Humanity. Accursed, wretched things, so blind to the truth. You, who have seen the truth of them, go forth without falter. Another ordeal awaits you there;
For you wished to bring forth a Silent Revolution. O King of Bel, why do you forsake your throne?
You don't know why you're even bothering.
Your compulsory education is over and done with, and there's absolutely no reason for you to be here on this train. In more ways than one, you've done your time already.
And after the Lockdown, after everything you'd seen and done, the thought of returning to school, returning to society as "an ordinary high schooler..."
...regardless of that. The invitation you had received from an anonymous benefactor within the Kirijo Group had implied that it was very much a bad idea to decline. It was funny, really. There weren't many kids your age who would decline an offer of a free ride at the prestigious Gekkoukan High School with no strings attached and reject it outright. There were probably even fewer still who would have simply gotten the same offer, worded more insistently, and thought to decline it a second time.
Still, you hadn't survived the Lockdown and the Ordeal within it by picking fights you couldn't win.
[] It's only been a few weeks since then. Everything is still quite raw, and fresh in your mind. Truth be told, you're not even sure that you're ready to do anything just yet. Maybe you never will be.
[] It's been a few months since then, and things are beginning to dull for you. Still, some scars never fade, and those experiences will be with you forever.
[] It's been over a year since then, and anything that time would take, it has. Not that it matters, because those days are firmly in the past. You aren't needed now, and you won't be.
So here you were, boarding a train bound for Tatsumi Port Island, home of the world-famous Gekkoukan High. Regardless of your feelings, it seems your life as "an ordinary high school student" is about to begin.
"Please stand clear of the closing doors. The next stop is..."
You turn up the volume on your headphones, and tune out the world. It's going to be a while before your train gets to Iwatodai.
[] That's why you took one of the early morning trains. There's no sense in putting things off.
[] That's why you took one of the mid-afternoon trains. You wanted to enjoy the last days of your peaceful drifting through the world you helped to save.
[] That's why you took the last train of the day. They were going to have you for an entire year; so they can afford to wait for as long as you can make them wait.
And as the train begins to pull away from the station with you on board, you can only think to yourself...
[] This is as fine a time as any to take a nap.
[] This is as fine a time as any to review...
Do not be alarmed. More character generation waits for you at the end of your next choice, regardless of what it may be.
This is primarily to be a narrative quest; as such, statistics and numbers (where they appear) have less weight here. This may change in the future but is unlikely to for a while.
Major Characters
The Protagonist
Name: Kazuya Minegishi Title: The True and Rightful King Of Bel Age: 16 Alignment: Humanity
This is you, Kazuya Minegishi. The Hero. Caught in an unreasonable fate and subjected to an Ordeal, you didn't merely survive - you thrived. The power you wield is phenomenal and it serves humanity on your word alone.
HP: 100% MP: 100% Mood: OK Health: Good, no ailments
Neutral to everything
Bonds Yukari Takeba: (II) A manifestation of the trust she placed in you, and you in her. This Bond is providing you with the ability to share small amounts of power with Yukari. Akihiko Sanada: (I) A fragile Bond that has begun to form from the seeds of your hesitant partnership. This Bond will provide returns if it is nurtured and strengthened.
You were one of the Demon Summoners who had been caught in the Yamanote Lockdown. For seven long days, you fought across an endless battlefield to keep your friends alive and discover the truth behind your fate. Your drive and desire to save everyone caused you to step into the middle of a greater battle for the Throne of Bel.
With the help of Atsuro Kihara, Cain your cousin Naoya, and all your friends, you defeated the summoning server Babel on the final day. By this action, you won the War of Bel. Your choice to then place that power into the hands of humanity did not constitute an abdication of your Throne. For seven months you turned your eyes and covered your ears to the truth. For one single, glorious instant, you embraced the truth instead.
You were brought to Gekkoukan by the efforts of one Shuji Ikutsuki, the school's Chairman of the Board and Club Advisor to the "Specialized Extracurricular Execution Squad" - a high-school club that professes to fight the Shadows. After some trepidation, you've agreed to assist this SEES with exploration of Tartarus despite some serious misgivings on your part with the way they operate.
Human-demon hybrid
Demons are powerful spiritual beings but ultimately incapable of true growth. Humans are spiritually weak but possess infinite capacity for growth. In most cases of fusion, the demonic power overwhelms the human, resulting in conversion. You are the exceedingly rare exception, a stable combination of raw power with unlimited potential to grow. Take care not to let this fusion come unbalanced.
Magic focus: Your growth throughout the Ordeal was focused on Magic. You can command and control the elements fairly easily and are a devastating opponent for those weak against magical power. By contrast, you have nothing to fear from magical attacks.
Nearly mortal body: By contrast, you never cared overly much about your physique. The harmonizer was always the only real barrier between you and being torn to shreds by so much as an errant claw or blade. If there's a way to gain superhuman strength or durability through your power, you don't know what it is. Even if you did, your body is not appreciably different from any other average teenage boy's, and you've been skipping out on the gym for months now. You'll need to be careful not to get hit.
The King of Bel
You are the True and Rightful King regardless of who or what occupies your Throne. The Summoning Server draws on your power at your pleasure. Your authority exists outside of the code and policy that composes it. As such, you can negate any of the Server's functions by denying them your power. If you knew how, you might be able to command the Server as well. Unfortunately, you're too afraid of the potential blowback from an errant or poorly-worded command to even think about experimenting.
Encyclopedia Daemonica: Knowledge is but one more form of power that the Throne has accumulated and made available to you. This manifested as the initial surge of combat-relevant information which pumped itself into your head when you called on the Throne's power. It has since gone dormant. You'd need to know how to access the knowledge to gain the knowledge of how to access it, and the only way you know how to do that right now has potentially devastating consequences.
Domination: The power of any King is to Rule, and you are no exception. You can command demons and subjugate them in accordance to the strength of your will and your power. This won't work if your will is too weak in comparison, or if you find yourself unable to draw the necessary amount of power. And if it fails... well, suffice it to say, you're too afraid of the consequences to experiment.
Staff proficiency: Basic.
Your ability to wield this weapon is textbook, driven almost purely by an infusion of knowledge from the Throne, and your physical condition is horribly mismatched to that knowledge - you'll need to apply yourself to training this, and you could certainly benefit from a teacher besides. Textbook exercises only get you so far.
Combat magic: Highly skilled.
Your ascension merely reinforced the aptitude for magic that you've possessed your entire life. Your experiences in the Lockdown opened a door of understanding that was fated to open eventually. From first principles onward, your grasp of magic is substantial, but you're acutely aware that there is so much more to discover.
Rusty from disuse: It's been a long time since the Lockdown and you don't have access to any of the notes or your old COMP anymore. As such, it's a little bit harder for you to get back into casting as of yet... but it's like riding a bicycle. You never really forget.
Summoning: LOCKED.
You fear the consequences too greatly to do anything with this power.
Equipment
Simple Quarterstaff: A standard wooden staff fit for beginners. (Provides no bonuses or penalties.) (Equipped)
Outfits
Gekkoukan High School Boy's Uniform: The standard-issue uniform indicating you as a second-year student at Gekkoukan High.
Casual outfit: A long-sleeved black shirt and red pants. Other than your uniform, this is basically it as far as clothes you own.
Accessories
Headphones: Your favorite pair of white over-ear headphones. The wires look kind of like cat ears. (Provides immunity to panic and charm.) (Equipped)
Miscellaneous
Smartphone: Your old MP3 player finally gave out, and you got a modern smartphone to replace it.
S.E.E.S
Yukari Takeba
Name: Yukari Takeba Title: No Title Age: 16 Alignment: SEES (?)
She's the first classmate you met, one of the core members of SEES, and someone who very much wants to be your friend.
HP: 100% MP: 100% Mood: OK Health: Good, no ailments
Resists Puncture | Weak to Strike
Resists Wind | Weak to Electricty
Immune to Expel
Bonds Kazuya Minegishi: (II) A manifestation of the trust she placed in you, and you in her. This Bond is providing Yukari with the ability to share small amounts of power with you.
Yukari-san finally earned first name basis with you after trying to defend you by stepping in between you and a monster. Unfortunately, she wasn't nearly as ready as she needed to be for live combat, and you ended up having to save her, instead.
Once you recovered from the fallout of your choice, Yukari-san was there and waiting for you in the hospital. She obviously cared a lot for your predicament, and chose to put her entire life story before you for you to judge as an apology for what had happened up to now. You decided to repay her apology by meeting her halfway. She's earned that limited trust by keeping those secrets you shared for you, allowing you to decide what and how you tell her teammates in SEES.
Persona-user
Persona-users have a natural resistance to the powers of the Collective Unconscious, instinctively drawing on their Persona as a shield against them. As such, they are able to fight against Shadows on even footing and safely operate in environments such as the Dark Hour. With practice, this ability to channel Persona can be leveraged to provide the user with supernatural strength, speed, durability and reflexes, as well as enabling them to use the Persona's abilities as their own. Additionally, a Persona-user can manifest their Persona outside of their own body, utilizing it for offense and defense.
Evoker dependency: Yukari's potential to wield Persona awakened without any of the self-discovery or spiritual growth needed to fully utilize it. While passive resistance to the Dark Hour and Shadows is instinctual, active applications such as channeling are beyond her. Worse yet, she requires an Evoker to fully manifest her Persona for combat. Correctable problems, but one must first know and accept that there's a problem before it can be corrected.
Bow proficiency: Skilled.
Yukari has years of practical experience with longbows owing to her position on the Gekkoukan High School Archery team. Granted, varsity target practice is a long way from live fire combat, but her service time has given her both the strength and skill necessary to aim and fire true. If you give her the time and space to line up her shots properly, she's capable of dealing a lot of damage.
Persona (Io): Basic.
Yukari's Initial Persona is Io - a former priestess of the goddess Hera who was transformed into a cow by Zeus. Io is affiliated with the Lovers Arcana, support magic, healing, and the element of Wind. Yukari is receiving her current elemental affinities passively from Io.
When summoned, Io can cast Garu, Patra, and Dia. Other skills will become available as Yukari grows stronger.
Junpei Iori
Name: Junpei Iori Title: No Title Age: 16 Alignment: Neutral
Easy-going and overly friendly, Junpei is the second classmate you met and the most recent addition to SEES.
HP: 100% MP: 100% Mood: OK Health: Good, no ailments
Neutral to physical attacks
Resists Fire | Weak to Wind
Immune to Expel
Bonds
None.
Loud, friendly, and the life of the party, it was weird to see Iori-san so completely freaked out over some bad dreams. With a little further research and the right questioning, you learned that his 'bad dreams' were actually him awakening to his potential as a Persona-user. You gave him time to process that grim reality and he left before you could follow up with him to provide him more options for how to proceed.
What happens next is as much in Iori-san's court as it is anyone else's...
Persona-user
Persona-users have a natural resistance to the powers of the Collective Unconscious, instinctively drawing on their Persona as a shield against them. As such, they are able to fight against Shadows on even footing and safely operate in environments such as the Dark Hour. With practice, this ability to channel Persona can be leveraged to provide the user with supernatural strength, speed, durability and reflexes, as well as enabling them to use the Persona's abilities as their own. Additionally, a Persona-user can manifest their Persona outside of their own body, utilizing it for offense and defense.
Evoker dependency: Junpei's potential to wield Persona awakened without any of the self-discovery or spiritual growth needed to fully utilize it. While passive resistance to the Dark Hour and Shadows is instinctual, active applications such as channeling are beyond him. Worse yet, he requires an Evoker to fully manifest his Persona for combat. Correctable problems, but one must first know and accept that there's a problem before it can be corrected.
Club proficiency: Basic.
Junpei is not a trained fighter. He's packing enough raw athleticism and strength to make up for having no technique, and is most comfortable with a bat or a mace in his hands... or whatever blunt pole-shaped object he can grab.
Rumormongering: Skilled.
Junpei is extremely plugged in to the pulse of the student body at Gekkoukan. If there's a rumor circulating amongst your classmates, he'll know about it, and he's more than capable of starting and manipulating rumors himself. In another timeline, he was 'encouraged' not to utilize this talent by Yukari Takeba and others, and so allowed it to atrophy. But there's a certain undeniable power to rumors, and it'd be a shame to let this talent go to waste...
Persona (Hermes): Basic.
Junpei's Initial Persona is Hermes - youngest of the Twelve Olympians and the messenger of the gods. Hermes is affiliated with the Magician Arcana, force of will, manipulation, and the element of Fire.
When summoned, Hermes can cast Cleave and Agi. Other skills will become available as Junpei grows stronger.
Mitsuru Kirijo
Name: Mitsuru Kirijo Title: Club President of S.E.E.S Age: 17 Alignment: SEES
Scion of the Kirijo Group's leading family and its primary heir, Mitsuru tries to be the unmovable rock at the center of her team.
HP: 100% MP: 100% Mood: Concerned Health: Good, no ailments
Nullifies Strike | Weak to Slash
Resists Ice | Resists Electricity | Weak to Fire
Immune to Expel
Bonds Akihiko Sanada: (V) An unbreakable Bond forged in the fires of a war fought by two teenagers against an entire world of monsters. This Bond is providing Mitsuru with enhanced resistance to Strikes and Electricity as well as the ability to share power with Akihiko.
Kirijo-sempai has supposedly been working hard to keep you right where you are in Iwatodai. Whether that's because she's concerned for you or for her company's image is an open question.
It turns out that this is at least in part due to Kirijo-sempai needing your help with Tartarus exploration. She's hiding things behind incomplete truths and assumptions of irrelevance, and you don't know the right questions to ask to get her to reveal those secrets. So you're not comfortable entrusting yourself fully to her either. But you've agreed to help with Tartarus exploration, if not much else.
Persona-user
Persona-users have a natural resistance to the powers of the Collective Unconscious, instinctively drawing on their Persona as a shield against them. As such, they are able to fight against Shadows on even footing and safely operate in environments such as the Dark Hour. With practice, this ability to channel Persona can be leveraged to provide the user with supernatural strength, speed, durability and reflexes, as well as enabling them to use the Persona's abilities as their own. Additionally, a Persona-user can manifest their Persona outside of their own body, utilizing it for offense and defense.
Evoker dependency: Mitsuru's potential to wield Persona awakened without any of the self-discovery or spiritual growth needed to fully utilize it. While passive resistance to the Dark Hour and Shadows is instinctual, active applications such as channeling are beyond her. Worse yet, she requires an Evoker to fully manifest her Persona for combat. Correctable problems, but one must first know and accept that there's a problem before it can be corrected.
Rapier proficiency: Skilled.
Mitsuru has benefited from the finest instruction money can buy in the fine combat arts of fencing. She's more than capable of holding her own both on the piste and a live combat field. While you can't expect her to pack the devastating power of her compatriots into a single strike, she outpaces them in attack frequency and is more than effective with the strategy of 'death by 1000 strikes.'
Riding: Skilled.
Mitsuru has also benefited from the finest instruction money can buy in the world of motorsports. She's licensed and highly proficient with both motorcycles and standard cars, whether the setting is on-road or off-road. You suspect she's got plenty of equestrian experience as well, but there hasn't been an occasion to confirm that.
Persona (Penthesilea): Basic.
Mitsuru's Initial Persona is Penthesilea - Amazon queen and the daughter of Ares, god of war. Penthesilea is affiliated with the Empress Arcana, protection, support, and the element of Ice. Mitsuru is receiving her current elemental affinities passively from Penthesilea.
Extrasensory Perception: Penthesilea has a weak sensory/analysis aspect. Mitsuru requires specialized technology to use it effectively.
When summoned, Penthesilea can cast Marin Karin, Marin Karin, Marin Karin and Marin Karin. Bufu, Rakukaja, and Sukunda. Other skills will become available as Mitsuru grows stronger.
Akihiko Sanada
Name: Akihiko Sanada Title: Boxing Team Captain and SEES Field Leader Age: 17 Alignment: SEES
Part of the core founding membership of SEES, Akihiko is a powerful fighter and determined to look after his juniors.
HP: 100% MP: 100% Mood: Concerned Health: Good, no ailments
Nullifies Strike | Weak to Puncture
Resists Electricity
Immune to Expel
Bonds Mitsuru Kirijo: (V) An unbreakable Bond forged in the fires of a war fought by two teenagers against an entire world of monsters. This Bond is providing Akihiko with enhanced resistance to Strikes and Ice as well as the ability to share power with Mitsuru. Kazuya Minegishi: (I) A fragile Bond that has begun to form from the seeds of your hesitant partnership. This Bond will provide returns if it is nurtured and strengthened.
Sanada-sempai is the man responsible for 'leading SEES from the front.' Like any good sempai, he's trying to look out for you, even if you don't entirely agree with his 'death tower dungeon exploration as training' strategies. He's probably keeping 'Mitsuru's' secrets for her, you can tell they're close, but other than that he's refreshingly honest and straightforward.
Persona-user
Persona-users have a natural resistance to the powers of the Collective Unconscious, instinctively drawing on their Persona as a shield against them. As such, they are able to fight against Shadows on even footing and safely operate in environments such as the Dark Hour. With practice, this ability to channel Persona can be leveraged to provide the user with supernatural strength, speed, durability and reflexes, as well as enabling them to use the Persona's abilities as their own. Additionally, a Persona-user can manifest their Persona outside of their own body, utilizing it for offense and defense.
Evoker dependency: Akihiko's potential to wield Persona awakened without any of the self-discovery or spiritual growth needed to fully utilize it. While passive resistance to the Dark Hour and Shadows is instinctual, active applications such as channeling are beyond him. Worse yet, he requires an Evoker to fully manifest his Persona for combat. Correctable problems, but one must first know and accept that there's a problem before it can be corrected.
Boxing proficiency: Skilled.
Akihiko is a trained fighter and his title as Team Captain is not just for show. With the right combination of strength, combat intellect, and pure athleticism, Akihiko is the best member of SEES to have at your side in a fistfight, or leading from the front.
Persona (Pollux): Basic.
Aikihiko's Initial Persona is Pollux - son of Zeus twin brother of the mortal Castor with whom he shared a mother but not a father. Pollux is affiliated with the Emperor Arcana, physical prowess, control, and the element of Electricity. Akihiko is receiving his current elemental affinities passively from Pollux.
When summoned, Pollux can cast Storm Punch, Zio, Tarukaja, and Rakunda. Other skills will become available as Akihiko grows stronger.
And just in case, one more post in case we need it for something else later. Along with it, do note that this is my first time writing anything in a long time, I may make mistakes and I thank you all for your patience and support. Together, we will make this the best quest possible.
You may begin making your choices. As always, we ask only that you accept the consequences of your actions.
EDIT, 11/6/18: Turns out the thing we need it for later is a world map of sorts. Enclosed, you'll find all the places you know about along with some brief descriptions and a rough overview of what you can expect if you commit to spending time there.
EDIT, 11/18/18: Spell glossary unlocked! As this is a narrative-focused quest there is very little mechanical information and you (or NPCs) will be able to deviate from the spellbook at any time if inclined. However, this is a good refresher/reference for what a bunch of the weird words that Atlus uses instead of just saying "Fire" or "Cure" mean as well as a possible source of inspiration for future write-in votes of creative exploitation of element magic.
Iwatodai City
Summary
Capital of Hyōgo Prefecture and the fifth-largest city in the Japan of this universe - Iwatodai has replaced Kobe wholesale both geographically and historically. (In the US of this universe, you can indeed overpay for something labeled 'Iwatodai beef' that almost certainly didn't come from Iwatodai at all.) It's slightly larger and more populated than Kobe is in reality due to the Kirijo Group's distorting influence, which hangs heavily over the entire city. It's not all bad, as the Kirijo Group takes its own talk of being responsible public citizens very seriously and the effects are felt from the meticulously kept streets all the way up to the lavishly funded and expansive education system. Still, there are plenty of reasons to be uncomfortable with "Kirijo City" and plenty of people voicing those reasons. Some are louder than others.
Places of Interest
Iwatodai Station: One of the central nodes in the extensive Japanese national railway system. You can go basically anywhere that trains run from here, though you may need to transfer once or twice more. Other than that, there's the usual assortment of door-stopper bookstores, business-attire clothes shops, and so on that you can find at any sufficiently large transportation hub. You don't have any reason to spend time here.
Station District: Your standard big-city mixed-use neighborhood, with surface-level restaurants and cafes providing an approachable buffer against the imposing high-rises (mostly offices and hotels, but a couple of apartment towers, too.) Your dorm, at four stories, is actually the smallest building in this neighborhood. In another timeline, you might have been able to visit an old bookstore and form a Bond with an old couple. But that store closed...
Shomonkai Shrine: A warded shrine just outside of the entertainment district belonging to the Shomonkai. The priestess in charge of this shrine has stated her mission is to provide spiritual guidance and nurturing... you're pretty sure she means 'magic assistance.' In any case, spending time here will offer you a chance to work on magic in a slightly better equipped environment than self-teaching in your room. The only cost? Having to listen to the Shomonkai sermonize about their Savior and the path.
Entertainment District: The safe kind of entertainment district, packed with kid-friendly arcades and exercise-disguised-as-play. It's easy to imagine a neighborhood like this coming about as the logical result of an enormous workforce needing a safe place to deposit children who might otherwise be interfering with work or study. As you are not a child who needs to be tricked into exhausting themselves with rock climbing or ropes courses, you probably won't be coming here much of your own volition.
You can spend time here at a parkour gym to improve your own speed and reflexes, and of course, learn parkour... that is to say, you could do that, given the proper motivation.
Iwatodai Dorm: your place of dwelling for the next year. It doesn't feel like home yet, but you're working on that. You've taken charge of its kitchen because nobody else was using it. For some reason the dorm is very under-occupied and it's quite easy to stay out of your dormmates' ways.
You can spend time here in the kitchen. Cooking food has a variety of beneficial effects, makes you feel good, and makes others feel good too. They say the way to someone's heart is through the stomach!
You can spend time here in the privacy and security of your room working on any given project that doesn't require access to some other space. (Certain projects may benefit from this, others may be hindered.)
Tatsumi Port Island
Summary
A crowning achievement of mankind's capacity to create from nothing, Tatsumi is an entirely artificial landmass off the coast of Iwatodai. Owing to its nature as a man-made island, everything is meticulously planned, placed, and maintained. This island serves as the location of the Gekkoukan Academies elevator system; a meticulous pipeline carrying the local children (and the best from the rest of Japan) from preschool through compulsory education to high school and on to university, and then into stable long-term employment with the Kirijo Group. Not coincidentally, several major Kirijo Group research facilities and offices are also scattered throughout the island.
Places of Interest
Gekkoukan High School: Your place of compulsory education for at least the next year. Shuji Ikutsuki is the Chairman of the Board here and considered it worth "inviting" you here on a full scholarship... although you get the feeling that he wasn't actually asking. Some part of you is interested in finding the line, some part of you is interested in jumping over the line at full speed, and some part of you just wants to try and make the most of your days here.
You spend time here on various school activities, chief among them your classes. You may vote to engage in various delinquent activities such as flagrant tardiness or truancy, but there will be consequences for doing so.
Bless element: The equivalent of "cure," roughly speaking. Bless-affiliated magic is meant to restore health and vitality, cure illness/status effects, mend or reverse injuries, and provide general support to combatants. SMT doesn't conform to the JRPG standard of "undead types take damage from healing" - the Bless element can't deal direct damage, and it isn't possible to gain an innate resistance or weakness to Bless. If you're looking for 'holy' power, you want Expel.
Dia: Generic healing spell. This is the weakest form of healing magic available, but sometimes all you need is a bandage.
Media: Generic area healing spell. This is a Dia spell that has had an area modifier fixed to it, sacrificing precision for the ability to quickly heal multiple targets.
Diarama: Second-tier healing spell. This is a stronger form of healing magic tuned for handling bigger or deeper injuries (perhaps a deep gouge, or a broken jaw.)
Mediarama: Second-tier area healing spell. Diarama given an area modifier to wipe out a lot of injuries in a wide scope. Typically, this is a temporary measure but a trained physician or healer can work miracles with it.
Diarahan: A higher-order healing spell that doesn't so much "heal" as it does force the target body into whatever the conceived state of 'full health' is. This requires a lot more power and is a lot more dangerous than simply trying to heal injury away - its intended purpose and defined structure provide something of a safety rail but safety rails aren't perfect.
Mediarahan: A wide-area Diarahan. In the right hands this is an extremely effective 'panic button' to very quickly snap everyone in the affected range back to nearly starting strength. In the wrong hands... well, experimenting with (Me)Diarahan is probably a terrible idea.
Patra: Status negation. Removes the Panic and Fear afflictions from a given target. The magical equivalent of a firm hug and reassurances that everything's going to be okay.
Me Patra: Area status negation. Removes the Panic and Fear afflictions from everything in range. Group hug!
Charmdi: Status negation. Removes the Charm and Confusion afflictions from a given target. The magical equivalent of a light knock to the head and a 'get a hold of yourself!'
Strandi: Status negation. Removes the Strain affliction from a given target, and prompts recovery from being Downed or Dizzied.
Posumudi: Status negation. Removes the Poison affliction from a given target.
Paraladi: Status negation. Removes the Paralysis affliction from a given target.
Petradi: Status negation. Removes the Petrification affliction from a given target.
Amrita: Global status negation. Think "Esuna." As with Diarahan, it's a spell that relies on taking the target's perception of what 'healthy' is and overwriting any afflictions with that template.
Dekunda: Effect negation. A targeted counterspell that is designed to strip away magical debuffs from a target. Can theoretically also be applied to things like curses or negative enchantments on a magical artifact of some kind.
Tarukaja: Support buff. Increases physical attack power for a target. This is a generalized effect that basically amounts to physical strikes being a little bit more potent.
Makakaja: Support buff. Increases magical attack power for a target. This is a generalized effect that basically works as a magnifying lens on any outgoing magic.
Rakukaja: Support buff. Increases physical defenses for a target. This is a generalized effect that makes its target "sturdier" - less physical damage, more endurance.
Samakaja: Support buff. Increases magical defenses for a target. This is a generalized effect that acts to diminish and ward against any incoming magic.
Sukukaja: Support buff. Increases agility (accuracy/evasion) for a target. This is a generalized effect that essentially makes the user a little faster and more coordinated.
Curse element: The opposite of Bless element. Curse-affiliated magic is meant to cause harm rather than address it. If you're looking to harry an opponent, cause illnesses or status effects, or sap strength and vitality, there's probably a Curse that will do it for you. As is true for Bless, Curse is not a direct damage element type, and it isn't possible to gain an innate resistance or weakness to Curse. If you're looking for 'dark' power, you want Death.
Marin Karin: Status affliction. Attempts to magically Charm the target at the cost of becoming a meme. Charmed enemies are bewitched into treating their own allies as enemies and the caster('s allies) as friendlies.
Tentarafoo: Status affliction. Attempts to magically Panic the target. Panicked enemies have their willpower sapped and are generally unable to effectively cast magic or maintain effects they're powering.
Pulinpa: Status affliction. Attempts to magically Confuse the target. Confused enemies are unable to distinguish friend from foe and prone to acting completely randomly.
Poisma: Status affliction. Magically creates Poison and then floods the target's systems with it. This poison's effectiveness is a product both of the caster's understanding of 'Poison' as well as the victim's understanding of 'being Poisoned' - a strong will or perceived immunity to toxin can allow someone to throw the effect off.
Paralama: Status affliction. Magically Paralyzes the target, inhibiting movement and action. The effect can be thrown off by sufficient willpower or determination to keep moving. Though it's a status affliction, the effect can have beneficial uses as well, such as immobilizing a broken arm so that it can mend properly.
Dormina: Status affliction. A magical soporific that compels the target to fall asleep. As with Poisma, the strength of the effect is a product of both caster and victim; it can be thrown off with relative ease by a strong enough will. Conversely, its effectiveness increases dramatically the more tired the target is.
Dekaja: Effect negation. A targeted counterspell that is designed to strip away magical buffs and positive enchantments from its target while leaving the negative ones intact.
Tarunda: Debuff. Decreases physical attack power for a target. This is a generalized effect that basically amounts to physical strikes being a little bit more potent.
Makanda: Debuff. Decreases magical attack power for a target. This is a generalized effect that basically diminishes and saps power from any outgoing magic.
Rakunda: Debuff. Decreases physical defenses for a target. This is a generalized effect that essentially forces 'frailness' onto its target - more damage, less endurance.
Samanda: Debuff. Decreases magical defenses for a target. This is a generalized effect that acts as a magnifying lens on any incoming magic.
Sukunda: Debuff. Decreases agility (accuracy/evasion) for a target. This is a generalized effect that essentially forces 'sluggishness' onto its target.
Magic that harnesses the four classical elements (plus the RPG classic element of electricity). Allies and enemies can have one or more elemental affinities to elements under this category (as well as to light and darkness). Water elemental affinities are expressed as Ice, with it being much harder to create water than it is to freeze things (and due to a desire by the QM to not bog down the quest with an overly large number of esoteric elements to manage affinities for while simultaneously wanting to leave the door open for the thread to become very creative).
Fire element: The classical element associated with passion, strength, activity, transformations, and creation; but also with irreversible change, destruction, impulsiveness, aimlessness and volatility. Fire spells (and magicians associated strongly with fire) are exceptionally good at heat transfer even outside of the 'exactly what it says on the tin' fire-starting capabilities. This is not the element you rely on for subtlety; problems addressed by Fire often have quick and dirty solutions.
Agi: Generic damage spell.
Maragi: Generic area damage spell.
Agilao: Second-tier damage spell.
Maragion: Second-tier area damage spell.
Agidyne: Third-tier damage spell.
Maragidyne: Third-tier area damage spell.
Ice/Water element: The classical element associated with fluidity, emotions, relationships, adaptability, healing, and cleansing; but also with disengagement, negative fantasizing, repression, isolation and lack of agency. It is much easier to weaponize 'coldness' and the negative affiliations of this element. As such, offensive use of the Water element is so closely associated with Ice that it's not uncommon for this element to be referred to as 'Ice' instead of Water. Like water itself, spells and magicians closely affiliated with this element will fill the boundaries provided to them and effective use depends strongly on setting the correct path and allowing the magic to flow naturally to its conclusion.
Bufu: Generic damage spell.
Mabufu: Generic area damage spell.
Bufula: Second-tier damage spell.
Mabufula: Second-tier area damage spell.
Bufudyne: Third-tier damage spell.
Mabufudyne: Third-tier area damage spell.
Wind/Air element: The classical element associated with force, ambition, courage, power, and knowledge; but also with oppression, conflict, abuse, harsh judgements and indecisiveness. This element symbolizes the boundary between mind and body as well as between thoughts and actions. Wind magic (and strongly Wind-affiliated magicians) tends towards subtlety but is no less capable of dramatic actions for that; equally capable of devastating tornadoes as they are at precision removal of small amounts of air from a tight space.
Garu: Generic damage spell.
Magaru: Generic area damage spell.
Garula: Second-tier damage spell.
Magarula: Second-tier area damage spell.
Garudyne: Third-tier damage spell.
Magarudyne: Third-tier area damage spell.
Earth element: The classical element associated with stability, prosperity, assurance, proof, and resolution; but also with greed, materialism, sloth, waste, and refusal to change. Earth magic is the hardest elemental magic to master, making magicians strongly affiliated with Earth a relative rarity. All things belong to the Earth and are bound together by that shared thread, and Earth magic in turn is particularly suited towards setting and enforcing boundaries as well as manipulation of physical space - Earth magic tends to weaponize what's on hand rather than conjure an elemental force from nothing. In turn, Earth magic is uniquely suited to attacking with and commanding urban 'elements' such as Neon, Concrete, Glass, and Paper; which all trace their existences back to products of the Earth.
Tera: Generic damage spell.
Matera: Generic area damage spell.
Terazi: Second-tier damage spell.
Materazi: Second-tier area damage spell.
Teradyne: Third-tier damage spell.
Materadyne: Third-tier area damage spell.
Electricity element: Not a classical element as such, but an important bridge for magicians - electricity sits in both the lower order elementals of physical magic as well as in the higher order forces of Fundamental Interaction, representing life, spirit, motion, reaction, and energy; but also unrealized potential, negations, inattentiveness, compulsions and obsession. It would be more accurate to call it the element of Electromagnetism and Electricity magic is every bit as suited to applications as Magnetism magic. Unfortunately, most Electricity-affiliated magicians embody the negative aspects of this element as strongly as its positives and allow themselves to be distracted from their true potential by the flash and spark of wielding more and stronger lightning bolts.
Zio: Generic damage spell.
Mazio: Generic area damage spell.
Zionga: Second-tier damage spell.
Mazionga: Second-tier area damage spell.
Ziodyne: Third-tier damage spell.
Maziodyne: Third-tier area damage spell.
Generally speaking, magical power over light and darkness in the SMT-verse deals with instant death. Unlike certain other RPG franchises where instakills are generally a waste of time and MP, instant death is refreshingly effective in SMT. The weaker something is compared to the caster, the better the chance of making a spell in this category stick; and if something has an innate weakness to Expel or Death, any skill at all in the correct category will never fail to eliminate them. That holds true in this quest as well. As such, while it is theoretically possible to use 'light' or 'dark' in a pure damage spell akin to the elemental magic tab, it's impractical and inefficient.
Expel element: Otherwise known as Light. This is the element of holy cleansings and Divine Punishment. As it is fundamentally a family of exorcism techniques, humans are innately immune to Expel. (Kazuya lost his Expel immunity when he became a hybrid.)
Hama: A low chance of instantly killing a given target not immune or better to Expel.
Mahama: A low chance of instantly killing anything in a given scope not immune or better to Expel. This isn't all or nothing; a single spell can succeed on some targets while failing on others.
Hamaon: A moderate chance of instantly killing a given target not immune or better to Expel.
Mahamaon: A moderate chance of instantly killing anything in a given scope not immune or better to Expel. This isn't all or nothing; a single spell can succeed on some targets while failing on others.
Death element: Otherwise known as darkness. This the element of vengeance, unjust slayings, and murderous intention.
Mudo: A low chance of instantly killing a given target not immune or better to Death.
Mamudo: A low chance of instantly killing anything in a given scope not immune or better to Death. This isn't all or nothing; a single spell can succeed on some targets while failing on others.
Mudoon: A moderate chance of instantly killing a given target not immune or better to Death.
Mamudoon: A moderate chance of instantly killing anything in a given scope not immune or better to Death. This isn't all or nothing; a single spell can succeed on some targets while failing on others.
Almighty 'element': Not, strictly speaking, an element - this is the 'element' of pure magical supremacy. Nothing can be categorically immune or better against Almighty, although it is possible to train or gain innate resistance to magic in general which would include resistance against Almighty spells.
Megido: Flood the target area with a lot of pure magical energy. For those of you familiar with Final Fantasy, think "Ultima." Comparable power to a Ma-dyne spell.
Megidola: The next step up from Megido in both power demand and potential devastation.
Megidolaon: "And this... is to go even further beyond!" Generally speaking if you have an indication that someone is casting Megidolaon you really want to get the hell out of the blast zone.
Force element: The 'Zan' series of spells. Force has been more or less interchangeable with Wind throughout the SMT franchise with the most notable exception being (again) P1 and P2. Zan was the single-target version of Megido in P2, and it was yet another element that represented kinetic energy in P1 (where it was called Blast because 'Force' referred to the group of elements that consisted of Blast/Electricity/Gravity/Nuclear). It has been eliminated as a possible elemental affiliation in this quest for the same reason Water was rolled into Ice; one of the changes to Devil Survivor canon for the purposes of this quest is that every single instance of the word 'Zan' was quietly replaced by 'Garu' (and Force Dance became Wind Dance, etc.).
Esoterica: While also not considered elements for the purposes of determining elemental affinities in the universe of this quest, the following 'elements' have previously appeared in SMT games and received named spells. I've included them here mostly for the sake of completeness and because, as previously mentioned in the summary of the Electricity element, it is possible for a magician to become proficient in and gain mastery over the manipulation of higher-order forces.
Adhoc vote count started by Stardust Falcon on Oct 30, 2018 at 5:07 PM, finished with 7 posts and 4 votes.
[X] unsettled you.
[X] It's been a few months since then, and things are beginning to dull for you. Still, some scars never fade, and those experiences will be with you forever.
[X] That's why you took one of the mid-afternoon trains. You wanted to enjoy the last days of your peaceful drifting through the world you helped to save.
[X] This is as fine a time as any to take a nap.
[X] scared you.
[X] It's been a few months since then, and things are beginning to dull for you. Still, some scars never fade, and those experiences will be with you forever.
[X] That's why you took one of the mid-afternoon trains. You wanted to enjoy the last days of your peaceful drifting through the world you helped to save.
[X] This is as fine a time as any to take a nap.
[X] It's been a few months since then, and things are beginning to dull for you. Still, some scars never fade, and those experiences will be with you forever.
[X] That's why you took one of the mid-afternoon trains. You wanted to enjoy the last days of your peaceful drifting through the world you helped to save.
[X] It's been a few months since then, and things are beginning to dull for you. Still, some scars never fade, and those experiences will be with you forever.
[X] That's why you took one of the mid-afternoon trains. You wanted to enjoy the last days of your peaceful drifting through the world you helped to save.
[X] It's been a few months since then, and things are beginning to dull for you. Still, some scars never fade, and those experiences will be with you forever.
[X] That's why you took one of the mid-afternoon trains. You wanted to enjoy the last days of your peaceful drifting through the world you helped to save.
[X] It's been a few months since then, and things are beginning to dull for you. Still, some scars never fade, and those experiences will be with you forever.
[X] That's why you took one of the mid-afternoon trains. You wanted to enjoy the last days of your peaceful drifting through the world you helped to save.
[x] It's been a few months since then, and things are beginning to dull for you. Still, some scars never fade, and those experiences will be with you forever.
[x] That's why you took the last train of the day. They were going to have you for an entire year; so they can afford to wait for as long as you can make them wait.
[X] unsettled you.
[X] It's been a few months since then, and things are beginning to dull for you. Still, some scars never fade, and those experiences will be with you forever.
[X] That's why you took one of the mid-afternoon trains. You wanted to enjoy the last days of your peaceful drifting through the world you helped to save.
[X] This is as fine a time as any to take a nap.
The first few days after had been the hardest. Once the pressure and the adrenaline gave way to relief and then almost immediately gave way in turn to reality, it was all you could do to keep moving. You didn't want to be around anyone; you couldn't be around anyone, not as you were then. And so you started running, and you kept on running. In time, the urge to run gave out to exhaustion, and your pace slowed. Yet as the days turned to weeks and then to months behind you, you never thought to stop - not completely. Your frantic need to keep moving turned into a more leisurely tour of the country, a desperate need to be anywhere else turning into a simple desire to see everything you could with your own eyes.
You weren't afraid, not anymore. The truth of what had happened to you had started to dull, the hard edges sharpened by conquest and sacrifice blunting against the endless sands of time. But even so... the Lockdown had left its mark on you, as it had on everyone trapped within it, and the thought of those marks going away entirely was as alien and incomprehensible as the idea of demons had been, before.
It was thoughts like that which unsettled you. How could you possibly just wander into a classroom, like nothing happened? Take your seat in some everyday homeroom and pretend that you hadn't survived a week of an actual incursion of Hell upon Earth. How would you ever bridge the chasm between yourself and your peers?
You didn't know, but it seems you'd have an entire year to figure it out. Starting as soon as you got off this train - but, it was going to be a very long, very dull ride. And with nothing better to do, you decide to let your eyes drift closed and the motion of the train rock you to sleep.
A blue butterfly drifts overhead, somewhere just outside your vision, observing...
Your slumber is filled with memories, glazed over and not as raw, but painful nonetheless.
Of peaceful times, just hanging out and enjoying the company of your best friends Yuzu and Atsuro.
Your aloof cousin Naoya, who you now know you never really knew at all.
You see yourself standing in the middle of a ruined city street, facing down a Bel demon...
[] Demonic strength ready to be unleashed through your fists.
[] Powerful magic crackling in your fingertips.
[] Ready to strike with inhuman grace and dexterity.
[] Both feet planted in the ground, ready to weather the worst blows.
The Death Clocks and the Laplace Mail system, permanent reminders of the approaching end you all faced. You had done what you had to do to keep everyone alive, somehow.
From there, indistinct visions of magic and weaponry flash through your head, too quickly to fully comprehend, but you latch onto...
[] Your preferred weapon. (Write-in.)
[] The element that always resonated best with you. (Write-in.)
...
In a ritual room somewhere, a holy maiden prays before a scattering of candles, with an archangel dutifully watching over her shoulder.
Deep within the bowels of a military installation, a golden server hums beneath the careful supervision of a young man in a white beanie cap.
Far away, a cursed man suffers, raging against the deity that damned him so long ago.
A pink-haired girl about your age runs desperately through a world painted green, an unspeakable horror chasing.
In a world of endless blue, you see... [] A man in a butterfly mask, and he sees you, too.
[] A woman dressed in a blue attendant's uniform with white hair and impossibly yellow eyes.
[] A man dressed in a blue attendant's uniform with white hair and impossibly yellow eyes.
[] A professional-seeming woman dressed in a blue coat with an air of maturity around her.
...and then, blissful oblivion. The visions and the memories alike fade away.
When you open your eyes next, you find yourself in a very different sort of train. Soft blue velvet carpets the floors, cushions the couch-like seating, and blocks out the windows to the world beyond. Anything that isn't velvet, like the display cases holding texts that you can't quite make out, is a stately dark mahogany. The entire affair is the very picture of high-class elegance from a bygone era; you would have expected to find a cabin much like this one serving as a parlor car for first-class passengers a hundred years ago. Across from you, on the other side of what would seem to be a coffee table, is an old soul with an impressively long nose. At his left is a notably empty seat with a tome resting innocently upon it.
"Welcome to the Velvet Room," Long Nose intones, opening his eyes far wider than any human possibly could. You can't help but also notice his inhumanly wide grin that seems to be fixed in place, as he continues to speak. "My... the Fate that is unfolding before you is truly remarkable. Hmhmhm."
His laughter chills you for reasons you can't quite understand just now.
"An introduction is in order. I am Igor, and I must apologize. My assistant is away at the moment."
Unbidden, Igor waves his hand over the coffee table, producing a red business folder that wouldn't look out of place in a company board room. Another wave of his hand and the folder springs open, revealing a whole bunch of text that stubbornly refuses to make itself clear in your vision. The only word you can read...
Contract
"Ah, do not be alarmed. This place exists between mind and matter, separating dreams from reality. Normally, only those individuals who have forged a contract are permitted to visit this Room. You will need to enter into such a contract should you wish to utilize our services."
Igor waves his hand again, and suddenly, a beautiful feather pen in an inkwell rests on the table, next to the summoned contract. This entire dream becomes stranger and stranger by the second. Signing this contract seems at once the most natural, and most unnatural, thing that you could possibly do.
"This contract merely says that you'll accept full responsibility for your actions. You need only sign here."
With a shaky hand, you... [] Refuse to sign the Contract. (You will also need to select a name for the protagonist.)
[] Sign the name, "Minato Arisato."
[] Sign the name, "Makoto Yuuki."
[] Sign the name, "Kazuya Minegishi." [] Sign the name, "Abel." (You will also need to select a name for the protagonist.)
[] Something else. (You may write in anything, as long as it includes a name for the protagonist.)
Do not be afraid. There is no wrong answer written here. Read this post carefully, and then make your choices.
This feels like it's dragging on somewhat to me, but it can't be helped. I didn't really want to have like ten or more choices to make in the OP. Consider this the "tutorial," if you prefer. The next post will be our intrepid protagonist arriving at his new dorm followed by more immediately relevant choices instead of nebulous "who are we" type stuff.
[X] Powerful magic crackling in your fingertips.
[X] Your preferred weapon. (A staff)
[X] The element that always resonated best with you. (Light/Holy) [X] A man in a butterfly mask, and he sees you, too.
[X] Sign the name, "Minato Arisato."
[x] Both feet planted in the ground, ready to weather the worst blows.
[x] A man dressed in a blue attendant's uniform with white hair and impossibly yellow eyes.
[x] Sign the name, "Kazuya Minegishi."
[X] Demonic strength ready to be unleashed through your fists.
[X] Your preferred weapon. (A pipe)
[X] The element that always resonated best with you. (Ice/Bufu)
[X] A man dressed in a blue attendant's uniform with white hair and impossibly yellow eyes.
[x] Sign the name, "Kazuya Minegishi."
Source material knowledge for any of the wider Megami Tensei universe outside of Persona 3 shouldn't necessarily be required if I'm doing my job correctly, but it will probably be helpful! In service of that, please accept the following informational. Any discrepancies from the precise text of the game is due to me possibly not quite remembering things correctly but will be instead attributed to this game taking place in an Alternate Universe. Oh god, we haven't even made it to the third update and a Codex is already forming D: Devil Survivor: an Introduction Megami Ibunroku: Devil Survivor (released in the US as Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor because reasons) is a tactical strategy RPG set in modern-day Tokyo - specifically, within a quarantine zone bounded by the Yamanote Circle. You and your allies play the role of demon tamers, utilizing special modified Nintendo DS Lites Communication Players (COMPs for short - a recurring item in the wider SMT universe that is always a demon summoning machine) to summon and command pairs of demons which join with the human tamer to form parties of three. Devil Survivor continues in the storied tradition of most SMT games by having a Silent Protagonist, whose personality is by and large determined by your in-game choices and your out-of-game headcanons. (In this quest, the protagonist's personality will largely be determined by the thread.) If you're a fan of turn-based tactical RPGs, strategy games, or SMT in general I'd highly recommend you pick it up. Regardless of if you do or not, the game released in 2009 - as a courtesy, the rest of this post is going to be massive SPOILERS for the story; as this quest is set a few months following the end of Devil Survivor, massive spoilers are unavoidable and won't be marked.
The Story
One day during the summer (I don't believe it's ever specified precisely, but the thread's initial choice of a few months allows us to set the time of the lockdown as the first full week of September with the quest beginning in the first full week of April of the following year), the Protagonist is summoned to a meeting between himself, his elder cousin Naoya, and his two best friends - everygirl Yuzu Tanikawa and prodigal hacker Atsuro Kihara. Yuzu arrives to the meeting with three heavily modified COMPs and mentions Naoya told her to give them to her friends and that he couldn't make it to the meeting as he had to "take care of something." Atsuro pretty quickly uncovers hidden files on the COMP, and decides that Naoya left them there deliberately for him to crack as a "friendly greeting" - it doesn't take him long at all to break through the first set of encryptions and uncover the Laplace Mail, a creepy set of predictions of future events that begins with a man being killed in Naoya's apartment complex roughly half an hour after the mail is discovered. Atsuro gets to work cracking the rest of the files on the modified COMPs, while the protagonist and Yuzu kill time wandering around until they see a bunch of police cars screaming towards Naoya's building. Heading over there, sure enough, the prediction came true - Naoya's next door neighbor has been killed by a "carnivorous beast" and Naoya urges the protagonist to rejoin Atsuro and "to not turn away from the events that are about to unfold - overcome your fate."
Sure enough, Atsuro calls the protagonist and Yuzu back with the announcement that he's figured out how to crack the rest of the encrypted files but that there's an additional protection which prevents him from doing it unless he has all three COMPs together. Once he does, they automatically reboot into the Demon Summoning Program and summon the tutorial fight monsters. As it turns out, the contract which backs the summoning requires you to fight and defeat the first demon in order to bind it to your service; if it kills you instead, it gets its freedom to run around the human world doing whatever. Luckily, the summoning program also includes a "harmonizer" that roughly levels out strength between our intrepid heroes and the demons they face. As long as you've got a COMP, you can go toe to toe with demons instead of just getting flattened into paste immediately. Sure enough, the protagonists win their tutorial fight and gain the strength of the demons they summoned. Atsuro declares that they can use the combination of the summoning program and the Laplace Mails to alter fate - since the death earlier in the day was caused by a demon attack, he rationalizes that they could have been there to prevent it if they wanted to and could in turn choose to prevent the other Bad Things That They Read About On The News. Yuzu wants to run away. (This is something of a theme for Yuzu and it's one of the reasons she's widely disliked.) Naoya eventually emails the group, surmising the confusion has died down, and tells them to go to Aoyama Cemetery to meet someone who will affect their future activities. Upon arrival, they meet Amane - a priestess and the Maiden of a cult called the Shomonkai, who also has both a COMP and about 30 levels on our protagonists. She's fighting a Wendigo, a powerful demon, and temporarily cooperates with the protagonists; after the battle, the last incident foretold in the Laplace Mail (a region-wide blackout) comes true. Amane places a barrier around the cemetery allowing the protagonists to spend the night there without fear of being killed by demons and then leaves.
The next day (the first of the Lockdown) the protagonists wake up to a Laplace Mail foretelling their own deaths - at 1pm, a snowman murders them. Additionally, the JSDF has put a quarantine into place - the Yamamote Circle has been entirely sealed, with power and communication denied to all those trapped inside of it. Naoya contacts the group again after a short time to provide them with access to the Devil Auction, a system where they can bid macca (the currency of Hell) to acquire the services of demons. Between this (Atsuro notes that for an Auction to be established, you need someone buying and someone selling and therefore demons have been around a long time before this) and the fact that an impenetrable barricade was set overnight, it starts to become clear that all of this was orchestrated well in advance and there's far more going on than a simple random disaster followed by a quarantine. The protagonists successfully use the power they've been granted to avert their own death by killing the Wendigo instead, and, buoyed by the knowledge that they can indeed change fate, set off to find a way to escape the lockdown and prevent others from dying. They learn that something is going to happen in six days time that kills everyone within the Lockdown.
This something is later revealed to be a nuclear option embedded in every electronic device as part of the PSE Law - the Lockdown is the center of a battle between angels and demons to determine the worthiness of mankind (an Ordeal ostensibly handed down as a punishment against mankind but ultimately because SMT has a long and storied history of heaven being kind of assholes), and should the demon outbreak not be ended in seven days, humanity will be found wanting and the angels will destroy the world. To prevent that, the government intends to press the button at the last moment and end the demon incursion by killing everyone and everything inside the Lockdown.
Additionally, the Lockdown serves as the stage for something called the War of Bel; a battle between 'Bel' demons to determine who among them will inherit the Throne of Bel and become the King. As it turns out, Naoya and the protagonist are respectively the reincarnations of the biblical Cain and Abel - Naoya remembers everything due to being damned to immortality for his sin of killing Abel, and though he's still a mortal human, the immortal soul of Abel confers eligibility for the Throne upon the protagonist. As such, beginning on the third day when he averts his death by killing and taking Beldr's power, the protagonist is also a participant in the War of Bel and is hunted down by all the remaining Bel demons.
Since the Throne of Bel has dominion over all demonkind, it becomes apparent at the end of the sixth day that the only way the Lockdown ends without everyone dying is if Abel ascends to the Throne and uses its power to end the incursion. You can choose the Law ending where you rule from the Throne as the Messiah, you can choose the Chaos ending where the protagonist embraces the power of the King of Bel and rallies demonkind for a war against heaven, you can decide to use your power to instead punch through the Lockdown in Yuzu's ending despite knowing that this means humanity fails the Ordeal, you can choose the Neutral ending where you command the Throne and all the demons back into hell which erases them from the world...
...or, you can choose the second Neutral (what I would call the Humanity ending rather than True Neutral) option, where Naoya is convinced to change the server backing the summoning program and all the COMPs, which also happens to be the body that Babel (the manifestation of the Throne of Bel) is summoned into. By doing that, the protagonist ultimately commands the Throne to obey the summoning server's new programming, placing the power of demons into the hands of humanity and leaving the authorities to determine and control access to the system. This is the ending from which this Quest springs.
Most of the events that take place between the Silent Revolution (the Humanity ending) and the start of this quest will be revealed over the course of the Quest, including an explanation for what our protagonist has been up to between then and now. Suffice it to say, someone or something is looking out for him and that's why he's been allowed to drift aimlessly through the world and take the "who needs to talk through their issues I SURE DON'T" approach to his life right up until the Kirijo Group managed to find him and decided to tell him to come to Gekkoukan.
...geez, I skipped over a ton of things that aren't yet and possibly won't ever be relevant and this still ended up being this long. D:
I kind of didn't realize until you asked that there was probably a substantial subset of people who either haven't heard of or haven't played Devil Survivor, and had I realized that earlier I probably would've put Devil Survivor 101 in near the top of the story.
PS EDIT: We are currently tied on a name, and while I'm going to leave the voting for the Velvet Room staff open through at least the next update (and the combat based decisions open until we actually get to this quest's tutorial fight), I do kind of need someone to decide on a name before we can continue to the next update.
I also made a subtle edit to one of the secret options. I assure you, none of the choices in that post are traps.
Adhoc vote count started by Stardust Falcon on Oct 31, 2018 at 7:55 PM, finished with 17 posts and 4 votes.
[X] Powerful magic crackling in your fingertips.
[X] Your preferred weapon. (A staff)
[X] The element that always resonated best with you. (Light/Holy) [X] A man in a butterfly mask, and he sees you, too.
[X] Sign the name, "Minato Arisato."
[X] Demonic strength ready to be unleashed through your fists.
[X] Your preferred weapon. (A pipe) [X] A man in a butterfly mask, and he sees you, too.
[X] Sign the name, "Minato Arisato."
[x] Both feet planted in the ground, ready to weather the worst blows.
[x] A man dressed in a blue attendant's uniform with white hair and impossibly yellow eyes.
[x] Sign the name, "Kazuya Minegishi."
[X] Demonic strength ready to be unleashed through your fists.
[X] Your preferred weapon. (A pipe)
[X] The element that always resonated best with you. (Ice/Bufu)
[x] A man dressed in a blue attendant's uniform with white hair and impossibly yellow eyes.
[x] Sign the name, "Kazuya Minegishi."
Wait. No one's voting to sign as Abel? Guys. Stahp!
Seriously though, how are we signing as anything but Abel? I thought we were playing him, though I guess it's been purposefully ambiguous... *Sigh* Wait, his name is on there twice. What?
I guess Abel could be true mode end, or does he Remember somehow and that's how he's signing with that name? I'm confused.
I do wonder how what's his name, the cousin is doing though. I suppose he'd be happy Kazuya is just alive on some level. Guy's a creepy ass fucker, but he's still mostly alright somehow, if very callous. To be expected though.
[] Sign the name, "Abel." (You will also need to select a name for the protagonist.)
Question actually, is the "Protagonist" our name or the other guy's name? Cause you have the protag of the quest, which I think is what you mean, but then you can have the Protagonist of the Story.
For some reason I thought one of the names up there was one of the female side characters, and thus kind of opting out of being Abel. I was seeing things, my bad.
Wait. No one's voting to sign as Abel? Guys. Stahp!
Seriously though, how are we signing as anything but Abel? I thought we were playing him, though I guess it's been purposefully ambiguous... *Sigh* Wait, his name is on there twice. What?
I guess Abel could be true mode end, or does he Remember somehow and that's how he's signing with that name? I'm confused.
Also would hard mode be playing a female and trying to seduce both of them?
I do wonder how what's his name, the cousin is doing though. I suppose he'd be happy Kazuya is just alive on some level. Guy's a creepy ass fucker, but he's still mostly alright somehow, if very callous. To be expected though.
[] Sign the name, "Abel." (You will also need to select a name for the protagonist.)
Question actually, is the "Protagonist" our name or the other guy's name? Cause you have the protag of the quest, which I think is what you mean, but then you can have the Protagonist of the Story.
The protagonist is our name, and we are the protagonist of Devil Survivor as well as of this quest/story. (This entire thing was born out of a what if the reason why Devil Survivor's protagonist looks identical to Persona 3's is because they're the same person, after all.)
Signing as Abel requires you to pick another name to represent your birth name since you weren't born Abel and didn't discover that you were Abel's reincarnation until near the end of the game. It signifies at the very least that your first inclination when faced with a mystical contract in a dream dimension is to put down that name instead of Minato Arisato or whatever name ultimately gets picked - and it'll also probably have other consequences. (But I promise this isn't a trap leading to some bad end now or later because you decided to sign as Abel.)
I will note for the record that I won't be putting any trap choices into any voting prompts whether they are plaintext or hidden options. Hidden text choices represent non-obvious answers to a prompt that will have more dramatic effects on the story that I've thought about - don't be afraid of them being gotcha!s. (Any write-in responses will also have a more dramatic effect on the story but it won't be one I've already thought out.)
Also, whichever last name we pick becomes Naoya's last name as well. This is how it worked in the game, even though they're cousins.
To your other question, Almighty is not a valid element to select here and I would count any votes as such the same way I'd count a vote for neutral or "no element preference."
For some reason I thought one of the names up there was one of the female side characters, and thus kind of opting out of being Abel. I was seeing things, my bad.
No no, if anything confuses you by all means please ask! Like I said, it's been a long time since I've done this and welcome clarifying questions/feedback as it helps me refine this whole process.
Adhoc vote count started by Stardust Falcon on Oct 31, 2018 at 11:23 PM, finished with 23 posts and 7 votes.
[X] Powerful magic crackling in your fingertips.
[X] Your preferred weapon. (A staff)
[X] The element that always resonated best with you. (Neutral) [X] A man in a butterfly mask, and he sees you, too.
[X] Sign the name, "Abel." (You will also need to select a name for the protagonist.)
-[X] Kazuya Minegishi
[X] Powerful magic crackling in your fingertips.
[X] Your preferred weapon. (A staff)
[X] The element that always resonated best with you. (Light/Holy) [X] A man in a butterfly mask, and he sees you, too.
[X] Sign the name, "Minato Arisato."
[X] Demonic strength ready to be unleashed through your fists.
[X] Your preferred weapon. (A pipe) [X] A man in a butterfly mask, and he sees you, too.
[X] Sign the name, "Minato Arisato."
[x] Both feet planted in the ground, ready to weather the worst blows.
[x] A man dressed in a blue attendant's uniform with white hair and impossibly yellow eyes.
[x] Sign the name, "Kazuya Minegishi."
[X] Demonic strength ready to be unleashed through your fists.
[X] Your preferred weapon. (A pipe)
[X] The element that always resonated best with you. (Ice/Bufu)
[x] A man dressed in a blue attendant's uniform with white hair and impossibly yellow eyes.
[x] Sign the name, "Kazuya Minegishi."
[X] Sign the name, "Minato Arisato."
[X] The element that always resonated best with you. (Neutral)
[X] A woman dressed in a blue attendant's uniform with white hair and impossibly yellow eyes.
[X] Powerful magic crackling in your fingertips.
[X] Your preferred weapon. (A staff)
[X] The element that always resonated best with you. (Neutral)
[X] A man in a butterfly mask, and he sees you, too.
[X] Sign the name, "Abel." (You will also need to select a name for the protagonist.)
-[X] Kazuya Minegishi
I'll go with Neutral. Most of the point of the way magic works in this setting is to have whatever element you need to exploit your enemy's weakness(es) after all.
[X] Sign the name, "Minato Arisato."
[X] The element that always resonated best with you. (Neutral)
[X] A woman dressed in a blue attendant's uniform with white hair and impossibly yellow eyes.
I don't have an opinion on the other options. Though, to be honest, I don't recognise the other name choices, aside from Abel, since I read the info dump.
[X] Powerful magic crackling in your fingertips.
[X] Your preferred weapon. (A staff)
[X] The element that always resonated best with you. (Neutral)
[X] A man in a butterfly mask, and he sees you, too.
[X] Sign the name, "Abel." (You will also need to select a name for the protagonist.)
-[X] Kazuya Minegishi
[X] Your name is Kazuya Minegishi. (2 votes to sign as Kazuya, 2 additional votes to be named Kazuya)
- [X] You signed the contract in the Velvet Room. Enough people voted for Abel that some part of Kazuya's deeper consciousness considered and rejected it.
A reminder that all other choices remain open for voting following the conclusion of this update.
With a shaky hand, and a moment's hesitation, you sign your name to the Contract. You are Kazuya Minegishi, of course. That's always been your name. Any indecisive feelings you have about writing that name down are simply because of how bizarre this whole velvet dream is.
Right?
"Excellent! Henceforth, you shall be welcome here in the Velvet Room." Igor continues to smile. You're beginning to suspect that he can't do anything else. Another wave of his hand and the table is empty again, save for a single blue key. "Hold on to this..."
You take the Velvet Key and fix it to your key chain.
"You have a unique Fate," he continues, "and will benefit from my help in order to hone your abilities and overcome that Fate."
Those words send a chill down your spine. You have a feeling that you know exactly which abilities he's talking about - but he's wrong. He has to be wrong. You left all of that behind at the end of the Lockdown. You had to have. Everything you'd seen and done, you could cope with easily as long as it was firmly in the past. The alternative wasn't even worth contemplating, because it was an impossibility.
If Igor notices your rising discomfort, he doesn't care. "For now, it seems your stop is approaching. I look forward to our next meeting..."
Light floods your vision as you drift out of the Velvet Room and back into the realm of consciousness.
Monday, April 6
Afternoon
"Iwatodai. Passengers seeking Tatsumi Port Island, please disembark here. Once again, now arriving at Iwatodai."
You wake with a start. Thanks to the deeply upsetting nature of your dream, you don't feel refreshed at all. Still, this is your stop, so you force your discomfort into a back corner of your mind and are the first out the doors when the train stops moving. Over time, you'd gotten pretty good at navigating yourself around, and it doesn't take you long at all to reach Gekkoukan High's Iwatodai dorm.
A sophisticated-seeming gentleman is waiting for you at the door as you walk up to the dorm. "Ah! Right on time. Good afternoon. My name is Shuji Ikutsuki."
You recognize the name immediately - Ikutsuki was the name on your invitation. And now, here he was, cracking some joke you didn't really hear about his name. You know he's the Chairman of the Board here, which should frankly preclude him from even having the time to waste on waiting for your arrival at the dorm. This whole situation is unnerving. Fortunately, Ikutsuki seems to notice your discomfort.
"But of course, you've come quite a long way to be here and I'm sure you'd rather not stand out here listening to an old man prattle on. Please, do come inside."
Wordlessly, you enter the dorm. Ikutsuki hands you another key, which you affix to your keychain while pointedly ignoring the Velvet Key from your dream that has somehow made its way into the waking world.
"Your room is on the second floor, at the end of the hall. Easy to remember, right? Well, I'm afraid I have other have business to return to today, so I'll leave you get settled in. Please excuse me."
Ikutsuki leaves the dorm without another word. This is almost certainly not the last time you'll be seeing him.
There was, of course, a curfew on students of Gekkoukan. You would be expected to return to your dorm in the evening, and presumably, you'd be able to meet with your new dormmates then. Still, because you'd dutifully taken an early afternoon train, you had a little time to yourself. Iwatodai City was fairly large, and there was no shortage of things you could do.
It might be helpful for you to acquaint yourself with the other facilities available to a Gekkoukan student. Today was the scheduled arrival day for incoming students, and you saw no reason why it wouldn't be possible for you to explore the school itself, or perhaps other buildings. On the other hand, you expected to be spending an entire year in this place, so perhaps there wasn't really any point in visiting the main campus before you absolutely had to? For that matter, Iwatodai City was a substantial commerce center even before the Kirijo Group's money and influence flooded every corner of it. Even limiting yourself to just the immediate neighborhood (and, as it stood to reason, the types of venues carefully vetted and approved for teenage consumption), you were certain to find no shortage of things to do.
You didn't necessarily want to just shut yourself into your room and allow time to pass, but the dorm was large enough that you could probably kill time just acquainting yourself with the dorm and its common areas, and that might be helpful enough in its own right.
What to do next, Kazuya?
[] Head for Tatsumi Port Island.
- [] Head for Gekkoukan, specifically.
-- [] Once inside Gekkoukan, head straight for... (choose a school facility.)
- [] Check out the non-school parts of Port Island.
[] Head out into the city.
- [] But stay close to the dorm.
- [] Venture as far away from the dorm as you can while allowing for time to get back before evening.
- [] Venture even farther away. You don't really care about the curfew.
[] Stay inside the dorm, but start exploring the common areas.
- [] Head for the kitchen. Cooking is a very useful hobby.
[] Stay in your dorm room for now. (Time will advance to the next day.)
Feel free to write in vague or specific destination ideas; for example, you might decide you really want to visit the Shrine or the Mall. Just because I haven't established something as a place you can go doesn't necessarily mean you can't go there.
I'm aiming for another post today based on how many people respond since I'd very much like to get us to April 9th as quickly as possible.
