Through the Living Heir

Interesting… I have a couple things to say about this. First, in all cases I know of, attribute spikes are stacked and power spikes aren’t. I’d imagine that one iron spike would merely make you a bit stronger, and maybe more muscular. Meanwhile, having four spikes granting the same power will likely do something new. Secondly, we already know that high levels of allomancy or other powers can warp the body; savantism is the result. Thus, high levels of hemalurgy-granted may speed up or even instantly grant savantism. (Thinking about it like that, perhaps koloss can be considered h-iron savants.) It’s possible there are more levels of savantism than those reached by characters we’ve seen. What happens if, for instance, Spook continued to flare tin for the rest of his lifetime? He wouldn’t stop at the level of sensory overclocking he’d reached; he’d have even more dependable and even more benefit, although maybe the increase would slow over time. We also know that eventually savantism can simply vaporize your body, and that it can be fatal, so perhaps with enough spikes you can increase the “pressure” from magic to the extent that it begins to kill you. As for the effect of the warping, I think you’d get some savantism like effects, at least at first. Physical changes other than that seem hard to think of. However, hemalurgy grants permanent powers that cannot be turned off. I think that, with enough spikes, you’d lose the ability to deactivate your powers at all, with them being constantly fueled hemalurgically, perhaps at a low burn. The ability to continuously activate allomancy without burning metals is interesting to contemplate, especially considering that such a person would be completely controlled by Ruin. I’m looking forward to seeing what everyone else thinks of this.

“Sure. Sell your soul instead of wearing some clothes. That makes so much sense.”

“Here, give me your arm.” Nick’s pointer finger has a needle like structure on it. “Is that a common thing on your world? How do you know when you’re given a soul?” Nick grits his teeth. “I’m not saying that there’ll be monsters, or you’ll need to do some swimming. I’m saying that we’ll eventually end up somewhere hot enough to ignite your skin, or cold enough to turn your blood to ice, or there just won’t be any air, or it’ll be raining acid, or you’ll be crushed by your own bodyweight, or any number of other things nobody can survive on their own.” He makes a conscious effort to calm down, letting out a breath. “Almost all of everything is empty space, with essentially no air, light, or heat. Even if we’re limited to planets, and won’t be floating in space or dropped into a star, for every one planet with life, there are hundreds more without it.” He slowly gets louder and more frustrated as he talks. “No life means no oxygen. No oxygen means no breathing.” Nick draws his finger across his throat. “For every one of those with the right temperature - the ones that might have water - the ones that could have been forests and oceans and grasslands - there are ten planets too far from the sun, or too close. Those are either balls of ice or so scorching that our blood would boil. If we had some air, maybe the moon crystals could protect us. Maybe we could survive.” Nick pauses and looks both of you in the eyes. “But! For every one of those planets, you get ten that don’t even have ground. All gas - and these are massive. We show up on one of those, and we fall. And fall. And fall. They have small rocky cores, but before we even got there, we’d be dead because we’d be moving too fast, or we can’t breathe, or it’s the wrong temperature, or the winds of storms several times the size of most rocky planets turn us to shreds. Even if we show up on the core, and it’s somehow oxygen at the right temperature, the planet is so big, and there’d be so much air above us, that we’d just be smashed flat.” Nick claps parallel to the ground, demonstrating the point. “I’m surprised you’re still alive after three. All of you have no idea how dangerous this is. You don’t have any way to know.” Ending his rant, he sits on the floor. ”If any of you die, it’ll be because I didn’t convince you. I’ll all be my fault.”

“So you gain sustenance from consuming souls?” Nick’s eyes are wide. “Here, I’ll start with the snack, you can tell me more later. Are you good with me IVing it to you, or would you prefer me to grow a container for it?”

“I’m trying to help you guys. We’re going to end up somewhere you can’t survive, and it’ll be my fault if I can’t save you.” “…” Nick looks at you oddly. “…how would I even do that?”

“Let’s rephrase that; so far, the blade grows a plant that likes heat. We use something similar for our reentry shielding - I’m glad I had a sample with me.” Nick’s suit has started to change colors; the black turning to dark shades of blue, green, and yellow, visibly separated from each other. He addresses the whole group. ( @Ancient Elantrian @AltonicKeys @J. Magi and @TheRavenHasLanded ) “Three out of five of my projects are done now. Does anyone want me to make them something? It’ll take me a few days to get actual xenosuits for you all - the stupid anti replication safeguards are forcing me to sequence and construct the genome by hand - but I can make pretty much anything else.”

Zephyr spores produce breathable oxygen when they activate. I don’t know if it’s enough to keep a planet of people breathing, but it would at least be a factor. As for the weather patterns, I’d imagine it’s a side effect of whatever is keeping the moons in the air, or perhaps their tidal forces. Why Crimson is so dangerous might relate somehow - maybe it is moving around chaotically for some reason, messing up the system of tides. Perhaps it still retains a bit of intelligence, so it tries its best to get as much water as possible, either from co-opted rain or from impaled humans stuck in the showers.

“I’m trying to change that. The first stage of my energy harvesting plan is done. I took some bacteria that are supposed to live on an extremely hot planet, so the blade’s temperature is quite good for their growth; that planet’s other life can’t live at anything close to room temperature, but these bacteria go dormant instead. Then, I’ll need to have something convert the bacteria into earth-compatible nutrients or precursors for them. Finally, I’ll need to finish processing the result; biomolecules typically aren’t good for anything that uses a different set - they’re typically close but not quite compatible, so they hijack the pathways, shutting them down.”

“There are thirteen known species in the domain of the Interstellar Intelligent Species Council that are capable of forming a society, and thus are able to be accepted into the Council. One is humans, like me, and, I assume, you. How a planet dropped off the map, I have no idea. Although the existence of Larry throws a wrench into my idea of us being in the same universe.” Nick shrugs. “Anyway, humans, then a species that declared war on us for some reason; two species from the same planet, one from on land and another - these guys are a lot like cephalopods - from under water, they had trading and “hybrid cities” on coastlines; the Vvondin - they’re the most technologically advanced from before we made contact - are eusocial like ants and bees; a species locked in a pretty meaningless war with itself - we’re trying to establish a treaty before we let either side join the IISC; some species I can’t remember; the quantum AI - they’re extremely advanced versions of SIMON - mostly keep to themselves; another species I can’t remember; the Ferrians - which are probably the strangest species - are swarms of magnetic segments that my dad discovered; and then the Sapeiodrakes, which my wings here are patterned off of. A couple years ago - before the sapeiodrake thing - I memorized them all for school, but I’ve forgotten most of it and SIMON’s memory is corrupted.” “Wow, your world really is dystopian, isn’t it.”

“Sounds like my culture’s idea of generic demons. What’s the name of your planet?” “You should see the religions of the 12; some of the species have completely different mindsets than humans.”

Ok. I wish you good luck.

Uh oh. It’s essentially just more complicated but compact base three. Did you pick base nine, or was it assigned? I’m sure there’s something it can be used for. Square roots of some sort, perhaps?

@Ancient Elantrian “Whoa whoa whoa. Nobody’s killing anybody. I can and will sedate both of you. His exorcism moves ‘sun demons’ from one object or person to another. I’ve been using the side effect of heat draining to reverse entropy.” Nick pauses. “Although actually, it almost killed me… took out my electricity and shut down the air circulation in my suit. The exorcism could seriously harm whatever these crystals are, but only if they’re not demons. Describe the demons from your world; I find it strange that you’re more considerate of their lives than of your own, or fellow humans.”

“Sure, why not… do a small one first, though.” Nick sits down again to continue his projects.

“Yeah, I think these are alive too. Don’t know why they’re glowing; things don’t glow for no reason. Either they’re artificial, they’re communicating, or they’re trying to repel predators or attract predators of the predators.” “I think it’s a fungus, so you could murder it, but that wouldn’t help us in any way. We should probably just leave them here; we have a couple actually infinite power sources already.”

“Wisteria?” Nick bends down to examine the crystals, careful not to touch them until he’s sure they’re not fragile, explosive, or electrified. He compares them to the crystalline organisms of a planet he learned about in school, which froze and melted water to move; the magical crystals given to him by Kaleb, and any other pattern he can find. “SIMON, what do you think these are? Are there any brightness fluctuations? Does the light actually match amethyst?” @The Stormfather, can Nick figure out what the crystals are, why they’re glowing, or what would happen if he touched or moved them?

It makes dividing by three easier. But so does base twelve, and base nine makes pretty much everything else harder.

What level are you? What other classes are in your party? Definitely recommend phantasmal force, it’s extremely useful. You’ll want a basic damage dealing spell, like burning hands, and a damage cantrip or two are always useful; I like ray of frost and fire bolt. Minor illusion is a good cantrip for an illusionist. Disguise self is useful, especially if you have high ish charisma and/or proficiency in deception. Hypnotic pattern is rather high level, assuming you start a first, but it can shut down an entire encounter. A defensive spell like blur, mage armor, or mirror image will likely be useful in combat. This list is under the assumption that your goal as an illusionist is to illusion to solve most of your problems. If your party is more combat focused, you’ll want more combat spells.

“I’ll give you some more humane and efficient galactic domination strategies later.” “Let me see them first! They might be dangerous to remove! Or be ruined by it!” Nick jogs through the tunnel, holding the biofabric-wrapped lightsaber in his hand. “Whoa.”

“Ok…” Nick sits down to manage his various projects. The backup of SIMON is going fine, but the lightsaber and moon crystals need more management. @The Stormfather, apparently Sleeper is going off into the tunnel. @Ancient Elantrian, do you think an electric signal with intent could operate the crystal?

“Ok then… someone should probably see what’s through the cave that way. I have some raw nutrients that my suit has been IVing, if you want that now.”

“I assume you don’t have fusion reactors. Those would solve your problems.”

“Wait. You have cybernetics that can hear SIMON literally speaking into me ear, but no way to produce enough food for your civilization? I don’t think you need to hold this. I’ll just surround the lightsaber then connect it to my suit by a thread. Any problems that would hurt me would probably kill the rest of us too.” The lightsaber is indeed disconnecting from the suit sleeve. “Maybe we should explore and see if there’s anything else useful. What’s the range on your wrist communicator thing through rock, Larry?” @AltonicKeys

“Probably not, but better safe than sorry.” Evidently Nick’s suit did something, because several “voop” noises and a momentary plasma blade come from the spot on his forearm he placed it. “Maybe I shouldn’t mess with this thing while it’s this close to me… SIMON, stop dissembling that until we can get it detached from my arm.” “I can’t tell if this thing is infinite or just absurdly energy dense, but this is probably more energy than you’d need in a lifetime.” “To start, we should probably use the best constructive energy absorption we have, and just turn the blade on. We can take energy directly once we know what we’re doing.” Nick says, seemingly to himself, as SIMON’s speaker is very quiet.