"You exist: without name, without form. You cannot see the light of day; you cannot see the dark. You sold the green earth and the sun and stars to save yourself. But you have no self. All that which you sold, that is yourself. You have given everything for nothing. "
Ursula K. Le Guin, The Farthest Shore
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Approaching a city best left forgotten a gruesome procession advanced. The center piece was a creature like a horse but many times larger, standing close to 10 meters high the creature looked like something out of a nightmare, it's skin had been flayed away leaving glistening muscle and tendon and a harness of metal that was one part saddle and one part cage was bolted into the animals body.
The horse thing moved towards a city that couldn't exist and yet did. It had no true equivalent but an observer might describe it as akin to Rome as it had been in the time of Caesar but swollen to impossible size and now equal to the greatest cities of the modern world. Here a skyscraper wrought of faded marble and wood jutted impossibly upwards, here was a coliseum where steam powered golem beasts battled while inhuman crowds roared.
The streets of this dammed city were chocked with the refuse of another life: plastic bags, old newspapers, rusted metal wrecks, glass and broken toys piled on top of each other forming rivers where their should streets. The place was a garbage dump of insane scale. To breath here was to gag on smog and stink so thick you could cut it.
To look up was to behold a sky of red tinged void, an empty pit of no stars or sun with only a sense of alien cold radiating from it. Those bound onto the horse beast's back in the cage - saddle knew a truth like a shard of glass driven into their hearts.
This was Hell.
And they were dammed.
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Okay welcome one and all to the OOC Thread of 'Awake, arise, or be for ever fall'n', I am toxinvictory and I will be acting as the primary GM for this project.
This is a rewrite/reboot of a RP I started a long time ago To Reign in Hell (SI Multi-cross/Original Setting Roleplay) OOC which was begun back when I was relatively new to writing and trying to juggle a range of commitments. God has it really been four years? Since that project I've written a range of other material, struck up lasting dialogues with more experienced writers and I like to think grown a bit better at handling the workload that comes with such a project.
So to kick off the new year I'm revisiting my old RP notion, putting on a fresh layer of paint and giving it another go. Credit to @UbeOne for prompting me to try this and also to @Sunshine for being an truly inventive writer whose evil ideas about corruption and identity have long been inspirational (if you want a slot in this Sunny it's yours no questions asked).
Okay then down to the nitty gritty. This is a sort of SI based game with some reservations. The central characters who players well control are people who frankly speaking should be sent to Hell in death, either outright villains or folk that did something evil and didn't have time to properly atone before they died. These dammed have arrived in Hell and are being transported to their judgment/fate/etc, which is where the SI element comes in. To make sure these new arrivals are contained and don't make a mess before they reach a secure area each new arrival has been implanted with a Soul Copy.
Soul Copy's are within the framework of this quest artificial replication of normal human's soul complete with memories - personality, they don't tend to last very long but can possess - takeover another mind for time. That's what players are: Intended to be short lived copies of actual people that have been shoved into the minds of dammed souls to keep said souls confused/disoriented until they are safely behind bars or pushing a rock up a hill for eternity.
Only something has gone wrong, a wave of power from an experiment or spell gone wrong has granted this crop of artificial souls more of an afterlife than anyone thought they could have. Now you are the primary mind in control and that's not going to change any time soon. You have access to the skills, memories and powers of the dammed you were pushed into. The original soul has been assimilated into the artificial but Hell sees no difference, you are a sinner and deserve to be here any argument otherwise is likely to fall on deaf ears.
What you do with this newfound lease of afterlife and what context the merge takes is up to you. Maybe the weight of past sins is enough to make accepting whatever punishment Hell has in store seem right? Maybe the original inhabitant has overwhelmed the artificial soul and has come out the other side better or even worse for the process? Maybe the idea of acquiring power among the dammed and demons while running from/fighting the powers that be sounds like fun? Maybe escape from or denial of this damnation is the driving goal.
It's up to you.
Okay so players are inserted into a character of their choice, you can play as just about anyone within some restrictions. Played characters can not be from universes with clearly depicted afterlives, my take on Hell is it's own thing and I don't really want to open the can of worms of for example a character playing Aizen Sosuke and running into the fact my take on Hell is very different from the Bleach one.
Also to be clear characters so powerful they render conflict non-existent will not be accepted, the Plutonian (Character) - Comic Vine could absolutely be sent to Hell but the ability to subconsciously alter reality and in so doing cause anything you want to happen makes coming up with real challenges somewhat difficult for me.
I will be accepting 5 - 6 players for this if that many people are interested in taking part. Since they expressed an interest in the concept directly to me and so got the ball rolling @UbeOne has a locked in slot unless health or work concerns come up. I ask that all players be civil with each other OOC and if you have questions feel free to ask me.
Since they took part in the original game just dropping you a line @Redium @ebolasos @munchkinomatic @Cjdavis103 if you are interested.
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