[NEXUS] MaGLoG II: Alcoholic Boogaloo

[Reinholdt]

The Hanging Thread

Nooo... Butler's sexiness! It's a quintessential Butlertude!

Butler is not immune to mild shapeshapeshifting, and indeed doesn't even notice all that much.

Except that everything seems taller for some reason. Maybe a side effect of being near the psychics is getting taller? Weird.

"Alright, let's get back to the party sirs!"

Butler will lead the way to the Employees Only door. He's an employee so it must mean him.

[Gullara]

[The Party]

Kirk chuckles amusedly as he lets Decker wrap him up, though not without pushing his arm outward a bit to keep it loose.

A moment later he wishes he hadn't even allowed that much, however. He turns to look at the approaching shadow. As close as they still are to the entrance, there isn't much time to react. None the less, he isn't going to allow this to happen quite so easily as Dena apparently is. The drow moves fast, likely cutting Dena off mid sentence. He backpedals away from the shadow, just managing to pull his arm free so he can grab Dena and yank her away as well.

[Morty]

[The Party]

When tendrils start to appear and she feels something trying to tug at her mind to make her behave differently, Sophie reflexively activates her Second Sight. This shields her psyche from any meddling. She backs away towards the center of the room, thinking about the apple she got after heading through the door. 'Trust'. Strange word in this environment...

[Zefir]

The Hanging Thread

Ezreal is shocked as the clothes seem to attack Butler. He draws his weapon, but he leaves it down as he notice that no harm is made on butler. He needs a moment to get things, but assumes thats meant by the sign they saw.

As butler heads for the employee room Ezreal tries to stop him.

"Hey Butler. Employees Only is meant for Employees who work in THIS shop. We should take the portal instead."

If I'm not wrong the portal isn't the employee only door.

[happyturtle]

At the Party

Decker skates around trying to punch people in the mouth to break their teeth. If anyone wants their PC to be attacked, just speak up.

Elias is turned invisible but one of the tendrils reaches him - just a slight brush across the ankle. He tries to pull Hekta closer to him. "Come with me. We should go into the shadows, away from everyone," he whispers.

Following the Light

Elaine and Vinny continue to follow the light.

[Slii Arhem]

The Hanging Thread

This wasn't right. One of the best things about having a familiar was that you can always to check to see if you're just being crazy. Both agreed, clothes moving by themselves wasn't right. Using his free hand, Jace attempts to cast an identify spell, which would highlight enchanted materials and help him ascertain the kind of magic on them. A spell to make donning easier, apparently a bit of transmutation would seem normal enough for magic clothing, but if they were animate, or turned invisible, or exploded, or...well, there are plenty of bad things they could do.

The Hanging Thread

Nooo... Butler's sexiness! It's a quintessential Butlertude!

Butler is not immune to mild shapeshapeshifting, and indeed doesn't even notice all that much.

Except that everything seems taller for some reason. Maybe a side effect of being near the psychics is getting taller? Weird.

"Alright, let's get back to the party sirs!"

Butler will lead the way to the Employees Only door. He's an employee so it must mean him.

The Hanging Thread

As Butler walks towards the Employee's Only door, it unlocks and opens from the inside, revealing a bouncy young woman in a witch's outfit, complete with a makeup wart on the tip of her nose and green face paint. She giggles as she notices Butler's costume, holding up a wand with a streamer dangling off the end.

"So, thought you could just take a costume without paying did you? I bet you thought that just because we didn't have anyone on register we'd let you just waltz right on out. Well, if you're too much of a skin flint to pay the normal way, you'll just have to work off your debt like everyone else."

She waves the streamer at Butler, trying to catch him on the tip of his nose with it. If it lands, he'll probably feel an itching, tingling sensation that might make him want to sneeze, but he'll probably find sneezing quite impossible.

The reason is quite obvious to the others standing around, as if the magic takes hold Butler's nose will have been turned into hard plastic, a condition which will rapidly spread from that point to cover his entire body soon enough.

Jace's identify spell doesn't seem to identify anything at first. Nothing in the store front seems magical at all. Then, as if it was a delayed reaction, something comes back to him from it. Some kind of illusion is at play here.

[Creeping Dread]

Ormirrah immediately looks upwards towards the source of the sound. Heights? She can't deal with heights. But monsters she can, and for the moment, it takes her off her focus of what's below. Or, more accurately, what's not below.

That's long enough to break her panicked immobility, and Ormirrah bolts off to the side, moving deftly despite how little ground she has to move on. Right now, she isn't thinking about how she might fall, she's thinking about how she might fight that buzzard thing, and it's making all the difference in the world. The feeling is familiar, and with familiarity comes comfort, even in life threatening situations.

Creeping Dread

Well that's definitely something then. Now that Ormirrah is moving, she can probably hear something coming from one side of the path, back where she came from. It's the sound of heavy, panting breath, and even though she's moving it's getting steadily closer, though it stays just out of her sight in the gloom of the night.

One of its claws scrapes against the stone as it unsheathes them, a rare occurrence with its otherwise silent footfalls.

The Party

Kate immediately is snagged by one of the tentacles... she writhes away from it, and then tries to fight the effects.

Not knowingly, however. She looks like she's distracted... she just thinking hard.

Now, the question is, who is the Porcelain Maiden?

The porcelain maiden is a costume that Kate threw together on a budget for a masquerade.

That's it.

Nothing more, not really. Though Kate would have usually have thought this out entirely too much, she did not in this case. However, the costume was specifically made for a masquerade...

Masquerade... Seething shadows breathing lies... masquerade...

Kate turns to look at the party again. No one here is who they seem-

Kate's mind takes over here. No... they are who they seem. They're just probably being altered right now. Like the "Goddess of chaos" just said, the costumes are becoming the dominant personalities. On the other hand, none of them are really their costumes... there are people, being warped by this goddess...

No one here is who they seem.

Carry on, bizarre masquerade mindset, you seem to know what you're doing.

Kate turns to the nearby arachnae and vampire. It's time to meet some strangers.

Kate never really was comfortable meeting strangers...

But...

She can fake being an extrovert for one night. Especially tonight.

The maiden casually walks up to Sophie, and gives a slight bow. "Good evening. Are you well today?"

Halloween Night - Kate and Mintbalm

As Sophie scurries off to go be curious about the apple, Mintbalm seems more curious about herself. Intellectually, she knows she's not a grig, because she has pixie magic instead of grig magic. She can feel it inside her. So clearly, she's a pixie physically, but a grig mentally.

And a grig could get into a lot of trouble with pixie magic. No need for boundaries there, just whatever you can imagine, so long as you have enough power, can be yours at least for a little while.

And then, of course, she realizes Vriveka's own woes. Absolute power was absolutely boring, and nothing she could do to these people was going to top what Eris had already pulled by locking them all in with new personalities. She was outplayed here, and it sucked.

So, she turns to Kate, who she still recognized. The good thing about being a generic grig was that most of the history was just filled in with her own memories and only her personality was twisted.

"Hello to you too. How are you feeling?"

[Halae]

[Creeping Dread]

Should the creature get too close, Ormirrah's tail will swing towards it, even if she doesn't look at the beast. She just keeps at her steady hustle; not too fast and thus going to kill herself, but certainly not slow either. Her skirt rides up a little because it's not meant for this kind of leg movement, which she reflexively pulls back down with one of her hands, even as she keeps running

[Lost_Deep]

Halloween Night - Kate and Mintbalm

"Fine, fine."

Not sure how much is Mintbalm or how much is the costume, Kate thinks to herself. Sophie got away: good for her, Kate notes quietly.

"What are you going to do, given this... sudden change?"

[KerfuffleMach2]

Strange Delights

Krystal shakes her head quickly. No! No...I'm not good at cooking. You wouldn't want me to do it, trust me.

She'll start shoving people out of the way if she has to. She didn't like this room at all.

The Party

Alysha will step closer to the floating mouth and eyes. Her whole demeanor has changed. Gone is the peppy vampire from before.

She'll reach out to where Amil's hair should be, on the side of her head, and try to give said hair a light stroke.

Mm...you know, that ability is quite unique. Very attractive to some. Her voice seems to have dropped in pitch, and has an almost enchanting quality to it.

[Deathkeeper]

The Hanging Thread

Why does this sort of thing happen every time I forget to be paranoid? I should have said something sooner about taking things Jace thought to himself the moment the girl begins admonishing Butler about not paying.
Judging from the wand, her tone, (and the fact that Identify has only been active for about a minute and therefore is still detecting magic, hopefully) Jace figures that this isn't going anywhere he'd like to be. Shifting his grip on his spear (roughly 6 feet long, by the way) during her speech, he reacts to the girl's sudden streamer-throw by swinging downwards with it, in hopes of swatting the flying fabric out of the air. Without waiting to see what happens, he immediately begins talking.
Now, Ma'am, there's no need to be hasty. I'm sure my friend here had every intention of providing you payment, which is why he went straight for the Employees door to find someone matching that description. How about we all settle down and talk about how he can pay in "the normal way," without any hostilities?

[Shadowcaller]

[The Party - Kirk & Dena]

Dena was actually just about to dash away, though her player wasn't sure if Kirk was stuck or not. In any case, she isn't planning to give up so easily either but she isn't sure how to avoid these tendrils, smoke bombs probably won't help but who knows? Maybe they rely on sight somehow?

So as they run Dena throws a smoke bomb behind them as they go, planning to make a classic ninja disappearance. Now to just find a direction where there wasn't tendrils, perhaps upwards? She scans the ceiling for some type of exit while she hopes Kirk is doing the same.

At the Party

Hekta attempts to dodge the tendrils as well as she can while Elias is looking for a way out of there. But just as her partner she can't away from them forever and one of them manages to touch her wrist.
The little demon isn't exactly sure what a witch is though but suddenly figures that she can do magic and ride a broom though with the disappointing lack of the second thing she had to do magic. Just like her old caretaker!

As she attempts to figure out what sort of magic she actually can cast Elias pulls her close, "Uh, okay!" She replies while being dragged away into some dark corner of the room.

[happyturtle]

At the Party

As The Fool pulls The Witch further into the darkness, into the deepest darkest corner he can find, he uses his free hand to pull a small, sharp knife out of a hidden pocket in his belt. "I'm just going to need a little bit of blood," he whispers, and tries to draw a cut down the length of Hekta's restrained arm.

[Shadowcaller]

At the Party

Hekta looks at Elias in absolute confusion as he suddenly pulls a knife, and winches, trying to pull away as he starts making a cut, not the smartest move but the pain makes her winche. "AHHH! What did you do that for?!" She shouts back at Elias who will notice that the blood that now trickles down Hekta's arm is pitch black and seem much thicker than human blood. He might also note that her wound is already slowly closing.

[Reinholdt]

The Hanging Thread

Eep.

Butler steps back quickly from the streamer thing, not because of anything it might have done, but because someone decided to interject a spear right there.

"I'm sorry ma'am. I thought they were for the party ma'am. I'll be happy to pay ma'am." He casts a slightly nervous look at Jace, just in case that spear gets used again.

I think Butler missed the portal Ezreal mentioned, but he's probably right. Going that way would probably be better.

[Zefir]

The Hanging Thread

Ezreal watches the scene since it appears all is cleared right now.

[McBish]

The Darkened Way

Walking towards the light seems wise, but as they go on it doesn't appear to get any larger as they head towards it, which seems to confirm just how far away it is. One thing they may notice is that whatever they're walking on has a slight but noticeable incline that gets more pronounced as they go on. If they continue, they'll find that the dot of light itself has migrated upwards in their field of vision slowly as they approach it, and that their steps might take more effort with the slope gradually increasing.

Still, if they persist, they will find themselves standing and looking at a tiny hole in the fabric of this world, no bigger than a pin. It's slightly higher up than their eye level, but even standing on this curved slope they could reach up to it.

"This is just creepy. I wasn't expecting to do so much walking at the party I will admit."

She is glad that Gertrude is here with her. She couldn't imagine being alone in this darkness. The thought gives her the shivers.

[Earl of Purple]

The Darkened Way

"I know. I'm sorta glad it's just us here, though. No weird noises in the distance or anything. Anyway, what should we do with this light?" Gertrude will try to stand under it. She's very tall, so she may brush it accidently.

[McBish]

The Darkened Way

"I don't know, maybe try and see if you can see through it. Or maybe it is some sort of button."

Kayla who is a shorter woman and would have a hard time reaching the light without some sort of boost.

[ThirdEmperor]

The Party

It appears the Wraith's question has gone answered, either lost in the din or simply because nobody had an answer to give. So, time to find his own escape from this madness. As mentioned before, the main door was likely barred and at the epicenter of the tendrils as well. That leaves the windows and the other six doors. Neither option holds much appeal, but the Wraith will take the one that does not put his hide at risk from broken glass.

Simple Pleasures. That sounded, if not quite reassuring, less ominous than the labels of the other doors. Waving his fire at the shadows in the hopes that they'll continue to shy away from it, the Wraith heads towards the chosen door.

[Slii Arhem]

Strange Delights

Krystal shakes her head quickly. No! No...I'm not good at cooking. You wouldn't want me to do it, trust me.

She'll start shoving people out of the way if she has to. She didn't like this room at all.

The Party

Alysha will step closer to the floating mouth and eyes. Her whole demeanor has changed. Gone is the peppy vampire from before.

She'll reach out to where Amil's hair should be, on the side of her head, and try to give said hair a light stroke.

Mm...you know, that ability is quite unique. Very attractive to some. Her voice seems to have dropped in pitch, and has an almost enchanting quality to it.

Strange Delights

A few of the haremites protest and try to grasp at her spandex ineffectually, but no one really stops Krystal from leaving through the way she came. Of course, once she leaves the lounge room, she'll be walking straight into the wall of shadow that has covered the portal wall, and the personality altering effects it entails.

Halloween Night - Kate and Mintbalm

"Fine, fine."

Not sure how much is Mintbalm or how much is the costume, Kate thinks to herself. Sophie got away: good for her, Kate notes quietly.

"What are you going to do, given this... sudden change?"

Halloween Night - Kate and Mintbalm

"If I was still my normal self, I'd probably try to urge you to do something about all this and try to force a way out of here for everyone. Now I think I'll just sit back and admire her work. I could probably learn a thing or two from this Eris." Mintbalm explains. It's no sin to enjoy a party, even if the reactions of those normal people are somewhat boring her. She doesn't really understand what's so wrong about being someone else for the night, when that's really what Halloween was about in her opinion.

[Creeping Dread]

Should the creature get too close, Ormirrah's tail will swing towards it, even if she doesn't look at the beast. She just keeps at her steady hustle; not too fast and thus going to kill herself, but certainly not slow either. Her skirt rides up a little because it's not meant for this kind of leg movement, which she reflexively pulls back down with one of her hands, even as she keeps running

Creeping Dread

With the ledge being so small, Ormirrah will find her maximum safe speed to be uncomfortably slow, and the creature's breath behind her keeps getting louder and closer as she continues along the path. Her tail swipe meets with nothing but air, but elicits a threatening growl from the beast that sounds like the rumblings of hell itself.

At the Party

Decker skates around trying to punch people in the mouth to break their teeth. If anyone wants their PC to be attacked, just speak up.

Elias is turned invisible but one of the tendrils reaches him - just a slight brush across the ankle. He tries to pull Hekta closer to him. "Come with me. We should go into the shadows, away from everyone," he whispers.

Following the Light

Elaine and Vinny continue to follow the light.

Following the Light

As they approach the light, the two will find it harder and harder to look directly into it as it gets harsher and brighter. It may drive them to look away and lose everything, but if they persist, they will eventually walk through it and be bathed in glowing fog.

A voice, hazy and indistinct, calls out to her, "Elaine? Is that... my Elaine?"

[The Party]

When tendrils start to appear and she feels something trying to tug at her mind to make her behave differently, Sophie reflexively activates her Second Sight. This shields her psyche from any meddling. She backs away towards the center of the room, thinking about the apple she got after heading through the door. 'Trust'. Strange word in this environment...

The Party

Under Sophie's Second Sight, the apple she's holding glows with chaotic energy, waiting for the slightest provocation to be unleashed. Breaking the perfect skin or even bruising the fruit might set it off. The shadowy walls, of course, ooze enchantment, while the rest of the casino isn't majorly magical or supernatural.

At the Party

As The Fool pulls The Witch further into the darkness, into the deepest darkest corner he can find, he uses his free hand to pull a small, sharp knife out of a hidden pocket in his belt. "I'm just going to need a little bit of blood," he whispers, and tries to draw a cut down the length of Hekta's restrained arm.

[The Party - Kirk & Dena]

Dena was actually just about to dash away, though her player wasn't sure if Kirk was stuck or not. In any case, she isn't planning to give up so easily either but she isn't sure how to avoid these tendrils, smoke bombs probably won't help but who knows? Maybe they rely on sight somehow?

So as they run Dena throws a smoke bomb behind them as they go, planning to make a classic ninja disappearance. Now to just find a direction where there wasn't tendrils, perhaps upwards? She scans the ceiling for some type of exit while she hopes Kirk is doing the same.

At the Party

Hekta attempts to dodge the tendrils as well as she can while Elias is looking for a way out of there. But just as her partner she can't away from them forever and one of them manages to touch her wrist.
The little demon isn't exactly sure what a witch is though but suddenly figures that she can do magic and ride a broom though with the disappointing lack of the second thing she had to do magic. Just like her old caretaker!

As she attempts to figure out what sort of magic she actually can cast Elias pulls her close, "Uh, okay!" She replies while being dragged away into some dark corner of the room.

In the Darkness

Hekta and Elias will hear the cackling laughter of the gremlins as they enter the darkened ruins of the casino beyond the well-lit lobby. After Elias makes his cut, their glowing eyes begin appearing all around the pair, staring down at them hauntingly. No one in the lobby can see the eyes, but while in the darkness with the gremlins, they can.

"Mistress wants. Come." One of the evil little creatures speaks, the words hissing out from between the carved lips of its gourd.

Halloween Night - Lobby

As Dena and Kirk escape their own set of doomy tendrils and head to where everyone else is huddling for safety, Dena looking up to the ceiling has clued her into a very important fact. The tendrils of shadow that are reaching ever closer to the center of the room are above their heads now, and yet they aren't trying to touch anyone. Instead, they're reaching for the flickering candle flames in the chandeliers. One can only imagine what will happen if they have their way and the lights are extinguished, but it can't be good.

When the Wraith approaches the wall, the shadows nearest him part almost tauntingly, revealing that the place where the door leading to Simple Pleasures was once before, nothing but a bare patch of wall is now. It seems like all the portals have vanished similarly, at least until the people still trapped inside have left, as Krystal stumbling out of the wall proved.

The Hanging Thread

"Oh you'll pay alright. You'll all pay! Hyahahahaha!" The young woman laughs uncharacteristically before exploding into a puff of greyish-green smoke and disappearing, leaving her wand and outfit behind, oddly enough.

Even more odd is the fact that the outfit is defying gravity, floating there as if she was still inside it. The shelves begin to empty as more costumes assemble themselves off the shelves and fill the aisles between them and the portal to freedom, standing menacingly with masks staring at the trespassers blankly.

A lion costume starts to move in slowly, its empty sockets eying the spear Jace carries warily.

The Darkened Way

The light doesn't respond to being brushed against, but perhaps the hole it's coming from could be widened in some fashion. After all, the walls seem to be made out of the same spongy material that the floor is.

[Halae]

[Creeping Dread]

And within moments, Ormirrah panics, and begins running faster. This is bad, however, as it means her footing is precarious.

This fact betrays her, and her left foot doesn't plant itself properly on the ledge, before going down further then it should. the fall with her right leg still sitting on the ledge stretches her muscles painfully, and with a scream, she'll go careening off the ledge.

[Slii Arhem]

Creeping Dread -> The Lobby

As Ormirrah tumbles down the cliff and into the darkness, whatever was pursuing her still seems to be getting closer. With the flutter of wings, the panting, growling bird she spooked from its nest swoops by her head, taunting her with its powers of flight before flying off into the sky and ceasing its lion-like mimicry before letting out another shriek that perfectly mimics her own scream.

For a while, there is nothing but falling through the blackness next to the shear vertical obsidian cliff, and then finally there's not even that.

Ormirrah should come to in the lobby after being shunted through the wall of shadow just as Krystal was, in time to have her personality possibly replaced by that of her costume.

[Lost_Deep]

Halloween Night - Kate and Mintbalm

"Okay then. I'll have to find someone else to participate in mindbent shenanigans. That is to say, I intend to investigate further, and I expect shenanigans to follow. If you want to be spectator as opposed to an instigator... well, perhaps we will swap tales later." Okay... Kate wasn't expecting that to come out of her mouth, but if it works it works!

[Halae]

[The Lobby]

It occurs to me that Ormirrah is likely deposited near Kate, Sophie, and Minbalm. They'll have the opportunity to see her come out of the shadows, sprawled onto her back as she's breathing heavily; that screaming takes a lot out of someone.

But the personality shift is present, and Ormirrah will quickly stand up and straighten her wig; Can't have something like that prevent you from looking good. Not that it matters in the end; this whole party has been terrible so far, what with all the losers pretending they're something they're not. Unlike Ormirrah, who is totally capable of being what she's dressed up as. Damn, where's a mirror when you need one?

Yes, she actually thinks that as she's standing up.

[ThirdEmperor]

[Halloween Night- Lobby]

Oh, goddam it.

The windows then? Or.... No. If the curse afflicting this could hide the door, then it could surely prevent him from escaping by that method as well. There's nothing for it but to find the source of all this and put a stop to these games. If that can even be done.

Krystal might find a bony hand grasping her shoulder when she stumbles out of the vanished portal, the Wraith trying to stop her before she accidentally stumbles into the tendril's grasp. Can you tell me what was behind that door? Any menace is certainly unintentional, but if Krystal is at all the nervous type, I can't imagine being grabbed and questioned by a faceless specter will be anything but disconcerting.

[KerfuffleMach2]

[Lobby]

Krystal backs out of the door without looking, still freaked out by what was going on in there. Which means she doesn't notice the tendrils until they grab a hold of her.

So when the Wraith grabs her shoulder, her demeanor has changed.

Krystal will turn to face the Wraith, a hard look in her eyes. Definitely not freaked out anymore.

Buncha cannibalistic hussies. Her voice has gone down in pitch and become more gruff. Not that the Wraith would know what her original voice was. But it might still seem a little odd for a young woman to have.

Her eyes scan the lobby, noticing that something is not right. Mind tellin' me who you are and what the hell is goin' on in here, bub?

[ThirdEmperor]

[Halloween Night- Lobby]

Any other day and maybe the Wraith would indeed think it odd. But today is not any day. Today the bar for 'odd' has been set high enough that a mere incongruous voice simply doesn't reach, doesn't even register. If anything, the Wraith assumes she's used magic to alter her voice, the same as he.

A reveller like yourself and as clueless as yourself. A voice spoke, the doors slammed shut and now these- A skeletal digit is turned upon the tendrils in accusation -seek to ensnare us. But they seem also to fear fire, so you should be safe as long as you remain close by.

[KerfuffleMach2]

[Lobby]

Krystal takes a closer look at the people here. She doesn't remember most of them being here when she got here.

No, wait, that isn't entirely true...she saw them. But they were costumes. Now, they seem almost like the real thing...

You know what set these things off?

[Zefir]

The Hanging Thread

"It might be only me, but I have the strange feeling these costums won't let us pass."

Andy looks around preparing for whatever comes to him.

"Butler. It may be best to get out of the costum."

[Deathkeeper]

The Hanging Thread
Jace hears Zebes give a colorful swear in Draconic. Still eyeing the costumes,
I think you'd be right, Ezrael. If I clear us an aisle, can you take point?