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[i]Modern/sci-fi adventure in post-war depression[/i]
[i]Characters are young war veterans and childhood friends[/i]
[i]Special powers and abilities inspired by Animism[/i]
[i]Story and setting inspired by Half-Life, Tomb Raider, and Final Fantasy[/i]

[url=http://www.roleplayerguild.com/topics/8274/posts/ooc?page=1#post-158682]Link to OOC[/url].

[b]The Spirits Within[/b]
Everything began ten years ago. I still remember the chaos and confusion, as if it happened yesterday. It was the experiments of a covert government research facility that inadvertently caused the end of the world. That’s what most people called it, the end of the world. The scientists at the research facility attempted to peer into another dimension using a displacement device, but something went terribly wrong. An anti-mass spectrometer malfunctioned and caused a dimensional fracture to appear, through which myriads of monstrous creatures poured. The government tried to contain the situation by launching a nuclear warhead at the facility, but all it did was to cause further damage by initiating a quantum aftershock, which caused displacement storms to flare all around the world, allowing more of the alien creatures to invade. It was a disaster that plunged humanity into a war with a non-human force.

Before I continue, there are a few things one must know about Pandora. Everything in our world has a spirit and each spirit is connected through the Earth. Life on this planet depends on this symbiosis. There is no separation between the spiritual and material world. Souls and spirits exist in humans and animals, botany and rocks, thunder and wind, everything. The non-human invaders thrived on consuming these spirits, as it made them grow stronger. This caused the symbiosis to shatter and millions of spirits to flee their material embodiments. The spirits sought refuge in material entities whose spirits were already strong to begin with, and most of these entities were humans. Those who were chosen by the spirits to protect them became their guardians. The spirits stimulated the guardians’ bodies and minds and allowed them to exert the spirits’ inherit power, a defense mechanism imposed by the spirits within.

The war lasted for three years and took the lives of many, but humanity ultimately won. However, with the disruption of the symbiosis, the world began to wither. The weather and seasons became incoherent and chaotic, shorelines along the coasts receded, natural resources gradually vanished, and wildlife turned into lifeless husks. Today, the world is akin to something out of post-apocalyptic fiction: alien diseases wreak havoc, food and water are in short supplies, electricity is not a granted certainty, savages and cults rule the outlands with primitive weapons, and the remnants of different governments have turned into a paranoid world state. We do what we can to survive, but the chance of a full recovery is doubtful.

[b]Characters[/b]
You portray a Guardian. All the characters are childhood friends and they are bound together by a member of their group who died many years ago, Max. He was a charismatic and energetic young man, who always led the group to adventure and mischief common to children. The unfortunate event of his death—a car accident—occurred four years prior to the incident at the research facility, when all the characters were around ten years old. When the war began, all the characters were drafted and separated, which means that they have not seen each other for at least three years at the beginning of this roleplay.

[b]Story[/b]
[hider=hider]The story begins with all the characters being attacked by mysterious assailants resembling cultists of the outlands. Anything that is not part of a major metropolitan area is called the outlands. The attack brings the characters together and they figure out that it was not a random incursion. This event initiates a terrible, but epic adventure that will have the characters combat a cult that is about to reopen the dimensional fracture and allow the alien creatures to invade Pandora once again.[/hider]

[b]What’s next?[/b]
Think about what kind of adventures Max could have dragged the rest of the group into, how he was as a person, and what kind of personal relationship he had with your character. Max’s mother is still alive, though her husband died in the car crash, what kind of relationship does our characters have with her? It seems logical that our characters cared for her after her son’s death, like an aunt perhaps. We have to write a shared memory of Max, so these things are important.

[b]OOC[/b]
+Codex with random bits and pieces of information about the world
+Background information on Max, which we must write together (!)
+Character Sheet
+Rules