first verse Augury: Ten of the Void

[I think I am here.]

They were gods. Actual gods. Price stared wide-eyed at the Cahayan boy, who'd been dead only moments prior. And dead for a while, Price had seen it with his own eyes. Tearing his eyes from the gods he looked at Negation with a new light, then took out his ledger and scribbled ceaselessly.

The Gods are real. Study combat applications immediately.

Snapping the book shut he looked at Negation in disbelief. It seemed Sagitta was shocked too.

"Sure," he said, when she asked whether they could sit down. "Though I am unsure why you'd need to ask. You're... gods."

[AonEne]

10 hours ago, I think I am here. said:

"Sure," he said, when she asked whether they could sit down. "Though I am unsure why you'd need to ask. You're... gods."

"That doesn't mean we shouldn't be polite," Gati returned, wishing Facet were here so she could ask what the man had written down. "What are your names?"

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The paradox in that sentence *facepalms* "I wanna be polite, but I wish I could spy on your notes"

 

[+Sorana]

Sagitta slowly made an inviting gesture towards the ground.

"Sure, we can sit." She loosened her grip on the branch, but her eyes stayed with the gods. Sit and then maybe there would be some answers, maybe something else. A way to stop the wars, to save so many lives. Without the fighting they could prosper, teach the children something else but fighting. She took a step back but made sure she stayed in front of Zura and Price. Gods. She was talking to gods. And Öl her of them was Sensation. She had to ask if the tale was true. The stars. Had he really created the stars?

[Lunamor]

Zura watched the Cahayan boy stand up with a terrified expression. That wasn’t supposed to be possible. This was wrong. He had been gone. He shouldn’t have been able to come back. She felt like she should do something to comfort him, help him. He had just come back from death, after all. But all she could do was stare at him, unsure what to feel. 

She heard something about sitting and let her legs give out, somehow managing to fall in a way that she was sitting with legs crossed. She had known they were gods, ever sense that weird, color changing guy. But now they had revealed themselves to have powers that were greater than anything she had thought possible.

[AonEne]

Gati beckoned the confused-looking Cahayan boy over and sat with her knees folded under her. The boy followed Zura's example.

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Basically a filler post.

 

[Archer]

16 hours ago, I think I am here. said:

It's nighttime 

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Oops, retcon sunlight with starlight then, as Lunamor implied. Thanks, I forgot about that. 

13 hours ago, AonEne said:

She turned back to Tion with a playful “Ta-da!”, not letting the three - now four - mortals see what it had taken out of her. Tion could probably tell, but then he’d seen her do that type of thing before. 

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Good to know. He will definitely use that against you later on.  Also, that was one of the most horrifically casual resurrections I've ever witnessed. 

Tion sat beside Negation in the growing ring of gods and mortals.

“Wars often serve a valuable purpose,” Tion mumbled, crumbs of bread flying from his mouth as he talked. He’d found half a sandwich in one of his pockets. It tasted slightly acidic, but he needed a prop to disguise how uncomfortable he was at the moment. “Gati, remind me sometime to talk about my theory that either everyone you meet is capable of morality but you aren’t, or vice versa. It’s one of the two, I think. I just need to figure out the free will component.”

He idly started manipulating the (zombie?) boy’s sensations, trying to get him to wiggle his ears. It was hard prompting muscle responses, but the child had a weak will. It would just take a few moments to figure out what kind of stimuli would be enough to make him do it.

“You’re not used to working together,” he noted abruptly. “Some of you radiate trust, but there’s no precision, no proper coordination among you. Interesting.”

The boy’s left ear spasmed. Tion smiled, then slowly slouched as he sat to gradually defer the groups' attention away from him. It was easier to mess with people when they were focused elsewhere. 

“But never mind that," he added. "Give us your names.”

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Tion will try to expend a small amount of effort to probe the humans' souls as the conversation continues. To avoid godmodding, I'll say if they're strong willed they can probably shake it off given how little he's trying and how on edge they are. But if anyone wants, they can experience unexpected surges in random emotions that would be indicative of him toying with them. eg. For a few moments, start to feel happier than you should right now. It's up to you. 

 

[AonEne]

4 minutes ago, Archer said:

Good to know. He will definitely use that against you later on. 

Also, that was one of the most horrifically casual resurrections I've ever witnessed.

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Oh fantastic.

That was what I was going for!

"If you want to," Gati added. "You could also continue to not tell us your names, if that appeals more to you." And there went her last excuse for not talking about the wars. She sighed. "There are some gods who fight in the wars, or at least involve themselves more directly, such as Entropy's choice to become a major general in Tuhine. Then there are others who prefer to remove themselves from the public entirely. And then there are those of us who do...subtler things. But for the most part, we have chosen to leave humanity alone."

[xinoehp512]

On 9/21/2019 at 8:28 PM, AonEne said:

Rrrrgh I feel like I’m ruining this roleplay. Everyone else is an awesome writer and I’m just over here with no idea where this character is headed in terms of anything. I am so sorry. 

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You're doing much better than I am...

 

[AonEne]

11 minutes ago, xinoehp512 said:

 

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I think you were doing fine, when you were writing. Are you going to rejoin us? 

 

[+Sorana]

"Sagitta T'Sora."

She replied immediatly when Sensation asked for her name. The urge to please him was strong, so strong that she sat down as well, put her branch away. When her hand left the wood she paused, the feeling gone again.  Slowly she continued her movement, let the branch where it was. A god. Sensation.

"Did you really create the stars?" She asked, looked at him directly. The reply of Negation made her suspect that the answer was a no, that all of it had been nothing but a tale. Most of the gods didn't care, had decided to leave them alone.

"But why are you here? If you decided to leave us alone, why are you here, talking to us?" She added, suddenly hoped that her earlier question remained unanswered. Truth, sometimes a lie was gently, was easier. She didn't want to know anymore.

[AonEne]

25 minutes ago, Sorana said:

"But why are you here? If you decided to leave us alone, why are you here, talking to us?" She added. 

Gati smiled at Sagitta. “It’s rare to see three people, each of a different nation, talking together like this. It’s also rare for them to be talking about such deep subjects - I assume you talked about more than just instincts, at least. I could be wrong. Anyway, I was interested.” She looked at Tion, wondering vaguely if his motivation had been the same or different, or if he had merely followed what she’d done. 

[I think I am here.]

3 minutes ago, AonEne said:

Gati smiled at Sagitta. “It’s rare to see three people, each of a different nation, talking together like this. It’s also rare for them to be talking about such deep subjects - I assume you talked about more than just instincts, at least. I could be wrong. Anyway, I was interested.” She looked at Tion, wondering vaguely if his motivation had been the same or different, or if he had merely followed what she’d done. 

Price nodded, sat down with Sagitta. Gods. The surprise had already set in and set his mind aflame. The fact that the gods even existed was crazy enough, but two of them were here, talking to Price? Wait, did they say Entropy was currently a Tühinine General? He felt a stab of pride at having a god as part of his country. But still... if Entropy busied themselves with the war effort, why didn’t they just use their power and end it?

“It...” he started, but yes. It was rare. Very rare, in fact. “It took a lot of interesting circumstances, I assure you. Maybe Probablility was watching us before you and decided to have some fun.”

Quickly he glanced back to his closed ledger. Study weapon applications. It seemed haughty, to even imagine to contain the power of a god. But, he suspected if it was successful, he’d be the most successful Tühinine in history. Maybe that would make up for not being a soldier. Maybe he’d be enough then.

He shrugged. “Who knows?” Then answered it. “Truth, probably.”

[xinoehp512]

12 hours ago, AonEne said:

I think you were doing fine, when you were writing. Are you going to rejoin us? 

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Eventually. Right now, Reality doesn't feel like getting involved in events.

 

[+Sorana]

11 hours ago, AonEne said:

Gati smiled at Sagitta. “It’s rare to see three people, each of a different nation, talking together like this. It’s also rare for them to be talking about such deep subjects - I assume you talked about more than just instincts, at least. I could be wrong. Anyway, I was interested.” She looked at Tion, wondering vaguely if his motivation had been the same or different, or if he had merely followed what she’d done. 

Sagitta nodded at Price' words. "We didn't really choose to end up here, but whatever the reasons, we did." She turned her head, smiled at Price, at the way he held his ledger. Study, he could study gods. He was no soldier. Maybe he would be one in the future, but he lived for his tests and his research. There was no reason, why he couldn't do both, but if you wanted to master what you did - then you had to concentrate, focus. She would see, maybe he surprised her.

Her eyes wandered back to the undead boy and she shivvered from barely hidden disgust. "What happened to his soul?" She asked directly, because she needed to know. They were gods. They had to take care of these things, they were supposed to maintain order, not break it. Death was - death. Dead. A stop. No way onward. Just the end.

@Lunamor (fyi)

[AonEne]

“Truth knows everything,” Gati echoed softly. Except for his past. And what the Augury means. She looked at the three with renewed interest - was this meeting due to the Augury’s beginning? Or was it Probability? She cocked her head at the man who’d suggested that, still not knowing his name, then looked at Sagitta when she asked what had happened to the revived boy’s soul. “I assume he still has it,” she told her. “He’s living, after all, and doesn’t look old enough to have lost it through his own actions.” 

[Archer]

Tion’s eyes shimmered, becoming like a cat’s, in that they faintly reflected the ambient light. He extended his Power, tapping into the web of coloured beams that radiated from each of the assembled individuals. Thick, violet stipes were radiating from the scholar’s chest: pride. The soldier was harder to read. A mix of muddled blues and greens danced around her, so chose not to dwell on her for long. Rather, the god turned his focus on the boy, peering curiously at the emissions of his soul.

As he’d feared, everything seemed normal.

“You must understand, Negation’s greatest gift is that her powers are undetectable. We could have had this conversation a dozen times over now, and you would never know it. He’s incredibly smooth, believe me. To be so careless as to forget to include a subject’s soul is not his style.”

Tion returned the other god’s glance, shrugging his shoulder slightly. His reasons for being here were practical in nature, making local allies was often an effective way of entering hostile territory undetected, but he was also a firm believer in trusting his luck. In a realm where supernatural manipulation of probability was common, seemingly random chance encounters were often worth giving a second thought.  However, he couldn’t help snorting at the human’s trust in Probability’s tendency towards divine intervention.

“Situations,” he said quickly, “are often what you make them. Look at the sky! Those specks of light you see are nothing until you choose to notice and interpret them. If you choose to see those sparks as stars, that is what they become! You make the stars, in your heads, Sagitta T'Sora and company.”

He looked at the lights shimmering around her again. The greens were spinning lazily, like a spiralling aurora borealis.

“By way of answering your other question, I must pose one of my own to you all. Have any of you noticed any,” he paused, trying to find the right way to word it, “fluctuations of your instincts recently?”

Tion looked down at his own body. No light shone from it. His skin and clothes were just a smooth, obsidian shade of black.

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For reference, when using his Sight to look at himself, Tion looks like a background character in the early RWBY episodes. That’s what I’m picturing, anyway.

Spoiler

 

 

[AonEne]

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Tion is Shadow Chibi Ruby. Got it. 

 

[+Sorana]

7 hours ago, Archer said:

He looked at the lights shimmering around her again. The greens were spinning lazily, like a spiralling aurora borealis.

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Is there a reason you made her aura green/ blue?

Sagitta considered his words and question carefully. The stars were the stars, because she thought of them as stars. It was a strange concept, the stars were stars. Even a child, that didn't know what the stars were, couldn't change them being stars. They were always the same. If she knew how to call them didn't matter. Stars were nothing but stars. Her face fell, when she realized that his answer was a no. He hadn't created the stars for them. He hadn't named them, united them. She closed a hand, as if to hold on to broken parts, to keep that tale true and real.

"No, I haven't." She replied and narrowed her eyes on him. There was no reason to ask them. None of them were of Negation or Sensation, so maybe they couldn't feel their instincts, or know if something was off with them, but still the question was off. They were gods. There was no need to ask about their powers or if they fluctated.

"What is wrong?"

[overlord stick]

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CRAP I FORGOT THIS EXISTED AHH WHY AM I NOT GETTING NOTIFICATIONS

 

[AonEne]

22 minutes ago, Lord Furret said:

 

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You’re following it - check your notif settings? 

 

[I think I am here.]

“My instincts haven’t fluctuated either,” Price said, looking warily to the two gods and the necromanced boy.

Negation. It was their instinct that had done this.

“You said instincts are natural,” he said, looking to Negation. “And that you all don’t choose, but if that is the case, then why does no one have your instinct?”

[AonEne]

Pretending not to have heard Sagitta's question about what was wrong, Gati said to Price, "I don't know that, actually." 

[Archer]

On 9/24/2019 at 2:13 AM, Sorana said:

Is there a reason you made her aura green/ blue?

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There is a reason, but the reason was that I haven’t attributed any specific meaning to those colours yet, so that combination could be symbolic of pretty much any emotion. The auras change colour depending on how people are feeling/what sensations they're experiencing. I knew Price was feeling proud, but I couldn't commit to anything specific about Sagitta so it was more of a worldbuilding than a character building line. Sorry if that caused any confusion. 

That said, I believe she's feeling sad at the moment, but unfortunately, Tion's going to have no idea why she's feeling disappointed. He should really read his own myths more often. 

6 hours ago, I think I am here. said:

...the necromanced boy.

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I didn't say anything was wrong, Tion thought. Fluctuation goes both ways. Would they notice if our weakness began to bolster their strength? Would they care?

"The gods have stalked this land for long enough that some might say that we are forces of nature, the same as the wind and stars," Tion murmured. "Just because most of us deities choose to share our gifts does not mean that we are in any way forced to. Perhaps something inside of him recognizes a need to hoard the power for a rainy day. Or to withhold it, until our subjects are ready. I learned long ago not to underestimate the strength of one's subconscious."

He looked at Gati, but kept his voice loud enough to be audible to the entire group. "I appreciate the perspective that these beings have to offer, but there is still the small mater of-" he raised his eyebrows somewhat ambiguously, then realizing that that was too vague, tapped his index finger to his temple. 

"And with the, ahem, fluctuations recently, perhaps it would be best not to leave it to last minute."

In case that was still unclear, he then exaggeratedly mouthed the words 'LEAVE NO TRACE'. 

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Hmm. By definition, Negation's powers are undetectable. And allegedly, no one has ever had the instinct. So how do we know his powers are real?  

 

[AonEne]

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Gati is faking it confirmed! She’s actually Biblioden in disguise! 

Also she is currently female, so l’m not sure if Tion just hasn’t noticed or if I need to start pointing it out every time I switch pronouns. 

On the matter of her erasing their memories of this, it’s up to Sorana, Itiah, and Luna. I assume you want your characters to keep the memory of this encounter; do you want to have someone, multiple people, or all of you lose the question about the fluctuations and your reaction to it? Luna, this is also a chance for you to get slight amnesia if you want, if Gati accidentally went too far. There could be character development for anyone whichever way you guys take it, so up to you what each of you individually knows. 

 

[Lunamor]

1 hour ago, AonEne said:

 

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If the others are alright with having their characters’ memories erased, then Zura accidentally getting amnesia would be great. Otherwise I can probably find another way for her to get some character development  

Zura internally sighed with relief when she heard that the Cahayan boy still probably had his soul. The fact that he had been revived still was terrible, but at least he wouldn’t have to live out the rest of his second life as a soulless monster.

The gods were saying things about fluctuations of Instincts or something like that, but she wasn’t paying much attention anymore. Things just seemed really weird. The fact that she was talking to gods and sitting next to someone who had been dead a few moments ago was incredibly odd, something that she had never expected to happen. Granted, she hadn’t expected to make peace with a Tühine either, but this stuff was stranger. She itched to throw a knife at someone, anyone just to see what would happen, to establish some sense of normality. Violence was a quite common occurrence for her. Battle, she could understand. Weird god powers and should-be-dead people, not so much.

A random impulse entered her head and she poked the Cahayan boy in the cheek just to see if he was a ghost. She quickly pulled back her hand, blushing and horrified at herself. Why had she done that?! That wasn’t definitely not what the poor kid needed at the moment.

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I’m so sorry I’ve been so inactive here lately!

 

Edited September 26, 2019 by Lunamor