Katalyth
From Karteria DWRP Wiki
Jump to navigationJump to search
Rock formations that emit Arcane Radiation. Used to power most fancy technology produced by Patho-Gen eg the barrier around Karteria, Syntrofos[1], ServiTons.
Effects
[edit | edit source]Being in proximity to Katalyth causes a sense of dread, and proximity for an extended period of time causes Arcane Radiation poisoning.
Arcane Radiation
[edit | edit source]The blight Pathos faces. Outside the protection of Karteria's barrier there is an abundance of Arcane Radiation. Exposure to this prior to the arrival of the Augmented has caused the deaths and much pain and suffering of the less fortunate members of Karterian society.
Related FAQs
[edit | edit source]| Information | Question | Answer |
|---|---|---|
| #1
Topics: Syntrofos, Golem, Katalyth, Technology, Imprinting Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-09-13 |
hi, mods! i have a few questions -- 1) elan really wants to eat his phone. someone's phone. anybody's phone, really. what would happen if he tried? is it edible for golem types? will he (or his victim) get a new one if it turns out that the syntrofos is, in fact, a delicious snack? i'm sorry. i promise he will not try to eat the servitons. 2) a strange (?) imprinting question. let's say you have (necessarily) positive feelings about your imprint, as a distinct, autonomous person, but your natural soul is the type to be scared shitless by their natural soul (say, a predator/prey situation). can this interfere with the imprint in any way, ex., on account of how the natural souls would likely respond to each other? -- addendum, sorry!: 3) is one half of an imprinted pair instinctively aware of when their partner dies, or are they just "more affected" when they find out through word of mouth, etc., that their partner has died? i wasn't sure when reading the faq if intuiting the partner's death is exclusive to the pair bonding mechanic. (if it is, i will have a small, very-particular-to-my-character follow-up question.) thank you in advance! 🫶 Edited (i can type) 2025-09-11 11:05 pm (local)
|
1. Well. Provided that Elan can fit it into his mouth, either in whole or after smashing it up a bit, there's no one who can stop a determined Elan from eating someone's phone. It does come with an unexpected complication: Elan will probably die from this. Almost immediately after consumption, he'll be hit with a sense of absolute dread. This was a bad idea. And the feeling won't stop, only getting worse as the minutes pass. Depending on how intact the Syntrofos was to start with, it'll be somewhere between 15-30 minutes before he starts showing physical symptoms- that of acute arcane radiation poisoning. He's likely to automatically Shift in self-defense, to become covered in black boils, and to otherwise mutate. This is what happens when someone comes in physical contact with Katalyth. Being a Golem, and as the amount of Katalyth sequestered within a Syntrofos is miniscule, Elan has a greater chance of surviving this than were he another soul type. Allowing it to linger within him until it burns itself out still has a good chance of killing him anyway, but even if he survives he'll have an absolutely miserable, feral time of it regardless. Were he to cough up the Syntrofos quickly (ideally as soon as that dread started setting in), the effect on his health would be correspondingly reduced. He still won't feel great, but the poisoning will clear up faster. On replacing a eaten Syntrofos: should Patho-Gen be told the truth, they will be very upset with him. This is doubly true if he died and they've already had to intervene to revive him (in which case they might already have seen the evidence of a crushed up Syntrofos in him...). If he lies and says it broke, or he lost it, they'll reprimand him, and he'll have to pay for a replacement (price: 8000 numis) from them (if he has no money, it'll basically be loaned to him, and he will be pestered regularly to pay up), but he won't be otherwise penalized. (If he eats someone else's Syntrofos, his victim will be the one reprimanded for breaking it and have to... eat the costs. Unless it all comes out that it's Elan's snack-habit that caused this, in which case blame would be redirected back at him.) Even any old messages might be able to be imported to the new device, thanks to the wonders of the cloud! 2. Having opposing (in a sense) Natural Souls can interfere with the imprinting process- as it might put the prey-character more on edge than they otherwise would be, unconscious instinct telling them to avoid contact (and to recoil from the clear threat on experiencing it). Whether this is enough to altogether prevent imprinting is up to the players. The characters' own feelings could be enough to overcome this instinct, and the Natural Soul's fears are likely to reduce over time, soothed by the imprint's reassurance that this predator is somehow family. Or, the soul could be just too panicked and flood their host with the same emotion, enough to put a stop to any imprinting dreams. Some more mundane soothing (and a good deal more time) would probably be necessary in order for an imprint to take. So really, it could go either way, depending on how you wanted to play things out. Ex. Imprinted pairs are not automatically attuned to each other's deaths. It's only when the attachment has slipped into the depths of pair bonding that these emotional resonances occur (along with just being generally 'aware' of important fluctuations in their physical state). |
FAQs with key word "Katalyth"
[edit | edit source]Consider adding the topic "Katalyth"!
| Information | Question | Answer |
|---|---|---|
| #2
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2026-01-22 |
help i can't believe he gets a free tour.... Thank you, this is juicy as always!! Follow up tidbits: 1. In the Uncomfortable Server Room, if he managed to put his little necromancer hands on one of those boxes before they shoo him out to the breakroom and etc., would he get any psychometry vibes? Like anyone in particular who handles these things physically on the regular beyond just moving them around, or worse, if the mystery magic has Living Energy in it... 2. Not technically a question, but he would be compelled to nudge that one guy's pragmatism into Real Human Empathy, ironically in a petty kind of way. Get empathy'd, punk. 3. can he steal a bunch of pens from the breakroom |
1. They would be very concerned about him touching the equipment- and would be genuinely more concerned for him, rather than that he might break things (it is a concern, but one that would only trigger once they ascertained he was okay). He would be quickly shooed away from it, but Pal could still pick up on a couple things:
So while the mystery magic doesn't have anything alive in it (or anything dead, for that matter), it almost certainly involves Katalyth. 2. Is this responsible cniding... But yes, his nudge of this guy into better empathy may succeed. 3. He can. They will be very exasperated about it but they won't go after him over it. If Pal wanted a complementary pen on his tour he could have just asked!! (Or maybe have gone to the job fair they had free pens there!) |
| #3
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2026-01-22 |
Hi mods! I know sailing beyond the islands is basically a death sentence, as the ocean extends for miles upon miles to no end, but how deep can one delve in the sea just off the shores of Karteria itself? Like, diving from the Waterfront? Since it's based off the Pacific Northwest, would it range from shallow to about the depths of the Puget Sound before a drop-off? Do Karterian shops near the pier have run-down diving gear, maybe? Would it be fine to build anything down there offshore? I'm assuming the wildlife is also similar to what everything's been like thus far. Not sure where I'm going with this yet, but I'm asking on behalf of some ocean-oriented Augmented. Thanks! |
Though the waterfront in Karteria isn't a proper channel like Puget Sound is, for convenience: yes, it has a similar structure of depth. From shallow, it goes to about 1000ft in depth before plummeting to Deep Scary Ocean depths; while Katalyth exists anywhere in the ocean, there's far, far less of it in this 1000ft-deep area, and this would be the areas most "comfortably" traversable for the Augmented! I'd say that it extends juuust around 7 miles out, this 'safe' 1000ft-deep zone... which means that the Augmented can swim or dive as they like here, especially if they maintain the same buddy system that they'd have out beyond the barrier. Is there diving gear? Yes, but you're right in assuming that it's some vintage stuff that might need some patching or work. Not that we expect anyone to thread that, but it's some good background for the sort of state diving goods are in. Surprisingly, there is a lot of ocean-faring gear available in thrift stores in various states of heavily-used and heavily-damaged. Thrift store owners will explain this thusly: before the real threat of Katalyth impending, there was a real big push for sailors. It was one of the most lucrative jobs out there. Delivering crews, ferrying supplies... For all kinds of jobs. What kinds of jobs? Shop owners don't know. They just work here. They're not sailors. The sailors are dead, and they took their secrets with 'em. Nonetheless, they've got all this diving gear available and with no real application, so it can be quite cheap. |
| #4
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2026-01-18 |
Is there any record of the barrier failing this way before (or at all), say in searchable news records etc? Do the Patho-Gen staff collecting the stuff seem surprised by its appearance in any way? TY | There is not any record of the barrier failing (or any of its individual pillars) since it was first constructed. There's no news articles to find about it, and if asked the Karterians will agree that they've never heard even a hint of there ever being problems with the pillars or the barrier. It seems to be an entirely new phenomena. Even Patho-Gen staff would agree that there's never been an issue before. That there's Katalyth (deliberate) inside of the structure, clearly powering it... it's not a surprise, to most staff, who had at least suspected it to be the case. One of those unfortunate necessities that's best to not think too much about. (And of course many in Patho-Gen knew the whole time what was supplying energy for the barrier. There's regular maintenance on these things, and it'd be hard to do that without going inside.) The excess Katalyth, the uncommonly-colored sort found growing wild in the pillar: that is new, and very alarming to them. While Katalyth has always been a part of the pillars, yes, it's never shown any signs of growing outside of its containment. They're clearly disturbed by this development, and that it happened so quickly. |
| #5
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2026-01-14 |
So, the Coordinator Carnivora Duo (that is, Dearka and Yzak) are more interested in snooping than looting. Using their considerable home-world experience in ~intelligence gathering~ combined with what they know of Karterian city politics, are there any specific homes of politicians, industrial magnates and/or Patho-Gen management figures that the boys might be able to suss out as good targets worth delving into? They’re both pretty cautious and wouldn’t want to repeat the act too many times (since that would risk detection and potentially tank the Augmented’s reputation for everyone), so they’d probably limit themselves to just one, MAYBE two high-priority locations. (I can get more into what precise kinds of info they’d be looking for if that’s preferred, I’m never totally sure what the best angle to come at these sort of investigation type questions is... Figured I'd ask what the general flavor of Powerful People they could look into is, first.) Edited 2026-01-06 08:38 am (local)
|
OOPS! Discord decided to mark this one as replied to in our chat, and only now did we notice that is not the case! Stellar work. But here we are. Welcom... to the homes of rich people. There are indeed a great many politicians who have their roots deep in the city, and the CCD (Coordinator Carn- you get it) may find... a lot of Official Documents! Living trusts, deeds to land, Taxe's, yadda yadda yadda. Even in the houses of Important Figures, there is very little in their homes that are particularly interesting; the wealthiest of the wealthy often keep their important documentation pertaining to business (and thus, the inner workings of the city) in safer places, with accountants and secretaries and, well, other places. Snooping in Basileios in general... We can supply a good two "??cool??" things to find, and their locations.
|
| #6
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2026-01-14 |
I should not be asking this so are katalyth-induced hallucinations... close enough to dreams to eat in case that might temporarily relieve the hallucinator...? And on a scale of 1 to whatever-Bricks-is-doing, how bad of an idea is this? |
The Katalyth-induced hallucinations are unfortunately(?) not close enough to dreams for them to be edible. Hubert could still try to eat them and rather than result in a proper devouring, it would be more like... joining in with the hallucination, becoming just as affected by the energy as the afflicted person. No one would be saved, and now an extra person (himself) would be caught in the situation. (It wouldn't have any particularly bad effects beyond this, as the hallucination itself would prevent him from trying to devour enough for a Brickston-esque-outcome.) |
| #7
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2026-01-08 |
Hello it's me again we're doing it; Florian and Eli have helped Bricks kidnap a Patho-Gen employee and are doing some terrible science on him. Bricks will attempt to possess his pet Katalyth shard, accept any and all powering-up no matter how horrible, so desperate to separate this guy's soul. I'm open to him accidentally doing something else instead if mods have anything in mind? Either way this is obviously going to go very badly for him and kill him. He'll die with grief and frustration wanting to make some difference in this world and lamenting his own limitations. Assuming he goes crazy, excessively mutates from all the powering-up, turns into some spectral vampiric fire demon of sorts burning with a lust for life-energy, petty vengeance, and hunger for knowledge—what will the aftermath of this look like (mostly for his CR)? What happens with his pet Katalyth shard (does it turn dark?) Could Brickston haunt a particular location? Potentially drain the life force from anyone who comes within a certain vicinity unless they offer a nugget of knowledge to him instead? I initially imagined this to be underground right where he dies but if there are any other locations in game that mods could suggest that sound fun or might be appropriate for a knowledge-hungry tinkerer I'd be game for that? Under or near Patho-Gen HQ? His rowhouse in Sophia? Somewhere in Kelesis? Somewhere yet undiscovered? If there's something mods have in mind that he feels appropriate to use for in any way, please let me know I'd be happy to help accommodate though his death. |
It's Happening..... Brickston looked too far into the abyss and it looked back. It's possible, even likely- that in his maddened, powered-up Spectral and Katalyth-infused state that he would succeed in separating the soul from his victim. Without the connection to its host, and surrounded by Brickston's new power, the soul would disintegrate, fall apart into errant shreds, each of them mutating beyond recognition. This soul has eyes, it's nothing but eyes and teeth, a maw that tears itself apart the more Brickston tries to hold it. The now-corpse of the Patho-Gen employee faces this as a backlash, as the energy spills over into the nearest relevant parties. It twists itself apart, bones snapping, with new spires of them growing out of every fracture. And with them, more eyes, more teeth, organs that slip from fresh cavities, blackened with boils even as they form. It's unrestricted, horrible growth, a perpetual ruin that will take over the basement they're doing this in. (Eli and Florian may also face a limited amount of this backlash as desired, just by being in the vicinity. Or it can remain as a horrible circuit between Bricks and his experiment.) But for Brickston himself: The Augmenter, the Natural Soul. They were made, implanted with the aim of protecting someone from Katalyth, and the arcane radiation it emits. But there's limits to each of them, and if there's a way to survive persistent contact with the material, this was not the path to achieving it. His own personal shard- it's too unstable, too pure with how much of himself Brickston has placed into it. While it doesn't turn black, as the broken-pillar Katalyth has, it deepens instead into a bloody red. If Brickston wanted to possess it, it possesses him right back, amplifying those deepest parts of himself: his frustration, lamentations, and the need to know. It becomes a permanent part of what remains of his body, less removable than a once-beating heart. Brickston's Spectral-self would not only overwhelm what's left of his rapidly corrupting body, but with the complete failure and destruction of the Augmenter, it too would properly and permanently fuse with what's left of his own soul. There would be no distinguishing them; Brickston is a Spectral-type himself now, rather than an Augmented. Were he ever to be captured by Patho-Gen, it would not be to revive him as a man, but used for research (or very dubious implantation fodder). Uncaptured and free, he could haunt a particular location, whether that's the place of his demise, or anywhere else Brickston bore some connection or attachment to. He'd likely make quite a malevolent figure, given that he's a compounded-Spectral whose passion for knowledge has persisted past life and sanity. With the Katalyth embedded in his shade, he would continue in this ruined state, equally supported and starved by his favorite shard. (He could also be a roaming ghost than a fixed one- this is all really more down to what you would be most interested in having his fate be. But he could stick around in the setting for CR to be horrified/intrigued at, and for new people to... also be horrified/intrigued at. This is a Potential Fate for the Augmented....) |
| #8
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2026-01-07 |
Since it sounds like touching Katalyth is still Extremely a no-go, what methods would characters be using to transport the funky Katalyth out from the top of the pillar? edit to add: also does the patho-gen experiment room work like kelesis wrt recording and photography. a.k.a. if i'm making momo a jellyfish cnidaria for the unfitting soul prompt could he take a photo of his cnidsona and still have it after he exits the dreamspace or whatever exactly it is that's goin on Edited 2026-01-05 04:59 pm (local)
|
Re: Katalyth Handling. The Augmented will still be the most equipped to handle getting close to it, but indeed, in the past Patho-Gen has often advised characters to simply note the location of outcroppings, rather than make any direct contact with it. In these dangerous circumstances, they have to resort to giving characters their own methods. (This probably would have been wise to include in the body of the text; I think I may well put a succinct version of this answer as a highlighted EDIT in the post itself, since I think many may have this question.) This circles back around to this: How has Patho-Gen been handling Katalyth, if it's so dangerous? They will provide the Augmented with as much PPE as they can. Thick suits or gloves; long metal foreceps, so as to keep as much distance between themselves and the Katalyth. Chisels, welder's masks, vests that have the same feeling as those radiation shields used during X-rays. If characters wonder if this is remotely enough to protect the average human from even average Katalyth outcroppings... it wouldn't be remiss to question it. Patho-Gen staff who provide such PPE have scarcely ever had to use it themselves, and for those who have, their contact with Katalyth has ever been fleeting and limited. Too much time around it is dangerous. Strangely, nobody who can be spoken to has ever been tasked with physically going out into the environment to deal with it. Re: the experiment room and photography/recordings. It works similarly to Kelesis! That is to say, recording and photos work with a level of glitchiness to it. Some noise here, something that wasn't originally there in the background over there, a couple silly artifacts but nothing groundbreaking. Momo may absolutely document his Cnidaria-type-sona. |
| #9
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2026-01-07 |
Hi mods! I have a few questions about specific canon abilities for my OC and natural soul design. 1. How are foresight abilities handled? 2. What about characters with unusually feeding methods? My character feeds on the residual magical energy in air. What kind of magic can be found in Kateria? They can survive in a non magical world with just their own magic reserves however the augmenter blunting their inherent abilities would mean they can only use a trickle of that energy pool so it wouldn't necessarily satisfy them as much. Which is fine! I like the challenge of Sheliak having to adjust to this new world. I'm just curious who much he will suffer and if the natural soul inside him would try to protect him in any way? 3. I'm thinking of going with a spectral natural soul for him but I have a few questions. If a character is technically already dead, do they still go through a second physical death? 4. Can a spectral design be based on multiple myths? For example a mix of banshee and djinn? |
Hello there! 1. Foresight abilities can still work in some limited sense. While they wouldn't be able to predict future game events or plotlines, they can function for things happening to characters (with player permission, of course). 2. The locals have limited magic of their own (which could be probably be generally felt in the world). Additionally, many of the characters who have arrived are also capable of magic, and might provide some extra energy. In the wilderness, the greatest source of ambient energy would be arcane radiation- the polluting force that Katalyth gives off. As an Augmented (and particularly, as a Spectral-type), he would be protected from much of the usual sickening in its presence, and it's entirely up to you how much of arcane radiation is edible! It's likely to have some untoward effects (faster corruption, added corruptions), but it's definitely magical and there's a lot of it. 3. If a character arrives already dead (or in an inherently unliving state), it would be a challenge for the body to die a second time. They might feel a sort of wasting, or weakness for a time in place of it, or simply undergo the rest of their corruptions without experiencing death2 as a part of it (similar to other soul types). 4. Yes, Spectral designs can absolutely be based on multiple things! Banshee and djinns would be just fine. |
| #10
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2026-01-06 |
And while I’m thinking on it. What does The Calling magic do to him? Just so I know. | Oh, that's an interesting one... But yes, anyone with multiple Natural/Wild Souls would experience that Calling magic is more influential on them, compared to someone with only a single soul. A greater defense against Katalyth/arcane radiation, a greater weakness to the local people, should they try to take advantage of it. (Even so, Calling magic isn't hugely powerful in its own right. It works on animals, who are much simpler than people, because of that relative 'simplicity'. Foreign minds will always tangle up the mechanics of it.) |
| #11
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2026-01-06 |
Does the curfew apply to augmented who are (or who claim to be) helping with the pillar? Does the song from the dark Katalyth have anything familiar with Peacock’s song from the PG holiday camp? |
The curfew wouldn't apply to anyone helping with the pillar! They can work at their own schedule, their own time. Nor would the Augmented be held strictly to it if they're seen wandering around elsewhere (unless they're noticeably causing trouble), as it would be assumed that they're on some sort of important/relevant business. (How to enforce the curfew, you may ask? It may seem unfair, but for the wealthy, it's not being strictly enforced... It might do them well if the Augmented patrolled the streets to gently remind average citizens that they're safer indoors, and that there is a curfew they're supposed to follow.) The song doesn't sound too much like Peacock's, as the source of its melody derives from other places. Though it would have some underlying themes, moods in common- it holds a fresher pain, something particularly raw and recent. Peacock's contains an ache that's been made over the years- and is more of a proper 'song', at least, coming from an Aves. However, for characters who were taken on holiday (or are close to someone who was), some portion of the song might feel familiar. Like something that could have poured from their own throat, their own agony congealed and made to clot up in crystal. |
| #12
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2026-01-06 |
does the extra katalyth-y katalyth give extra glitchy glitches to northly's glasses? and do the protective suits as worn by the patho-gen employees have any notable stats or do they glitch out just like katalyth (given it powers the barrier and it powers syntrofos it seems pretty darn likely that it's also in the protective suits.....) speaking of syntrofos though, do they work on syntrofos given there's katalyth in there? will she find anything that kataglitches when she's off thieving the rich with eli and gale? (gonna bring them to try and ID RARE and SUPER RARE and SUPER SUPER RARE items.) Edited (sorry for all the edits, keep thinking of new things...) 2026-01-05 09:04 pm (local)
|
The special edition Katalyth is VERY glitchy. The glitches are glitching. The special Patho-Gen suits: their stats would be somewhat readable! Some parts might be redacted (and those parts are glitching in themselves), but it would be clear that they are excellent at protecting the occupant from Katalyth, while being abysmal for comfort, mobility, or fashion. The Syntrofos themselves: as a unit, they would have mostly normal, readable stats. A few words here and there might be glitched, but the stats as a whole would remain comprehensible. Katalyth glitching in other goods: anything that's malfunctioning, whether it's in Basileios or the rest of the city (but especially Basileios) will have accompanying glitchy text. But like the Syntrofos, it won't be enough to corrupt the entire reading (a refrigerator will still have fridge stats rather than garbage, computers will have computer stats, etc.) but the display is staticy and messy. (After this event has resolved itself, and everything is mostly running again- that glitchyness will remain. Everything is just a little bit more agitated, it seems.) The rich folks will have plenty of top-of-the-line fancy consumer goods, as well as solid antique varieties. But anything that's mechanical, and draws energy from something, might be malfunctioning (and therefore, have some distortion in the stats displayed). It's not everything- but it's common. Especially in anything Patho-Gen branded- and they are the most popular manufacturer. |
| #13
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2026-01-05 |
random and not at all concerning question don't worry about it: does patho-gen have protections around the teleporters inside their hq or would it be entirely possible to transport some big lumps of katalyth into pathogen via them and Demonstrate why it is perhaps not a good idea to do inhumane experiments on the augmented. | Northly... for the sake of this clearly very hypothetical question: no, Patho-Gen does not have those sort of safe-guards around their teleporters. They have no reason to expect- and therefore, prevent- someone from dumping loads of Katalyth on their doorstep. It could be done. It would set off alarms, however, as they do have things to monitor contamination levels- and a lot of Katalyth concentrated in one place would certainly trigger them. It would also set off more mundane alarms in the hearts of the staff. And more than that, as it will also result in a great amount of very sick staff, who are likely to ultimately die. That's a lot of arcane radiation for a normal human to suddenly be in the midst of, but it's an emergency and they can't exactly leave it laying around for even more to be exposed by. Once this happened, they would likely try to work out a means to reject/restrict sendings of mass amounts of Katalyth through teleporters. It may also result in greater restrictions to teleporter access in the near future. But it would succeed at least once. |
| #14
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2026-01-05 |
For the Destabilization prompt: would the calming techniques the Katalyth talkers/musicians developed here have any effect on the super nasty Katalyth as far as shrinking it a bit? | This nasty Katalyth (which I am affectionately calling Dark Katalyth) is like the Katalyth Jayce is used to, on steroids. The sheer amount of dread and despair concentrated into these masses seem to have "aspected" it into sheer agony; it isn't the result of ambient despair and pain, but rather, the direct result of concentrated torment. The calming techniques, therefore, are hit or miss. They work sometimes; the Katalyth may respond to the calming techniques by shrinking very slightly, albeit at a pace more sluggish than commonplace deposits of Katalyth. (And a Golem-type like Jayce may have better luck at it.) But other times, these techniques may have the opposite effect, and even agitate the Katalyth into growing and flaring up, as though unable to be calmed. Sometimes, pain and despair responds to soothing by lashing out, like a wound opened up through tenderness. The same is true for this Dark Katalyth. It would take intense patience and care that nobody can really afford to give given the urgent circumstances, to truly shrink it down to nothing. But perhaps it might be shrunken down into more manageable specimens. |
| #15
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2026-01-05 |
TY OOCly I was hoping to give the team a minor success in this department to balance out some of the horrors they've gone through with their work, so if it's reasonable for a group of them to focus on a small section of the pillar's Dark Katalyth to shrink it to add in removal that would be great! But if that's too much success that's all good, he'll just try a few times and go back to regular removal. also if Patho-Gen is observing what they're doing and would question their 'technique', Jayce would refuse to elaborate with anyone but Celia at this point, whatever trouble he would get in for that (oocly I'm not looking for trouble one way or another!) |
The team could still have some success! All their ingenuity, everything they've gone through up to this point- it can't fix everything, but if they're persistent with working on soothing specific parts of the Dark Katalyth, they will be able to provide functional, practical assistance. It would take a lot more people (and a lot more sanity) to remove all of the Katalyth like this, in the same way that it would be a challenge to remove it from the world at large. But what they're doing would still make a difference, and they would be able to see that. Patho-Gen would certainly be curious about this technique if they witnessed it- and while they might be surprised at Jayce (Golem as he is) refusing to explain it, they would refrain from pushing too hard. It wouldn't get him, or other members of the team in trouble, as whatever they're doing is working. (Celia wouldn't be nearby, but if she caught wind of this mysterious technique... she would also probably not inquire. While she wants to trust Patho-Gen with information like this, well- there's reason for caution. And if the Augmented doing this aren't volunteering their methods, she will trust that they have a valid reason for withholding it from them.) |
| #16
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2026-01-05 |
With Kaeya having three souls of a Katalyth resistant type in him. How much will the effects of being inside the pillar hit him? | That's a proper wolf stack Kaeya has developed. He would be able to endure noticeably more torment compared to a double-layered wolf, or the mere single wolf. (Added protection would accompany anyone with multiple Natural/Wild Souls, unless they were of a type specifically weak to it (such as Terra) or otherwise specially influenced (like Spectral.).) He'll still feel it- and it'll keep getting worse with long exposure time, more time spent towards the top- but it'll be more muffled. Sort of like having a very dense fur coat, able to shake off the cold (severely negative emotions). Kaeya still shouldn't touch/eat it, but that too he would be able to survive much more readily than before. His wolves are prepared to endure as a collective. |
| #17
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-12-17 |
katalyth power question! Gale just made the mistake of suggesting to Eli that perhaps his soul could feed on katalyth, since it feeds on fear and gains power from it, and since we now know that katalyth is sort of like emotion itself, and many of those emotions are extremely negative. He originally had this thought when Gale was doing his fucked-up experiments with absorbing the katalyth, but Gale was acting as his self control, so now that Gale is on board, he's likely gonna try it very soon. Probably just by full-shifting near some katalyth and seeing how his soul reacts. Maybe touching it? Probably touching it. What will happen? |
Eli no... what is with mages touching/licking/absorbing the Katalyth.... Full-shifting near Katalyth in itself is mostly 'safe', insofar as anything is safe. But Eli could notice a certain resonance between himself and Katalyth- like calling to like (especially if he's in anything like a bad mood). Just being around Katalyth outcroppings wouldn't cause him to siphon it all up automatically, but he could feel a pull towards it- a nudge towards trying to absorb it. If he touches it, Eli could choose to feed on it. The effect would be similar to what Gale has experienced- that Eli could very well use this influx of energy to strengthen his own abilities, but at the cost of severe pain and rapid mutations. The more he does it, the worse it gets. Unlike with Gale (being a Carnivora, though their advanced healing helps), Eli's Spectral-hood would mean he'd have a much harder time actually dying to this. It wouldn't be very pleasant, though. That's a lot of negativity he's eating at once, and that will warp even a Spectral. But he could definitely do it and most likely live to reap the benefits(?). |
| #18
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-12-15 |
re: the defectors, wrio gave malkuth the neat idea to see if there's a relatively up-to-date census log in the libraries across karteria in order to determine if they can put any names to faces and possibly trace where the defectors generally hailed from! sort of on the same line as kal's question but with more of a focus on what group is centrally leaving karteria's safe walls and any hint as to why -- are they being pushed out? do they just see their chances better away from the government and patho-gen? that sort of thing (malkuth assumes it's most likely the dispirited lower class rather than anyone from the cushier upper echelons, but a confirmation in some direction would be better!) |
The assumption that the defectors hail from the most impoverished and lower class groups... that would be accurate. Anyone with means (and just as important: a support network) would not attempt to live outside the city. Almost everyone, even should they become unhoused, would remain in Karteria proper, scraping out a meager life that's still preferable to the quicker death by arcane radiation outside the barrier. So those who do make the choice- or feel like they have to, with no where else to go, alienated from society- don't leave much behind them. It's possible to sift through census data to find names of people who are in Karteria one year, and gone the next time the census takers make their rounds. And the lower down you go in society, the more incomplete the information is, and the more people fall through the cracks. Occasionally, a very dedicated government employee will risk going out to the defectors, feeling a duty that their existence should still be recorded. This helps to fill in some gaps, but the people who live out there... aren't the most forthcoming when it comes to their personal information. The middle (and even, on some exceptionally rare occasion, upper) class have turned up amongst the defectors, but only for very short amounts of time, before someone (usually law enforcement) turns up to collect them. They still have people to look for them, are still under someone's watch, and going out there even in the short term is usually the result of a mental health crisis. For the lower classes/impoverished who live out there permanently, there's no one left to take them in, or no one who wants to. Their reasons are various, but there are common underlying threads, such as a paranoia towards governmental structures/Patho-Gen/everything. Do they feel like they were pushed out? Some of them do, though they'd have a harder time naming a specific culprit. Society itself, maybe. |
| #19
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-12-08 |
I was not expecting to mark 'Kelesis is Zanarkand' on my Kart conspiracy board So many questions. Very sorry about this interrogator man. 3. Hubert meets blunt with blunt: so long as whatever Kelesis is doing is not harming/impeding him or his, they will have nothing to fear from him. He just wants to learn; the current Augmented have been abducted into this world and held in the dark. He wants to understand what is happening to him [oocly, his gaining of the Peri-soul]; he wants to know if the doe-eyed figure is a former generation Augmented; he wants to understand how Kelesis protects its citizens from radiation in case that might be applied or adapted elsewhere; they once said 'Karteria has helped and hurt', can they confirm how; and it was them, wasn't it, that sheltered the Augmenteds' minds in the October dream carnival? He will guard Kelesis' nature and only speak of it to truly trusted; Hubert acknowledges even outside of Patho-Gen, there are likely some Augmented that could do serious damage with this knowledge. He will also not dispel these dreams (barring anything like the hallucination prompt/sidebar in the event). 4. He will express a marvel for the dream world, but also, if he is becoming like the doe-eyed figure... would the doe-eyed figure tutor him in his Perissodactyla dream abilities? In exchange, so long as it does not harm his own interests, he will offer to protect Kelesis interests outside their borders. Feel free to interpret this as a Pact offer—Hubert is a baby Peri and unaware of the pact magic. (Hubert definitely would utilize that knowledge to haunt the dreams of those who gravely wrong him.) |
3. Hubert's forthright nature goes over well with them. But they are a little surprised at the idea that the doe-eyed figure is a former Augmented. This much they will easily refute; no, they are not and have never been an Augmented. They had never seen one before their arrival on Eparsis. As for whether they aided during the dream carnival: they will suggest yes, but some of that was specifically performed by missing bretheren of theirs. Their greatest sphere of influence is around Kelesis, but dreams know fewer boundaries. And the distress of those 'nearby' resonated fiercely enough for them to take notice of it. There is an unease about this too, a worry that churns wordlessly in the background. As for Karteria's past actions: Karteria withdrew aid. We came to help. We were invited. We were The 'voice' abruptly shifts into a flash of imagery. It's drawn, in a crude storybook-like way, with the ground scratched out and the sky dark and simple figures collapsed in the streets. It's clear that this is a scene of mass death. The text just as suddenly clips back in, as though the prior scene had never been there. We saved what Karteria would not. But our protection... ... No. It wouldn't work for you. You don't need it. If Karteria ever falls come and find us. They don't seem willing or able to help with barrier creation outside of Kelesis- or at least, not until Karteria itself is in dire straits, its dying throes. Perhaps as recompense for its treatment of Kelesis? 4. As for whether Hubert is becoming a doe-eyed figure... they have to mull it over. He is, and isn't like them. He is a human and an arachnid, concepts they view in equal regard. But he is also like them now. But they will light up at the offer; once it's made, the surroundings of their dream bubble fade into haze and stillness. There's no sound left but the speech of the entity before him, the words etched into his soul. Promise to protect Kelesis from afar, and we'll show you how to use the part of us that we gave you. And they will make good on that offer, freely giving Hubert some pro tips on how to navigate dreams, how to create or modify them, how to speak in courier text, the kinds of dreams they think taste best... practical aid, encompassing the kinds of powers a Perissodactyla-type would possess. (What Hubert does with his new abilities does not concern them so long as it doesn't run contrary to Kelesian interests.) |
| #20
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-12-06 |
Does spending time within the Kelesian barrier mitigate the build-up of arcane radiation for Augmented in the way that spending time inside Karteria's does? (Basically can Tighnari avoid returning to Karteria longer by hanging out in Kelesis.) And if it doesn't, what happens? Exposure mutations at the same rate as if the Augmented was outside of Karteria for a long period? Edited 2025-12-05 03:25 pm (local)
|
It does not, unfortunately, have the same effect as being inside the Karterian barrier. To be in Kelesis is in practice no difference from being in the wilderness. So exposure mutations would occur at the same rate as anywhere else outside of Karteria. Which should still take a good amount of time to build up, if the Augmented isn't alone out there. (Particularly long for Spectrals/Golems, while Terras naturally have it a bit harder, as usual.) |
| #21
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-12-05 |
re: the Outer Defectors If gently wheedled or pressed, would any of them mention family that they wish they could see/talk to? Someone that should be notified when they die in the following days? Obviously they feel abandoned but, for instance, if they had a young kid once upon a time or someone they cared for that they haven't been able to see... Or are they pretty much all in the mindset that even those people have abandoned them? Edited 2025-12-05 02:26 am (local)
|
Most of the defectors are of the conviction that they've been abandoned- or are proud (bitter) about doing the abandoning themselves. No one cares about them, they don't need anyone, they know the truth, etc., it's as exhausting as it is sad. The mental deterioration due to arcane radiation isn't doing them any favors when it comes to a steady lucidity. It's still possible to hit upon a moment of weakness and regret in some of them, and be given a name, some direction. They won't ask for anyone to be located, but if an Augmented were to persevere anyway... Most of the time there's nothing to find- either because no one remembers who they're talking about, or because the information they gave was incorrect, jumbled up with something else. In some cases, it's possible to get an indirect hit, locating an old neighbor, or a friend who recognizes the description. Some will pass along the news that the person has already died. Others will become defensive, upset if it's made clear on whose behalf the Augmented is looking, and refuse to connect them further. 'Good riddance,' is the common sentiment. 'I hope they stay out there. Leaving is the only good thing they've ever done.' But the defectors are not, unfortunately, wrong about being alone out there. Apart from the vague 'community' they keep outside the city, no one else would notice if they were gone. |
| #22
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-12-04 |
For the ex-Patho-Gen people, would plant pheromones and giving them an alcoholic hot drink like Irish coffee or spiked hot chocolate (ostensibly to help them warm up while working outside) lower their inhibitions enough to let a few things slip that they might not have intended to? | Ooh, good question! It very well could. Most of them don't have anything to offer beyond the scope of their clerical duties, or the fact that they weren't all that important in the grand scheme of things. Some may even state their regret for their involvement, but not for any, ah... moral reason. It's purely because they feel so small, thrown under the bus like this. So disposable. Most of them are grunt workers. Janitorial. Clerical. They were in charge of guarding a doorway, or making sure paperwork went unseen. They were in charge of cleaning supplies, or replacing scalpel blades. They admit things like their overall hatred of the upper class, or their disgust towards the lower class; they'll talk about how Patho-Gen will find a way to salvation. That's what all of this loyalty is all about. Salvation. ... For this firm belief in salvation, these imprisoned Patho-Gen members sure don't seem to know much about the plan behind attaining salvation, however. Something about unlocking the pathway to worlds beyond this one, this miserable place. Hardly worth saving. To try to fight its destruction is delusion. They fear the encroaching arcane radiation. These staff members spiral at this point, if drunk/drugged enough; they're sad, scared, powerless. Even though they're complicit in horrific crimes, at the end of the day they're rebelling against a world they're certain is going to kill them. They don't believe in the angle of trying to solve or understand Katalyth, and believe they need to give up on the world, and rebuild on another. |
| #23
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-11-29 |
HELLO, I know there are multiple efforts from different PCs to make our own barriers (enrichment for the nerds) particularly for the Bridge Town Project. For those who are trying to use non-Katalyth power sources, I wanted to check if it's reasonable to work out methods for essentially converting some natural magic abilities of PCs (like Mel's light magic) into energy stored in some sort of battery. This is riffing off the solar panels/hydro energy projects the PCs did to keep science cabin running (along with the generators they were loaned). |
Its important to keep the nerds occupied! But yes, that sounds entirely feasible, that character-based sources of energy could be stored in some sort of battery, in the same way that sun/water can be. By all means, please feel free to use the powers of PCs to make the best use of their abilities—and the more cooperation (and chance for CR building), the better! |
| #24
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-11-29 |
Henlo thank you mods for indulging my horrible questions; 1) How does a spectral die after they've experienced physical death? Is it dependent on the Spectral type's weakness in question (daylight, stake through the heart, garlic, rainbow beam, etc), and then the natural soul totally takes over? I guess more specifically what does death by Katalyth play out like? 2) Evolving from his Katalyth studies Bricks is getting more desperate and willing to experiment on himself (or a test subject like a plant, rock, small animal, other Karterian, other augmented?) using Katalyth. His goals are to see if the can separate a soul from a source (be it a Natural Soul or an augmented's soul), even a small part of it, and if it can be distilled in some form. Could he attempt to possess his pet Katalyth shard, or use it like some kind of soul knife? He'll music to it if it seems to have any effect. Does the Katalyth have its own soul? Would any of this make energy? 3) If Bricks wanted to experiment with soul-severing on the very specific patho-gen member who very specifically put the house arrest anklet on Eli, and asked Florian and possibly any other augmented for help in kidnapping them and dragging them back to one of their seedy science dungeons, would that be possible? 4) How tinkerable is the anklet on Eli? Very amendable to him only getting so far in any of that research if it broaches too much into setting mechanics stuff but I also would love to use these experiments as a segue into his eventual death. Edited 2025-11-25 07:19 (UTC)
|
1. How can something that's already dead die? The easiest method is as described- that if the Spectral-type is badly weak to a specific thing, then being exposed to that thing will kill them. If a Spectral type lacks a mortal weakness, but merely finds it uncomfortable to be exposed to light/rainbows, perhaps- being kept in those conditions would diminish them by degrees, and when paired with something like starvation could lead them to tip into a second death. The character would waste away, eventually reaching a point where their own consciousness had faded back enough to qualify as 'dead', and for the Natural Soul to take over (as best it could, in these conditions). The line is more blurred compared to most other soul types. For a Katalyth-provoked death in Spectrals specifically... it's unpleasant. Death via Katalyth in any person is unpleasant, but Spectrals have the mostly-unique (shared with Golems, though their manifestation is different) quality of being better able to withstand it. As they're already dead, how can they die another time? Well.... It's death of a sort, but closer to a tipping into madness. If left in physical contact with Katalyth, their bodies will excessively mutate, distort and change, their cells rapidly and incessantly forced to adapt to all the grief in the world, to find some form capable of withstanding everything. The change is naturally powered by Katalyth itself, but is exhausting for the character as well. Living things are killed by this too-rapid development, torn apart from it. An already-dead thing can physically withstand it, but their consciousness will be perpetually battered by contact with it, broken down by the unending torrent of pain they're subjecting themself to. Their body will be a ship without a crew, left to founder in the storm. In this 'death' they will continue to mutate, reactive to everything and nothing. The taking over by their Natural Soul in this mind-broken condition is similarly fraught and directionless, though if they're possessed of any underlying instinct (to haunt a specific location, to perform some specific task), they'll be driven to do so. They will be no more sane in it. In essence... Katalyth will kill the mind of a Spectral-/Golem-type, leaving their ravaged body behind to be piloted by their Natural Soul. Unfortunate. 2. Trying to cut apart souls using Katalyth as a blade is... a choice. Katalyth itself does not have a soul, or anything soul-adjacent. That said, Brickston could hallucinate/convince himself that it does, in its own strange way, that the manifestations of its energy, that the connection he's made to it, means that it's not only alive but that it's developed a soul. As his pet Katalyth shard remains attuned and specifically responsive to him, he could easily feel that it 'agrees' with any assessment he makes, continuing to reflect what he wants to hear. To actually try and possess his pet, in the Spectral way... it's not a good idea. It's a terrible idea. Katalyth is not alive in the normal sense, and trying to possess a clump of it is the same as trying to possess the concept of emotion, or a spell. There's nothing to possess, no consistent will to override and direct- but that doesn't mean that nothing happens. It's inviting himself into its corruptive force, in a very vulnerable way, as bad as being in physical contact with it. But it can't be controlled through possession, neither forced to move or grow or diminish. The sensation of possession will almost rebound on Bricks in a way, sharply strengthening his Spectral abilities, and making it easy to lash out with them, to act on every errant thought. And there are a lot of errant thoughts when he's putting his mind in the middle of the essence of emotion. Music will have its usual effect of making things worse/better depending on what he plays to it (although doing so during the 'possession' will be naturally difficult). For using Katalyth to cut souls: not really. It could probably be used to damage souls, or to power (dangerously) someone else's ability/object used in that direction. Brickston is invited to make the attempt though, and his pet Katalyth will encourage any feelings that he's definitely making progress and not just horribly warping people (including himself). 3. That is very pre-meditated of you Bricks, and irresponsible to be bringing in others to these shenanigans. That said, this particular Patho-Gen employee isn't anyone important, and so long as the participants have a way of tracking down a normal person, they could succeed in catching them and carting them off to science. If they're careful in their catching and their disposal, all parties involved might even get away with it! 4. It is very tinkerable, but it would also immediately transmit that it was being tinkered with- which would naturally not be viewed in Eli's favor (along with whoever might be helping him to mess with it). It would be very, very difficult to modify without it triggering that alarm. More punishment time for Eli. |
| #25
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-11-19 |
Hi mods! So, obviously, I wanted to run this by you guys first, but. In canon, Noé can see a person's memories when he feeds from them for the first time. How would that go if Vincent and/or Vanitas brought up the idea of using that against the Patho-Gen employees to learn more about the group? Obviously, I don't expect that to be easy, especially if they want to find someone who would be higher ranking, sort of thing that might have more access to info. But just curious. |
Sorry for the slowness on this one... It slipped into Discord Purgatory, where none can view its existence (unless you view a hover-thing on desktop specifically, it seems, and we've been unfortunately Mobile this month). We rolled a dice to see if Noé would even hit anyone with an inkling of knowledge of anything other than some clerical things, like "oooh I handle paperwork, so top-secret." Indeed, we rolled a favorable outcome. Noé can learn a thing. Your random victim description of the day: a meek individual who looks deceptively younger than they actually are: Anh. While this individual has no major relevance to anything plot-wise, they are higher-ranking than one might assume by looking at them, disheveled and frazzled as they are. They are influential. Due to their education, they have been verily accepted into high places; their father's side has been involved in Karterian government. The memory:
|
| #26
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-11-11 |
Part of Saturn's association-based Golem powers for Being Plastic is that she typically has a sixth sense for what materials an object is made out of, and how it might be destroyed. She also has ANYWAY she's gotten permission from Hubert to poke at his retrieved Augmenter and would like to see if there's anything new (or fucked up) (or new and fucked up) she can deduce about the thing circa her powers~~! |
Unfortunately for Saturn, the Augmenter delivered to her arrives pre-broken. But with her uncanny ability for deducing these sorts of things, she should be able to tell a bit about how and why it was broken: It is only half of a 'complete' Augmenter (even a bit less than that, given that this part of the capsule doesn't have that much in it). The way it was connected to the other half is deliberately frail, built to detach on disturbance (which suggests that attempting to remove an intact Augmenter from a character will be difficult to achieve- not impossible, but difficult). It is also... unpleasant to hold. Mildly so, the sort of feeling that would be easy to brush off (or go unnoticed entirely were the character touching it already feeling stressed, or upset). It doesn't get any worse the longer Saturn (or anyone else) holds it, but it's always there, a background hum of pessimism, of apathy. As a Golem-type in particular, Saturn may be more 'conscious' of this infliction, this small deadening of mood. While there's no visible residue left on the capsule, it has been in close contact with Katalyth. The capsule itself is inert, it won't kill anyone to stay in contact with it (or eat it), but it's absorbed some of those bad vibes, in a way. The material of the capsule itself is otherwise sturdy- very sturdy, plasticy, artificial- made of some unknown composite material. It's only its connection to the other, missing half that's frail, as it's something that's otherwise built to seal off and protect its contents from the outside. |
| #27
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-11-10 |
If a dropped character is re-apped by the same player and that player wants to change the Soul choice, can that be done at time of app & implied to have happened while they were being held by Patho-Gen post-drop, or would they need to keep the original Soul choice? If the former, does that count as their free swap? --UNRELATEDLY TO THAT, can a Shifted form change permanently without the involved Natural Souls changing at all, or is the form set? If it can change, is there a limited degree of change possible? Would it need a triggering event of some kind to provoke the change? Edited 2025-11-07 11:04 am (local)
|
A dropped + reapped character (by the same player) could change their Natural Soul type on reapping! It could be assumed to have happened while their body was in Patho-Gen's keeping (either as a result of them attempting to plant a new Augmenter in there, or something that happened 'naturally' as in the case of treat-related additions). This wouldn't have to count for the free change (if problems ever arise from this, we may reassess, but as it stands it feels unnecessary as a restriction). And one's developed Shift could somewhat change its features, if the player wanted it. For souls like Golems, it tends to happen naturally anyway, as their bodies adapt to what they're being used for (and the kinds of rocks they've been eating), or what the character would like to do with themself. For other soul types, changes can still happen, though it shouldn't diverge too far from the original idea. Such as a bear Carnivora turning into a racoon... but there's still room for aspects to develop in new directions- to become bulkier or lighter, or to carry different patterns, etc. This could happen on its own, or as the result of stress, or mutation from too much time spent around Katalyth. The addition of parts/features (as in, the player thought of a neat thing to add to an existing creature) is fine! |
| #28
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-11-07 |
if tighnari applies what he's learned about imprint generated power to what gale's learned about barrier creation, would he be able to have any success in making an imprint powered barrier? | As imprinting energy is a perfectly good form of energy (far safer than Katalyth), this would be a fine use for it, when combined with Gale's barriers and/or what science can collectively come up with to imitate it mechanically. It would still take a lot of imprints/pair bonds, and some work to refine/make efficient the collection and use of this power, but it has a lot of potential. |
| #29
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-11-03 |
Horrors or no horrors, Gale is continuing to His recent project is seeing if he can understand the magic at work in Karteria's barriers on a molecular level (or photonic, or whatever). He's trying to replicate the barriers as a spell. He knows he's not going to be able to make city-sized barriers, he's aiming for something more the size of Globe of Invulnerability that a couple people could stand in for a little while. He's gonna test being able to do it just on his own powers compared to with an absorbing-katalyth boost. His long term plan is to be able to understand the magic so he can work with the techy types to build barrier generators. |
Doing this on his own energies is going to be challenging... It'll take some practice, but given his experience with wizarding (and an increased familiarity with Katalyth, and what it might take to defend against it), he could probably develop something capable of keeping out arcane radiation for a time. It would almost certainly be a development that is running along a different track than the Karterian barrier (maybe parallel, but the magic of the world is different from at home), but that's not to say that performing the feat in his own way is impossible. Or that studying the composition of the Karterian barrier wouldn't be a good avenue for inspiration/guidance on how that bubble filters out radiation. It's bound to be pretty tiring even when he's got it working (and if he ever uses Katalyth to boost himself to repel Katalyth, it'll certainly strengthen things, but also carry its own very obvious drawbacks to his health), but it's certainly doable. Conveying what he learns to the technical crowd would be some great teamwork, and certainly a good use of resources. With arcane radiation ever present, and with the majority of Augmented not immune to it when exposed over long periods, being able to create and maintain their own protection from it could be valuable. |
| #30
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-11-03 |
I roll back in with a follow-up question related to Brickston's particular brand of losing his mind via Katalyth .... specifically his delusion that he's Imprinted with the rock... 1) If the boys hooked up Bricks to the energy reading device, would it give similar results to someone giving off energy from imprint? Would it be a big fat ZERO? Could results be inconclusive? Kat is fine with any outcome, we just wanted to check with you guys if these options are okay! 2) oh no science again (I'm so sorry).... as far as the specific (sub)type of energy coming off of imprints, is there any descriptors you prefer? Is it simply MAGIC energy, or is there a chemical element (this is where Jayce would start because he assumes PHEROMONES). This is all for flavor because I'd like to give him something to noodle over while working on this, I am always happy to make some nonsense stuff up I just don't want to overstep. Thank you! |
1. Some good sciencing happening here, making the most of Brickston's good decisions. When hooking him up to the device... Brickston's connection to this piece of Katalyth does, in fact give off a similar register to the energy between people. There is a connection between him and this concentrated magic. It wouldn't be wrong to describe it as an imprint. It's not an identical reaction to a normal imprint, however, as it is additionally far more volatile. Depending on Brickston's own emotional state (and to a lesser extent, that of everyone in the vicinity), it would fluctuate in response. Sometimes, it could register as a fresh imprint might, a delicate tether- and at other points, carry all the intensity of a pair bond. The connection between two people is comparatively stable, with increases in imprint depth taking time to develop. Even if the characters' emotional state is in turmoil during the test, their connection is unlikely to fluctuate (unless something is happening that would threaten the survival of their imprint). The Brickston/Katalyth imprint is wildly in flux, as though incapable of settling on how it 'feels' about this. Considering that one half of the pairing could be described as emotion itself, knitted so closely into being that it becomes something tangible... that may not be all that surprising. But Brickston is definitely connected to it, with all the problems that come with that. Hopefully he's keeping that shard safe; the loss of an imprint is a painful thing. (Bonus: while Brickston is the only one of science cabin absolutely tied to this thing, were the other members of the team who have been working closely with this specific piece of Katalyth to test themselves, there would also be a response. It's a wisp of connection by comparison, and similarly unstable, but it's there. Were a completely unrelated person to be tested with this shard, there would be no connection. Katalyth itself is always sort of... giving off bursts of this energy. Without an answer to it (such as what Brickston has done), it dissolves around itself as arcane radiation, inflicting misery, hallucinations, or death, depending on one's susceptibility. Imprinting as a mechanic is more complicated than what Katalyth is doing, but what it is doing is potent and wild enough to make up for what it's lacking, and can create a connection through brute emotional impact, when it's left with someone for a long enough amount of time.) 2. Oh, it can be described however you prefer, it's energy at the end of it. For more description though, it's a sort of... natural energy. A chemical element is be involved, but it's more of a side-effect, or symptom. It's not a requirement to imprint (so characters who come in as machines, or just don't give off anything pheromone-esque can imprint from the start just as fully as anyone else), but more of a facet. When testing an imprinted pair, a part of that connection could be measured as chemical. There would be something like pheromones produced in reaction to one another, that they would each be susceptible to. But what causes the imprint to form in the first place is emotion, and what causes it to deepen is also emotion. But if no sort of attraction/attachment/comfort existed beforehand, both parties are likely to produce chemicals to foster those sorts of feelings, and encourage the bond to deepen. If the character shouldn't be capable of producing something like that, it still happens, as a sort of soul-residue. (It's the same thing as what organic pairs produce, but the latter also comes with a material component.) The energy produced is primarily magical in nature, colored by the souls that touch it. It's very close to the emotional energy of Katalyth- and given that emotions are a core part of how an imprint forms, that's probably to be expected. But it's inherently far more stable. A Katalyth-imprint is senseless and purely emotional, and lacks this soul-imprinting, or chemical residue, even if the other party is organic. It is inherently unstable, because Katalyth itself is unstable, the concept of emotion itself. It's... genuine in its way, but it's not alive in any traditional sense, yet it's entirely possible to bond with it through excessive contact, as Bricks has done. Bonus: Can an imprint be suppressed through chemical means: yes and no. Ultimately no, but the symptoms (those feelings of closeness and comfort) can be muffled, covered up by developing drugs/magic that inhibits the production of these 'pheromones', or deadens a person's ability to receive them. |
| #31
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-10-27 |
howdyyy dropping this here so I can link it around when it's through, it's about pal going to meet with "anon"-- basically, was wondering if we could do a little handwave of how that exchange will go! pal of course does not lie, so he will be incredibly up front about what he remembers from being in the horrors; he won't diminish to protect anyone's feelings, but he also won't embellish just for dramatic effect. while he wouldn't share anyone else's presence/experience by name, from his own jaunt in the horrors he will at least tell her: -the conditions and look of the place -the content of the imprinting experiment -the specialized power testing rooms, incl. about the angry augmented bone full of spite he got to touch -the inhumane treatment overall re: food and so on -the katalyth room/he will let her look at his corruption eyes if she keeps a polite distance so re: the handwave, things I would love to know are: -what's her vibe...how's her response -does she have any other illicit information she'd slip him, on purpose or otherwise -if he bothers her about who she's taking this to specifically, like for names, will she cough them up and because he will Insist she Put His Name On It -will there be any other npc response to pal about this, friendly or un. I'm going to slap the network thread on the reputation reporting eventually, so if that would come up then, please feel free to shuffle me off that way I FORGOT ALSO....... would she meet with him like, day of the network post, or Another Date-- Edited 2025-10-24 11:07 am (local)
|
A handwave would be fantastic. It would keep things from getting messy..... especially since there will be Others Potentially Present. Celia will be by herself. There's very clearly an unease to her because welp this whole post was a lot, but she is not willing to relent due to discomfort. She's gotta know about Patho-Gen's crimes. That said, she will remain as polite and accommodating as possible. Pal's refusal for of her aid during their conversation has made her very wary of overstepping, so she won't ask to poke around unless sincerely offered. Even then, re: his special eyes, she will only look and jot down notes; she offers that her field of expertise isn't whatever this is, but that it should be accounted for as a side-effect of the way Patho-Gen's treated him. There's no desire on her part to hungrily Learn Science from his condition. ... All to say that she appreciates this digest. (Sorry for the length... Celia wants to be OPEN, as much as possible.) She dutifully takes notes. She needs to know these things, and will be presenting it to a collaborative group of government and Patho-Gen officials; she proposes further that an oversight must be made to see to the ethical concerns not only of Augmented Ones, but of Karterian citizens. If Augmented Ones have suffered so, what of their own citizens? She doesn't think that it's only the Augmented who have suffered, but rather, that they've been the only one who could survive to have a voice about it.
1. Celia has noticed a pattern amongst some of her colleagues. While most are focused on understanding the nature of Katalyth, or helping to cure arcane radiation poisoning, or doing literally anything of relevance to the city of Karteria's health and technology, she has noticed that about 1 of every 4 individuals has a weird slant towards focusing on other worlds, and sees the Augmented Ones as a mark of success in connecting to these other realms. She has had a colleague ask her once to survey the Augmented for details of their homeworlds, specifically to find out how habitable they might be. This colleague has been missing since the incident this month; probably died, and was probably involved in the Patho-Gen Holiday Hotel (TM). This is what compels Celia to believe there is a division in the intentions of Patho-Gen, wherein their public face is for the well-being of the world, but some of its members have a distorted view of what that might be. The recent events, performed under the nose of so many staff members, continue to justify her suspicions that not all people are of the same mind. She knows little else beyond this, and is incredibly hushed about it. 2. She will also be candid: nobody has seen Georges since before the Augmented showed up. He's been missing. Entirely. There were early transmissions from him, but nothing else. Celia knows that Georges and a small team of his closest cohorts were tasked with interacting directly with a tear in the fabric of reality... It's dangerous work. Somehow, more Augmented Ones keep coming, so this suggests that he's still alive. 3. Celia was put to sleep just like the rest of the Augmented, and experienced a strange version of Kelesis rather than the circus-like horror show the Augmented were subjected to. She's come to learn that this Kelesis she saw is the one the Augmented get to visit in Eparsis... To her, it doesn't seem quite right. Celia doesn't know what it is, but internally, Patho-Gen is very frustrated by the lack of control they have over Kelesis, and they've been struggling to explain why all attempts to take control of its bounty (underground) have been thwarted. She is aware that they currently have a special interest in the powers of Spectral-types... but what's weirder is that some force is influencing the government & Patho-Gen alike to consider forceful and even militaristic action on Kelesis. Someone is trying to sow the seeds of fear and discontent! Perhaps it's crucial that Spectral-types keep their guards up. If she learns anything else, she will try to disseminate it. 4. Lastly, of fun details she will try to divulge: Patho-Gen is a massive company. About a half of all of Karteria's people are somehow involved in it. But what's weird, is that nobody knows who the head of Patho-Gen is. Their name is obscured; attempts to find out more from highers-up are always thwarted. "We are our own guiding hand," highers-up always claim, saying that there's nobody at the tippy-top. As though Patho-Gen is "Employee-Owned And Operated!". Celia thinks that knowing more about who is in control of Patho-Gen may yield more information about it as a whole... These are questions she's only started trying to delve into since the appearance of that plant monster in the city who is, undeniably, augmented. Scary. As for other NPC interaction with Pal's name being slapped on things, throwing that on Reputation is the way to go. We're still assessing the general temperature from the government and Patho-Gen; if there are repercussions or other outcomes, that shall be the place they're mentioned. Re: When Celia would meet Pal: she would either meet with him that day, or later. If she meets with him after the post, she will immediately offer to him a complete copy of the post on a little SD card-like thing; she saw some Augmented were panicked about it being deleted, but it had to be done. She figures giving a copy to the Augmented is fair, if it helps to demonstrate her intentions. |
| #32
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-10-22 |
Sorry if these are repeats, trying to get my ducks in a row for a thread: 1) Do the hell pit Golems (and Terra) all have detectable Augmenters in them? 2) If yes: I don't think Jayce is going to rip an Augmenter out of a still living Golem, but could one be removed from a crazed Terra while fighting it? I totally get that this would unlock 5 million annoying questions of them trying to analyze an Augmenter, so totally fair if no! Thank you! |
1. The Golems and Terras do have detectable Augmenters! It's a small thing, but it's there. 2. Pulling one out of a still-living Terra is going to be difficult. They are certainly not going to cooperate, but assuming that anyone who's trying has the means to restrain/sedate the plant and the ability to do delicate surgery in a hell pit without light, they could remove... something. The Augmenter is a very small thing though, and under these conditions, they would only be able to pull out something that looks like... about half of a capsule, about a centimeter in size. It won't actually have all that much that's useful inside, almost like it's been hollowed out already. It does have a number of indentations, absolutely tiny things, as though some very complicated (and very minuscule) objects or circuitry had once been placed inside it. There could still be some remnants there, hair-thin wires, but the 'bulk' of the capsule is missing. It wouldn't be hard to guess that this isn't the whole of it, but the other half seems to have been detached, broken apart and dissolved entirely. Should the Terra still be alive at the time of removal: they will soon not be. The signs of Katalyth poisoning will be almost immediately in evidence, as boils progress rapidly through their body, spreading from the implantation site to all extremities. As they're already insane, nothing really changes there, but with their poisoning progressing so rapidly, they aren't likely to survive long enough to attack, should whatever is restraining them fail. But it's very clearly a miserable way to go, especially for the Katalyth-sensitive Terras. |
| #33
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-10-16 |
Bonjour, mods! If someone asked about the location of Ingrid Chevron's office (or whomever is acting in that role, should Ingrid be gone), what info could be gleamed? Is it on a map somewhere of the building, off limits, not there at all, etc? Thank you! |
Asking after Ingrid Chevron will inevitably lead to general confusion, as she's dead. She was old when she was the Director of Experimental Sciences and Augmented Affairs, and her role was to oversee the bridge between the Original Augmented Ones (the Karterian ones!) and their role as, well, experiments towards a better future. This meant that she was often placed in a role of secrecy, keeping her colleagues on both sides of the fence (the side of humanizing them, versus the side of trying to understand them) in the dark. Patho-Gen scientists who are Claude's age and older—so like, 50+—who met Ingrid don't seem to much like her, and describe her as a stony woman of few words. Ingrid herself faded out of her position in a very quiet retirement, especially after the OG Augmented died. No more experimental science, no more Augmented Affairs. It seems by the end of it all, she passed due to arcane radiation poisoning. There is nobody who has occupied her role in this length of time. The Augmented were only recently brought back... Perhaps someone should occupy that role now, huh? |
| #34
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-10-16 |
1. Would they offer any useful information if Ciel were to ask things like how they got the poisoning? Are there any former Patho-Gen employees he can gently prod (under the guise of being a curious youth/trying to be helpful)? Would the babblers have anything interesting to say amidst their nonsense? 2. Would Riddle be immediately locked down in naptime after this? Or would they let him use his powers if he didn't seem to be aware what he was doing at first (He tends to just throw out his collars when he'd mad and throwing a tantrum, not to intentionally subvert anything- but once he catches on he would do it purposefully). |
|
| #35
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-10-15 |
Question/request about tech and science stuff! 1) After getting an update from Bricks about the Katalyth research and how Bricks is certain he's imprinting with it... I wanted to find out if it would be possible for Jayce to put together his own device to get energy readings from imprints - those with Katalyth and those between Augmented. He's aware Patho-Gen keeps aggressively testing them for imprinting and he wants to figure out for himself wtf is going on with it finally 2) Would it be okay for them to have made their own devices to get arcane radiation readings? In all our back and forths on radiation questions I don't think we ever said what they were using 8') what is science we just don't know... |
1. Yes, given Jayce's experience, he would be able to create some sort of device to measure imprints/get energy readings from them (which amounts to similar data, since the stronger the imprint, the more energy is created...). Turn those emotions back into the tidiness of math, science his way through the feelings. Maybe even power something through love and/or unintended affection. Given Patho-Gen's interest in this direction, understanding what's going on, and how to use it would make a valuable use of his effort. 2. What IS science, we just don't know... but yeah, after all this time, it would be safe to assume that whatever it is that Jayce and co. have been using, could have been replicated/found some alternative for, so that they're no longer as reliant on Patho-Gen for everything. |
| #36
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-10-14 |
By native powers, are they testing powers that people came in with, and/or natural soul-related ones? If yes to the powers people came in with, would they reasonably have a way to force Bruno to have a vision, and if so, what might they want to make him see? He has future sight, so it'd have to be something in the future, if anything. I can also skip having them poke at that power if that might be too spoilery! |
Sorry about the delay, wanted to give Bruno a Proper Vision(tm) to take home with him.... But yes, native powers are the ones characters possess at home, and may also possess to some greater or lesser degree in game. (They are also testing Natural Soul-related powers, but in the native-power room, that interest takes a backseat.) And yes, in the room where native powers are permitted to exist, Bruno could be treated to a taste of the future. And as he might expect, it's not a great one, and certainly nothing Patho-Gen would want to see: Karterian streets, but there's something wrong. The sky above is clear, clear; it lacks the familiar, protective translucence that stagnates the air but blocks the harmfulness of arcane radiation. The barrier has fallen. While the heavens are clear, something like fog sticks close to the buildings, a haze that makes it difficult to see more than a few feet ahead. It's not a true fog, nor mist, but something that distorts the view of everything around. Streets flicker in and out of existence, appearing to be twisted up by flesh and vine, before returning to normal. The streets aren't deserted, but it's quiet. There's bodies- of Augmented and local Karterian- collapsed in alley and thoroughfare, curled up in doorways. As a mercy, they seem to all be largely alive... though with the barrier down, how long that will still be the case is numbered in days, when it comes to the Karterians. While there's movement, almost everyone seems to be unconscious. Some kneel besides the downed, trying to rouse them- only to collapse at their side. In every direction, the same thing plays out. |
| #37
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-10-10 |
So, Patho-Gen wants to test native abilities, and they also want to test Katalyth exposure. Would these by chance ever happen in the same location? Would Gale have the chance to pull his absorbing Katalyth to cast a big spell bullshit? If he managed to cause some big damage, what sort of result will that get him? This may be answered somewhere else but I couldn't find it: could the carnivora+imprint healing be able to regrow lost body parts, or just rapidly heal the wounds (e.g. if a finger gets chopped off, is it coming back, or will there just be a healed stump? or is it choose your own adventure horrors?). Edited (bolding is helpful in the main body so I thought I'd use it in asking questions too... but I messed up the code whoops) 2025-10-07 02:30 pm (local)
|
While native ability testing would never take place in the Katalyth room itself, it's not impossible that some (smaller) amount of Katalyth might be brought in to the former. It's also possible that they could do this for Gale, out of some awareness of his ability to absorb magic... or just to see how his magic would react to it. So he could probably cause a big explosion this way (before being quickly shut down). That's too much of a demonstration... though they'll be interested in how he corrupts afterward. But it's possible that he could kill someone/damage the room itself, and be treated a lot more brusquely/cautiously afterward. Carnivora (particularly while bolstered with imprints) can regrow some lost parts. It'll take some time (no one's restoring limbs in the heat of battle), and is much slower than healing simple cuts (or even deep ones). It's not perfect though, and the more that's missing, the more likely that it just... stops part way. Closes the wound, calls the construction of half a finger good enough. Or maybe it manages the whole thing! So yes, it's a choose-your-own-stump adventure. |
| #38
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-10-07 |
I'm going to regret this aren't I but if someone's Katalyth song was hummed back at the peacock in that bleak harmony, as a sort of "I hear you," how does she react? | The peacock will sing more strongly or confidently. Perhaps there's a note of excitement: she might sing a step quicker. She would also harmonize with this, but not to the same emotional wavelength as she does with an Aves-type. |
| #39
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-10-06 |
Thank you for this nightmare shit, mods! A little while ago I asked about a Midas touch power for Kalim and I was thinking of having that manifest during this event. So on that note: does that kind of thing work on Katalyth? If he's restrained up near that stuff for long enough, will it be possible to turn an amount of it into gold? |
Katalyth exists in a strange state, as something that can be handled physically (though it's not a great idea to do so, even for a Golem), but is ultimately a form of tightly knitted magic, rather than being an actual mineral. In that sense, it's not physical by some definitions, and fails to obey all the rules when it comes to physical things. Which doesn't mean that it can't react to Kalim's power, or that it won't do anything. He will be able to create some amount of actual gold this way. More than gold, he will also generate other, unintended materials. Different minerals, none of them pure, each full of inclusions of something else. The more he does this, the more organic the mutations will become; his gold-dusted iron growing fur, his copper full of lumps of teeth. It will bleed. The Katalyth itself won't be 'transformed' into these mutations; it will simply power them, and be responsible for this twisting of his magic. |
| #40
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-10-06 |
Is it cool to say a sympathetic/too busy for this shit Patho-Gen nurse allows an Augmented into the palliative care ward - mostly so they have more than a few minutes to linger there and chat with anyone lucid enough to talk (or if even the medical staff would talk to him)... Jayce would be asking when they patients have last been able to speak to their families, and if he can relay any messages. | Oh yes, it'd definitely be possible for an Augmented to be allowed to linger there if they weren't the troublemaking sort (characters who are more known for being violent would have a harder time getting this far). But someone like Jayce, especially as he's a Golem-type, is practically overlooked. (The staff might casually order him to fetch supplies while he's there... but he'd also be left to himself.) Arcane radiation poisoning isn't catching, so the patients here are occasionally allowed visitors. The restrictions in play are for their benefit, given the frailty of their condition; they are at much greater risk of falling to unrelated infections, as their bodies increasingly lose the means to fight anything off. But many here either don't have family, or haven't seen them in a while- or aren't lucid enough to remember much of anything. At the offer to relay messages to the outside, some of the patients will scoff, and dismiss him. What do they have to update anyone on? That they're still dying? That it can't come soon enough, because the poor wretch next to them keeps them up all night talking to themself, muttering about things that make no sense. Their family is useless, never visits enough anyway, not that they want them to, and so on. (Underneath it all, they're afraid. They still refuse to pass anything on.) Others will accept, leaving Jayce with names and addresses and short messages. It's mostly instructions on how to look after a business, reminders over pets and children, or requests for specific books on a family member's next visit. Boredom is the most common complaint amongst the still lucid. In all cases, they don't seem to view Jayce as a person himself, either using or dismissing him as a machine who'd been told to perform these tasks. The usual treatment. The medical staff are tired. It's just been one thing after another, with arcane radiation taking its gradual toll, plus a good portion of their staff going blind, plus all the injuries from the tree incident.... They doubt they'll be permitted any leave in the foreseeable future, and while they largely don't resent it, seeing firsthand how necessary their presence is, there is a palpable fatigue in the staff. They know less than most when it comes to what Patho-Gen is doing with the reclaimed Augmented; these are primarily doctors and nurses, and only secondarily Patho-Gen employees. But some of their team has been called in to support with whatever's going on with this 'adjustment' business, leaving them additionally short-staffed. They're a bit grumbly at that, but assume there must be good reason for it. |
| #41
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-10-06 |
hello, love the horrors, 1. when you say the orpheus's song variant will stick in characters' heads, is this similar to the katalyth earworm? how would the two songs interact while both are being "heard," if at all? 2. if someone is an unevenly-corrupted freak of a necromancer and gets put in the special tests room, can he put his hands on anything and get a Necromancer Vision? 2b. also how protected from long-distance powers are patho-gen down there, ie could a guy squeeze someone's heart from inside the room or nah..... 2c. if a guy tries anyway whether or not it works, can i have him native power-nerfed for a few weeks after they're released as a punishment, like would a drug effect conveniently last that long for my dark purposes? |
the horrors love you too 1. It's similar, in that there's a sort of underlying mechanism behind them, but not exactly the same. It's sort of an offshoot of the Katalyth-earworm... or a corruption of what had once been a normal expression of Orpheus' Song. A character earwormed by both would not necessarily have them both playing at once (unless you want that mess). It's more likely that they would find some sort of bleak harmonization, or that the familiar earworm would turn up in the peacock's voice, or the peacock's song would take on Pal's personal Katalyth voice. 2. Patho-Gen just loves necromantic visions... to test it, they would present him with a number of bones, and expect him to read them (and to share the results). Most are fragments of animal bones- livestock, who have died at various points in the past decade, having led fairly undramatic lives. Nothing very interesting there. Within the samples is an unassuming chip from something else- still some kind of 'ruminant', but with a very different perspective. Their life is significantly more fraught, and their death is an experience of pain, anger, and frustration. It occurred ~12 years ago. They were worked to death, partially for practical purpose, but mostly to test the limits of their endurance. They had seen others of their 'kind' fall similarly, disappearing one after the other, and knew that their own time was limited. While they intended to go out fighting, they were already too weak to trample even a single person. Spite floods their last moments. 2b. A Pal in Karteria wouldn't be able to reach where the captives are being held, to squeeze any hearts. A Pal in captivity, if within the special tests room, could probably manage to do this to anyone in the facility! They would shut it down pretty quick (and Pal with it, to be scooted back into nullification space), but it's the sort of power that they wouldn't have been prepared to face. 2c. He can absolutely be nerfed as a consequence. That is a horrible ability our Pal has, and Patho-Gen would be negligent to not try to squash it. Pal can remain as suffocated from his native powers for as long as is convenient for you. |
| #42
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-10-02 |
Hello modlies! Katalyth studies update: Following up on Bricks & Jayces' Katalyth studies; they figured out how to get Katalyth to reduce in size before Jayce went on Golem hiatus. Brickston continued the work while he hibernated, and figured out the other half of how to make it worsen/grow, especially using music. His goal is definitely not to just make things worse Madness suggestion?: I'd love to have Brickston have an arc of possibly taking inspiration from Georges andor slowly go crazy/self destruct over the next month or two, so I don't know if there's any segues that might come about with some Very Obsessive Katalyth research/communication, or experimenting with augmented as-possible-resources, or if there's another aspect of the setting that might facilitate a character going a little mad and sounds fun, please let me know. I'm very into that. 👀 edit: it will be my turn for a little hiatus next month as I'll be traveling, actually very open to having Patho-Gen call him in for experimentation or find out he's been experimenting on Katalyth or messing with the computer terminal or something of that vein if that might slide in nicely with a hiatus mechanic, too! Kelesian connection error: Feel free to shoot this down (or if risking it for the biscuit is a dice roll option, I'm game) but asking since Bricks saw the corresponding communication computer a while back would want to try something. It seems pretty busted and not much to traditionally tinker with so he'd be willing to try one of three things in increasingly desperate order; How would any of that potentially go? where Gojo gogo: UNRELATED TO THAT at some other point in the month he'll stop by Patho-Gen HQ and ask anyone where Gojo Satoru's body went. He'll phrase it like. What would they say? Edited 2025-09-26 06:56 am (local)
|
Sorry about the delay and also sorry for these words: because this ended up long That's some good work Brickston, being a very responsible sort and definitely only working for the greater good/benefit of all. It's not as though Katalyth is exactly 'conscious', or can react as a living (or reasonably sane) person could to this demonstration of empathy towards it. Not... exactly. It's not thinking, at least not at this time. But Brickston is hitting on more 'chords' that it is reactive to, through his persistence (and willingness to suffer for it). The more he communes with this specific piece of Katalyth, the more reactive it specifically becomes to Brickston. When he causes it to grow, it really grows. When he causes it to shrink, it will diminish more than someone else could do. And a greater portion of that diminishing- that energy that's quietly released with it (in itself a spell of emotion)- will be absorbed right into Brickston. It could be worse. As a Spectral-type, he's naturally resistant to arcane radiation (which this emotion-energy is). And aligning himself so deliberately with it, reading this piece and 'talking' back to it in a way that it responds to- will earn him a few bonuses. His magics as a Spectral will be temporarily enhanced after each session with the Katalyth. He's absorbing this energy that would kill a normal human- and be likely to sicken a non-Spectral (or Golem). It would feel both exhilarating, and absolutely dreadful. It's still Katalyth. Of course, if he does this too much (diminishing the Katalyth and feeding off of it), his physical state will corrupt more, developing more (temporary) little features. More winglets, more eyes, teeth in the wrong places, etc., it could be whatever you'd like. But alongside it comes the more ongoing (or permanent, depending on how you'd like to play things) mental effects... so tying into the Madness Request more specifically now. Just as Brickston is tuning into Katalyth as a construction, he is also imprinting something of himself into this particular portion of it. Whether he's causing it to shrink or grow, it's aligning personally to him (Brickston being the only one really concentrating on it for these weeks is what causes this connection to grow by leaps and bounds; no one else's 'signals' were in the way.). He'll start to hear it talking to him more often, through the music it gives off. While it had always done this to some extent (once he and the Science Team were deep enough to start hearing it anyway) it will feel that much... personal. Sometimes it's in language he understands (the language of home); sometimes it's utter gibberish but he will feel the meaning. The only meaning is what Brickston ascribes to it. In truth, there is no mind to his Katalyth companion, no heart- at least not at this precise moment. This is all delusion. But it is a very real delusion, it's reacting to what he wants to hear from it. It 'wants' to talk to him, to learn from him, to share itself with him... Brickston could feel as though he were always at the edge of a breakthrough with it, that if he communed a little harder, fed it and diminished it in some beautiful cycle... that he'd find his answers at the end of all things. But it always, always trails dark. It can't help it; the emotions written into its melody, that are being rewritten to fit Brickston's own fears, judgements, traumas... it can't help but react to his heart and reflect it in itself. It 'sympathizes' with them, expands them; when he causes it to grow, it will be written with him in 'mind'. When he feeds off of it, it will compound everything he's already feeling. At this point it would be very, very easy to spiral into greater madness (as though he weren't already there, having done all this). Kelesian connection error: Brickston continuing his clever ideas in bringing his pet Katalyth shard with him on holiday into the hell pit. 1. ...Luckily for him (rolled an 18 btw) Brickston's first attempt nets him the success he's after, without him having to resort to more desperate means. Maybe all the time spent around his Katalyth has paid off? Because it responds handily to Brickston's intent, his channeling of its energy (at cost to his own health/sanity) forces the computer back into brief operation. It's not operating on its own sanity any more; the machine remains broken in practice, but Katalyth energy transcends sanity. Even so, there's not any sort of keyboard available, or other obvious way of telling it what to do now. Fortunately, this thread of connection has spurred it into doing something on its own. Connection lost. Please wait... ... Logged into: Arboretum Hub Error in sending last report. Abort/retry/fail? There's no way of telling it to do anything. Smacking the monitor (a tried and true method) causes it to flicker and hum, and after a few seconds (whether manhandled or not) lines of text and numbers proceed to fill the screen. It's enough that it's all soon scrolling out of sight. But it looks to be information on various aspects of the area. Soil qualities, air qualities. There's that nitrogen reading again. The radiation quantity in every category is "catastrophic". There's a lot of numerical codes complete with short abbreviations and yet more numbers. Each row ends with either "unknown" or "lost". Still, it's a lot to take in at once and it's all flying by very quickly. But it's at least an impression of a lot of scientific readings, and perhaps some kind of inventory. The screen ends on someone's typed notes- a clear addendum to all this data. The words of the last person to have ever used this machine. It's already too late for us. You knew this would happen. What happens now is blood on your hands. We've disabled the teleporters. Maybe this will strike you as spite, but it's not. Containment has failed. ... Please wait... pleasepleasepleasepleasepleaseplease pleasepleasepleasepleasepleaseplease pleasepleasepleasepleasepleaseplease pleasepleasepleasepleasepleaseplease ...maybe the Katalyth is doing more to this poor machine than powering it. The screen is quickly filled with a repetition of the same word, before shutting off completely. It will not turn on again, no matter what anyone does. It's dead, its final message conveyed. Gojo hunting: Brickston has been on good enough behavior recently, so he's not just shown back out the door when he turns up asking questions. The staff will be surprised at his phrasing, but it won't change their answer: a confirmation that Gojo is being held in Patho-Gen HQ due to an Augmenter malfunction. They would say the same thing even if he asked it in a less weird way. They would be apologetic about the news, and wouldn't hide that this meant that it was exceedingly unlikely that he would be seen again. They've yet to find a cure for this error once it's already happened, but they would assure that their engineers are doing their utmost to get to the root of the underlying cause. Hopefully it can be fixed and prevent losses like these from happening in future. |
| #43
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-09-26 |
Are there fish to be caught in the strait between orexis and eparsis? what about in rivers or any of the lakes? northly has a hungry carnivora to feed! unrelated, but I don't know that I've asked it amongst my many soul questions, does katalyth show anything in soul sight? anti-soul? Edited 2025-09-25 11:48 pm (local)
|
There are indeed fish! It's not an amazing bounty of fish, and it looks like there has been some underlying problem for some time (likely related in some way to the unknown quantities of Katalyth laying on the ocean floor). Most fish run towards the small, as though they're just not managing to live long enough to grow to significant sizes. It is also not uncommon to find mutations in their flesh, though they're largely harmless enough- such as extra eyes (including eyes on the inside of their bodies), distorted fins, or extra appendage that look a lot like very small legs? They remain safe to eat, however, and Northly may freely fish for her Carnivora. She's not likely to put a meaningful dent into the failing population.... Katalyth does not register as anything at all to soul sight. Whatever all is wrong with it, it does not (yet?) seem to have grown anything like that. While it is a bundle of miserable replicating energy (that could be seen by any character who's sensitive to that sort of thing), it is not 'alive' in the sense of possessing a soul. |
| #44
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-09-20 |
question about the imprinting experiment! if a (helpful, respectable, scientific) mind wanted to see if they could replicate the experiment, would that be at all possible or does it require patho-gen tech/resources? | The Patho-Gen machines themselves would be a difficult thing to replicate, and they would be rather guarded about their proprietary technology. They'd been working on developing these tests for some time, after having first learned of the existence of these invisible bonds. And to potentially harvest this power... (for the good of the world, of course; understanding how it further bolsters a protection against arcane radiation, and even provides energy would be a boon to everyone!), well, they would rather not it fall into outside hands. Which isn't to say that the process (or at least a process) isn't replicable elsewhere. Even if Patho-Gen wouldn't allow even a very polite and responsible Augmented to use their machines, a capable and determined character could probably develop their own version of it. With all the different magics characters and their Natural Souls possess, it's not at all impossible that they could come up with something if they tried. Harnessing the very scientific power of friendship is a worthy goal for anyone. |
| #45
Topics: Syntrofos, Golem, Katalyth, Technology, Imprinting Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-09-13 |
hi, mods! i have a few questions -- 1) elan really wants to eat his phone. someone's phone. anybody's phone, really. what would happen if he tried? is it edible for golem types? will he (or his victim) get a new one if it turns out that the syntrofos is, in fact, a delicious snack? i'm sorry. i promise he will not try to eat the servitons. 2) a strange (?) imprinting question. let's say you have (necessarily) positive feelings about your imprint, as a distinct, autonomous person, but your natural soul is the type to be scared shitless by their natural soul (say, a predator/prey situation). can this interfere with the imprint in any way, ex., on account of how the natural souls would likely respond to each other? -- addendum, sorry!: 3) is one half of an imprinted pair instinctively aware of when their partner dies, or are they just "more affected" when they find out through word of mouth, etc., that their partner has died? i wasn't sure when reading the faq if intuiting the partner's death is exclusive to the pair bonding mechanic. (if it is, i will have a small, very-particular-to-my-character follow-up question.) thank you in advance! 🫶 Edited (i can type) 2025-09-11 11:05 pm (local)
|
1. Well. Provided that Elan can fit it into his mouth, either in whole or after smashing it up a bit, there's no one who can stop a determined Elan from eating someone's phone. It does come with an unexpected complication: Elan will probably die from this. Almost immediately after consumption, he'll be hit with a sense of absolute dread. This was a bad idea. And the feeling won't stop, only getting worse as the minutes pass. Depending on how intact the Syntrofos was to start with, it'll be somewhere between 15-30 minutes before he starts showing physical symptoms- that of acute arcane radiation poisoning. He's likely to automatically Shift in self-defense, to become covered in black boils, and to otherwise mutate. This is what happens when someone comes in physical contact with Katalyth. Being a Golem, and as the amount of Katalyth sequestered within a Syntrofos is miniscule, Elan has a greater chance of surviving this than were he another soul type. Allowing it to linger within him until it burns itself out still has a good chance of killing him anyway, but even if he survives he'll have an absolutely miserable, feral time of it regardless. Were he to cough up the Syntrofos quickly (ideally as soon as that dread started setting in), the effect on his health would be correspondingly reduced. He still won't feel great, but the poisoning will clear up faster. On replacing a eaten Syntrofos: should Patho-Gen be told the truth, they will be very upset with him. This is doubly true if he died and they've already had to intervene to revive him (in which case they might already have seen the evidence of a crushed up Syntrofos in him...). If he lies and says it broke, or he lost it, they'll reprimand him, and he'll have to pay for a replacement (price: 8000 numis) from them (if he has no money, it'll basically be loaned to him, and he will be pestered regularly to pay up), but he won't be otherwise penalized. (If he eats someone else's Syntrofos, his victim will be the one reprimanded for breaking it and have to... eat the costs. Unless it all comes out that it's Elan's snack-habit that caused this, in which case blame would be redirected back at him.) Even any old messages might be able to be imported to the new device, thanks to the wonders of the cloud! 2. Having opposing (in a sense) Natural Souls can interfere with the imprinting process- as it might put the prey-character more on edge than they otherwise would be, unconscious instinct telling them to avoid contact (and to recoil from the clear threat on experiencing it). Whether this is enough to altogether prevent imprinting is up to the players. The characters' own feelings could be enough to overcome this instinct, and the Natural Soul's fears are likely to reduce over time, soothed by the imprint's reassurance that this predator is somehow family. Or, the soul could be just too panicked and flood their host with the same emotion, enough to put a stop to any imprinting dreams. Some more mundane soothing (and a good deal more time) would probably be necessary in order for an imprint to take. So really, it could go either way, depending on how you wanted to play things out. Ex. Imprinted pairs are not automatically attuned to each other's deaths. It's only when the attachment has slipped into the depths of pair bonding that these emotional resonances occur (along with just being generally 'aware' of important fluctuations in their physical state). |
| #46
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-09-10 |
Hello mods! I have a question about housing and I apologize if this has been asked before. Say a character wants to just go out into the woods and build a shack...well, not really a shack more like a more traditional Heian era house like this. Is this tenable or does it have to be one of the housing types listed on the housing page? |
Not a mod (and sorry if this is overstepping), but I can point you in the direction of a question that I think covers this. From here: "Housing outside the barrier- well, no one lives there or could quarrel with some Augmented choosing to live there. The houses there have no connection to Karteria's utilities, and are in various states of decay, but they could claim as many yards as they wanted, really. To spend most of one's time outside the barrier isn't wholly healthy even for Augmented, however; while they won't ever perish to arcane radiation, it will speed up their corruption. This is especially true if a significant amount of that time is spent alone; the company of at least one other Augmented conveys additional protection. In the long-term it may result in additional effects as explored here, but if they're mostly out there together (or with some other Augmented company) then it's far, far safer." So yeah, living out in the woods possible, and there's probably nothing stopping characters from building a house out there (my dude here has a leatherworking station in one abandoned building, a group of scientists has commandeered an old logging cabin, etc.), but you might end up real weird.
Thank you to Grimme for providing that answer! That is absolutely the jist of it. Some characters are even looking to build some back-up safe havens in abandoned areas around Orexis. Yes, building a house out in the open is totally doable. Enjoy your hastened corruptions... |
| #47
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-09-08 |
I'm shuffling my butt back in here betwixt the balance of doing game things, and furthering Florian's Agenda: Fantastic! Let's say someone does manage to smuggle in one of those shards o' Katalyth into the city. I understand Katalyth emanates a dreadful feeling, so I know having too much of it might be easily noticed even by citizens... Are there consequences to storing it in the basement of a shitty townhouse in Gloria? Lastly, for the kicker: exposure to Katalyth = arcane radiation poisoning for Karterians, and is generally inadvisable even for Augmented. Let's assume that a character is evil and deliberately tries to embed just a shard of Katalyth into a citizen, like a shard of glass in the foot. So small! What happens? |
Katalyth in a basement: Too much—a concentration of it larger than the size of a golf ball in total, even in fragments—will cause most sensitive Augmented Ones to feel something's amiss. This includes NatSouls that are generally more sensitive to arcane radiation, as well as Augmented who are more empathic in general. Just as described, the feeling will be dreadful. Even Karterian Citizens will walk past the house and feel unwell. Florian himself is a Terra-type; he'll be sensitive to Katalyth, so be wary of that. Characters who go near the Katalyth-haus will feel its dreadful influence even from beyond the front door; the closer they get to the basement, the more repulsive. Katalyth embedded into a citizen: speedrunning awful. bad florian. A larger piece would be incredibly toxic. It would likely ravage the host body so quickly that the individual would go to the hospital, and have the piece found. They would, inevitably, die with that level of contact anyway, even with the intervention... and the doctors aiding them will get that much sicker. But a very, very small piece is... both the same, and different story. Eventually, the end result is death. But a small fragment, like a tiny shard of glass embedded into a victim, will result in gradual disfigurement. The signs of your typical arcane radiation poisoning will arise, with black boils, hallucinations, fatigue, and eventual cardiac arrest... but especially Karterians who remain inside of their barrier will be so slowly poisoned, that they'll start to grow teratoma-like masses, or find themselves with extra disfigurement. Their death can be expedited by leaving Karteria, but so too will this cycle of rapid, cancerous growth: beyond the barrier, they'd grow more arms, more legs, more teeth... Within Karteria, the effects are less severe, but the boils they grow will eventually ravage them. The end result is the same: they'll die. |
| #48
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-09-01 |
How big are the bits of katalyth on squid-chan? obviously not something to do all at once, but if someone were to (gingerly, with a fingertip, for a single moment) touch a piece and put it into her inventory to remove it from the squid, would that be possible? | They are somewhat variable in size, from uncomfortably large chunks longer than an average human's forearm, to uncomfortably small chunks the size of a fingernail. Touching any of it remains a bad idea, but if someone (Northly) understood/ignored the warnings in that regard, so long as she were quick about not staying in direct contact with it, she could slide a piece into her inventory without too much trouble. The squid would no doubt benefit from a thorough cleansing of Katalyth, but every bit removed helps. |
| #49
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-08-23 |
Would there be any change to "saran" on the kelesians if the augmented who can't read were to view them? Would they get pictograms? | They would get their own personal Saran interpretation! It would look a bit like something you'd find in an illustrated fairy tale book for children. Because of that (and that it's appearing on someone's skin), it'd be hard to get too much detail out of it, but it looks almost certainly human. A human of indeterminate age, but leaning feminine. Sometimes they look happy; sometimes they're drawn with dark circles on their face, a simple representation of arcane radiation poisoning. |
| #50
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-08-19 |
Hello, my darlings. So for Gojo and teams exploring outside of Karteria for the month, he'd like to push a bit farther-- Team Peachy (Momo, Chuuya, and Dazai), as the fastest-moving team, will be trying to reach Doxa. The discussed route was along the edge of the woods and the swamp, the route Gojo and his team previously took to the Blood Lake, and then pretty much a straight line from the north side of Blood Lake to Doxa. Team Sneeze Smash (Tartaglia, Izuku, and Blade) will be scouting the Kelesis Environs and Lake Telos. A few trips of, idk, 3 days each? Proposed routes. Team Boyfriends (Gojo, Felwinter, and Choso) will be following up (belatedly) on the Brickston Intel (specifically the version Gojo got from him and suggested strategy) and searching more thoroughly along that coast and near the creepy cabins they found on earlier explorations. Hereabouts. Please let me know if this is too much (i know this is a LOT to ask for, but it's on behalf of, uh, the nine of us?) or if you'd like more information about their strategy or approach to any region. Thank you wonderful mods ❤️❤️❤️ |
Sorry about the delay this was a bit to pull together.... cw: animal remains, implied experimentation, bugs Doxa 1. The path to Doxa is a straightforward one. There's even some decaying evidence of roadwork having existed at some point in the past, but it's intermittent- suggesting that a connection to this corner of Orexis had never been completed, rather than it having only gone neglected and overgrown. Katalyth is present, in unremarkable amounts, and once they're past the edges of Asphodel Fields, the ground- while still moist- is nicely traversable. It should make for an uneventful journey to the borders of Doxa. Unfortunately, the explorers will not find any human, nor human-shaped-entity left alive in the town. There is no sign of any attempt to build a barrier, nor any kind of generator; this was not a place anyone tried to protect. Thankfully, there also aren't any signs of mass death, though there are certainly a few human-belonging bones here and there, lain in moldering beds, or dragged into the street. Many have visible signs of being chewed on. But there's not so many to suggest that the entire town had stricken and died; instead, the majority of the inhabitants chose to leave. The buildings haven't had time to collapse for the most part, but nature has begun its work on reclaiming them, turning green the skeleton of the town. Many of the buildings remain furnished, mostly with larger pieces that would have been difficult to transport across the island. Most small, personal belongings are gone- perhaps suggesting that the people who left here knew they weren't coming back. There are quite a few sailing ships in the harbor, in varying stages of decay. Doxa had once been a modest harbor town, with a sub-5000 population at its height. Being the closest point (relatively speaking) to the island of Ekklisis is why the settlement sprang up in the first place. People dreamed of regular (even easy) travel between the islands, and a properly connected, international Pathos, but even these early stages were never given the opportunity to see fruit. Sailing has been a dangerous profession for longer than living memory, and as arcane radiation made it utterly unfeasible for the indefinite future, what point is there in a harbor town? There are also plenty of signs of wildlife having taken over residence of Doxa, with the most notable being a pack of feral dogs. Or rather, the descendants of once domesticated canines, pets that were left behind when the town was abandoned. Karteria is rather strict with pet ownership, after all.... Several generations onward, these dogs have survived, and with some interbreeding with local wolves, are even thriving in their way. But it's not without some changes. Similar to what's happened around the cenote, the dogs are notably mutated, particularly around their faces- which are now equipped with numerous black tentacle-like growths. It doesn't seem to interfere with their lives too badly, though you'll sometimes catch a dog trying to scrape one of them off against the side of a tree, or some other hard surface. If the characters noticed bits of blackened dropped-off flesh and smears of blood against the lower parts of trees on their way into Doxa... well, that would be where it came from. The other animals in the area are largely normal, showing the occasional visible mutation, but nothing on the systemic level as the dogs. If there ever became a time where reaching Ekklisis was pressing, Doxa could become an important- or at least convenient- staging point. Until then, it is full of tentacled-dogs and rotting ships. Kelesis Environs 1. The most Northern route. The forests directly to the Northeast of Kelesis are quite nice. They're not as dark as the Woods outside Karteria, so there's plenty of light dappling through the leaves. There's no sign of people having been out this way in years, as might be expected, and most paths have been consumed by the forest around them. But there's always some sort of path, and it seems to always lead in the direction they want to go...? (Maybe it's nothing, and this had simply been the most popular route in the past, so it's faded the least.) If one were imagining an idyllic, peaceful slice of nature, the forests outside of Kelesis would match it exactly. The birds sound... odd, or rather, there's birdsong even when there's no birds around. Their music also doesn't match the kind of birds found on this part of the island either. But there's no denying it adds to the ambiance. Once they leave the treeline, they'll have a relatively easy path northward across grassy fields. As just about anywhere flat in Pathos, the ground is moist, but it hasn't yet given way entirely to proper marsh or bogland. It remains safe and reasonably traversable. There is no sign of any past travel past this point, or if something had been there, it was so irregularly trod that it's disappeared entirely. The next bout of woods is denser, though still lighter than the Karterian woods. It also functions more 'normally', in terms of ambient noise and ability to pick a way through it. There is no sign of any human-made path, though there's some places that deer seem to have trod something of their own. The deer are normal. There is nothing unusual out this way, no signs of human habitation or human remains. The levels of mutation in the wildlife is akin to that found in Orexis. This part of Eparsis, at least, has neither been spared the spread of arcane radiation, nor been harder hit. Overall, the amount of Katalyth in the environment is unremarkable. There is plenty of it around, but it's neither infesting anywhere in particular, nor failing to grow anywhere else. 2. Lake Telos. The land moistens to the point of turning back into proper wetlands on the approach to Lake Telos, and the region is absolutely teeming with wildlife. It's less of a dreary-feeling place than the Orexian equivalents, but it doesn't make it any easier going. Once they reach the lake, they'll see that it's not necessarily one made to swim in, but is quite beautiful in its own right. There's an immense amount of flora blooming across its surface, in bright shades to contrast the deep blue of the water. Colorful fish dart about underneath, hunted by a variety of birds and aquatic-lizards (just as colorful as the plants, as though designed to blend in). The insects are similarly dazzling, and give off an ever-present hum in these summer months. Telos is thriving. The majority of the lake's surrounds (including the lake itself) have the average concentrations of Katalyth. However, at the Southeast corner the exploration party will come across obvious signs of a past human presence. A camp, of sorts, rather than a town- but here, every structure has been absolutely consumed by Katalyth. It'll be very noticeable even from a distance, both visually and especially emotionally, as the sense of absolute dread coming from that corner of the lake is not a subtle thing. The buildings themselves look like they're beginning to collapse under the weight of the mineral (or maybe even inorganic structures can get depressed...?), which at least offers a glimpse of what's inside without getting too close. As it would be next-to-impossible for most characters to enter the habitations without losing themselves to the oppressive madness the Katalyth emanates. A Golem-type would have the best shot at it, especially if full-shifted, but even they shouldn't linger there. But it looks like someone had set up a laboratory space here. There's wrecked computers, books that have faded to illegibility (or otherwise ruined by water-damage). Lots of broken glass, with unknown substances dried in them- or in some cases, still oddly sticky, after all this time. Metal cages, large enough to contain something on par with a large dog (or average human), with various damage to the bars of them. Bite marks, claws, burns.... There's collections of bones, both inside and outside of the cages. Overturned tables, and even more chemical residue. Should they find some means to explore inside, there's nothing left in terms of usable equipment. If characters have the means to date anything in the area, it seems to have been abandoned in the early-to-pre-arcane radiation lockdown days. Where everywhere else in the wetland is full of activity, this place is avoided by the local wildlife. The few plants whose seeds have landed nearby have grown up into oddly twisted things, their colors and shapes distorted in comparison to their nearby kin. 3. Southern route, skirting the mountains, all the way to another lake. There is nothing particularly remarkable about this path, but the mountains will look quite lovely as they shuffle past them. That Southern lake is a bit like a smaller version of Telos in terms of appearance and wildlife presentation, but there's no record of humans having settled here, or done anything questionable. Hopefully the exploration crew can spend some time appreciating the sights along with just surveying them! Though it is still rather moist, so sticking around for too long might be uncomfortable in its own right.... Team Boyfriends Route The uncanny cabins are right where they had left them, looking... basically untouched, with barely any more leaf litter or dust or animal tracks or anything. It feels like everything has abandoned this place. The area around it is more normal, the forest becoming patchier as they close in on the coast. And with all their detailed searching, this team is rewarded by coming across signs of a shipwreck. At first it's fragments of wood, rotting and soft. Bits of planks, things too clearly made to be the result of a collapsed tree. There's pieces of metal too, rusted to uselessness, warped and occasionally gnawed. The further up the coast they go, the larger pieces they'll find, caught against the rocky shore (and the occasional spike of Katalyth, jutting up out of the water, uncomfortably smooth, suggesting its erosion into the ocean). The largest find is fabric: thick stretches of coarse wool, sturdy and water-repellant. It lays torn and tangled up amidst rocks, as an evidence of sails (though of a different style and quality to the sailing ships that rot in Karteria's and Doxa's harbors). Apart from being cut up in places, it's in fairly good condition, though if there had ever been any sort of marking upon it, it's long since been bleached away by the sun. There's fragments of wooden masts around it, in far worse condition, turned into the nests of sea-happy bugs and marine mice. There's nothing to suggest that the ship collided with the West coast of Orexis, and it seems far more likely that something caused it to sink further out to sea, and then washed up here. Given the condition of the materials, this probably took place within the past decade or so. There are no human remains (or non-human remains). Besides the materials of the ship itself, there's the remnants of luggage, or at least cargo. There's several wood-like chests strewn along the coast, and unlike the rotting remnants of the ship, these are surprisingly intact. Though there's signs of having been battered against rock, there's no record of anything alive having tried to open them. If anything, nature is giving them a wide berth. A couple have popped open, revealing insides that look like they've been gnawed away, scraped at in splinters at a time. There is no blood, no gore, nothing organic left at all. Three chests remain intact, and... are bulging, slightly. There is no sign of movement, but on approach it'll be impossible to miss that they smell awful. Absolutely wretched. It'll take a strong constitution (or no sense of smell) to even get close enough to try and open one without being sick. Not that you'd want to open one. Why would you? On their inevitable opening: a cloud of thick, hand-sized black flies will emerge. They emit no sound in their flight, and if the container had smelled bad before... it's worse now. It's real bad. The flies will immediately try and escape into the woods, in search of a better life than being trapped inside lost luggage.... (If the party manages to grab and kill any individual fly, it will explode into a mess of murky blood and foam. If they capture an individual fly without killing it, the same thing will happen once the escaping swarm is far enough away. The fly residue also smells terrible, clings to anything it touches, but is otherwise both harmless and useless.) All three chests contain the same fly-prize. Unfortunately, there's nothing in the area that suggests anything from Brickston's intel is around here. |
| #51
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-08-17 |
if caleb (and potential company) was/were to take advantage of the chaos during requiem in bloom to infiltrate patho-gen hq for some sleuthing, how successful will it be? he will be aiming to hack into and/or retrieve potential physical and/or non-physical files/data that could discern what patho-gen is up to, especially irt their current debacle. (and ofc learning from his previous mistake, he will be paying heed to any cameras to evade and/or destroy.) also appropos to the above question, i'm assuming that characters will only have access to their natural soul abilities to combat the tree/zombies since they're within patho-gen hq territory, correct? |
blinks... The month has been unkind to us both. Our apologies, some of these questions are easier to answer while others are a tad more taxing. Patho-Gen... The building itself is in a state of lockdown. It will not be easy to infiltrate, but plenty of rooms will have security protocol out of whack. This means that some previously inaccessible rooms may be... accessible! Unfortunately, a lot of what Caleb/potential company might find has little to do with the current debacle, particularly in any accessible areas. However, there is a bit of an interesting find that Caleb might discover—and even if he's not destroying the cameras, things are way too chaotic for anyone to notice anything! Patho-Gen is in lockdown, evacuation, et cetera mode. If there's anything to be discovered, it's some sort of digital file open on a computer that is documenting the effects being noticed in Kelesis. Despite Patho-Gen's upfront claims that "everything is fine" in Kelesis, there seems to be robust notes about what's not fine. Accessible in this file for as long as Caleb can view it includes the fact that seven Patho-Gen scientists have died in the past month due to their travels to Kelesis... The causes of death include: 1-5. arcane radiation poisoning, 6. UNKNOWN, 7. predation. Their identities are not disclosed. The abilities characters have thanks to their Natural Soul are surprisingly reachable in Patho-Gen territory even in the midst of this attack! However, any other powers they possess are still completely defunct while in Patho-Gen HQ. Natural Soul powers may not be reached if a Patho-Gen scientist were presently using a device to restrain or restrict a character, but while all of this is going down they may use many of their Natural Soul powers even in Patho-Gen HQ. (Just... not any of their From-Home powers.) |
| #52
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-08-17 |
Hello! I am returning for continued Katalyth shenanigans, if that's okay! Jayce has been floating the idea of testing methods to communicate with Katalyth in a way that would eventually allow them to 1) ask questions and 2) soothe its distress, based off of the music notes they've been taking written notes on. Basically, he wants to figure out if communication with Katalyth may eventually be possible, if it's even a two way street at all - based on his work with the Arcane in his own world and communicating instructions to it via runes. OOCly, I just want to give him some more ENRICHMENT and general busywork around the cabin (since I don't think sample testing really takes up too much time at this point). We don't expect them to uncode very much because of plot reasons. Bricks' player also expressed interest in this (and volunteering his cursed musical instrument). I figure they would test on their tiny sample to see if they can get a response from it by playing from the violin, or playing recordings of the sad birds, just to start. Jayce will be going into a rock hibernation for two weeks starting in September as well, so on the off chance his time as a chia pet could be incorporated into this communication attempt in some small way 👀 No rush on any of this since there's an event going on + my impending hiatus. Thank you again for everything! |
Communication with Katalyth is naturally not straightforward. It's not quite a matter of talking to it, and having it talk back, or that it 'recognizes' words in the way a human (or similar sentient entity) does. It is a consciousness that's not exactly conscious, or at least has great difficulty in persisting in any kind of stable, communicable state. It is screaming into the void that is the world, and the world is mutating to adapt to it. To use its own language in its presence, either through replicating its music (through Bricks' violin, or even characters humming or singing what they've been hearing), or by playing the sounds of things affected by it (the sad birds; the sounds the plant monster makes; the bleating or snorting, etc., of heavily mutated animals) they could garner a response. Or at least, a reaction. Even multiple reactions!
|
| #53
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-08-16 |
Walks in here several months late with Starbucks OK so we wanted to actually thread out the decision of whether they'd tell Patho-Gen about Phantasia, and this is what they decided on. Ultimately, Childe will tell Patho-Gen that Phantasia still exists but they need their barrier strengthened and maybe some supplies if they can be spared. He's not going to offer many details outside of that, but he will offer to go himself to create a teleportation point for this to be able to happen if Patho-Gen would like to offer aid. He's hoping that if the people can slowly detox from the Katalyth poisoning, maybe some of them will want to come to Karteria where they'll be safer than where they are right now. |
1. Patho-Gen will aid in the efforts to build teleporter waypoints to help Augmented Ones make it to Phantasia. This will be helpful if they want to offer any aid to these faraway citizens, who chose to remain there despite the warnings that they needed to seek the shelter Karteria offered. 2. Their barrier could use a tune-up. This, Patho-Gen would agree with. They take pity on their suspicion of them, and decide it might be best to leave these efforts in the hands of the Augmented. In this case, Patho-Gen will offer whatever they can... Tools, special diagrams that might help with the constructs that create their barrier—something to help improve it compared to the roughshod one they have. However, Patho-Gen scientists do not think it possible to undo the effects arcane radiation is having on these people. It hasn't been demonstrated to be possible as of yet... Not to say that they don't think it's valuable to offer them greater protection nonetheless. Even if their mentalities can't be helped, their bodies can be, and their physical health is something worth saving even if they remain paranoid. The greatest obstacle Childe and Eli will face in attempting to work on the barrier may be the Phantasians themselves. They are extremely protective over their barrier; one wrong move, and ???? barrier fails?? Sure, the end times are coming, but nobody is allowed to take what life they have left and if that barrier goes down, it's over, right?! It'll require having some grace and patience, as they'll be reluctant to even talk about this save for a solid "no, we don't need your help." ... At least there's a way to convince them. If they're just waiting for their barrier to break, why not let someone attempt to fix it to avoid that fate? Similarly, Patho-Gen scientists will offer the advice to Eli/Childe that should something go awry with a single beacon that creates the structure of the barrier, it will only weaken the barrier rather than break it. Reasoning with locals that a single mistake won't completely destroy their barrier may help them reluctantly agree to the tune-up. 3. The people of Phantasia will remain completely reluctant to travel to Karteria, even after the overtures of assistance. The more this idea is pitched, the more they dig in their heels. It is not a friendly subject to them. Over time, however, some may reveal something of the reason... And in future, more of this information may come to the forefront: some of their ancestors came from Lupê, very long ago. They are far removed from these ancestors, but citizens of Phantasia have been taught that Lupê rejected technology, and favored taking only what they needed. Moreover, Lupêans did not control nor tame their environment via Controlling magic or industrialization: they grew with it and existed among it. They were a peaceful, rational people who lived within their means, and the city just isn't their vibe! They live here out here to connect with the culture Lupêans had; their ancestors always warned them of the city. A complaint they have of Karterians, and everyone else, is that nobody is willing to "face the music." To them, this means... well, accepting doom. (Interestingly, if one returns to Karteria to attempt to trace the lineage of any of these people (obviously using the names of parents or grandparents mentioned, as most individuals in Phantasia have been there since birth at this rate), they are not related to any Lupêans. Most of them, at least: there are a scant few who are. Similarly, their ideas about Lupêan culture is contrary to what Karteria has to say about the militaristic, vicious, unreasonable Lupê.) |
| #54
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-08-13 |
Delightful! He'll be making contact with Tighnari, and taking DO NOT EXPOSE IT TO LIGHT to heart. Which means, he'll be tunneling the long way down. If they tunnel in from the side, in complete dark, is the Hell Pit experience different? Once the concrete is breached deep underground, how does Hubert's radiation-responsive chitin (rainbow Kelesian variant) react? In a series of smart life choices, Hubert has started Katalyth Reading. Is the song in the Hell Pit? Is it different? A response up above mentioned Aves seeing pinpricks in soul-sight. If an arthropoda were to find those sources, is this where the Hell Pit's anger originates from, or do the pinpricks have a different intent? Edit for more: Can imprints stave off the overwhelming-pass-out-madness, or is that our "TUNE IN NEXT MONTH" cliffhanger? Edited 2025-08-09 04:16 am (local)
|
Any approach to the Hell Pit(tm) that avoids taking it head-on is a wise choice. As characters are made to sense, revealing the whole thing to daylight would be a bad idea. And further study of the pit and its surroundings will suggest that it's more than a singular pit, but a whole structure of tunnels, and additional nodes that are also full of anger. When it comes to combining Aves soul-sight, and Arthropoda's own good senses for these emotions... yes, a lot of those pinpricks come from underground, and it would be possible to put together that the greater clusters of soul light corresponds to the worst of the fury. (There are still plenty of souls above Kelesis, of course. The continuous distortion of it all makes it hard for an Aves to concentrate on it long without inflicting a migraine on themself, but with effort it's possible to tell that the above-ground soul presence is more 'normal', and the below-ground soul presence is more 'fragmented.') Hubert's chitin will continue to glow, will continue to reflect the constant presence of arcane radiation. But the deeper he goes into the pit, the more it will revert from its Kelesian rainbow, and back into his usual, expected coloring. But he will continue to light up... though will oddly fail to serve as much of a flashlight. The darkness is pervasive- almost physical, suffocating everything beyond the immediacy of his body. Katalyth reading, a good and normal hobby to pick up... the song in the Hell Pit is different! Or rather, it's the Kelesian faireground dirge, but pitched increasingly offkey, and increasingly slowed. Whether this is an improvement or not is left up to the listener. Properly exploring into the Hell Pit will be available next month, with this one covering the process of reaching it, mapping out its structures, etc. The madness is just too heavy... but imprints do certainly help! Hubert can tape all his friends to his chitin and make it a lot further than he could otherwise... and once leaving the pit, all those connections will make recovery from the experience much easier. |
| #55
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-08-11 |
Jumping onto this bc Aemond came to science folks for testing - would this procedure cause elevated radiation levels or would his tests be whatever counts as normal baseline for most Augmented who aren't fucking around with Katalyth? | Even with everything else that Aemond is going through, increased radiation levels are not a part of it! If anything, they're a little lower than average, perhaps due to his Spectral nature, and their greater resistance to it. |
| #56
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-08-07 |
Likewise validated by the 'dig deeper' message, if he resumes his digging from last month but doesn't stop as requested, I assume Hubert would get evicted from Kelesis? And if he does, and decides to try to tunnel around the long way from outside the city to find the concrete, how would attempts to break/bypass that (via stone-affiliated soul types/magic/extreme force etc) go? |
This time, Hubert won't get evicted from Kelesis. It's as if the higher-ups in the city needed to measure how much they could trust the Augmented, and they've passed whatever metric they had. No longer will the mere act of digging too deep provoke messages to stop. Since we had a similar question here, we'll copypaste what was written there: Tunneling around the perimeter of this mass from the outside might be a good idea, especially if one angles to dig deep down through dirt to find some manner of... side to this massive chamber, rather than the top of it. Please do your worst, Hubert! |
| #57
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-08-07 |
Thank you mods!! This is all so juicy and delighorrifying. If an aves looked down the hole to the rotting abyss with soul sight, what would they see? If digging/probing with rooting was done just outside of kelesis, and then incrementally closer to the inside of kelesis, could the hell pit (working title) be mapped? not looking to open up more than one hole, just see if it's possible to tell where the edges are. how do the kelesians respond to the hole to the hell pit? how deep down is the concrete/hell pit, deep enough that it should be a hell tunnel more than a hell pit? What font is the warning about the light in? Are the "sorry" and "help" that follow the sores in comic sans? What about the "dig deeper"? and on a different tack: If a character was to try to write back to the thing putting messages on people by writing on themself (first with just a marker, then by uh, sharper means,) would that do anything? writing things like "who are you?" "where are you?" "what are you?" If (after the plant monster happens) someone were to try to interrogate patho-gen employees about how they received communication from kelesis about them having a solution to the food shortage, what would they say? Edited 2025-08-07 03:40 am (local)
|
Aves gazing at hole: Yes... there are faint lights down there. <img src="https://emos.plurk.com/ae614ee6e6d6035afb3ad867b80774e3_w24_h21.png" class="imageshrink-actualsize"> Digging/probing outside of Kelesis for edges: This is doable, and frankly, advised. Another character may be doing much the same... It might be a safer way of entering than from above, especially if it means less light can enter. Kelesian response to hell pit: We're calling it hell pit now. If digging in the heart of the city, Kelesians get a little huffy about this disturbance to their city. They don't want to know what Augmented Ones are doing, and get a little glassy-eyed about it. It's not for them to unearth. They're living the good life. Digging far enough to release the Foul Stench may cause any nearby Kelesians or businesses to request that it be covered up, it's gross. Hell pit depth: It is deep. But it is more accurately a... hmm. Well, trust: it is deep, and we prefer hell pit. It is not cylindrical in shape, that much is for sure. Fonts & warnings: So the warning about cracking a hole in the hell pit isn't a physical marking the way other writings are. It's a gut feeling... even if it's implanted. It's like someone is reaching into character's minds and planting that thought there, though characters may well be aware that this isn't a thought of their own. As for the "sorry" and "help," they may appear in all sorts of fonts, comic sans included! Dig deeper is similarly in all manner of fonts. Passing notes on faces: This is cute. Most attempts to write messages back will go unanswered. "Where are you," however, gets the response: "WATCHING YOU." If characters seem disturbed by this... Um, a little smilie is tacked on. Patho-Gen interrogations, post-plant: Most Patho-Gen staff will be completely, utterly floored by... all of this. It will be hard to get answers from any of them, because many available staff members flat-out don't know the details. It's beyond their department, perhaps; for those who do deal with these kinds of things, they'll say that the communication didn't happen recently at all, and there's no reason to hide that fact. There was no communication to start with, but Patho-Gen had collaborated with Kelesis very long ago—within the past 50 years—to create a solution to potential famine. (Potential famine, when famine didn't exist... Why, one may ask? Conjecture is the response: well, things were starting to look bad, and Katalyth was spreading faster in Eparsis, so Patho-Gen reached out to help.) Thus, if these old solutions still existed, it would be a great boon! And given that they found the food, it still exists! The communication established after Augmented Ones finally reached Kelesis... Available staff who might know of this communication with Kelesian officials say that their answer was to guide them to their ample resources. Where these resources are... No available staff knows. One staff member makes an off-hand comment. One of their cohorts did know. ...They haven't seen this person since mid-July. |
| #58
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-08-07 |
I'm here to So, Gale has been pondering whether his magic is limited because he doesn't have access to his native energy source/magic fuel (the Weave), or maybe because Karteria just doesn't have as much ambient magical energy to tap into and that's why none of the natives do big magic like he's used to. He's wondering if he can... add an additional magical fuel source, so to speak. If he experimented with trying to absorb magic from some piece of technology or trying to absorb Katalyth (as mentioned in the previous comments above), could he use it as a sort of energy boost and allow him to cast bigger spells? So far, I've been playing it like he can cast cantrips/low level spells, he can cast medium level spells but they're much smaller (fireball is fire baseball now), but what would happen if he tried to do a shot of Katalyth and cast something higher level? I know he'll probably suffer horrible physical consequences and die if he pushes it, but would he be able to figure out how to do it even a little? A bit of chain lightning while he writhes around on the ground with four thousand new teeth or whatever? Or maybe something Weirder happens? I promise I don't want to make an OP character to break the setting or anything! I just have a power hungry boy full of hubris. What's a wizard without that high int/low wis arrogance? |
To channel Katalyth as suggested, to absorb its power into himself as Gale is accustomed to doing... it might just well have the effect he's after! It's an immense source of energy, and if he can tolerate the immediate emotional effects of being around it (and not become too hopeless to even cast his chain lightning), this would allow him to use his higher level spells as nature intended. Of course, it comes at a cost. It is likely to include physical corruptions, or disfigurations such as those 4000 teeth, and some new limbs to carry them all. It will almost always cause him to spontaneously Shift, if he hadn't been Shifted already, as though to better defend against the Katalyth intrusion into himself. Gale might also notice a particular pain in his neck- exactly where the Augmenter had first been inserted. It feels like something is boiling in there, becoming dangerously hot, with the pain radiating to the rest of his extremities. The degree of mutation/pain is naturally determined by how much he's using at once. Pushing it too far (and this includes doing small amounts too frequently), and he'll temporarily lose sanity entirely, with his Natural Soul taking full command of their body and likely reacting with violence to everything around it. And being properly charged up with Katalyth energy means it might randomly fire off those high-level spells, mixed with owlbear Carnivora magics, along with just... inexplicably bizarre effects (Gale's a wild magic sorcerer now...). He would need to be restrained/subdued until it all works its way out of his system, and he would not be in great shape for a time after. But, if Gale is responsibly reckless, he can occasionally cast a Big Spell, and then... wait for any new growths to rot away or fall off, but otherwise not suffer permanent damage. (Although, to go this route: Gale is also likely to start hearing the Katalyth music as described here, if he isn't already.) |
| #59
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-08-06 |
The thing under kelesis seems to be telling augmented to get down there, can terra types get past the concrete now? What would an attempt now get them? What if they tried to team up with some golems to use their force on the concrete? (as soon as tighnari hears about the messages, he'll give rooting another go, though will try to quit before passing out this time) is the effect of last month where the augmented are corrupted more when in kelesis still happening? the distorted people parts that seem to be in the plant, do they happen to correlate at all to the parts that were missing from the gristly piles of people bits from the east sophians, or are they too plant-squished to tell? Is there anything to be found in Kelesis or Karteria about the founding of Kelesis and how infrastructure came about? Tighnari is replying to the network event asking for these, and he's going to try researching it now it's occurred to him. Edited 2025-08-06 08:23 pm (local)
|
Re: digging. Indeed, some force is now encouraging Augmented Ones to get down there. Previously, digging too deep wasn't exactly welcome by the city's officials, given the headaches and the passing out; they weren't sure how to feel about the Augmented right away, but now Kelesis's higher-ups seem to be trusting of them. Digging is now possible. It will take time. To dig deep will eventually lead to a very thick wall of concrete, and Terra-types will have to probe for areas of weakness in the concrete to begin with. Even then, it will take a lot of tapping into their Shifted forms to get far, and having the help of other Natural Soul types wouldn't be remiss. Get a Ruminantia's/Glire's kick in the mix; get a Golem's force on the force (ha ha). Get the strength of a Cephalopoda's tentacles in the mix, and so on. Here's the tricky bit, however. As soon as characters get close to erupting through the concrete, any participants are plagued with a very prominent concern: "DO NOT EXPOSE IT TO LIGHT." The thinning, breaking concrete will crumble. A small hole will fracture into the thick layer of concrete. The stench of fermenting garbage will warm the air... and no matter what light you attempt to shine through that hole, characters will see nothing but sheer darkness beneath. It's hard to even hear the bottom of this cavernous well. To slip into this hole would be to drop to your deaths. Could an Aves-type manage the drop, could a Spectral-type use their levitation powers to go deeper...? Whatever the case, the feeling all characters get is excruciating enough to feel once more like passing out. It's like standing too close to Katalyth for too long, but instead of causing any sort of mutations or distortions, it causes utter madness. So that's where things are at. We look forward to seeing character attempts as they try to 'dig deeper' in the Reputation thread! Re: Kelesian Corruption traits: yes, all of last month's effects still stand. Characters are just... more monstrous here! For some reason. Even if they aren't outside of Kelesis, they are when inside of it. Re: Is there a connection to East Sophians & the Plant Critter? This is a very interesting theory, and the answer is... it would be impossible to tell. There are so many parts. So many missing East Sophians. (In truth, there is not much of a connection between the two... in most ways. It's not worth investigating far, but it's not to say there aren't any commonalities.) Re: Kelesis and its founding. There isn't much info within Kelesis. Texts seem to suggest that the Kelesian people are travelers and wanderers, but the people in Kelesis actually disagree with this. They're just people: some like to be homebodies, some get bitten by the wanderlust bug... You know! Kelesians in Karteria would agree with what the people say, that they aren't especially travelers. Kelesians in Karteria may be the best source of intel on Kelesis, as they lived there. Here are a few points of interest from what they say, versus what can be found in Kelesis.
|
| #60
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-08-02 |
How apparent to a Katalyth communicator like Harry is it going to be that the word scars are a result of it reaching and reacting? | It would probably be apparent to Harry (or any character who's attuned to this sort of thing and paying attention), that there's a connection to Katalyth in these things, yes. Something that even living within a barrier can't filter out, a sort of communication (or, well, resonance) that can't be shut out. |
| #61
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-08-02 |
For those experiencing Katalyth song - does anything change about it during Requiem in Bloom? | It does not, sort of. The song sounds about the same as it ever did, and is about as present as it usually is. The sounds that the tree makes however: for the Katalyth-listeners, they may find the noise it produces is a lot like what they've been listening to. Even if what they've been hearing is individual, they will find snatches of those patterns in the way the plant-creature is screaming. |
| #62
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-08-02 |
Any sciency type characters who study tissue/plant/leaf/seed samples taken from Plant-kun and tissue samples taken from Karterian victims, what might they gleam? Also would the plant or samples react to the Katalyth song if it's hummed/whistled/music'd to them? |
There'll be some more info on the official event FAQ and on the event itself, but they will be able to determine that the original plant-creature has a lot of meat in there, and it's definitely human. Possibly multiple human, but it is badly distorted, and twined up with assorted varieties of plant. Samples taken from the fresh Karterian hosts will reflect that 'original' sludge of genetic information, entangling and twisting and changing what it's infesting. An incorporation of the victims into these offshoots of the original tree. No part of the plant appreciates music. It definitely does not appreciate Katalyth-related melodies, and will go out of its way to target and attempt to silence anyone who's producing it. The musician may also notice that the noise the tree is making becomes something of a horrible duet, or an echo of what they've just been playing- all while it's trying to crush the life out of them. (The samples twitch. It's hard to tell whether they like it or not, or whether they feel much of anything about it. But they will be squirming.) |
| #63
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-08-02 |
me again, lumping all my questions for my guys into one comment, wheeze pal question: since saturn will be hiatused under the "augmenter maintenance" hiatus model, if pal tried to come and visit her, would he glean anything at all from a little patho-gen visit? see anything, be told anything specific about "augmenter maintenance," etc? or would they just tell him to please not disturb her, go home squidboy.... pal question 2: necromancer edition: following the above question about katalyth music and studying the samples, if he does his necromancer touchy touch thing on a seedling person (since he's not going to approach the main plant and get his ass kicked), would he get any unique reads on The Energies? lorenz question: I'm planning on his shift having either a healing magic effect if some leaves are ingested or a carnivorous plant reaction if otherwise physically touched, so if he were to panic-shift and catch a few seedling plant zombies in his big tree shift, would either of these effects... be effective? and even if chewing the plant parasites out of the seedlings doesn't do anything for them, would it do something to him? octavian question: the new mole and the weird scar. would patho-gen give him medical records of his new body... growth?? transfer?? and what would these say if so? also if he roped in someone with basically xray powers (law) to look at the abdominal scar, would there be anything noteworthy in there, like actually it IS an appendicitis scar? would he be able to tell how old it is? and, horrible: if he cut it open again would he find anything strange... this is a last resort... thaaaank youuu as always |
Pal Question #1: Indeed, Patho-Gen staff (dressed in whites; they are of the medical branch!) will advise Palamedes that she is committed for "Augmenter maintenance." What this entails, they don't really know... They are here to care for Saturn, not to monkey with Augmenters. If he wished to visit her, they will instruct him that they have visiting hours as many hospitals do. Saturn will be unconscious. Stable, but unconscious. Staff are strict about visiting hours. Get out when visiting hours are over, after 8pm. No coming back until 8am. 12 hours is plenty. Pal Question #2: Not approaching the main plant is wise. Touching a seedling, one that has branched off of the main plant, will give such a fragment of a glimpse of its past that it's difficult to parse. But perhaps with enough focus, Palamedes could glean that this creature has a history indeed. It is about 50 years old. It offers a great portion of that life underneath artificial lights. The reason light is so important to this creature is that the sun feels novel to it; however, the sun is too intense, it feels. The sun is somehow agitating, but it's not the primary source of agitation. Lorenz Question: Oh dear. Lorenz. That would be a horrific time. To capture plant zombies, particularly Karterian citizens-turned-plamt, would be more likely to simply engulf them into his person. A sort of coffin for an already dying individual... Perhaps his healing abilities would at least mollify them as they're sapped and consumed by his body, their energy drawn into Lorenz's Shifted form. Chewing up any part of the plant will be highly nutritious! Plant zombies (those are citizens, do not forget this!) or part of the plant creature/its smaller pieces are all edible. Octavian Question: There is a removed appendix. It is a real appendicitis scar. The appendix was removed at least 10 years ago. As for medical records, he has the very same records most all Augmented have in the sense that Patho-Gen documents what they find in their newly-Augmented charges. There is... a bit sparser of information regarding the physical condition of Octavian's body upon "recovery" compared to most characters. Not that it would be particularly easy to tell: they will only let Octavian see his own files, but only after being annoyingly bureaucratic about the process ("fill out this form" "wait 5 business days" "moshi moshi this is patho-gen can you give me your first and last name, your first born, your birthday, your blood type" "which documents are you requesting" "do you have a document code for this (nobody knows what the codes are)" "ok wait 3 business days" "sorry what were you looking for again" etc). There is, at least, one small morsel of a prize waiting in those hard-to-obtain files: "Successful implantation." While it might be easy to assume this is referring to the augmenter, this note is under the field documenting the body's condition upon retrieval... Fun! |
| #64
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-08-02 |
Hey there, mods! I am here to ask follow up questions about the efforts to revive the abandoned farm outside of the city and grow crops to offset the food shortages! (Here is the Original request, and here is the June feedback where I discussed how Konoha was going about things.) It's been long enough that I think she should have produced a few of the faster growing crop staples (she was trying grains and veg, as well as trying to revive the old orchard). As per the deal, she would give samples over to Patho-Gen, and she also told Jayce she would hand over some samples to the science crew for testing as well. The big question then is..................... are the crops edible and safe?!?!? Is there anything else about them worth noting? Should she try other methods? What would the report back from Patho-Gen say, and would she receive permission to continue? Looking forward to hearing from y'all what's possible here, and Konoha will keep trying her best as long as she can. |
That's some efficient farming Konoha; she was definitely brought here for a reason, and she has found her niche. And it's an important one! The crops are...... indeed edible and safe! As with all food/water, there's a limited amount of arcane radiation within them, but it's little worse than what's found in the food already being sold in Karteria. It's as close to safe as things are going to get for the appreciable future. Any samples taken and studied would reflect that she has successfully grown harmless, nutritious food. The reports returned to her would express that exact thing, that what she's grown is thankfully unremarkable. As for other methods: if what she's doing is working, the scientists would rather leave it to her. She's demonstrating results, which is what matters. And Konoha would absolutely be encouraged to continue! Even with food coming in from Kelesis, there's at least a few sensible/cautious types within Patho-Gen (and even the Government) who recognize the continued importance of having a larger localized food supply. The connection to the other island might be lost again, or some new disaster might disrupt it; it remains crucial to increase the productivity of farmland close to Karteria! |
| #65
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-07-30 |
I know I am a mod but I wish to shuffle this where it can be seen, for Floriananigans!! There is city guardsmen posted at the entryways to Karteria's barrier. What do they do? In that same vein... would they stop an individual from smuggling Katalyth into the city? How would they respond to an Augmented One attempting to bring some in where they can see it? Or, would they be able to stop them if they were being discreet? DO THEY PAT EVERYONE DOWN AS THEY ENTER/EXIT THE CITY??? |
Hello Florian. Fancy seeing you here. City guards mostly ensure that people aren't being weird when they're trying to get in and out of the city. They stand post night and day; it's not a very strenuous job, most of the time, and it doesn't pay exceptionally well either. It's not very glamorous. Most of their duties involve quieting the rabble of outer city folks who have started to go mad with arcane radiation poisoning... you know, as their senses start to slip and all. They are free to come into the city they FORMALLY call home all they like, but they can't come running in screaming about how they're going to kill the hatman or whatever they're hallucinating! They'll disturb the peace! Katalyth smuggling is a very real deal, and something Karteria's security force has cracked down on—hard. If an Augmented One attempts to enter the city with Katalyth in plain sight, they will be told to leave, pronto. The guards will be aghast! (Definitely report such happenings on any Reputation thread if you choose to do this.) Carrying any amount of Katalyth where the guards can see it will result in this reaction. If a character attempts to discreetly smuggle Katalyth into the city (god, why would you)... No, the guard doesn't pat anyone down—for now. But they don't need to. Katalyth that comes in the size of a US quarter or larger will cause a device on their person to chime, a radar for arcane radiation in close proximity. Obviously, there are few applications Karterians have for such a device since they can't get close to Katalyth, but they have to do what they have to do if someone's going to bring it to their doorstep like this! In this kind of situation, the character will be turned around and sent back into the wilderness, told to deposit the Katalyth before returning. But they're gonna write you up. So you will get in trouble for doing this, and more extreme trouble for trying to be discreet about it. This will even involve penalty. (Again, let us know if you decide to have your character do this in a Reputation report.) But any amount smaller than a quarter, discreetly smuggled... is an amount that their radars do not detect. However, having Katalyth in the city perimeter is a felony, and characters will be punished if they're found out. Edited (MOBILLLLLLE) 2025-07-30 03:55 pm (local)
|
| #66
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-07-23 |
As they have been around that long, are there likely to be remnants outside the barrier for salvaging, or have they only ever worked (and thus been used) inside karteria? | There are unfortunately not any large scraps of ServiTon left outside the barrier. In pre-arcane radiation days they still didn't venture out very far from the city limits. And after the barrier came up, all their assignments just became that much more restrictive, existing solely within the barrier. Weirdly, when this shift of domain happened, the Karterians didn't miss a single one; there's no storage shed out there with a load of forgotten robots, nor someone's misplaced housekeeper forever locked in an abandoned closet. They've all been accounted for. Which isn't to say that there's absolutely nothing. There might be a bit of a broken-off ear-cap, or a piece of a screen, or part of one of their little floating hands (no longer floating). There wouldn't be enough to collect to build one's own ServiTon out of them, sadly. |
| #67
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-07-16 |
Is there anything we should know about Kartesian burial practices? Are these bodies shrouded or casketed? Is anyone attending the lowering of the body into the grave? | Karterian burial practices are variable among family preferences, and can be both shrouded or casketed. Cremation is an option; it is very expensive to do. For many families, bodies are ideally displayed, shrouded or not, for the funeral procession; then, they are buried and lowered into a grave with family present. Unfortunately, things have changed and this "ideal" cannot be fulfilled for most citizens anymore. Funerals/memorials are held; for bodies that are in good condition, Karterians prefer to hold a viewing. (Shrouding happens for those who succumb to illness especially; even if the person's appearance is fine, this is largely customary.) But after this, they have to surrender the body to their gravediggers. Prior to the arrival of the Augmented a few months ago, there were some small amount of well-paid gravediggers who would venture beyond the city's barrier for this task. These same people, if found, will show themselves to be from a poorer family; they will also be sick with arcane radiation, attempting to earn money for their family's benefit at the expense of their well-being. It was a highly-demanded job, and scarcely enough hands to perform it. With the Augmented here, now these off-site burials can be performed more readily; morgues can be unburdened, the queue of bodies finally laid to rest. In short, this is why the Augmented don't directly attend the aggrieved in this quest doled out by the Velvet Claw. The families have grieved; they cannot safely visit the grave sites, they know. It's become more normal to have loved ones buried where their graves can't be visited, given the lack of available land within the barrier. But someday, Karterians will hope they can safely venture beyond the city. |
| #68
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-07-15 |
Questions about servitons! When were servitons developed? Did they exist before the katapocalypse? This guy has some experience with repairing essentially a magic powered mechanical crab which was given a soul. Would this translate to being able to tinker with servitons? I don't imagine patho-gen would be thrilled by him doing that, and even with a... Less than deferential attitude to their authority, he wouldn't mess with any that are programmed to help out with citizens (blinded or otherwise) but if he could find abandoned parts that haven't been scavenged and present himself very helpfully Interested, potentially, even partnering with a blinded engineer to learn about them? Overall he's less interested in mechanics than other fields (plants, mushrooms, animals) but it would be fun to have him dabble. (Planning on apping him this app round and got excited thinking about this) |
ServiTons have been around for almost fifty years, so they do predate the current crisis with arcane radiation. Karteria has had robots of some form for longer than that (100+ years), though they were simpler in design and functionality. Though some old relics are still in use (particularly behind the scenes, in roles where they're less likely to have to interact with a consumer), they have largely been supplanted by the friendly ServiTons. The magic would be different from what he's used to, but he might be better equipped than many to deal with the way it's layered with mechanics. Taking apart, or otherwise interfering with the work of any ServiTon is very much not approved of, so he'd have to be careful to not get caught trying to crack one open (if he did find one that wasn't engaged in anything particularly useful and decided to have a go). Truly abandoned parts of ServiTons would be hard to find; they're too valuable to just be thrown out, and even irreparably broken ones have anything remotely reusable salvaged. There is still resource scarcity within the city, particularly with advanced electronics like the ServiTons. But he might be able to find an in with blinded engineers and repair technicians- as capable hands are in short supply, and someone who's good at picking up the mechanics would be welcome. He would learn a bit about the Karterian controlling magic which lays at the heart of these constructs, even if it's not something they're able to teach. But they would appreciate having someone familiar with the concept of what they're doing at hand. |
| #69
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-07-11 |
Thank you so much for this info!! We decided sometime late Aug-Sept they're going to find a house (or several with adjoining yards for Maximum Garden) outside the barrier. So no rush to answer these Q's as it's not very time sensitive! As for location, this is a rough idea what I was thinking: <img src="https://i.imgur.com/RhSvQyA.png" max="max" width="500px" class="imageshrink-actualsize"> Assuming that the small village outside the border is about in the rough area of that blue circle and they'd pick a spot (red star) that is near the outskirts of that village, the Karterian barrier, and the Woods. Few quick Q's about this spot: 1. Eli will undergo spectral death in August and then become undead- I read that this makes him immune to some (all?) effects of Katalyth- does that also make him immune to this advanced corruption/mutation that Pom experienced? 2. Does the village outside of the Karterian barrier have their own power/plumbing grid that the boys could tap into, or are they completely off-grid with no electricity or plumbing? 3. Related to that, it looks like there's a river nearby- is this river safe to drink from, wrt Katalyth levels? 4. I'm thinking Eli may try to help out in this village outside the barrier. Is there anything they obviously need aid with? Medical care? Finding food? Do they want aid from the city? He is also going to vibe with the fact that they don't like Patho-Gen... Definitely not Silco level of class war incitement but a little bit as a treat. Edited 2025-07-08 05:52 am (local)
|
That location should be just fine! As it's outside the barrier, it's up for grabs to any Augmented who want to live out of the city. 1. Being a Proper Spectral at that point would make him largely impervious to arcane radiation, yes. Eli would have to dedicate himself to unwise decisions (never going into Karteria, always being alone outside the barrier) for an extended period of time before he noticed any sort of negative effect (such as more mutations). It would take like an unbroken year of being a hermit in the woods for it to harm him. 2. That decaying village does have its solutions for water and electricity, but they are very limited. Their water supply is from wells, collected rainwater, and the nearby river. All of it requires boiling to be potable (not that this removes the mild levels of radiation from it). They have a few electric generators, older models that still run off of Katalyth (as do their anti-radiation generators... creating more radiation just to survive). Most of the village doesn't have electricity at all- and what they do have is used as a community, rather than attached to any individual home. They barely have enough to go around as it is, and would likely not take terribly well to strangers trying to tap into their resources. 3. The river is lightly contaminated, but Augmented drinking from it shouldn't have any particular trouble handling it. (It might still be a good idea to boil it first, for general health.) 4. The village is honestly in need of everything. Their health is failing more rapidly than that of Karterians inside the barrier- given that they're inherently exposed to much more arcane radiation, their limited generators not anywhere near as effective. Medical supplies (of really any sort) and food are the biggest problems. They are, however, something of a paranoid and skeptical group- and while they could use the help, most would be reluctant to accept it from sources unknown to them. (They're also reluctant to take charity from the city as well, for similar reasons of paranoia. Many still venture into Karteria for brief periods, scrounging up supplies personally- which most view as 'safer' than anything given to them.) Of course, it's not impossible to get to know them, share in the conspiracy theories of the day. |
| #70
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-07-10 |
Hello! Just wanted to check in re: this as I make some plans for July — totally happy to wait, however I just wanted to throw out the option of setting it aside for the time being if the Wildness™ persists. I completely understand that modding is a huge job and don't want to put further pressure on you if it's too much, especially considering the game is getting so big and the plot is so rich and complex. I imagine there are more and more plates to spin every month! Anyway thank you again for all you do, and I'm v much looking forward to July's TDM \o/ |
The wildness does persist......... I'm so sorry for how long this has taken. Regardless of how wild life gets, I feel I should at least be able to offer an ETA for things like this when matters get hectic on the RL side, and moving forward I hope to do better about this. But we've found a moment to collaborate some more on this while keeping it distinct. I hope this works for you, but if not please feel free to offer your thoughts! To Aemond's request, Patho-Gen will hear him out. You're free to say that he's started pitching it to those at the Wellness Centers, who promise they'll funnel the request upwards... It reaches somebody, but they've no need to specifically address Aemond until now. He's a volunteer, after all; his motivations don't matter as much to them. (Basically, you're free to have had Aemond approach Patho-Gen as many times as you prefer in the time it's taken us to get back to you on this! They'll keep pondering their options, while assuring him that they'll have something for him soon.) And that something comes now, in July. With the unveiling of Kelesis, Aemond offers something to them that Patho-Gen cannot refuse: he is a Spectral-type, and Spectral-types have proven to have some manner of... special traits in the face of Kelesis, haven't they? Patho-Gen will page Aemond via Syntrofos sometime in July, whenever it suits you with regards to planning. Either later this month, or in early August, they will invite Aemond to Patho-Gen HQ, where they will invite him into an office. In this office, they will outline the following to him: Patho-Gen wishes to obtain Aemond's consent to be a test subject to understand better the unknown qualities of the Spectral-type. They understand goats and bears and squids... but Spectral-types deserve some extra exploration, they claim. They say they must monitor him regularly; if he wishes to work with them, they insist gently that this is to be kept under wraps, as much as possible. What they intend to do to him, however, they cannot tell him at this time. Unlike with Viktor, however, this Patho-Gen scientist does not give Aemond time to think about it. They expect an answer then and there. If Aemond insists that he needs time to think over it, they'll only reluctantly grant him some time to think and remind him of the secret nature of this endeavor. If Aemond agrees, the scientist will nod and thank him for his willingness. It's then that Aemond will lose consciousness. Aemond will pass out, but he will have a couple moments of hazy awareness... cw: human experimentation, blood, hallucinations
Rise and shine! ... Dark room and shady figure? Huh? What dark room? Figure who? Oh, those scars? Those came from an unfortunate accident with some tech in Patho-Gen HQ, where Aemond is now. He's in a real nice bed, frankly. Well in hand and comfortable, he is told he can rest as long as he needs. Aemond's recollection of those two moments will be so lucid that they veer into fantastical, like something out of a drug-induced hallucination. Explaining them to Patho-Gen personnel will elicit truly shocked reactions: it's the first time they've heard of any of this, and they've had him here the entire time?? What has Patho-Gen done? First: Aemond will realize his neck's been cut open again. Thanks, Patho-Gen. They explain to Aemond that they fitted him with a device that should be able to gather feedback from him any time he taps into his Spectral powers. No, it's not another Augmenter or anything... But it has a sort of, ah, uninhibitor in it to help him tap into his greatest potentials. They want to understand the powers of Spectral-types, from their strengths and weaknesses; their ability to control wildlife... and their ability to tamper with dreams. Patho-Gen encourages Aemond to tap into his powers more often. A strange, nagging feeling will accompany this suggestion: Aemond will feel... strangely endeared to Patho-Gen, obedient and compliant. Intrinsically he feels his powers should not be used on anyone who is allied with Patho-Gen. Aemond won't notice much different for about a month, save for the fact that sleeping will always, always result in horrific nightmares. Those nightmares can be whatever would serve to haunt him the worst; he will feel an increasing sense of paranoia accompanying it. But after that... Aemond's nightmares will start to bleed with reality. He may be awake, but he'll hallucinate that which plagues him most, like a waking nightmare. Paranoia and rage, especially around fellow Augmented, will erratically haunt him; he may be more inclined to Shift against his will, his powers harder to control. He will become more likely to harm those who he doesn't wish to hurt, and find it difficult to distinguish between nightmares and reality. Being around Katalyth makes him even more volatile... which is strange, given that Patho-Gen surely wants him to be able to resist Katalyth, right? Does he gain anything from this? Aemond will find he has an increasing talent for interfacing with dreams in a meaningful way. Going to sleep at the same time as another Augmented One means he can invade their dreams; remotely, like this, he can actually visit harm upon them in real life. A cut in a dream translates to a cut on that person's body. And Patho-Gen will be intrigued all the while. Something about this is of great interest to them... |
| #71
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-07-08 |
Question: if Harry pops in for a visit is he able to hear the singing? Lately he's been avoiding direct Katalyth exposure in favor of trying to communicate with it from a distance. | If you would like, Harry can also be treated to the sound of Katalyth radio (and the Carnival Dirge variant that occurs within Kelesis). Since he's also a Katalyth-listener in his own particular way, he could also have tuned into this particular 'channel' of unfortunate comprehension and connection. How much and where it affects him is entirely up to you (at least the Kelesis voices say nice things...). |
| #72
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-07-07 |
Hi mods. :D Not particularly TDM-specific, but Gojo's Project of the Month ... So I've had this one in my back pocket for a while. He was just so busy with his other projects that I postponed it. And this idea was actually the reason I nerfed his Six Eyes down to 30 feet (which is crippling for what he's used to), because it's too powerful if he can do this at a greater range. As you've noticed in this thread, Gojo has recruited Johann's help for a project. The plan is to find a nice spot leaning against a wall on the exterior of Patho-Gen HQ. He's been in and around the building enough times (all those helpful visits to coordinate things like the teleportation panels) to have a pretty good idea of where the public areas and non-public areas are, so he'll install himself against a wall that he thinks ... might be interesting. To any observer, he will seem to be waiting to meet up with his lover. He'll just kind of be hanging out, checking his syntrofos for the time every so often. Seems that whoever he's meeting is running late! And once his lover shows up, well, they just chat and flirt for a bit before moving along. Guess they weren't in any hurry to head out to whatever destination for their date. But what he's actually doing is using the Six Eyes to snoop. The nerfed description of the Six Eyes I put on the app is "can see through walls or other obstacles within 30 feet" in any direction (so he'll also be looking up and down a floor or two). No audio, so he's expecting to see mostly boring labs and offices and that most of the useful information will be reading any interesting files or computer screens. It's a headache for him to read this way, but he can do it. He will additionally be limited to only being able to read open files. A closed book or file with the pages all pressed together would be too difficult for him to parse individual pages. If this works out reasonably well for him, he intends to repeat it a few times in different locations around the Patho-Gen building. (Johann's so hard to contact by device, after all! May as well set up pre-arranged meetings, and Patho-Gen is such a convenient central location for them to meet up.) Once or twice a week for a few weeks to get pretty thorough coverage of the different restricted areas of the building, up and down a floor or two. He has reason to go inside the building, after all, even if it's just a quick visit to provide updates on his current projects. (He's not the most forthcoming about his discoveries or the discoveries of his teams, but since he pretty regularly has been working with Patho-Gen to help fund and coordinate the exploration efforts, he's got to have contacts there who he's been updating with broad details of the regions they've explored and he'll be checking in on things like 'are the teleportation panels satisfactory where they are? did you want any more of those somewhere? any other regions you especially wanted my teams to check out?' Things like that with whatever contacts he already has there.) And then he'll just ... kind of hang out in the hallway near there, again with the 'checking the time' routine until Johann shows up, they flirt for a bit, then leave. Does he spot or read anything interesting in these efforts? Thank you, darling mods! |
Well well well, Gojo. 30 feet may yield something, even if it's not much. The stunt with Johann works, at least, in keeping people from being particularly suspicious. What is there to be suspicious of, anyway? Generally speaking, Patho-Gen employees do not know what powers Gojo possesses, so they aren't disturbed by this behavior even if they walk around the perimeter of the building—and they do, sometimes, during a lunch break or a call on their Syntrofos. They're not particularly paranoid about Gojo hanging around... But Johann sometimes gets some Patho-Gen employees to pay attention to whatever they're doing. While Johann is strangely not memorable in appearance, some of them can at least recall that this was one of the Augmented who behaved with more than violence toward some Patho-Gen staff. The most this small handful of employees do at this point is keep a wary eye on the two, and otherwise mind their distance, unless they were to see something unsettling. We shall give you three different things he finds by doing this that can happen on three separate occasions. There are rolls involved off screen to determine the chance of finding anything.
Hope this whets ya appetite! Luckily no more bad rolls meant that Patho-Gen didn't continue to get after Gojo and co, either. |
| #73
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-07-07 |
Forgot to ask this last month, but: Water/soil/flora samples surrounding Kelesis - anything particularly high or low on the arcane radiation scale or otherwise notable in that realm? |
The arcane radiation levels in the areas directly around Kelesis are similar to those found around Karteria. A roughly consistent, pervasive amount, without too many dips or peaks. There's plenty of Katalyth to be seen, but no massive formations of it, nor places where it's failed to grow. The local flora/fauna has its occasional visible mutation, and when dissected, everything will show the same hints of mutable behavior after death. As in Karteria, there's no Katalyth visibly growing within Kelesis itself. |
| #74
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-07-06 |
Hello mod besties, Eli is looking to move out of the Valentia eventually with his worm bestie Cassius. I am going to cash in threads for a monetary reward for this purpose. The only goals they have for housing are to meet the bare necessities of living, and Cas wants a space where he can grow a big-ass flower garden. From the housing page, I am seeing that big yards are not a thing unless you're uber rich because space is at such a premium within the barrier, understandably. So, we have two ideas: 1. Could they find a shittier, very small house on a larger plot of land on the very outskirts of the city near the barrier for a "modest" price? What about outside the barrier? What kind of long-term effects would the two of them living outside of the barrier have? 2. Probably more feasible- if they got a small apartment that had a balcony and big communal terrace/rooftop, do you think they could rope their way into getting Cas hired as the gardener for said communal space? If not for pay, I think he'd also be happy to do it on a volunteer basis. Cassius is... a little off-putting, given that he's made of worms and has a blank wide-eyed stare, but he's very polite and sweet. Eli is better at acting like a normal person so he could do the persuasion part of getting him the job, while hiding his own corruption as well as he could. Edited 2025-07-02 09:10 am (local)
|
1. If they're looking for actual acreage, that wouldn't be possible within the barrier. Even the independent houses in Basileios (a district which continues to refuse tenancy to Augmented, if it could even be afforded) don't have that much land. So it's less a matter of money, and just a problem of space. But it would be possible to say a rowhouse of some otherwise modest variety has a larger-than-average backyard, if that would be enough land for Cassius to be content in. It would still not be dramatically large, even close to the barrier. Housing outside the barrier- well, no one lives there or could quarrel with some Augmented choosing to live there. The houses there have no connection to Karteria's utilities, and are in various states of decay, but they could claim as many yards as they wanted, really. To spend most of one's time outside the barrier isn't wholly healthy even for Augmented, however; while they won't ever perish to arcane radiation, it will speed up their corruption. This is especially true if a significant amount of that time is spent alone; the company of at least one other Augmented conveys additional protection. In the long-term it may result in additional effects as explored here, but if they're mostly out there together (or with some other Augmented company) then it's far, far safer. 2. Being allowed responsibility for a shared rooftop garden on top of an apartment building should be feasible, though! There's some that are not particularly well-tended, or fully neglected, even, if no one in the building happens to find gardening a congenial leisure activity (and no one wants to take responsibility for organizing outside help for it). Actually employing Cassius to do it- it's possible, especially with Eli to help smooth out any misgivings, if they found Cas initially unsettling. It probably wouldn't pay very well, but he could get some sort of token salary for maintaining the space. |
| #75
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-07-05 |
This is great 👀 ty mods! For our science folks who have been studying Katalyth and getting strange side effects, are the voices/song muffled when they're behind the Kelesis barrier the same way they are within the Karterian one? |
Strangely, the voices/sounds the Katalyth-listeners are tuning into remains properly audible within Kelesis. And yet, there's some sort of filtering effect going on, as it sounds distinctly different. Rather than a dirge, it's rather lively, closer to carnival music. Weirdly, it would be the same tunes that they'd already been hearing, but played in a major key, turned into something that wouldn't be out of place at a fairground. (Occasionally discordant at times, before righting itself.) And while the voices are still there, they're only saying nice, encouraging things. (Or things that sound like speech, that have the inflection and cadence and everything spot on, but the words are nonsensical.) |
| #76
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-07-05 |
Couple of questions here! -Momo is poking around the few Kelesian bookstores/libraries to see if they have writing on the conflict with Lupe (so he can compare it to what Karteria has written) - would he find anything? -Given the...[gestures at the situation with focusing in on Kelesian individuals], if Momo tried putting on a comedy show with an audience participation element, would that actually be possible to do? -Not TDM-specific, but: Momo's been trying to form connections in and get involved with Karterian entertainment over the last few months. Would it be feasible at this point to have gotten the TV talk show (for more helping to humanise the Augmented along with cultural sharing between Karteria and everyone's worlds) idea he bounced off Mettaton off the ground, or at least progressed on it? With radio being more accessible, he would've begun engaging with that already and focusing more in on it this month, so if a proof of concept is necessary that's a route he's willing to go down. Edited (revise stop getting the city names mixed up challenge impossible mode) 2025-07-04 03:04 pm (local)
|
1. War with Lupê? Hmm... Kelesian citizens aren't sure about what this is. There is no texts they know of, and no texts to be found, not at first. After about a week, however, a few will show themselves! They're more like tabloids. Karteria and Lupê fought... but it was so quick that Kelesis only learned of it as soon as it was all over! Their sister city says it's because Lupê struck first, and their retaliation was swift, their weapon of choice being their Augmented Folks. Lupê had no comment save for the ravenous spread of Katalyth across islands... And obviously they were too gone to comment. Ultimately, accounts are... Blurry. Kelesis doesn't seem to know what's going on. It seems to be leeching a little bit from Karteria's perception of what happened, but they seem blindsided by the event–and citizens themselves are only vaguely aware of it, lamenting the lost lives of Lupêlias and the Karterian Augmented Ones. 2. It would actually be possible to do! It might be that if he were singling out a specific person in the audience, that they would fade back, while someone else would enthusiastically take their place. But he would have his participation. Kelesians are even more likely to find this kind of participation-feature entertaining and fun than Karterians who are a generally more reserved bunch. 3. It is possible that Momo would get his chance to be on TV, given all his work in setting himself up on radio (And generally being well-liked by Karterians, not giving anyone any trouble.). He is palatable (despite the buggy parts), he is friendly, he has a face for television (and no one else has cratered the Augmented's reputation to counter all those things)... Momo can get his chance. |
| #77
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-07-05 |
By Its Cover! If he spends hours reading and researching (or in any other libraries) what might he come up with regarding; - Kelesian barriers - history on Lupê / the original augmented's involvement in Kelesis? - history of Kelesis, in general |
1. That's some dull reading Brickston is after! Even if he scrounged thoroughly through the decorated bookstore (and the few small libraries that exist), there wouldn't be any sort of serious literature about the barrier, or how it functions. There would be magazine articles though, which primarily feature lovely artistic photos of its pillars. The focus is definitely on its aesthetic appeal, with only footnotes about how it's saving everyone's lives by existing. 2. Lupê isn't covered well at all in Kelesian literature- but the same could be said about most serious topics. It's mentioned as one of the islands of Pathos, as far away from their island of Eparsis as it's possible to be. It's more questions than answers, wild hypotheticals on the type of foods they have, or the music they listen to. After a few weeks, some articles will turn up about Lupê's war with Karteria, as noted here. The original Augmented's presence in Kelesis wasn't much of a major event in their eyes. There's some older periodicals which give mention to them- and much like the Kelesian's view of them today, is focused more on their charm factor, and less on why they're there. There's interviews on what it's like to have feathers and claws, there's monstrous glamour shots. There's not really anything on what they're doing there. 3. Kelesian history... to go through the shelves, it'd be possible to get the impression that it just doesn't have one. Apart from some basic facts (It's on the island of Eparsis, it's the largest settlement, it has friendly relations with Karteria on the neighboring island of Orexis), there's nothing that couldn't have already been read about in Karteria. There's nothing about how it was founded, even as part of some idealized mythology. There's more on current trends, current fashions, treatises on the lovely weather, and their sparkling waterfront. Anything that tries to be serious or methodical ends up becoming unreasonably poetic and metaphorical instead. The situation with arcane radiation is written like a story- and not even a deliberately sensationalized one, but as a simple storybook tale with a happy ending (The Kelesian barrier! No more information on how it functions here either, it's merely a plot device that means everyone is safe now.). |
| #78
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-07-05 |
Kelesis-Arthropoda question! Once Hubert learns to tune out the ambient emotion and focuses on the perpetual movement/frustration emanating from the underground, what would happen if he shifted and burrowed towards the source of it? Or towards it in general, if it's ubiquitously sourced? Edit for second question: The Kelesians insist the radiation filtering is near perfect. Hubert's chitin turns blue in the presence of arcane radiation outside of direct light. Does he ever glow inside the Kelesis barrier? Edited (added second question) 2025-07-04 07:29 pm (local)
|
It certainly is possible to dig down down down, and to get notably closer to it- but to go down far enough (several meters in places), he'll hit concrete. It looks to be very hard to bore through, and while Kelesians will tolerate Hubert digging around in their city (so long as he's not doing it in the middle of a shop, or right on the street), this is starting to get quite disruptive, and he'd be asked to stop. It would be very clear that there's some sort of created structure underground though. And given the spread of the emotions/movement underground, it is expansive. Digging outside Kelesis won't have anyone stop him, but he also won't hit on anything. (Could he tunnel in the long way? Possibly, but it would be rough going, and would take quite a bit of time to return to where the emotions and activity are.) As for Hubert's glowing... he would. But rather than merely blue, Hubert would also find himself glowing in an assortment of fine colors, bright and cheerful. He could be strobing rainbow. |
| #79
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-07-03 |
May I ask- does it seem as though the citizens here have gone slightly insane from the intensity of the Katalyth, perhaps even the barrier not being enough to totally shield them? Or does their paranoia seem to be more of the typical isolated-small-town variety? | It's something of a mix of both. Were Katalyth not in existence, the Phantasians would still be skeptical and wary of outsiders. They don't want to live in the big city for a reason (even if that reason is 'we've always been here'), and anyone who turns up from elsewhere... why? It'd be hard for them to imagine a purpose that's to their benefit. But Katalyth exposure, and its known influence over emotion... it's not doing anything good to the local mindset. Their smaller barrier isn't quite as effective as Karteria's, and the amount of Katalyth in the region is immense. It's amazing that they're surviving at all, but also inevitable that the emotional leakage from the arcane mineral is leaving its mark on their minds. It deepens pre-existing paranoia, provides more angles for it, more reasons to be afraid. That said, it would still take a good amount of provocation for them to be hostile to outsiders. Katalyth is depressing; it provides more reason to believe in the inevitability of the end-times, and the apathy to do no more than continue toiling at their daily lives. So basically: always paranoid, Katalyth making it easier to find more justifications to be paranoid and pessimistic and a bit odd. |
| #80
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-07-03 |
Because I'm curious (so this is super low priority) would gold be useful for karterian tech? Gold is used irl in electronics because of its non-reactive properties, but in limited amounts because of its rarity/value | Gold does have its value in Karterian tech! It's valued in electronics (magical and otherwise) for those same properties as it is in real life. Same problems with scarcity too (even worse, over the years, as they can't exactly go out mining for it), keeping its value high. Recycling old electronics is ingrained in Karterian society- though things are generally built to last. (Planned obsolescence hadn't quite had the time to fully take hold of consumer culture before arcane radiation hit, so the quality of existing goods remains relatively high where it exists.) So basically: yes, it's useful, there's trace amounts of it in a lot of things. |
| #81
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-06-28 |
Hello! Popping back in to check in about what Science Cabin might learn next in their Katalyth studies. Bricks, Jayce, Pal and Viktor have all been working on a schedule to try to unravel its 'words' under the microscope. No big rush on this since June is event month, but if it's possible for them to make some progress by July... THANK YOU AGAIN |
Apologies for the wait, wanted to get through this properly.... Having delved so unwisely and so bravely into the Katalyth-language is bearing its unfortunate fruit. The line between something being 'magic' or simply 'magical' is a faint one, but the essence they've been studying lays within the former. It is a form of magic on a conceptual level, concentrated into a shape tangible and visible. It's both naturally-occurring and absolutely not. Whether it was ever intended to have a consciousness is difficult to say at this point, and its origin in the world is similarly unknown. But it would be possible to discern that something happened in the past to provoke it into spinning itself into being- something quite distant in time. Magical carbon-dating, in a way... as there's fragments in the language they're constructing that are old, things that it's been murmuring to itself for over a millennia. It is older than the crisis on Pathos, certainly. And yet its current rampant agitation is new, relatively speaking. It's been getting louder, and as a consequence, has been creating ever more Katalyth in the environment. Even so, the way it is building, replicating, composing itself is as 'natural' as anything like it can be. It's magic in some pure, cancerous form, writing its hopes and fears out in individual notes. And the more the science crew pieces together its 'language', the more patterns emerge that are quite like 'notes'. Studying it at this point will reveal sound amidst the language, as though it's being whispered out to them, its pronunciation carved directly into their brain. What exactly it sounds like is different for everyone, as if it is being personally translated, or otherwise filtered through a character's particular experiences. It can resonate with anything and everyone, but in so doing changes itself to be understood. Not in words, precisely- though the group might imagine phrases or lines that have meaning to them, though it's really an effect of it melding itself to them in a way they can understand. But it's melodic, haunting, dirge-like. While not traditionally 'catchy', it catches, and the scientists studying it will find that it lingers in their heads, no matter where they are (though it is far more muffled within the Karterian barrier, or near other devices made to filter out the radiation). They might hear it in places they shouldn't, its patterns played on the radio, or in birdsong, or in ambient conversation. As arcane radiation is everywhere, and they now know what it sounds like. Katalyth can't help but produce it, and it can't help but inflict itself on everything around it. It's emotion, twisted and miserable and alive, talking to itself in a language it created, trying to understand, to live. So Katalyth, all on its own accord, is constantly 'singing' this dirge, burning itself and spreading its hopes and its fears and inadvertently poisoning everyone who 'hears' it. This is why the Augmented feel miserable around it, to the point of hallucinating terrible things. Even if they can't quite hear it (apart from you all who have been deliberately tuning into it), its meaning is being conveyed all the same. Un-Augmented humans are ruined by it instead, torn apart by the weight of its terror and grief. The wildlife and native plants have adapted better to it, though they generally don't like hanging around large amounts of Katalyth either. But the language it speaks to them doesn't inflict quite the same despair. The Augmented, as an odd half-way point, have the protection that animals and plants do, while not being spared the emotional consequences (or the mutations, if they're being reckless...). (It is also quite possible that the wildlife of Pathos are inherently depressed. Not so much as to give up on living, or to drastically alter their behavior, but they might all be beset by a nagging sense of: what is it all for? But they, by and large, lack a developed language of their own to ponder this question. The emotional corruption is conveyed through their bodies instead, spurring them to mutate and develop into something different, something that might solve the crisis that they lack the words for. But the birds don't sing quite as sweetly as they used to. It would be a difficult thing for the Augmented to notice, being as they've never heard birds in the old days.) Also, if it weren't already apparent: the process of Katalyth giving off arcane radiation (casting its magic into the world, in sad notes at a time) also gives off energy. Quite a bit of energy, so if you have the means to capture it, it's a fantastic way to power almost anything. Trying to do so makes it replicate faster, so if it weren't for the whole... everything about it, it'd be a perfect fuel. Burning despair to generate electricity. So this is, generally speaking, the current consequence/reward for all that misery the science cabin has been putting themselves through. Earwormed (not literally) by Katalyth. It's an old problem that's getting worse very quickly, it is half-way conscious and becoming more so as it continues to write itself a meaning, brute-forcing it though endless attempts at it. It is possibly making the birds sad. |
| #82
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-06-28 |
This is horrifying (positive) thank you! And no worries on the wait, always take your time to cook. Follow-up question specific to Jayce and his Golem stuff: I'm working through how I want to complete his permanent corruption trait stuff and I often have him relying on his 'half-shift' (where he's fully encased in crystal but still Jayce-shaped) to lessen the emotional effects of being around the Katalyth. Could I potentially use the half-shift to temporarily muffle the earworm too, or do you prefer that his half-shift has no effect on this? |
Jayce's method of half-shifting to avoid the worst of the emotional damage would continue to work! (How could an earworm burrow through rock, anyway.) It's one of those nice Golem traits, to not have to feel much of anything. And as Katalyth is communicating through emotion... Jayce would effectively continue being partially deaf to it. |
| #83
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-06-17 |
Harry’s going to be vibing in the ruins, at the graveyard, trying to pick up some of the stories of the people who lived and left Aparallaxia with his psychic nonesense. And tell them to passerby whether they want to hear him or not. Might be an odd question but, do the mods have any stories in particular they’d like to be told here? Also, I’ve been wondering in general about genius loci, does this world have such a thing? And if so would it be willing to talk to an outsider? (I’m not even sure Harry himself would be ready to make that kind of connection yet but he is trying to become more intimate with this world and it's cultures.) |
Ahh apologies for the delay on this, the stories bit is taking a hot multiple seconds, but wanted to get this part out at least... For the genius loci, there isn't something quite like that. Not exactly... or not yet. Katalyth is very good at growing, at appearing. In addition to being miserable to be around, if looked closely at (really closely at, like under a microscope), it possesses a structure like nothing in nature. To be around it causes mutations, and Katalyth itself mutates... adapting to something without thought behind it, grasping at everything it can and changing it. It's endless, ceaseless, tireless, without focus or meaning- but within all of that, could it not ultimately hit upon something that can think back? So if there is a genius loci, it's a newborn. It is fragile as a thread, it is constantly being drowned out, suffocated and remade. But it may be piecing together something consciousness-shaped. It would be a difficult thing to talk to, as anything Harry might hit upon might not be 'alive' days later- or he could end up listening in to another part of its body, another facet that's also learning and dying, fumbling for meaning within the morass of terror and grief and growth that it's made out of. |
| #84
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-06-13 |
so on a totally different topic (food shortage instead of my other kelesis questions) hi it's me again <img src="https://media.tenor.com/tNKbpShxXYcAAAAC/its-me-hi-im-the-problem-its-me-taylor-swift.gif" class="imageshrink-actualsize"> i expect you've noticed gojo's farming and other charities project i've paused a couple of times to think to myself 'should i ask if this is permissible/plausible/feasible?' but no, gojo satoru asks no permission and honestly a single abandoned farmhouse and one old fruit tree would be enough to convince him that his plan is great. what he WILL ask for, though, is for somebody else to foot the bill. (do the folks at the augmented affairs office just feel a sense of dread whenever they see him coming?) since the City Council and other governmental officials are the ones who asked the Augmented for help with the food shortage, gojo will take his proposal to them. (especially anyone who knows that he's been doing good work hunting for Karteria, though if they've been delivered An Entire Dead Boar or two maybe that only increases their sense of dread.) anyway he's got volunteers for an augmented-run farm or two to help with the food shortage!! would the government like to help fund this effort? he even has Experienced Farmers ready to take the helm (he has *one* experienced farmer). they're going to need ... farming equipment. gojo has no idea what 'farming equipment' entails. but he will have his experienced farmers and the volunteer laborers follow up with specific requisition requests. |
There were once more farms around Karteria, more than the few clinging to survival at the edges of the barrier. Some of that land still belongs to the remaining farms, but has simply gone unused- being just too far out for them to do anything with. The ownership of the rest is muddled, with the prior farms having gone bust completely. The land is useless to Karterians, so there's no one interested in contesting the Augmented using it for now. The condition of the fields is... mixed. The pieces closest to the forest have already begun being reclaimed by it. The rest is grassy and damp (though not marshland), but there's nothing about it that seems unfertile, merely unmanaged. Nature is doing just fine without human involvement. Arcane radiation is the only thing preventing humanity from coming in and changing that. A good thing that the Augmented are resistant to it! There is the occasional charming (decaying) old farmhouse and those fruit trees that tell Gojo that this is a good idea. (Largely apple, pear, or plum- colder-weather fruits, or foreign equivalents. They're doing pretty well, actually, with a bit of friendly mutating.) The blackberry thickets are thriving a bit too hard. And it's... not an impossible idea, really. The Government will humor it; it keeps the Augmented occupied in ways that don't involve the destruction of public property. As for the request for 'farming equipment'... it would not be categorically denied, but there would be an insistence that Gojo's farming crew should reclaim what's already out there first. What is out there, lurking in those old decaying (charming) farmhouses? Bits and pieces. A lot of it is rusted, but it was built to endure so it might still be functional underneath. Most of the seed that was left behind has already been eaten by enterprising rodents, but there might be a smidge remaining. What isn't available could likely be borrowed by the few remaining farms. As there's already been some positive contact between them and the Augmented, they would probably be willing to loan out some extra tools. (As most of the remaining farms had to retract themselves, quite a few have more than they can use, amounts made for more fields, more orchards.) And as they're already familiar with supply chains within the city... working in greater concert with would-be Augmented farmers would increase their profit (which is what matters in the middle of an irradiated, mid-apocalyptic landscape; capitalism must endure). (That, and most people do not want to see Karteria starve. There's some few who are earnest and honest enough to recognize that getting help is more important than a few numis.) Should the Augmented productively produce a productive produce yield, however, it has been decreed that Patho-Gen MUST analyze it for safety reasons. The growing conditions beyond Karteria's little safe zones isn't clear to them, and they want to make sure no fruit or vegetables are carrying little bits of Katalyth for human consumption. Kind of like checking to ensure there isn't any pesticides riding with the veg, you know. So yes, Gojo may become a farmer. Farm cats are a staple, after all.... |
| #85
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-06-13 |
Being an curious old soul, Norimune would likely have tea with the Aparallaxia client and join her for tea and snacks afterwards. Yay! If he asks, what kind of stories would she's willing to tell about herself, the sentimental item(s) and her life/hometown? He doesn't mind whichever topic she tells, he'll listen to them. ... Also I'm morbidly curious and wanted to ask (even if Norimune won't do it). Is the squid edible? Assuming someone slice off a limb and get the idea. |
Enjoy that tea and those bonus snack cakes! While she would demur over discussing herself directly, she would be happy to talk about what life had been like in Aparallaxia. Living on a bridge had its quirks... she didn't know of anyone who drowned of falling accidentally into the sea (there are guardrails, of course, to protect against the clumsy or drunk). But there were a number of Childhood Tragedies, of a game being cut short because the ball was sent over the edge, into the ocean... or of some favored possession deliberately thrown into the waves by a rival. The sound of the water was constant, and soothing; she's one of the few who go to Water's Edge for the sake of the water, and who doesn't view the ocean with distrust or distaste. It's the only place in Karteria that reminds her anything of home. It's still not the same as being surrounded by it, but even when there were storms in Aparallaxia, when she watched the waves lash against its edges, against the pillars supporting the structure, she never felt unsafe. In Karteria, nothing feels safe. As for the squid... it is edible, after a fashion. Despite the Katalyth growing on parts of its body (don't eat those), the majority of its meat remains safe for consumption. It wouldn't taste exactly like what you'd expect... closer to a hybrid between squid and mammal, meatier in a disconcerting way. But there's nothing dangerous about it. |
| #86
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-06-12 |
Belated piggybacks off this chain; if Bricks were to tinker with the clicker device, try to open it up with tools and examine it the same way with the ServiTons what might he learn? | A lad here to tinker. There is very clearly a small chip laced with magic within. It's of the sort used for ServiTons: it contains that patented flavor of Karterian Controlling magic that they so love, because nothing beats forcing the world around them to behave. There is also a small capsule. It almost slaps of the Augmenter... but much smaller, nary a seam in sight. This will be risky to try to pry open, and it's otherwise a solid metal capsule. There is indeed a warning printed on the side: DO NOT PUNCTURE. And yet puncture or cutting seems to be the only way inside... We'll go ahead and detail what will happen if Brickston decides he wants to pry this capsule open. The safeguard: this capsule floods the air with a poisonous mist, enough to suffer temporary neurological effects that may last for a week to a month. (Local Reptilia-types and Golem-types will be immune to these effects!) If that's not enough, a small explosion takes place! Keep those fingers clear! All traces of the capsule and what is inside is destroyed. Unfortunately, there are very few ways to disarm this capsule; whoever designed this is clearly hiding something about its structure. There may be other ways to detect what lays beyond the shell of the capsule... If Brickston decides he will heed the warning and not puncture the capsule, and attempt other means of exploring this little doodad, there may be certain detection devices that could be made or accessed that would show a very slight reading of Katalyth, so microscopic that it's almost an error. Alas, if it's let to detonate, the ability to process a reading out of its dust will be very difficult to do. |
| #87
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-06-12 |
Hello my darling mods! Thank you for that info--yeah he's definitely only going to try that once and bail on the plan pretty quick. Won't take him long to make a new plan though~ The new plan: So he's taken up carrying a bow for the hunting prompt, and has made the effort to find (or make, if he has to) some sort of foam-tipped arrows, whatever will shoot safely and effectively into the city with a letter tied to it. (What kind of range does a foam arrow have? Glad you asked. An archer of Gojo's strength with a modern bow should have a maximum range of 350 yards--since we can only assume that a foam arrow with a letter tied to it is less aerodynamic, let's say 100 yards.) He intends to make like ... six copies of this letter and shoot it in the direction of Kelesis at slightly different angles in hopes of at least one copy reaching an interested party. Here's his letter: To the people and leaders of Kelesis, My name is Gojo Satoru. I am one of many kidnap victims recently brought to this world by the organization called Patho-Gen in Karteria. They have subjected us to experimentation and torture in the interests of developing a resistance to the substance they call Katalyth. With this resistance, they expect us to carry out work for them outside of their city. For this reason, they have sent us in hopes of re-establishing trade between Karteria and Kelesis. I can imagine, given the unethical treatment that we have received from Karteria, that perhaps you do not wish to re-establish communication with such people, and I imagine also that the reason your city is so inaccessible to us explorers is that you have defenses in place to keep strangers away. It is my hope that you might consider establishing a dialogue with us, those called 'Augmented' due to the experimental procedure that Patho-Gen forced upon us, as people unwillingly affiliated with Karteria. I do not speak for all the Augmented and I am no leader of them, though I have taken up a role to facilitate communications between the Augmented for other projects. I would gladly serve to facilitate communications in this, if any among you are willing to speak to us. If the inaccessibility of your city is something that has befallen you and not something that you've done intentionally, then we will do our best to provide assistance if possible. We are here outside your city, for now, and we have many abilities. If you need assistance, then send out some communication to us and we will try. Your hopeful ally, Gojo Satoru He draws a little sketch near the signature of himself with cat ears and a blindfold, giving a V-sign, captioning it: 'I look like this!' (Bonus content of him workshopping it with Mel.) Since this will be happening pretty late in the month anyway (getting to Eparsis, poking around Kelesis, formulating this plan, workshopping the plan), and Gojo expects that best case scenario (if there are people alive and coherent in Kelesis, if they want to communicate) the people / leaders of Kelesis will want to take a few days to consider before making any effort of communication, I don't expect to get any kind of prompt response from this (if there is any response at all), so feel free to put me off until next month. |
Gojo and Mel may author their letter, and Gojo may do his best to shoot it in the vague direction of Kelesis. ...Let's hope it doesn't hit anyone on the way in, yes? Even if it's foam, what a shocking way to get in touch! It'll take a day or two, as long as he's willing to stick around. But that response will eventually come—and though Gojo was the one who signed it, Mel is welcome to be treated to this message as well! Seems whoever the authorities are, they are aware of what's going on around their perimeter... There is no formal "letter" in return. However, there will be a response. It'll take one of the following forms:
Sorry. It has been long. Since we exchanged words with anyone. We will deliberate showing our city to you. Treat our citizens kindly." |
| #88
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-06-09 |
So this is separate from the event, sorry mods...but Eli and Childe were thinking about going to explore the northern part of Orexis, and their destination is Phantasia: <img src="https://images.plurk.com/1x8WR6bpCZsZ36vTaM1r6U.png"> Is it possible to reach there, and if so, what would characters expect to find (wildlife, monsters, notable buildings or things in the area?) |
Phantasia is a small settlement of... people, surprisingly. If characters explicitly ask Patho-Gen about Phantasia, they will sigh; the particular way they treat those who live in Phantasia is with the same sort of pity that they treat those who live in the outer city, in that many who live there are... defectors, of a sort. They hope they're doing alright, particularly since they've given them quite a bit of technology to live there as safely as they can. Karteria's government will treat them with the same sort of pity. As you know, the world at large has become unsafe for regular people to live in without the use of a barrier; on the island of Orexis, the only place safe for people to live in is Karteria. Phantasia... is somewhat the only second option that they know of. (How Doxa is- long ago this was a small settlement, but they haven't had any contact from anyone there since the barrier was erected.) Phantasia's resources were a monetary drain on Karteria, so the government hopes they're grateful for this overture of good will. So... why does Karteria insist on offering them any monetary support? Well, these people were of Karteria once... They don't offer much further explanation. Eli and Childe would find first the evidence of overgrown farmlands on their way to Phantasia. They can't be tilled, used, or relied upon anymore; they've been let to the wilderness for many years. There's signs of humans having existed there, that much is undeniable. But at first, it'll be incredibly hard to find anybody. As the further northwest they go, the more they'll find intense concentrations of Katalyth. We're talking entire manmade structures, sheds and old trucks, absolutely encased in Katalyth. It's enough to inspire unease and madness in even the Augmented Ones, with how much there is. (Some book reading back in Karteria might clarify why this is: Katalyth's first recorded incidence on Orexian soil is in the year 829, where it's documented on the northwestern shore. It'll require access to some of the archival files in the library, which can be very tedious; this might be the job for someone who is fastidious about reading and learning. ...There is very little else said about this, other than the marvel at this, as well as the unease it sparks in researchers- as well as documented notes about how they "must keep calm.") It's inhospitable. How could anyone live out here? At the base of Alexane's Range, tall spires as steep as the Southern Spires but far more massive- despite the fact that these peaks are similarly encrusted with sickly, multicolored iterations of Katalyth (ranging from the usual turquoite, to yellow, to violet)- is a small settlement. Its barrier is less transparent than Karteria's, a dome-like, shimmering veil over a city about 2 sq mi at most. Stout structures in poor condition, akin to shacks, stand against the test of time. Small farms are dispersed between buildings... and the amount of residents? It's a small population of about 500 people, which is miraculous! They are incredibly withdrawn, and are reluctant to acknowledge the Augmented Ones as anything other than a sign of the endtimes. They aren't hostile; they are stubborn people who are hardened by the direness of their circumstance, people who wake early and tend to what livestock and crops they have. Survival is their priority, while Karteria's people live in some semblance of comfort. But they're making it. If characters ask these settlers about Karteria, they will face them grimly. Do not trust the big city. They don't have any actual personal anecdotes to share, and most of them have never even been to Karteria! But their people have developed something of a doomsday-like mentality of the world, and feel convinced that anything Karteria does to combat it is only going to hasten the world's demise. Summoning these otherworldly Augmented Ones... Phantasians pity the Augmented, who have been yanked from across time and space against their will. This is a broken, unsalvageable world. This, their ancestors have told them. All of this nonsense about Controlling magic, about interdimensional reaching, about harnessing the world's resources for reckless development... This is mankind's own undoing! All they can do as this tiny settlement is live their small lives until the world ends, or until their barrier breaks. But yes, aside from some very grim peoples who live an extremely simple lifestyle, the landscape is ravaged by Katalyth. The local flora and fauna continue to grow, doing quite well! But in these highly concentrated areas of Katalyth, especially closer to the shoreline, animals and critters seem to have... evolved some special traits. Rabbits have sharp, predatory teeth, or may have even developed eyes on the front of their head rather than the sides (uncanny, strange, weird); cougars are faster, more inclined to forage for vegetation, alert and cautious to the approach of Augmented. Creatures are evolving and changing in strange and nonsensical ways, but they're thriving. Do Eli or Childe wish to report back to Patho-Gen about Phantasia's existence? While they are aware of them, they have had absolutely no contact with them and basically had to believe that their tech has been somehow holding up over all this time. They will be curious to know how they fare. |
| #89
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-06-06 |
alright mods... rubs my hands together... eleanor is going to try to psychically communicate with Da Squid Eleanor is able to peek into the minds of animals in canon, and the way it essentially works is inhabiting their point of view and their minds for the moment. So, even if it's not verbal communication, she should be able to understand it and get a general vibe of what's upsetting the poor thing. She won't connect for long (because it does tend to be a bit traumatic for the creature--though a squid might do better since it's more intelligent), but she's trying to see what has it so agitated and see if there's a way she can help. EDIT THE SECOND: Set (  redsoil) will also be helping her out here actually! Since he can speak with animals, they’ll just do a fun n’ flirty little mind meld to assist with that. Surely nothing bad could happen! (we both welcome bad things happening)And in case it's helpful, here's the snippet of her explanation about this process to give you an idea of how it works! below the cut! Salem ; I tried to touch minds with one of Lettie’s rats, once, just to see what would happen. Drifter ; Okay, I have to ask how that went. Salem ; It was a dreadful three seconds for him. Salem ; Poor little thing. I’d failed to allow for what touching MY mind would seem like to HIM, you see. Imagine a child lost in an infinite department store, screaming for its mother at the top of its lungs over and over. Everything was enormous and incomprehensible and had NOISES and SHAPES instead of SMELLS. Salem ; I broke the link as fast as I could. He was a little dizzy for an hour or so, then he was fine. I doubt he even remembers what happened to him. Drifter ; And your side of it? What was it like being a rat? Salem ; I don’t know if you’ve ever had the kind of slump where all you want to do is lie in bed and breathe in and out and just exist without doing anything else, but it was a lot like that. Salem ; Very basic. Simple needs met in simple ways. Salem ; Childhood innocence has nothing on rat-consciousness. Drifter ; Sounds kind of pleasant, the way you talk about it. Salem ; Oh, it was. I’m sure being a rat has its bad side, like having to eat your dead brother so the predators won’t sniff him out, but that fleeting moment of simplicity was like a religious breakthrough, almost. Salem ; I guess being a rat is a lot like being a monk. Live off scraps, make your humble way in the world, never own a car or a house. EDIT: and a secondary side question for a different prompt! I notice that the log says that the blood lake's waters are caustic, whereas this FAQ mentions that they're safe. Is the former more a rumor (or just find for Augmented because they're more resilient)? Or is it not actually safe for swimming? Edited 2025-06-05 12:11 pm (local)
|
One of the strangest things about the squid-mind is that it's not only intelligent, its thoughts are structured in a way that is eerily similar to that of a human. It's not identical, but it's close. Something cephalopodic has been fitted with it, merged to a degree that it would be hard to even consider them as separate entities... with the result a consciousness that is a hybrid of the two. So any trauma that comes about from being on wildly different levels of consciousness would be minimized- but it'll probably be overwhelming all the same. The squid might attempt to use human language, on connection with Elanor's mind- but it's likely to broken speech, reflective of questions, and relying on impressions of its emotional state to get its meaning across. It can't properly ask who she and Set are, or what they are, or express the pain it's in (even though it's survived Katalyth growing on it, it's not a comfortable experience). Frustration will flavor its attempts, a despair over its own clumsiness, but it will genuinely try to hold a conversation of sorts with Elanor and Set. It will deliver impressions of 'WHO' and 'WHY'. There's a lot of imagery in its head, flashes of the Augmented who've been around this portion of the bridge, paired with more repetitions of the same feeling of curiosity. As for bad things happening: this might be very uncomfortable for all parties involved! The squid doesn't know how to think softly, to emote gently. In its desperation for company and this hint of someone talking back in a way that it understands, it might scream that much louder. All of this is likely to induce more migraines, even temporary blindness, deafness. It's not trying to hurt them... it's just excited, and trying to understand. Between its questions are visions of deep water, of emptiness. You all are the first non-fish it's seen in years. (There are some other impressions it provides of non-Augmented humans, not on the bridge, but on streets and in cars. In homes, in offices, in labs underneath bright lights and sharp knives. ...And beyond that, a city, bustling with life. It looks a lot like Karteria.) And that's a good catch about the Blood Lake, as some information has diverged accidentally over time... the locations page will be updated to clarify this, but: Blood Lake itself (red) is uncomfortable to swim in. It's somewhat caustic, but not outright dangerous. It's just... very salt. Around it are pink lakes, which are safe, if not necessarily as medicinal as rumor would have it. They can be swam in freely. They are very nice to swim in! |
| #90
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-06-06 |
hello mods! thank you so much for this exciting event, and i have some questions :' since the big squid is presumably going to sustain some damage during various people fighting it, could I assume that there will be katalyth-contaminated??? bits and pieces in the area of battle? secondly, i know it says direct contact will bring unpleasant results (not that even indirect but close proximity to it is any better), but harrow does have in her arsenal the ability to create perpetual/regenerating bone - this is obviously going to take all her energy to maintain and she is definitely going to be doing some edgy bleeding out of her pores etc with the exertion, but could she potentially contain a sample of katalyth and take it to a different location to study it? option two to the second: if the first attempt fails then she will try to just encase it in many many layers of bones and roll it along like a snowball. will that work?? thank you so much again! |
That is very likely, that if bits of the squid are severed, or parts of its Katalyth-growths otherwise knocked off, that those parts would fall onto the bridge. What a hazard... good thing Harrow is there on cleanup duty. To gather it up in bones, it would be sort of like containing it in a thick glass jar... in that it would still give off radiation, and it would still provoke feelings of distress and unhappiness to be around it, but it would be 'portable'. It would also look much cooler to be surrounded by bone. And given a long enough time in contact with it (days to weeks, so it doesn't sound like it's necessarily possible, if she has to bleed out to maintain it the whole time, but for reference's sake:) the Katalyth might attempt to... attach to it. So both of her options would work, in that they would let her move Katalyth pieces elsewhere without directly touching it herself. It will be unpleasant but possible! As for the bones found from Asphodel Fields, she should certainly be able to glean some details. For that one in particular, the remains were of someone in their 40s-50s, probably female, and with signs of long-term illness, something that pre-dated whatever caused it to mutate. While it was never cured of it, it was made to persist for far longer than it should have; the bones have a history of someone miserable and anxious, that was terrified of living and dying in equal measure. addendum: because i missed the may TDM shenanigans ... the bodies found in the asphodel fields are said to have no evidence of souls. is there anything that harrow would be able to find out from them were she try to "read" the bone remains that momo has retrieved? for example, rough age, sex, any other physiological identifiable details ... thank you so much and sorry about how many times ive mentioned bones in these questions! |
| #91
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-06-05 |
Hello! Since Lilias is finally getting to the point where she's prepared to bind a new familiar from the local wildlife, I wanted to be clear on a couple things going forward. First, is she doing to have to sneak it into establishments in her pocket if she wants to take it inside with her? When I initially asked about familiars, I was told that service animals don't exist in Karteria, but later on I saw a reply to someone else's question that indicated they do exist, but are simply uncommon compared to service bots. Second, will she be able to take it with her when she leaves the city's barrier? It seems like other animals are fine out there, so I'm not entirely clear on where the line is drawn wrt creatures who are vulnerable to katalyth (local humans) and the ones that are not (animals, plants, humanoid monsters like spectrals). |
Ack! A good catch. Neither of us noticed that detail slip-up re: service animals; we'd intended for it to be largely ServiTons, but things happen. Thus, service animals may now exist, though uncommon. We apologize for the miscommunication on this point. Moving forward with this assumption that service animals may exist in small amounts: it still remains that most establishments turn their noses up at animals being indoors. Dogs are going to be the most accepted sort of service animal, and we see this following Karterian cultural custom with their handle over Controlling magics (basically just a spell they use to control beasts other than humans). We're willing to say that you're free to play with this whenever it's most fun for you to; if you'd rather she be able to bring a familiar into a place without too much hassle, then whichever Karterian is present is simply more tolerant. If you want someone to raise a stink, they can be a particularly strict sort who has a beef with Animals Indoors. Regarding animals being able to be beyond the barrier: this is absolutely correct, in that most all animals can go beyond the barrier with fewer consequences than humans! Of course, we have a great example of what happens when animals remain in extremely close proximity with Katalyth for too long: they have a higher risk of mutating, though it's not of any sort that is lethal. Otherwise, say Lilias had a rat familiar. That rat could join her most anywhere beyond the barrier without consequence, more than any human could. Primarily, characters will find that the only sorts of creatures that are vulnerable in an injurious sense to Katalyth are: humans, and only humans. Interesting, that... I hope that helps, and apologies again for the hiccup on details. Thank you for bringing it to our attention! |
| #92
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-06-03 |
hello mods, i have a question that i was chewing on for a bit now due to it coming up in conversation that's pertaining more to the city itself: is it possible that the sewers have a set of hidden passages and the like? because i was considering having texas head down there eventually to look around after the idea got planted in her head while searching for the missing people. if there is, would it be possible for them to find these hidden passages and discover where they might lead to? |
Is there a difference between a hidden passage and a merely forgotten one, places tucked away and badly noted down (if they were noted at all) in the blueprints? Because there's certainly places like that down there, access-ways that have never seen much accessing, lost in favor of ones more convenient. Now, nothing is particularly convenient for the Karterians, as going too far beneath the city is the same as going outside it in terms of protection from arcane radiation. So it'd be possible to go down there and look around, find moldering supply closets and a water system that badly needs maintenance. An underground network of passages of varying levels of passibility, connecting the far corners of the city in somewhat inconvenient ways. |
| #93
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-06-02 |
hi sooo if someone were to go bug-hunting in the swamp, would they find just regular ol' swamp-bugs like we have in the real world, or are the bugs Different?? I've been going with the assumption all the bugs are basically the same but figured i should ask since Helaena...loves bugs....and catching them.... | It would probably be a mix! Familiar bug, unusual bug... not even necessarily unnaturally mutated bug, but just the result of evolution taking some of the bugs in different directions. Of course, there are the occasional ones that seem to have been mutated by arcane radiation, given that their developments are more... haphazard. Dragonflies with extra sets of wings, mosquitos with far too many mouthparts, water striders grown too heavy to stride. Most of the nonfunctional ones are just eaten by something else in the wetlands, but some of the developments might be advantageous, or at least not too much of a hindrance. A toxicity that makes them repulsive to the ambient amphibians and birds, or appendages that mimic the local snakes... nature is beautiful. So really, she can find a combination of familiar, similar-but-localized, bizarrely-mutated, and mixes of all of those.... |
| #94
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-05-31 |
Did Patho-Gen or the City of Karteria happen to keep the remains of the sea monster (or any sea monster they might of came across?) If so, is it accessible to player characters to see? Also thank you for the response on this stuff mods, it's always appreciated :) |
A few pieces of the sea monster are on display in a natural history museum in the Northeast of Belle Ville! They also have helpful infographics on what it presumably looked like when it was alive, with little human figures for scale. It was big. The skull and a section of its spine are what were preserved, and continue to menace small children. The museum is open to the public, with a modest entrance fee. The museum also has a collection of other watery finds, though nothing to the scale of that particular monster. The nautical wing of the museum focuses on the dangers of the ocean, and it's hard to tell how much of it is dramatized.... But it does present some sort of overview of the history of Karteria's relationship with the sea. The fish that used to be found there, the pollution of the harbor and the cleaning of it, and so on. It all hasn't been updated in some time, with arcane radiation still written as having a 'new and poorly-understood' impact on the natural environment. |
| #95
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-05-29 |
As any party wizard should, Gale continues to go around basically casting Detect Magic all over the place. This time, he's curious about what kind of magic is at work with the barriers, how they're able to keep the arcane radiation out, and why Katalyth doesn't grow inside them. |
The barriers operate on the same logic (as it is the same magic) as the rest of what Karterians use in their daily lives- only more so. It's dense, absolutely thick with orders, and similar in strength to the amount of energy large deposits of Katalyth give off. Given the amount of arcane radiation in the environment, it presumably takes a lot to power a defense against it. There are a number of pillars around the border of Karteria, and the heaviness of the magic involved is naturally at its highest around them, as these pillars piece the barrier together. Almost half of them are technically redundant, as a failsafe. The direction of the magic's orderliness is that of "restriction". That is, a restricting of what is passing through its net, which in this case is the form of energy that is arcane radiation. It controls its passage, by refusing it entry. For the most part.... Trace contamination exists, as even densely-organized spellcraft isn't precise enough to deny every whisper of it. Katalyth can't grow on the barrier, because... that would be the antithesis of its function, the opposite of the order it's imposing. Any attempt of a deposit forming would be torn apart and dispersed. |
| #96
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-05-27 |
Question specific to my guy's weird brand of psychic business. Harry is trying to become more in tune with this world and its people. Back home he was connected to the living spirit of his world and was able to communicate with the genius loci of his city. He’s a big sensitive radio antenna for vibes and thoughts of the consciousnesses of others, and in Elysium this extends into being able to see the nature of the apocalypse and other things that can potentially happen in the future. (Though I’d say his abilities lean towards herald of the apocalypse and other acts of violence. Off the top of my head he doesn’t foresee a single Good thing. Would he start picking up on what apocalypse via katalyth is going to look like? Is he getting any juicy details? |
And Harry can continue seeing Nothing Good... it is also accelerating rapidly. The tipping point was years ago- not decades, but hundreds. The world in its current shape has only moments left. The end is... lush. It's too lush, ceaselessly and mindlessly voracious, a canopy of limbs and stems grasping outward. Underneath its sun-blocking boughs all else decays, but is denied rest. The ground heaves, stares, and reaches inward. The old world has turned over in its sleep, and drowned the rest, the carcass of its body torn asunder. Life persists, but it's unrecognizable, screaming and starved. |
| #97
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-05-26 |
Oh my god these are all so juicy thanks y'all 👀 i think this gives me some nice little ideas to start running with and start moving in certain directions (sorry......... I'm sure I'll be scooting over to the mod contact at some point soon with a concrete plan / trajectory for y'all) I'm sure the local crime lord won't attempt to do anything irresponsible!!! RE: The underground subway network — are there ways to find out how it has been sealed off? Are there key-holders? Hidden entrances or welded-shut areas where they could be uh... looked into? Especially for |
We trust you, Silco... The existence of the abandoned subway is no secret, and the general consensus (and the more direct consensus, if he hits on talking to someone who actually worked on it) is that some progress had been made on stations within Water's Edge and Gloria. The one in Water's Edge is the harder to get to, with multiple welded-shut doors, and warnings against trespassing, and also warning of arcane radiation (less effective a deterrent, perhaps, than all the welded-shut doors). If he does manage to burrow past all of that without getting caught, the reward is... well, it's primitive. Apart from the beginnings of a hollowed out tunnel, there's not much there. Some abandoned tools. It's also rather humid down there, and plants/fungi capable of thriving in moist, dark conditions are doing well. Gloria's station made it fairly far into development. The above-ground portion is merely boarded up and abandoned, with warnings against arcane radiation (and fines for trespassing again) serving to keep away the locals. No one really 'sees' the station these days, it's just that building no one's been in for years, gradually falling apart with no one responsible for maintaining it. The locals just walk by, a landmark to something that never happened. Once you get past all that, and into the underground... it's actually quite lovely. Something along the lines of these images, though dirtier, and more filled with trash (more abandoned tools, and general human litter, lots of dead insects and rodents). Cleaned up, it would look something like that. Though there's also some sections of tunnel that reach towards one another, the two stations never had a chance to meet. |
| #98
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-05-22 |
i close my eyes im sorry mods, here i am with a piggyback on this question which is yes, the most predictable questions one could have... Since I'm cooking an idea (sorry...) and want to make sure I go in the right direction with things... I just have a few questions! 1) Only tangentially related to the medical question — what's the drug scene like in Karteria? 2) For the alternative medicines in the Lower-Class Areas. As they are fairly effective, what sorts of individuals/types of people are dealing in them? Does it seem to be a concentration of more... organized groups that distribute them? Or are they mostly small individual operations, that say, are smuggling them out of whatever places Patho-Gen is manufacturing them in? EDIT: and because I just thought of something / I close my eyes What does the underground of Karteria look like? Transport tunnels? Just sewers? Is it accessible? Edited (Wait I thought of something!!!) 2025-05-20 04:49 am (local)
|
1) Recreational use of drugs remains illegal, but that doesn't mean they're not popular. That popularity has only increased in the past decades, coinciding with the declining health and morale of the population. Everyone is generally feeling bleaker, sicker, drawing in those who might otherwise not have been interested. It's a thriving business opportunity! 2) Illegal distributions are on an individual level, with some family-run enterprises. Some are loosely aligned with one another, in the sense of mutual avoidance and non-interference. Attempts to unify into some manner of organized, broader-reaching syndicate have thus far failed- as anyone who's tried has naturally thought to set themself at the top of it, but has lacked both the resources and the charisma to stay there. There's persistent rumors that it's Patho-Gen themselves who are responsible for the smuggling, if not the direct distribution. There's other rumors that suggest that they're the reason why there's been no successful banding together of the local criminal types- that they've been sabotaging any attempt towards organization. Whether it's true or not, anyone who tries to organize sees their drug supply soon cut off, stolen, or otherwise tainted. Bonus) There is an extensive sewer structure. It is not particularly well-maintained, with sections of it having not been updated in 50-70 years. This has led to significant waste due to leaky pipes, and the city is not that far off from it breaking catastrophically. Fixing it would be very expensive though, and no one in government wants to be on the hook for that. There are also transport tunnels in addition to the sewers, with some points of connection between them. They are also not in great shape, are dirty, unsafe- to the point where few people even attempt to live down there, despite the housing shortage. The deeper beneath the city you go, the more arcane radiation has its effect... as the Karterian barrier doesn't extend down all that far. One more reason for maintenance to be tricky! There's also some abandoned beginnings of what had been intended as an underground subway network, to further supplement the above-ground tram network. The project was put on hold a few years before arcane radiation effectively closed Karteria's borders, and was canceled entirely a few years later. The primary culprit is considered to be a lack of resources, and some issues with ground stability and flooding. A couple of partial-stations and unused tunnels remain as hollows underneath the city, but their entrances have been (supposedly) sealed off. |
| #99
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-05-22 |
Hey hey, question about world-related stuff that's available in libraries, specifically: 1. Stuff about what happens to an un-Augmented body with arcane radiation poisoning, whether in actual medical texts or like, archived periodicals that might have been made available to the public. Essentially, if Palamedes wants to find stuff about/from when the Katalyth's downfall era was in full swing, could he? Or is that stuff restricted... 2. Related, stuff about Peacock! Is there published information about Peacock's life and so on, etc. 3. Legends, fairy tales, mythology type stuff. Specifically involving magic and its origins, but he'll take anything. He will also take just regular ol' scientific studies of how magic got here or was developed. |
1. There would be some general information available to the public. Periodicals from the start of the crisis are more towards the sensationalized and not necessarily accurate- and are focused more on blaming Lupê for the situation. It's not talked about much in the newspapers these days, as with arcane radiation being here to stay, it's neither new nor sensational. The actual books are more helpful, and there's been multiple attempts to tackle the subject. Medical literature wouldn't be restricted, and might be the most useful- describing the symptoms (both visible and emotional) of someone falling ill from arcane radiation. Information on treating it is sadly limited- as beyond keeping a sick person inside the Karterian barrier, and palliative treatment to try and relieve pain, there doesn't seem to be anything science can do to save them. There's some books that focus on the human toll, collecting interviews with people who've survived bouts of contamination, along with those who've watched loved ones die to it. 2. There are multiple books about Peacock! Many of them are in the children's section, colorfully dramatized 'accounts' of her life and her valiant work to save Karteria. There are also some books for adults, less colorfully dramatized- and which largely amount to saying the same things, but with larger words. It's all very superficial, sanitized, and heroic. She was a lovely person who (unfortunately) developed some bird traits due to the Augmentation process, but did so for the sake of the city. Everyone loves Peacock. 3. Mythology isn't a very popular subject in Karteria- as with society's self-perception of being rational, evidence-based... the practice of coming up with stories to explain phenomena is scorned. (Which isn't to say that Karterians don't love fiction, don't love fantasy or sci-fi... but no one goes into those books expecting a true story! The division between reality and fiction is kept sharply divided.) Books on magic exist, though there's not much about its 'origin'- only that it's been around as long as humanity has, and there's not even any hard date on that. Magic is seen as normal and unexciting, though most Karterians have only a marginal personal talent for it. It's usually referred to as 'Controlling', and a fair amount of the 'literature' that exists on it is in magazine form, and has to do with training pets. The only more recent development in magic has been utilizing it in electronics- that the process of controlling could be applied to less organic things, cutting it into circuitry in order to tell it to do specific tasks. It still requires an outside source of energy to function, the magic providing instruction without power. Katalyth had been perfect to use in conjunction with Karterian magic, but it's unfortunately not an option any more. |
| #100
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-05-18 |
Hellooo- Ala, Set, and Mettaton are exploring north of Karteria (eg route 2 from here and continuing along the coast) this month, primarily having Ala transform into a dragon to fly them over the land without having to trudge through the terrain proper 1) Ala's trying to keep out of the katalyth's reach by flying as high as she can above them so they don't affect her as much, with the downside of the higher altitude = cold = the penchant to fall asleep midair, along with her inability to maintain the form for an extended period of time regardless. Will she have an easier time going the coastal route or flying over the water, suggesting there are less katalyth out at sea, or are mostly embedded on the sea floor far underwater, or are there outcroppings of tiny islands on the surface/???maybe katalyth floats, idk 2) Ala's also looking for the oxalis plant, but really any sort of weed with bright yellow flowers that ideally taste sour when you chew on the stems but she's not picky and if they end up being toxic (whether due to katalyth or not) I'm sorry bc she's bringing them back to the Fillanthropy to be used in salads and stuff, sorry. Are there edible plants out here? whether there are animals they can spot out here eating the plants with no apparent/immediate ill effect, or if Ala & co. taste test on the field 3) Does communication via syntrofos break down or weaken the further they are from Karteria, and if yes then to what extent? better/worse over the open grassland vs over the ocean vs up higher in the mountains? 4) Unrelated to the exploration questions above, but if Ala sees people asleep/unconscious on the streets (either pcs or npc citizens from, for example, some aberrant spectral-type power draining people's lifeforce) how easy would it be to transfer numis from syntrofos to syntrofos... just skimming a little off the top instead of draining their entire bank account... you know... Syntrofos unlocks in the possession of their owner but does that person have to be conscious |
1. In terms of Katalyth, sticking to the coastal route will probably be easier (maybe the battering of the waves pulls the deposits out to sea?). Flying too far out is still not recommended, as weather conditions can change rapidly, and the winds are likely to buffet her down into the ocean. But sticking close to the shoreline should be safe. 2. If not that precise plant, Ala could find some similar local equivalent- something brightly yellow with a sharp taste. There's some more information here on some of the kinds of plants and critters that might be around. 3. The Syntrofos signal is surprisingly robust. However it's operating, it seems to function entirely well in the wilderness, even far from Karteria. It seems to have some issues with extreme temperatures (such as cold), and it certainly does not like being underwater, but these seem to be problems with the device itself rather than the signal. Elevations and forest coverage otherwise don't seem to influence it. 4. Oh dear... yes, it might be possible for her to drain (modestly or otherwise) the accounts of those she catches napping. The Syntrofos does not care if its owner is unconscious. There will be a data trail left behind though, so she is likely to be caught doing this if enough NPCs check their accounts and notice some mysterious transfers. She would be arrested and the amounts taken returned with penalty, and she would also face some amount of community service (along with preparing a presentation that explains that she understands what she did was wrong, and won't do it again). (Draining Augmented accounts... Should the victim notice and complain, the amount will be pulled back out of her account and returned to its owner, but she's not likely to face more (official) recompense than that. This is a problem between monsters.) |
| #101
Topics: Edit question: edit
Answer date: 2025-05-18 |
Hey mods! By the end of May, Pom will have spent the better part of his two months in Karteria carefully mapping out this area here by hand, making some general notes (i.e. marking with symbols) where points of interest are! He's had to do some mapping as a hunter and turns into a pretty fast dog monster that can cover a lot of ground when he wants to, but even he's been leery about trying to go across anything mountainous, hence that border at the top. Aside from natural features, he'd mostly mark plants and rocks for himself, as well as tracks and nests/dens of certain wildlife. He's kind of trying to make himself the apex predator out there, taking anything mutated to the Science Team Field Lab while collecting and trapping things for himself, keeping tabs on the local flora and fauna population and mutations, etc. Just checking to make sure there aren't any other points of interest he'd come across in that space that aren't listed on the Locations page! A hole to the abyss, a magic tower made of glitter, the skeleton of a gargantuan land shark, anything super obvious or that would catch his eye (or nose, rather) if it's out there. He said he'd actually help mark Katalyth deposits for the Science Team, so he's being helpful this time around, promise promise. Edit: Oh, also! He's been doing a lot of this map-making on his lonesome, so if there are any effects from the arcane radiation that he'd have been safer from if he'd brought a friend like literally everyone has been trying to get him to do, hit me with them! Edited 2025-05-17 08:19 pm (local)
|
Thank you for all your efforts Pom, making the woods a safter place for everyone. There shouldn't be anything too notable in that section of map (nothing that hasn't already been mentioned here or here). More interesting, perhaps, is that Pom has made himself into a very peculiar experiment. The Augmented are, by and large, immune to the fatal ills of arcane radiation, even if they can't survive direct contact with Katalyth itself. But what happens if an Augmented spends a considerable amount of time outside the Karterian barrier, and all on his lonesome, unbolstered by the protection of another Augmented (imprinted or otherwise).... Bits of his corruption might take on stranger casts. Anything permanently expressed might continue to grow and twist in dimensions. Teeth splitting open to reveal more teeth, growing extra claws or fingers in places that should have neither, fur splitting into winding tendrils, etc. His body may struggle to keep up with all this- as it may also be continuously attempting to shed all this broken, non-functioning material and regrow it properly. His corruption is refusing to settle, in any case, as it struggles to adapt to this excessive amount of arcane radiation he's battering himself with. If he takes better care of himself (i.e., spends more time with other Augmented when he's outside), it should start clearing up. You're free to distort him as much or as little as you'd like, and if you'd like to keep his figure from veering far into twisted body horror zone, you're free to do this as well. Nonetheless, being exposed to Katalyth will expedite his Corruption, even if it doesn't cause him to exhibit extra Exciting Traits. |
