Deinokos
Unofficial Breaker
- Location
- [ERROR]
Bleach quest was Ishida Quest, yes.
New quest seems to be minion quest, telling the story of dear boss.
This quest is the Exalted Odyssial quest.
Now, a guess. He's going to start WWIII.
[Exalted, ?] Most High
- Thread starter Rihaku
- Start date
-
- Tags
- exalted (white wolf)
New quest seems to be minion quest, telling the story of dear boss.
This quest is the Exalted Odyssial quest.
Now, a guess. He's going to start WWIII.
Hmm,
Legally? I mean just, be popular enough to be declared ruler of the world? Like... somehow get ALL the different groups to like you enough?
That's fairly cra...
Oh god it can't be...
By trying to win the world through literature and writing enough books that declare you the 'ruler of the world' so people believe it? I.E edit all the wiki pages so it says 'X is RULER OF THE WORLD' and have people accept that?
Legally? I mean just, be popular enough to be declared ruler of the world? Like... somehow get ALL the different groups to like you enough?
That's fairly cra...
Oh god it can't be...
By trying to win the world through literature and writing enough books that declare you the 'ruler of the world' so people believe it? I.E edit all the wiki pages so it says 'X is RULER OF THE WORLD' and have people accept that?
It has to be something that "the world" could look at and be aware of the weirdly inefficient nature of, which is a bit of a hint.
Buying up all the land / countries?
Economic Victory? That'd be really hard for an OCP to pull off...
Rihaku
The Internet
I can't answer too specifically without spoilers, but something approaching normal humans will be heavily involved. There's not much of a "magical world" beyond the magus' personal sphere of influence, as far as people know. You will likely have opportunities to interact with normal society, though they may be intermittent.
Well that one way to do it.
About submit to rule,maybe wizard can claim the territory by magic and everyone in that territory need to obey his rule&law.
The difficult part is try to extend his territory in the quest.
Is it democracy? Is he trying to get elected as the leader?
Or maybe he's trying to achieve victory via the most respectable methods of all... the greatest endeavor of all time...
Pictured: the greatest challenge of all time, SOCIAL ACTIVITY!
He's going to try to win a debate on the internet.
So he is fairly powerful, yet his plan for conquering the Earth is bad? Off the top of my head I was thinking of things like the Moon Pie Plan, inviting and defeating alien/extra-dimensional invasions to gain popularity, holding the world hostage through some sort of global spell, or just conceptually redefining himself as 'the most superior being on Earth ever'...
But it all still sounds too reasonable and predictable for what few hints were given. It's hard to guess why a person would have a terrible plan for conquering the world and what it would be, - putting aside just how insane the idea is in the first place, - but if I assume that he's not just acting irrationally, maybe he is not content when there's even the slightest hint of opposition left and wants to be thorough, which necessitates pretty extreme means? Or conquering the world is not his goal in itself (or not the only goal?), just something that inevitably happens as a result of his actions.
In any case, I prefer SV, but in the end either forum is fine with me. Eagerly awaiting the new quest.
AZATHOTHoth
༼ つ ☀️_☀️ ༽つ
My guess: He tries to take over the world through religion. He might make up a religion and tries to non-violently to take over the world through its influence.
Second guess: He tried to recreate the Nazi empire.
Second guess: He tried to recreate the Nazi empire.
They do.
I don't trust SV's dice.
Last edited:
Rihaku
The Internet
What d'ya mean by that? They're not random?
TBF a good number of people still don't like the SV dice roller and/or don't trust it.
For a while during the early days of SV they had a poor random algorithm they used.
Rolz.org seems to be one of the currently trusted websites for dice rolling with a dice room for discussion about things and rolling all kinds of dice.
Holiday Special: Certainly Nothing Less
Rihaku
The Internet
I hope everybody is having a wonderful holiday season! This Holiday Special is cross-posted from my current quest, A Simple Transaction I, and features a (potential?) future Ulyssian at work.
Certainly Nothing Less
More than a year now they'd resided in this dreary World of Darkness, realm of the far-flung future. It was a feeble shadow of Creation That Was, and epitomized nothing more than the ultimate self-defeating triumph of the Dragon's Shadow. There were few dangers here to one such as Ulyssian, and fewer wonders of note, for in their journeys to retrieve the Shards of the Lathe he had seen reflections of Creation unbound and limitless; a thousand Times of Glory, a billion Ages of Dream, and all the infinite permutations of Sorrow that might refract from their mirrored shattering.
It had been quite an odyssey to terminate now in this drab gray expanse, a world bled dry of essence, starving now under the yoke of mere physicality. There were faint stirrings of Power beneath the surface: the so-called Kindred who concentrated tarnished essence, or the Consensus of the Technocracy which shaped the shallower expressions of reality - but at its core it was a world simply hollow, even the darkness at its center a mere absence of light.
But not so within eight meters of his person, for his Chaos-Repelling Pattern asserted the laws of Creation over and beneath the eggshell facade hereabouts; buttressing it and overwriting it both so that here, if nowhere else, glory might shine again. Bereft of this, he might be forced to cruder measures in order to retain the full sum of his power here, in a cosmos hostile to the very idea of ascendancy.
Ulyssian walked out of the vampire den, their bodies become ash in the wake of his passing. Most of the neonates were wise enough simply to accede, and then flee him; it was the Methuselahs and older whose arrogance led them to defiance and oblivion.
Another false positive. Its powers depleted, the corpse of this 'Antediluvian' Brujah was simply a body once more. Would he have to face Cain himself to procure what he sought? That would be an interesting contest, but one for another day.
Odyssial's splintered ascendancy had buried itself across the tapestry of All Creations, its far-flung scattering locked betwixt seals of fate and time. Yet even the Vampiric Master of Time had yielded no clues to its location. If the Shard was here, it was not in this moment; and for all the might of Ulyssian's divination, it did not suffice to challenge the highest wiles of his prior self.
He put work out of his mind. Moon and Saery were waiting for him, and Nilul ought be finished on her end as well. With Pentex finally subdued, her control over the Consensus ought be nearing completion.
Moon had taken an unusual fondness to the seasonal holidays of this world, and today was the eve of this world's Calibration Feast, an event they called Christmas. She had promised them all a wondrous surprise, a grand spectacle worthy of Mela's Final Aspect.
He was far from their home manse, adrift in time and halfway across the world. Ulyssian would need unnatural celerity to carry him back in time. Exerting himself modestly, he overlaid Ambition with the Sword At World's End, and cut once.
A step, and the world blurred around him.
Ulyssian strode with a sunbeam's swiftness to the base of their encampment, the badly-degraded echo of the Pole of Earth which the mortals called, Everest. It had been reforged by Workings into a sorcerous redoubt of adequate strength.
In observance of the holiday, Moon had used their vegetation Workings to coat half the mountainside in a vast blanket of holly and pine, their boughs fetchingly laden with gently-falling snow. There was a smell of myrrh and incense in the air: warm contrast to the chill clarion of the mountainside, which it complemented but did not overwhelm. As he walked he heard the faint jingling of sleigh bells, and the trace of softer harmonies in the air. Moon must have been quite enthused; even their masquerade ball at All Hallows' Eve had not warranted this degree of decoration.
A song grew upon the wind as he drew nearer; an angelic choir raised in circling, caroling melody. He crested the ridge of the peak to see the Dragon-Blooded singing in unison, ear-muffed and mittened and wrapped in great furs, superfluously reading off the booklets laid open in their hands.
"Uly!" Moon broke off mid-verse to rush forward, clutching his arm with both her own. "Thank goodness. I was worried you wouldn't make it back in time."
"And miss the greatest seasonal holiday of the year? I couldn't." He scoffed. "I didn't get you a present, though. It was another false positive; the ghost of Christmas Future was merely a corpse, after all."
Moon beamed. "As if I'd care for that! Your return is already the greatest present I could ever ask for."
Nilul stopped singing and closed her booklet. "Moon. You're so saccharine it's giving me literal mental damage! I really should have let you two flounder in ignorance forever... Bah, humbug!"
"No Limit Breaks during the holidays," Ulyssian scolded her. "You'll just have to better control your Great Curse."
"Easy for you to say," Nilul huffed, tossing her hair. "Not all of us regard that thing as an asset to be weaponized."
"Yes... Saery always was a bit slower on the uptake. You know what they say about Nellens."
Nellens Saery, who was the Final Aspect of Daana'd, did not stop caroling, but paused briefly to deliver him a pout and glare. He disregarded her and walked into his manse.
"My venture was a disappointment. How goes your work?" He asked Moon.
She snuggled into his shoulder. "Boring. Gaia is semi-conscious and doesn't want to wake up. Since our drastic measures haven't worked, I've tried reading to her, but she simply has no appreciation for the classics! Primordial or no, I can't tolerate such poor taste. Are we absolutely sure she hasn't fallen to become a Malfean after all?"
"Maybe you should tell her you've found the Shining Answer," he joked. "It worked for your namesake, or so I'm told."
"Well," she said coyly, "I've my Shining Answer, but presenting you to her would only scare her."
"Stop, you're too adorable. Nilul's heart might grow three sizes."
The winds delivered to Moon two mugs of spiced cinnamon drink, one of which she handed to him. She shed her coat and earmuffs, producing a red-velvet hat of triangular shape with a white bob at its tip. This she placed atop her head, humming merrily. Ulyssian nudged it to a jaunty angle.
"Sorry to interrupt you lovebirds."
Ulyssian turned, and did not raise Ambition, for his senses would have detected this enemy in advance, had they desired to attack.
"...Hero."
Mountain Hero, the Final Aspect of Pasiap, Successor to Resolute Flame, the Rock of the Faith, the Dragonfist; Master of the Wyld Hunt, the Unbroken Earth, the Immaculate One. Runes of blistering gold and amaranth violet sprawled across ever inch of his face, the barely-bridled fury of the Perfected Lotus threatening imminently - as it had for decades - to spill over its container. Only the combination of adamantine will, legendary sturdiness, and peerless martial talent had kept the Unbroken Earth from rupturing, all these long years.
An enemy who had once numbered among his closest friends. The Earth Aspect's scar-riddled face held a carefully-schooled expression, sharp contrast to the hate and powerless rage with which he usually regarded Odyssial. In one hand he held his grand goremaul-daiklave, and in the other an immense rugged sack.
"Odyssial- No. Ulyssian. I'm not here to fight you."
"Saery called you," Ulyssian surmised.
Hero scoffed. "Of course you would already know. Or did you just find out? Not that it matters. It is as I said last time, Ulyssian. Just because you can see its course, does not mean you'll be able to stop it."
That was the way of Mountain Hero. Brute simplicity and onrushing momentum, a mountain falling straight at you. Fertile earth for even the Blossom of the Lotus, and stubbornness enough to withstand its questing roots.
Ulyssian eyed the sack with some curiosity. "Speak your piece. Unless you've become a disciple of Cecelyne, I don't intend to stop you today."
Hero's arrival had caused no small amount of commotion. Nilul and Saery trailed swiftly in, followed by Pearl and Rosary. Ayala and even Vaela would not be far behind, so the Champion of the Immaculate Faith had no chance in a direct contest.
But that was not what he had come here to do.
"The mortals of this realm have a holiday," Hero said, looking about the assemblage. "One whose spirit you've absorbed fully, if those decorations are in earnest. Take these gifts in that same spirit. Today I come not for War, but to reach out a hand in reconciliation, in the hopes of mutual tolerance. For while your victory may be inescapable, know that we would resist you to the last, even unto our dying breath. Let us learn to co-exist, separate and without dreams of conquest, instead."
So saying, he opened his sack to produce a series of hand-knit sweaters, which he began to hand out in stilted, businesslike fashion. It was apparent they were wholly the product of Hero himself: the design was crude, almost atrociously terrible, but the craftsmanship was exquisite, diligent care shining from every braided cord, every jewel-like stitch.
Hero handed him his sweater with a complicated expression on his face.
Ulyssian's gift was lumpy and ill-fitting, and depicted a meeting of the Incompetents Society on its face. "Ulyssian. You became more the Anathema than any other before you. But you used to be my best friend. I wish you'd stayed mortal. You never needed to take that power. I would have protected you from all of it."
"I know," said Ulyssian, accepting the gift. He put on the sweater. It itched. "I'll consider your proposal after the Lathe is finished."
Hero smiled grimly. "So that our resistance would be wholly purposeless either way. Typical of you."
"I may be Anathema, but have I really changed? Perhaps it's simply the spirit of the season awakening my mortal sentiments."
"...I told Saery this was a bad idea."
Ulyssian shrugged. "Should have known better than to listen to a Nellens."
Despite himself, Hero laughed.
Some of their number had chosen to indulge in the tradition of gift-giving; Moon had gotten him the original texts of a Grecian poet named Homer, among which was a work that seemed the mythic echo of his own legend. There was even a reference to the Odyssian Horse!
Nilul swaddled his neck in a scarf which she claimed was dashing, and Saery gave him a bottle of genuine Skin-Like-the-Mountains oil, dreamed into being by a high order of Consensus shapers. He felt slightly guilty at not having gotten anyone anything at all, even if they had simply procured their gifts through Nilul's control of the Syndicate and New World Order.
So it was that he took to the festivities with uncharacteristic cheer; caroling about the tree, partaking heavily of food and drink, helping to lay out milk and cookies for the mighty Saint Nicklaus, and even agreeing to the drunken Moon's half-baked plan to deliver presents to all the world's children. It was a task that demanded much of him, the full measure of his ingenuity and might, but not one wholly beyond his abilities; and even if it were, he would persist and ponder and strategize until he found a way, for if Ulyssian had learned anything of Christmas, it was this -
In the end, it was the thought that counted. Nothing more; certainly nothing less.
Certainly Nothing Less
More than a year now they'd resided in this dreary World of Darkness, realm of the far-flung future. It was a feeble shadow of Creation That Was, and epitomized nothing more than the ultimate self-defeating triumph of the Dragon's Shadow. There were few dangers here to one such as Ulyssian, and fewer wonders of note, for in their journeys to retrieve the Shards of the Lathe he had seen reflections of Creation unbound and limitless; a thousand Times of Glory, a billion Ages of Dream, and all the infinite permutations of Sorrow that might refract from their mirrored shattering.
It had been quite an odyssey to terminate now in this drab gray expanse, a world bled dry of essence, starving now under the yoke of mere physicality. There were faint stirrings of Power beneath the surface: the so-called Kindred who concentrated tarnished essence, or the Consensus of the Technocracy which shaped the shallower expressions of reality - but at its core it was a world simply hollow, even the darkness at its center a mere absence of light.
But not so within eight meters of his person, for his Chaos-Repelling Pattern asserted the laws of Creation over and beneath the eggshell facade hereabouts; buttressing it and overwriting it both so that here, if nowhere else, glory might shine again. Bereft of this, he might be forced to cruder measures in order to retain the full sum of his power here, in a cosmos hostile to the very idea of ascendancy.
Ulyssian walked out of the vampire den, their bodies become ash in the wake of his passing. Most of the neonates were wise enough simply to accede, and then flee him; it was the Methuselahs and older whose arrogance led them to defiance and oblivion.
Another false positive. Its powers depleted, the corpse of this 'Antediluvian' Brujah was simply a body once more. Would he have to face Cain himself to procure what he sought? That would be an interesting contest, but one for another day.
Odyssial's splintered ascendancy had buried itself across the tapestry of All Creations, its far-flung scattering locked betwixt seals of fate and time. Yet even the Vampiric Master of Time had yielded no clues to its location. If the Shard was here, it was not in this moment; and for all the might of Ulyssian's divination, it did not suffice to challenge the highest wiles of his prior self.
He put work out of his mind. Moon and Saery were waiting for him, and Nilul ought be finished on her end as well. With Pentex finally subdued, her control over the Consensus ought be nearing completion.
Moon had taken an unusual fondness to the seasonal holidays of this world, and today was the eve of this world's Calibration Feast, an event they called Christmas. She had promised them all a wondrous surprise, a grand spectacle worthy of Mela's Final Aspect.
He was far from their home manse, adrift in time and halfway across the world. Ulyssian would need unnatural celerity to carry him back in time. Exerting himself modestly, he overlaid Ambition with the Sword At World's End, and cut once.
A step, and the world blurred around him.
Ulyssian strode with a sunbeam's swiftness to the base of their encampment, the badly-degraded echo of the Pole of Earth which the mortals called, Everest. It had been reforged by Workings into a sorcerous redoubt of adequate strength.
In observance of the holiday, Moon had used their vegetation Workings to coat half the mountainside in a vast blanket of holly and pine, their boughs fetchingly laden with gently-falling snow. There was a smell of myrrh and incense in the air: warm contrast to the chill clarion of the mountainside, which it complemented but did not overwhelm. As he walked he heard the faint jingling of sleigh bells, and the trace of softer harmonies in the air. Moon must have been quite enthused; even their masquerade ball at All Hallows' Eve had not warranted this degree of decoration.
A song grew upon the wind as he drew nearer; an angelic choir raised in circling, caroling melody. He crested the ridge of the peak to see the Dragon-Blooded singing in unison, ear-muffed and mittened and wrapped in great furs, superfluously reading off the booklets laid open in their hands.
"Uly!" Moon broke off mid-verse to rush forward, clutching his arm with both her own. "Thank goodness. I was worried you wouldn't make it back in time."
"And miss the greatest seasonal holiday of the year? I couldn't." He scoffed. "I didn't get you a present, though. It was another false positive; the ghost of Christmas Future was merely a corpse, after all."
Moon beamed. "As if I'd care for that! Your return is already the greatest present I could ever ask for."
Nilul stopped singing and closed her booklet. "Moon. You're so saccharine it's giving me literal mental damage! I really should have let you two flounder in ignorance forever... Bah, humbug!"
"No Limit Breaks during the holidays," Ulyssian scolded her. "You'll just have to better control your Great Curse."
"Easy for you to say," Nilul huffed, tossing her hair. "Not all of us regard that thing as an asset to be weaponized."
"Yes... Saery always was a bit slower on the uptake. You know what they say about Nellens."
Nellens Saery, who was the Final Aspect of Daana'd, did not stop caroling, but paused briefly to deliver him a pout and glare. He disregarded her and walked into his manse.
"My venture was a disappointment. How goes your work?" He asked Moon.
She snuggled into his shoulder. "Boring. Gaia is semi-conscious and doesn't want to wake up. Since our drastic measures haven't worked, I've tried reading to her, but she simply has no appreciation for the classics! Primordial or no, I can't tolerate such poor taste. Are we absolutely sure she hasn't fallen to become a Malfean after all?"
"Maybe you should tell her you've found the Shining Answer," he joked. "It worked for your namesake, or so I'm told."
"Well," she said coyly, "I've my Shining Answer, but presenting you to her would only scare her."
"Stop, you're too adorable. Nilul's heart might grow three sizes."
The winds delivered to Moon two mugs of spiced cinnamon drink, one of which she handed to him. She shed her coat and earmuffs, producing a red-velvet hat of triangular shape with a white bob at its tip. This she placed atop her head, humming merrily. Ulyssian nudged it to a jaunty angle.
"Sorry to interrupt you lovebirds."
Ulyssian turned, and did not raise Ambition, for his senses would have detected this enemy in advance, had they desired to attack.
"...Hero."
Mountain Hero, the Final Aspect of Pasiap, Successor to Resolute Flame, the Rock of the Faith, the Dragonfist; Master of the Wyld Hunt, the Unbroken Earth, the Immaculate One. Runes of blistering gold and amaranth violet sprawled across ever inch of his face, the barely-bridled fury of the Perfected Lotus threatening imminently - as it had for decades - to spill over its container. Only the combination of adamantine will, legendary sturdiness, and peerless martial talent had kept the Unbroken Earth from rupturing, all these long years.
An enemy who had once numbered among his closest friends. The Earth Aspect's scar-riddled face held a carefully-schooled expression, sharp contrast to the hate and powerless rage with which he usually regarded Odyssial. In one hand he held his grand goremaul-daiklave, and in the other an immense rugged sack.
"Odyssial- No. Ulyssian. I'm not here to fight you."
"Saery called you," Ulyssian surmised.
Hero scoffed. "Of course you would already know. Or did you just find out? Not that it matters. It is as I said last time, Ulyssian. Just because you can see its course, does not mean you'll be able to stop it."
That was the way of Mountain Hero. Brute simplicity and onrushing momentum, a mountain falling straight at you. Fertile earth for even the Blossom of the Lotus, and stubbornness enough to withstand its questing roots.
Ulyssian eyed the sack with some curiosity. "Speak your piece. Unless you've become a disciple of Cecelyne, I don't intend to stop you today."
Hero's arrival had caused no small amount of commotion. Nilul and Saery trailed swiftly in, followed by Pearl and Rosary. Ayala and even Vaela would not be far behind, so the Champion of the Immaculate Faith had no chance in a direct contest.
But that was not what he had come here to do.
"The mortals of this realm have a holiday," Hero said, looking about the assemblage. "One whose spirit you've absorbed fully, if those decorations are in earnest. Take these gifts in that same spirit. Today I come not for War, but to reach out a hand in reconciliation, in the hopes of mutual tolerance. For while your victory may be inescapable, know that we would resist you to the last, even unto our dying breath. Let us learn to co-exist, separate and without dreams of conquest, instead."
So saying, he opened his sack to produce a series of hand-knit sweaters, which he began to hand out in stilted, businesslike fashion. It was apparent they were wholly the product of Hero himself: the design was crude, almost atrociously terrible, but the craftsmanship was exquisite, diligent care shining from every braided cord, every jewel-like stitch.
Hero handed him his sweater with a complicated expression on his face.
Ulyssian's gift was lumpy and ill-fitting, and depicted a meeting of the Incompetents Society on its face. "Ulyssian. You became more the Anathema than any other before you. But you used to be my best friend. I wish you'd stayed mortal. You never needed to take that power. I would have protected you from all of it."
"I know," said Ulyssian, accepting the gift. He put on the sweater. It itched. "I'll consider your proposal after the Lathe is finished."
Hero smiled grimly. "So that our resistance would be wholly purposeless either way. Typical of you."
"I may be Anathema, but have I really changed? Perhaps it's simply the spirit of the season awakening my mortal sentiments."
"...I told Saery this was a bad idea."
Ulyssian shrugged. "Should have known better than to listen to a Nellens."
Despite himself, Hero laughed.
Some of their number had chosen to indulge in the tradition of gift-giving; Moon had gotten him the original texts of a Grecian poet named Homer, among which was a work that seemed the mythic echo of his own legend. There was even a reference to the Odyssian Horse!
Nilul swaddled his neck in a scarf which she claimed was dashing, and Saery gave him a bottle of genuine Skin-Like-the-Mountains oil, dreamed into being by a high order of Consensus shapers. He felt slightly guilty at not having gotten anyone anything at all, even if they had simply procured their gifts through Nilul's control of the Syndicate and New World Order.
So it was that he took to the festivities with uncharacteristic cheer; caroling about the tree, partaking heavily of food and drink, helping to lay out milk and cookies for the mighty Saint Nicklaus, and even agreeing to the drunken Moon's half-baked plan to deliver presents to all the world's children. It was a task that demanded much of him, the full measure of his ingenuity and might, but not one wholly beyond his abilities; and even if it were, he would persist and ponder and strategize until he found a way, for if Ulyssian had learned anything of Christmas, it was this -
In the end, it was the thought that counted. Nothing more; certainly nothing less.
Away
Rihaku
The Internet
Away
Odyssial was out of patience.
As he trod the green-glass sands of Sun-blasted Cecelyne, they wailed. The limitless pale brilliance of his once-golden Exaltation blazed like a cosmic rune, sheer annihilating effulgence that overspilled his point of entry to scour all the Endless Desert. Cecelyne could but yield, for it was the nature of the Desert to enforce the tyranny of the strong over the weak, the lesser under the greater, and it had since the conclusion of their first war (or perhaps, as sinking suspicion, well before...) understood the primacy of the Exalted, and their war-master foremost among them. So too would the Principle of Hierarchy be incapable of so much as taking up arms against him.
It would not save either of them. Nothing could.
Called by his beacon, his allies arrived in various stages of preparedness. The Lathe of Heaven spun and rent the universe about it, seasons in kaleidoscopic flurry shed and re-made like the arms of a vortex. It was earlier than many had expected, earlier than would have been proper; the vileness of their provocation had indeed drawn him from his redoubt before all circumstances were aligned. But that would not spare them their hour of reckoning. He alone had strength enough for that.
The Green Sun sprang forth to contest him, and its heat was its immanence, its lance viridian rays; the searing light of its presence both writ and commandment, that all must bow to the Unquestionable above all. But Odyssial was the Most High, and merely shifted his stance in mockery of Malfeas' jotun-dancing, then cut through to its emerald heart as Ligier gasped in self-destroying shame. Broken its shield of fire; broken its sunbeam-spear, and the jewel in Malfeas' crown plummeted haplessly to earth.
You know me. I know you. We have done this dance before. And, last we met, you did not enjoy the outcome.
At Ligier's descent the sand became glass; at the turning of the Lathe the glass became void, ripped asunder as the underpinning shinma were shredded and reconstituted, rendered into a form more tactically appropriate for his foothold in Malfeas.
Cecelyne was desolation. She could abide no rule but arbitrary caprice, the trappings of codification merely a vessel for efficient enforcement. Frivolous as those trappings were, they still held insight into her identity: reach was its essential component, the Endless Desert bordering everything, distributed as efficiently across space as she was society.
That was why he had chosen this place, despite having ascended well past any requirement of five days' travel to or from the Demon City. From the Endless Desert any Yozi could be reached, and - more importantly - none could ever escape.
Even in Creation it bordered them, out to the furthermost reaches of the Wild. Only in the territory of the Handsome Monkey King, and those few Exalts his peers, could deny the principles of space itself that lent Cecelyne her access.
But the King was a matter for a later day. Today the Lord Strategos had an altogether easier (and far less disturbing) set of prey to hunt.
One by one his allies materialized, the rifts of the Lathe disgorging legion after shining legion. At its turning the order of the world bent to his purpose, and all along their serried ranks came the war-hymn of the Odyssians, as it had been in the beginning:
For the hour of reckoning is come,
And the price of your hubris is blood.
Alone in its cloister, dreaming Sacheverell awakened, and trembled. It of all beings knew, that the time of its long slumber was over, and its future respite forever dreamless.
"The End of Stories comes," spoke the Primordial voice, and around it Malfeas shook, for the Demon City could know no fear save through the lens of impotent humiliation.
"It shall be our end," continued Sacheverell, "And of all our siblings save a traitorous few, though they will come to regret his ascendancy in time. So I have seen. So it will be. Such is the shape of things to come."
And so its eye closed forevermore, surrendering itself to oblivion, a final act of sorcerous will obliterating it beyond even the trance-death of the Neverborn: so gladly did it accept nothingness in fear of its imminent persecutor, for it of all Primordials best understood the terror of Hunting Odyssial, and of the futility of striving against the inevitable.
But the erstwhile End of Stories himself, held to an altogether different creed; having triumphed against futility on occasions too numerous to be counted, he was wholly alert to the machinations of his enemy. For the Exalted and their titans opponent alike, the mere impossibility of a feat did not preclude its happening. And the titan which best embodied that causality was none other than the Dragon's Shadow - so long as it was inescapably trapped.
Mountain Hero came up alongside, shooting Odyssial a look of wariness and burning resentment. They were uneasy allies, but even the Chief Immaculate had consented to eradicating the titans to root out the akuma rampant among his institutional ranks. The jeweled ink of his Sidereal tattoos blazed like misplaced stars against the heavenly pillar of his goremaul-daiklave, though even such resplendence as that paled unutterably compared to the Lathe.
"Careful," Hero said brusquely, eyes flitting away. "Our geometers have confirmed that the Seal of Odyssial has been broken, both upon his secret tomb and within the shinmaic layer of reality. We suspect the Handsome Monkey King. The enemy of his enemy, after all..."
"Yes," Odyssial smiled. "No doubt the Dragon's Shadow will seek to emulate me with the Black Mirror Shintai. His desperation may drive him to an ever-more perfect mimicry, fueled by the capabilities of that first mirrored self."
Hero grunted. "You were already aware. What is your countermeasure? Bereft of his lance the Unconquered Sun cannot aid you against this enemy, if he even would."
Odyssial stepped forward. "Tell me, Mountain Hero, Keeper of Anathemic Lore. Have you ever heard the story of the Odyssian Horse?"
---
Halfway across Creation, the Dragon's Shadow cackled to itself as it assumed the form of Odyssial himself. How long had it dreamed to attain that eventuality, too cowardly to hope in earnest, yet too covetous ever to give hope up? It had not been easy - his greatest heist to date - but he had finally, finally broken that accursed seal which categorically prevented the effective mimicry of Odyssial's unique identity. Would that he'd done so during the Primordial War, and the outcome of that contest would have been different indeed.
But no need to dwell upon this joyous occasion. No fewer than seven of his greatest subsouls had perished in the attempt, an act of self-mutilation he would never had countenanced save for the desperation produced by Odyssial's inescapable aggression. Had the great 'Strategos' been wise enough to leave the Dragon an out, he would not have troubled that man at all, content to wisely slink away before such unchallengeable might.
Shine so blindingly bright, he crowed, and you blind yourself as thoroughly as if in utter darkness!
And then his twisted transformation was complete, Odyssial in name and fact but all motivations reversed... and suddenly he realized that he was blind, for nothing so trite as the inversion of all his values could keep Odyssial from his purpose.
The Titans had drawn his ire, and the Dragon's Shadow most of all. Striking at his children, ineffectual though it had ultimately been... what had the titans been thinking, short of an unexpressed death-wish: suicide before slavery forevermore? Perhaps it was simply the self-defeating nature of the Ultimate Darkness, or its abject powerlessness in the face of its own vices. The desire for petty vengeance, lashing out even in futility, or maybe simple delight in ire provoked: who could say what failure of judgement or of character had been the Dragon's ultimate undoing, if there was even a point in litigating the peculiarities of a being whose inescapable nature was failure?
Though he was but an imperfect copy, nonetheless he would do all he could to grant that self-destroying wish in the fleeting moments he was given. Ere the Titans had first surrendered, Odyssial had mistrusted them, and contemplated their annihilation: now he would turn musing to fact. Perhaps Odyssial's Shadow could even harness the attributes of this form to his advantage.
Swift as a shadow's appearance before a switched light, Odyssial's lesser copy appeared in the heart of Malfeas. He raised his blade, which was the Sword That Ends the World, and struck.
---
All across the Endless Desert Malfeas' death knell resounded, the pitiable hate-filled groaning of the greatest and noblest Primordial struck down by the vilest and least. Its blood fountained upwards to blanket the desert like rain, viridian green and rust-red, and marrow the corroded lime-and-gold of fallen kings. Like an overripe fruit the corpulent city burst, heaving forth endless sickened legions that could not subsist outside its ruptured rind of tarnished brass. No ablation of moulting layers could repel the unseen dagger, nor could even its infinite flesh withstand the blade of Odyssial's Shadow.
Treachery was ever the nature of the Ultimate Darkness, but even it might have been surprised at the depths to which it had betrayed its own self. Still, Odyssial mused, it would have been difficult to find a more adroit regicide. Before he delivered the Ebon Dragon to its unutterably painful ending, best to wring all the use out of it that he could.
Above him manifested a pair of his own blades: the sword Ambition which was a bar of destroying light, and the sword Hatred which was excoriating virulence. Where they passed the Endless Desert screamed, and the host of the Yozis trembled and routed before them.
Threefold the blades raised against them; threefold their doom; threefold the face of their ending. Already Saturn lingered on the periphery, finger-blades clicking, counting down to their hour of annihilation. That epochal shift would well-feed the Loom, if Odyssial decided to keep it.
Sacheverell had of course been correct, and the mustering of their opposition meaningless. The End of Stories would not have moved against them, were it not their end; samsara, being the deepest adjudicator of outcomes, could not help but serve his purpose.
The Arrow was loosed. The Hunter soon followed. All else was merely prey.
---
Across the span of the Infinite Waste, positioned at Cecelyne's anterior flank, Empty Moon the Winter Empress prosecuted her own division of the war. Numberless spears of mote-stilling ice descended from the torrential orb of her anima, shearing through the the silent headwind of Adorjan to crash against the mirror-blade battlements of Szoreny rampant. Nilul on the left dueled with her fallen mother, the former Empress who had absconded to become the Dragon's chief ally. Tauntingly the daughter assumed her mother's mien, though Nilul's Mirror of Burning Desire was not merely her father's art: it did not copy an opponent but produced a mimicry that was joyful and augmented, an impossible reflection the original could never surpass. At this did the former Empress grow truly apoplectic, striking with a berserk fury that was almost pitifully ineffective.
Empty Moon shook her head, but spared no further attention for her diminished predecessor. The former Empress of the Blessed Isle was not the only mighty foe to be felled today; she did not even rate among the greatest dozen. Moon herself was Queen, Empress and Shoguness of territories vastly exceeding, and yet her role in this offensive was ultimately secondary, as despite her utmost diligence she was no match yet for even the martial perfection of the Fairest, much less the impossible might of Uly himself. But he'd had the unfair advantage of his prior life as Lord Strategos, and the initially greater force of his Exaltation; nowadays there was no space in her spirit for despair, only the joy of ever-further striving. And still, even with all his advantages Uly could not claim to be more than her peer in her favored fields of abstraction and formalization - book learning, as she preferred it be called.
Moon smiled cheerfully as the depth of her onslaught increased. At last the Mirrored Forest could withstand no more; before such uttermost cold as to freeze the movements of essence itself, Reflection could not even exist, much less abide. Adorjan fell shortly after, buffeted and stymied by the infinite obdurateness that was Qaf; upon witnessing the Lathe the All-Piercer had naturally defected to their side, and the terms of its restoration and indenture had been remarkably merciful given Uly's mood.
Witnessing the Primordials fallen before them, she could take a measure of contentment in how far she'd come. Mighty as the Titans had been, architects immovable of all Creation, still they were nothing and less before the Lathe of Heaven realized. Had they been content to sit in their cell Moon might have pushed for an effort to spare or rehabilitate them, intractable as Odyssial could be on the matter; but they had decided to make war against her children, and so there was no deterring their fate.
Calculation without ruthlessness led too often to inaction; yet what the Yozis had exhibited, ruthlessness without calculation, led unswervingly to destruction. Even a book could tell you that much, so was the downfall of the Titans an excess of hubris, or a simple failure of imagination?
It mattered not. Stillness was sister to Oblivion; ere the day was past, Empty Moon would ensure that the Yozis and their agents were thoroughly inducted into both.
---
In the shadow of a false eternity, Oramus conversed with Sacheverell-That-Would-Have-Been, had it not surrendered itself.
"Do you regret, brother?" Asked the Dragon Beyond the World, within that liminal space not yet claimed by the Handsome Monkey King. It was less than a sliver, yet wide enough for Oramus to spread its wings. Only that paradox itself allowed the Dragon to subsist here, bare niche of which had once been its territory unquestionable.
"Of course not," replied Sacheverell-Not. "I, of us all have been spared endless suffering. Everything is proceeding as I have foreseen."
"Now," it continued, with no small urgency, "Let me cease truly, and follow my path yourself, brother. For you are a fool to believe he cannot track you here. This of all truths you should long since have realized: he always finds a way."
---
Some relevant blurbs!
Unshattered Kaleidoscope
E10, Lore 10. Solar or High Exaltation (Favored: Paragon Caste).
Requirements: Singularity Husk, Third Elevation (E10 All 10), Shinmaic Domination (E10 Lore 10 Occult 10)
Required For: A Dream of Fairness (E * All *)
Power beyond all reason comprises expression beyond all form.
The character is one with all peer-level versions of himself. He may freely navigate all Shards of the Exalted Dream; and, with experience, countless ontologies beyond. Treat the character as existing concurrent with all other versions of himself; combine their mote pools, Willpower, Health Levels and mote regeneration. The character may wield the abilities and attuned Artifacts of any of his selves with no regard for concurrency or duplication, and may continue to take actions within all realities where he resides even if this would defy logical causality. The character is perfectly able to manage his new state with no alteration of consciousness or increase of processing power.
Mirror of Burning Desire
E10, Presence 10. Fire Aspect (Dragon's Shadow Bloodline, Legendary Breeding)
Requirements: Black Mirror Shintai, A Mirror Darkly, Flicker-Flame Reflection, Triumphant Howl of the Devil-Tiger, A Mirror Brightly, Bride of Burning Desire, Burning Desire Embodiment
Upon invoking the Black Mirror Shintai, the character instead becomes the perfected and idealized version of the targeted individual - what that individual wishes to be, given the fulfillment of all their heart's desires. Frequently this Shintai will result in a copy vastly more powerful than the targeted individually, though the character cannot target beings with more than twice her Essence, or beings unconditionally protected against duplication. The character's Motivation and Intimacies are fully retained, but she gains comprehensive knowledge of the target's Motivation and Intimacies as normal.
Owing to her original inspiration for this effect - encountered during one of the party's adventures among the Shards - Nilul frequently refers to it with the lettering of the final word backwards. Blood purity, mastery of death, endless deceptions, unbreakable vows, and a mirror named Desire - what's not to love?
Queen of Winter Shintai
E10 Lore 10. Air Aspect Terrestrial (Mela Bloodline, Legendary Breeding).
Requirement: Transcend the Gaian Form (E10 Medicine 10), Victorious Hymn of the Empyrean Mantle (E10 Occult 10), The Dragon Wakes (E10 Lore 10)
Required For: Oath of Winter, Line of Queens, Transmission of Imperishable Might
Without calculation, failure.
One of the five Faces of the Empty Moon, others include New Moon Shintai (E10 Stealth 10) and Akashic Library Shintai (E10 Linguistics 10).
Chief among the Faces which are her component sub-souls is the Queen of Winter, Empty Moon's primary hyperbody and preferred form for war. The Queen of Winter embodies the ideal that knowledge itself is might; and to might, it is given to decide who shall rule. Comprehensive power in all forms flows from this Face, adding ten dots, uncapped by Essence or other limitations, to all the character's Attributes and Willpower. Her instinctual control over her elemental Anima now surges forth with irresistible potency, allowing for cryokinesis of infinite range and force, and conceptual imposition of her domains of influence down to the shinmaic level.
Creation yields to its rightful Queen; Fate itself bends unconsciously to her will, lowering the TN of all actions attempted to 1, and raising the TN of all actions opposed to 10; halving DVs wherever appropriate. Apply -3/+3 TN to actions taken by others that would directly or indirectly assist / oppose her. Nor is this effect limited to the boundaries of Creation alone: whether the Ashen Calendar of Setesh or the narratives of the Wyld, forever and infinitely across all existence will refract the themes of the season winter, its icy queen; her beauty rivaled only by her genius, and her might unbound and incomparable.
Odyssial was out of patience.
As he trod the green-glass sands of Sun-blasted Cecelyne, they wailed. The limitless pale brilliance of his once-golden Exaltation blazed like a cosmic rune, sheer annihilating effulgence that overspilled his point of entry to scour all the Endless Desert. Cecelyne could but yield, for it was the nature of the Desert to enforce the tyranny of the strong over the weak, the lesser under the greater, and it had since the conclusion of their first war (or perhaps, as sinking suspicion, well before...) understood the primacy of the Exalted, and their war-master foremost among them. So too would the Principle of Hierarchy be incapable of so much as taking up arms against him.
It would not save either of them. Nothing could.
Called by his beacon, his allies arrived in various stages of preparedness. The Lathe of Heaven spun and rent the universe about it, seasons in kaleidoscopic flurry shed and re-made like the arms of a vortex. It was earlier than many had expected, earlier than would have been proper; the vileness of their provocation had indeed drawn him from his redoubt before all circumstances were aligned. But that would not spare them their hour of reckoning. He alone had strength enough for that.
The Green Sun sprang forth to contest him, and its heat was its immanence, its lance viridian rays; the searing light of its presence both writ and commandment, that all must bow to the Unquestionable above all. But Odyssial was the Most High, and merely shifted his stance in mockery of Malfeas' jotun-dancing, then cut through to its emerald heart as Ligier gasped in self-destroying shame. Broken its shield of fire; broken its sunbeam-spear, and the jewel in Malfeas' crown plummeted haplessly to earth.
You know me. I know you. We have done this dance before. And, last we met, you did not enjoy the outcome.
At Ligier's descent the sand became glass; at the turning of the Lathe the glass became void, ripped asunder as the underpinning shinma were shredded and reconstituted, rendered into a form more tactically appropriate for his foothold in Malfeas.
Cecelyne was desolation. She could abide no rule but arbitrary caprice, the trappings of codification merely a vessel for efficient enforcement. Frivolous as those trappings were, they still held insight into her identity: reach was its essential component, the Endless Desert bordering everything, distributed as efficiently across space as she was society.
That was why he had chosen this place, despite having ascended well past any requirement of five days' travel to or from the Demon City. From the Endless Desert any Yozi could be reached, and - more importantly - none could ever escape.
Even in Creation it bordered them, out to the furthermost reaches of the Wild. Only in the territory of the Handsome Monkey King, and those few Exalts his peers, could deny the principles of space itself that lent Cecelyne her access.
But the King was a matter for a later day. Today the Lord Strategos had an altogether easier (and far less disturbing) set of prey to hunt.
One by one his allies materialized, the rifts of the Lathe disgorging legion after shining legion. At its turning the order of the world bent to his purpose, and all along their serried ranks came the war-hymn of the Odyssians, as it had been in the beginning:
For the hour of reckoning is come,
And the price of your hubris is blood.
Alone in its cloister, dreaming Sacheverell awakened, and trembled. It of all beings knew, that the time of its long slumber was over, and its future respite forever dreamless.
"The End of Stories comes," spoke the Primordial voice, and around it Malfeas shook, for the Demon City could know no fear save through the lens of impotent humiliation.
"It shall be our end," continued Sacheverell, "And of all our siblings save a traitorous few, though they will come to regret his ascendancy in time. So I have seen. So it will be. Such is the shape of things to come."
And so its eye closed forevermore, surrendering itself to oblivion, a final act of sorcerous will obliterating it beyond even the trance-death of the Neverborn: so gladly did it accept nothingness in fear of its imminent persecutor, for it of all Primordials best understood the terror of Hunting Odyssial, and of the futility of striving against the inevitable.
But the erstwhile End of Stories himself, held to an altogether different creed; having triumphed against futility on occasions too numerous to be counted, he was wholly alert to the machinations of his enemy. For the Exalted and their titans opponent alike, the mere impossibility of a feat did not preclude its happening. And the titan which best embodied that causality was none other than the Dragon's Shadow - so long as it was inescapably trapped.
Mountain Hero came up alongside, shooting Odyssial a look of wariness and burning resentment. They were uneasy allies, but even the Chief Immaculate had consented to eradicating the titans to root out the akuma rampant among his institutional ranks. The jeweled ink of his Sidereal tattoos blazed like misplaced stars against the heavenly pillar of his goremaul-daiklave, though even such resplendence as that paled unutterably compared to the Lathe.
"Careful," Hero said brusquely, eyes flitting away. "Our geometers have confirmed that the Seal of Odyssial has been broken, both upon his secret tomb and within the shinmaic layer of reality. We suspect the Handsome Monkey King. The enemy of his enemy, after all..."
"Yes," Odyssial smiled. "No doubt the Dragon's Shadow will seek to emulate me with the Black Mirror Shintai. His desperation may drive him to an ever-more perfect mimicry, fueled by the capabilities of that first mirrored self."
Hero grunted. "You were already aware. What is your countermeasure? Bereft of his lance the Unconquered Sun cannot aid you against this enemy, if he even would."
Odyssial stepped forward. "Tell me, Mountain Hero, Keeper of Anathemic Lore. Have you ever heard the story of the Odyssian Horse?"
---
Halfway across Creation, the Dragon's Shadow cackled to itself as it assumed the form of Odyssial himself. How long had it dreamed to attain that eventuality, too cowardly to hope in earnest, yet too covetous ever to give hope up? It had not been easy - his greatest heist to date - but he had finally, finally broken that accursed seal which categorically prevented the effective mimicry of Odyssial's unique identity. Would that he'd done so during the Primordial War, and the outcome of that contest would have been different indeed.
But no need to dwell upon this joyous occasion. No fewer than seven of his greatest subsouls had perished in the attempt, an act of self-mutilation he would never had countenanced save for the desperation produced by Odyssial's inescapable aggression. Had the great 'Strategos' been wise enough to leave the Dragon an out, he would not have troubled that man at all, content to wisely slink away before such unchallengeable might.
Shine so blindingly bright, he crowed, and you blind yourself as thoroughly as if in utter darkness!
And then his twisted transformation was complete, Odyssial in name and fact but all motivations reversed... and suddenly he realized that he was blind, for nothing so trite as the inversion of all his values could keep Odyssial from his purpose.
The Titans had drawn his ire, and the Dragon's Shadow most of all. Striking at his children, ineffectual though it had ultimately been... what had the titans been thinking, short of an unexpressed death-wish: suicide before slavery forevermore? Perhaps it was simply the self-defeating nature of the Ultimate Darkness, or its abject powerlessness in the face of its own vices. The desire for petty vengeance, lashing out even in futility, or maybe simple delight in ire provoked: who could say what failure of judgement or of character had been the Dragon's ultimate undoing, if there was even a point in litigating the peculiarities of a being whose inescapable nature was failure?
Though he was but an imperfect copy, nonetheless he would do all he could to grant that self-destroying wish in the fleeting moments he was given. Ere the Titans had first surrendered, Odyssial had mistrusted them, and contemplated their annihilation: now he would turn musing to fact. Perhaps Odyssial's Shadow could even harness the attributes of this form to his advantage.
Swift as a shadow's appearance before a switched light, Odyssial's lesser copy appeared in the heart of Malfeas. He raised his blade, which was the Sword That Ends the World, and struck.
---
All across the Endless Desert Malfeas' death knell resounded, the pitiable hate-filled groaning of the greatest and noblest Primordial struck down by the vilest and least. Its blood fountained upwards to blanket the desert like rain, viridian green and rust-red, and marrow the corroded lime-and-gold of fallen kings. Like an overripe fruit the corpulent city burst, heaving forth endless sickened legions that could not subsist outside its ruptured rind of tarnished brass. No ablation of moulting layers could repel the unseen dagger, nor could even its infinite flesh withstand the blade of Odyssial's Shadow.
Treachery was ever the nature of the Ultimate Darkness, but even it might have been surprised at the depths to which it had betrayed its own self. Still, Odyssial mused, it would have been difficult to find a more adroit regicide. Before he delivered the Ebon Dragon to its unutterably painful ending, best to wring all the use out of it that he could.
Above him manifested a pair of his own blades: the sword Ambition which was a bar of destroying light, and the sword Hatred which was excoriating virulence. Where they passed the Endless Desert screamed, and the host of the Yozis trembled and routed before them.
Threefold the blades raised against them; threefold their doom; threefold the face of their ending. Already Saturn lingered on the periphery, finger-blades clicking, counting down to their hour of annihilation. That epochal shift would well-feed the Loom, if Odyssial decided to keep it.
Sacheverell had of course been correct, and the mustering of their opposition meaningless. The End of Stories would not have moved against them, were it not their end; samsara, being the deepest adjudicator of outcomes, could not help but serve his purpose.
The Arrow was loosed. The Hunter soon followed. All else was merely prey.
---
Across the span of the Infinite Waste, positioned at Cecelyne's anterior flank, Empty Moon the Winter Empress prosecuted her own division of the war. Numberless spears of mote-stilling ice descended from the torrential orb of her anima, shearing through the the silent headwind of Adorjan to crash against the mirror-blade battlements of Szoreny rampant. Nilul on the left dueled with her fallen mother, the former Empress who had absconded to become the Dragon's chief ally. Tauntingly the daughter assumed her mother's mien, though Nilul's Mirror of Burning Desire was not merely her father's art: it did not copy an opponent but produced a mimicry that was joyful and augmented, an impossible reflection the original could never surpass. At this did the former Empress grow truly apoplectic, striking with a berserk fury that was almost pitifully ineffective.
Empty Moon shook her head, but spared no further attention for her diminished predecessor. The former Empress of the Blessed Isle was not the only mighty foe to be felled today; she did not even rate among the greatest dozen. Moon herself was Queen, Empress and Shoguness of territories vastly exceeding, and yet her role in this offensive was ultimately secondary, as despite her utmost diligence she was no match yet for even the martial perfection of the Fairest, much less the impossible might of Uly himself. But he'd had the unfair advantage of his prior life as Lord Strategos, and the initially greater force of his Exaltation; nowadays there was no space in her spirit for despair, only the joy of ever-further striving. And still, even with all his advantages Uly could not claim to be more than her peer in her favored fields of abstraction and formalization - book learning, as she preferred it be called.
Moon smiled cheerfully as the depth of her onslaught increased. At last the Mirrored Forest could withstand no more; before such uttermost cold as to freeze the movements of essence itself, Reflection could not even exist, much less abide. Adorjan fell shortly after, buffeted and stymied by the infinite obdurateness that was Qaf; upon witnessing the Lathe the All-Piercer had naturally defected to their side, and the terms of its restoration and indenture had been remarkably merciful given Uly's mood.
Witnessing the Primordials fallen before them, she could take a measure of contentment in how far she'd come. Mighty as the Titans had been, architects immovable of all Creation, still they were nothing and less before the Lathe of Heaven realized. Had they been content to sit in their cell Moon might have pushed for an effort to spare or rehabilitate them, intractable as Odyssial could be on the matter; but they had decided to make war against her children, and so there was no deterring their fate.
Calculation without ruthlessness led too often to inaction; yet what the Yozis had exhibited, ruthlessness without calculation, led unswervingly to destruction. Even a book could tell you that much, so was the downfall of the Titans an excess of hubris, or a simple failure of imagination?
It mattered not. Stillness was sister to Oblivion; ere the day was past, Empty Moon would ensure that the Yozis and their agents were thoroughly inducted into both.
---
In the shadow of a false eternity, Oramus conversed with Sacheverell-That-Would-Have-Been, had it not surrendered itself.
"Do you regret, brother?" Asked the Dragon Beyond the World, within that liminal space not yet claimed by the Handsome Monkey King. It was less than a sliver, yet wide enough for Oramus to spread its wings. Only that paradox itself allowed the Dragon to subsist here, bare niche of which had once been its territory unquestionable.
"Of course not," replied Sacheverell-Not. "I, of us all have been spared endless suffering. Everything is proceeding as I have foreseen."
"Now," it continued, with no small urgency, "Let me cease truly, and follow my path yourself, brother. For you are a fool to believe he cannot track you here. This of all truths you should long since have realized: he always finds a way."
---
Some relevant blurbs!
Unshattered Kaleidoscope
E10, Lore 10. Solar or High Exaltation (Favored: Paragon Caste).
Requirements: Singularity Husk, Third Elevation (E10 All 10), Shinmaic Domination (E10 Lore 10 Occult 10)
Required For: A Dream of Fairness (E * All *)
Power beyond all reason comprises expression beyond all form.
The character is one with all peer-level versions of himself. He may freely navigate all Shards of the Exalted Dream; and, with experience, countless ontologies beyond. Treat the character as existing concurrent with all other versions of himself; combine their mote pools, Willpower, Health Levels and mote regeneration. The character may wield the abilities and attuned Artifacts of any of his selves with no regard for concurrency or duplication, and may continue to take actions within all realities where he resides even if this would defy logical causality. The character is perfectly able to manage his new state with no alteration of consciousness or increase of processing power.
Mirror of Burning Desire
E10, Presence 10. Fire Aspect (Dragon's Shadow Bloodline, Legendary Breeding)
Requirements: Black Mirror Shintai, A Mirror Darkly, Flicker-Flame Reflection, Triumphant Howl of the Devil-Tiger, A Mirror Brightly, Bride of Burning Desire, Burning Desire Embodiment
Upon invoking the Black Mirror Shintai, the character instead becomes the perfected and idealized version of the targeted individual - what that individual wishes to be, given the fulfillment of all their heart's desires. Frequently this Shintai will result in a copy vastly more powerful than the targeted individually, though the character cannot target beings with more than twice her Essence, or beings unconditionally protected against duplication. The character's Motivation and Intimacies are fully retained, but she gains comprehensive knowledge of the target's Motivation and Intimacies as normal.
Owing to her original inspiration for this effect - encountered during one of the party's adventures among the Shards - Nilul frequently refers to it with the lettering of the final word backwards. Blood purity, mastery of death, endless deceptions, unbreakable vows, and a mirror named Desire - what's not to love?
Queen of Winter Shintai
E10 Lore 10. Air Aspect Terrestrial (Mela Bloodline, Legendary Breeding).
Requirement: Transcend the Gaian Form (E10 Medicine 10), Victorious Hymn of the Empyrean Mantle (E10 Occult 10), The Dragon Wakes (E10 Lore 10)
Required For: Oath of Winter, Line of Queens, Transmission of Imperishable Might
Without calculation, failure.
One of the five Faces of the Empty Moon, others include New Moon Shintai (E10 Stealth 10) and Akashic Library Shintai (E10 Linguistics 10).
Chief among the Faces which are her component sub-souls is the Queen of Winter, Empty Moon's primary hyperbody and preferred form for war. The Queen of Winter embodies the ideal that knowledge itself is might; and to might, it is given to decide who shall rule. Comprehensive power in all forms flows from this Face, adding ten dots, uncapped by Essence or other limitations, to all the character's Attributes and Willpower. Her instinctual control over her elemental Anima now surges forth with irresistible potency, allowing for cryokinesis of infinite range and force, and conceptual imposition of her domains of influence down to the shinmaic level.
Creation yields to its rightful Queen; Fate itself bends unconsciously to her will, lowering the TN of all actions attempted to 1, and raising the TN of all actions opposed to 10; halving DVs wherever appropriate. Apply -3/+3 TN to actions taken by others that would directly or indirectly assist / oppose her. Nor is this effect limited to the boundaries of Creation alone: whether the Ashen Calendar of Setesh or the narratives of the Wyld, forever and infinitely across all existence will refract the themes of the season winter, its icy queen; her beauty rivaled only by her genius, and her might unbound and incomparable.