wounds.
4
Unfortunately, you soon had to learn that you were not the only one who had learned much from this confrontation. The creature still prowled beneath the waves, but while you could sense its approach, it was fast and wily. It was in no hurry to attack you again, but it kept devouring the dead whenever your attention wavered, darting into your realm and retreating again before you could respond. You put blessings on the dead as you drew them beneath the waves, to hide them from the beasts senses and to deter it from taking them, but it was no use. It had all the time it wanted to find them after all, being quite happy to tear apart even the decaying remnants that rested on the seafloor for a while. Worse yet, the creature seemed to take a sick pleasure from terrifying the Sea People and soon enough, they told stories about the great, broken serpent that was locked into conflict with the Proud Waters after wounding their servant in battle.
1
There was not much that you could do to stop the story from spreading among the Sea People, or further on for that matter, so you instead focused on the peoples prayers. The calls for healing and strength against diseases had become more regular as the seasons passed and you made sure to do good by the people in life at least if you could not wholly protect their dead. The old rites were easy to answer, be it lessening fevers or strengthening a mother in childbirth, but there were new ones too.From the healing of the trader had sprung a ritual that had become more important as time went on.
Twice a year, once on the first snow and once when the trees and plants began to green, the people gathered on the shore of the bay. All were invited, even outsiders like passing Travelling People or any Forest People who had come to the Bay Village in anticipation of the rite. In spring, they would begin shortly before sunrise while in autumn, shortly before dust. All attendants watched the shamans work on the small island that housed your shrine, bringing offerings of food and herbs to you while boiling some of it in the brackish bay water held in a great vessel made from clay. Once the sun had risen or set, they then took the vessel and brought it towards the shore, where the attendants waded into the bay to each receive a sip from the broth, quietly asking for you to bless their health as they drank.
It was a fine rite and you were quite pleased to see it accepted not just by the Sea People, so you always made sure to attend it and grant as many of the blessings the people asked for as you could. Each time you did, the gathering seemed to become larger and with more outsiders joining in. Each time the prayers grew bolder and the blessings greater. And as you noted with growing curiosity, each time the power you could draw from the offerings changed a minute bit. From an indistinct potential, it more and more turned to a deep and soothing warmth. You could draw on it just fine, but it seemed drawn to something that did not yet exists. Something that was not you. But maybe something that you could become.
Unlocked Healing domain.
3
All the while you also kept up the blessings for all who wished to settle in the River Village. In the wake of the Devourers flight over the village, the number of people wishing to live elsewhere had risen and you made sure that they would not come to harm on their way. You also ordered your herald to escort them, to keep away inquisitive sharks and porpoises from harassing the boats. While you could have travelled along yourself, it was still quite uncomfortable once the Bay Village was too far away and the River Village not yet close, but the great carp had no such limitations. The River Village prospered from the influx of new people and soon enough it grew from a loose assortment of huts into a proper village. A few shamans also settled over. They made a small and modest place of worship to you right where the river split apart around the island and mingled with the sea. It was not nearly as lavish and impressive as the one on the bay island, but it you still blessed them generously for it.
Soon enough, boats became a common sight on the river and the surrounding sea, bringing in large hauls of fish and crabs. There was little trade between the two villages as each was largely self-sufficient now, though there were still firm ties of family and marriage among all the Sea People. Unlike around the Bay Village though, the River Village also spread its influence landwards. Even though they were long dead, the tale of the first explorers setting out to find new places to settle had remained and now it was told with reverence that inspired others. Small homesteads like those of the Forest People began to spring up on favourable places on the river, its tributaries, and the lakes, but as they kept coming to the River Village proper for trade and prayers, they never stopped seeing themselves as Sea People. But while the people of the River Village had an outlet for this desire to explore, the Bay Village had not and soon people began to talk about a new great voyage into the unknown, this time with far fewer critics.
Gained River Shrine.
4 4 -> 8
As the people began to refine their craft of boat building in the hopes of making journeys both safer and fast, you noticed how recent events had shaped their art. Your herald, whom the people had seen quite often and quite closely as he helped the settlers, had become a common motive in their carvings. Likewise, unfortunately, the Devourer, whom they depicted swimming in the sea and snapping for the boats of the people or feasting on their dead. Though in opposition to the beast, they sometimes drew another figure coming from the waves. The idea that it was meant to be you was alien at first, but there was a small part in your mind that felt it was right for you to have a form. It was a world of form after all and even if you were pure thought, that did not mean you had to stay that way.
Do you want to present a form to the people to know you by?
[] No. You will stay unseen and formless.
[] Yes. Claim a form for yourself and show it to the people.
-[] Write-In what form.
AN: Please keep it thematically appropriate. Manifesting as a ball of fire would be within your power, but not exactly fitting for a sea god.
Sir LagsAlot
Yandere Dice Magnet
- Location
- In the fridge
[X] No. You will stay unseen and formless.
I had an entire argument about just this and my opinion hasn't exactly changed.
I had an entire argument about just this and my opinion hasn't exactly changed.
Ghostdevil
The Devil of Ghosts
- Location
- United States
[X] Yes. Claim a form for yourself and show it to the people.
-[X]
There we go.
-[X]
There we go.
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Ghostdevil
The Devil of Ghosts
- Location
- United States
I am also open to alternative Goddess forms if anyone has suggestions for pics or descriptions
Could also do the Sea Goddess from that one novel, uh what was it called?
Chaotic Sword God
She looks pretty cool.
Could also do the Sea Goddess from that one novel, uh what was it called?
Chaotic Sword God
She looks pretty cool.
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- Location
- Poland
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X] No. You will stay unseen and formless.
I just like the unknowable mystery of a real god.
Having a form would just... cheapen it.
I just like the unknowable mystery of a real god.
Having a form would just... cheapen it.
- Location
- Hollister
[X] Yes. Claim a form for yourself and show it to the people.
-[X] A swarm sea life dragging the ocean with it wherever it goes.
-[X] A swarm sea life dragging the ocean with it wherever it goes.
I am also open to alternative Goddess forms if anyone has suggestions for pics or descriptions
Cool picture, but I'm not so sure I dig the idea of a more... human form? I kind of like the whole shamanistic embodiment of the elements thing we've got going on, and I feel like deities with a human form are more associated with aspects of humanity in particular like trade or war. We're called the Proud Waters, after all.
I like the idea of being a whirlpool.
[X] Yes. Claim a form for yourself and show it to the people.
-[X] A whirlpool, dragging evil like the Devourer to the seafloor where they are transformed into vibrant sea life.
[X] Yes. Claim a form for yourself and show it to the people.
-[X] A whirlpool, dragging evil like the Devourer to the seafloor where they are transformed into vibrant sea life.
- Location
- United States
[X] Yes. Claim a form for yourself and show it to the people.
-[X] One of the People, of indeterminable gender, with hair like kelp and eyes like pearls, with skin of an ocean blue hue, possessing a stern, proud, but kindly presentation.
I've always been fond of Gods that are human but not, so I thought this would be interesting.
-[X] One of the People, of indeterminable gender, with hair like kelp and eyes like pearls, with skin of an ocean blue hue, possessing a stern, proud, but kindly presentation.
I've always been fond of Gods that are human but not, so I thought this would be interesting.
Ghostdevil
The Devil of Ghosts
- Location
- United States
I mean we feel very human anyways, from what i've seen. And its not like us being invisible and intangible will stop that association. It didn't stop them from doing it to gods in RL after all.
- Location
- New York
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X] Yes. Claim a form for yourself and show it to the people.
-[X] A whirlpool, dragging evil like the Devourer to the seafloor where they are transformed into vibrant sea life.
-[X] A whirlpool, dragging evil like the Devourer to the seafloor where they are transformed into vibrant sea life.
[X] @Ghostdevil
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