ARCANA (40K Perpetual Quest)
- Thread starter The Bird
- Start date
- Mature Sci-Fi Fantasy
Hmm... cool concept. I have not seem a quest that focuses on the arcane science of Orks before, even though reasonably Beast Orks were really advanced compared to the 30K Imperium they faced and even more so compared to canon
[X] Plan: Networks before Rumors
[X] Plan: Networks before Rumors
Kairos123
Insomniac Extraordinaire
[X] Plan: Networks before Rumors
While I really want to get into some rumors, networking had such a great outcome I definitely want to try again to see what we can get. Feel a little iffy about Sharkyz boys, but scouting out how much shit we are in is still a good idea.
While I really want to get into some rumors, networking had such a great outcome I definitely want to try again to see what we can get. Feel a little iffy about Sharkyz boys, but scouting out how much shit we are in is still a good idea.
[X] Plan: Networks before Rumors
- Location
- Finland
[X] Plan Still Meeting People
Turn 3 Pt 1
The Bird
tEM IS GUD...RITER!
- Location
- In that den of villains and scum, OKLAHOMA
Warning: the following chapter, while not having any particularly egrigious content, features a character being unnessarily cruel in a manner intended to be deeply unpleasant.
[ ] Warbike Repair: Pay would be nice, probably, but the real prize would be the warbike Reva promised you. All you had to do was get the Sisterhoods warbikes in working order. Reward: ??? Thrones, Working Warbike, cultivated Reva contact. Assorted Tech Skill progress.
___________________________________________________________________
Feral cogboy.
That was what Reva called you. You took it as a compliment, to a degree. It wasn't, however, accurate. You were in possession of knowledge gained from a lifetime of emergency repairs, desperate scavenging, and haphazard kludging together. After all, it wasn't like the shanties were possessed of any members of the Red Cult.
When they sinned, after all, they weren't exiled. They were above such things: for ones such as them, absolution existed within their systems and laws.
No, you were merely possessed of hedge-rituals and knowledge: you couldn't speak to machine spirits, not in the way the Magna Mechum, nor could you create shells for them to inhabit. All you could do was diagnose simple problems and create crude solutions, the same as any two bit tech-mat or hedge-mechanic.
Repair Roll: 81+15: 96: Strong Success
However, on some rare occasions? You could almost, almost hear the invisible whisper of the machine. Oh how they sang! Oh how the wires and electricity danced, a performance at which you stood as the conductor even as they composed the dance of metal and machine, a symphony, an electronic jig. It was in many ways one of the more beautiful things you had ever encountered, along with the clink of coin and that rare moment where your belly was full: one of those handfuls of experiences that should normally be joyous for you in a way that artefact hawking never was...
Jury Rig: 8: Failure
...But then, you reach too far, and the enchantment ends, and bitterness at failed opportunity strikes as you were reminded how unworthy you actually were. Coin is spent or stolen, leaving pockets empty. Hunger returns, worse than before, because before you never knew satiety and now must inevitably compare the emptiness of your stomach to when it was once full. And, inevitably, you overstep your bounds and the machine spirits no longer converse with you, the ephemeral patterns receding as they take offense to your transgression, your presumption, even briefly, of having mastery or even worthiness.
And like that, you are reminded of your remit: as much hedge-mechanics as you knew, you were not of the Order of the Machine, and you commanded no loyalty from those spirits that served the Omnissiah: whatever you received from His plate was mere charity, and you were no more entitled to more than a dog fed scraps was entitled to his masters plate.
You stepped away from the bike, whatever mood of pleasantness gone. Frankly, you just wanted it over with: this was why you never went into technology as a racket. It wasn't that it was hard. It wasn't that it was unprofitable.
It was that every time you were rejected by the machine spirits, you felt a little more hollow.
+1 Trauma
"It's done," You mutter, just loud enough for Reva to hear. In that smokey, grime filled place, she labored as well. Though you had saved her work on the bikes, she had opted to not take a break, instead deciding to work on another order for the Sisterhood, one far more within her capabilities: weapons, it appeared, mostlyheavy stub-pistols and stub-cannons.
That was good: if you weren't moving, you weren't surviving. Rest was a luxury reserved for those with more establishment behind them, after all. You marginally raised your estimation of how fast she would die or go mad.
"You really need to stop muttering," Reva said, voice flat as she rose from her workbench. "People have told you that, right? You mutter. Pretty loudly. Don't really appreciate you talking about how I'm going to die or go mad, because no offense, I don't plan to do either."
That's what they all say.
"I'm not them," Reva snarled, removing her dark, opaque workmans goggles as she glared at you, eyes full of fire. "I don't know what the hell you did to wind up here. I'm sure you think it was justified or worth it, but unlike you, I didn't have any choice! It was either them or the whole line, and-"
"The action I took that resulted in me inhabiting the Outskirts was being born to Outskirts, but yes, I absolutely had a choice," you reply blandly, not willing to engage her or entertain her absurd self-delusions. You weren't here to debate whatever sin she had committed, after all, though you did take some small pleasure at her face growing red as she spluttered, unable to respond. Still, professionalism. "Anyways, moving past your irrelevant delusions of moral superiority and judgement and unnecessary justifications that are absolutely unimportant, once again: the bikes are finished."
"I don't- You-" She gave a very dry swallow as she exhaled. "I'm not some...some deluded criminal! There wasn't anything else I could do-"
"Save the blubbering and self-righteous justifications for when I'm not here. How you sleep with yourself and the lies you tell to do it are none of my concern," You said flatly, doing your best to hide your growing frustration as you slowly felt your estimation of Reva drop again. "I don't give a shit," You clarified, helpfully. "Nobody gives a shit. You've been here...I'd say a month," You said, going off her clothes, which were still relatively clean, still in relatively good conditions, the color a soft, light grey instead of the dark browns and black of the assorted mold covered rags most had to with and the fabric untorn, undamaged compared to the barely stitched together clothing of most individuals you knew. "You've probably been telling everyone who even edges near the topic about how you didn't deserve this, how you had no choice, how you had actually, SECRETLY done the right thing!"
The venom dripped into your voice slowly as you continued your hateful deconstruction of the armsdealer. "Well, allow me to tell you this, Reva Laran-"
"Larral-"
"I supremely do not care," You replied, staring intently at the woman as her face grew redder and redder and she shrunk back more and more. "Nobody cares, and everyone whose been polite enough to humor you was probably annoyed at having to listen to some ignorant, judgemental city-born go on and on about their vaunted moral superiority and how YOU somehow are the exception to the countless other exiles they've met. You aren't special. You aren't some uniquely privleged individual: nobody you exclaim your innocents towards believes you, and even if they did, somehow, believe that or even were willing to humor it, they don't actually care, because you-"
You poked her in the chest, hard, and she took a step back. Ah yes, good old fashioned city-born cowardice: full of fire and vim and vigor when they felt secure, but the MOMENT that security was stripped away, they rolled on their belly like the spoiled dogs they were. "-Are not unique. I have seen literally hundreds like you, people from the city who fucked up and got exiled and decided THEY and THEY ALONE were the exception to the wretched rules of this universe that everyone else in the Outskirts was squigshit they had tracked in."
You leaned in, getting right into her face, savoring her tears a bit. "Newsflash, Reva! You're squigshit too! We're all Squigshit here, and you might have been a bit lucky getting into this shop and getting a marginally decent racket right out the gate, but I guarantee you luck is the first thing that runs out in this miserable, squalid little hellhole, and when it does run out for you, you'll realize just how little you or your self-proposed innocence matter." You leaned back, turning away.
"And when that happens, the Shanties will chew you up and spit your mangled carcass out for the crows to feed on." You walked to one of the bikes, grabbing them. "I'm done here and I'm taking this," You said, tone final, brooking no argument or tolerance, not that the now trembling, sobbing woman seemed to offer any. "If you actually want to last longer than my very generous projections, do yourself a kindness and grow up."
You pushed the bike out, leaving Reva sobbing at your tirade as you made your way home.
Only later would you feel guilt for your verbal destruction of the woman.
Gained Warbike
Contact: Reva Who-Cares advanced.
10/120 Progress to Repair (Master)
11/30 Progress to Jury-Rig (Journeyman)
Hidden Skill revealed:
Social: Teardown (Master)
[ ] Warbike Repair: Pay would be nice, probably, but the real prize would be the warbike Reva promised you. All you had to do was get the Sisterhoods warbikes in working order. Reward: ??? Thrones, Working Warbike, cultivated Reva contact. Assorted Tech Skill progress.
___________________________________________________________________
Feral cogboy.
That was what Reva called you. You took it as a compliment, to a degree. It wasn't, however, accurate. You were in possession of knowledge gained from a lifetime of emergency repairs, desperate scavenging, and haphazard kludging together. After all, it wasn't like the shanties were possessed of any members of the Red Cult.
When they sinned, after all, they weren't exiled. They were above such things: for ones such as them, absolution existed within their systems and laws.
No, you were merely possessed of hedge-rituals and knowledge: you couldn't speak to machine spirits, not in the way the Magna Mechum, nor could you create shells for them to inhabit. All you could do was diagnose simple problems and create crude solutions, the same as any two bit tech-mat or hedge-mechanic.
Repair Roll: 81+15: 96: Strong Success
However, on some rare occasions? You could almost, almost hear the invisible whisper of the machine. Oh how they sang! Oh how the wires and electricity danced, a performance at which you stood as the conductor even as they composed the dance of metal and machine, a symphony, an electronic jig. It was in many ways one of the more beautiful things you had ever encountered, along with the clink of coin and that rare moment where your belly was full: one of those handfuls of experiences that should normally be joyous for you in a way that artefact hawking never was...
Jury Rig: 8: Failure
...But then, you reach too far, and the enchantment ends, and bitterness at failed opportunity strikes as you were reminded how unworthy you actually were. Coin is spent or stolen, leaving pockets empty. Hunger returns, worse than before, because before you never knew satiety and now must inevitably compare the emptiness of your stomach to when it was once full. And, inevitably, you overstep your bounds and the machine spirits no longer converse with you, the ephemeral patterns receding as they take offense to your transgression, your presumption, even briefly, of having mastery or even worthiness.
And like that, you are reminded of your remit: as much hedge-mechanics as you knew, you were not of the Order of the Machine, and you commanded no loyalty from those spirits that served the Omnissiah: whatever you received from His plate was mere charity, and you were no more entitled to more than a dog fed scraps was entitled to his masters plate.
You stepped away from the bike, whatever mood of pleasantness gone. Frankly, you just wanted it over with: this was why you never went into technology as a racket. It wasn't that it was hard. It wasn't that it was unprofitable.
It was that every time you were rejected by the machine spirits, you felt a little more hollow.
+1 Trauma
"It's done," You mutter, just loud enough for Reva to hear. In that smokey, grime filled place, she labored as well. Though you had saved her work on the bikes, she had opted to not take a break, instead deciding to work on another order for the Sisterhood, one far more within her capabilities: weapons, it appeared, mostlyheavy stub-pistols and stub-cannons.
That was good: if you weren't moving, you weren't surviving. Rest was a luxury reserved for those with more establishment behind them, after all. You marginally raised your estimation of how fast she would die or go mad.
"You really need to stop muttering," Reva said, voice flat as she rose from her workbench. "People have told you that, right? You mutter. Pretty loudly. Don't really appreciate you talking about how I'm going to die or go mad, because no offense, I don't plan to do either."
That's what they all say.
"I'm not them," Reva snarled, removing her dark, opaque workmans goggles as she glared at you, eyes full of fire. "I don't know what the hell you did to wind up here. I'm sure you think it was justified or worth it, but unlike you, I didn't have any choice! It was either them or the whole line, and-"
"The action I took that resulted in me inhabiting the Outskirts was being born to Outskirts, but yes, I absolutely had a choice," you reply blandly, not willing to engage her or entertain her absurd self-delusions. You weren't here to debate whatever sin she had committed, after all, though you did take some small pleasure at her face growing red as she spluttered, unable to respond. Still, professionalism. "Anyways, moving past your irrelevant delusions of moral superiority and judgement and unnecessary justifications that are absolutely unimportant, once again: the bikes are finished."
"I don't- You-" She gave a very dry swallow as she exhaled. "I'm not some...some deluded criminal! There wasn't anything else I could do-"
"Save the blubbering and self-righteous justifications for when I'm not here. How you sleep with yourself and the lies you tell to do it are none of my concern," You said flatly, doing your best to hide your growing frustration as you slowly felt your estimation of Reva drop again. "I don't give a shit," You clarified, helpfully. "Nobody gives a shit. You've been here...I'd say a month," You said, going off her clothes, which were still relatively clean, still in relatively good conditions, the color a soft, light grey instead of the dark browns and black of the assorted mold covered rags most had to with and the fabric untorn, undamaged compared to the barely stitched together clothing of most individuals you knew. "You've probably been telling everyone who even edges near the topic about how you didn't deserve this, how you had no choice, how you had actually, SECRETLY done the right thing!"
The venom dripped into your voice slowly as you continued your hateful deconstruction of the armsdealer. "Well, allow me to tell you this, Reva Laran-"
"Larral-"
"I supremely do not care," You replied, staring intently at the woman as her face grew redder and redder and she shrunk back more and more. "Nobody cares, and everyone whose been polite enough to humor you was probably annoyed at having to listen to some ignorant, judgemental city-born go on and on about their vaunted moral superiority and how YOU somehow are the exception to the countless other exiles they've met. You aren't special. You aren't some uniquely privleged individual: nobody you exclaim your innocents towards believes you, and even if they did, somehow, believe that or even were willing to humor it, they don't actually care, because you-"
You poked her in the chest, hard, and she took a step back. Ah yes, good old fashioned city-born cowardice: full of fire and vim and vigor when they felt secure, but the MOMENT that security was stripped away, they rolled on their belly like the spoiled dogs they were. "-Are not unique. I have seen literally hundreds like you, people from the city who fucked up and got exiled and decided THEY and THEY ALONE were the exception to the wretched rules of this universe that everyone else in the Outskirts was squigshit they had tracked in."
You leaned in, getting right into her face, savoring her tears a bit. "Newsflash, Reva! You're squigshit too! We're all Squigshit here, and you might have been a bit lucky getting into this shop and getting a marginally decent racket right out the gate, but I guarantee you luck is the first thing that runs out in this miserable, squalid little hellhole, and when it does run out for you, you'll realize just how little you or your self-proposed innocence matter." You leaned back, turning away.
"And when that happens, the Shanties will chew you up and spit your mangled carcass out for the crows to feed on." You walked to one of the bikes, grabbing them. "I'm done here and I'm taking this," You said, tone final, brooking no argument or tolerance, not that the now trembling, sobbing woman seemed to offer any. "If you actually want to last longer than my very generous projections, do yourself a kindness and grow up."
You pushed the bike out, leaving Reva sobbing at your tirade as you made your way home.
Only later would you feel guilt for your verbal destruction of the woman.
Gained Warbike
Contact: Reva Who-Cares advanced.
10/120 Progress to Repair (Master)
11/30 Progress to Jury-Rig (Journeyman)
Hidden Skill revealed:
Social: Teardown (Master)
CedeTheBees
Probably high right now
- Location
- Somewhere
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Can't wait to use this on someone who actually deserves it :'D
- Pronouns
- He/Him
DEAR GOD (EMPEROR)!! WE NEED IMMIDIATE MEDICAL SERVICES! THIS WOMEN JUST GOT HORRIFICALLY (verbally) MAULD!
The Bird
tEM IS GUD...RITER!
- Location
- In that den of villains and scum, OKLAHOMA
Nah, just ones that would result in, well, extreme stress or injury or, in this case, play into his existing psychological hangups.
She can get over it or die, because from Ulysses perspective, if a few mean words were enough to alienate or seriously break her, she'll be a corpse inside a week. Though in mechanical terms he basically managed to give her five points of trauma, which is fun!
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CedeTheBees
Probably high right now
- Location
- Somewhere
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Any other ones we should know about? I feel like warnings about stuff the character already knows about would be fair.
The Bird
tEM IS GUD...RITER!
- Location
- In that den of villains and scum, OKLAHOMA
People are rarely fully cognizant of their own psychological deficiencies: self-awareness is a fairly rare trait even among the introspective. Beyond that, don't worry about it, I'm not planning on screwing you over via hidden Trauma landmines.
Daecl
CURSED BY THE DICE
To clarify, was inflicting teardown on Reva an inevitable part of the contact advancing, or was it triggered by the immediate Trauma gain beforehand?
The Bird
tEM IS GUD...RITER!
- Location
- In that den of villains and scum, OKLAHOMA
It would have happened eventually because Ulysses tolerance and patience only goes so far, but it didn't need to happen here.
- Location
- US
Hmm, I think this isn't separate trauma related to Machine Spirits, so much as it is social trauma stemming from Outcast.
Failing a tech-related roll is social rejection if you think of the tech as a person.
Failing a tech-related roll is social rejection if you think of the tech as a person.
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CedeTheBees
Probably high right now
- Location
- Somewhere
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Probably for the best this happened at the earliest possible moment. I imagine the outburst would've been worse if he had time to let his annoyance stew.
The Bird
tEM IS GUD...RITER!
- Location
- In that den of villains and scum, OKLAHOMA
Its more a combination of self-internalized prejudice against Outskirts including himself, unhealthy fascination and overidealization of the mechanicus, low self esteem, mixed with a genuine love of messing with tech and belief in the omnissiah, all mixing together to form a really unhealthy stew.
In his ideal world, Ulysses would be a member of the cult mechanicus. He would have purpose, worth, and the love of the Omnissiah and the secret arts to communing with the mechanica anima.
But that will never happen. He's an Outskirts. That means he's unworthy of the Omnissiah, no matter how much he dreams, no matter how much he desires, and nothing is more painful than a dream you not only can't achieve, but are inherently unworthy of achieving.
Kairos123
Insomniac Extraordinaire
I agree. Succeeding might even lower his trauma a bit.
The Bird
tEM IS GUD...RITER!
- Location
- In that den of villains and scum, OKLAHOMA
If mere lack of skill was the problem, there wouldn't be a problem.
- Location
- California
A potential long term goal then.