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westwhere2022-07-18 05:54 pm
groundrules) wrote in westwhere2022-07-18 05:54 pm
Entry tags:
- 2ha: chu wanning,
- asoiaf: daenerys targaryen,
- baldur's gate: astarion,
- harry potter: hermione granger,
- kingdom of the wicked: wrath,
- legend of fei: xie yun,
- mo dao zu shi: xiao xingchen,
- oh! my emperor: beitang moran,
- oh! my emperor: su xunxian,
- star trek: jim kirk (aos),
- star trek: leonard mccoy (aos),
- star trek: spock,
- star trek: una,
- storm at sea,
- tian guan ci fu: xie lian,
- umbrella academy: diego,
- umbrella academy: five,
- untamed: lan sizhui,
- warcraft: anduin wrynn,
- warcraft: wrathion,
- word of honor: zhou zishu
storm at sea | part ii
Thar she blows — part II of the Storm at Sea travel arc, lasting until 5 August.
SUMMARY: as allied pirate ships Pariah and Queen Zanyra sail onwards, mad captain Quicksilver Sam uses the artefact of the Dawn’s Reach Trade Company to call out to the notorious power of the haunted Crossing seas. He craves retribution from the crew of his former, drowned ship, the Storm at Sea — which rises up along other sunken vessels, all manned by undead sailors. With them is a vicious kraken. They attack, seeking Quicksilver Sam’s relic. So should you. Some characters dragged underwater reach a deserted dimension where time behaves aberrantly. To survive the two-three-day skirmish, keep your ship afloat and moving, hijack a few other vessels, fend off the undead and kraken, capture Quicksilver’s artefact — and breathe.
SAFE AT WA(TE)R
Quicksilver Sam’s Pariah continues into the black waters of the Crossing seas, escorted by ally Caladan Kreil’s Queen Zanyra and distantly pursued by Maximilian Hawk’s Concord of the Dawn’s Reach Trade Company. Characters can cross between the Queen Zanyra and Pariah by rowboat, until great storms darken the skies. Afterwards, reckless fools can risk their necks in the growling winds and drumming rains and traverse the rattling, thick chain that binds the two ships.
Quicksilver Sam joins the deck of the Pariah with a small box he opens to reveal a cut-out, impeccably preserved and warded human tongue. Once unwarded, the artefact seems to intensify the storms, while Quicksilver shouts out:
”Two years be, when the seas, them… they… broke’n’sundered and… was then. Then, when all of you! All of… all of you dead under the briny deep, you watched, and you plotted, and you… was then! We all broke bread under the black flag, and we were brothers… brothers of the Storm at Sea. Was enough coin in the coffer for everyone, but you, you had the greed in you, thicker than blood of our covenant, or water of any womb! You turned! You put me out to die, and now, look where you are? You lily-livered scurvies, you wake up now, look around you! You put me to sea? Left me to die? Samuel Vane, you thought me, I was for drowning? You look me in the eye, and you tell me so again, because I’m here for you! I’ll be ruin for you, Storm at Sea, I’ll cleave you!”
- ■ The tongue artefact summons up dozens of sunken ships from the Crossing, which take under an hour to fully emerge. They are manned by reanimated sailors — many whom you may have encountered as cored bodies underwater.
■ The Storm at Sea also rises, staffed by Quicksilver Sam’s now revenant crew. The vessel spearheads the undead offensive and approaches the Pariah — leaving her within reach for infiltration. Wei Wuxian will report back after engaging undead first mate Augustus Silvering.
■ The tongue relic also calls up an immense kraken, whose tentacles can be recognised as the ‘coral’ strings that had bound the sunken ships. The kraken is neither living nor dead and composed of the coagulated dark water that characters have previously encountered. Kraken meat is comestible but not seafood. It unexpectedly tastes of succulent white fish, best paired with a Sauvignon blanc and served generously with lemon, rosemary and dill. Do not overcook on the bonfire of your sinking ship.
■ You may end up locked inside cabins or brigs, whether ‘for your safety’ or at the first sign of insubordination against the on-edge captains.
■ You’re in danger as long as you remain within the Crossing seas. To steer the boats, take occasional shifts from exhausted pirates and learn to helm your vessel with navigational help from your companions.
■ (Wisps of) agitated spirits linger in the Crossing — some maliciously seek to push you overboard, while others protect you. Most are petrified. These remaining spirits are more akin to afterthoughts of emotion, which you can calm down, exorcise or ignore.
NAIL’EM TO THE MAST
When you can’t beat’em, try again with a torch, a harpoon and a better attitude:
- ■ The kraken and undead violently attempt to reach the tongue artefact and sink the Pariah, Queen Zanyra and nearby Concord. Your enemies have hardened skins that require extra hacking, but regular weapons still work. Fire is especially efficient.
■ The kraken slams and sweeps its tentacles across the deck to drag ships underwater — do use cannons and primitive explosives.
■ The undead mount rowboats or swim to climb onboard. Fortunately, the storms impede your attackers, earning you respite between fresh assaults. Assume one-two hours' rest between attacks.
■ Extensively touching the living kraken tentacles slowly depletes your stamina and/or magical strength.
■ Consider taking Viktor’s steampunk boat and setting up primitive dynamite to sink these ships before their undead crew can reach you. Beware the storms.
■ You can infiltrate undead ships at any point, but can only commandeer one if you group up to man it.
■ Use diving suits that let you breathe four hours underwater and light up white for alert, red for danger, yellow for the urgent need to return on land and green-blue otherwise.
■ Bad news for the Pariah: on top of the undead, the kraken and the mad pirate, you are dealing with the incensed Hawk and Caladan Kreil, both whom send men to stop Quicksilver Sam’s summons at all costs.
■ Magical communicators are prone to glitches or disruptions amid poor weather conditions.
■ A school of mermaids is drawn to the kraken and the Pariah — warn them off with lights or lure them away with baits of food or blood. Speaking with them reveals they want Quicksilver’s artefact.
■ Those wishing to avoid violence can head to the more distant Concord by rowboat, under a white flag. Maximilian Hawk believes you are refugees aboard the Pariah and Queen Zanyra and will offer sanctuary. The sleek, highly disciplined and martial Concord faces significantly less attack, and you can spend a more peaceful time below deck. Alternatively, pair up to persuade the crew to give up chasing the Pariah, and convince Hawk and first mate Lattimore the ‘ancient power’ pursued by the Dawn’s Reach Trade Company should arguably never be found.
STICKY FINGERS
Moments after his speech, a rattled Quicksilver Sam retreats with the tongue relic in his heavily guarded and magically warded cabin.
- ■ Group up to capture the tongue with minimal damage to ship and crew. Ideally, some characters can distract the guards or attempt to lure Quicksilver out.
■ Helpful tips: despite his questionable sanity, Quicksilver Sam has shown high regard for manners, women and his ship. The pirate guards are loyal, but skittish before the supernatural.
■ During the diversion, lift the wards or forcibly infiltrate the cabin by breaking the door in. Careful, as Quicksilver appears to have purchased a Taravast special — a small caged white owl, which paralyses in place those who meet her gaze. Someone should distract the bird or cover her cage to break her trance.
■ Everyone can hunt, but Five and Wrathion get final joint custody of the tongue. They have decided to ward and box it. This will see the kraken and sinking ships gradually lose power, then submerge within two days. The tongue stays with the duo. Given Kirk’s previous reveal, the group could choose to trade the tongue in with Maximilian Hawk and the Dawn’s Reach Trade Company.
■ If the tongue is ever brought near the heart possessed by Kaneki Ken, the two artefacts will briefly thrum in synchrony.
THE STRANDING
Some characters captured by the kraken’s tentacles and pulled underwater lose consciousness, only to mentally wake up in the dimension of a perfectly silent, deserted and seemingly interminable beach island.
- ■ Characters experience time differently here, shifting between younger and older states every few hours. Up to you whether these changes are mental, physical or both, and whether your character is aware this isn’t their natural form.
■ Several mute, humanoid tar figures roam aimlessly. They largely ignore newcomers, but peacefully stop them from entering the dark sea waters.
■ The island sky is despairingly grey. There are no animals or plants.
■ Characters find they lose more of their memories, the longer they linger — particularly if they start to be politely but incessantly followed by tar figures, which gradually assume their form.
■ You can occasionally find human footsteps and writing in wet beach sand. The writing spells out children’s limericks.
■ Time passes differently on the island — dealer’s choice whether faster or slower than in the real world for your character.
■ Characters can wake up into the real world, if their bodies are rescued from where they’ve sunken underwater, remaining alive for up to two days in the vicinity of the kraken.
■ Characters may initially experience light amnesia and a sense of listlessness and estrangement from their bodies, once they have left the island dimension. This dissipates within a day’s time.
■ You can only reach the island once. Characters can be brought underwater by the kraken without entering the beach dimension.
NPC CONTACT
no subject
"What?" He immediately comes over to get a closer look at the... at the tongue that he's just holding like it's nothing. All this time he's been expecting a mirror, not an organ. "...You're sure? That's what did this?"
no subject
Something hits Wrathion on the back of his head.
He hisses, vanishes in a puff of smoke and reappears a short distance away as Vane picks up the warded box to swing it at Five.
"We need to destroy this thing. Fire may work, but I'll need time."
He was the distraction last time, can they continue taking it in turns?
no subject
"No—," Vane looks up at the same time Wrathion speaks, and Five elbows him in the eye, which finally gives him enough leverage to pull the box free. "Are you insane? You can't destroy it. You don't know what it'll do."
no subject
Determined on his plan, Wrathion vanishes and re-appears back just outside the cabin.
"This is far too dangerous to keep!"
So, obviously, he's going to do something about it.
no subject
"Wrathion. Listen to me." He attempts a placating tone, but he’s fighting not to keep his eyes glued to the tongue in his hand. If Wrathion tries to destroy it, or throw it overboard, he's prepared to stop him by whatever means necessary. "I know what I'm talking about, alright? Bad shit happens when you destroy powerful objects around here. We can’t take that risk.”
no subject
He is, however, ready to at a moments notice.
"You sound like you speak from experience."
His own experience runs the other direction -- things left buried come back to haunt you. If Five does have decent evidence that destroying this could be worse, however, he is willing to at least listen to it. A quick glance sideways, though, says they should probably make a decision quickly. The kraken is now joined by a large quantity of mermaids. This whole place is becoming more unfriendly by the minute.
no subject
"I am." He doesn't want to bring up the mirror, or the magnitude of what that temper tantrum cost him, but it's the reason he's so adamant about this. "I know because I did it once and it nearly got my family killed. I'm not going to let you summon something worse because you didn't know what you were doing."
no subject
Which, honestly, does undermine Five's argument here. So he nearly killed his own family? So what, apparently his family just keeps nearly causing the world to end all the time! This sounds about average for them in that case, rather than anything specific. It isn't specific enough for Wrathion to believe it would happen again here.
no subject
"You've heard that already, have you?" He's so furious he can barely get the words out, but he steps forward anyway, box at the ready. "Alright. How about it also brought on a blizzard that overtook half the city and released forces of the undead that you couldn't begin to understand. You really don't think a body part is connected to something larger?"
He ignores everything going on around them, ready to lunge if he doesn't surrender it in the next minute.
"Don't be an idiot. Give me the fucking tongue."
no subject
Realisation flickers over Wrathion's expression.
"You speak of Taravast," he prompts. "You destroyed something there?"
That was -- caused by something being destroyed? Not just the undead coming to punish the city over shipments being missed?
"What did you destroy?"
no subject
"...A mirror." He destroyed a mirror and it released Anurr's power. The name is one thing he holds back, even if Wrathion might be able to put two and two together if he's had any experience with the warlord. He lets out a tense breath and holds the box in front of him.
"We don't have time for the full story. We need to ward that thing and put a stop to this."
no subject
Wrathion makes a low, exasperated sound -- as if he's frustrated by this. As if he clearly would know better, despite him not having even known about mirrors until Ellethia.
He would have known better even if it was in Taravast, he is sure. He would have worked it out. He wouldn't have done something like that, surely.
"This is different to the mirrors," Wrathion begins, "it's --"
There's a sound off to his right, and Wrathion vanishes in a puff of smoke as another pirate comes rushing towards them. He re-appears behind Five, and copies of Wrathion begin filling the area again as the ship rocks from the Kraken striking it again. They'll do as a distraction briefly.
" -- I don't know how exactly the captain used it," he continues from behind Five, "but I cannot sense a presence surrounding it. It's alive, but not... connected obviously to anything."
A pause, a hesitation as if Wrathion is beginning to falter in his determination.
"You are familiar with warding?"
He did say "we" need to.
no subject
He's not sure how Wrathion cloned himself, but it manages to keep Five from having to fight anyone that may have made him lose sight of the tongue. He braces against the ship as it rocks violently to one side, then twists to glare at the man behind him, only halfway certain he's the real one.
"I needed you to break the door, didn't I?" Five suspects Magnus and Lan Wangji could have done the same, but right now he's the one here. He holds up the box again, practically shouting in his ear. "This held it before. I'd suggest we use it before the ship splits in half."
no subject
This man is truly frustrating.
"Fine," he growls, and swipes out a hand to the box. An injection of magic reaches out at the same time, thrumming around it and beginning to try and levitate it -- if Five lets go or not. There was a reason Wrathion was taking it, and it wasn't purely mistrust.