PHASE I [ 6 30 ] You really have arrived, finally.
Too bad the welcome isn’t so great.
Upon arrival, you will literally be dropped out of the sky.
You may land in the lake (watch out for the fish). You may land on the roofs of the buildings in the town (watch out for the spires). Or you may be unlucky, and fall all the way from the sky to the ground, at which point you die and lose a life already.
Don’t worry, you’ll respawn in the air and you can try again.
Good luck this time!
If you do manage to finally land in a way that doesn’t break your spine and/or drown you, you’ll find that if you’re a newcomer, you’ll have some strange words hovering over your head. They seem to be a set of your name, a level, a class and a quest, something like --
Ima Adventurerer Lv. 9000
Class: Dragon Slayer
Current Quest: Slay every dragon
-- but aside from existing, they don't seem to have any actual impact on your abilities or requirements. But you can do the quests if you really want to. Everyone will clap politely for you if you do. There might be confetti, even.
They would appear to coincide with a scroll or two posted up in the middle of town for everyone to see.
At least it’s easy to tell who’s new this round.
PHASE II [ 745 ] Once you’re safely on the ground (hopefully no broken bones!), it’s time to get a feel for the game. As free range as it seems to be, you have all sorts of choices in where to go and what to do. You could take on some quests! You could go hunt down monsters! You could...pick up that fancy looking armor over there!
Except you may not actually want to do so. As soon as you touch that armor, it will equip itself, no ifs, ands or buts. Of course, it isn’t so bad, at least, not for the ladies. For the men who equip the armor, they may find it to be a little breezy. In many different variations.
To make matters worse, be careful what you touch in your inventory, unless you want to equip a fish instead of your sword, or whatever the hell this is instead of your cool, awesome, special weapon. Good luck.
And the only way to unequip it is to find something else to equip. There’s motivation for some questing, at least.
PHASE III [ 1000 ] Eventually, you have to venture out of the town, however. There are NPCs ushering you to quest onwards, and there’s nothing in the town worth poking your nose into; none of the doors open, and all of the NPCs say the same, looping lines in a creepy monotone.
There are quests to be done outside of the town, they say, over and over.
So, off you go. However, the moment you step out of the town, you’re…somewhere else entirely. Look behind you, and the town is gone. Look around you, and there’s nothing but flowers, fields and the other people who have stepped out of the town themselves, looking equally confused. The bizarre armor is now gone, and you're back in your proper clothing; the strange floating titles and levels and the like are also gone. Otherwise, it is silent; there isn’t a single other soul. No bird song, no buzzing of bees -- just silence.
Of course, it won’t last. Soon, the monsters show up...but strangely, they seem to be monsters from your world, if your world had monsters. If your world had animals, they are those, or robots, or any number of combinations. But they seem...different. They’re meaner, larger, nastier, and all dark colors and bloody, dripping claws and fangs.
It seems everything’s been a little corrupted here -- even things from your own worlds.
PHASE IV [ 1400 ] If you persevere through the monster-infested fields, trampling your way through flowers which did nothing at all to you, you’ll eventually find yourself at a still, still lake. It’s a beautiful place, quiet and hushed and untouched, and totally monster-free; it might be a good place to take a breather.
But if you look into the lake, even for a brief moment, you’ll see whatever it is you want most in the world. Whether it’s a person (dead or alive), a thing, a title… it doesn’t matter; the lake will show it, tantalizing and right there, so close to being in your grasp.
If you don’t pull away immediately, you might find that it’s hypnotizing, in fact; you’ll feel the need to go closer and closer, even if it means wading into the lake to get closer to that goal. Just...don’t go too far. Something is waiting for you.
If you touch someone to try to help them, you’ll see what they are also seeing in the lake, for better or for worse. It might be a good chance to get to know them, if you weren’t, you know, in danger of being eaten.
Thankfully, with some perseverance and good friends, the hypnotism can be broken. You do have friends, right?
If you survive all of that, you can finally log out and join Cerealia proper -- hooray!
BONUS [ xxxx ] There sure are a lot of flowers in this field of flowers. There are flowers everywhere. Which isn’t a bad thing, unless you’re allergic to flowers (if you are allergic to flowers, CERES apologizes and suggests you take their special, patented ClariCERESclear to clear that right up). Except...the longer you’re in said field of flowers, the more you may notice that things are a little...strange.
Some of the pollen of the flowers has some strange effects on your bodies, it would seem. You could stumble across any of these (or none at all), and they could last anywhere from 5 minutes to an hour or two, depending on how much of that pollen you breathe in.
The effects are as follows:
➟ The urge to princess-carry the nearest person
➟ The urge to serenade the nearest person, regardless of your singing ability
➟ An awakened urge to be really aggressive towards the nearest person, even to the point of fighting (it's time to pvp)
➟ Uncontrollable crying
➟ An uncontrollable urge to make flower crowns and place them on peoples' heads (which thus further spreads the other effects).
Don’t trust the flowers.
[ Remember to apply proper warnings on threads with sensitive or inappropriate material and do let a mod know if your thread careens off into maiming or canoodling so we can lock the log. ] |
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meebo;
[it's okay, because stahn and dymlos alike are surprised. and that's exactly why he'll hear them respond in unison:]
You can hear Dymlos!?
You can hear me?
[sometimes, they're like two peas in a pod. sometimes. stahn is definitely a lot more surprised than dymlos is though; since he's the one who suggested why the possibility exists, it doesn't seem too far off. still, people being able to hear him is rare enough to question it.]
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Yes, I can hear you. Dymlos, is it?
[He pauses for a moment.]
Uh...Stahn, his voice is coming from near you, right?
[Please...don't tell him that Stahn is haunted....]
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Oh, uh... yeah. [he's still a little surprised about mikleo being able to hear dymlos. it's so rare for others to hear him, after all. this place is definitely strange in a lot of ways.
but at least he doesn't hesitate, unsheathing dymlos. he holds the sword out with the blade pointed at the sky, but doesn't say anything else.
"That's correct. I am Dymlos, the Swordian of Fire."]
1/??? you have unleashed the beast
What even is a Meebo, anyway?Wait wrong Tales entirely.Okay. Okay that's better to deal with than a ghost. In fact, Mikleo looks more intrigued, now. Stahn, Dymlos, I hope you're ready for him to turn into a huge nerd.]
So, if you're of fire, then there's a Swordian for the other elements?
2/??? i'll let you know when he's done
Then again, "Swordian" sounds like a cross between 'sword' and 'guardian,' so perhaps that's only to be expected.
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Sorry, you asked a question earlier about what I was. I'm a seraph. Well, specifically a water seraph, which means I can manipulate the element of water, including ice and mist. All seraphim are of one of the four elements: water, fire, earth, or wind.
NOW he's done
Although, history says that the humans used to be able to universally see the seraphim, but that stopped being commonplace around two thousand years ago during the Age of Disappearance. Our blessing started to weaken all across the continent of Glenwood as well. It's what protected the humans from the malevolence or corruption.
what a nerd
"It similar to how you're thinking, and from the sounds of it, somewhat similar to seraphim. The Swordians have control over a specific element—the ones you mentioned, as well as light."]
Huh... So seraphim are like Swordians that way. Hey, Dymlos... Does that mean you were kind of like Mikleo when you were human?
[yes, that's the first association he makes... but dymlos will shoot that one down quickly enough. "It wasn't like that at all! Don't make strange assumptions, we're still very different."]
Right... sorry, sorry! [geeze, dymlos. chill.] It sounds pretty cool though... seraphim! I'm not sure I get that other stuff about blessings and malevolence, though.
a huge nerd. also, wow, tl;dr forever, Mikleo, jfc
Dymlos, you were human? [If he was human, then....
Mikleo cups his chin, choosing his words so that they can better understand.]
It's a long and somewhat complicated explanation, so I'll try my best. First, to understand what our blessings do, I need to tell you about the malevolence. Malevolence is the impurity born from the hearts of humans, and if left unchecked, it can possess plants, animals, humans, and even seraphim. We call those possessed by the malevolence 'hellions,' which also can't be seen by humans. They'll see them as a sick or hostile animal, or a natural disaster if the hellion is strong enough. I once came across a plague town with such a concentrated amount of malevolence that it bound itself to the disease, making it harder for the citizens to heal from it.
There is a way to save those overcome with the malevolence. It's called 'purification,' an ability only the Lady of the Lake, who's a seraph, can grant to those who make a pact with her.
There's only one hellion that humans will see, and it's what happens if a seraph remains a hellion for too long or if they stay in an area steeped in that corruption for too long. This hellion is called a dragon. Dragons have always been the harbingers of destruction, generally only spoken of in legends, and they can't be purified. The only way to save a seraph in that state is to kill them. Just because we're beings of purity doesn't save us from the affects of the malevolence.
[That had been a rather shocking lesson to learn, but he's glad he's armed with that knowledge.]
Blessings are a way for the seraphim and humans to purify a land. Those seraphim who would be bound to a pure vessel and protect a certain territory are called Lords of the Land. This pure vessel serves as their protection against the malevolence. Through the blessing, the Lord of the Land will be able to keep a majority of the malevolence at bay. The more people who pray to us and leave offerings in gratitude, the stronger and more widespread the protection gets.
[Mikleo pauses for a moment.]
That being said...a general blessing varies from seraph to seraph, so not all blessings are good or things humans can be grateful for. Just as not all seraphim are cut out to be a Lord of the Land.
1/i'll let you know...
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he's a simple kid. sometimes, maybe a little too simple.]
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[okay, his brain is rebooting. just give him another minute. dymlos is kind of just sighing.
"Stahn can be a bit... simple at times. The situation in your world sounds a bit more complex than what he's had to deal with." though... their situation isn't easy either, stahn's had time to learn all the necessary terminology and gain experience with things, whereas this is just a crazy infodump.]
okay, i'm done
It sounds pretty complicated... [he's scratching his head a little, trying to find the simplest way to repeat this back to mikleo and see if he's processed this correctly.]
So... if someone has malevolence and it gets too strong, they become a hellion. And if a seraph becomes a hellion, they can turn into a dragon... [this is so, so different than what he's used to.] But they can be purified and saved by people with the right kind of ability. And the land can be kept safe with the blessing.
...Is that right? [honestly, even dymlos is pretty proud of stahn for being able to do that much. simple as stahn is, he's a very willing student. he always wants to learn and understand new things, even if they go over his head—so it's not the biggest surprised that he gets it on something of a very base level. some of the details may get lost along the way, but he thinks he gets it enough, probably.]
Stahn is such a cute
I wouldn't know just how complex it could get if I hadn't gone on a journey with my closest friend, Sorey, to find our own answers. By seraph standards, I'm extremely young, so I don't have the same experience as our older party members.
[However, it's clear that he likes that despite how complex it is, Stahn doesn't shy away from learning about and understanding it. Simple or not, that's a trait to be admired, at least in Mikleo's opinion.]
Exactly so. [The water seraph gives Stahn a slight smile.] If you have trouble with the details, you're always welcome to ask me later. I know this was a pretty hefty lecture about my world.
he doesn't try but i guess it happens...
I think I know what you mean. When I left Leane... that's when I found out how much was really out in my world too. How many different kinds of things, both good and terrible. [he's seen the best and the worst of people, and he's grown a lot because of it... so he understands that much.
he totally gets being inexperienced and not knowing the darknesses in the world until being faced with them; it's something he's been struggling with lately more than ever before.]
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Speaking of whom...]
Not to bring up a potentially bad topic for you, Dymlos, but you said that he was human? Are all Swordians human spirits bound to a sword?
[Because that...is some intense spelling, and he's not sure he likes that such a spell was created in the first place.]
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dymlos doen't seemed fussed by it, at the very least. he doesn't have much of a reason to, since it's not as if it's some sad situation. he exists with a purpose, and while his master is no longer dymlos timber, who died a thousand years prior... stahn is sufficient, and he's able to carry out what he exists to do.
that's what's most important. the human dymlos carried all the most human traits, and while they shared a personality, memories and resonance, swordian dymlos was meant to be a sentient weapon. he's cool with it.]
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That's quite the spell, considering that it and the sword have lasted for what sounds like an extremely long time. I never would've thought that humans could have created something like that.
[He shakes his head.]
Then again, my frame of reference won't entirely line up with what people in your world can do. I've only ever come across one human capable of using magic. Magic is primarily associated with the seraphim, and no decent seraph would teach a human how to use Seraphic Artes.
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[so there's there that.]
But I don't think most people can use magic artes where we're from, either. Right, Dymlos? I can use it because of you.
["That's right. Lens are what make it possible to harness magic, and all of the Swordians have a Lens core. That's what gives us all of the power we utilize in both ability and communication."
at least dymlos can explain things better than stahn can.]
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It sounds like a pretty limited resource, if not something very rare.
[Heck, it gives anyone who can wield a Swordian an extreme advantage over others by virtue of being able to cast spells. That's not so different from how the Shepherd and Squire have advantages because of the seraphim they have a pact with.]
Could anyone use magic as long as they have Lens? Or would it be that only certain people have the aptitude use them?
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Yeah... We haven't met many people who can do that, right? Lens get used for a lot of stuff, and some people even collect them and sell them for money.
["'Collect.' Hmph..." shh, dymlos nobody asked you! don't make jabs at rutee when she's not even here, even if he's not totally wrong.]
But I don't think we really fought a lot of people who used magic. [and generally the ones who did had some pretty core connections, so it's not hard to assume there's a good reason for it that stretches beyond normal means. but stahn really doesn't want to think about those people.]
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However, the wording has intrigued him.]
Healing magic isn't part of what Lens can give a human?
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[sure, some of the swordian masters had healing magic, but that was because of the swordians. but he's never seen anyone use healing artes that way.
"It's better to consider Lens a raw material. It can be put to use with the right technology and capabilities, but it's largely useless on its own."
stahn's knowledge of how lens works it pretty simplistic, and for all that dymlos knows, he thinks that's the simplest way to explain it. it's something with magical properties, but it doesn't just bestow ability on people; it's used more as a resource for things powering up weapons and accessories for the party over anything else.]
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I see. Interesting, that's not something we even have a parallel to on our world.
[It's kind of cool that there's something totally unique to a world. He offers them a small smile.]
Thank you for humoring my questions. The world you two live in is kind of fascinating. I'd love to hear about its history sometime.
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