[X] Reverance to the dead
[X] Plan Forgive Us Our Sins
[X] Plan Forgive Us Our Sins
Unnatural Forces; a Necromancy Quest
- Thread starter DocSpooky
- Start date
- Original
- Pronouns
- It/Its
[X] Plan: I'm gonna be Pirate Queen!
[X] Plan : Kerkhof's Monster
[X] Plan : Kerkhof's Monster
-[X] Plan : Kerkhof's Monster
--[X] A Dark and Stormy Night
--[X] Doctor Victor Van Kerkhof
--[X] A Dark and Stormy Night
--[X] Doctor Victor Van Kerkhof
[X] Plan Forgive Us Our Sins
Well, this certainly looks intresting. Getting spirtual tips through scientific graphs and autopsy reports does sound fun.
Omegahugger
Inattentive Idiot
I can't complain about this result, Mary Shelley is a classic for a reason.
Ferb_Ancos
The one under the table
- Pronouns
- He
votes have closed already
Turn 1
DocSpooky
Humblest in the World
- Location
- Australia
- Pronouns
- They/Them
The thunder keeps him awake. He's too far gone for the caffeine and the stimulants to reach, but the screaming cracks of the storm always seem to jolt just a little bit more life into him. He only needs to last until the end of the experiment. He knows he cannot last any longer on his feet, anyway.
He leans against the great machine for support, breathing deep of the damp and dusty air of this disused backroom of the university. He watches over tremendously bagged eyes as dear, sweet Clerval dutifully mops to keep the stormwater pouring in from the open window away from anything too terribly sensitive. A lightning rod juts out the window into the downpour like a bone after a terrible fall. Tightly coiled copper crudely attached to the rafters is set to guide animating fulmination through a dizzying array of deviant machines and noxious chemicals, each the product of months of relentless mania, to a metal spike that runs, finally, through the heart of the abomination on the gurney. The not-yet-animated cadaver.
Victor swears he hears it speak sometimes, or sees it move out of the corner of his eye.
His eyes are locked to that window now. Waiting for the storm to do what it needs to. Frail fingers grip the lever that will finally see this task done. He is suddenly aware that he does not recall the last time he ate.
As if offended by the momentary loss of attention, the storm sends a bolt of lightning shrieking into existence. The room lights up with the glow, first of the lightning, then of overheated wires. The corpse begins its pseudo-animated convulsions. It takes Victor a moment to pull the lever, releasing the bubbling and electrolysed contents of all those flasks and bulbs into the cadaver.
The corpse begins to scream.
The random convulsions of an electrified corpse give way to animal struggles against captivity as branching scars bloom from that central metal spike. Stitches pop from the struggle and belch an acrid, ammonia-smelling smoke. The flesh withers in the smoke, but fails to bruise from the pressure. Joints bend wrong and bones creak as the limbs jostle against the leather straps binding them, a poorly-inserted catheter flies from its place in the cadaver's arm, spilling vibrant and ugly vitriol across the floor of the lab.
The struggles die down as the lightning does. Ghostly afterimages of the lightning's glow cover the visions of the room's living inhabitants. The screaming has stopped. The only sounds the rain and the poorly-affixed copper wiring falling down from the singed rafters with a sploosh and a soft sizzle.
When Victor's eyes clear, they reveal Clerval staring at him, blond hair slicked over his face by sweat and stormwater. Victor gestures as frantically as his rapidly deactivating body could toward the gurney. Clerval holds his gaze for a moment longer, then goes about his part in this. He pulls the latch that would allow him to heave the gurney into a position closer to standing than laying and begins to work on the straps. The creature's limbs twitch as they are freed, but make no effort to encourage its freedom. Clerval steps back, and the newly arisen cadaver steps naked into the puddle of unwisely mixed chemicals at its feet.
CHOOSE ONE
[ ] Cadavers gain [Ominous] - Its eyes resemble the storm outside, grey and cloudy and stuttering with a cold light. There isn't intelligence there, not yet, but an awareness of something. It is fascinated by something in its creator's direction, but beyond its creator, beyond the walls of lab, somewhere far in the distance. Its gaze turns to the window moments before the storm carries the lightning rod away, watching with the awed fascination of the inebriated and intoxicated. The creature continues to stare even as Clerval moves to close the window, eyes casting flickering shadows against the wall.
[ ] Cadavers gain [Lithesome] - The creature bobs and sways for a moment on unsteady feet before coming to a stop, unnaturally still. Its once human form is not used to the way its weight now hangs, new pieces branching out like some unnatural tree of flesh. The muscular structure required to support the dozen additional arms had broken Victor once, the impossible calculations leading him to take an axe to his work. In the end, he had settled on grafting half an additional torso to the thing, complete with its own sensory organs, just to keep the arms functional. It was a glorious success, and the creature now stood in front of him with impossible grace.
[ ] Cadavers gain [Haunting 2] - The incoherent mass of flesh and machinery that was the cadaver's head turned to face Victor, misaligned eyes almost sparkling. The creature's smile is ecstatic, lips curled and mouth corners stretched so tight the stitching tears, dragging that hideous grin wider and wider. The head had always been wrong, needing to be taken apart and reassembled again and again. The creature needed a mind of a very particular sort, capable of understanding instructions, of focussing on what it was told, and, above all else, being entirely enamoured of its creator. It makes a sharp sound, a smoker's laugh or the bark of a sick dog, and looked impossibly eager to be commanded.
Victor stumbles away from the lever. His eyes try desperately to close, but he cannot close them. Not yet. He inspects his creation as it stands there, almost unbelieving. The work is complete, for now. It exists. It is animated.
"I did it," says Victor with a weak chuckle, "It's alive."
Then, before Clerval can do anything, Victor collapses, exhausted, face down in a puddle of diluted chemicals.
Magnitude: 10/10
Nigredo: The first part of growth is destruction. The old must be dismantled and broken down to free its constituent parts of impurities. This is necessary for ascension. The power of necromancy is too dependent on the form its targets once took. Let them putrify so that they may later be cleansed of the worldly, and so truer forms may be revealed. 0/15, Grants [Ancient Knowledge] to all Manifestations (if multiple Manifestations have 1 level of Ancient Knowledge, the player still only has 1 level total), unlocks a broader variety of Manifestations
St. Azrael's Fire: Lightning has been behaving curiously since the dead began to rise. It stays longer, it looks more vibrant, it travels in strange directions. Despite all this, it remains merely a conduit for the power of Necromancy, not truly unliving itself. Encourage these curious tendencies and remedy this. Give lightning something like a will of its own by allowing spirits to inhabit it. 0/7, Grants a new manifestation: Phantoms [Mysterious] [Perfidious], increases Magnitude
Damnable Weather: There is little of this world about the weather that carries you, so why be limited to mundane meteorology? Lightning storms appear out of nowhere, setting fire to dry ground, move against the wind, and vanish as quickly as they appear. Lightning glows odd colours and sears the eye more than it should. Perhaps, if the conditions are right, you might be summoned without a cloud in the sky. 0/5, Increases Magnitude, causes Unnatural Weather
Unerring Hunters: Revenants, as they are, are largely passive creatures. They wander aimlessly, largely heedless of their surroundings. Their terrible and vicious rage might never manifest if they never cross paths with the target of their ire. This changes that. Revenants now know at all times the location of their target and will hunt them until their bodies give out. 0/3, Gain 1 Fear, Revenants gain [Ominous]
Crop Circles: A strange behaviour observed among the ranks of the dead. Usually aimless creatures finding semblance of purpose, walking in very strict patterns again and again until the plants they tread on grind away to nothing. Even labouring Cadavers sent to shoo away interloping zombies will instead join them, marching in those same circles for hours, even days, until some arcane criteria is met and they disperse to go about their business, leaving strange rune carved into the face of the country. 0/2 Increases Magnitude, Area of Influence extends
Sparks of Life: Not enough lightning strikes in a storm to raise a proper horde. It pays dividends to learn exactly how much lightning is required to animate a body. As it started, a single strike of lightning in the right place could raise a handful of surrounding corpses. Now, as death suffuses the country, it can take so little to bring the dead to life. Just a spark, a tiny shock, is enough now for the animation of a Zombie. 0/5, Zombies gain [Horde 2]
Mr. and Mrs. Doe: The lightning gets lucky, sometimes. Not all the dead are buried in clearly marked graves, sometimes they are lost in bogs or deep in the wilderness. Sometimes they are disposed of quietly in rivers and garden plots. Sometimes the lightning finds just the right spot to strike that they can find their way back, climbing their way back to the surface so desperately alone. 0/5, Gain a new Manifestation: Ghouls [Mysterious] [Vicious]
Whispers
Victor Van Kerkhof: This turn, Victor is riding high on his creation of an entirely new branch of natural philosophy. He has so many ideas.
[ ] Corpse Labour Proliferation: Cadavers are already beginning to be used for manual labour, though there is resistance. Victor should put his efforts into pushing past that resistance, working to produce Cadaver models that are cleaner and more efficient labourers and pushing for funding to produce more. Cadavers will become more numerous and prominent in heavy labour fields.
[ ] Academic Collaboration: Victor has just revolutionised his field, but he is not the only scholar who has worked on this subject. Scholars from around Ossuaria and abroad have an interest in studying the art. Under Victor's pull, they can be gathered together to pool their knowledge and accelerate the advancement of Necromantic Science
[ ] Tenure: A thesis is not enough. The university may be willing, if pushed, to offer a teaching position. While most undergraduate necromancers will amount to little, it would allow some small amount of knowledge of the art to proliferate, allowing necromancy to become more deeply enmeshed in everyday life.
[ ] Observation: The Cadaver is a prototype and will require observation. It seems to function well enough that little extra effort needs to be spent here. Nevertheless, gaining a better understanding of the thing's working could not only provide ideas to improve future models but also provide insight into the best practices for working with and handling such creatures.
A/N: I am not entirely satisfied with how I have whispers working. Nevertheless, here is how this works for now: create a plan vote that includes the Cadaver vote, how to spend your Magnitude, and a single Whisper for Victor to do while not making more of the living dead. Clerval, your second Necromancer, will be introduced properly in the next update.
Because of the surprising interest, I will be instituting a 2 hour moratorium before voting opens to discuss plans.
He leans against the great machine for support, breathing deep of the damp and dusty air of this disused backroom of the university. He watches over tremendously bagged eyes as dear, sweet Clerval dutifully mops to keep the stormwater pouring in from the open window away from anything too terribly sensitive. A lightning rod juts out the window into the downpour like a bone after a terrible fall. Tightly coiled copper crudely attached to the rafters is set to guide animating fulmination through a dizzying array of deviant machines and noxious chemicals, each the product of months of relentless mania, to a metal spike that runs, finally, through the heart of the abomination on the gurney. The not-yet-animated cadaver.
Victor swears he hears it speak sometimes, or sees it move out of the corner of his eye.
His eyes are locked to that window now. Waiting for the storm to do what it needs to. Frail fingers grip the lever that will finally see this task done. He is suddenly aware that he does not recall the last time he ate.
As if offended by the momentary loss of attention, the storm sends a bolt of lightning shrieking into existence. The room lights up with the glow, first of the lightning, then of overheated wires. The corpse begins its pseudo-animated convulsions. It takes Victor a moment to pull the lever, releasing the bubbling and electrolysed contents of all those flasks and bulbs into the cadaver.
The corpse begins to scream.
The random convulsions of an electrified corpse give way to animal struggles against captivity as branching scars bloom from that central metal spike. Stitches pop from the struggle and belch an acrid, ammonia-smelling smoke. The flesh withers in the smoke, but fails to bruise from the pressure. Joints bend wrong and bones creak as the limbs jostle against the leather straps binding them, a poorly-inserted catheter flies from its place in the cadaver's arm, spilling vibrant and ugly vitriol across the floor of the lab.
The struggles die down as the lightning does. Ghostly afterimages of the lightning's glow cover the visions of the room's living inhabitants. The screaming has stopped. The only sounds the rain and the poorly-affixed copper wiring falling down from the singed rafters with a sploosh and a soft sizzle.
When Victor's eyes clear, they reveal Clerval staring at him, blond hair slicked over his face by sweat and stormwater. Victor gestures as frantically as his rapidly deactivating body could toward the gurney. Clerval holds his gaze for a moment longer, then goes about his part in this. He pulls the latch that would allow him to heave the gurney into a position closer to standing than laying and begins to work on the straps. The creature's limbs twitch as they are freed, but make no effort to encourage its freedom. Clerval steps back, and the newly arisen cadaver steps naked into the puddle of unwisely mixed chemicals at its feet.
CHOOSE ONE
[ ] Cadavers gain [Ominous] - Its eyes resemble the storm outside, grey and cloudy and stuttering with a cold light. There isn't intelligence there, not yet, but an awareness of something. It is fascinated by something in its creator's direction, but beyond its creator, beyond the walls of lab, somewhere far in the distance. Its gaze turns to the window moments before the storm carries the lightning rod away, watching with the awed fascination of the inebriated and intoxicated. The creature continues to stare even as Clerval moves to close the window, eyes casting flickering shadows against the wall.
[ ] Cadavers gain [Lithesome] - The creature bobs and sways for a moment on unsteady feet before coming to a stop, unnaturally still. Its once human form is not used to the way its weight now hangs, new pieces branching out like some unnatural tree of flesh. The muscular structure required to support the dozen additional arms had broken Victor once, the impossible calculations leading him to take an axe to his work. In the end, he had settled on grafting half an additional torso to the thing, complete with its own sensory organs, just to keep the arms functional. It was a glorious success, and the creature now stood in front of him with impossible grace.
[ ] Cadavers gain [Haunting 2] - The incoherent mass of flesh and machinery that was the cadaver's head turned to face Victor, misaligned eyes almost sparkling. The creature's smile is ecstatic, lips curled and mouth corners stretched so tight the stitching tears, dragging that hideous grin wider and wider. The head had always been wrong, needing to be taken apart and reassembled again and again. The creature needed a mind of a very particular sort, capable of understanding instructions, of focussing on what it was told, and, above all else, being entirely enamoured of its creator. It makes a sharp sound, a smoker's laugh or the bark of a sick dog, and looked impossibly eager to be commanded.
Victor stumbles away from the lever. His eyes try desperately to close, but he cannot close them. Not yet. He inspects his creation as it stands there, almost unbelieving. The work is complete, for now. It exists. It is animated.
"I did it," says Victor with a weak chuckle, "It's alive."
Then, before Clerval can do anything, Victor collapses, exhausted, face down in a puddle of diluted chemicals.
Magnitude: 10/10
Nigredo: The first part of growth is destruction. The old must be dismantled and broken down to free its constituent parts of impurities. This is necessary for ascension. The power of necromancy is too dependent on the form its targets once took. Let them putrify so that they may later be cleansed of the worldly, and so truer forms may be revealed. 0/15, Grants [Ancient Knowledge] to all Manifestations (if multiple Manifestations have 1 level of Ancient Knowledge, the player still only has 1 level total), unlocks a broader variety of Manifestations
St. Azrael's Fire: Lightning has been behaving curiously since the dead began to rise. It stays longer, it looks more vibrant, it travels in strange directions. Despite all this, it remains merely a conduit for the power of Necromancy, not truly unliving itself. Encourage these curious tendencies and remedy this. Give lightning something like a will of its own by allowing spirits to inhabit it. 0/7, Grants a new manifestation: Phantoms [Mysterious] [Perfidious], increases Magnitude
Damnable Weather: There is little of this world about the weather that carries you, so why be limited to mundane meteorology? Lightning storms appear out of nowhere, setting fire to dry ground, move against the wind, and vanish as quickly as they appear. Lightning glows odd colours and sears the eye more than it should. Perhaps, if the conditions are right, you might be summoned without a cloud in the sky. 0/5, Increases Magnitude, causes Unnatural Weather
Unerring Hunters: Revenants, as they are, are largely passive creatures. They wander aimlessly, largely heedless of their surroundings. Their terrible and vicious rage might never manifest if they never cross paths with the target of their ire. This changes that. Revenants now know at all times the location of their target and will hunt them until their bodies give out. 0/3, Gain 1 Fear, Revenants gain [Ominous]
Crop Circles: A strange behaviour observed among the ranks of the dead. Usually aimless creatures finding semblance of purpose, walking in very strict patterns again and again until the plants they tread on grind away to nothing. Even labouring Cadavers sent to shoo away interloping zombies will instead join them, marching in those same circles for hours, even days, until some arcane criteria is met and they disperse to go about their business, leaving strange rune carved into the face of the country. 0/2 Increases Magnitude, Area of Influence extends
Sparks of Life: Not enough lightning strikes in a storm to raise a proper horde. It pays dividends to learn exactly how much lightning is required to animate a body. As it started, a single strike of lightning in the right place could raise a handful of surrounding corpses. Now, as death suffuses the country, it can take so little to bring the dead to life. Just a spark, a tiny shock, is enough now for the animation of a Zombie. 0/5, Zombies gain [Horde 2]
Mr. and Mrs. Doe: The lightning gets lucky, sometimes. Not all the dead are buried in clearly marked graves, sometimes they are lost in bogs or deep in the wilderness. Sometimes they are disposed of quietly in rivers and garden plots. Sometimes the lightning finds just the right spot to strike that they can find their way back, climbing their way back to the surface so desperately alone. 0/5, Gain a new Manifestation: Ghouls [Mysterious] [Vicious]
Whispers
Victor Van Kerkhof: This turn, Victor is riding high on his creation of an entirely new branch of natural philosophy. He has so many ideas.
[ ] Corpse Labour Proliferation: Cadavers are already beginning to be used for manual labour, though there is resistance. Victor should put his efforts into pushing past that resistance, working to produce Cadaver models that are cleaner and more efficient labourers and pushing for funding to produce more. Cadavers will become more numerous and prominent in heavy labour fields.
[ ] Academic Collaboration: Victor has just revolutionised his field, but he is not the only scholar who has worked on this subject. Scholars from around Ossuaria and abroad have an interest in studying the art. Under Victor's pull, they can be gathered together to pool their knowledge and accelerate the advancement of Necromantic Science
[ ] Tenure: A thesis is not enough. The university may be willing, if pushed, to offer a teaching position. While most undergraduate necromancers will amount to little, it would allow some small amount of knowledge of the art to proliferate, allowing necromancy to become more deeply enmeshed in everyday life.
[ ] Observation: The Cadaver is a prototype and will require observation. It seems to function well enough that little extra effort needs to be spent here. Nevertheless, gaining a better understanding of the thing's working could not only provide ideas to improve future models but also provide insight into the best practices for working with and handling such creatures.
A/N: I am not entirely satisfied with how I have whispers working. Nevertheless, here is how this works for now: create a plan vote that includes the Cadaver vote, how to spend your Magnitude, and a single Whisper for Victor to do while not making more of the living dead. Clerval, your second Necromancer, will be introduced properly in the next update.
Because of the surprising interest, I will be instituting a 2 hour moratorium before voting opens to discuss plans.
How many options csn we pick?
DocSpooky
Humblest in the World
- Location
- Australia
- Pronouns
- They/Them
For Whispers, only one right now. For Magnitude, you're just voting how to spend your Magnitude so you could theoretically spend points on every option, but that would be very inefficient and not get you much.
- Location
- Mataram Free Territory
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[] Plan : Frankenstein early access edition
-[] Cadavers gain [Lithesome]
-[] Sparks of Life [5/5]
-[] Crop Circles [2/2]
-[]Damnable Weather [3/5]
-[]Observation
My logic here is that we hope to repeat the experiment again the the future, as such it'd be wise if we can understand and streamline the process to resurrect multiple cadaver as easy as possible, not to mention control it. as of now what to do our current corpse is to study it, maybe even engage in a dialogue to understand what it wants and to gauge how smart it is.
-[] Cadavers gain [Lithesome]
-[] Sparks of Life [5/5]
-[] Crop Circles [2/2]
-[]Damnable Weather [3/5]
-[]Observation
My logic here is that we hope to repeat the experiment again the the future, as such it'd be wise if we can understand and streamline the process to resurrect multiple cadaver as easy as possible, not to mention control it. as of now what to do our current corpse is to study it, maybe even engage in a dialogue to understand what it wants and to gauge how smart it is.