Turn 1: First Steps Toward Forever
(Yes, I will keep giving these pretentious turn titles. Sue me.)
Alice
( Luck: 8 )
You swear, somebody must have put an enchantment on this place; seems like it's always evening. It's no trouble for you, of course, but it just feel gloomy.
While you're walking past a bar - the Blackwagon Flagon - you hear some drunken shouting. A man and a woman, it seems.
"Oy tohld ya, the cap'n's hahdin sommin!"
"Shaddop, Rolf- Wolp- mate, cappy Golm don' hoid shit. He's an roht bastad, bot ee's en 'oness bassad, yeh?"
"Baddee's defeni- defaneh- depa- rally hodin' sothig, ah knowi! Ey's been aaaaall sheddy en shi..."
"Ah sedda sho shaddup."
"Oiz bettin ee's fand a new girleeee~"
"And Eyzed ye shol shoddep!"
You hear the unmistakable sound of glass shattering, and afterwards the inevitable melody of a bar fight.
You remember the name "Captain Golm", though. The man's known for spending more of his efforts hunting down dead pirates' treasures rather than trying to rob traders; it doesn't win him any love, and he comes back empty-handed as often as not, but his crew doesn't seem to die as much, and they certainly go new places.
Salem
( Ship-to-ship combat, navy v pirates: 9v6 )
As you reach the deck, the skies are blue, save for one rapidly-fraying column of grey stretching diagonally across the sky. You only see two enemy ships, and the cannoneers are reloading. They must have gotten one.
You feel the floor below you shudder, then. You stumble; they must have shot the ship! When you're upright again, you can see that one of the scouts has drawn back and is parallel to the ship, while- where's the other one-
A dozen pirates drop down from above onto the deck.
Wing
( Analysis: 7+3 )
The first thing you note is that the mechanism is essentially gun-shaped, though with far more moving parts than you're used to.
Curious.
The second thing you note is that the item is absolutely covered in runes - the same rune, in fact, over and over again. Specifically, a rune for inducing paranoia in the viewer.
Wonderful.
Thankfully, the magic stores for them seem to be almost wholly depleted; you briefly wonder about the possibility that there's people out there looking for this thing, but you're pretty sure that's your own, justified fears rather than any sort of magical panic. The lack of magic also implies that the discharge was recent, which might explain the odd man who dropped this thing on you.
After setting up a small spell to drain ambient magic - just in case - you set about looking at the mechanisms. Five minutes in, though, you still haven't found any channels for magic that isn't meant to cause paranoia.
Then you prod one of the moving pieces - which you're certain should definitely not move on a normal gun - and a cylinder swings out on one side, with six holes in it. Four of those disgorge additional, smaller cylinders, sliding out at different rates.
What the hell is this thing?
Mysti
It takes a little while, and you have to ask a few questions, but you find the archeologist at the dock, or at least, you're pretty sure you do. More specifically, you spy a Sciro - female, from what you've heard, but it's always difficult to tell with those scorpions - wearing a tan jacket and pith helmet, gesturing wildly with all six arms at anybody who'll come nearby.
"You, you look like an excellent fighter- or you, yes, you look adept at working with mechanisms, always need someone who can do that-!"
It sounds like they're practically advertising, flattering people into joining their crew. Most of the passers-by are ignoring them - probably already with a crew, or otherwise occupied - but there's already a couple of people sitting by them, apparently recruited.
Max
You rustle about a bit below deck - quietly, you hope - and make your way toward a hatch that leads upward. You open it a crack, trying to look out. All you see in that direction is day-blue sky, though; the hinge must be on the island-ward side, you suppose. However, it smells... fresh, perhaps? And maybe a bit dirty, or earthy. It's hard to describe.
You turn, try to get a glimpse around the hatch without moving it too much more. It's hard, though, with such a thin crack; you think you can see some fuzzy greenness. A jungle island, maybe? You know there's some with outposts on them. Maybe they're mahogany traders. But what was that about "mapping courses", though?
It occurs to you that the only sound you've heard nearby in a good ten minutes have been your own. Feeling a bit brazen, you push the hatch up, and turn around. You see-
Oh. Oh no. Ooh, no no no.
Out before you spreads a wall of green, grey, brown, and black. Vines hang down, and you can see boulders strangled by them. Caves extend in every which way, and it hurts to look too deep into them. It feels like your vision is twisting. You see trees and birds on one island, and recognize none of them. Another looks like a bowl overfilled with water. A third - barely more than a rock, really - seems to be home solely to a single lamp-post.
This isn't a jungle island. Those people weren't carrying trading cargo.
This is the Greywood.
Author
Topic: Multiverse Crash - IC: Lands Adrift (Read 1507 times)