The CHALLENGE continues!

[Glass Mouse]

Hmm, theme, theme, theme...Alright, there was a little zine I wanted to submit to, but I didn't finish any of my pieces in time (family vacation/general put-off-ery). Their theme was hunt. And so it shall be ours.

Y'know what? I had a bunch of ideas for the direction of my novel. The theme will be my guide here, considering one of my ideas was the main character running from a bunch of bad guys (being the prey of a hunt, basically). We'll see how that pans out.

Yeah I think so, might as well try to keep everything in one place.

Sweet. Just PM me if you ever deviate from that

[Icewalker]

Well, I haven't drawn anything this week (yet). Which means one of three things: 1) I'll go wild again and draw a full week's challenge set in one afternoon/evening tomorrow. 2) I'll do a little bit of drawing tomorrow, maybe just one or two entries, just to keep up some measure of practice. 3) I won't draw at all tomorrow and will just submit some of the 4000 words of novel I've gotten down this week.

[Neoriceisgood]

Like last time I posted my pictures here:

http://imgur.com/a/a9w7H#5

With the sheer size (and time consuming-ness) of some of the pieces posted I decided to leave out some random individual sprites I ended up making. If you need any more I can make a compilation of small junk to add to this collection though.

[HeadlessMermaid]

Just a heads up. I did absolutely nothing this week. No reason, other than an exceptionally bad mood. It happens. :)

Hope I'll be back to schedule next week.

[Zjoot]

I only posted three things this week, but I've got more waiting. Here are the next three items so I meet the requirements for this week.

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SOUP or SOAP, BUT NOT REALLY

Come and let us ponder
in the essence of rubber turtles
and envelope doves.

For a thrifty shopkeeper
to a rocking chair once said,
toppled peppermint unsavory.
The honeycomb is the jellyfish.
The soothsayer a Norseman's oar.

Vermont left us waiting
in the orchard
for the grapes.

We ended up with roses,
or rosy dinosaurs.

This fluctuation was an undressing
through time the fruit wavers;
before it's eventual Roman state
it is not unlike birds
despite its lack of feathers
and it has never been devoured by snake.

Now peeled, it plumes bubbles and smoke
Rupturing the giants
upward of the knee, but south of arm 3

Wandering is only a platitude.
Charity a fixture,
marmalade a microwave,
and lucidity; oddly lucid.

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MEANINGLESS

light came
meaningless
bamboo
barbed wire
fence

outside were Golgotha
the welcome rosewater
brushing away
Iron Maiden flakes

the Maori
went into it
so far,
horrible.

it was boomed
at him vaguely

make them
bundled up for battle
freeze there

another pair
had come

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ADRIAN'S HAND

I found Adrian's hand in my tea this morning,
while bathed in the manifold musical notes of outside.

"It is blue skies and 65 degrees.
Patriotism classes are cancelled for today."
My knees knocked together like newton balls;
We rowed faster.

Almost invariably, that cloud is wearing a necktie.

In Nevada, the governor's shrubbery needs alteration.
In the corpse of last night's cider, there is a single hair.
In the next 30 years, the water will come,
and the ravens
will
stop
their
jabbering.

We rowed faster, much much faster.

And hopefully I'll have the things for the hunt theme finished by tomorrow.

[Lady Serpentine]

1,616 words of setting details and RPing:

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Godtown is the central district, and is roughly circular; mainly, it houses nobles and temples, hence the name Godtown. The other details I think you already have from the intro I sent you, right?

Nightgrove sits off to the right of it, and slightly up; it's got all sorts of weird things going on, due to the Bell effects I told you about, and has spread out like a stain from the Bell of Shadows, which is towards that corner, so much as a city that completely covers the top of a mountain (much like Gondor, if you remember the architectural details of there, but with the demarcations between levels being much more gradual, since the slope is much gentler) has corners, with tendrils straying out into the neighboring areas.

The Web is a massive sprawl of ruined, or at least half-decayed, buildings that used to be rather nice, freshly built shacks and tenements, and an occasional well-built home, all in a constantly shifting maze of narrow, twisting, streets, with different maps needed for a traveler to navigate each story, due to the network of walkways that spring up between windows, rooftops, and what used to be the interiors of some spaces, but are now open to the air; at the rough center of it is the Central Gasworks, a magitech monstrosity responsible for most of the lighting in the City, though the Web's own gaslights are rarely, if at all, functional. It sits just under Nightgrove, and takes up most of the remainder of that side of the city, spreading from Eastgate to Southgate.

Midtown: A somewhat prosperous district, crammed into the space between Godtown and The Web, with a border touching Nightgrove; primarily, it's the merchant district, though most people set up their homes in the back/upper floors of their businesses, unless they're rich enough to live in Godtown.

Cloudcatch: Located directly to the west of Godtown, Cloudcatch is quite large indeed, and contains the airship docks, located at what used to be Westgate, around which a sprawling complex of warehouses, import/export firms, mechanics (for airships, automatons, and even the rare mechanical ground transports, of various types), and hotels has sprung up. It also, not unreasonably, houses the main customs office, and the primary slave markets (at least, the legal ones) are here as well.

The rest is, for the moment, mainly nondescript city, though I'll probably come up with more districts later.

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There have always been, and always will be, worms. Most are harmless, or even, like earthworms, beneficial. The land around the City of Bells was no exception to this rule. But at some point during the City's rise, the wild magic flowing around, or perhaps some mage experimenting, caused a rather unusual strain to appear, though admittedly, the Corpse Worm shares far more traits with grubs than true worms, and probably started as a group of maggots.

Their origin, however, is primarily irrelevant save to historians and the idly curious. Whatever caused them to come into being, the effects are the same; every so often, someone or something freshly dead will be found by a small group, which burrows into their flesh through the nose and mouth, taking great care to leave the skin intact, secreting preservatives as they go, eventually replacing every muscle the creature or person had with a group of themselves, at which time they, if necessary, begin to claw their way free of where they were buried, or if not, simply begin to go about their business, namely, finding more bodies to infect.

They have no real culture, though they do gain a basic moral and social structure, as well as speech skills, if they inhabit a person, at least once they have replicated sufficiently (as they have a form of hive mind, the more of them there are in a small area, the more intelligent they are, somewhat tempered by how intelligent the host began as; a group the size of a human or elf will probably be as smart as the host body was) to be able to recognize and use such concepts.

However, they do often try to get jobs involving the dead in one way or another, as that allows them to infect more people, normally one of their primary concerns, though this is hardly universal, at least among those inhabiting the skins of intelligent organisms, since in those cases they are essentially a thinking individual, and thus it is no more imperative for them to infect other bodies than it is for any other sapient lifeform to reproduce.

[The Void]

Savorla sat in a place out of time, crafting something with infinite care. Or perhaps, instead, she sat in a time out of place, one which had not, as yet, begun, and perhaps never would, for if that were so, something as simple as a grain of sand in a courtier's eye could change events so far that what had led up to the moment she was in never took place.

But where and when and how she sat... That is not important. What is important is that she sat, and why sat, as well as what she made there; the plane she wove from night and asteroids, and the long-cold corpses of volcanoes.

Eventually, though she was done. Or at least, done with that task, for she still had to birth a ruler for the Fae...

[Netheli]

The Gentry she had chosen had been capricious, for such was the way of his kind. But never mad. Until now, where he was left a gibbering fool, his brain slowly dying from the inside out. Not that she cared, really, at least too much, though it was distracting. But still, it was an interesting observation...

In any case, however, it was time. Mix the man's essence, heady with madness and corruption, into her own, and then expel both, carefully crafting, and testing her creation on the mindless husk.

Eventually, she was satisfied, and, once she was, she finally let her newest creation form permanently, taking him into her arms once he had, and planting a single soft kiss on his cheek.

"Welcome to the world, young one..."

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Weave Plane (Netheli, Refuge of All, The Court of Shadows): A plane of eternal night, where those who seek Savorla's aid are brought. For now, it is simply composed of a massive (possibly even infinite) obsidian and tektite castle, where the mortals taken here live until their wounds, of whatever type, are healed, and they will no longer be in danger from whoever was harming them on the Material.

Below all that, however, the Gentry keep their own ways, and they are dark ones indeed...

Create Fabled Life (Fae, the Gentry, Elves, Faeries, etc.): The Fae are not, on the whole, pleasant. They take people from their homes, sometimes by trickery, sometimes by force. And once they're in Netheli... Well, things go well at first, usually, though sometimes they don't, usually for those who were never to supposed to find their part of the world in the first place. But then it twists.

The dancer, chosen for her beauty and skill, forced to dance past all enduring, wearing shoes of glass so that any misstep will cut her feet to pieces.

A girl brought as a companion for a young member of the Gentry, who has her eyes replaced with simulacra, always dry, even if she leaves her head underwater, because the one she was charged with befriending wished she would feel better, and so her Keeper made it impossible for her to cry, that she would not disturb her charge any longer by showing how she felt.

Or stranger and more terrible things than those, for that matter...

Curse: Mortals begin to be taken by Fae, and may sometimes stumble across the boundary between their section of Netheli and the mortal world.

0 AP

Savorla appears next to him, a soft smile on her face, the ice that seems to coat her eyes looking far thinner than it normally does.

"What guidance do you seek, Sower of Chaos? And why should I grant it, when you chose to fly from Netheli as soon as you were birthed? That hardly seems the action of one who respects me, to stay not even long enough to say that you would go...

But you are of my making. So perhaps a compromise is in order, since I am fond of you, despite your lack of tact... Make me an offer for my guidance, and if the terms are acceptable to me, I will grant it, if I can; otherwise, we will renegotiate. Is that acceptable to you?"

[Land of Beauty]

"Hm. Impressive, as such things go, but not too much more powerful than what Storm and Pfiann can do. And your methods, well... They leave something to be desired. You appear to have utterly wrecked the normal weather patterns, resulting in the formation of a hurricane."

As a stroke of lightning split the skies, a pool of blood-tinged sea ice spread between them, reflecting the pair in its dark surface, before clouding, and showing the world as through from high above the atmosphere; in the center of the ocean between the Fertile Valley, Hidden Isle, Silver Fire Isle, and the Land of Beauty, there was indeed a hurricane, one large enough to touch all of them at once - at least, if Savorla could be believed.

"I suggest that, in the future, you think on what will happen before doing such things...

Now, as for your offer, a question first: Having seen how much you have yet to learn about using your power, why should I trust that corrupting someone would have any fewer unintended consequences?"

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3 AP

Curse (-1 AP) - There is now a massive, and extremely powerful, hurricane sitting at the location described above.

[Icewalker]

I actually have something ENTIRELY unexpected to submit. I didn't end up doing any drawing, and while I could submit my 4000ish words of the start of my novel, I also ended up slamming this out in a couple of hours: also 4000 or so words of a complete description, moment by moment, of a tabletop one-shot that I ran as part of continuity with an elaborate live action roleplay epic adventure being run at the Wayfinder Experience summer camp.

This is horror. Fairly intense horror. Just as a fair warning to anybody who tries to read it.

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Shadows in the Dark

The party had four people: Daria Storm, a Scion of Dareos Nyx (Scions being people who has an echo of memories and personality of an ancient hero taken out of death instilled in them in infancy), Alastair Brooks the battle cleric, Everetta Demure the countermage, and Dan Calder, Boatswain on the Evening Star. A fairly motley group.

The four traveled by boat far to the west, heading to the blasted beaches which supposedly border on the Coral Desert, the place that seems to defy placement on maps or any similar simple locating. On the way there, Daria starts having nightmares. Visions. Much akin to her Scion visions, but she knows that they aren't Dareos Nyx's memories, they're from somewhere else. Flashes of death and destruction, war spreading across a continent. Blood and bone. And always, approaching on the horizon, a wake of smoke and fire.

They make the trip without any trouble, and arrive at this wasteland beach. The four, equipped with a whole plethora of standard adventurer's and explorer's gear, set out, starting in the afternoon, to seek the Coral Desert. After half a dozen hours traveling...nothing. They saw a vulture, at one point. That was about it. Just empty white-yellow sand, dune after dune after dune, sweeping to the horizon. Night falls and they set up camp, with a regular watch prepared. The moon is full, and it's not too difficult to see.

Alastair has first watch. Two hour pass uneventfully. Daria has second watch. Partway through her shift, another of these nightmare visions hits her, much the same as the others: blood, bone, murder, trailing a wake of smoke and fire. She wakes up in a sweat, as the visions seem to have made her lose consciousness.

The first thing she notices is that it is darker than it was when her watch started. A lot darker. Which is weird, because it was already completely night.

There's no moon. And the stars are dim, much dimmer than they should be. It takes her a moment longer to realize that one reason things seem so much much darker...is that the sand is all black, as far out as she can see. She wakes the rest of the party.

They respond fairly well (also with a lot of "...Oh ****." out of character). They get a bullseye lantern lit, to see. It seems to put out only about half as much light as it should. But it's better than nothing.

At this point, Daria spots a flicker of movement, right on the edge of the light. They look, but can't see anything.

Not knowing what else to do, they set out. They take a pole, set a lit lantern hanging from it, and set it in the sand at their campsite, to find their way back. They start moving through this empty black sand desert. More tiny flashes of movement keep being spotted by all of them on the edges of what they can see. Daria has a very strong feeling of being watched.

They spot something white sticking out of the sand a ways ahead, and move to it. It looks like an old dead tree at first, but they realize it seems to be made of bone as they approach. They look it over for a few moments, trying to figure out what the hell it is.

Then Calder touches it, and a drop of blood wells from a finger cut by sharp bone.

He is suddenly overwhelmed by a vision. For a long long moment, he IS somebody else. A young child, hiding in the basement, as her family told her to, her mother still upstairs. Noises. Wood splintering. A scream. A sickening crunch. The child flinches as a warm drop of liquid strikes her forehead. Reaching a hand to it and pulling away, she finds blood. Red drops are pooling on the ceiling above. She is crying, and panicked. (the player is also freaking out.) Heat. Crackling. The wooden ceiling cracks, and after a minute, collapses, half crushing the child under broken wood and rubble. Her vision slowly fades as the fire consumes the ruins of her home and her along with it.

And Dan Calder sits bolt upright in the black sand in front of the bone tree. He is fine. Physically, anyway. Everetta tries to feel for magic inside the tree, touching it, and the bone cuts her hand.

She is upstairs, in her home. She's told her young daughter to hide in the basement. He is here. With his armies. And there's nothing they can do to stop him, they're just a small town. As she tries to figure out what to do, the noises grow outside, and her door smashes inward, splintering, a ten foot tall humanoid construct built fully out of human bones storming inside. She screams. It grabs her by the head with one hand, slamming her to the wooden floor, her skull giving way with a sickening crunch she can feel.

Everetta wakes up. For the others, they simply see their friends fall for a moment, then sit up, panicking, if not screaming. They explain what they have seen, and deliberate for a time. They chip a piece off the tree and keep it without touching it. Everetta felt magic in the tree, but not arcane magic she could dispel. More divine. Alastair opens his eyes to the spirit world, and feels for souls and divine energy. The desert is...empty. When people die, they leave behind some semblance of divine energy, even when their souls pass on to Death properly. But there is nothing here. Just a horrid emptiness. And there is divine magic of some kind bound into the tree.

At this point, Alastair makes a decision. He gathers his energy, and slams his palm into the tree, throwing a spirit shock through into it. He feels the vast, nearly overwhelming fear and sorrow of dead souls sealed inside. Four souls are ripped free of the bone structure, and sent properly on to Death. Alastair's hand is cut by the bone of the tree, but he has no vision like the others: the bone is empty of souls.

They continue on. Flickers of movement still seem to follow them, right on the edges of their vision. They find another half buried skeleton, strange large bone growths akin to coral beginning to spread through the body, rooted partway into the black sand. Calder digs away at the sand where the bone goes into it, trying to see more of the skeleton and the growth. He discovers that this bone growth seems almost to have taken root in the black sand, spreading broader roots just under the surface. Though he tried to avoid touching the bone or being too close when he started digging, the bone extends out small growing roots in all directions, and he scratches one with his palm.

He is standing on a chair, looking up out of the window, far into the distance. He can see it, there on the horizon. A wake of smoke and fire. They are coming. He kicks the chair out from under his feet, and the noose pulls taught around his neck, which breaks with a clean snap he can feel in his spine, and Dan Calder wakes up back in the Coral Desert. Alastair has one more spirit shock, but he saves it.

They realize at that point that Daria is no longer with them. She was walking in the back of the group, and has vanished. They start shouting for her. I leave them to stew in their panic and pull Cas aside for a bit. As they moved along the dunes, a bone somewhere under the sand shifted on a small ridge, and she rolled into a small gully between two dunes. On the way down, her arm is cut, pretty badly, on a bone sticking out of the side of the sand.

She is pressing against her door, trying to hold it closed. Her husband is battering at the outside. He died ten years ago, but he's trying to break down the door. Not just trying. She loses her hold, and the door flies open, batting her back, stumbling, a bruise on her face. The rotting body of her husband, half decomposed, steps into the room, teeth visible in a horrid grin through rotting lips, and grabs her as she turns to run. Its arms twist with an unnatural strength. And twist. Pressure. Pain. She feels her neck crunch, and break, as he wrenches it around.

Daria wakes in the Coral Desert. The injury to her arm is fairly bad. Not bad enough to kill or cripple, but it's a gash of not insignificant depth, and probably about five inches long. She hears the rest of the group, panicked, calling for her, and she follows their voices back until she finds them. Alastair seals the wound on her arm with a touch of magic, as he has with the other spot injuries the group has suffered. They move on, still with a feeling of being watched.

They find...something. It's bones, but it's not a human skeleton. At least, it's not one human skeleton. It looks almost like a ribcage, but the spine continues further than it should, curving down into the sand on both sides, whatever else it might be buried in the sand. Calder steps up, and willingly cuts his hand on the bone, hoping to find some understanding of how to fight back against the Fallen One within the visions.

A small child is in the street, running. She turns over her shoulder to see the thing coming at her. It looks almost serpentine, winding as it moves, only five or six feet off the ground, but nearly a hundred feet long. Spines, attached end to end, still with ribcages, maybe two or three dozen of them, hook together into a horrifying bone abomination. Skeletal arms are still attached to the spines, ending in hands with fingers sharpened to jagged points, scraps of flesh of her friends and family in the town, trampled and torn by the monstrosity are still hanging and dragging bloody along the fingers and the ground. The bone centipede runs her down, she falls, and it catches her, jagged bone fingers ripping her to pieces.

Calder wakes. The group is getting demoralized in their goal, not to mention simply panicked and stressed to an enormous degree by their situation. In all these visions, they have seen no real fight back against the Fallen One's armies, and worry they may be impossible to fight.

Then they make a disturbing discovery. The small cuts they received on the bones seem to have...scarred. Or left marks. They feel the small white lines where the cuts where to find them hard. Like bone.

They panic, fast. Smart of them. Alastair immediately prepares and carries out small exploratory and experimental surgery on Calder's hand, and finds two slivers of bone left where the cuts where, which seemed to be growing deeper into the flesh. He carries out similar procedures to get all such small bone slivers out safely from the small cuts, before they turn to Daria.

There is a five inch line of thin white bone visible on the surface of her skin on her arm. On the spot, Alastair carries out a horrifically painful surgery, opening up a huge portion of Daria's arm, parting skin, flesh, muscle, and cutting out the curling tendrils of bone beginning to grow down into her body. The process takes some time. But, in the end, the surgery is a success. As far as he can tell (and he turns out correct), Alastair has removed the full growing bone spur from her arm. It's about five-six inches long, and almost an inch deep, thin. They cover it, and keep it. Alastair repairs her arm, and weaves everything back together with magic, but she'll have a scar.

The group moves on. They've resolved to avoid the bone, and do, though they pass a number more skeletons, in various stages of coral growth. They seem to be finding more and more of them. Eventually they find a large dune, and make their way up the side. They reach the ridge to find that it is roughly circular, around a central pit. The dune slopes down, fairly sharply, to a basin, about a hundred feet across. There are more bones here than anywhere else. Not solidly covering the ground or anything, but there are a lot. And, in the very center of the basin, is a white obelisk. It stands about forty feet, and is covered in curling runic markings.

As the four of them reach the ridge, something large in the sand is off balanced by their motion, and shifts. All four of them are hurled off balance, rolling down the side of the dune into the basin. All four of them receive at least one cut from bone on the way down, Everetta getting a fairly nasty gash on the back of her shoulder.

It is the capital city. One of the last bastions against his armies. A small force of guards stands just inside the gates, spears readied, all terrified. He is outside. They know he is. The fires have spread, burning much of what is outside the capital's walls. The enormous wood and metal gates rock with an echoing blow. And a second. The guards prepare for what comes, but none are truly ready. The gate explodes inward. A pair of golems built of bone of all kinds, standing nearly thirty feet tall, break and smash through the gate, ripping their way inside. Small constructs, the size of dogs, all built of bone, bound in incredibly quickly, teeth bared in snarls as they weave in between the legs of the golems.

And between the golems is a silhouette, black against the raging fires outside the gate. It looks simply human, and steps calmly over the threshold, a wake of smoke and fire trailing from his steps.

Calder feels a massive wooden splinter of the door sink into the gut of one of the guards, and he flies back, slamming into stone. The hounds close. Daria lives the death of another guard as the bone hounds mob him. The guard strikes at one of them, the spear connecting and snapping through thin bone, and the construct falls aside with a limp, stumbling, but more of them whip past and leap, bringing the guard down with flashing red-stained teeth. One of the enormous golems lifts a third guard, Alastair living through him, and crushes the man with a simple closing of its fist, tossing the rags of the body aside. One guard backs away, doing her best to fend off dogs with her spear. Everetta lives through her, as the dogs suddenly peel off, going for other guards and targets, and she looks up to see Him.

Konstantin's hand closes around her throat. Despite the fires raging all around, the sight of his eyes makes her shiver, freezing cold. There is no determination, no anger in his eyes. He looks...almost casual. And with a single smooth motion, violently parts the guard's soul and body, and kneels. Clutching the screaming soul of the guard in one hand, he draws the fingers of his other hand across the stone courtyard ground, leaving black marks in the rock, etching a single rune. As the shape is drawn closed, the soul is pulled into it, bound, watching from the stone as her city begins to burn around her...

All four wake in the central basin of the Coral Desert, not more than fifty feet from the obelisk. They lay a moment, recovering. As they gather themselves, Everetta realizes the ground under her is not completely sand, but there is something beneath it. Brushing a little away, she finds stone. Courtyard stone. And a small black rune etched into it.

The four stand and move to the obelisk, cautiously. Each of its four faces are covered in coiling runes, reaching to its full forty foot height. The base is broad. They are unsure from the sight of it whether it is rock or bone, as it does not appear to be grown like the other bone coral they have seen, but it does look about the same color. Everetta notes that the runes on the obelisk are very similar to the one etched into the courtyard: soul binding.

She touches the obelisk.

And nothing happens. The consistency of the surface feels like bone, but it is made, not grown. Ground smooth. No sharp edges, no cut, no blood, no vision. She can feel the same magic within it as was within the tree, but stronger. Incredibly strong. She takes a notebook and begins copying down the marks of the obelisk.

Alastair feels the stone, and opens his eyes into the spirit world, feeling his way out with his sight into the obelisk.

And he feels them.

He feels their fear. He feels their sorrow. He feels their anger. He feels their dread.

He has opened himself to feel, and so he feels. He feels the emotions of a hundred thousand dead, bound for hundreds of years into this bone column.

Alastair falls back, crying out. The emotions of a hundred thousand, of families, loved ones, all murdered, and all bound with no proper rest. He curls on the ground for a time, mental state blasted into utter inaction, crying into the sand.

Calder takes his knife and saws a small ways into the side of the obelisk. It is bone, and so he manages to cut a small ridge into the side of the structure.

Then, the takes his thumb, and presses it to the point until it breaks skin. Perhaps still hoping, still hunting for truth, but he has sought too deep.

As a drop of red drips out of his thumb, one hundred thousand souls, one hundred thousand DEATHS, flood Calder's mind.

He lives them.

He lives each and every one of them.

And Dan Calder, convulsing in the black sand of the Coral Desert, dies, one hundred thousand times.

It is at just this moment that Daria first touches the obelisk. She simply lays a hand on it, as others had done.

And the Scion's mark on her forehead flares blinding white. The channel opened in her in her infancy opens wide, as the souls of a hundred thousand weaken the lines between the living and the dead. And through those weakened walls a soul steps out of Death.

And an echo of Konstantin Tremaine steps into the body of Daria Storm, visions of blood and bone, and a wake of smoke and fire filling her mind.

He overwhelms her immediately. Daria's body, now simply a vessel for an echo of the Fallen One, turns and extends her arms. Bones begin to rise from the sand, ripping through her flesh, latching and building. A second cage of rib-like bone closes around her torso, enormous curving stretches extending the reach of her arms and legs. Massive jagged arcs of bent bones rip into the flesh of her palms and knuckles and fingers, stretching into massive claws, until Daria Storm, her eyes cold and calm, stands at ten feet, a framework, a second skeleton of bone forms a body and armor for her small natural form.

Calder and Alastair manage to get to their feet. Everetta backs away with them, as several skeletons, and two bone-construct hounds, rise out of the sand behind them.

They start thinking fast. Calder smashes two bottles of lantern oil, spreading an arc behind them, and then lights it, raising a wall of fire between them and the simpler skeletons. The human forms advance, but burn and half crumble in the flame, easily finished by Calder's spear, as a hound runs towards Everetta. With a blast of fire, she smashes the constructs shoulder apart, and it collapses into the sand and stone, crumbling. The last hound leaps for Alastair, and he meets it cleanly between the jaws with his short sword, smashing the hound into fragments which tumble to the ground around him.

And the massive bone golem that was Daria Storm steps closer. Alastair pulls Everetta and Calder in, calling up his magic to form a Sanctuary. A Pilgrimage. They can escape, they can flee, protected by the divine.

As they begin to move away, Konstantin's claw closes over their sphere of protection, and with a simple push and force of will, it shatters, the break cutting all the way into Alastair's soul, severing his protections, his sanctuary broken.

She swings a claw at Alastair. It would kill him. It would connect cleanly into his chest and rend him wide open. But the monster hesitates. For just a fraction of a second, Daria Storm holds back the soul of Konstantin, and the claw barely nicks Alastair. His eyes, still open to the spirit realm, see into her body for just an instant as contact is made. Daria is still in there, there is no question. But what can they do? Alastair's last spirit shock would destroy Daria's soul as well.

And a thought flicks into Alastairs mind.

Calder runs distraction. Pouring another bottle of oil over the head of his harpoon, he lights it, and hurls the flaming spear into Konstantin's chest. It barely even takes a step back, before approaching for Calder, who stumbles back, barely holding on to consciousness after the trauma of the deaths he lived through.

But it's enough time.

Alastair dives past Konstantin, pulling together everything in him, magic, mind, body, and soul, and pouring it into his magic, a wave of severing divine energy gathers, and he slams his palm into the side of the obelisk, and pushes with power beyond anything he has ever attempted. And pushes, channeling, pouring out the last of his magic, beginning to tear up his very soul to empower the spell.

Everetta, only a second behind, places her hands over his shoulders, pouring the entirety of her own magic into him, flooding her power through him so he can channel it forward.

And the spell breaks.

Alastair's hand slams an inch forward, a handprint broken into the side of the column, suffused with cracks. One long crack makes its way up to the very peak of the pillar.

One hundred thousand souls scream free from the runes that bound them for centuries. Alastair collapses, conscious and alive. He would have ripped out his soul to finish the spell if Everetta hadn't poured her magic in to support him. The link to Death is severed, and the echo of Konstantin silenced, an unconscious Daria falls as bones scatter away from her. A massive half-cauterized wound crosses her stomach, and her entire body is striped in deep slashes from where bone ripped into her body. She will die of blood loss within a minute.

Everetta manages to rise and make it to her, using the last and simplest of her magic to hold Daria in stasis. Alastair, barely conscious, drags himself to her side. He empties a final spark of magic into Daria, enough to seal wounds, although not enough to stop scars, and he collapses, unconscious. Everetta and Calder collapse back into the sand, their vision fades to black.



Alastair, Daria, Everetta, and Calder wake outside of their tent, on the white sands of the wasteland beach where they set it. The sun is rising. All are torn, beaten, and exhausted. Alastair and Calder have not, and never will, fully recover from what they experienced through the obelisk. Daria's torso is mapped with scars, and she will wear gloves from that day on to cover the slashes that were opened all across her hands. By the time Everetta realizes bone coral is growing in the gash on the back of her shoulder, it will have already reached bone. There is nothing Alastair, or anybody else, can do to remove it, and it doesn't seem to have stopped growing.

But the four are alive. And they return with a notebook of soul-binding runes, and at least a little bit more knowledge of what they are facing.

And so Daria Storm, Alastair Brooks, Everetta Demure, and Dan Calder rise with the sun, and make their way back to their ship, to return to Bantora, and to confront the Fallen One once again.

[Glass Mouse]

Y'know what's awesome? Logging onto GiTP and seeing a whole bunch of challenges met


Glass Mouse passes with 2,265 words of novel, including an "ambush followed by flee" scene.

C'nor passes with 1,616 words of setting details and RPing

HeadlessMermaid didn't upload anything.

The Grimmace passes with six poems.

CheesePirate passes with two pirate avatars, four drawings (of toys, sea creatures and dinosaurs), and a silly cheese hunt.

Neoriceisgood passes with sprite buildings, backgrounds, heroes and a crowd, plus a tree lion thing.

Icewalker passes with 4000-ish words of horror story.



Thus, HeadlessMermaidFAILS this round!

Glass Mouse, C'nor, The Grimmace, CheesePirate and Icewalker PASS this round!


Current standing:

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Glass Mouse
Current run: 98 weeks
Longest run: -

C'nor
Current run: 1 week
Longest run: 1 week

HeadlessMermaid
Current run: -
Longest run: 11 weeks

The Grimmace
Current run: 12 weeks
Longest run: -

CheesePirate
Current run: 2 weeks
Longest run: -

Neoriceisgood
Current run: 2 weeks
Longest run: 8 weeks

Icewalker
Current run: 2 weeks
Longest run: 3 weeks

It's CheesePirate's turn to choose a theme



C'nor, that part about the Weave Plane is nicely twisted. I like. Especially the part with the simulcra eyes - very creepy and in line with "bad fairy" behaviour.

Neorice, it's good to have you back. I'd forgotten how much I like your sprite art.

Sorry to hear about the bad week, Headless. I hope you'll bounce back soon (if you haven't already )

[Lady Serpentine]

Thanks! I'm glad you liked it. You might see more in that vein this week, depending on how things go...

[CheesePirate]

Hmm, a theme for this week...how about friendship?

[Glass Mouse]

Hmm, a theme for this week...how about friendship?

Perfect timing. I'm just writing a part of the story where the two main characters get to know each other and fall in friendship/love. I should probably illustrate it or something, too.

[Lady Serpentine]

Hmm, a theme for this week...how about friendship?

Perfect timing for me, too... The first Changeling I make in that LoC game is going to have been taken as an unwilling pet/friend for a young Fae.

[Icewalker]

Oh yes! Again, alas, no drawing. But, again, in addition to a pile of novel writing, I also did a second prisoner case file for the Lock...

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Solomon Kai’s complete history is unknown. The first recorded incident confirmed to be one of the “Ravenous Killings” was in the year 328, on the 3rd day of the 3rd month. At the time, the instance was presumed not to be a murder, due to the recent disappearance and the state of the remains. For the first number of years, the remains found from the Ravenous Killings were presumed to be long-dead bodies later consumed by animals, as investigators made the assumption that gnawed bones were indicative of a far past killing, and in the few cases bones were found, they were usually found within days following the missing persons report, and as such were never linked to the missing individual.

Over the course of the last thirteen years, there have been 63 recorded cases in the Ravenous Killings. Despite numerous different situations to investigate, no more than a dozen crime scenes have ever been located, and Solomon Kai himself was only confronted three times. With the enormous variety in the details of the killings, it has been impossible to pin down any consistent modus operandi of the murders. In trial, the prisoner admitted to nearly an order of magnitude more killings than were pinned to him, and though all reported cases are on file as unknown missing persons, or accidents, no evidence besides this admission has linked these instances to Solomon Kai and the Ravenous Killings.

The existence of the Ravenous Killings was acknowledged in the year 337, being considered only an unproven theory since it was first proposed by psychologist and police investigator Cassandra Pierce in the year 333. The only consistent pattern in every instance of the Ravenous Killings is the destruction of some or all of the body, usually but not always excluding the bones, and the complete removal of the soul. Solomon Kai has stated that he has consumed the flesh and often bone of every individual he has murdered. Numerous bodies from the 648 missing persons cases Solomon Kai claims to have been responsible for were never found. Solomon Kai has stated that the reason for this is that he consumed the entirety of the bodies himself. The only other pattern between the Ravenous Killings is location, as all recorded have been within the cities of the Spire. Investigator Cassandra Pierce has stated theories that the killings may extend beyond the Spire, however have not been recorded as they have not been investigated beyond Spire Authority jurisdiction. She also has theorized that the killings may extend previously in time before the first recognized Ravenous Killing in 328, thirteen years ago. Solomon Kai has claimed both of these things to be true during his trial.

Solomon Kai, unidentified at the time and known to the police simply as Ravenous, was confronted by Spire Authorities three times before his capture. There are a huge variety of instances, all unconfirmed, of civilians who claim to have sighted Ravenous on the streets of the Spire. The rumors and near legendary status the Ravenous Killings quickly gained in the cities resulted in paranoia of all sorts and numerous false reports of sightings. Few such instances have made it onto record as they would and continue to happen on a near daily basis.

The first known confrontation of Ravenous occurred on the 9th day of the 3rd month, year 337. A three man unit of Spire Authorities responding to reports of screaming arrived to find a man in an alley standing over the severely mangled body of a woman. The officers immediately set a beacon for help. Information and forensics from the scene, as well as at least one passing civilian witness, reported that the three officers attempted to stop the killer. When additional units arrived at the scene minutes later, all three officers were already dead, and the suspect had vanished. (Details on the witnessed deaths are expanded upon below in the Known Capabilities section of this case file.) Forensics showed no apparent traces of arcane or divine magic used. A perimeter was quickly established, but the suspect was not located. Both the victim, and all three officers had had their souls removed. The method by which this was accomplished, and whether the souls were destroyed or simply bound, is unknown.

The second instance of Spire Authority interactions with Ravenous occurred approximately three months later, on the 3rd day of the 6th month, year 337. Several individuals called in witnessing a suspicious figure. Several of these civilians claimed they saw Ravenous, though such statements are not unusual. However, between a recent missing persons case filed in the area and some additional killing trend information recognized by Investigator Cassandra Pierce, the investigator called for a very large Authority response. Five standard three-man units of Spire Authorities as well as a HW-ML Strike Team. The suspect was spotted in an abandoned warehouse, with a recently killed body, which the suspect was taking apart with a large knife. The units surrounded the suspect, however lost track of him in the shadows of the building. Several officers report spotting the suspect in locations it would be impossible for him to have physically moved to given present observation and mapping, and so teleportation was assumed. Three officers were killed in the confrontation, before the suspect was caught in the firing lines of the Heavy Weapons Strike Team. The officers at the scene report that the body was severely damaged, with severe upper torso and neck trauma that caused the officers present to assume the death of the suspect. The HW-ML Strike Team transported the suspect, who was presumed dead. At some point between the captured at the warehouse and the Spire Authority facility to which he was being transported, the suspect escaped via methods unknown. The entire three-man HW-ML Strike Team was found dead, and the suspect gone. Forensics teams again determined that no arcane or divine magic other than that of the Spire Authorities themselves was used at either the warehouse or the scene of the killed Strike Team.

The third instance, and final capture of the suspect occurred on the 27th day of the 12th month, year 338. The suspect attacked an off duty Spire Authority, taking her to an abandoned home within city slums. Officer Emma Lian risked and lost her life in the process of delaying her captor while relaying as much information as possible to the Spire Authority. The building was surrounded by a deployment of ten standard units, a SC-ML Strike Team, a CO-ML Strike Team, two MN-ML Strike Teams, and a Spire Authority Archmage, on the request of Investigator Cassandra Pierce. The entire perimeter was taken and placed within a sealed pocket dimension to ensure that nobody could escape, even if the Magic Nullifier teams were not able to stop whatever unconventional and unknown capacities the suspect had exhibited in previous encounters. The Covert Operations team entered the building and found the suspect, and Officer Emma Lian, who had already been killed. The suspect escaped the building via unknown methods, and killed the Archmage, despite multiple standard units and one MN-ML Strike Team defending the Archmage’s position. The pocket dimension perimeter broke, however the suspect was overwhelmed by both MN-ML Strike Teams as well as several units of standard officers. The suspect made several attempts to escape, which were stopped by the massive Authority forces present. One escape attempt resulted in the suspect removing himself from Authority custody, however he was located by the Search & Capture Strike Team before he had escaped a significant distance. Both MN-ML Strike Teams and several standard units closed on the location and re-captured the suspect, however the entire SC-ML Strike Team and five standard officers were killed before the suspect was brought back under control.

Within two hours of the capture, experts from the Lock arrived to enforce maximum plausible security on the suspect. Information gathering turned up nothing on the suspect, however once fully captured, the suspect was quite cooperative. Sessions with Investigator Pierce provided a name, and the suspect was identified as Solomon Kai. The name was found on certain standard documents, confirming the existence of the man. However, the paper trail and records only run back approximately two decades, with no known origin or long term history found under the name Solomon Kai.

In trial, Solomon Kai admitted to every murder he was accused of, as well as stating that he had killed an additional 648 people in the Spire Cities in the previous 20 years. When questioned regarding the removed souls of the victims, Solomon Kai would make no statement. He was convicted guilty of 81 counts of Murder of the 3rd Gauge, and of Use of Priority I Illegal Magic, and convicted to life in prison in the Lock prison facility.

No trace of the injuries delivered to the suspect in the second confrontation could be found on Solomon Kai’s body.

Upon imprisonment, Solomon Kai stated that he would only eat the flesh and bone of sentient beings, refusing all other provided food. No such accommodations were made, and since his initial imprisonment, Solomon Kai has been served only standard prison fare. Since his capture three and a half years ago, Solomon Kai has not eaten. Approximately every three to four weeks, Solomon Kai is found dead, seemingly of starvation. He wakes, alive and well, within the next 6-12 hours. When questioned regarding this suspect, Solomon Kai does not comment beyond reiterating his demands to be served only the flesh and bone of sentient beings.

[Lady Serpentine]

872 characters of me playing a crazy mage girl:

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From her place deep within an ornamental hedge, a scarred girl watches the winged one's progress, huddling deeper into the foliage as she passed by, though the reaction of the locals intrigued her sufficiently that she would, if it were possible to do so, trail her to the limits of the wall of concealing branches, which moved out of her way as she slipped through, so that she made little, if any, noise.

That glance. Something she recognized, not from having seen it before, but from doing it. The winged girl was running too. And that meant that she might need help, help she wouldn't get from the people ignoring her...

What the other one was running from, that didn't matter. What mattered was that she wouldn't let someone else get caught, not if she could help it; anyone who was running like that didn't deserve going back to whatever they'd gotten free from.

Ghosting out of the hedge, she darted quietly into an alleyway, then up another, and back towards the street again, trying to get in front of the other runner.

The scarred girl, dressed in tattered jeans and t-shirt as well, flinches when the other runner's wings flare, fighting the instinct to flee, back into the shadows, hide somewhere she can't be seen, can't be found, doesn't exist at all.

"You're running from something. Need to hide. I have places you can-"

And then she sees the woman coming from the monastery. And not just a visitor, even, judging by her clothes; no, this one followed a deity devoutly, that much was almost sure. Whatever else she was going to say lost, as she turns and runs into the alley again, a look of terror in her eyes, beckoning the winged girl to follow as she does.

The scarred girl is heedless of Dani's pleas, knowing that only pain and fire and blood come from temples when you're what she is. Except when there were worse things, but she can't think of that now, has to shut out the whispers and the memories, the table with the chains she can see right ahead of her, even though it isn't there...

Soon, she's back in the mouth of the first alley she went into, hiding behind a pair of trashcans, with a stack of contractor bags pulled over herself, the refuse littering the street subtly helping her hide, in the form of the newspaper that's sticking to the bags as though it was glued there, covering a hole that she could otherwise be seen through, or the way the shadows from the cans fall just right to hide her, even though they really should be cast just a little bit further to the side, or whatever else shouldn't quite be happening, watching the other runner and the temple-woman, at least when she can see them, and trying, mostly unsuccessfully, to get her memories under control when she can't.

The blonde girl shakes her head, retreating a tiny bit deeper under her covering, though it's only when she speaks that it can be told exactly where she is.
"Not going back. Temple-people did this to me," she says, pointing at a curving scar that goes from the outer corner of her left eyebrow to the back her jaw on the right side. "Burned me, too. Worse. Nice to you, maybe, not me. Never me, not with what I am."

The other girl had wings. That simple fact had taken a while to connect with anything in the pain filled, at least half hallucinatory, haze that filled the runner's mind, but now it did.

It meant, simply enough, that she was in danger too, if this church was what she thought it was. She would not, if she could possibly stop it, let the other runner go through what she had. And if it turned out, by some miracle, not to be... Well, then they'd both end up better off.

So, contrary to expectations, the girl crawled out of her makeshift, though shockingly effective, hiding place, and, very hesitantly, stepped out of the alley, looking like she might bolt at any moment.

"Aernis Bastion,", the scarred girl answers, false name sliding easily off her tongue, through long practice using it when she's had to talk to people, or when the memories get too strong, just like now, when she hears the fire burning, and sees the frame on the wall out of the corner of her eye, the frame that isn't there, that's down below this church-girl's temple if it's anywhere here, feel the hands on her, rough and hard and ready to drag her onto it, or maybe to somewhere else, somewhere worse, even with how bad that is, if there's a special thing planned for her...

"Lots of places. Just none like you mean," Bastion offers, shivering at being so exposed, wanting to get back into the shadows and the small places, where no-one would think to look for her, the places where the things around her helped her hide, deep in the dark and the quiet where she could hear people coming and wouldn't be seen, hide back in her little den...

1,382 words of me playing various others:

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[Suffice to say, Then, That She Tried to Assimilate the Universe Twice, Believed Pain was an Expression of Love, and Had the Hearts of Several Different Deities.]

"I am aware of his name, since you just told it to me, but that tells me nothing about what Ombra is like as a person; I know nothing about the deities I share blood with, save you, Gwyn, and Isyldar."

[That Is Fortunate.]

Welcome to Arcadia, Changeling. You have been taken to provide a pet, of sorts, or at least a companion, for my daughter, who is near your own age when one considers the differences in our lifespan, though she has clear memories of events several hundred years ago, as we measure time here.

Please her, and your care will be up to her, which I doubt you will have too much of a problem with, as she is surprisingly kind, for one of our race. Make her unhappy, and the reason for her unhappiness will be removed."

[She Was, Actually. Provided it was The Right Sort of Party, At Least...]

"I see. He sounds an interesting one... What are you preoccupied with? If it is something that would be best accomplished soon, I can let you be for now."

[A Tithe of Souls, Perhaps? Worship by Their Followers?]

As he ponders his predicament, a pretty girl, who bears a strong resemblance to the man who knocked him out, wearing a white silk dress, enters the room, smiling at him.

"Hello. You must be the one who's going to be staying here... Would you like something to eat, or a drink, perhaps?"

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Very much so. I'm basing this off of Changeling: The Lost, by White Wolf, with a sprinkling of my own mythological research and insane creations, and one of the major themes of the game is dealing with all of the mental damage from the time the Changelings spent in Arcadia.

Also, shouldn't Belsheroth also get +2 for being in a plane he controls?

[Not The Opera, No. She Was More the Type Invited to Orgies or Mass Executions.]

"I see. Is there any way I can offer assistance, then?"

[True. AP, Then?]

The girl giggles, sounding surprisingly normal for someone planning to keep a Ravenkin as a pet.

"You don't really expect me to tell you my name, do you? And this is Arcadia, past the Hedge. Or at least, our part of it.

And what do you mean, 'why am I here'? Aren't you the one who's going to be keeping me company?"

[Alchazzar, Court of the Rifts]

Savorla heard the call of Morgash from deep in Netheli, where she lay upon her velvet couch, and sent one of her own out to the Fae, commanding them to send those they had changed, for looking out she saw the armies gathering, and would not arrive unescorted.

So with her, to the gathering in Alchazzar, came men and women of wood and stone, fire and water, air and darkness. Ones with the form of beasts, some chained and leashed still by their Fae handlers, others in more human seeming, and still more who were fairer than any yet seen, save the Elves they served, along with some who seemed small and shrunken, yet carried weapons and wore armor that gave off strange power. And, finally, huge brutes, massively strong, and amazingly hearty, clearly made for pure strength.

[She Would Have Adored Him, Yes. Or At Least, I Think She Would. You'd Have to Ask Mystic.]

Savorla sends the impression of a nod, and withdraws the contact, which is probably around when she heard Morgash's call.

[There Was A God Who Pretty Much Lived On Transferred AP, And We can Share It For Anything But Gaining Domains, So I Don't See Why Not...]

The girl frowns, looking a bit upset about that, and rather confused... Which is when her father, the same man who took Kyran, enters.

"He's still not quite thinking clearly, I'm afraid, dear. As I said, he was hit rather hard in the head when he fell off the horse on the way; he needs bit more time to recover. Now run along for a while; I have some things I need to try to make him recover."

At that, the girl's smile returns, and she nods, quickly heading out of the room.

"That was most unwise. I told you that making her unhappy would have... Consequences. Yet you insisted on telling her how I took you. So now, you must pay the price."

Kyran probably finds himself completely paralyzed as the Fae speaks; if so, his tongue will be removed, and a new one put in it's place, which will give him little or no control over what he says, instead forcing him to try to make the girl think that he came willingly.

[Nysv Certainly Used Them That Way.]

"In Hell? No, I think not. Even were I to die, my soul would remain here in Netheli."

The last thing Kyran heard as he blacked out would be the sound of cold laughter...

---

The man smiled at Kyran from his place across the room, where he was idly lounging in an armchair, in front of a fire, though it was subtly off, tinged with malice, and with a sadistic undercurrent.

"Good morning, Kyran. Would you tell me how you got here, please?"

[Alchazzar]

Savorla lounged on her throne, appearing different to all there, for she seemed to be their perfect lover to each, smiling indolently at the assembled deities.

"I get along well enough with most deities... Still, this will be interesting so I suppose I'll join, for now. But bear in mind that I do work for pay, so I will provide services to whoever provides me with my price, regardless of the side that they're on. Is this acceptable?"

"Make it worth my time, then, little shadow. I have no vested interest in either side; it will take payment to sway me to either side, something you, so far, offer none of.

And who I aid without something to bind me to you for the duration would hardly be restricted to your foes. If you gave me something I found better payment than their offer, I would take it gladly, and my allegiances might shift from battle to battle as I grew strong from your conflict."

Savorla paused a moment, looking over at Ombra, a frown plain on her face, marring her fair features, as the ice over her eyes thickened, cold distaste evident in them, and, indeed, every line of her body, though she had barely shifted from the pleasantly relaxed sprawl she had been in a moment ago, even if she did hold her tongue until he was gone.

"Also... If he becomes a part of this, then I am on the other side, and there is nothing you can do to buy my aid in this war; I refuse to fight to destroy the world, with all of the creations I care for, and the joy it gives me."

[Alchazzar]

"What?", Savorla asked sweetly, a dangerous undercurrent of confusion and malice mingling in her tone. "Do we not, then, get spoils in any case, for what we defeat, that you can offer them as payment for my joining? Surely, there has been some confusion... And what is this about support? I had taken that to be a clause of the joining already.

Surely, you wouldn't be trying to buy me with things I get merely for joining, would you? Nor would those who already have get nothing in return save -" she shot a significant glance at Vargull, the wolf-god, as she spoke. "- leashes held by you?""

Savorla pouted, mock-frowning at The Shade.

"What, only as well? And here I thought I was doing so much better...

And I see that there are rewards inherent in joining the Circle," she went on, seeming far more serious, even going to the extent of sitting up straight in the uncomfortable stone throne. "I simply wish a little extra at the start. After all, why should I accept nothing but rewards that might never materialize, should we lose, in exchange for risking the wrath of some of the most powerful beings ever to have known this world?

As for where my heart lies... You gather together all of the evil deities in existence, and you expect me not to be selfish? Is not that what your whole argument is based on, the fact that we refuse to share with the good deities?"

I'm pretty sure that gets me over the limit, though there's more stuff in the LoC thread if I need it.

[Glass Mouse]

Status time! I didn't have time to read everything, so if you followed the theme and I didn't mention it, I apologize.


Glass Mouse passes with 2.058 words of fantasy novel (wherein the two main characters grow to become friends), plus a self-portrait.

C'nor passes with 2.254 words of RPG'ing.

HeadlessMermaid passes with 2.370 words of D&D character background.

The Grimmace passes with 9 regularly abstract poems and one prose poem.

CheesePirate passes with 5 pirate avatars and a drawing of an unexpected friend.

Neoriceisgood passes with two comics and a bunch of commissions.

Icewalker passes with 1.590 words of fantasy short story.


Thus, no one FAILS this round!

Glass Mouse, C'nor, HeadlessMermaid, The Grimmace, CheesePirate, Neoriceisgood and Icewalker PASS this round!


Current standing:

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Glass Mouse
Current run: 99 weeks
Longest run: -

C'nor
Current run: 2 weeks
Longest run: 1 week

HeadlessMermaid
Current run: 1 week
Longest run: 11 weeks

The Grimmace
Current run: 13 weeks
Longest run: -

CheesePirate
Current run: 3 weeks
Longest run: -

Neoriceisgood
Current run: 3 weeks
Longest run: 8 weeks

Icewalker
Current run: 3 weeks
Longest run: 3 weeks

It's Neoriceisgood's turn to choose a theme



Holy beep, guys, this'll be my 100th week of the Challenge. That's scary.

[CheesePirate]

No theme this time?

[Mercenary Pen]

I just found this thread today, and I'm in the middle of preparing for National Novel Writing Month in November, so I'm hoping to use this to get in the swing of things.

If you're looking for a theme at this point, can I suggest New World...

Considering that it's Glass Mouse's 100th week, I'm willing to do a request in writing if wanted, but beyond that, I'll probably just write background material towards my novel for November if that's okay?

[Neoriceisgood]

Ahh crap, I didn't realise I could get picked for theme stuff! Sorry guys.

Let's do that New World thing yeah, it's already this late in the week anyway.

[Mercenary Pen]

Well, I'm putting up my first week of challenge submissions because I'm working tomorrow evening and I don't want to leave it until sunday... Neither piece feels finished (particularly the second), but here they are:

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Sharon MacPherson stood at her post aboard the terraforming ship Hephaestus, gazing down at the planet Okami as it passed lazily beneath her feet. She had arrived in this solar system a matter of three years earlier, and there were days- far too many to count- that she wished that her job here was already done, times that she wished for some real gravity beneath her feet rather than the spin induced artificial gravity which was the only thing preventing them working in freefall up here.

She was in her thirties now, and the terraforming of Okami was her first major job since university, the inability of humanity to break the light barrier meaning that she had travelled for years to get here, some of that time spent in cryogenic sleep to preserve her youth, but some of the time serving months at a time as part of the active crew for whatever ship she was on, keeping track of ships systems as they passed through the emptiness of space, all for this. Terraforming assignments didn't grow on trees, even if the human race was expanding into the void as fast as new expeditions could be assembled.

The project she was currently working on was the seeding of the planet with plants that would start the transformation of its atmosphere in earnest, earlier treatments having dropped chemicals from orbit to lower the inherent acidity of the planet's atmosphere to something rather closer to neutral, leaving only an overabundance of carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide to be addressed. This next process would take at least another five years, even accelerated by procedures undertaken from orbit, but whilst it was ongoing, the Hephaestus and her sister ship the Vulcan would make planetfall, beginning to locate sites with rich natural resources and to set up the infrastructure for exploiting them, starting with the list of interplanetary businesses that had invested significant amounts of money into this colonisation expedition in exchange for receiving prime pieces of real estate and access to abundant natural resources on the new planet. Once those early sites had been discovered and development of Okami's fledgling industry had commenced, the terraformers would also be set to the task of civil engineering, creating the bridges, tunnels, cuttings, embankments, docks, railways and shipping canals that would support the beginnings of industry here.

Only after all of the above tasks had been completed would sites for cities be selected, power stations be constructed and the rudiments of urban infrastructure such as hospital buildings, sewage treatment plants and local telecommunications centres be put in. It seemed like a lot of work to the casual observer, and true it would take multiple standard years to complete, but towards the end the pace would increase immensely as they awoke many of the colonists from their cryogenic sleep to add their skills to the project as a whole.

At that moment, the door slid open behind Sharon, admitting her colleague, Doctor Ruth Smith, formerly a postgraduate lecturer at the Eden university of planetary sciences on the colony of Faraday, freshly returned from a scheduled coffee break and just beginning to show as pregnant.

“How goes the work?” asked doctor Smith, stretching her arms as if to work out a strain.

“We're coming into the third stage of the operation now, the canisters of nanomachines have just begun to enter Okami's atmosphere, and should break up on entry, dispersing the nanomachines throughout the upper reaches of the atmosphere to assist with the change to something a little lighter on carbon and heavier on oxygen. Now the shuttle pilots are standing by here and on Vulcan for final clearance to launch for their assigned flight plans.”

“Any of the military pilots complaining about the restrictions on the flight plans?” Doctor Smith asked, “because if you get any of that pass it on to me or to their ship commanders, you have a job to do, and dealing with the complaints of idle flyboys isn't part of that.”

“Haven't had any of that as yet,” MacPherson replied, “possibly they're complaining directly to their commanding officers and leaving us out of the loop on the whole business here. Which is just as well considering that we're bending the regulations at this stage to get them flying at all this soon after they've come out of cryogenic sleep. They're supposed to go straight back to simulators and re-qualify from scratch before we put them into real shuttles under normal circumstances, but we didn't really have the time for that if we were to do something other than sit around up here twiddling our thumbs for the next few weeks.”

They faded into silence for a moment, checking various readouts on the workstations in their shared command centre, examining the telemetry from the containers of nanomachines that were breaking up against the upper reaches of the atmosphere, both of them wanting to be sure that the containers had broken up sufficiently that there was no chance of the shuttles impacting against debris from the containers once they reached the planet's atmosphere.

Finally, doctor Smith hit the button for the ship's internal communications system, “this is terraforming control to flight deck, launch window has now opened. I repeat launch window is opened, release shuttles at your discretion.”

“Copy that forming central,” came the voice of the shuttle bay's officer of the deck, using the slang term that had been applied to their operations centre by the unspoken mutual consensus of the fleet, “shuttles have been ready to lift for ages, I'll start herding them out of here.”

“Understood flight deck,” MacPherson announced before Doctor Smith could complain again about the deck officer's use of slang to refer to their station, “get them under way at your best speed.”

The internal communication system shut off as doctor Smith's hand was removed from the activation panel, “I don't understand why you insist on letting it slide every time they use slang terms on official business,” doctor Smith snapped at her colleague, “its unprofessional, and you know they don't treat our profession with the respect it deserves as it is.”

“I know all that,” Sharon replied, “but if you had that discussion with the flight deck there and then, it would only have made us look just as unprofessional as well- and it would have pushed back the shuttle launch schedule unnecessarily. By all means write it up as part of your report, but we shouldn't let mission control accuse us of delaying the mission.”

“Damn it but you're right,” Ruth replied, “but don't think for a moment that I'm going to let this slide, I will make sure that his commanding officer knows my displeasure and takes the time to correct him on matters of protocol.”

Sharon sighed and returned to what she was supposed to be doing, surveying her screen as little glyphs that represented the shuttles launching from both terraforming ships spread out across the display

They continued to watch as the twinned swarms of shuttles fanned out in an intricately coordinated pattern, taking up carefully determined positions in local parking orbit, maximising the coverage of the planets individual continents that they would achieve as they descended into the planet's atmosphere, their positions determined in advance according to the topography of the planet beneath and according to the bounties of seeds, spores and other plant life that they were carrying as their respective payloads, all of which had been mapped out to achieve the rough plan of the planet's fledgling ecosystem. Sure enough, there were always going to be deviations from the plan they had set out, species that didn't take due to unexpected differences in the soil compared with how they had been projected from orbital data, places where an unexpected plant took dominance over other plants that would normally be more dominant.

New world theme used, 1318 words

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An introduction to the Audacious-class star frigate:

For authorised eyes only:

Dear customer, we want to thank you for your interest in the Morgan Orbital Industries Audacious-class star frigate, the first and foremost design in interplanetary escort warships as recognised by the Terrestrial Federation of Sovereign Planetary Republics. Whilst not suited for the rigours of full scale space warfare, the Audacious-class is a versatile and continually evolving design, that has been built for the purpose of excelling at escort duty, projecting power over an area disproportionate to its overall tonnage and coordinating seamlessly with most modern military and commercial communications protocols and information sharing systems.

An overview:
Our latest production model of the Audacious-class star frigate is the Mk13 EK, which is approximately five hundred and thirty six metres in length and sixty seven metres across its beam, with a height of forty nine metres. Carrying consumables and other stores for voyages of up to three years when fully crewed, the engines can manage acceleration and deceleration at a rate of up to two hundred gravities with a full load, all of which is fully inertially compensated, even in the thick of battle, allowing the Mk13 EK to perform astonishing combat manoeuvres to interpose itself between attackers and the ships it is escorting. In terms of sensor capabilities, the Mk13 EK is equipped with a state of the art sensor array produced under license from Velasquez void technologies, with an effective range of thirteen astronomical units against most vessels, though this drops to reliability out to three gigametres against state of the art passive stealth. However, the Mk13 EK also comes with an optional towed sensor array that can extend the effective range of the Frigate's sensory envelope not only overall but also against both passive and active stealth systems- though the towed array does place constraints on the frigate's acceleration, deceleration and ability to manoeuvre.

Theme not used, trying a technical/corporate promotional material style with this- 316 words

Total output: 1,634 words

[Icewalker]

New goal: Write enough of my novel to pass the challenge each week. Then pass the challenge each week without using any writing from my novel.

...I wrote a song! I'd negotiate for how much it counts as (quite a bit? It took most of the day) but I'm planning to write another prisoner case file tonight or tomorrow, which will likely be 1000+ words, if not fulfilling the whole 1500 on its own, so it doesn't much matter.

[Lady Serpentine]

924 words (in two chapters) of character backstory.

The rest will be put up tomorrow, when I'm more up to gathering stuff...

[Glass Mouse]

I just found this thread today, and I'm in the middle of preparing for National Novel Writing Month in November, so I'm hoping to use this to get in the swing of things.

If you're looking for a theme at this point, can I suggest New World...

Considering that it's Glass Mouse's 100th week, I'm willing to do a request in writing if wanted, but beyond that, I'll probably just write background material towards my novel for November if that's okay?

Hi Mercenary, welcome to the Challenge Novel and background material are definitely okay.

I'm really, really considering NaNoWriMo myself. I've wanted to do it for years, and for once I have the time. Having another NaNoWriMo'er here may even ensure that I don't give up halfway though!

And thanks for the 100th week thing, that's really sweet of you. I'll see if I can think up something

Ahh crap, I didn't realise I could get picked for theme stuff! Sorry guys.

No worries, it happens

Everyone gets picked for themes, in time. I simply go down the list, and the next name gets to choose.

New goal: Write enough of my novel to pass the challenge each week. Then pass the challenge each week without using any writing from my novel.

...I wrote a song! I'd negotiate for how much it counts as (quite a bit? It took most of the day) but I'm planning to write another prisoner case file tonight or tomorrow, which will likely be 1000+ words, if not fulfilling the whole 1500 on its own, so it doesn't much matter.

Haha, I like that goal!

I'd think a song counts as a poem (aka, one song = one piece), but having never written those, I'm open to suggestions.

[Mercenary Pen]

Hi Mercenary, welcome to the Challenge Novel and background material are definitely okay.

I'm really, really considering NaNoWriMo myself. I've wanted to do it for years, and for once I have the time. Having another NaNoWriMo'er here may even ensure that I don't give up halfway though!

And thanks for the 100th week thing, that's really sweet of you. I'll see if I can think up something

Well, there usually tends to be a forum thread for NaNo each year- which allows for many of the other GITP wrimos to congregate (I'm thinking that I'll probably create the thread myself if nobody else has by early October) and since our number for NaNoWriMo has typically included everyone up to and including members of the forum staff in previous years, there will be plenty of other Wrimos on the boards to measure yourself against.

As to the 100th week thing, I skimmed the entire thread before jumping in, and I also kind of noticed that your personal haul of prizes dropped off when IncoherentEssay dropped out. Just send me a PM when you come up with something.

[Icewalker]

I'd think a song counts as a poem (aka, one song = one piece), but having never written those, I'm open to suggestions.

I'd figure something like one for the lyrics, one or more for the notes, depending on what it's composed for (in this case guitar, so it's chords + strumming pattern, I'd say probably one.)

Again, not too important to me at the moment! I've currently got about 1000 words of case file on Void, and another 1000 words of novel. I'll post later tonight with whatever I decide to put up.

Edit: Ooh! Midnight! My non-novel creations this week: 1000 words for the case file on Cell 4 (Ætherphysics is fun!), and the lyrics and chords to a song I wrote for guitar.

Cell 4 Occupant: Unidentified Anomaly

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History:
A number of ripples and shifts, the so-called ‘Echoes’ in the Æther of spacetime have confused researchers since the original discoveries of Æther over a century ago in the year 227. These unexpected and unaccounted for patterns had no apparent origin, and were generally assumed to be outside the scope of research for the time being, though numerous theories were proposed. Fifteen years ago, in 326, Æther Researcher Dante Hollow proposed the theory of the Oblivion Space, a dimensional layer overlapping our own with size and shape incomprehensible to the instinctive mind, as by definition the space cannot physically exist. By application of this theory, Hollow predicted that it could be possible due to the inertia of thought for an intelligence to be manifest within such a space. Because intelligence is a matter of existence, and not of oblivion, this could result in a manifestation of this Oblivion Space within our physical existence.

Hollow named this the Walking Void theory. The paper predicted that it would be possible to have a quasi-stable sentience contained within a layer of the theorized Oblivion Space, resulting in a manifestation capable of being in and of influencing our existence. This would potentially allow for a crossing of the barrier between our physical existence and the non-existence of the Oblivion Space. However, Hollow’s theories suggested that this interaction could be an incredibly dangerous one: as the Oblivion Space does not have physical dimensions in the way ours does, the interaction was likely to be a one-directional event. Hollow predicted that the influence of the Oblivion Space upon our reality would completely remove objects from our physical existence. The Ætherphysical state of the Oblivion Space however is not simply a physical lack: it is, by its very definition, non-physical, and on a temporospatial scale, rather than simply a spatial one. As a result, this influence was theorized to have the potential to not simply remove an object from our physical existence, but to remove all previous instances of it through previous time. The details surrounding this conclusion are lengthy and rooted in extensive arcane particulars, as well as some of the background within the field of Ætherphysics. Because of this complexity, the details of this proof are not laid out within this case file. For further reference into the theoretical basis of these processes, it is recommended that one read the paper Experimental Studies in the Ætherphysical Inertia of Intelligence, one of the founding papers of Ætherphysics written by Dr. Cole Galyn in the year 242, as well as Dante Hollow’s two groundbreaking papers, Theoretical Considerations On The Medium of Temporospatial Echoes, in which Hollow’s Oblivion Space theory is laid out, and Dimensional Folding as a Result of Inertial Intelligence: Interactions between Non-Space and Physical Matter, in which he first introduced the Walking Void theory.

These theories paved the way for a more complete investigation of the Æther Echoes phenomenon. It is at this point that the records and progression of events become unclear. It has since been determined that in the extensive testing and investigation of the Walking Void theory, many records, conclusions, and likely researchers, were removed entirely from physical existence, in both past and present. As this research included discoveries of barriers, materials, and magics capable of stopping the temporospatial echoes of this removal, we have been able to determine that things were removed, rather than having them completely wiped from all memories and records as they were theorized to have been in the past.

The date at which the unidentified anomaly consistent with the Walking Void theory was located, as well as the date at which it was confined to the Lock prison facility, are both unknown, as records have been lost. Scattered records imply that the anomaly was responsible for the complete removal from our existence of three entire cities and the entirety of their populations: one located within the Empire of the Sands and two unidentified. The names, populations, and exact locations of these theorized now non-existent cities is unknown, as is the potential further damage that the anomaly could have caused.

Known Capabilities:
Almost all experimental attempts to discover information regarding the nature and capacities of the unidentified anomaly have resulted in a loss of information rather than a gain of it. Nearly the entirety of information regarding this entity are a result of purely theoretical calculations and theories, primarily provided by researcher Dante Hollow.

While untested in any properly recorded context, the only theory with any attestations is the Oblivion -- Matter interaction predicted by Hollow’s paper on Dimensional Folding. It seems that contact, or even certain interactions without contact with the anomaly will result in the removal of an object or living being from our existence in its entirety, past and future, removing even memories of the individual from others. Due to the effects of inertial intelligence, while the removal of a physical object is nigh instantaneous, the removal of a living being is a process that occurs over a slightly extended period of time, although appears irreversible.

Several layers of protections from this process have been set into place across the Lock prison facility. The most important and prominent of these is the anomaly’s cell itself, which contains the being and its capacities completely. It is unknown when precisely this cell was designed and built, and records of the complete extent of its protections and design are also lost. However, the boundaries of the cell, as well as the boundaries of the prison as a whole, are designed to contain the temporospatial Echoes that in turn remove all traces of an object when destroyed. If the anomaly ever leaves its cell, all such protections within the facility will be irrelevant, and all previously contained Echoes will then spread.

It is theorized that annihilation on a larger scale from the anomaly would simply necessitate time. If left to its own devices, it is likely that the anomaly would be capable of collapsing the entirety of our dimensional existence. It is possible that certain material magics could slow, or accelerate, this process.

Will You Give Us a Song

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Am C G Am
There once was a boy who did run from his home
Am C E
Dreaming of stories and song.
Am C G Am
He wanted the world and far would he roam
Am C E
For the roads were where he belonged.

Am C G Am
The young bard would lay at the bright river's sides,
Am C E
The soft weight of sleep on his eyes
Am C G Am
And he Dreamed of a man who would sail to the skies
Am G Am
A man who would sail to the skies

CHORUS:
F C G Am
There are epics in echoes and stories in souls
F Am E
There are legends in every child's eye.
F C G Am
There are songs to fill silence there is warmth for lost hearts
F C G
In every hello and goodbye.
Am G Am
Just look and you will see.

There once was a man who took to the stars
This pilot did not fear to die
Many were watching and many still are
For the man who sailed to the sky.

But he dreamed of a man who could fly without wings
As the engines with fire did sing
He dreamed of the freedom that magic could bring
The freedom that magic could bring

CHORUS

An old wizard lay chained on a tower so high
It was said that it nigh touched the moon
And he whispered a word to the wind drifting by
He knew his escape would come soon

But he feared for the people across the whole Earth
For a darkness did spread towards the North
To save any child his life would be worth
To save them his life would be worth

CHORUS

A child she laughed as she ran through the town
Her friends all right there at her side
For they'd heard that a traveler of some great renown
To the small village had now arrived.

So they gathered in circles and sides all along
'Fore the man who on roads did belong
And the children all smiled, "will you give us a song,"
"Oh please will you give us a song."

And the man he smiled...
And he said to them all...

CHORUS:
There are epics in echoes and stories in souls
There are legends in every child's eye.
There are songs to fill silence there is warmth for lost hearts
In every hello and goodbye.
Just look and you will see.
Just look and you will see.
Just look and you will see.

[Glass Mouse]

Triple post incoming. Sorry about that, but it would be way too cluttered if I put everything in one post.

Well, there usually tends to be a forum thread for NaNo each year- which allows for many of the other GITP wrimos to congregate (I'm thinking that I'll probably create the thread myself if nobody else has by early October) and since our number for NaNoWriMo has typically included everyone up to and including members of the forum staff in previous years, there will be plenty of other Wrimos on the boards to measure yourself against.

As to the 100th week thing, I skimmed the entire thread before jumping in, and I also kind of noticed that your personal haul of prizes dropped off when IncoherentEssay dropped out. Just send me a PM when you come up with something.

Oooh, I didn't know that. Why October already? I thought people didn't prepare much - that it was part of the idea.

Yeah, he was the only other prize-crafter. But I got an awesome figurine out of the deal before he left

Actually, I've got something you could do, if you feel like it... A propaganda piece for a "we are so very good for all you people" corporation controlling an entire city (with the outside world being controlled by other corporations, all in competition with each other). Don't know if you'd like that? You seem up for style challenges, and I could use the inspiration (and possibly the actual piece for a webcomic, with all credits given)

I'd figure something like one for the lyrics, one or more for the notes, depending on what it's composed for (in this case guitar, so it's chords + strumming pattern, I'd say probably one.)

That sounds reasonable. Guideline adopted

And great job on (almost) reaching your goal! Many lifted hats and high fives to you!
Life is kinda being a jerk right now, but when I'm back on track, I'll be following your example in some way (probably regarding my oh-my-god-will-it-EVER-get-online webcomic, haha).

[Glass Mouse]

Now for the status!


Glass Mouse passes with 2,800 words of horror-ish short story.

C'nor uploaded 924 words of character backstory.

HeadlessMermaid didn't upload/send me anything.

The Grimmace passes with 15 poems of various styles and themes.

CheesePirate passes with four "Mouse on Cheese Moon" drawing series, and two illustrated poems.

Neoriceisgood passes with four comic pages and assorted drawings.

Icewalker passes with 1,000 words of case file, plus lyrics and chords for a song.

Mercenary Pen passes with 1,634 words of explorer/New world writings and style experiment.


Thus, C'nor and HeadlessMermaid FAIL this round!

Glass Mouse, The Grimmace, CheesePirate, Neoriceisgood, Icewalker and Mercenary Pen PASS this round!


Current standing:

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URL="http://glassmouse89.deviantart.com/"]Glass[/URL] Mouse
Current run: 100 weeks
Longest run: -
Themes: -

C'nor
Current run: -
Longest run: 1 week
Themes: -

HeadlessMermaid
Current run: -
Longest run: 11 weeks
Themes: -

The Grimmace
Current run: 14 weeks
Longest run: -
Themes: -

CheesePirate
Current run: 4 weeks
Longest run: -
Themes: 4 weeks

Neoriceisgood
Current run: 4 weeks
Longest run: 8 weeks
Themes: -

Icewalker
Current run: 4 weeks
Longest run: 3 weeks
Themes: 1 week

Mercenary Pen
Current run: 1 week
Longest run: -
Themes: 1 week

It's Icewalker's turn to choose a theme



Grimmace, you're back on a roll! Great job

Icewalker, 'grats on passing your previous best!

[Glass Mouse]

And now for a public service, because after 600 pieces made, I obviously need to do more

I'm offering up two more prizes

First and foremost, I want themes to matter. Anyone who has an unbroken 4 weeks of following the themes (and passing the Challenge) will receive a small drawing/writing/photography prize by me, equaling one Challenge piece (to compare, my 8-week prizes take me an average of 4-5 hours and often span several pieces).
This could be a quick character portrait, an essay, a reference photo, etc.

Also, for every 4 regular Challenge weeks passed, I offer a critique of one piece of your choice. I'll aim for 250 words of critique and improvement suggestions. I know this isn't everyone's cup of tea, and I may not be qualified to talk about everything, but the offer is there.

So, to summarize my prizes:

• For every 4 weeks passed, I offer one ~250 words of critique.
• For every 8 weeks passed, I offer one carefully made commission drawing.
• For every 4 weeks of following the themes, I offer one creative work, equaling one Challenge piece.

A few guidelines:

• Before requesting, take a look at my DA gallery, so you'll know what I can do.
• Everything must be SFW, and I can always refuse a commission (but will do something else instead).

[flyingchicken]

How to join challenge? nevermind I saw the FAQ which I never noticed before

I want in :0

[HeadlessMermaid]

Yeap, I failed this round.

However, I have a little something today. I think Glass Mouse deserves a prize for 100 freaking weeks of passing the Challenge and not balking once, not to mention the work she's been putting for everybody else. So here goes.

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It's lackluster, I know, my apologies. But it was the best I could do considering that:
1) it's been many years since I drew anything at all
2) I'm photoshop-illiterate
3) I can't do coloring to save my life, and inking isn't my strong suit either
4) apparently, I have misplaced the scanner's cable , so I had to snap a photo of it

Here's to hoping it's the thought that counts , and congratulations to Glass Mouse!

P.S. Welcome aboard, flyingchicken! :)

[Mercenary Pen]

Oooh, I didn't know that. Why October already? I thought people didn't prepare much - that it was part of the idea.

Yeah, he was the only other prize-crafter. But I got an awesome figurine out of the deal before he left

Actually, I've got something you could do, if you feel like it... A propaganda piece for a "we are so very good for all you people" corporation controlling an entire city (with the outside world being controlled by other corporations, all in competition with each other). Don't know if you'd like that? You seem up for style challenges, and I could use the inspiration (and possibly the actual piece for a webcomic, with all credits given)

On the matter of starting the NaNo thread in October- I'd do this because it allows for raising awareness amongst all the people who might want to participate, also because there are no restrictions on pre-planning (as long as you don't start writing the story proper before November 1st) and some of us tend to get started planning well ahead of time. Also, it gives us time to help people with difficulties setting themselves up on the NaNo site before it grinds to a halt because everyone's trying to update their word count every five minutes. Only reason I'm holding it as late as October is that the NaNo forums get an annual purge on the first of October...


In other news, challenge accepted on the stylistic piece- I can even think of a couple of things I want to draw inspiration from. Do the city and/or corporation already have names, or do I have a completely blank slate to work with?