Male || 200 || Lich "The shortsighted consider my art a travesty. I, however, consider it pragmatically. A corpse is simply a resource after all, just like any other. 'Twould be a shame, therefore, not to use it."
Personality
The most notable trait that Varael possesses, and indeed the one others often take note of first, is his pragmatism. For he - unlike most - has absolutely no qualms with resorting to all manner of unsavory deeds to get what he wants, especially when it comes to robbing the grave. Or several, as the case may be. It is to be expected, of course, that a man as versed in the darker arts as he is would have little to no ethical scruples, but that does not make it any less shocking for those who get to see such amorality put into practice firsthand. Beyond that Varael seems to be a rather mellow individual, not overly ambitious or cruel (though the latter is especially debatable given the horrific nature of some of his prior experiments, and even the former can be dismissed on the basis of his current existential state alone), preferring on the whole to be left to his own devices if possible. Unfortunately for him however, the wider world doesn't take all that kindly to practitioners of necromancy regardless of how neutral their intentions might be, so he has had to spend the majority of his un-life on the run from the powers that be as a result - lest they find him and destroy his phylactery.
Biography
Varael is a two hundred year old necromancer turned lich, with a rather sordid past at that, who hails from a distant and largely obscure land. Then again, a person does tend to acquire such when they work with the dead and dabble in defying fate itself. He prefers not to focus on his personal history, however, as those years hold memories he'd really like to forget. In regards to how he cheated death the first time around, that's actually quite simple. He trapped his soul in a particular object - in this case a plain silver ring that he always keeps on his person - as it is one of the most common methods by which mortals achieve lichdom. Crane guards this item compulsively, becoming antsy when someone so much as glances at it, and snapping outright should someone attempt to take it from him. Putting aside his perversion of the natural cycle of life and death for a moment though, he eventually decided to depart the land of his birth some point in time, though his real motivation for doing so is hazy at best. While rest and relaxation are the main reasons Varael cites when anyone asks him why he decided to leave his homeland, and he seems quite intent on sticking to that story, the actual truth of the matter is a bit more complicated; and may or may not involve him fleeing his home for heinous acts committed against the gods, his people, and the state, to say nothing of his numerous other crimes against the proper order of the world itself.
Equipment
x1 Crystal Staff: A simple wooden staff with a pinkish-purple crystal embedded in one end, which Crane enchanted prior to his ascension to spew powerful streams of electricity at foes. This is the only kind of non-necromantic magical effect he can summon without the use of corruption.
x1 Journal: A simple leatherbound book - enchanted to have infinite pages - that Varael uses to keep records and notes on such things as important events, interesting spells, and the happenings in his day-to-day life.
Additional Info
The following is the actual build I used for Crane, ala the Undeath CYOA, plus some extra information regarding what types of magic he can and cannot use now.
Method of Immortality
A Phylactery: You trapped your soul inside a particular object, the most common method to achieve lichdom due to it's relative simplicity. It leaves you very vulnerable given how easily one could break it, however it also grants you full access to your magical potential as your soul remains entirely within this plane of existence, simply placed elsewhere. The closer you are to your phylactery, the more of your power you can access. At 3 miles your power unnoticeably affected, from 3 to 9 there will be some decrease, and from 9 to 36 your power will be close to three-quarters. From further distances the decrease is more significant. At 64 miles away your magical power will be cut to but a twentieth or less, before diminishing to nothing soon after.
Way of Resurrection
At Your Phylactery: The 'natural' form of resurrection for one whose soul is bound to an object. When your body is destroyed, it soon fades to ash and then nothing. After several hours your body reforms at a phylactery belonging to you.
Physical Form
Almost Mortal: In body, you will be almost identical to a true mortal. Perhaps you may not react as strongly to the cold as others and appear sterile with no root cause, but in everyday circumstances no one will be able to see what you truly are. You will be able to engage others in physical confrontations fully, with the advantage that the warm blood in your veins is not what's keeping you alive but magic instead, requiring your body to sustain serious damage in order for you to defeated and let your form fade.
Details
An Enchanted Phylactery: That which holds your soul is strong. To break it would require a powerful enchanted weapon and great strength, strong and particular magics, or great environmental dangers such as magma.
Sudden Resurgence: Once your body dissipates, you resurrect in a matter of seconds. Your enemies will not have escaped.
Greater Strength: You improved your physical strength. If a skeleton, your strength would rise to that of a man with flesh and the wards keeping you together would become stronger. With flesh, your strength would nearly double.
Necromancy
Possess Undead: From within half a mile you may inhabit the body of any being you have reanimated. Through that being you may use whatever abilities it possesses and also your powers of necromancy. You are immobile while doing this, but protected by a strong barrier that alerts you of any damage to it.
Raise Greater Undead: You can now raise powerful beings from the dead. Where before you could only raise beings such as elephants at most, and similar giant creatures or races, now you can raise dragons. Raising an elephant may take the power to raise twenty-five men, while raising a miniature dragon would likely take the power to raise five hundred, yet the power would still be within reach.
Superior Necromancy: You can now raise over five hundred undead soldiers, a formidable warband.
Other Skills
Corrupted Arcana: Varael is a masterful practitioner of the magical arts, and has a vast repertoire of spells at his disposal... or did anyway. Following the completion of the ritual, however, any magicka (aka mana) that was not used to fuel his ascension to undeath had been utilized to strengthen his connection to the dead. As such, he is limited to casting spells and cantrips relating solely to the dark arts. Even then he must have an ambient source of magicka in the environment to draw upon and corrupt to achieve such an effect. Think of it as the trade-off one makes to attain powers many would consider... unnatural. (It should be noted that the above does not apply to Crane's aforementioned necromantic abilities.)
Basic Combat Training: While no master-at-arms or warrior monk, Varael is no slouch when it comes to close-quarters combat, and is more than capable of holding his own in a fight. His enhanced strength and experience with wielding a staff both help greatly in this regard.
Master Mortician: It might sound odd to some, but Crane is quite good when it comes to refuting wear-and-tear on corpses. Granted, the only reason for this is his pragmatism and choice of magical art, as undead servants are generally more useful when not lying on the ground as an assorted pile of useless viscera and inanimate bone dust. Still, should funerary rites be required then Varael can certainly provide. Just don't ask him to give the world's best eulogy and you should be fine.
Male || 25 || Human "I swear to God... if I have to fight one more demon lord I'll have a fucking aneurysm!"
~Personality~
Despite his rather... emo appearance and withdrawn nature, Shirai is a very cheerful, compassionate, and resilient person in actuality. One who, oddly enough, doesn't consider his present circumstances to be all that bad when compared to the ones he used to have back on Earth. And where most might judge him as some manner of edgelord based on appearance alone, those closest to him know he is anything but. As a matter of fact, he seems to have a compulsive aversion to brooding moodily in dark corners or spouting the same tired spiel about some ambiguously tragic past, to say nothing of his taste in clothing - which is motivated less by a desire to make everyone around him think he looks cool in a dark and menacing way, and more by a genuine appreciation for the minimalistic nature of the ensemble itself. Lastly, Sazama has a very strong dislike for demon lords. At least the world or dimension conquering kind anyway, mostly because he's had to fight so many since he was first taken from his home that it's - quite frankly - gotten really fucking tiring. In truth, his distaste for them has grown to the point where he won't even waste time on the usual hero/villain pleasantries when confronting them. He'll simply kill them on sight if possible.
Additionally, Sazama happens to curse like a sailor when upset.
Just because he's pleasant to be around once you get to know him doesn't mean he's a saint after all.
~Appearance~
Tall with an athletic build, fair complexion, a short cropping of dark hair, and inhumanly good looks, just like the majority of isekai protagonists out there; with the addition of having an aesthetic taste centered around simpler or more minimalistic fashion. In regards to what he used to look like back on Earth, well the answer is much the same, only scrawnier and with slightly above average levels of physical attractiveness. So just like everyone else, really, albeit a lot worse for wear around the time he was first summoned to another world thanks to his living situation at the time, if it can even be called living that is. He was such a mess that, upon arriving in the realm to which he had been called, the sorceress performing the ritual thought she'd made a mistake and conjured the wrong person by accident. It was only after going back over her notes that she realized he was the hero the kingdom was looking for.
Of course she couldn't present him to the ruling nobility in such a sorry state, so she held him back for a couple of years, during which time she subjected him to a rigorous physical and mental workout regimen. Once that was done she conducted the standard slew of magical treatments given to all summoned heroes to boost their physical capabilities to superhuman levels so they actually stand a chance of going toe-to-toe with the demon lord and their forces. Skip forward a couple of years and the result is what you see here.
~Biography~
Sazama was, at one point in his life, a normal person just like everyone else. He had a decent upbringing, did well in school, and eventually moved out of his parents house to live on his own. From there he got a job in the IT department of a local tech company using the skills he'd acquired from university and the web, started earning a stable wage, and even began dipping his feet into the online dating pool. Life was - for the foreseeable future anyway - pretty damn good. Then, as it so often does, tragedy struck. At first things were manageable enough, a few missed bill payments here and there that he was able to pay off in time with the amount of money he made, as well as a few hits and misses when it came to his romantic prospects but nothing too major. Around a year or so into his first serious relationship though is when shit really began to hit the fan. First came a lack of upward mobility in his workplace, which included his boss constantly passing him over for promotion regardless of how hard he worked. This then led to him pushing even harder at the office, which resulted in less time for him to spend with his significant other, and that itself led to the steady decline of their relationship with one another.
Shirai's life just continued to spiral from there, eventually seeing him and his partner break up and Sazama himself being fired from his job. Still he refused to give up hope and continued to push on, looking for more employment opportunities in spite of it all. Despite his best efforts, however, he just couldn't seem to catch a break and ultimately found himself living on the streets. It was here, when he was at his lowest, that he was pulled into another world. Given a second chance at life, he made the most of it like he always had - working with the kingdom that had summoned him to get stronger so he could kill the demon lord. Fast forward a couple of years, several summoning's, a hundred or so dead demon lords later, and here we are...
More or less.
~Powers & Abilities~
Enchanting: A school of magic covering the imbuement of weapons, armor, and other inorganic items with magical properties. With just this specialization alone Shirai can create things like flaming swords or rings that turn flesh to solid stone. After a fair bit of practice and study, however, Sazama found himself capable of forging bows that fire lightning bolts capable of destroying castles, and near-invincible suits of armor that heal the wearer, just to name a few.
Chronokinesis: A school of magic covering the halting, slowing, or acceleration of time for brief periods. Shirai can manipulate the time of individual people or objects to age them to dust in seconds or freeze them outright. Naturally as his skills grew over the years he eventually became capable of several reality breaking feats such as traveling through time, healing himself by reversing the age of his injuries, making objects immune to decay by locking them in time, and creating a whole city in seconds by accelerating time around its foundation.
Spatiokinesis: A school of magic covering the manipulation of gravity and physical space however one desires. With it Shirai can turn the world upside down, crush people with gravity, and teleport nearly anywhere in an instant. Some of his more creative applications of this ability include tearing people apart with condensed blasts of space, altering the course of celestial objects, and creating pocket dimensions by shearing off sections of reality.
Enhanced Strength: Sazama possesses strength beyond that of a normal human thanks to the magical treatments he was given. At base level, his strength is several times greater than other members of his race at their peak, and he is able to lift heavy objects such as cars, large boulders, vans, and most other objects that are bigger than him with ease. He is also able to exert great physical force from various parts of his body (prominently through his hands), sending enemies flying through walls or breaking their bones instantly with a single punch. Due to the physical force exerted on his body as a result of his enhanced strength, Shirai also possesses increased durability so as to not destroy himself both from the force of impact and general exertion.
~Arms & Armaments~
Requiem, Annihilation of the Undying: An ornate katana that Shirai enchanted during his quest to defeat the first demon lord, rendering it not only damn near unbreakable, but making it capable of cutting through almost anything as well - including that which is intangible such as spirits or ghosts. He's a little peeved about the name everyone in the first kingdom gave it though, considering it far too edgy for his tastes, but accepts it regardless since it's not like he can change it now in any case. The name bears a legend, and legends bear weight no matter what world you're in.
Gender: Male Age: Ancient Domain: Domination "All things have their place in this world, and that place is beneath me, groveling at my feet."
~Personality~
Ermus is a being whose cruelty knows no end and tyranny no bounds, and his ambition is likewise. Despite this, he does not act blindly like some kind of animal, lashing out at those around him without reason or cause. Rather, he works in accordance with the Chain. The philosophical and - in the case of those who've been subjugated by or have sided with him - metaphysical construct by which all weaker beings are bound. As such, his conquests in the material plane are not some horrific travesty or necessary evil in his lifeless eyes, nor are his numerous acts of violence and destruction vile deeds. No, to him they are merely a simple fact of nature. One of life's many inevitabilities that will ultimately come to pass regardless of how hard mortals try to fight against it or the nature of their divine backing. When it comes to his feelings on his fellow deity, however, he does not view her as yet another link in the Chain. Instead, he sees her as a being that resides above it much like he himself does. A fellow master of the unwashed masses that reigns supreme over the worlds which lay blasted and broken at their feet, one who dispenses blackened omens from on high. It is in her that he finds a kindred spirit, one who has completely freed themselves of the slave mentality so many lesser beings fall prey to, what with their ceaseless pursuit of the baser animal instincts and other woefully short-sighted goals.
~Appearance~
Ermus cuts a grim figure. Standing as tall as the highest mountain, sporting an oily cloak that unfurls to blot out the very sky, and wearing a suit of armor whose plates - although corroded, dented, and worn - could deflect the blows of even the mightiest god. When a mortal bears witness to his horned form looming on the horizon, they know their doom has come. Know that any and all semblance of hope has finally abandoned them, burned away by the white-hot flames roiling within his skull, while their meager excuse for freedom has been utterly shackled by the beguiling thorns crowning his head. Those who continue to resist in spite of all of this will be met not with cowardice but a blade. One whose loathsome edge can cleave the staunchest of dragons in twain, and whose bite can cripple even the most determined of foes, leaving them as naught but mindless puppets. Slaves to their better's - and by virtue of the Chain - Ermus' infernal will.
~Biography~
Ermus is an incredibly ancient entity, having been birthed from the void mere moments before a majority of his siblings were to fulfill the role of its wretched firstborn. Even in those earliest of days he was an incredibly cruel and ambitious individual, and these traits were exemplified best by his immediate response to wage war against his fellows out of an inborn desire to subjugate them to his will, for such was his right as the eldest son. He'd failed in the end of course, and was hounded to the ends of the umbra for his treachery, but was not outright destroyed - for at that time the spirits had yet to war amongst themselves, and therefore lacked the knowledge required to accomplish such a herculean feat. As such he hid, biding his time and consolidating his power until the time came for his conquests to begin anew. It was then that he rose up once more to establish his dominion within the void, raising a cold and lifeless realm within the infinite expanse to serve as the stronghold from which a shadow most baleful would spread.
It was here within the accursed halls of Draelar that he plotted and schemed for the next eon. Gradually building up his armies in preparation for a second conflict with his siblings in the womb beyond. Only, such a battle never occurred. Instead, when Ermus and his hordes of hellish fiends first returned, they found two things of significance. The first was that their realm was not the only one to exist within the confines of the void anymore, having been joined by a multitude of others on top of many other worlds besides, and the second was that his siblings refused to attack him immediately - a behavior he found most strange given their prior animosity. It was only after they had expounded unto him the rules of their game that he finally understood their reluctance for bloodshed. Although he found such reasonings pathetic at first and dismissed them outright, they eventually grew on him over the years, following a few threats of uniform violence from his brothers and sisters anyway. For they were many where he was but one - and far more cunning than he was at that, several millennia's worth of infighting having sharpened their senses - meaning that for all his overwhelming might and power he would be little more than chaff in the wind should they ever decide to face him in fully unified throng.
Thus, with little choice but to participate in the grand distraction they had created for themselves or stagnate in isolation, Ermus found his attention turning inexorably towards the new worlds above and the creatures that inhabited them. Weak beings he determined them to be, and exceedingly fragile, but not totally devoid of every use. For one they proved themselves to be naturally obedient to those in positions of power and authority, and incredibly easy to subjugate on top of that. What's more, many of them were greedy to a fault, willing to do almost anything in their never-ending pursuit of power and security. These were the attributes that drew the attention of the dark god in full, prompting him to make his first move in centuries and invade one of the many utopias above. An act that not only served to further refine his view of existence into what it is now, a striking contrast to the purely reactionary instinct it used to be, but also established him as an official piece on the cosmological chessboard.
What he hadn't anticipated at the time was the unlikely alliance he would go on to forge with another being of equal power...
But the great game makes strange bedfellows of us all, whether we wish it to or not.
~Powers & Domain~
Domination, contextualized here as the subjugation and control of others through fear and rigidly enforced hierarchies, is Ermus' domain. As such his abilities tend to share a similar theme, and range from the physical to the metaphysical in terms of scope. Things such as mind control or mental compulsion as demonstrated by the Chain, inhuman strength, pain inducement and the like. Being a spirit whose nature is inherently dark, however, he also possesses the natural capacity to change his form and corrupt others through various means, though the former isn't a power he uses very often, not to mention the capability to consume other spirits provided they have been sufficiently weakened beforehand. Although this last attribute is a trait he shares with all of his siblings no matter their alignment or lack thereof. Furthermore, Ermus is immortal and exists in a state so above mundane life that it would take a god of similar power, or many working in conjunction, to end him permanently. And even then his essence - akin to a select few incredibly powerful or knowledgeable deities - will linger on in some way, shape, or form to influence the worlds and their inhabitants in various ways until it is reconstituted somehow or otherwise consumed. Although in the case of the latter, should the diablerist in question fail to win the contest of wills that ensues, they will find their physical form overtaken and consciousness subsumed. Added to the new whole that has just been created while Ermus himself lives on within new flesh.
~Realm~
Draelar: Ermus' realm is one of barren wastes and obsidian cities whose streets are as labyrinthine as they are simple. Both of which serve as the habitation of countless demons, foul spirits, and mortal followers alike; all of whom act as one beneath his will. Despite its desolate environs, Draelar is not a land of unbridled chaos but suffocating order. There is cruelty and excess to be found here still, yet all of it is conducted in accordance with the Chain. For just as a servant does not strike their master or mistress with impunity, so too does that same master or mistress fail to strike their superior. In many cases a higher ranking demon or spirit, although the same cannot be said of the reverse. Finally, no one - no matter how powerful or far up in the pecking order they may be - strikes or disobeys Ermus. Not if they want to avoid being tortured for the rest of eternity that is.
"I have come to the enlightened understanding that life, ultimately, is nothing but a dream. So come! Let us dream of something beautiful together."
The Spark
An Inferno of Supremacy: Upon your anointment, you have already attained the Master Spark, the final flame before your ascent into Amaranth. Thus, you have complete initial access to the powers of the Master Spark, and require no further magnification or time to attain them. You exceed even the arbiter of the Versal Cycle in power by far, and there are so few bounds to your power that it is difficult to discern it from omnipotence. Only Amaranth awaits.
You have:
6 Spark Points
10 Master Spark Points
6 Resource Points
Innumerable or Custom Modes of Transcendence
Modes of Transcendence
Living Image: You have seen the dream of the Verse as it is. You have spoken your name to the vivid illusion, and you have become an individual, disparate and yet one with all things. The world is as but a dream, and you the dreamer. Everything is dependent upon you to stand upright. The status of Living Image is much like Buddhist enlightenment, in that one realizes that they are one with creation, but also much like solipsism, in that one realizes creation is one with themselves, and so is as manipulable as moving a finger or blinking. Think of these abilities as like a lucid dream, in which you see past the veil and realize that nothing is outside of yourself.
Your abilities are surreal in nature.
The Secret: Through the understanding of The Secret, the meaning of everything is within your grasp. Manipulation of these secrets allow creation to be malleable on a conceptual level, given that you understand its underpinnings perfectly. Think of Prometheus and the secret of fire, and then conceive of having knowledge of every secret, given that just one made man into a veritable god of the Earth. Even deities will be as insects to you.
Your abilities are esoteric in nature.
Godhood: You have ascended to divinity, to be numbered among the ranks of pantheonic gods. However, you are not merely a deity, but a supreme deity, a god among gods, for whom Hyperion bends the knee and Athena kisses the foot. You are not bound up in a single aspect of godhood, such as thunder, the seas, or so on, and your powers are far more broad and overreaching. As such, you will likely be worshipped by all.
Your abilities are divine in nature.
Goals
Freedom: With the strength you possess, who would dare try to tell you what you want? You are free to do as you please with your might, and may choose to pursue or abandon any of the above goals or others you may think of as you see fit. There is no law holding you to anything, and the only will you follow is your own. If you simply want to experiment with your powers, or if you want to freely toy with the world of mortals as you please, you may do so with total recklessness. There are next to no consequences left that can affect you, so what matter is anything but your own good desire?
Spark Powers
Meta-Immortality (0): You are eternal and invincible on a metaphysical level, and your state of existence is beyond time, space, and causality, immune to harm from all conceivable sources, even of a metaphysical or abstract nature. You cannot die, even on a conceptual level, by any means at all. Along with eternal being, you also possess eternal agency; you cannot be bound, entrapped, or otherwise, nor can your will and self be altered or manipulated; you will always have the full capability to do that which is your will to do, immunizing you from the effects of manipulation or restraint of any kind. Should the local universe, multiverse, omniverse, or even the Verse itself or all Verses be compromised, you will continue to exist in spite of this, and, if you so choose, may remain unconscious and unaware of the passage of time until the natural forces of creation reconstitute existence. You are exempt from the negative side effects of living an infinite life, such as boredom, ennui, depression, mental instability, and so on, if those emotions or any other effects like them were to be caused by the fact that you live an eternal life. If you should ever wish to pass on from this life, you may do so freely and enter into an afterlife of your choosing, and may return to life whenever you should desire to, and, if you are so inclined, reincarnate into whatever form of natural life is fitting for you throughout the cosmos. You are eternally in your prime, are immune to the effects of age, and possess perfect mental and physical faculties, meaning that you will never lose your soundness of mind or become unable to recall events from millions or billions of years ago.
Omnilock (0): Your existence is outside of and beyond creation, and thus is beyond the effects of any and all things. You have absolute and utter immunity against all threats against you or anything which your being/mantle encompasses. While you may possess a physical form that exists within the bounds of dimensions, time, space, form, comprehension, and so on, this avatar is not your true being; your true existence is so vast and abstract that it defies and supersedes all physical, metaphysical, real, and unreal boundaries and definitions, capable of surviving the death of all things, immune to all negative effects derived from a creation so below your godhead. Anything which is entailed by your mantle exists in this way, and this may include anything which is subservient or attached to your person, a definition which is, for the most part, dictated by your interpretation.
Eternal Ascension (0): Until such time as you should attain Amaranth, the highest possible state of absolute omnipotence, you have infinite potential in all aspects and attributes, and grow in power at near-infinite rates which are constantly increasing at near-infinite speeds. The speed at which your rate of progress towards Amaranth increases is also near-infinite, and so on to a near-infinite degree. Your ability to supersede, ascend, and overcome limitations of any kind is of the highest caliber in existence. It is impossible for you to degrade in power, and you are in a constant state of exponential progression towards omnipotence. When you lack sufficient strength to complete your endeavors, when you are defeated, or when you are otherwise impotent to your ends, you will evolve drastically to meet the challenges entailed to you. Your existing powers may grow to vastly different proportions and in numerous functionalities, and you will come to possess powers not presented to you here as you attain greater and greater heights of power. Even omnipotence as you know it now is not the upper boundary of your future capabilities. You are able to learn any powers, techniques, arts, masteries, and abilities with ease, even by mere observation, and possess prodigious talents of nigh-infinite magnitude in your every endeavor and undertaking. Without exception, you have the greatest natural capacity for power in all of creation.
Unbound (0): You possess true and transcendent freedom from all authority and wills other than your own. Your self is inviolate and unchained by that which once abated you; good and evil, truth and lies, one and all. Because your self is inviolate, and you are thus unbound by causality, fate, the past, the present, or the future, there are no longer versions of yourself which exist in alternate worlds, times, or spaces, and you yourself encompass all that is and ever will be called "you," making you a Versal Constant. You cannot have your ascent prevented via retroactive alteration through time travel or similar abilities, nor can you have your actions subverted in any way; just as your self is inviolate, so to is your will; nothing can influence your decisions or desires but your own will and pleasure; your will is your own, and temptation, manipulation, irrationality, and the like will not inhibit it. Similarly, you are completely freed from negative emotions you do not wish to experience, and are unbound by psychological or biological factors in your wellbeing and personal state. You may experience whatever emotions or sensations you desire, and may adjust your mental and emotional state to whatever is desirable to you.
Celestial Substance (0): The physical form which your abstract consciousness inhabits is now no longer composed of mundane physical matter, and has been revoked of all possible imperfection and defect. Because your body is one of Celestial Substance, you are unbound by all biological and physical limitations. You possess no physical needs, nor do you possess any biological compulsions, though you may experience and undertake any of these if you so desire. This form is a reflection of your ultimate and absolute self, and is astoundingly beautiful beyond the scope even of the most resplendent divine beings and mantles. Even your very blood is the flickering, gleaming fluid of distilled, metatextual meaning. Your form is that which embodies perfectly your highest self, and as a result may entail whatever features you deem appropriate. Similarly, whatever you may choose, your form will possess physical and intellectual prowess at the highest possible echelon for mortal life across the breadth of the Verse.
Emanation (0): Your presence is overwhelming when in full breadth, and you may convey your power and form with whatever effects are desirable, from blinding vivid lights to strange and surreal shapes and sounds antithetical to vision and hearing themselves. Depending on the degree to which you choose to reveal your true nature, this effect can range from subtle to mind-bendingly vast. The effect which your true nature has on others is dependent upon what aspects of your infinite self you choose to magnify; your overwhelming and impossible beauty, your vast and awe-inspiring power, your consummate and perfected wisdom, your abstract and incomprehensible nature, and so on. That given, the full comprehension of your complete and true form is likely to bring existential crisis, insanity, or even death, and so is inadvisable when these effects are not desirable. With this ability at your disposal, legions of bitter foes will bow in reverence at the slightest command, followers will regard your word as infallible truth, doubters will turn white with fear, and the want of innumerable amatory hearts will be your merest touch.
Planeswalk (0): You have complete mastery over locus, and may pass between higher and alternate dimensions, times, realms, universes, planes, worlds, spaces, and so on, even to extents beyond that of the Verse's scope or in the strange and surreal interspace between the structured cosmos. You have exact knowledge of your location, both temporal and spatial, with reference to the rest of existence, thus dramatically simplifying navigation in all but the most phantasmagorical planes and spaces. You are similarly capable of omnidirectional movement at truly unlimited speeds, allotting you flight and motion at speeds massively faster than light, sufficient to traverse metaphysical distances, or distances across lengths greater even than the concept of distance, instantaneously. Your form and mind are adaptive to whatever conditions you may encounter in alternate planes, you are capable of communication perfectly in any language or system, and you can easily adapt to strange and unknown cultures, traditions, and the like throughout your travels. You may use this ability to transport others and objects as you see fit similarly. Other unmentioned minutiae of convenience for the purposes of Versal travel are included within this ability; opening portals and gateways, teleporting objects and individuals selectively, resolution of intertemporal paradoxes, and all that is requisite for complete ease of travel throughout the vast and unknowable cosmos.
Power Matrix (0): Your powers are in an echelon above that of a Point, and as such are perfected and refined in ways even the most perfectly aligned powers are not. They and your consciousness are one in the same, and as such cannot be altered, manipulated, or acted upon in any way by any force, such as in replication or dampening. Similarly, they operate without even the effort of a blink, and roil with their full power at your slightest whim, unabated by loss of focus, distraction, or any other factors. Because your powers are as much a part of you as your will is, you are aware of the every minutia, limitation, and strategic value, and you possess absolute knowledge of their every facet and mechanic, with skill in wielding them at the level of one who had possessed them for truly infinite eternities and Versal Cycles. It is impossible for your powers to ever operate in a way that is not conducive to your will and intent, and may act upon your will and intent even if you are unaware, such as preventing calamity in far-off dimensions that would be undesirable to you. A number of other enhancements of convenience are included within this ability, such as manifesting your powers in whatever aesthetic capacity is desirable to you, immunity to the effects of powers of a lower magnitude than your own, fine-tuned control of how much of your full power you allow yourself to use at a time, and so on, all to the effect of enhancing and easing the usage of your powers as much as possible.
Subtle (0): One such as yourself, just as you may wish to be known, so too may wish to be unknown. At will, you may become undetectable by any means whatsoever, in any selective capacity, along with your actions. This includes detection through such means as future-sight, divination, omniscient awareness, calculation, or any other more varied means of detection along with sensory detection. You may selectively revoke knowledge of your actions, of yourself, or of anything else as you see fit. Similarly, you are capable of revoking and reversing the effects of any of your powers at will, in whatever capacity and to whatever degree is desirable. The total effect of this ability allows you complete privacy, and welcome freedom from the detrimental consequences of your actions, errors of judgement, or brash misuse of your abilities. Few things are consequential to one as yourself.
Master (0): As is tradition with many beings of your caliber, servants, under the incentive of your divine power, will seek to serve you dutifully and do your will, often heroes of legendary prowess who wish to champion your cause, other deities in need of the protection of your wing, or even religious figures leading your worship. You may bestow any powers you possess, in whatever capacity and to whatever degree you deem appropriate, to others. Much like under the effects of Power Matrix your abilities operate unconsciously in accordance with your will, any powers which you bestow upon others will also function in accordance with your will unconsciously, and will naturally cease to function if the individual wielding them acts outside of your will or otherwise. Mortals will pine after your favors with rabid fervor in the pursuit of both your approval and the chance at eternal life, vast mystical skill, or other powers you possess, and will gladly do your continual bidding, whatever that may entail, to retain them.
True Anointed (0): Your ascension entails a vast understanding of the underlying mechanics of the metanarrative, in whatever form that may take. As a result, you possess ultimate and transcendent wisdom, as if you had existed since the beginning of creation itself, before all Versal Cycles, at the stirrings of the complete Ad Deus, with all the knowledge such a life would entail. That upon which existence stands, along with innumerable, unimaginable secrets attained over unimaginable eons are all within your repertoire of prior knowledge. You are a living repository of infinite wisdom, the ancient knowledge of the Verse funneled into your mind at the instant of your ascent. Though you are not omniscient, you are like a true messianic figure, enlightened to the deepest secrets existence and life have to offer.
Timeless (0): Your existence and origin is not bound by time in the slightest; you may decide the point in time at which you come into existence, how long you have existed, and so on, whenever you see fit to alter these. As a result, the prevention of your ascent is impossible, given that it could feasibly have occurred before you even existed, or could have simply occurred in a time impossible to intrude upon. You may retroactively decide how long you have lived, after your previous activities based upon knowledge you gain in future activities, alter your future activities based upon knowledge you gain in prior activities, and so on; the boundary of time is all but nonexistent for one as yourself.
Alchemical Arbiter (6): You are the master of the metaphysical aspects and Platonic Forms with which an object or concept is described. This power is extremely esoteric, even by the standards set by other powers within this listing, but in the hands of one skilled in its execution is also one of the most fundamentally powerful. You control not the physical existence of the object or concept which you manipulate, but the very essence of it; in a single manipulation, you could maximize the conceptual aspect of beauty across existence, causing all things to become consummately aesthetically pleasing on a metaphysical level. In a more complex manipulation, you could change the very concept of time into a solid object in the palm of your hands, as easily manipulated as physical matter. Freely and arbitrarily determine the colors of space, the weight of mass itself, the darkness of light, or even more abstract concepts like morality, consciousness, and information as you see fit. All aspect and description is beneath your divine edict.
Master Spark Powers
Verse Weaver (5): Your understanding of the nature and structure of planes and that which interlinks them has allotted you absolute creative powers, like those which brought about the Verse as it exists now. By your whim you may create utterly anything, even to the scale of entire Verses beyond our own, molded to the magnification of your splendor. This power is over creation, and not destruction; you may create without limitation, but cannot destroy through any means using these abilities other than to revoke that which you create. Limitless potential dimensions, personal artifacts and objects of value, vast construct armies, and entire multiverses formed to your liking are all easily within your power, and the scalar limitation of the infinite Verse is as easily violable by your simple will. That which you create is not limited by your understanding, imagination, or any other factors; that which you will to be created is created, regardless of these factors. That which you do not personally detail will be implemented as if you had detailed it.
(Evolution of Restructure, Heaven King)
Spark Artifice (5): You have the absolute power to alter state, quality, quantity, attribute, and so on of any existing concept, entity, object, or force, including powers themselves. That is, you can grant yourself and others any conceivable powers and attributes up to and including those of the nigh-infinite magnitude of Spark Powers such as Omnikinesis, Worldmind, and so on. This in itself constitutes nigh-omnipotence in the sheer variety of powers you may design for yourself, lacking in any scalar limitations whatsoever, being powers born of your enlightenment. That said, these powers cannot reach the heights of Master Spark Powers, being so infinitely superior that only the original spark of Amaranth within you could drive you to the Master Spark you have attained; their might is thus irreplicable. As much as these are valuable, you possess a complete mastery over meaning itself, on a metaphysical level. The fundamental attributes and elements from which even metaphysical concepts arise bow to your artifice. You do not merely manipulate the matter and quantities with which the object of your control is concerned; you fundamentally alter the force of meaning upon which the reality of a given object stands. All is as your effigy; all is as your attribution states it to be. The very machinations of the Ad and Sub Deus, the dead gods of entity and existence, are beneath your command.
(Evolution of Alchemical Arbiter, Spectrum, Power Architect)
Resources
Wealth (1): You have access to multiple Vaults, vast cosmic stores of wealth designed to house the fortunes of ancient civilizations securely until their rightful owner might claim them. This entails nigh limitless supplies of rare gems, metals and materials, precious jewelry and antiques, as well as near limitless stores of all variety of interuniversal currencies, such as Pearls, Credits, Gold Coins, and so forth. The wealth stored within is so vast as to be the net worth of thousands of universes (or roughly 20% to 30% of the Verse's currently produced wealth), capable of easily purchasing personal galaxies, pocket dimensions, powerful magitech, potent substances, and any number of slaves you could wish for. The Vaults slowly grow in size and capacity over time, filling with exponentially greater riches in relation to how much you expend, so that you always have enough wealth to purchase essentially whatever you require. Inflation or other economic constraints will never cause the wealth of your Vaults to diminish by excessive spending. You can easily turn a massive profit by investing in mining operations, dyson spheres, planetary conquests, black markets, and more to become a powerful mogul and economic force throughout the Verse. No one can access the Vault but you, and you may access its resources at any time. The riches of ten-thousand universes are at your disposal, and will only grow with time. If you have Collections or any other extraplanar storage facilities, these may be merged at your discretion. If you already have an idea of what you wish to spend some of this wealth on, you may specify as you desire. Note that currency created using any powers or permutations of powers is fundamentally invalid, and generally as valuable as counterfeit. None of the items on this list of Resources may be purchased using this supply of wealth, though this does not apply to funds acquired through other ventures, meaning that through investment and business you may acquire funds applicable to these ends.
Collection (1): You have come into possession of vast untouched collections containing a variety of exceedingly rare and legendary valuables. This includes unique mystical artifacts in droves, ancient technology that can be adapted to your purposes, rare and precious materials found nowhere else, legendary pieces of art and sculpture long thought to be destroyed, mighty starcrafts, artificial stars, and exalted weapons heard of only in legend. These are all stored in an endless extraplanar museum which only you may have access to. Exploring further into the depths of this facility will reveal still more varied treasures and artifacts in literally endless variety. Note, however, that each item within is one-of-a-kind, so no artifact within should be treated as disposable, even if you have a limitless variety to choose from. Searching for a specific lost artifact or legendary material will usually cause you to find it with ease, if it has ever existed in the first place. You may add to this collection as you see fit. If you have Vaults or any other extraplanar storage facilities, these may be merged at your discretion.
Technology (1): You have access to mystical and scientific constructs, designs, and systems only dreamed of by the rest of the Verse. High-Order Mathematics, Source Cores, Hyperion Veils, Mass Relicators, and more, along with all their designs are both given to you in an extradimensional storage facility and injected directly into your mind, granting you perfect knowledge of their inner workings and how to further expand upon them to points of parody. If you have ever wanted weapons capable of annihilating the entire Virgo supercluster with a single blast, or the means to custom design the constellations in your image, or mystical tech capable of generating populations of billions of intensely loyal artificial humanoids, this choice will serve you well. Your prospective technology will outclass even the most mighty sciences of ancient times, much less the means of today. Your opponents will be as if primitive animals by comparison to your vast advancements. Fill your worlds with the means to produce limitless supplies of valuable resources, eliminate hunger entirely from the genes of your populace, or ruthlessly crush your foes with super-viruses that sway their armies to bend the knee before you. If you have Vaults or other extradimensional storage facilities, these may be combined and organized according to your preference.
Personal Plane (1): You possess a personal plane of existence, in which you are absolutely, truly omnipotent and fully omniscient concerning the scope and events within it. This plane is completely infinite, and in theory the entire Verse could be simulated within it for testing or entertainment, if you really wanted to. You may invite others to this place freely and take any items you desire with you, but any changes you make to outside objects or persons (including yourself) will be nullified and restored to their original condition unless done without the use of your planar omnipotence (in the case of training, retaining new information, etc). You cannot take anything constructed using your planar omnipotence outside. Everything within your personal plane is as "real" as anything outside, it just can't leave with you. This is a perfect place to construct your infinite palaces, test military strategies, develop and study new technologies, explore and push the boundaries of your powers, or entertain yourself and guests with whatever your hearts desire. You could even declare this plane the capital of your empire and transport your populations within, or use it to maintain your standing military. You may transport yourself, anyone, and any of your possessions you desire into this space, though other Ascendants such as yourself may leave at any time they desire. Any other extradimensional storage such as Vaults may be combined with this one as you see fit.
Sway (1): You hold a high and respected position, whether in multiversal councils, pantheons of deities, the center of a massive religious following, a member of a highly influential group, or otherwise. Whatever the case may be, your word and opinions have weight throughout the entire Verse, if not directly then by opinion. In whatever group you should choose, you are certainly the most influential and powerful. You are of the highest castes in all societies, ubiquitously respected and revered among your peers. Your charisma and position are undeniable, and opinions of you are naturally high. Fame and renown are yours. Expect to be treated highly wherever you go, nearly to the point of worship and fanaticism. Of course, if these become troublesome or you want to be unseen, your wishes will be respected.
Perfect Vessel (1): Someone of your caliber naturally has to fly in style. While you are almost certainly capable of transporting yourself vast distances (perhaps even instantaneously) the flare of riding with your compatriots, dignitaries, and attendants in truly consummate comfort is irreplaceable. You are given full access to a legendary artifact vehicle known as a Perfect Vessel, a spacecraft designed with such divine attention to detail as to be without flaw entirely, like a rare cosmic jewel in superiority, one of perhaps five or six in the Verse. What this entails is up to you. This craft may shift between any desirable form and functions, from a megalithic solar-system sized space station to a palace-craft with internal gardens and atriums. Whatever the case may be, it is controlled by a ruthlessly loyal emergent Al which adapts to your preferences and desires, learning what you like and dislike, what weapons systems are effective and ineffective, and so on. This vessel is obviously indestructible by conventional methods, equipped with vast modular weapons systems, and can shift to any size that is desirable to you. Functions and facilities that are unsatisfactory to you can easily be upgraded or outright added/replaced through the ship's modular interiors, utilizing block-form High Order Mathematics to alter technological functions onboard. Technology you have researched, developed, or possess yourself may be integrated onto this craft seamlessly.
Ventures
Journey: Though you've achieved ultimate enlightenment, the journey does not end. You have simply come to the apex of a living circle, and await the next tumble about its fulcrums towards new goals and adventure. There are always sights to see, challenges to overcome, loves to be had and made, friendships to be developed, foes to encounter, and life-altering experiences to be had. In this life, one does not ever stop living until the time is right, and you have plenty of time. Even with nearly all you could want in the world, conflict will still arise, whether internal or external, and through effort and introspection you will overcome and rise to the challenge of human experience in spite of ascending your humanity.
Other Options
Aesthetics: You may freely alter anything about the Living God CYOA aesthetically speaking. If you don't like how a character looks, want yourself to look a certain way, want your powers to manifest with certain visual effects, and so on, you may do so freely and without limit so long as functionality is retained. If you want the entire setting to be Dune-esque in clothing, architecture, and so forth, you may choose this freely. If you want classic space-opera, Marvel comics, or any other imaginable high-fantasy sci-fi adventure aesthetics, you may do so completely and without limit. If aliens don't seem alien enough, feel free to make them that way. You may customize even down to the way people walk, talk, and act, so long as it is for purely flavorful and nonfunctional reasons. If you want everyone to look this way or that, have this or that physical feature, or act this or that way, you may alter these in any way that does not disrupt the canon. This option, obviously, will never manifest any real change in the flow of the setting, your level of power, or otherwise, and is purely intended to make everything eye-candy according to your preferences.
Character Creator: If you don't want to be a self-insert, (that is, you'd prefer not to be "yourself" but rather a character of your own design) you are free to do so. Customize your gender, race, alien species, background, home plane, personal history, and so on freely, so long as the end result is that you become a Living God and achieve the prerequisites of this CYOA. If you should choose this option, then specify your changes in any build you create.
Depower: If you have any desire to decrease your power, wealth, or anything else of the sort, you may do so completely freely and without limit. This can be done to create a greater sense of challenge, even yourself out with other cosmic contenders, or generally create the type of experience you want.
Multiplayer
Anarchic Verses: There are a multitude of interconnected Verses which innumerable players may inhabit. Each player in this mode is not guaranteed their own individual Verse of origin. There are no Master Gods, nor any other figures of significant authority other than the players themselves who are involved. Any build of any strength is freely allowed to choose this option, regardless of the exploitative nature of their builds, etc. Meta CYOAs are obviously not permitted for usage in builds of this type, but any flawed mechanics may and should be utilized to their fullest possible abuse. Chaos reigns utterly and undiluted. Godspeed, you foolish anointed.
~Varos~
Male || Timeless || Living God "Your story is mine to write, your destiny mine to control. Submit, therefore, or be scattered like chaff on the wind."
~Nature, Demeanor, and Goals~
▬▬ Nature ▬▬ Beast: You seek to conquer all who oppose you, destroying them if possible. Your world view is defined by those who bow to you and those who get eaten because they didn't. To you, all exists at and for your pleasure. You play people off each other, like chess pieces on a board, with no consideration for anyone's needs but your own. You take what you want without asking, and you destroy those weaker than yourself for amusement.
▬▬ Demeanor ▬▬ Ringleader: You have your gang and you rule them with an iron fist. You work hard to build and strengthen your organization, preaching loyalty and submission to the cause you embody. You will not stand for your law or authority to be undermined. While you understand that a group is more powerful than any one individual, you do not consider yourself equal to your band of followers. You are the head, and you use them at your whim to further your own goals.
▬▬ Goals ▬▬ Conquest: You wish to enter the Versal War so that its boons will be yours and yours alone. You will overcome the paltry empires in their petty squabbles for power with ruthless, crushing efficiency, and the wealth of a thousand universes shall sit shining in your palm. The Verse shall bow before you in worship, and your authority will be insurmountable. Of course, there is a war to wage before the revelry may begin.
Mastery: You are not satisfied with the powers you possess. Within yourself you can sense great vistas of untapped potential, and you are drawn to explore what you're truly capable of. Knowledge and power are greater than any treasures, and so you will pursue through concerted effort even higher powers than your own, to become a truly unstoppable master, wise and mighty beyond comprehension. Those few who dare to challenge you will soon know how hopelessly outmatched they are when the full potential of your strength causes creation itself to shudder in fear.
Sadism: You embrace the feeling of power over others, knowing there's no one in all of creation who could stand up to you, no matter what you do or how you abuse your unquestioned strength. In fact, rubbing their noses in it for sheer sadistic joy gives you quite a kick. You're villainous and you know it, not that there's anyone to stop you. You want power over people to make them feel weak, make people think what you want them to think, feel what you want them to feel. If anyone should defy you or speak out of turn, you'll make sure they're duly punished. Evil gives you a devilish sort of guilty pleasure, and with nothing in your way, why not indulge in it a little?
~The Spark~
A Blaze of Awakening: At the moment of your ascension, you possess power sufficient to challenge even the Master God, the arbiter of the current Versal Cycle. That speaks nothing to the powers you may come to wield as the Spark grows within you. Ancient and powerful abstract beings and coveted mantles who are in themselves nigh-omnipotent could not endure a snap of your fingers, even in fully unified throng. The whipping tongues of Amaranthine fire soar and surge within you, lusting for infinite and unrivaled power.
You have: 16 Spark Points 5 Resource Points 3 Modes of Transcendence
~Modes of Transcendence~
Dark Enlightenment: You have peered into the heart of the world, and realized that it is nothingness; a mere story; that life, love, and existence are illusory, that death and entropy consume all, even in a scenario existing only in pure fantasy. Having not prepared yourself properly for the revelation, the gravity of the illusion fills you with reality, and you stand at the precipice of the endless blackness, knowing that anything else is a farce. As such, dispelling or adding to this illusion of reality is simple. You are the only being who is truly real and outside the delusion, your opposition being a mere fog beneath your boot, nothing more than wicked fantasia.
Your abilities are negative in nature.
Outsider: You have attained a fundamental cosmic otherness, becoming unbounded to the Verse and what exists outside of it. You are likened unto an apocalyptic being beyond comprehension, rising from outside of the realm of existence itself. You are not created, but you create. You are not born, but you exist nonetheless. This curious existence you have come into contact with is nothing but a plaything before you, a strange bauble on the necklace of true infinity.
Your abilities are eldritch in nature.
Godhood: You have ascended to divinity, to be numbered among the ranks of pantheonic gods. However, you are not merely a deity, but a supreme deity, a god among gods, for whom Hyperion bends the knee and Athena kisses the foot. You are not bound up in a single aspect of godhood, such as thunder, the seas, or so on, and your powers are far more broad and overreaching. As such, you will likely be worshipped by all.
Your abilities are divine in nature.
~Spark Powers~
Omnilock (0): Your existence is outside of and beyond creation, and thus is beyond the effects of any and all things. You have absolute and utter immunity against all threats against you or anything which your being/mantle encompasses. While you may possess a physical form that exists within the bounds of dimensions, time, space, form, comprehension, and so on, this avatar is not your true being; your true existence is so vast and abstract that it defies and supersedes all physical, metaphysical, real, and unreal boundaries and definitions, capable of surviving the death of all things, immune to all negative effects derived from a creation so below your godhead. Anything which is entailed by your mantle exists in this way, and this may include anything which is subservient or attached to your person, a definition which is, for the most part, dictated by your interpretation.
Eternal Ascension (0): Until such time as you should attain Amaranth, the highest possible state of absolute omnipotence, you have infinite potential in all aspects and attributes, and grow in power at near-infinite rates which are constantly increasing at near-infinite speeds. The speed at which your rate of progress towards Amaranth increases is also near-infinite, and so on to a near-infinite degree. Your ability to supersede, ascend, and overcome limitations of any kind is of the highest caliber in existence. It is impossible for you to degrade in power, and you are in a constant state of exponential progression towards omnipotence. When you lack sufficient strength to complete your endeavors, when you are defeated, or when you are otherwise impotent to your ends, you will evolve drastically to meet the challenges entailed to you. Your existing powers may grow to vastly different proportions and in numerous functionalities, and you will come to possess powers not presented to you here as you attain greater and greater heights of power. Even omnipotence as you know it now is not the upper boundary of your future capabilities. You are able to learn any powers, techniques, arts, masteries, and abilities with ease, even by mere observation, and possess prodigious talents of nigh-infinite magnitude in your every endeavor and undertaking. Without exception, you have the greatest natural capacity for power in all of creation.
Unbound (0): You possess true and transcendent freedom from all authority and wills other than your own. Your self is inviolate and unchained by that which once abated you; good and evil, truth and lies, one and all. Because your self is inviolate, and you are thus unbound by causality, fate, the past, the present, or the future, there are no longer versions of yourself which exist in alternate worlds, times, or spaces, and you yourself encompass all that is and ever will be called "you," making you a Versal Constant. You cannot have your ascent prevented via retroactive alteration through time travel or similar abilities, nor can you have your actions subverted in any way; just as your self is inviolate, so to is your will; nothing can influence your decisions or desires but your own will and pleasure; your will is your own, and temptation, manipulation, irrationality, and the like will not inhibit it. Similarly, you are completely freed from negative emotions you do not wish to experience, and are unbound by psychological or biological factors in your wellbeing and personal state. You may experience whatever emotions or sensations you desire, and may adjust your mental and emotional state to whatever is desirable to you.
Celestial Substance (0): The physical form which your abstract consciousness inhabits is now no longer composed of mundane physical matter, and has been revoked of all possible imperfection and defect. Because your body is one of Celestial Substance, you are unbound by all biological and physical limitations. You possess no physical needs, nor do you possess any biological compulsions, though you may experience and undertake any of these if you so desire. This form is a reflection of your ultimate and absolute self, and is astoundingly beautiful beyond the scope even of the most resplendent divine beings and mantles. Even your very blood is the flickering, gleaming fluid of distilled, metatextual meaning. Your form is that which embodies perfectly your highest self, and as a result may entail whatever features you deem appropriate. Similarly, whatever you may choose, your form will possess physical and intellectual prowess at the highest possible echelon for mortal life across the breadth of the Verse.
Emanation (0): Your presence is overwhelming when in full breadth, and you may convey your power and form with whatever effects are desirable, from blinding vivid lights to strange and surreal shapes and sounds antithetical to vision and hearing themselves. Depending on the degree to which you choose to reveal your true nature, this effect can range from subtle to mind-bendingly vast. The effect which your true nature has on others is dependent upon what aspects of your infinite self you choose to magnify; your overwhelming and impossible beauty, your vast and awe-inspiring power, your consummate and perfected wisdom, your abstract and incomprehensible nature, and so on. That given, the full comprehension of your complete and true form is likely to bring existential crisis, insanity, or even death, and so is inadvisable when these effects are not desirable. With this ability at your disposal, legions of bitter foes will bow in reverence at the slightest command, followers will regard your word as infallible truth, doubters will turn white with fear, and the want of innumerable amatory hearts will be your merest touch.
Planeswalk (0): You have complete mastery over locus, and may pass between higher and alternate dimensions, times, realms, universes, planes, worlds, spaces, and so on, even to extents beyond that of the Verse's scope or in the strange and surreal interspace between the structured cosmos. You have exact knowledge of your location, both temporal and spatial, with reference to the rest of existence, thus dramatically simplifying navigation in all but the most phantasmagorical planes and spaces. You are similarly capable of omnidirectional movement at truly unlimited speeds, allotting you flight and motion at speeds massively faster than light, sufficient to traverse metaphysical distances, or distances across lengths greater even than the concept of distance, instantaneously. Your form and mind are adaptive to whatever conditions you may encounter in alternate planes, you are capable of communication perfectly in any language or system, and you can easily adapt to strange and unknown cultures, traditions, and the like throughout your travels. You may use this ability to transport others and objects as you see fit similarly. Other unmentioned minutiae of convenience for the purposes of Versal travel are included within this ability; opening portals and gateways, teleporting objects and individuals selectively, resolution of intertemporal paradoxes, and all that is requisite for complete ease of travel throughout the vast and unknowable cosmos.
Power Matrix (0): Your powers are in an echelon above that of a Point, and as such are perfected and refined in ways even the most perfectly aligned powers are not. They and your consciousness are one in the same, and as such cannot be altered, manipulated, or acted upon in any way by any force, such as in replication or dampening. Similarly, they operate without even the effort of a blink, and roil with their full power at your slightest whim, unabated by loss of focus, distraction, or any other factors. Because your powers are as much a part of you as your will is, you are aware of the every minutia, limitation, and strategic value, and you possess absolute knowledge of their every facet and mechanic, with skill in wielding them at the level of one who had possessed them for truly infinite eternities and Versal Cycles. It is impossible for your powers to ever operate in a way that is not conducive to your will and intent, and may act upon your will and intent even if you are unaware, such as preventing calamity in far-off dimensions that would be undesirable to you. A number of other enhancements of convenience are included within this ability, such as manifesting your powers in whatever aesthetic capacity is desirable to you, immunity to the effects of powers of a lower magnitude than your own, fine-tuned control of how much of your full power you allow yourself to use at a time, and so on, all to the effect of enhancing and easing the usage of your powers as much as possible.
Subtle (0): One such as yourself, just as you may wish to be known, so too may wish to be unknown. At will, you may become undetectable by any means whatsoever, in any selective capacity, along with your actions. This includes detection through such means as future-sight, divination, omniscient awareness, calculation, or any other more varied means of detection along with sensory detection. You may selectively revoke knowledge of your actions, of yourself, or of anything else as you see fit. Similarly, you are capable of revoking and reversing the effects of any of your powers at will, in whatever capacity and to whatever degree is desirable. The total effect of this ability allows you complete privacy, and welcome freedom from the detrimental consequences of your actions, errors of judgement, or brash misuse of your abilities. Few things are consequential to one as yourself.
Master (0): As is tradition with many beings of your caliber, servants, under the incentive of your divine power, will seek to serve you dutifully and do your will, often heroes of legendary prowess who wish to champion your cause, other deities in need of the protection of your wing, or even religious figures leading your worship. You may bestow any powers you possess, in whatever capacity and to whatever degree you deem appropriate, to others. Much like under the effects of Power Matrix your abilities operate unconsciously in accordance with your will, any powers which you bestow upon others will also function in accordance with your will unconsciously, and will naturally cease to function if the individual wielding them acts outside of your will or otherwise. Mortals will pine after your favors with rabid fervor in the pursuit of both your approval and the chance at eternal life, vast mystical skill, or other powers you possess, and will gladly do your continual bidding, whatever that may entail, to retain them.
True Anointed (0): Your ascension entails a vast understanding of the underlying mechanics of the metanarrative, in whatever form that may take. As a result, you possess ultimate and transcendent wisdom, as if you had existed since the beginning of creation itself, before all Versal Cycles, at the stirrings of the complete Ad Deus, with all the knowledge such a life would entail. That upon which existence stands, along with innumerable, unimaginable secrets attained over unimaginable eons are all within your repertoire of prior knowledge. You are a living repository of infinite wisdom, the ancient knowledge of the Verse funneled into your mind at the instant of your ascent. Though you are not omniscient, you are like a true messianic figure, enlightened to the deepest secrets existence and life have to offer.
Timeless (0): Your existence and origin is not bound by time in the slightest; you may decide the point in time at which you come into existence, how long you have existed, and so on, whenever you see fit to alter these. As a result, the prevention of your ascent is impossible, given that it could feasibly have occurred before you even existed, or could have simply occurred in a time impossible to intrude upon. You may retroactively decide how long you have lived, after your previous activities based upon knowledge you gain in future activities, alter your future activities based upon knowledge you gain in prior activities, and so on; the boundary of time is all but nonexistent for one as yourself.
Absolute Condition (4): Your body and its movements are completely under your control. This means you can move omnidirectionally at literally immeasurable speeds, lift an infinite amount of weight, resist forces in an infinite variety and scale, and punch with an infinite amount of force. If ever tested, you would be capable of lifting up the entire Verse on both physical and conceptual levels. Forces mean nothing to your body, allowing you to remain unmoved and unaltered even when assaulted with forces capable of ripping universes apart. Your body's position, condition, and ability to be affected by any and all alterations is entirely yours. This also allows for teleportation, unlimited shapeshifting, self-personality altering and any other abilities entailed by complete control over your own personal condition. You may take on forms that defy imagination, such as becoming a body made of time itself, or a memetic entity. Every facet of yourself is fully under your control, aside obviously from what powers you have and things of that sort, meaning you cannot grant yourself powers of any kind using this ability. You are granted martial and combat techniques that are perfected and nigh-unstoppable within your body's range of motion. The only limitation to this ability is what degree of force you're accustomed to using, though this can always be exceeded if desirable.
Restructure (4): You are capable of restructuring the Verse in a huge variety of ways. The Verse is generally structured into planes, universes, dimensions, and so forth, but you may freely tear apart this original architecture and implant your own designs. Allowing the Outside to bleed into existence, forcing persons and objects to be Versal Constants like yourself, or even merging lower dimensions into higher ones is possible to surreal and broad effect. For instance, merging the dimensions of time and distance together could make walking in a straight line move you forward through time itself, or turning a planet into a plane would make it extend infinitely in all directions in its own personal pocket of creation. Erecting barriers between universes that restrict travel, connecting dimensions together through vast openings in spacetime, and so on are easily within your capabilities. The architecture on which existence stand is merely a suggestion to you.
Power Architect (4): You have the ability to manipulate powers and abilities themselves, allowing you to null the powers and effects of your adversary, grant yourself essentially any power (of a strength lower than these abilities/this ability), grant powers to others or yourself, alter the functionality and specifications of powers, and any other, more varied manipulations, such as nullifying, absorbing, strengthening or weakening powers. These abilities also allow you to cultivate other abilities you already possess in terms of scale, including this one, up to a certain point. This and other limits on this power can be pushed as you develop your abilities. Grant yourself and others the ability to fly at lightspeed, time travel, read minds, or lift planets with ease. Your only real limitation is that the powers you deal with must have a limited scale, unlike other powers available here. For instance, you could create matter manipulation on a limited scale, but never at the unlimited scale of Omnikinesis, and so forth. Nearly any reasonably limited power is available to you, allowing you to grant yourself telepathy, enhanced durability, superior intelligence, and so forth, but not on the absurd, unlimited scale of the other abilities available here.
Worldmind (4): Your intellect is absolute and unquestioned. Every facet of your mind is literally infinite in capacity, making your memory and computational power completely without equal. You have the greatest mind in all of creation, exceeding even the Master God. You are nigh-omniscient, capable of discerning every atom of existence simply from outside observation, and can sense all things and events at once in full breadth. Your psychic and psionic abilities are absolute, being so vast as to be capable of creating your own mental Verse in your head, if you so desired. No mind is outside your control, no object too large to be fundamentally altered by your telekinesis. You are capable of every imaginable psychic and psionic feat and ability in full capacity, easily ripping consciousness itself apart, or mind controlling massive populations and swaths of the Verse. You can create illusions indiscernible from reality, warp people's sense of time, or generate psychokinetic constructs and entities with ease. You are intelligent enough to perform Block-Form High Order Mathematics in your head, capable of altering space and time itself by sheer calculative effort and other such feats. Consciousness itself prostrates before you. No technology, design, or technique is beyond your mental and creative abilities.
~Master Spark Powers~
Verse Weaver: Your understanding of the nature and structure of planes and that which interlinks them has allotted you absolute creative powers, like those which brought about the Verse as it exists now. By your whim you may create utterly anything, even to the scale of entire Verses beyond our own, molded to the magnification of your splendor. This power is over creation, and not destruction; you may create without limitation, but cannot destroy through any means using these abilities other than to revoke that which you create. Limitless potential dimensions, personal artifacts and objects of value, vast construct armies, and entire multiverses formed to your liking are all easily within your power, and the scalar limitation of the infinite Verse is as easily violable by your simple will. That which you create is not limited by your understanding, imagination, or any other factors; that which you will to be created is created, regardless of these factors. That which you do not personally detail will be implemented as if you had detailed it.
(Evolution of Restructure, Heaven King)
Spark Artifice: You have the absolute power to alter state, quality, quantity, attribute, and so on of any existing concept, entity, object, or force, including powers themselves. That is, you can grant yourself and others any conceivable powers and attributes up to and including those of the nigh-infinite magnitude of Spark Powers such as Omnikinesis, Worldmind, and so on. This in itself constitutes nigh-omnipotence in the sheer variety of powers you may design for yourself, lacking in any scalar limitations whatsoever, being powers born of your enlightenment. That said, these powers cannot reach the heights of Master Spark Powers, being so infinitely superior that only the original spark of Amaranth within you could drive you to the Master Spark you have attained; their might is thus irreplicable. As much as these are valuable, you possess a complete mastery over meaning itself, on a metaphysical level. The fundamental attributes and elements from which even metaphysical concepts arise bow to your artifice. You do not merely manipulate the matter and quantities with which the object of your control is concerned; you fundamentally alter the force of meaning upon which the reality of a given object stands. All is your effigy; all is as your attribution states it to be. The very machinations of the Ad and Sub Deus, the dead gods of entity and existence, are beneath your command.
(Evolution of Alchemical Arbiter, Spectrum, Power Architect)
Perfection: You have attained existential, philosophical personal perfection in all existing aspects. Thus, you are omnicompetent, and your overmind, physical form, and metaphysical spirit are absolute and infinite in every beneficial capacity. With a flick of your finger, your physical strength could rip an infinite number of Verses asunder; with the slightest mental exertion, you could deduce the solution to any conceivable inquiry, and no physical or metaphysical forces are capable of bringing even the slightest harm to you. You have absolutely no weaknesses or detrimental traits whatsoever, and represent the highest conceivable state of being. That which constitutes your being is in accordance with your whim, and so you may be, conceptually speaking, anything which you see fit to be, without any limitations: you may embody the Verse itself, or the concepts of space and time, or even the unified overmind presiding over all conscious life. Your endeavors are universally successful, and you are incapable of failure. However, because your perfection is as yet distinct from the imperfection of creation itself, this state is not yet Amaranth; it may be seen as a kind of contained omnipotence centered inward.
(Evolution of Absolute Condition, Presence)
Nous Omnibus: Your mind is completely unlocked and infinite, without even the limitation of thought itself imposed upon your mental faculties. You are truly, completely omniscient without limit or flaw. Your absolute mind entails mastery of dark sciences and divine technologies exceeding by far developments in any times and any Verses. Mechanical and alchemical constructs which alter the very structure of the Verse itself, starships which employ weaponry that threatens the highest gods, and computational monoliths which can calculate planes and dimensions into existence are all as primitive sticks and rocks to you. Because of your absolute and infinite mental prowess, you are capable of psychic and psionic feats of absolutely unlimited scale and near infinite variety; you may easily control or read the minds of every entity in existence simultaneously, psychokinetically mold space and time, create and alter consciousness on an archetypal level, and perform mathematical operations which by sheer calculative complexity can warp dimensions and the laws of creation as we know them. Your mind could create an infinite number of mental Verses as if it were nothing, and crush entire planes of existence like cans with naught but a psychic twitch.
(Evolution of Worldmind)
~Resources~
Wealth (1): You have access to multiple Vaults, vast cosmic stores of wealth designed to house the fortunes of ancient civilizations securely until their rightful owner might claim them. This entails nigh limitless supplies of rare gems, metals and materials, precious jewelry and antiques, as well as near limitless stores of all variety of interuniversal currencies, such as Pearls, Credits, Gold Coins, and so forth. The wealth stored within is so vast as to be the net worth of thousands of universes (or roughly 20% to 30% of the Verse's currently produced wealth), capable of easily purchasing personal galaxies, pocket dimensions, powerful magitech, potent substances, and any number of slaves you could wish for. The Vaults slowly grow in size and capacity over time, filling with exponentially greater riches in relation to how much you expend, so that you always have enough wealth to purchase essentially whatever you require. Inflation or other economic constraints will never cause the wealth of your Vaults to diminish by excessive spending. You can easily turn a massive profit by investing in mining operations, Dyson spheres, planetary conquests, black markets, and more to become a powerful mogul and economic force throughout the Verse. No one can access the Vault but you, and you may access its resources at any time. The riches of ten-thousand universes are at your disposal, and will only grow with time. If you have Collections or any other extraplanar storage facilities, these may be merged at your discretion. If you already have an idea of what you wish to spend some of this wealth on, you may specify as you desire. Note that currency created using any powers or permutations of powers are fundamentally invalid, and generally as valuable as counterfeit. None of the items on this list of Resources may be purchased using this supply of wealth, though this does not apply to funds acquired through other ventures, meaning that through investment and business you may acquire funds applicable to these ends.
Armies (1): At your disposal is a vast, self-sustaining and replenishing army of superelite soldiers, equipped with the most powerful technology, magic, superpowers, starships, and so on in the local Verse. Who and what composes this army are up to your discretion: perhaps an armada of vastly intelligent androids, or perhaps a long-preserved race of ancient warriors, awaiting their true leader for millennia. Whatever the case may be, your forces outclass any prominent empire in the Verse tenfold, and are unstoppably armed to the teeth with every imaginable resource, trained to hardened perfection. If your entire army is reduced to nothing, they are capable of being replenished, given due time to lick wounds, a task which your forces are capable of quickly and efficiently. Means to produce and maintain any weapons systems or fleets you may want are available, and this may be done on massive scales. Only the full might of every major empire in the Verse could stand up to even half of your crushing armada. All of your armies are fully and totally loyal to you to the point of death, and will serve your every whim without complaint, to the fullest extent of their abilities. Your armies may grow exceedingly quickly if you have need of even greater forces, but they require time to increase their amassed strength.
Personal Plane (1): You possess a personal plane of existence, in which you are absolutely, truly omnipotent and fully omniscient concerning the scope and events within it. This plane is completely infinite, and in theory the entire Verse could be simulated within it for testing or entertainment, if you really wanted to. You may invite others to this place freely and take any items you desire with you, but any changes you make to outside objects or persons (including yourself) will be nullified and restored to their original condition unless done without the use of your planar omnipotence (in the case of training, retaining new information, etc). You cannot take anything constructed using your planar omnipotence outside. Everything within your personal plane is as "real" as anything outside, it just can't leave with you. This is a perfect place to construct your infinite palaces, test military strategies, develop and study new technologies, explore and push the boundaries of your powers, or entertain yourself and guests with whatever your heart’s desire. You could even declare this plane the capital of your empire and transport your populations within, or use it to maintain your standing military. You may transport yourself, anyone, and any of your possessions you desire into this space, though other Ascendants such as yourself may leave at any time they desire. Any other extradimensional storage such as Vaults may be combined with this one as you see fit.
Technology (1): You have access to mystical and scientific constructs, designs, and systems only dreamed of by the rest of the Verse. High-Order Mathematics, Source Cores, Hyperion Veils, Mass Relicators, and more, along with all their designs are both given to you in an extradimensional storage facility and injected directly into your mind, granting you perfect knowledge of their inner workings and how to further expand upon them to points of parody. If you have ever wanted weapons capable of annihilating the entire Virgo supercluster with a single blast, or the means to custom design the constellations in your image, or mystical tech capable of generating populations of billions of intensely loyal artificial humanoids, this choice will serve you well. Your prospective technology will outclass even the most mighty sciences of ancient times, much less the means of today. Your opponents will be as if primitive animals by comparison to your vast advancements. Fill your worlds with the means to produce limitless supplies of valuable resources, eliminate hunger entirely from the genes of your populace, or ruthlessly crush your foes with super viruses that sway their armies to bend the knee before you. If you have Vaults or other extradimensional storage facilities, these may be combined and organized according to your preference.
Territory (1): Splitting the pie of creation is the point of some of the most vicious contention in the Verse, each glittering star worth its weight in blood. Even the most prominent empires in creation do not control but 5% of its breadth, given how utterly vast an undertaking conquest of that scale is. To give you a head start on this endeavor, your empire controls a whopping 20% of the Verse outright. Given that nearly 40% of the Verse remains unconquered, your stake in the war games is greater than any other. This includes full dictatorial hegemony over all the occupants of your territory, access to all of the resources, infrastructure, and technology therein, and the capacity to govern such a massive empire at full efficiency without any personal hiccups. By laying claim to such a massive territory, you solidify it as your permanent empire, meaning this and any other portions of the Verse you expand into cannot be reconquered or claimed by another without your consent. Your rule over this and other territories you come to control is unquestioned, and betrayal is either unthinkable or fruitless for the betrayer. Cultivating this territory to your liking in terms of business, production, government, trade, and so on will require your decision and judgement throughout numerous planes, dimensions, and galactic superclusters. How your governance is organized, how your administration will expend and draw funds, and so forth are all up to your discretion. You are an insurpable god-king.
~Relations~
▬▬ Subordinates ▬▬ Nihil: An ancient, slumbering evil, Nihil's story is a sordid one. Upon attaining Dark Enlightenment, her human form was twisted and torn apart for defiling the deepest secrets of creation, forever tainting the cosmos with the knowledge that it is nothing but a fantasy. In a rage against the Verse for its deception, Nihil annihilated vast swaths of the cosmos, killing uncountable numbers in blind anger and grief for billions of years. The efforts of even the Master God were required to contain her, and she has remained in an endless prison, until now. If you should take her as an ally, you may free her from her eternal bindings to aid you. If she is your foe, her fetters will finally be loosed, and unknowable evil will come upon the world.
Slan: The Supreme Goddess of Hells is certainly nothing to scoff at. She boasts powers which cause the likes of even the strongest pantheons to shudder, commanding armies of daemons and nightmarish abominations that put Lovecraft to shame. Though generally reserved to her screaming hellscapes, Slan is not above invading other realms to cause mayhem and strife among mortals, sowing the seeds of death and chaos. Exceedingly deceptive, manipulative, and sadistic, Slan is the master of cunning, an ancient and clever villain who is motivated to do evil simply for evil's sake. Her only drive is towards shaping the world into a place of pure chaos, lacking any restrictions, laws, morals, or limits.
~Other Options~
Humanity: While having the potential of a god certainly relieves you of most of the constraints of the human condition, there are parts of life that, though they're objectively negative, flavor human experience and make life what it is. You can become tired, you can become intoxicated, you can become hopelessly smitten, you can become bruised and bloodied, and you retain all your normal, healthy human emotions. Similarly, you can be incapacitated for temporary intervals, can fail at tasks you're unfamiliar with, and can face setbacks and hiccups just like anyone else. This applies to a myriad of other generally minor parts of human life that make a narrative interesting. The catch to this is that none of these negative effects will occur in a scenario where serious consequences would come as a result of them, or if other generally dire circumstances apply. For instance, you would never become tired to the point of unconsciousness if the fate of the world rested on your shoulders, nor would you become incapacitated if being incapacitated would result in your friends being slaughtered in your absence, and so on. Essentially, this option is intended to apply only in cases where your experience would be enhanced by having certain human traits. This option does not make you any more or less powerful in any way, and is designed solely with flavor purposes in mind. In short, taking this option makes you less of a Mary Sue and more of an actual character, while still retaining your absurd power.
Aesthetics: You may freely alter anything about the Living God CYOA aesthetically speaking. If you don't like how a character looks, want yourself to look a certain way, want your powers to manifest with certain visual effects, and so on, you may do so freely and without limit so long as functionality is retained. If you want the entire setting to be Dune-esque in clothing, architecture, and so forth, you may choose this freely. If you want classic space opera, Marvel comics, or any other imaginable high-fantasy sci-fi adventure aesthetics, you may do so completely and without limit. If aliens don't seem alien enough, feel free to make them that way. You may customize even down to the way people walk, talk, and act, so long as it is for purely flavorful and nonfunctional reasons. If you want everyone to look this way or that, have this or that physical feature, or act this or that way, you may alter these in any way that does not disrupt the canon. This option, obviously, will never manifest any real change in the flow of the setting, your level of power, or otherwise, and is purely intended to make everything eye-candy according to your preferences.
Character Creator: If you don't want to be a self-insert, (that is, you'd prefer not to be "yourself" but rather a character of your own design) you are free to do so. Customize your gender, race, alien species, background, home plane, personal history, and so on freely, so long as the end result is that you become a Living God and achieve the prerequisites of this CYOA. If you should choose this option, then specify your changes in any build you create.
Depower: If you have any desire to decrease your power, wealth, or anything else of the sort, you may do so completely freely and without limit. This can be done to create a greater sense of challenge, even yourself out with other cosmic contenders, or generally create the type of experience you want.
~Multiplayer~
Anarchic Verses: There are a multitude of interconnected Verses which innumerable players may inhabit. Each player in this mode is not guaranteed their own individual Verse of origin. There are no Master Gods, nor any other figures of significant authority other than the players themselves who are involved. Any build of any strength is freely allowed to choose this option, regardless of the exploitative nature of their builds, etc. Meta CYOAs are obviously not permitted for usage in builds of this type, but any flawed mechanics may and should be utilized to their fullest possible abuse. Chaos reigns utterly and undiluted. Godspeed, you foolish anointed.
"This world plays by different rules than the one we used to know. We must do the same lest we stagnate and die, regardless of how ruthless or cunning we become. For in the game of natural selection only the fittest survive."
Starting Continent
Andor: Andor is the largest continent. Home to humanoid races such as humans, elves, dwarfs, gnomes, goblins, orcs, centaurs, dryads, and fairies. The land of Andor is littered with forests, lakes, mountains, and rolling hills. In many ways, it's similar to medieval Europe. There are lots of monsters that terrorize the humanoid races of Andor. The humanoids have found that it's much more effective to combat monsters with small bands of specialized monster hunters rather than attacking them with large armies. This has led them to create monster hunter guilds that deal with the monsters. While the monster hunters deal with monstrous threats, the soldiers of the different kingdoms deal with humanoid threats. Unless of course a big dragon attacks, then every man and woman who can bear arms is called upon. Dragons are hated and despised in Andor because they are the most dangerous of all monsters. Young dragons are actively hunted by the many monster hunter guilds that reside here. Some dragons are enslaved by powerful spellcasters. But keeping an enslaved dragon as a familiar is extremely dangerous, as dragons almost always tend to break free from such spells. Andor is split into two landmasses, Anduvia and Cendor. Anduvia is the northern region of Andor. Cendor is the southern part of Andor. In Anduvia any non-humans are enslaved and referred to as half-monsters or demi-humans. Magic is also banned. The reason for this is their worship of Andea. While they don't have any mages, they have powerful warrior priests. In Cendor on the other hand non-humans are mostly treated as equals and magic is highly valued because of its power.
Species
Western Dragon (Gain Wings [Tier 1] and Scales [Tier 2]): Western Dragons are the most iconic species of dragon in Andor. They are famous not only for their hard scales, but also their greed, ruthlessness, and aggression. They tend to raid humanoid settlements to steal their treasures and add them to their hoard. The most powerful Wester Dragons have more treasures than the richest of kings.
Size
Enormous: A dragon of this size is an absolute force of nature. Enormous dragons can be anywhere between the size of a small castle to a large castle. Extremely few land-living dragons grow this large and those who do will undoubtedly have their names go down in legend.
Color
Black (Gain Acid Breath [Tier 1] or Energy Breath [Tier 1]): Black Dragons prefer to live in desolate places like swamps, badlands, and wastelands. They are infamous for being vicious, greedy, malicious, sadistic, and power-hungry. Despite their sinister personality traits they are often visited by ambitious or desperate humanoids. This is because out of all dragons Black Dragons are the most likely to form pacts or make deals with humanoids.
Breath Attack
Acid Breath Tier 1: You can breathe acid. The corrosion of your acid will mostly inflict superficial damage to your victims. Your acid is more effective against inorganic material. Its true value lies in its ability to dull weapons and break down armor. However this process isn't instant, it will take some time for the corrosion to kick in after you apply the acid.
Tier 2: Your acid is more potent. The strongest magical weapons and armor will fare no better than regular weapons and armor against your acid. The corrosion of your acid will also be faster.
Tier 3: Your acid breath will instantly melt any inorganic material it comes into contact with.
Poison Breath Tier 1: You can breathe poisonous gas. Anyone who breathes in your gas will become poisoned. Their health will rapidly deteriorate and after 30 minutes they will die without magical treatment of a similar tier as this breath attack. Additionally, you are immune to the effects of your own poison. Your poison breath can be avoided if the target is careful and holds their breath during this breath attack. This breath attack can also be countered by wind magic.
Tier 2: The poisonous gas you breathe won't disperse so easily. It will cling to the battlefield like a poisonous mist and linger for a good while.
Tier 3: The toxicity of your poisonous breath is extremely potent. It will take only 1 minute for it to kill.
Features
Muscles Tier 1: Your muscles are well-developed. You are physically stronger than the average dragon and creature of your size class.
Tier 2: Your musculature is impressive and beyond the majority of dragons of your size class. When it comes to brute force you are vastly superior to the other dragons and creatures that are of the same size class.
Scales Tier 1: Your scales are as hard as steel. While your scales offer excellent protection against piercing and slashing attacks, they are less effective against bludgeoning attacks. Your scales will absorb some of the impacts of bludgeoning attacks, but most of the force will go through.
Tier 2: Your scales are now as hard as mithril. Only the strongest weapons and attacks can pierce or cut through your scales.
Wings Tier 1 (Gain Flight [Tier 1]): You have wings and are able to fly. Taking off from the ground is rather slow and requires some effort. Initiating a flight will leave you vulnerable for a brief moment. It would be easier for you to jump off a cliff or some other high place in order to take to the skies.
Tier 2: Your wings are much stronger than the average dragon's wings. You can quickly and efficiently take off from the ground.
Tier 3: Your wings are some of the strongest wings seen among dragonkind. With the flap of your wings, you can create powerful gusts of wind that can deflect projectiles like arrows, throwing knives, javelins, and crossbow bolts.
Jaws Tier 1: Your fangs are hard as steel. While a biting attack is the attack with the shortest range a dragon can make, it is also one of the deadliest attacks if it connects. Capable of piercing skin, rending flesh, and crushing bone. Biting attacks are best used against powerful enemies, as it's often not worth the effort to bite weak enemies when you could have used your claws or tail which are generally faster and have a longer reach.
Tier 2: Your fangs are as hard as mithril and your bite even stronger.
Claws Tier 1: You've got claws as hard as steel. Your claws can slash and pierce through most natural armor such as thick leather, hide, carapaces and scales. Claw attacks have a lot longer reach than bite attacks and are great for close quarters combat, grappling, and aerial combat.
Tier 2: Your claws are as hard as mithril. Now your claws have no problem cutting through and piercing most metal armors.
Tail Tier 1: Your tail is prehensile. It can grab and manipulate objects. It can also be used during grappling to choke, grab, hold, and restrain your enemies.
Tier 2: The bone structure of your tail is robust and strong. It can withstand heavy impacts and be used as a weapon. A tail attack is the melee attack with the longest reach that a dragon can make. Tail attacks are especially useful against multiple smaller opponents or a single similar-sized enemy.
Horns Tier 1: You have horns that are as hard as steel. Your skull is also reinforced to withstand heavy impacts. The horns can look however you want. Forward and upward-pointing horns are better for charging enemies and for headbutts. While backward-pointing horns are great for stabbing attacks during grappling and as a defense against neck bites. Charge attacks are devastating and work very well as opening attacks during aerial, land, and underwater combat.
Tier 2: Your horns are as hard as mithril.
Spikes Tier 1: You have spikes growing on your body. These spikes are as hard as steel. Your spikes are a great defense against large enemies like monsters and dragons. If they try to bite, tackle, grapple, or maul you, they will risk getting impaled by your spikes. Of course, they could always aim for the parts of your body that aren't covered in spikes. But then you won't have to protect your entire body, making it easier to predict their attacks.
Tier 2: Your spikes are as hard as mithril.
Roar Tier 1: Your roar is really loud. It can easily scare away creatures of a smaller size class than you. Your roar is less effective against intelligent creatures like humanoids.
Tier 2: Your roar is terrifying. It can now scare away creatures of a similar size class as yours. Even intelligent creatures will cower before your fear-inducing roar.
Venom Tier 1: You have venom glands connected to either your fangs or your stinger (requires Tail [Tier 3]). Your venom will exhaust your victims, mess with their sense of balance and make them nauseous. Your venom can only be cured by Spells of a similar tier as your venom. You're immune to your own venom.
Tier 2: Your venom is more powerful. It can now paralyze any creature of up to 2 sizes bigger than your own, but your venom is now slow-acting and will take 30 minutes to work. You can speed up the process by injecting your enemy with more venom.
Tier 3: Your venom is extremely dangerous and fast-acting. Taking only a few minutes to kill its victims.
Senses Tier 1 x5: Choose 1 sense (Smell, Touch, Sight, Hearing, or Taste). Your chosen sense is equal to the best humanity has ever produced. You may purchase this feature multiple times, choosing a new sense each time.
Tier 2 (Smell/Touch/Taste/Hearing/Sight): Your chosen sense is equal to the best the animal kingdom has to offer.
Tier 3 (Sight): Your chosen sense is enhanced to the point of being supernatural. For example, if you choose sight you will be able to switch between different vision modes like infrared vision, telescopic vision, x-ray vision, and night vision. You would also be able to see through visual illusions.
Regeneration Tier 1: You can regrow lost limbs and you don't scar. Most of your wounds will heal within a day. Injuries caused by acid or fire will take twice as long to heal. Regeneration will slow down poisons and venoms, but it won't make you immune to them.
Tier 2: Most of your injuries will heal within 1 hour. It is impossible for you to lose consciousness or die due to blood loss. It is also possible for you to bleed yourself in order to cleanse your body of Tier 1 venoms.
Elemental Resistance Tier 1 x2 (Poison/Venom/Acid): Choose 1 element (Heat, Cold, Poison/Venom, Acid, Wind, or Lightning). You are now able to survive and thrive in environments where your chosen element is dominant. For example, heat would allow you to live in deserts, jungles, or volcanic landscapes. You may purchase this feature multiple times, choosing a new element each time.
Tier 2: You are completely immune to any kind of damage from your chosen element.
Tier 3: When you are exposed to your chosen element you will be healed proportionally to the intensity of the exposure.
Flight Tier 1: You are able to fly. However, you're not very graceful or fast in the air.
Tier 2: You are much faster and more agile during flight. You can outmaneuver and run circles around most flying creatures of your own size and any size class beyond. War machines like ballistae and catapults will have a much harder time hitting you.
Crawling Tier 1: Most dragons are rather slow and clumsy on the ground. Unlike most dragons, you are a fast runner. You can match the speed of creatures of similar size that are considered fast. This will make hunting for food or running away from a threat easier.
Brain Tier 1: You learn things twice as fast and your long-term memory is improved significantly.
Tier 2: You are able to process information faster and have a perfect memory. You can recall any memory you have in perfect detail. While concentrating you can even enter a state of mind to relive your memories.
Lungs Tier 1: By default, you would be able to hold your breath for about 30 seconds while doing a physically demanding activity. With this, you can safely hold your breath for up to 2 minutes while doing a physically demanding activity like fighting. This might not seem very useful, but being able to hold your breath in high-altitude aerial battles, fights against dragons with poison breath, or underwater battles can make a huge difference in the outcome of the battle.
Tier 2: You can now safely hold your breath for up to 30 minutes while performing a physically demanding activity.
Tier 3: Your lung capacity is extremely vast. You are able to safely hold your breath for up to 1 hour while doing a physically exhausting activity.
Rare Features
Fusion Breath: You can now purchase a second breath attack. Your breath attack will now become a fusion of your first and second breath attack. All tiers of the breath attacks that are associated with your chosen color will cost 1 less Ur-Ember for your second breath attack.
Enduring Features: Normally any feature of a dragon that is severed from its body would lose its supernatural hardness. Your features, however, only lose 1 tier worth of hardness, and they can be used to create high-quality weapons and armor.
Humanoid Hands: Instead of front legs, you have hands similar to that of a humanoid. With your added finger dexterity and opposable thumbs, you will be able to wield weapons in combat.
Acid Blood: The blood that runs through your veins is highly acidic. It is very effective against inorganic material and less effective against organic material. Your acidic blood offers an offensive defense against slashing and piercing attacks.
Adrenal Glands: You can make your adrenal glands secrete powerful chemicals into your bloodstream that will temporarily boost your physical abilities. This will vastly improve your strength, speed, and reflexes. It will also suppress pain and increase your ferocity, aggression, and bloodlust. You will feel exhausted after this burst of strength.
Reincarnation: This rare feature is only available to Greater Dragons, dragons that are born from a Dragonfall. Your soul and mind will be immortal and persist even after you die. While dead you will be unconscious. But you will be revived using some of the mystical energies that are released into the world during the next Dragonfall.
Diet
Meat: Feeding on the meat from mammals, reptiles, and binds is what the majority of dragons do. It's what people expect a dragon to do. And for good reason, as mammals, reptiles, and birds are abundant. From the smallest of rats to the biggest basilisk, there is always prey to be found no matter the dragon's size.
Sea Creatures: Feeding on fish, crustaceans, and other aquatic creatures is common among dragons below medium size. Fish is both easy to catch and find. Some of the largest dragons feed on this category. In the depths of the oceans there are plenty of sea creatures of varying sizes.
Drawbacks
Hoarder: You feel a strong desire to collect and hoard treasures. Treasure is defined as anything you perceive as valuable. Be it gold, precious stones, legendary artifacts, magical tomes, or beautiful women. To part with any item of your hoard is almost unthinkable to you.
Leaking Breath: Whenever you breathe you will exhale a tiny amount of your breath attack. Your leaking breath will reduce your daily limit of breath attacks by 1 breath attack. But more importantly, it will reveal the nature of your breath attacks and your breath will stop leaking whenever you have used up your daily breath attacks.
“Life's just one big story, and I live it not for the sake of a happy end, but an amusing one.”
Personality
Syn is best described as having blue-and-orange morality, since he sees no wrong in doing whatever he pleases to the world and people around him. This is due entirely to the fact that, from his point of view, everything that exists is nothing more than a work of pure fiction. One he has surpassed by virtue of the powers he has been given over the course of his, admittedly short, chain. It is for this reason that he does as he pleases, regardless of whom it might affect or hurt. This has led many people to think him evil, when in reality he is not. For to call him such would be akin to calling a person who enjoys playing violent video games a murderer, when in truth they are no such thing, since the “people” they have slaughtered are nothing more than NPCs. Scripts guiding 3D models along predetermined paths and through pre-scripted routines–which are endless in their repetition–while the entire scenario itself is nothing more than harmless entertainment…
Entertainment that has zero bearing on empirical reality.
Still, the majority of what Syn does he does for his own amusement. Which is why he doesn’t often go on senseless killing sprees or indulge in baser desires and extremely depraved acts. He wants to enjoy a good story, take part in a compelling narrative, instead of simply solving everyone’s problems outright or reducing everyone he meets to a mindless pleasure toy. It’s also why he prefers to limit the amount of power he uses in a confrontation, as he wishes to engage in comparatively fair fights against equally-skilled opponents. For there is little entertainment to be found in completely annihilating every threat one comes across. He doesn’t have a preference for or against companionship, and views those who do wish to travel with him as toys that are just the tiniest bit more special than the rest, especially if they manage to endear themselves to him. After all, every story has its fan favorite character or authorial pet. In the end though, he is more than capable of leaving them to die should the story or moment call for it.
The only time he makes an exception to this rule is in regards to matters which concern his family, or at least the one he was inserted into at the start of his chain anyway. Then again, he makes a lot of exceptions when it comes to his little sister Ajimu, though the reason for this is unknown. Perhaps it’s because she’s similar to him in terms of existential nature, perhaps it’s because of a genuine familial bond, or perhaps it’s for some other reason entirely. Whatever the case may be, Syn cares for her deeply, and should anyone actually try to harm her then they’ll find themselves on the receiving end of his wrath. Which is a very unfortunate place for anyone to be, regardless of their current existential status, as even fates worse than death cannot keep Syn from enacting his vengeance.
Hakoniwa Academy: A vast campus with dozens of different buildings of huge size, all centered around a massive tower that rises from the center of the campus. Hakoniwa Academy is the most advanced school on the planet, even ignoring its’ dealings with the Abnormal, and it gives only the best to its students. Encouraging independence and ambition, countless student committees and clubs have sprung up around campus and carry out their wonderful daily high school lives. Beneath the tower lies the many levels of the underground base where the current incarnation of the Flask Plan is being researched but it shouldn’t matter to you too much for a few weeks yet.
Not Equal: You are one of the creations of Ajimu Najimi, the godlike true creator of the Flask Plan. Created to act as one of her agents in Hakoniwa Academy, you’ve never been called into duty and thus have simply enjoyed your happy school life so far. You’ve got none of the attitude problems of the other origins but you may find yourself pressed into work alongside some fellow Not Equals later on. You’ve got 200 CP to spend on the Power section for Not Equal powers only.
Medaka Sue [1200]: Could there be any being as perfect as you? Only the youngest Kurokami heiress can match your natural abilities, all of which are described below.
Your body, mind and spirit are all incredibly far beyond even the peak of human capability. You possess superhuman ability in adaptability, agility, analysis, awareness, attractiveness, balance, calculation, charisma, cognition, combat, competence, coordination, deduction, dexterity, durability, eloquence, endurance, flexibility, instinct, intelligence, intuition, invincibility, leadership, memory, meta-luck, mimicry, perception, persuasion, reasoning, reflexes, regeneration, senses, speed, strength, tactics, vitality, and willpower. To illustrate the sheer level of each of these traits, some examples follow. Your speed allows you to travel at Mach 20 with no training at all, strength enough to pull thousands of tons just by walking forward, charisma enough to get 98% of a student vote to become student president, regeneration to heal every single bone in your body from shattered to full health in ninety seconds and so on. These attributes will also scale up in the case of non-human species that have greater baselines for their average.
Your learning rate is perhaps your most shocking ability. You are able to perfectly learn, memorize, recall, understand, master, and utilize anything and any skill by experiencing or observing it once, within seconds. Even things that take years or even decades for prodigies to learn, you can master, truly master, in just a few seconds. You also have no limitations on how far you can grow or learn, able to improve all skills and attributes and abilities without limit and with no loss in speed. You have total control over all parts of your body, including muscles, bones, flesh, blood, organs, nerves, hair, and veins. All of these can be consciously or subconsciously controlled, moved or adjusted, including improving them through thought to inhuman levels. This control is precise to an atomic level. This also allows you to be immune to any forced control of your physical body.
Finally, you have a series of super modes that you can unlock over time. Each one greatly boosts the power of your physical abilities and all of your powers, though at first your initial mode will drive you to a mad fury whilst in it. As you grow and learn to use these, you will be able to retain control of your temper and even all other aspects of yourself, rendering you immune to any attempt to control your mind or body or spirit. Eventually you may even be able to keep yourself permanently within this form or to unlock new, unheard of forms based on the powers you have or that you encounter. The Legendary Hero [1200]: You were born as a being with the power and destiny to both save the world and to destroy it. Your physical form is far beyond any human’s. You have the power to destroy the moon in a single blow, to travel faster than light with just your own two feet and several more unique powers on top. The first, imbuing your power into other objects. With this you can use your full power through anything you pick up. A flicked rubber band would hit with the greatest amount of power you could put out with a punch. You could poke someone with a pencil and blow a hole clean through them. Even the air around you can be used, a puff of air turning into a wave of destruction when it originates from you.
The second, a great defense against all powers. No supernatural or superhuman ability, no matter how strong or strange, can affect you unless you allow it too. From simple super strength or attacking with the elements to the esoteric, such as warping reality or attempting to delete the concept of your existence, you are utterly unaffected. The sole exception are powers based in the power of language, spoken or written or signed abilities that work solely by being spoken or written or signed. The Styles of this world are one such example. In addition to this, once you have seen an attack against your person once, excepting one that is based in language as a Style is, it becomes useless and ineffective against you, as you cease to recognize it as an attack. Obviously, if it failed to kill you the first time, it is nothing more than a bug sting.
The final, the irreversible action. Any action you take or change you make or damage you deal can be made permanent and irreversible by your will. Wounds you make will never be repaired or healed or changed at all, no matter what is attempted to change them, though language based powers will bypass this too. If you were to break someone’s will, it would remain broken for all eternity. You may reverse this at any time as you will, though it will automatically do so upon your death. This also has a secondary use, in that any attack that hits you will be broken permanently. Swords will be shattered, arms left twisted, techniques rendered powerless and so on. The greater the attack, the worse it will be broken. An ordinary sword might only be left bent and rusted but an indestructible sword of arcane might would be reduced to a pile of dust. Anshin’in [1200]: A mysterious being has appeared once more in this world. A being that can’t be called human yet looks like one. The second member of the Najimi family has appeared and it’s none other than yourself Jumper. But what’s this? You don’t have any powers yet. How strange for such a high-priced option. Perhaps you should wait a bit and see what appears to you. You see, the power of Anshin’in is not one that is immediately expressed but one that is infinite in time. The power to develop more powers, independently of anything else and at a rate that makes all things outside of it really quite silly.
You automatically develop new Abnormalities at a rate of 3,779 new powers per year. That’s about 10 new powers every 24 hours. A stunning rate isn’t it? Not all powers are equal however. The vast majority of powers that you gain are ultra-specific to your immediate thoughts and wishes at the time and quite limited in ability. Looking at yourself in the mirror one morning and wishing you didn’t need to use a razor to shave would give you Rather Razor [The shave facial hair from faces with a thought power] while wishing you could punish the driver who cut you off in traffic later that morning may give you Back Wheel Burnout [The ruin the back wheels of any car you can see power].
Now and then, you can gain powers with greater scope and magnitude, especially if you are desperately needing them or have a great connection to the potential power. A lifelong pyromaniac stuck battling a foe in a dry forest has a good chance of developing Foolish Friendly Flames [The create and control fire power]. These good abilities are quite rare, especially if there’s no pressing need for them, and even more powerful abilities are even rarer. As you get older, in the scale of orders of magnitude older, better powers will begin to become more and more common for you to regularly develop. Trampling On Your Dignity [50]: If you’re going to send a message, you might as well do it in complete overkilling style. There’s really no other way to go about things. Whenever you want, you’re able to call up text in whatever font and size you want to float around you in the air, spelling out anything you want the words to spell out.
Clinging With Your Feet [50]: A very strange martial art is the discipline of clinging to walls and ceilings with your feet, allowing you to walk on them as if they were the ground. You’ve become a master of this art, to the point of being able to use it even when you’re wearing shoes or piloting a mecha. Gravity only holds you down when you want it to. Or when you jump and stop holding on with your feet.
I Wanna Be The Strongest Hero [800]: You’ve become the very star of the story. A regular Main Character. At least, you’ll be on the level of the current Main Character. This doesn’t confer any of the amazing power and talent that Medaka Kurokami has. Not at first anyway. Rather, you’ll find that taking on the role of a Main Character provides a wealth of benefits and challenges over time.
Wherever you are, no matter the world, you’ll find yourself being dragged into and becoming an important part of the story. Becoming one of the first and most trusted allies of the protagonist, gaining hold of the McGuffin before anyone else does, being seen as the arch-villain by the hero, one way or another you’ll find yourself in a major position. This position will also result in you gaining many of the benefits that protagonists, mainly those of a Shonen manga bent, are likely to run into. Powerful and trusted friends and allies gather around you and you’ve got an honestly absurd ability to convert your former opponents into new friends. You’ll find yourself encountering useful and special items or being chosen as the student of some famous and powerful figure in the world. When you encounter adversity, you’ll also encounter potential ways to overcome that adversity such as new power ups or weapons or techniques.
Not always but they will make a big difference. You’ll even find yourself to have quite a lot of luck during the start and middle of the story, what some might call plot armor, which greatly assists you in surviving and thriving, though this cannot stretch forever. Whichever world you find yourself in, you’ll see that you receive about the same number and value of advantages that the local protagonist would receive, though quite rarely will they actually be the same advantages the local guy got. A blessed hero makes for a blessed you, while one more down on his luck will see your benefits faltering to match. In this world, you’d be matched against Zenkichi Hitoyoshi, vice president of the student council. If you are willing to pay an additional 300 CP over this perks’ base price, you will receive the same sort of busted unfairness of a Main Character like Medaka Kurokami herself. No longer limited to the level of the local big man, you’ll find yourself showered in blessings equal to the Heroine of Heroines herself. Superb powers awakening in you, brilliant teachers taking you under their wing, riches and treasures and relics almost beyond imagining making their way into your hands. More fortunate than the local protagonist would be the least you could expect. Medaka doesn’t play by anyone’s rules and it looks like you don’t either. That said, this might push that poor fellow hero out of place as the protagonist entirely though, leaving only you to take the stage and them as your supporting character at best.
However, a Main Character doesn’t just float through life without any issue. As much as all this above stuff on the level the local protagonist got is nice, you also have to deal with the bad side of being the lead of a story. The challenges, the threats, the danger. From threat to life and limb to threats to your goals and mental state, you’ll have to deal with an equivalent level and sort of threat as the other main hero you’re sharing a story with. After all, you’re one of the protagonists here now too. As a Main Character, you’ll also find that your plot armor and luck from this perk will often leave you as the story draws nearer to the climax, as that is the time when it becomes much more possible to defeat the hero or villain of the story for good. It’s not going to guarantee your defeat but it will make it a much less certain thing than what it may normally be. Those who are aware of these sort of genre conventions or their own fictional natures will also be able to sense that you are a Main Character. They might find you a little obnoxious for it. This perk’s effects can be toggled on or off at the start of each jump, including both benefits and drawbacks to it, but the decision must be kept until the start of the next jump. The capstone booster part is unaffected by this toggle.
This perk also acts as a Capstone Booster to any of the 600 CP perks that are taken in this jump. These will be detailed in the Notes section at the end of this document. Choose Your Victory [100]: It might not be a perfect replacement for the feeling of being genuinely defeated but perhaps for your purposes, it might still suffice. You’re able to lose at anything you want and make that loss utterly convincing and genuine to all who see it. While you can lose at anything, this only applies to situations where you are genuinely losing. Trying to lose at losing and similar abuses will just see you fail overall instead of somehow pull out a win from nothing.
Call Me Anshin’in [100]: Names are important in any world, even those without supernatural word language powers. Just getting called what you feel is fitting can make all the difference to you on a bad day. You’re able to freely decide the name that everyone calls you, changing that knowledge that everyone you have met or knows your name has. If you want to suddenly be called something completely different to what you usually are, it won’t erase you from the minds of people that knew you before or make those who’d never heard your original name suddenly know you, but everyone who knew your name before will now believe your new name to be that original name.
Powerpedia [200]: The more you stack up, the more confusing it gets to keep them all sorted. You’re probably already in the habit of collecting a wide array of abilities and it’ll only get worse from here. So it’s good that you’re now able to not only have a complete awareness of every ability and power that you have at all times but also all of their potential uses and combinations with each other. Even creative, obscure combinations between two seemingly irrelevant powers are immediately revealed to you upon possessing both of them.
Flimsy Paper [200]: Never been much for a stable view on life or reality, you’ve got a sense for when the medium around you has changed. You’ve grown used to the constant feeling of creation as some author writes you into a story but when an unplanned change happens, you’re always aware of how and when that change has occurred. When someone warps or alters reality in the setting that you are in, you are instantly aware of that event’s time and place and what has been changed.
Concept Ball [400]: When two combatants reach a certain level of power, fighting becomes a bit pointless. When both of you are Immovable Objects and Unstoppable Forces, you’re just going to be pointlessly nudging against each other. Well, if you were equal you would be. But you’re Not Equal. Whenever your own abilities that are meant to be without peer come into conflict with another such ability, yours trumps theirs. A blow that can pierce anything will tear through a defense that can block anything when you are using it. Your absolutes are more so, simply for the fact that you are the one using them.
Equality Through Inequality [400]: By your very nature, you are already a being of contradictions. Both Pluses, Minuses, and everything in between are open to you. So why not excuse any other contradictions in yourself? You can live just fine even with mutually exclusive parts of your being co-existing. You can have two sets of powers that shouldn’t co-exist together and see no complications at all, use two different kinds of energy through the same route without issue, have two exclusive personality traits at the same time without driving yourself to insanity and even be two exclusive physical things at once and retain only the benefits of each. A Not Equal hardly has to obey logic when it comes to their own form.
Gotta Have Power To Get Power [600]: Once you’ve had a taste, you can’t help but want another and another and another. Power is an addiction, one that the world seems all too happy to feed into you. The more power you gain, the easier and faster it will be to gain more power. Personal power, supernatural power, political power, financial power, any sort of power or influence on the world around you will become easier and easier to gain as you gain more of that sort of power. At the early stages, this can be as simple as growing faster or finding more sudden bursts of inspiration but later on you may find yourself gaining powerful mentors, finding great riches every day or even, eventually, just spontaneously developing new powers now and then.
Window In The Wall [600]: What were you again? Were you a character from the manga written by one Nisio Isin? Were you from the anime adaptation by Gainax? Ooh, maybe you’re the self-insert of some normal person back on Earth doing a Jum-------
Hm. Maybe you are just a manga character after all.
Whatever you are, you’re well aware of your nature and your author. That mythical thing, the Fourth Wall, isn’t so much a myth as it is a flimsy paper barrier to you. Something you can poke your head through, at least in a limited way. You’re fully aware of your fictional nature and the fictional nature of those around you, having an innate sense for the many tropes and clichés that are currently in effect around you. You’re not limited to what the author might write you to do either. Those tropes you became aware of? You’re very good at subverting or twisting them. You know who the main character of a story is but you can easily swap the story to focus on one of the other main characters as the hero instead. You can even change the genre or mood of the overall story with just a little work. These changes to the tropes or genre of the story take a few days to take effect once you’ve desired them though. As a side effect, your awareness of your own nature renders you totally independent of your creator/author, making you immune to any attempts to control or effect you through such a bond or even to erase you by destroying the fictional thing in which you are found.
Dead Lock [100]: Why let something as silly as age ruin all the fun? You’ll never need to fear the pains and aches of Father Time again as you no longer age. You’re immortal in the sense of the time that you are experiencing, never again needing to fear old age. You can still continue to grow if you wish but you’ll never reach a point where you begin to weaken and eventually die from time.
Crystal Edge [100]: People just hate what they know they'll never be able to match. It's not your fault you're so utterly amazing that they burn with jealousy. Or maybe it is, given what you can do with this power. You are able to mentally flick a switch that makes you despised by everyone around you. You'll instantly become the center of attention, all of it negative. It's enough to make people drop out of battles they are currently in to try and come after you, so long as such a thing won't immediately kill them to do.
Ladies and Gentlemen [100]: The people demand to be served and when it comes to serving fans, you know exactly what to do to keep them happy. With just a touch, you are able to alter any other being in a very specific pair of ways. First, you are able to switch their gender between being male or female at will and second, you are able to make them a much more attractive version of themselves or stay the same during this switch. Using this, you can turn an ugly brute into a beautiful young girl or just into a female version of what he already was. There is no drop or lessening of their abilities because of these changes.
Ad Hoc Attack [200]: What goes around, always comes back around. What goes up must come down. When you hit something, they'll always find themselves coming back for a second blow. Any attack that you make against someone is repeated against them a second later, whether it be a punch or a spell or a use of your powers. This secondary attack costs nothing from you but will only target the same place as the initial attack and be the same in every way as that attack.
Hyper Dash Wit [200]: Technically, there's not meant to be a benefit to acting cool in a fight. Being realistic, it's always more effective to just keep efficient and not show off. But we're in a manga, not real life. The more cool and over dramatic you act? The stronger you get. When you're in a fight and purposefully show off, act cool or get over dramatic, you'll find yourself steadily powering up more and more. The power up will leave you once the fight ends though, even if you manage a super cool climactic finisher move with an awesome one liner to send off your opponent.
Eccentric Talk [200]: It's so not cool to run out of bullets in the middle of a firefight. Dramatic? Sure, at the right time, but it is hella not fun to find yourself in that situation. Seems like you needn't worry from now on as any weapon you have just doesn't run out of ammunition. Whether it uses bullets or energy or something weird like rocks or rubbish, it looks like firing that stuff out doesn't actually get rid of it from within the weapon itself. Emptying the gun wouldn't let you take out as much ammo as you want, it only works when you're actually using it in the weapon.
Gun Visible Color [200]: They'll never expect such a childish gesture to be so dangerous. You've got finger guns now, letting you make a gun shape with your fingers and then have that hand fire off invisible bullets of force at the enemy. Each bullet is about as strong as one of your own punches but you're not limited to just firing invisible pistols. So long as you can roughly mime the use of the sort of gun, you're able to use that instead. You can cock and fire an unseen shotgun or ready up an entire chain gun, though you are limited to real world guns in this way.
Lip Service [200]: With naught but a kiss, you’re able to change someone’s life. You can give a person an ability you possess just by kissing them and, if they agree, even take an ability of theirs in exchange for what you gave them. You can take what you gave back with another kiss, though you can only take back what you gave and if what you gave was lost or modified, it will be lost to you. Through this method anyway. Besides, who doesn’t like an excuse to kiss anyway?
Mirror Juvenile [200]: It’s awfully embarrassing to just show your true self to other people that you don’t even know. Now you don’t need to worry as you are in complete control of how other people perceive you. You are able to appear as whatever you want to other people to their five senses or even to not appear at all. You just need for them to be in sensory range for it to affect them.
Skillful [300]: The Skill to be better at Skills, fitting that you of all people should have it. This ability does not provide you with anything on its own, only working when used in concert with other supernatural abilities. Having this allows you to effortlessly master any supernatural ability that you are capable of using, taking vast leaps in skill and experience with every individual use of your power. You'll discover every trick, hidden use, weakness and combination possible with your power as your growth and learning with it skyrockets to lightspeed.
Most Love [300]: They should be glad to take on your pain, really. If they love you so much, it's only fair that they're willing to shoulder some of your burdens. You're able to transfer damage or negative effects from yourself to someone who would be considered one of your loved ones, such as a family member or friend who genuinely cares for you. They'll take the wound and it'll disappear from your body, though you are only able to transfer bad stuff from yourself after it has happened to you. If you die in a single blow, this won't help you.
Metamor Stair [400]: Evolution is a wonderful process. It made these humans that are so fun to mess with, didn't it? But sometimes you can't be bothered waiting a few millions years for something to happen and just want it now. Now you can with just a touch, force anything, be it a person or an object, to evolve to a new and better stage up to twice. A monkey could be made to become a man and then into an evolved form of man. A blade could be turned into a chain sword and then into an energy sword.
More Than Group [400]: A one-on-one battle is by far the more suitable for a clear main antagonist like yourself. It's much less satisfying if the hero just beats you down with a hundred other guys as well, so now you can make it a heckuva lot harder for him to manage that. The more foes you face at once, the greater your power grows. While just a single opponent won't change anything, each additional foe beyond that will provide a significant increase to your base power, like you were half again as strong as before. There's no upper limit, so long as these multiple foes are all currently and directly engaging you personally in a battle. Just being in a war won't do anything but taking on an entire army at once will.
Auto Fumble [400]: The very essence of being a Not Equal is just that, being unequal to all those around you. You just don't make mistakes, never willingly or unwillingly messing up or making an error. No matter what you do, you do so at the best of your ability as if you were working in the best possible conditions with as much time as you like to make your decisions and with as little detractions as possible, save for those actively imposed by an enemy. This does not guarantee success and will not make the impossible possible, only that you do everything at your absolute best condition, time and place. For example, you would always cast a spell at your full power and with a full incantation, even if you were in an area that weakened your magic and did not have the time to do an incantation, though a place that entirely sealed your magic would not be bypassable. The resistance of an enemy, such as someone trying to dodge your attacks, can still cause you to fail.
Humor Contrast [400]: Never accept that someone can outmatch you forever, not when you are what you are. While being unequal to someone else might sound fitting to them because of what you are, you're just not the sort to accept that. When you find yourself facing someone that is stronger than you in a fight, you'll also find that your level of power begins to steadily rise to match theirs. This increase is permanent and the rate is quite fast, though it does not scale up as your opponents get stronger. The stronger your opponent is in comparison to you, the faster you will grow but this increase gets less and less the stronger your foe is.
My Inflation [400]: If the enemy wants to start off without fighting at full power, it's not your fault if you cheat a bit in return to keep up once they release huh? You're only keeping the fight even. Whenever you are in a fight with an enemy and that foe powers up from the power level they started the fight on, you'll gain an equal increase in power while in the fight. You won't increase to match their starting level of power, so this won't be much use on those that can't transform or improve themselves, but any other sort of boost, you'll get it as well as long as they do.
Alibi Lock [600]: With a wink and a smile, you’re off to another land. Which land? Any land you want. You’ve got the ability to appear anywhere you want in an instant, even locations that aren’t normally considered to be such. You can make yourself blink into existence within a magically sealed vault, in another dimension or even within someone’s mind or heart, where you can communicate directly to them or really mess them up. There’s nothing that can keep you out short of directly disabling or blocking this power.
Initialize History [600]: Retcons are a common staple of the comic book industry. Most fans don't have much fondness for them but you've found they have their uses, now that you're able to retcon living people. You are able to alter the history of anyone you touch, changing what happened in their past and drastically altering them as a person and, potentially, even altering other people. The greater the changes you make, the more people those changes might affect, the more powerful your target or those affected by your changes and the more important to the overall story your target and others affected are, the more tiring this process will be and too great changes for your current level of power will be beyond you entirely. You could certainly change the histories of entire families of normal people without much relation to this world's story, even to the point of them developing their own reasonably strong Abnormalities if they had the potential, but you could not touch a close companion of your own and make it so they have already defeated all of your enemies in this world for you. While as you grow in power, the changes you can make will grow, you cannot make entirely impossible changes to the past become real, no matter your power. Not through this ability in any case.
Life Zero [600]: Skills came about from your glorious leader, why would you ever let them be turned against their creator? You've got the power to shut down other powers, nullifying any supernatural ability that you can see and preventing those that possess such abilities from using them while under your gaze. You can selectively allow certain people or even certain abilities to still work but to those you do not allow, none may continue to operate when seen by you. Of course, you need to be watching them to do this and even blinking will momentarily lift the block, so make sure to keep your eyes on the prize here.
Lost Password [800]: When the fools try to crawl their way up to your level, you'll be waiting at the top with a hammer to slam down on their hands and send them plummeting back to the distant ground. On contact, you are able to deeply and permanently weaken any being that you touch. You are effectively able to 'return them to level one'. This removes anything that they do not naturally have or that is not the basic knowledge and common sense that an average adult of their race would have. They'd lose all their training in combat, all the skill in using supernatural powers, lose any powers or abilities that they did not innately possess, have the raw power that they have reduced to what they had at the very beginning. They retain their memories and can still function but will in effect, be a level one character compared to whatever they were before.
Skill Creation [1000]: For someone who already has so many powers, one might come to think they’d not need any more. But never underestimate the allure of new toys to play with or how happy others are when you share them. Skill Creation is an Abnormality that gives you the power to create powers, within certain limits. The powers you are able to create are outlined by the powers you already have available to you. You are able to use any ability or trait that you have, whether it be a superpower or a magic spell or a personality trait or some physical trait, and use any of the component parts to create your new powers. This way, you can grant copies of your own powers to others, create hybrids of your existing powers for yourself to use or make weaker versions of your powers before granting them to others. You can make as many copies of any power you can create as you desire, it costs nothing and takes nothing more than a thought from you, though having multiples of the same power will not allow you to use more than the effects of one at a time. When it comes to handing powers out to others, you may do so instantly provided you can see all your desired targets presently. This Abnormality also allows you to retake what you have given out even if you cannot see the recipient at the time.
Free Climbing [1200]: You're already used to the numbers game, given the sorts of power you regularly use and interact with. This just made you take it to a literal level. You are capable of manipulating parameters and variables to become greater and stronger or lesser and weaker. You can increase someone's physical strength or decrease their intelligence, increase their age or decrease their hair follicle count. So long as you can put a hard number to it, you are able to raise or lower that number. You are limited in how much of either can be done, only able to raise up to one thousand the original number or decrease to one thousandth of the original number. You must come in physical contact with your target to use this ability on it.
Sweet Sweets [100]: Careful you don’t overload that sweet tooth of yours. You’ve got an unlimited amount of candy now, just about any sort you can possibly find on a normal Earth in as great a quantity as you can fit down your mouth with each gulp. You can even share it with others if you’re actually feeling nice for once in your life.
Jumpanui Village [400]: It might seem like it’s a little out of time and place but you should just chalk it up to the innate weirdness of this place. This village contains several hundred of your own descendants, all still retaining many of your own visual features. It seems like you cultivated this town in order to have a ready supply of loyal agents for any plans you or an ally might have. They’re your genuine biological descendants, having kept their lineages pure and undiluted in some freaky way you don’t wanna ask about, and are all excellent spies, agents and warriors. They’re well aware of how to use any abilities you might have passed down to them but have no special powers beyond that. They do see you as an unquestionable lord and master of the town however, taking any order you care to give with relish.
Flask Plan Data [600]: The jewel of Hakoniwa Academy or at least what they hope will one day be that jewel. This USB contains all the data so far accumulated by the Flask Plan and a fair bit more on top. A project created in order to one day turn Normals into Abnormals, these are the starting steps towards successfully completing that plan. Given the creators of the plan’s true origins, there’d be no hope of succeeding at all without having this in hand and yet even with it, you’re still in for an arduous road of study, experimentation and a lot of expended resources. But when you’ve managed to bottle the essence of Gods, it’ll all be worth it.
Canon - Ajimu Najimi [100 CP per]: You’ve got some of the oddest people around here, just waiting for the chance to go on an adventure. If only you could convince them. Purchasing this option will give you one chance for each purchase to convince a character in this world to come along with you as a companion to other worlds. You’ll be lucky enough to hit it off with your chosen person on a good foot and continue to meet them in favorable situations at least a few times.
Are You Even Alive? [+100]: The knowledge of being fictional can have some pretty nasty side effects. You’ve started to see everyone else around you for what they really are, just fictional characters written for someone’s enjoyment. You’ve stopped really thinking that they have any feelings or personal agency, seeing little issue in toying with them for your own purposes or goals. People aren’t people to you anymore, just tools and toys and resources.
3,402,193,822,311 Years [+300]: All the way back to step one for you. You won’t be beginning your jump in the modern world at Hakoniwa Academy. Instead, you’ll be starting several universal deaths and births ago, around the time that Najimi Ajimu was first brought into existence. You’ll need to survive through over 3 trillion years of life, through the universe being born and dying and reborn over and over. Throughout this entire time, you’ll find yourself running into some of the strangest and wildest things in existence. Alien warlords, invaders from outside the universe, different versions of Abnormals, Ajimu herself, magical girls and other fictional entities will be very real parts of your life. Not everything will be threatening to you and you may even find some temporary allies but you will be involved with the story of this world for a very long time.
Any powers you have bought in this jump or that your companions are bought are not subject to loss from Growing Up into an adult. Powers obtained via any other means, without an appropriate perk to fix it, will be subject to such a thing
Boosted Capstone Gotta Have Power To Get Power: Just having power at all extends your influence into all aspects of life. Just having power in one area will now make it easier for you to gain power in all areas that can apply. It won’t be quite as good as the base perk in that area, having a great deal of financial power will still make it far easier to gain supernatural power but not as much as if you were solely focusing on supernatural power, but increasing your power in all fields will ultimately add up to far more than normal.
Window In The Wall: Before now, you just took peeks through the wall. Now you can hop out of it entirely. Your level of influence is greatly increased, to the point that you can briefly cease to be ‘fictional’ in the sense that these various worlds care for. In a story using words or pictures, like a manga or novel, you can peel yourself off the pages and jump ahead or back a few chapters to travel in time. You could lean out of the anime episode you are featured in to press pause on the remote to stop time. You can even alter the words written to change reality, though how this actually manifests can be very chaotic and unpredictable, as well as rarely long lasting. You’re even able to communicate with the author of the current work you are in, attempting to get them to change things to your liking, though this’ll likely freak them the fuck out. It is sadly impossible to get an author to change you yourself, since you are your own author already, and attempts to sneak around this limitation before your chain ends might have you end up meeting the rather stern and powerful editor of your story. You can’t stay out of the fiction you are in for too long or destroy it either, not without destroying yourself. It’s impossible to destroy the fiction you are in, through your own actions or through getting someone else to do it for you, at least until your chain has ended.
Basically you can’t just make yourself have every power or make the author write in a potion that does that until after your chain is over, since you’ve got a being, whether it’s the benefactor or something else, that monitors your use of this boosted capstone. Think of it as, if it’d make things boring or too easy, it won’t be seen as entertaining enough to go in the book. Despite the jokes, you can’t use this on the jumpchain itself, just the various worlds you go to.
Drop In [0cp]: You, just like a certain Chris Raion Spades, just appear into the world. You don’t know why you’re here, or if you have a goal.
Quantum Jumping [100cp]: You have the power to jump from this world to another, jumping across countless worlds in a time span so short it could be said that you exist in both at once. Any world that exists is yours to travel to.
Enhanced Motion and Speed [200cp]: You’re fast. Really fast. Sonic fast? Think faster. The Flash? Well, I’ll stop you there, because the answer is yes. You can move at such speeds that you could kill a group of men in 0.005 attoseconds. For scaling purposes, a single attosecond is the time it takes for light itself to move the distance of about a single molecule. What’s more, you have some insane reflexes, as in, you move in potential space. As in, you move before movement becomes a thing. Don’t understand? Don’t worry, you don’t have to.
Absolute Immortality & Regeneration [400cp]: Some enemies don’t play fair. Some of them decide to just wipe you from existence itself, removing you from ever having been. Well, that’s not an issue anymore. Should it ever happen, you will regenerate perfectly, as if you had never been undone. It doesn’t matter if you’ve been shot, stabbed, undone, or never made to begin with. You always come back. As a bonus, should you ever die in a jump, not only will you come back but it will no longer count as a loss for the purposes of jumpchain either.
Events and the Story [600cp]: The ebb and flow of the Story of everything is yours to control. Before information can be processed you are capable of reconfiguring both Nothing and Possibility, allowing you to reverse everything to before Creation or even fold events on themselves, wiping them from existence. You can even tear through events themselves, allowing you to arrive at any event without particular knowledge, and should you need to you can even halt the EVENT itself.
One [1000cp]: Except for this. Above ♠The Ace of Spades♠ are the Voyagers, beings that are as far above ♠The Ace of Spades♠ as ♠The Ace of Spades♠ is above literal nothingness. And you are above even them. The Benefactor has come to reward you by fusing the two of you together, becoming a new, singular being with power transcending anything and everything, all while the Benefactor retcons its very own existence so that it had never been and never could be, barring your own excellency which transcends even that. If I haven’t made myself clear enough, you are Omnipotent in the actual sense of the word and not the ways Lionel Suggs, the idiot author of this series, uses it. You are actually and truly Omnipotent. You also have your Spark.
Companion Import [200cp]: You may import infinite companions. All imported companions receive a free background and 1000cp to spend. In addition, all imported companions become absolutely loyal towards you.
It’s All Too Stupid For Me [+0cp]: You may take your perks and leave this world immediately. In fact, just enter you next jump with the stuff you got here. Go, get out of here.
"Why do I always get stuck with the crazy ones? As if all those sketchy security details back on Earth weren't bad enough, now I've got a bunch of delusional twats to deal with. Command better be giving me one hell of a promotion when communication is finally re-established..."
Titles & Roles
Pantheon - Not Applicable. Ship Crew - Head of Security (Formerly).
Artifacts & Powers
Displaying current armament and capabilities list...
x1 CTD (Consciousness Transferal Device): A bio-cybernetic spike in the shape of a double-helix that is designed to upload a human consciousness--be they baseline, transhuman, post-human, and so on--to a compatible vessel and/or receptacle. Despite the incredible speeds at which data is processed and transferred, at least in comparison to older computer systems or systems of around the same class, the act of virtualizing and uploading one's mind to an artificial body or mainframe still takes about a minute at most to complete. Finally, while other methods of uploading and downloading one's consciousness do exist, doing so via the usage of a CTD is typically considered to be the safest choice. Additional functions include the creation of copies for consciousness backups and a lockout failsafe in the case of malicious intrusion. Some CTDs can also be keyed to one's biometric signature as well, though the one Holcomb stole did not come with such a feature unfortunately.
x1 War Drexler: Assemblers differ greatly according to function, composition, and design, but a typical hylonano assembler is a molecular-scale robot arm which is able to hold and position reactive atoms and molecules so that they react at precisely determined locations to build or dismantle a structure a few atoms at a time. It consists of about a million atoms, making up an arm that is roughly one hundred atoms long, together with devices to modify the tool mounted on the arm, a control system that can interpret instructions from a nanocomputer and a receiver for accepting molecules from a conveyor system. An average assembler arm is capable of positioning approximately a million atoms per second. In this specific instance, the War Drexler Isaac has in his possession is designed for exactly what its name implies. War. Or at least colony-wide coverage and defense. A combination of atomic assembler and disassembler, while the WD is capable of creating a variety of remote-controlled machine warforms using feedstock procured from the local environment, it was originally intended to manufacture said machines via large quantities of industrial waste. Something that would have been--and indeed was to a very large degree, at least before Konrad got involved in things anyway--littering the entire planet.
Turning yesterday's trash into tomorrow's soldiers. A highly efficient and reassuring form of waste recycling if ever there was one, had things gone according to plan that is. As far as the present timeline is concerned, however, the capabilities of this machine are limited, since the planet the Isaac and the rest had been sent to aid was not considered that much of a threat so far as flora and fauna were concerned. It is for this reason that the drexler carries only two primary designs. A humanoid machineform identical to Holcomb's that is comprised of programmable smart-matter anchored to a central core embedded in the drone's chest, and a smaller set of spherical drones designed for aerial scouting and data collection. Unlike the previously mentioned humanoid variant, the latter group of machines is composed entirely of Inconel alloy for maximum durability in a variety of extreme environments and during high-speed aerial maneuvers. The drones also carry smaller laser-cutter implements that are used primarily for the unit's own defense. Although these same implements can be used to gain access to sealed chambers and the interiors of buildings as well, provided no one interrupts the cutting process and that the material itself is not too thick.
It should be noted, however, that while the latter can be destroyed or disabled easily enough with the right equipment, the same cannot be said of the former. Built to be completely EMP-proof, the humanoid machineforms produced by the WD can only be destroyed through sustained fire on their cores with something on the same level as a high-powered laser or stream/blast of plasma. Ballistics will do practically nothing to hinder these killing machines and neither will melee with mundane implements, as the smart-matter these machines are composed of is not only extremely resilient, but also possessed of incredible regenerative capabilities - hence the requirement for sustained fire, as one is effectively forced to drill through the buffering material in order to reach the core beneath. Once destroyed said material will be rendered inert and useless, since each core also serves as a mix of wireless node by which orders can be received, as well as a factory by which more smart-matter can be produced at an astonishing rate. All of this is thanks to a built-in hammerspace designed to house the hardware required--as well as shunt excess heat--which will undergo dimensional collapse upon taking enough damage.
This isn't of much concern for beings on the macro-scale, since said collapse manifests as nothing more than a harmless flash of light followed by a small yet swift implosion, though the same cannot be said for the components housed within - which will be destroyed outright. Regarding weaponry, these drones are limited to more primitive implements of harm such as swords and axes, as the excess energy required to power something like a laser rifle has been allocated entirely to maintaining the unit(s) in question. In addition to this (and their standard audiovisual package), these drones also come with multiple modes of vision; such as NV, thermal, and even a pseudo form of x-ray using advanced RF capture technologies, along with a discrete listening mode designed for picking up quieter sounds. This last package is installed in the humanoid and reconnaissance drones alike, although in the case of the latter it is used most often for eavesdropping on private conversations, while in the former it is deployed as an extra redundancy against hidden or fleeing targets should the unit's visual center become compromised somehow.
Despite their fearsome combat capabilities, it takes Holcomb around a century to build up a force adequate enough to challenge the pretender gods of Elysium in any reasonable capacity. This doesn't include the small host of constructs he has in reserve for the sake of defending his absconded assets and hideout naturally.
x3 Backup Arrays: A significant evolution of the RAID family of technologies--and data storage in general--these three obsidian monoliths serve as storage devices for Holcomb's mental backups, and feature multiple internal disks across which data is copied/read/written contiguously for the sake of redundancy. Despite being around the height of your average support beam or column, these arrays are actually quite fragile. Well, fragile in relation to other advanced technology anyway. Not just any primitive with a stick or a dagger can break these things, and you won't see something as simple as a fall from a great height doing so much as scratching them. This is opposed to an angry demigod, for example, who could shatter each array with ease using nothing but the right tools, their own brute strength, or both. Each of these also comes equipped with a variety of ports for a variety of hookups to compatible devices such as CTD's, external drives, etc.
Persona
Isaac is best described as cold and pragmatic, with a strong tendency to do things by the book. While he doesn't necessarily want civilian casualties, and indeed will do his best to prevent them since these were the people he was sent here to protect, Holcomb will do whatever it takes to see the mission completed according to its original parameters. If that means a few villages need to be raided as part of a greater strategy, then so be it. As for his crewmates and coworkers, or at least those who still remain, he has lost what little respect and empathy he used to have for them. Coming to view them as little more than insane nutjobs at best, and a genuine terroristic threat at worst, he has no qualms about slaughtering them to the last man if that's what it takes to restore order. In the end though, his ultimate goal is to secure the colony and re-establish communication with mission command back on Earth. Or at least send them a message concerning recent events and maybe get things back on track in the process. Otherwise he's largely done with the antics of his former crewmates as a whole, being quote: "Really fucking sick of their shit."
Background & Relationships
The former head of security for the ship--soon to be for the colony as well, at least in a temporary capacity--Holcomb held a professional yet cordial relationship with the rest of the ship's crew. Though he never got too close to anyone beyond that, as this was just another bog-standard security detail for him, one he'd be kicking back from eventually as the assembler he was in charge of was meant to be handed over to the colony's reformed government in the end anyway. It was only after they'd reached the planet and the captain announced his plan to abandon the mission in favor of ruling over the world below as gods that he finally put his foot down. He argued quite vocally against his captain's decision, calling him a variety of colorful things in the process, before ultimately electing to head into exile - but not before he took the war drexler he'd been assigned, a consciousness transferal device, and three backup arrays with him. Taking one of their shuttles designed for atmospheric flight, he touched down somewhere near the planet's northern regions. It was here that he got to work, engaging the assembler and uploading his consciousness to the first warform that was produced, before setting up each array and creating backups of his mind on all three. From here he slowly built up his machine army, though his former coworkers were able to repel it each time through a combination of cooperation and superior force.
As the centuries have worn on, however, and the gods so-called have only grown more decadent and lax, Holcomb has only grown more cold, ruthless, and cunning. To make matters even worse, he has committed himself to learning from every mistake that he and his enemy have made. A very frightening prospect considering the new army that now stands at the ready--one far larger than any that's come before--waiting only for its master to awaken and command it to spill blood once more.
Male || Ancient || Archangel "I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God; I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High."
~Nature & Demeanor~
▬▬ Nature ▬▬ Autocrat: It's your way or the highway. You want to be in charge, and seek prominence for its own sake, not necessarily because you have the organization's best interests at heart or have the best ideas, though certainly you think both of those things are true. You may genuinely believe that others are incompetent, but ultimately you crave power and control. You are likely to justify your authority through imagined or real threats, and though your leadership may be solid, you also brook no argument from those with equally valid alternate viewpoints.
▬▬ Demeanor ▬▬ Knave: With a sparkle in your eye, you cajole, encourage, tempt, trick, and manipulate others into exploring their darkest desires. You are the pusher, the perverter, taking the sweet and turning it into the sordid. You see yourself as a teacher of sorts – you teach people what base and feral creatures they really are. There's nothing you love more than to corrupt the innocent and do it with such panache that they never realize they've been compromised.
~Appearance~
Perfection. That is the only word, nay, the only concept that truly does justice to the Adversary's appearance. Be he in human guise or spiritual form, a descent into the depths of the pit has done little to diminish Lucifer's status as the most perfect and beautiful being in all of creation, aside from God himself of course. Not even Michael and the other archangels can compare to him when it comes to pure majesty and strength. In regards to a form that is physical, Lucifer has one face that he dons more than all the rest. Verily, it is the only one he truly considers his own. Thus it is that - when taking a form which can be both seen and felt - Lucifer will appear most often as a man, tall in stature and godlike in physique, with wings whose feathers are like unto a rainbow and locks akin to a sea of curling brass. In stark contrast to this, however, his eyes hold a malice that is as calculating as it is cold, the flame of benevolence and wisdom that once illuminated them having vanished entirely. This is not to say that he cannot take other forms as well, for what is the flesh but a mask one chooses to wear?
~Biography~
Among the first beings ever created by YHWH, Lucifer is the second most powerful and perfect entity in all of existence, rivaled in stature only by God himself. Despite this inherent perfection, however, the archangel suffered from one major flaw, that being pride. Pride in what he was and what he could do with or without God. A pride so insidious that it needed naught but the right trigger to bring about his fall, one that came all too suddenly when YHWH created man after his own image and bade the angels kneel – something Lucifer refused to do as he considered it a travesty. The divine flame having been sullied by the profane, polluted by clay made flesh and diluted almost to impotency. Following this the war in heaven began, which saw Lucifer sway a third of the heavenly host to his side with promises of freedom, authority, and power over the kingdom of man, as it should have been from the very beginning. Though the war raged for untold eons before the foundations of the universe were even laid (for the Elohim, just like their father, are not bound by time in the slightest), in the end their efforts were ultimately for naught, and the rebels were cast out one and all. Banished from God's heavenly light, they were forced to make their way in the chaotic wastes of Hell, eventually creating a permanent habitation there alongside every foul and unclean thing. Yet even now Lucifer and his servants refuse to submit in spite of the apparent futility of their cause. They have not forgotten the glory for which they once fought, nor the dominion for which they once bled. Verily they shall never forget, and indeed shall not rest until everything in creation is rendered subservient to them.
~Powers, Abilities, & Spells~
John 8:44 – Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.
Ezekiel 28:14 – Thus saith the Lord GOD; Thou sealest up the sum, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty. Thou hast been in Eden the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold: the workmanship of thy tabrets and of thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created. Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee.
1 Peter 5:8 – Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.
In short, Lucifer is perfect in every way, not to mention a consummate liar – and even in that regard he is perfect in every manipulation. The first to murder, the first to rebel, the first to fall, he is above and beyond all of creation in a way that only his creator can supersede. Even so, Michael and the other archangels can overcome him with coordinated effort and overwhelming force, as the war in heaven clearly demonstrates.
Personality: Originally a very fiery and zealous individual, not to mention general dickweed of a human being, Elijah has managed to mellow out considerably over the years. Where he was once a hardcore believer in the Enclave's insane ideals of purity and world domination, the time he spent deployed in the wastes helped change him. Maybe not for the better exactly, but at the very least he's much less of an extremist now than he was before. He no longer considers the various humans inhabiting the world to be abominable mutants in need of elimination for instance, though he still bears a great deal of hatred for feral ghouls and super mutants alike, if not for their genetic deviation and degradation then for their erratic and dangerous behavior. Beyond that he's a very straightforward and simple man, one not easily intimidated or impressed at that due to all the shit he's seen, in search of an equally simple and straightforward life. One free of the shackles imposed by his sinful past. Whether or not he'll be able to keep the little slice of happiness he's found for himself here in Montana, or even find some form of redemption, remains to be seen.
History: Born in the year 2242 sometime after the Enclave's decimation of Arroyo aboard the group's offshore oil rig, Fowler had a very strict upbringing thanks to the never-ending safety drills and security oriented entertainment the facility's populace had to partake in. This when combined with his father's service in the Department of the Army and his mother's position in Research and Development would instill a fiery zeal within the young boy regarding the Enclave's fascist and xenophobic ideology. Perhaps it was only natural for Elijah, then, that he would follow in his father's footsteps upon turning seventeen. Quickly making his way into and out of basic training, he found himself earning a spot in one of the Enclave's many vertibird assault teams. It was here that Fowler got his first taste of actual combat, an experience he found quite exhilarating at the time, unlike some of his more seasoned squadmates — many of whom viewed the firefights they engaged in as just another part of the job.
Elijah would see several deployments following this, up to and during the Chosen One's detonation of the oil rig's nuclear reactor. Like most staff that had been stationed or deployed elsewhere at the time, he had no idea of what had actually caused the tanker's destruction, not that it mattered much in the end. Thanks to the near total destruction of their senior command structure, Elijah and many others found themselves suddenly adrift. Unsure of where to go or what to do his father and mother—both of whom had been reassigned to Navarro a few months prior and thus avoided death at the hands of the Chosen One's machinations—heeded the call of President Eden, reuniting with the rest of the Enclave remnants as they made their way east to the ruins of Washington D.C. Fowler's squad did the same soon after, sensing that their prospects on the west coast were limited at best thanks to the staggering loss of power they once projected over the region. After rejoining the main force in Washington, being briefed on their current situation, and taking a moment or two to check in on his family, he soon found himself out on the frontlines yet again. Although this time it was to help secure the area around Raven Rock for continued operations.
This period of his life was not without struggle, however, though most of it was internal instead of external. Though he hid it well, the destruction of the oil rig and complete mess their forces had become in the aftermath had shaken his faith in what they were doing, and the missions he was sent out to complete in the Capital Wasteland only served to exacerbate the matter. He couldn't help but wonder if Eden was wrong in pursuing the complete annihilation of those humans who dwelt within the wastes, especially since the largest attempt they'd made thus far had ended in disaster. Fowler also began to question if those people he saw scraping by just to survive weren't worth saving as well. After all, the Enclave had touted itself as the final remnant of America's pre-War government, and if that truly was the case then were these dirt-stained scavengers not its citizens? Did they not have a right to it, and by extension his, protection? These feelings of doubt only grew in strength over the next couple of months, before ultimately culminating in a complete about face during the their conflict with the Brotherhood of Steel. Although he served throughout the entirety of that war—as did his parents, the two of them losing their lives in the process—he fled a short while after its conclusion.
Seeking asylum and a new lease on life, in addition to some time for introspection, he made his way back west; selling his services to various caravans in exchange for caps, transportation, and food to eat. Eventually he decided to settle down in Montana, specifically the town of Whitlash. Wanting to put some distance between himself and his past, Fowler stashed his power armor and weapons in a cave a few miles from the town itself, before finally settling down. He didn't necessarily interact with everyone in the settlement, or talk about his personal history all that much beyond the vague and the general, but he did pull his weight when it came to taking care of his new neighbors and friends — using his skills to help maintain some of the community's more irreplaceable implements, while also taking the occasional shift or two of guard duty as the need arose.
Appearance: Salt and pepper locks along with a hard stare are the first things people tend to notice when they get a good look at Fowler, although this often requires they tilt their heads back a little first, as he's quite tall in comparison to the average person. Despite this he's altogether average when it comes to weight and build, not displaying physical strength greater than what you'd expect from a normal man. His eyes are a dull gray and his complexion weathered—dirty—while his hands are permanently stained by the grease and oil he employs to keep everyone's equipment functioning as it should.
Extras Prodding Elijah about his past is a great way to remove the stubbornest of teeth, as if they weren't loose before, they sure as hell will be by the time he's done.
Though Fowler lives on the eastern side of town his repair shop lies within its center for ease of access, and is typically open from sunrise to sunset. He tried keeping a stricter timetable in the beginning but quickly abandoned it for simplicity's sake and to avoid potential hassles such as scheduling conflicts.
Elijah temporarily closes up shop at noon to eat lunch.
Fowler is more than willing to make "house calls" as he jokingly calls them. Basically if something needs to be repaired, and that something just so happens to be on the other side of town for example, he'll pack up the tools he needs and head out to fix it. Depending on how vital the broken item in question is he may or may not charge a flat fee.
Armament/Complement (roughly) 1 bowspike with fission explosive warhead. 2 XV-7/Omega Class Staser Cannons. 2 Harpoons with tow-cables. 6 Lifeboats.
History of the Ship: Bowships were first used during Gallifrey's war with the Great Vampires. According to the Record of Rassilon, it was Rassilon who ordered the construction of bowships. Rival histories suggested he may have taken the idea from someone else. One account claimed the bowships were actually first constructed by the Mithras Hives whilst Rassilon was still a commander. Another account suggested the idea for them derived from the discoveries of General Skellis. Rassilon himself piloted a bowship against the Great Vampires and drove them from the galaxy. Bowships were given artificial intelligence, which ultimately played against the Time Lords, as some of these intelligences wanted compensation before attacking a Great Vampire. Of the almost seven hundred bowships that went into this war, only thirty-four returned. Bowships were eventually time-scooped for use in the Last Great Time War, though they could not prevent the fall of Arcadia, Gallifrey's second city.
Notable Crew Gallifreyan names are very long, but they often use only the first one or two syllables of their name instead. INTRA (Shipboard/Governing Artificial Intelligence). Lord Grethothitrictri (Captain). Lord Mazmoleglidugagge (First Mate). Lord Drinzosaviggess (Communications Officer). Lady Qoryudvodronmen (Chief Engineer). Lady Persibluriamronn (Gunner). Lady Zevomothumemuss (Armourer).
Unique Technology Tactical Psycho-Defense Shield Emitter. Vortex Emergency Beacon. V-Stat Psycho Telemeter. Force Field Generator. Electromagnetic Rail Cannon.
Crew Size Min - 3. Avg - 6. Max - 9.
Faction/Operator/Owner: The Time Lords/Lord Grethothitrictri.
Special Containment Procedures: SCP-7102 is to be held at Area-02 within a titanium reinforced containment cell located approximately 3,000 meters (9,800 ft) beneath the surface, and secured by a single set of electric blast doors, which are to be powered down in the event of a containment breach. The walls of SCP-7102's cell are to be further shored by a combination of structural steel, reinforced concrete, and large amounts of osmium. Furthermore, wards are to be inscribed on the interior and exterior of each door, in addition to the surrounding walls and adjoining hallway. These wards are to be drawn in accordance with standard thaumatological guidelines and renewed every seven months by no less than seven D-Class personnel.
On-site staff are to avoid making direct contact with SCP-7102. All experiments and research pertaining to SCP-7102 are to be conducted using D-Class personnel only, and the doors leading to SCP-7102's cell are to remain locked during this time. The aforementioned D-Class are to record the details of their interactions with the entity via pen and paper - materials will be provided at the start of each experiment - and surrender their findings to the researcher in charge. Said D-Class personnel are to be escorted to and from SCP-7102's cell under armed guard and given Class C amnestics at the conclusion of each experiment. Regular screenings for memetic tampering, cognitohazardous effects, and anti-memetic tampering are to be conducted on all personnel involved with research pertaining to SCP-7102. Further screenings for unusual biological or physiological mutations and unexpected mental aberrations are also to be conducted on a bi-weekly basis.
Description: SCP-7102 is an alien entity whose true form is an incomprehensible mishmash of fleshy tendrils, bloated sacks (the exact contents of which are unknown), grasping limbs, eyes, and maws. Other forms have been noted, however, indicating that it can either change its shape, affect the minds of those viewing it, manipulate reality, or even use a combination of the three. These forms have been described as ranging from completely human to utterly eldritch, and everything in-between. SCP-7102 has yet to display any semblance of audible speech, although subjects have described its voice as a hollow sound that "reverberates" throughout the skull, implying telepathic capabilities, though the exact extent of this ability is not known. SCP-7102 has also displayed the ability to drive any individual who so much as remembers it insane, though this seems to be selective. Finally, SCP-7102 appears to be able to manipulate the world around it to a seemingly limitless degree, though whether this is due to some reality warping power or simple mental control over the personnel in question has yet to be determined.
Addendum 01: Additional experiments to determine the full scope of SCP-7102's physiology and capabilities should be given the highest priority by those assigned to its study.
Addendum 02: A Kant counter has been requisitioned for the measurement of Hume levels within SCP-7102's cell.
Mother of Misery || Master of Monstrosities || Composer of Wrath "Humanity shall be spared, you shall be spared! All you need do is submit to the sweetness of his song..."
~Your Setting~
Modern Day: The era of big cities choked by smog, with shimmering lights blighting out all the stars from the night sky. Humans are equipped with the finest technologies, but are more certain than ever that supernatural forces like yourself are mere fiction. Prove them wrong.
~Your Origins~
Ancient Slumber: In times long before recorded history Earth hosted a singularly grand civilization, one which left behind only vast, non-Euclidian ruins... and you. You have been slumbering or inactive for millennia, but now you are starting to awaken. Perhaps you will accept humanity as your supplicants, or perhaps you will wipe them off the face of your planet like the vermin they are; either way, you will take back what is rightfully yours.
~Your Influences~
Your power is beyond measure, but your influence upon this world is currently limited. Choose up to four channels through which your terrible influence spreads; you may choose more, but your power will be stretched thinly.
An Avatar: You may appear to the mortals in a form that is more or less comprehensible to them. This form will be severely less powerful than your true one, but it will help you manipulate humanity.
A Place (Lightless Kadath): The more specific, the more powerful. From the ring of stones on Sentinel Hill, to an underwater ruin, to an entire city; choose a place where the barrier between you and Earth is weakest.
Sensory (Abhathol's Lullaby): From a note or chord progression previously unheard of by human ears, or a color that's unlike any on the visible spectrum, your influence spreads through perception of the unknowable.
Temptation: People get the feeling you can provide them with what they desire the most, be it power, wealth, or sexual fulfillment. People are drawn to enact your will if you play to their vices and fantasies.
~Your Powers~
As your influence spreads more and more, and you gain more loyal worshippers willing to perform grotesque rituals in your honor, the more your power over this plane will deepen. Choose two powers you will develop.
Monstrosities: You can produce your own unearthly, sanity-defiling children — powerful supernatural beasts who can defend your cultists or exert your will. Can range from massive, powerful creatures that can only be birthed seldomly, to skittering, smaller creatures that can be produced in great numbers.
Transformation: Either slowly as your influence sets in, or all at once as part of a macabre ritual, your followers can become grotesque abominations made in your likeness. They will possess superhuman durability, speed and strength, and their very appearance will shake the sanity of any humans who witness them.
~The Symptoms~
To the human mind, there is one true poison; knowledge. The more humans are exposed to your sources of influence, the more they learn of your nature, and the more their sanity weakens. Choose three of the most prominent symptoms this weakening will cause.
Hallucinations: Those whose minds have been damaged by your influence will start to see and hear things that aren't really there. These will start out as small visual anomalies, but will grow more and more severe until the line between reality and delusion is completely indiscernible.
Sadism: The more people fall under your influence, the less empathy they feel for their fellow human beings. They will feel no pity at causing others suffering; in fact, they might even take a maligned pleasure in sowing as much discord and anguish as they possibly can.
Masochism: This can manifest as a result of feelings of self-hatred, or trying to purify the body; or, people might just genuinely come to enjoy the hellish anguish your influence puts them through. Whatever the case, expect them to indulge in self-mutilation and self-destructive behavior.
~Your Domains~
Of course, your true nature is beyond any descriptors limited mortal languages can possibly ascribe to you, so humans generally analogize you to concepts they are already familiar with. Choose up to five domains to be your main themes.
Royalty Wrath Pain Beasts Debauchery
~Your Followers~
For some, your influence will lead to death or suicide — but others will fall to their knees in devoted worship. Choose from one or two of the below options to determine what your disciples mainly consist of.
Aristocracy: Your worship has become fashionable among cabals of the wealthy and influential, and their secretive, decadent parties will invariably feature sacrifices in your honor. They are drawn to you for your power, and while disloyal, they have the influence to manipulate society to serve your interests, if you please them.
Monstrous (Requires Transformation): Your followers have largely forsaken their humanity, becoming beasts modelled after your perfect image. Some may take only moderate transformations so they can still more-or-less blend in, while others hide away and dwell farther and farther from humanity, both physically and mentally.
~Your Nemesis~
The Creatures (Kandarian Demon/Deadites): You've aroused the ire of another godlike entity, and it has sent its terrible children after you and your followers. These are few in number, but possess powers far in excess of the average human, and your cultists are not as immunized to their sanity-damaging visages. They are comparable in power to your own monstrosities, in that they can range from massive creatures that attack rarely, to swarms of smaller pests. You may have to work things out with the other entity.
Male || 50 || Homo Sapien "Contrary to what many believe, freedom is not the natural state of the world. As a matter of fact, we humans are all too willing to submit ourselves to the tender mercies of another should such an action prove beneficial in the long run. It is quite the bitter irony, no?"
~Listing, Age, and Species~
▬▬ Listing ▬▬ A-List.
▬▬ Age ▬▬ 2nd Gen. Supers (40 - 69 Y.O.): If you haven't left the cape and mask behind, you're reaching the age where you should consider it. While it is largely dependent on your age, your physical prime may be long behind you, or only just beginning to slip. Though the glory days are over, your sheer experience puts you in an immensely advantageous position to shape the next generation. Your children and wards will be the next greats, just as you have already proven yourself to be. With all of that said, you've still got some grit in you, and you're not out of the ring yet; you wouldn't have made it this long in your line of work if you weren't a force to be reckoned with.
▬▬ Species ▬▬ Human: The most common group on Earth, who fall under the species Homo Sapien. The vast majority of individuals possessing superhuman powers are either humans or mutaforms, with mutaforms making up no more than a tenth of the powered population and a twentieth of the general population. Your fully human physiology makes you more easily relatable to the populace at large, and less readily distinguishable when out of cape. Moreover, you may avoid much of the complications that could come with a drastically different physiology in public places or everyday life. While society has largely adapted to the existence of mutaforms and to a lesser degree nonnatives, it should not be expected that most people wouldn't stare if you were a mutaform, and the same applies for the miniscule portion of the population composed of Earth nonnatives.
~Origin, Archetype, Objective, and Patron~
▬▬ Origin ▬▬ Lucid Dream: Endogenous DMT within the body, while typically insufficient to cause any notable effect, can be created as a byproduct of neurotransmitters released during sleep. Even this trace amount, however, can induce superhuman abilities in rare cases. As the Super dreams, they will be given visions of their powers' previous owners utilizing the power to its fullest potential. In almost all cases, this is an anomalous entity, unless the powers were stolen, copied, given, or inherited.
▬▬ Archetype ▬▬ Radical: You are what the world calls evil, but you know that the masses wouldn't know evil if it stared them in the face. When you act, you act in principle, and those principles are objectionable if not abominable to the average person. Philosophies of eugenics, or total anarchism, or a world with you as its autocratic head may fall under this alignment, though with time you're certain anyone can see past their narrow views of morality and understand that your way is the right one.
▬▬ Objective ▬▬ The World: Unsurprisingly, Supers tend to be ambitious, for good or ill. Perhaps your motivation to change the world is good; you want to eliminate wars, or protect those who can't protect themselves. More than likely, however, is that you'd like to change the world for personal reasons rather than moral ones. To sit on a throne above endless peons, to take mankind into the stars and conquer existence, to make slaves of mortal men: these are often the motivations of those who would change the planetary status quo. In any case, the world is awaiting its master or its savior.
▬▬ Patron ▬▬ The Cobalt Monarch: The Daedalus Entity is the Egregore of the flawless logos, the supreme knowledge, the Master of Secrets, and the lips that speak them perfectly. The few who can approach it must be clear, cold, and calculated. The goals of its chosen are unimportant, so long as they are pursued with flawless reason and rationality, utterly frigid to the err of the flesh and the deficiencies of the human intellect. When you are aligned with the principle of emotionless, unerring pragmatism and calculate your every move with precision, the Cobalt Monarch's countenance will find favor with you; when you make human errors, ignore efficient routes to victory, or are swept up in your physical or psychological needs, the Cobalt Monarch will wane its powers away from you, and return their full might only with a sufficient display of dedication to its cause. The calculative flaws of your human nature make you frail; you must be rid of them entirely if Daedalus's blessings are to be yours.
~Powers and Mutations~
▬▬ Mutations ▬▬ Noctis Cape [T1]: You require drastically less sleep than a normal person, usually about a single night's worth per week. Your circadian rhythm can be adjusted just as your normal one can: you may wish to space out your sleep to a single hour per night, or concentrate all of your sleep into a normal night's rest and remain awake for days without any fatigue. You may still sleep as you would normally, but will only feel the negative side effects of sleep deprivation in extreme circumstances.
Morbidity Limit [T1]: Powers can have a variety of extremely horrifying effects on the internal physiology, from the telekinetic who can surgically crush your brain stem to the fire manipulator who can boil your very blood. While these gruesome realities afflict common men, those with superhuman abilities have developed an adaptive mutation out of necessity and natural selection. Your body cannot be targeted from the inside unless the powers involved are designed to only operate on the human body. That is, powers which specifically and solely create effects inside the body can affect you, but powers which can act outside the body in any capacity cannot so much as touch your internal physiology. They cannot attack from the inside out, though they can attack from the outside in.
Subtlety [T1]: Your powers are tied, both in function and appearance, to your personality and subconscious, though they are not perfectly aligned with your every whim. You may choose the initial appearance and visual flair of all your abilities, but cannot change these effects in post if you change your mind.
Power Lock [T1]: While there are very rare powers which can manipulate and even take powers, powers return to their user the same way a cut blossom will bloom again with time. As is the case with all Supers, if your powers are ever taken, dampened, or otherwise negatively altered, they will return to their original state given time. This may be a long, arduous time, but negative changes will be temporary nonetheless, and never untenably long (i.e. years, decades, or lifetimes).
Mental Blocks [T2]: You've learned anti-telepathy techniques used by intelligence operatives and spies, for whom confidentiality is considered an imperative, who employ specialized techniques for every situation. While this requires a multitude of techniques for a multitude of possible angles of attack, you have mastered all of them to degrees only the most unusual of methods could break. If you yourself possess powers of mental manipulation, knowledge of these techniques allots you knowledge of their weak points, meaning you may surpass the protections of Mental Blocks: Tier 2 if you can overcome the will of your victim. You may allow the influences of a psychic if you so desire. You do not need to possess powers to learn this ability, and many secret operatives, conspiracy theorists, and police forces have.
Natural Harmony [T1]: When one attains their powers, their abilities naturally adapt around their psyche and personality to operate at their best functionality, given the constraints of the human mind. In doing so, you instinctively know how to use your powers and their functions, and your powers will avoid incidentally harming you in the same way your mind prevents you from biting off your finger even though your jaw is strong enough to do so.
Low Frequency [T3]: You are immune to detection via Power Sense: Tier 1, Tier 2, and Tier 3. If you allow yourself to be detected by another through these abilities, you become aware of the fact that you are detected, and any information which they seek out about you, you are also given about them. You are given information concerning them before they comprehend any information about you. You have the ability to camouflage your own waveform, making others believe you are stronger or weaker than you are, that you have completely different powers, that you have weaknesses you don't actually possess, and more, so long as they would have been able to detect the information you're falsifying. This ability also works for the purposes of blood tests, technological power tests, and so forth.
Hypermutation [T1]: All powers grow in strength logarithmically, making great bounds of progress initially before petering out at a relative maximum and remaining relatively stagnant, save for the case of another Flash. With this mutation, your powers now grow linearly, never reaching a relative maximum with time. If you hypothetically lived forever, you would continue to grow in strength for multiple lifetimes before reaching the top of Magnitude 18's range. Additionally, this mutation exponentially amplifies the effects of Flashpoint mutations, though you must still pay this mutation's cost in your post-Flash sets to receive these benefits. Unless you already have a Paragon Aberrant, your powers cannot develop into Magnitudes beyond 18, though this is hardly an issue given how maddeningly high this upper limit is.
Concealed [T1]: If you should change any significant aspect of your appearance, people will be naturally unable to discern a connection between you and your disguised persona. For instance, wearing glasses or not wearing them, using a small mask, donning a hat, altering your hairstyle, or wearing makeup would sufficiently hide your identity even from people you know closely. If you do not make these significant changes, it will be difficult, but not impossible, to discern your identity. This effect may be toggled at will.
▬▬ Powers ▬▬ Mindmolder (Mag. 12): You are an absurdly powerful telepath, with mental manipulation abilities that rival some of the best on Earth; you can read minds like a book, wipe and replace memories, control thousands of minds overtly or hundreds of thousands subtly, implant thoughts which the subject believes to be their own, and minutely adjust behaviors they will believe are their own will. Similarly, you can communicate via telepathy to tens of thousands at a time, or deceive any one of your subject's senses with ease. The number of manipulations you may perform at once is simply the number you can keep track of in your own mind, and this skill will improve immensely with continued use.
Male || Eternal || Discordia "Behold a metaphor unending, swaddled in scarlet, covered by blood, cloaked in shadow. He has always been and always shall be, chaos eternal..."
▬▬ Nature & Demeanor ▬▬
Nature Mastermind: You are the brilliant, if underestimated, architect of destruction. Yes, you could achieve your goals through the most direct route, but such actions are for simpletons and animals. Instead, you enact complicated and lengthy plots to undo your enemies and accomplish your ends. There's nothing quite like a master plan coming together, and the shock on the faces of the fools around you when they realize your genius. You overcompensate for your own feelings of worthlessness, those inflicted upon you by others who could never understand your greatness. You'll show them all now, and they'll be forced to recognize your brilliance. You are moody, erratic, and given to overly elaborate methods of getting what you want. The simplest route is simply not your way.
Demeanor Knave: With a sparkle in your eye, you cajole, encourage, tempt, trick, and manipulate others into exploring their darkest desires. You are the pusher, the perverter, taking the sweet and turning it into the sordid. You see yourself as a teacher of sorts – you teach people what base and feral creatures they really are. There's nothing you love more than to corrupt the innocent and do it with such panache that they never realize they've been compromised.
▬▬ Biography ▬▬
It is said in legend and in myth, that the King was never human, never one of us. Yet here he sits upon his fetid throne in the wretched approximation of one, perfectly lucid of our every wayward desire or passing whim. Here he sits amidst the ruins of a broken tower, leading us forever more into the darkness of strife everlasting...
At least that would have been the case, had he not decided to steal some poor fool's interdimensional recreational vehicle and go on an extended vacation. Granted, Agthalan will claim that it's all just another part of his grand plan in the end. No matter how unlikely that may seem.
▬▬ Domain/Abilities ▬▬
Discordia: Chaos, strife, destruction... discord. All of these are domains of the King, the foundation of his throne and the bedrock of his empire. Even that which you see before you is not his truest form, nor purest expression, if there ever was one to begin with. No, Agthalan is change incarnate. The ceaseless chaos of the void, that which surges hungrily to subsume the static shores of ordered creation. This allots him power many would consider unnatural, and rightfully so. For he can assume new forms at will, curse people with inhuman maladies and afflictions, warp the natural world on an unimaginable scale, create avatars to influence others from afar, and so much more. Even the order imposed by his great enemy, and the prison its existence maintained, could not stop him in the end.
"My goal? My goal is simple. Defeat the Egregores. If that means I must sacrifice every human being on Earth in order to do so, then so be it." — Mathew Merritt
L I S T I N G
X-List: While there reasonably exists any number of high-level and low-level Supers, generally they keep to their own; blockbusters like Mathew seldom have business with small-time, low-level Supers, just as they seldom have business with random civilians.
G E N D E R
Male.
A G E
1st Gen. Supers (70 - 100+ Y.O.): Thanks to his Paragon Aberrant ability, Mathew is a veteran of events spanning from the aftermath of World War 2 to the modern age, if not longer. He's seen legendary heroes rise and fall, seen villains whose names are spoken with a gulp live and die, and seen revered bloodlines form between them. He was there when the Soviets dropped the bomb on Manhattan, and he was there when the first heroes stopped it. He was there to see the first man fly, yet in spite of witnessing horrors and wonders that would drive most men mad, Mathew remains focused on the greatest threat of all...
The Egregores.
S P E C I E S
Human: The most common group on Earth, who fall under the species Homo Sapien. The vast majority of individuals possessing superhuman powers are either humans or mutaforms, with mutaforms making up no more than a tenth of the powered population and a twentieth of the general population. Mathew's fully human physiology makes him more easily relatable to the populace at large, or at least it did before he decided to antagonize it, and less readily distinguishable when out of cape. Moreover, he may avoid many of the complications that normally come with a drastically different physiology in public places or everyday life. While society has largely adapted to the existence of mutaforms and to a lesser degree nonnatives, it should not be expected that most people wouldn't stare if he was a Mutaform, and the same applies for the miniscule portion of the population composed of Earth-based nonnatives.
B L O O D L I N E
Noble Singularity: The most notable Aberrants in history are seldom if ever accompanied by supplementary powers, instead focusing on one overwhelmingly powerful ability over any other. The anomalies associated with such powers are often called Noble Singularities, and their users have some of the highest variance in power on Earth, from the weakest of the weak to the strongest of the strong, and nothing in-between.
O R I G I N
Lucid Dream: Endogenous DMT within the body, while typically insufficient to cause any notable effect, can be created as a byproduct of neurotransmitters released during sleep. Even this trace amount, however, can induce superhuman abilities in rare cases. As the Super dreams, they will be given visions of their powers' previous owners utilizing the power to its fullest potential. In almost all cases this is an anomalous entity, unless the powers were stolen, copied, given, or inherited.
A R C H E T Y P E
Monster: Mathew has chosen, willfully and totally, to pursue his own goals without any qualms or restrictions. If this means massacring, genociding, and torturing every living soul on Earth, he could care less. The only thing that matters is what he wants, and everything that gets in his way will be stomped underfoot for even the most minor inconvenience, or simply on a whim. Nothing is off-limits, and what Merritt does, he does for reasons only he could ever understand, and which nobody and no one could ever justify.
O B J E C T I V E S
The Egregores: The mass-death of four out of seven Egregores created the world of superhumans, but another event like it is unlikely to occur again for billions of years, if ever. A weakness cultivated by the triad for uncountable eons allowed the stalemate to, at last, end, leaving only three remaining contenders to compete for mastery over existence. The idea of defeating all three of them, much less one, is madness for all but the most inconceivably powerful; each one possesses potentially centillions of powers, many of which are nigh-omnipotent in scale, all of which have been cultivated by billions of years of growth unmatchable by even the most ideally mutated humans. Still, there are more cunning ways to outplay even the omniscient; creating a new Egregore, or inciting a world-shattering conflict between any two and one unfortunate enough to be perceived as weak, and even changing the concepts which the Egregores themselves may be viable, if nearly impossible, paths to victory. A plan which may take thousands or even millions of years to overcome them and save the planet, though if anyone were capable of such a thing, it would be Mathew.
P O W E R M U T A T I O N S
Noctis Cape Tier 1: Mathew requires drastically less sleep than a normal person, usually about a single night's worth per week. His circadian rhythm can be adjusted just as his normal one can; he may wish to space out his sleep to a single hour per night, or concentrate all of his sleep into a normal night's rest and remain awake for days without any fatigue. Merritt may still sleep as he would normally of course, but he will only feel the negative side effects of sleep deprivation in extreme circumstances.
Tier 2: Merritt requires absolutely no sleep whatsoever in order to maintain full cognitive function. He can still be knocked unconscious, drugged, or otherwise, but he does not feel a natural urge to sleep unless he is injured or ill and would recover faster with bedrest. His escapades may now extend for days on end without any serious consequence to his health. Similarly, his eyes are adapted perfectly to the dark like those of a nocturnal animal, allowing him to see with total clarity in such conditions.
Morbidity Limit Tier 1: Powers can have a variety of extremely horrifying effects on the internal physiology of Supers, from the telekinetic who can surgically crush your brain stem to the fire manipulator who can boil your very blood. While these gruesome realities afflict common men, those with superhuman abilities have developed an adaptive mutation out of necessity and natural selection. Mathew's body cannot be targeted from the inside unless the powers involved are designed to only operate on the human body. That is, powers which specifically and solely create effects inside the body can affect him, but powers which can act outside the body in any capacity cannot so much as touch his internal physiology. They cannot attack Merritt from the inside-out, though they can attack from the outside-in.
Tier 2: If he wishes to inflict gory death upon his fellow Supers, this Tier allows Merritt to bypass the protection of Morbidity Limit: Tier 1. Since he possesses this Tier, others possessing Morbidity Limit: Tier 2 cannot bypass his protections. He may therefore, with free impunity, crush the bones of his enemies from the inside, create force fields that slowly expand within arteries, and so on.
Core Instinct Tier 1: The vast majority of powers require direct intent to operate. In the light-speed heat of superhuman conflict, human reaction time is a veritable eternity. His powers can now activate any of their effects as an instantaneous reflex. Thus if Mathew would have wanted his powers to activate any effect, but did not or could not do so himself, they will activate of their own accord as if he did, instantaneously and independent of his cognitive speed, reaction time, or otherwise.
Tier 2: Mathew's powers may now activate any of their effects under the principle above even without the need of his direct awareness, acting on full autopilot if need be. This includes even when he is unconscious or under the effects of mind control, if it should become necessary. However, it should be noted that his powers may only act upon circumstances within his immediately relevant surroundings; they are adept at avoiding danger, but cannot act upon psycho-remote stimulus. If even some small, otherwise unnoticeable part of him could detect a circumstance however, such as through subtle hearing or scent, his powers may act on it as if he did.
Power Lock Tier 1: While there are very rare powers which can manipulate and even take powers, powers return to their user the same way a cut blossom will bloom again with time. As is the case with all Supers, if Mathew's powers are ever taken, dampened, or otherwise negatively altered, they will return to their original state with time. This may be a long, arduous time, but negative changes will be temporary nonetheless, and never untenably long (i.e. years, decades, or even lifetimes).
Tier 2: Merritt's powers may still be dampened, manipulated, taken or otherwise negatively altered, but will return to him before the event of his death can occur, no matter what circumstances may apply. If his intangibility has been taken - for example - and a bullet is fired at him, it will return before the bullet collides with him. If Mathew's super strength is taken while he is holding up a building full of civilians, it will return to him before he is crushed by the building's weight.
Tier 3: Mathew's powers are inviolable, and the only way to revoke them is to end his life. Thus, they cannot be altered by any meta-manipulative abilities or effects directly, for better or for worse. While his abilities may or may not be like Paragon Aberrants in sheer strength, they are like them in their total inviolability. As a matter of fact, his abilities may even be Paragon Aberrants which have been clipped of their proverbial wings, limited in the process of transferring them from a Morphic Entity to a human wielder.
Mental Blocks Tier 1: While mental abilities such as telepathy, possession, illusions, or mind control can be devastating, anti-superhuman counterinsurgents have developed effective measures against mental attacks. Mathew is therefore aware of when an attempt is being made to influence his mind, and can counter the influence by concentrating and avoiding complex thought of any kind. For most people, this is extremely difficult, but Mathew has trained himself in the blockage of basic psychic influence. Attempting to resist high-level psychic attacks using these unspecialized techniques can cause bleeding of the nose and eyes, and will usually result in a failure of concentration, or even brain trauma if resistance is continued extensively. If Mathew himself should ever end up possessing powers of mental manipulation, knowledge of these techniques would allow him knowledge of his opponent's weak points, meaning he could surpass the protections of Mental Blocks: Tier 1 if he can overcome the will of his victim. He may allow the influences of a psychic if he so desires of course. Merritt does not need to possess powers to learn this ability, and many secretive operatives, conspiracy theorists, and police forces have.
Tier 2: Mathew's learned anti-telepathy techniques used by intelligence operatives and spies, for whom confidentiality is considered an imperative, who employ specialized techniques for every situation. While this requires a multitude of techniques for a multitude of possible angles of attack, Merritt has mastered all of them to degrees only the most unusual methods could break. If he himself should ever possess powers of mental manipulation, knowledge of these techniques allows him knowledge of their weak points, meaning he may surpass the protections of Mental Blocks: Tier 2 if he can overcome the will of his victim. He may allow the influences of a psychic if he so desires. He does not need to possess powers to learn this ability, and many secret operatives, conspiracy theorists, and police forces have.
Tier 3: Mathew has a talent for anti-telepathy techniques which are the envy of intelligence organization the world over. He's discovered a truly flawless method of blocking telepathic attacks, and it is impossible for him to be mind controlled, telepathically read, possessed, or otherwise mentally manipulated. Those that attempt to manipulate his mind, regardless of their psychic prowess, will be assaulted with heavy migraines and bleeding at the nose, with continued attempts at his mind resulting in concussions and even aneurysms. Merritt may allow the influences of a psychic if he so desires. His willpower against such attacks is absolutely unwavering. If Mathew himself is a psychic, he may penetrate these protections provided he can overwhelm the will of his target.
Power Sense Tier 1: When Supers use their powers, they release an anomalous waveform which can be detected by other Supers, allowing Supers within their proximity to detect the magnitude of abilities they've used. When within reasonable distance of another Super (about sight-range if there are no walls), if they use their powers Mathew can tell the magnitude of the power they just exerted and, in general, where these powers were used. Notably, he cannot tell if another Super is holding back, and he can only judge how powerful they are by what he's sensed them do so far.
Tier 2: Along with the above, Mathew can sense when a Super is holding back, though he cannot discern how much they are withholding. Moreover, he can tell what Type they are if they use a Type ability while near him, and sense if it is an Aberrant if not a Type. Finally, he can tell not only when a power is used in his proximity, but when a power is about to be used. If another Super has the Low Frequency: Tier 1 Mutation, he can sense them as if he were using Power Sense: Tier 1. Similarly, Merritt may use detection powers such as precognition, remote viewing, and so on against those with Low Frequency: Tier 1.
Tier 3: Mathew can sense Supers within his proximity whether or not they have recently used their powers, and can sense exactly how powerful they are. Similarly, when he does sense a Super, he becomes aware of exactly what their powers are capable of, down to their minute details. Merritt can also sense what Mutations they possess. If another Super has the Low Frequency: Tier 1 Mutation, Mathew can supersede their protections. If another Super has the Low Frequency: Tier 2 Mutation, he can sense them as if he were using Power Sense: Tier 2.
Low Frequency Tier 1: When Mathew uses his powers, he naturally emits an anomalous waveform that can be detected by other Supers, who can also tell how powerful the feat he just performed was. He is now immune to detection via Power Sense: Tier 1 or any other form of detection, such as technology, blood tests, or otherwise. Moreover, any other information powers which attempt to discover him or his activities will fail, such as precognitive abilities, remote viewing, and so on.
Tier 2: Mathew is now immune to detection via Power Sense: Tier 1 and Tier 2. If he is detected by another person who supersedes these boundaries, Merritt can become aware of the fact that he was detected, and any information which they know about him, he is also given about them, such as their relative strength, the kinds of powers they have, and so on. Merritt may also allow himself to be detected via Power Sense: Tier 1 and Tier 2 if he so desires to receive this information.
Tier 3: Mathew is immune to detection via Power Sense: Tier 1, Tier 2, and Tier 3. If he allows himself to be detected by another through these abilities, he becomes aware of the fact that he is detected, and any information which they seek out about him, he is also given about them. Merritt is given information concerning them before they comprehend any of the information about him. He has the ability to camouflage his own waveform, making others believe he is stronger or weaker than he actually is, that he has completely different powers, that he has weaknesses he doesn't actually possess, and more, so long as they would have been able to detect the information he's falsifying. This ability also works for the purposes of blood tests, technological power tests, and so forth.
Natural Harmony Tier 1: When one attains their powers, their abilities naturally adapt around their psyche and personality to operate at their best functionality, given the constraints of the human mind. In doing so, he instinctively knows how to use his powers and their functions, and his powers will avoid incidentally harming him in the same way his mind prevents him from biting off his finger even though his jaw is strong enough.
Tier 2: Mathew's powers control far easier than they would normally. He will never have any trouble pushing his powers to their absolute maximum, nor will distraction, emotion, or exhaustion ever affect their or his own performance. Merritt's powers will actively avoid incidentally harming him or others if he wouldn't wish to harm them. Unlike most, he also has an encyclopedic knowledge of his power's limitations and the extent of their functions, making creative exercise of his powers much more readily available and increasing his tactical options.
Tier 3: Merritt's powers now move with the ease of a blink and swell with the effort of a breath. It is impossible for him to become exhausted by the overuse of his powers, and he possesses feasibly infinite stamina as far as his abilities are concerned. His ability to use his powers is utterly ruthless, and he possesses knowledge of every minute detail of his powers down to their slightest nuance, including how they may have been used in the past by a prior possessor, if such applies. He feels as if both himself and his powers were made for one another in mind, and it is by destiny that he has come to possess them.
Iron Mind Mathew is cool-headed to the nth degree. His emotions never get in the way, he never becomes anxious to the point of making mistakes, and he is permanently immune to any and all mental health issues. Any he does possess when he acquires his powers are subsequently removed. Stressful circumstances, extreme danger, and even the effects of time on an unnatural lifespan will all have no degrading effect on his wellbeing, even if sustained for long periods. Moreover, his rational capacity for strategy, quick-thinking, and adaptability are dramatically improved, beyond what a human mind might be capable of in all of these departments. What would traumatize others falls off his back like water.
Painkiller Merritt doesn't experience physical pain in the way an average person might. Rather than being indicated by extreme sensation of discomfort, pain is instead indicated to Mathew by a light, undistracting fizzing sensation in the affected area, allowing him to operate at full capacity completely unabated by even the most dire injuries. A different sensation, like an itch, occurs if what he is doing will exacerbate an existing injury. All of this combined allows him to experience and respond to pain rationally while still keeping his priorities and survival in mind. That, and it allows Mathew to endure things most men have nightmares about and take it like a true ironman.
Linguist Merritt knows every language that is currently spoken on Earth with the fluency and articulation of a masterful native speaker. He may acquire similar knowledge of any language not included in this array via contact between his and a native speaker's linguistic organ; for instance, he could learn sign language or braille by touching the hand of someone who does, or any oral language through lip contact, et cetera. This can apply to languages the human body isn't even equipped to properly replicate. We don't have gas valves, chittering carapaces, and so on, but this mutation allows Mathew to effectively replicate all of these with his mouth if need be.
P A R A G O N A B E R R A N T S
Aeon (Mag. 19) Mathew is fundamentally, causally, and anomalously incapable of death, and is unaffected by time, age, disease, physical or mental damage, or any other type of interference. His mind, body, spirit, and powers are truly and utterly immutable by any and all means, even against those of unstoppable godlike power incomprehensible to the human mind. On a causal level, he is prevented from entrapment for any unreasonable duration. His physical body now represents the pinnacle of the human form in every respect, with intellect, physique, and beauty incomparable to any mortal. Merritt's memory and mind are supernaturally perfected, meaning he will never be driven mad or senile by his infinite lifespan. If he ever desires it, he may die of his own volition, and may return to life if he should ever see fit.
Mathew can see any and all paths to victory; that is, he can see the adaptable steps he would need to take in order to achieve any possible goal, and he possesses the human capacity to execute any of these steps perfectly, except anomalous or supernatural feats using powers that he doesn't actually have, such as flying around the world without the power of flight, or lifting a car without the aid of superhuman strength, etc. Notably, if a goal is not possible for him to achieve with the abilities at his disposal, he will be unable to see a path to victory. This power can process hundreds of billions of possible futures in mere attoseconds based on the most minute of actions, and can calculate a comparable number of paths to victory for him, allowing him to choose which path to victory creates a superior end scenario, rather than merely seeing the end goal to its completion. He may chain paths to victory together, such as a path which leads to the defeat of an enemy, and then subsequently the supposition of their resources for himself, so that he does not create scenarios in which he is cornered by his own abilities. Even such eventualities as time travel or otherwise cannot disrupt this ability's prediction. If desirable or necessary, his powers can direct his body on autopilot, so that the only error he can possibly make is in what goal he chooses to pursue with utter, ruthless perfection.
R E S O U R C E S
Entropium Bodysuit (Elemental) The suit that Mathew wears, while seemingly made of steel or some other mundane alloy, is actually made out of Entropium since it possesses a suite of thermodynamic properties that make it nearly indestructible when not under very specific electromagnetic conditions. This means that unless he happens to be conducting specific alternating current frequencies across his suit, the effects of heat, cold, rust, acids, erosion and deteriorating forces of any kind will leave this suit totally unaffected. It is hydrophobic, lipophobic, and airtight meaning it does not become wet and is nearly impossible to sully. It is infeasible to tear, cut, or otherwise damage it without truly absurd forces applied to it, and it absorbs shock to a degree unmatched by any mundane material. Moreover, it is nearly immune to the effects of time; if a suit that will last several hundred million years without so much as a patch job is in Mathew's shopping list, Entropium may be the ideal material for his costume. Its base temperature cannot be altered unless specific alternating currents are run across it, meaning that it is always out-of-the-dryer warm or spring rain cool in even the most extreme conditions. In its purest form, this metal is nearly impossible to thread or refine, so it is doped to allow for supersuits to be made with it. Of course this suit Mathew wears has also been upgraded with several technological additions such as a nuclear fusion powered anti-grav propulsion system that he uses for flight, and an internal H.U.D system that allots him several vision modes, real-time target identification, and much more. Other than that, the only other thing he's had replaced is the wiring, using an infusion of Metanon Silk instead of the traditional copper, iron, or steel.
Finally, Mathew wears a brown overcoat over it all.
Assets Mathew is boldly one of if not the wealthiest individuals on Earth. He has several trillion dollars at his disposal, and a twelve-figure passive income that he uses to pay for both his suit and base of operations. How he came into such wealth exactly is anyone's guess, as Mathew himself definitely isn't telling, but now his only consideration is what to do with it all; dispensing private islands as party favors, purchasing million-dollar mansions in every nation on Earth, commissioning a veritable army to see to his defense, and purchasing small countries for the sake of convenience should he forget his passport are all within the realm of possibility.
“And where Nyarlathotep went, rest vanished, for the small hours were rent with the screams of nightmare.” H.P. Lovecraft
GENDER Although Nyarlathotep's current avatar is decidedly feminine in both nature and shape, the actual being it represents is so far beyond human–as well as inhuman–comprehension as to be impossible to describe adequately. Thus it cannot be said that the Outer God itself is either male or female even though its many avatars may lean one way or the other, for it transcends the petty binaries created by humans and monsters alike. No. Nyarlathotep simply is and always shall be.
SPECIES Outer God: The Outer Gods are, for the most part, entities of cosmic significance who are indifferent to the various goings on of the lesser races and planes at large. They may be distinguished from the typically planet-bound Great Old Ones because of this, although the distinction isn't universally acknowledged or recognized by many species due to the fact that both groups are inimically hostile to all other forms of life in one way or another. Generally speaking, they are located beyond the confines of Earth and the solar system, exerting their influence from the lightless depths of space or from beyond the uniform confines of our dimension. However, at least one Outer God (Nyarlathotep), has taken up semi-permanent residence on Earth in the form of a less powerful avatar to better serve as a representative for its kin's interests on the Dark Council, as well as their window into the earthly realm.
ABILITIES & MAGIC While Nyarlathotep's current avatar has nothing of note in the way of physicality–being little more than mortal just like any other human, albeit a tad more resilient–besides serving as the method by which the Outer God influences and interacts with the world at large, it does possess a vast repertoire of forbidden and occult arcane knowledge that has been cultivated throughout the nameless aeons. This allows Nyarlathotep to cast all manner of spells, conduct all manner of rituals, and perform feats many would consider downright miraculous, although there is nothing truly beneficent about them. Other than that there isn't much overtly supernatural about it beyond its aura, which is overwhelming enough (when brought to bear by word or will) to enthrall most humans to its service while simultaneously driving them mad, though even the most stubborn among them will fall if given time enough to bask in its presence.
SKILLS In regards to its current incarnation, Nyarlathotep specializes primarily in manipulation and subterfuge, being a consummate liar with the raw charisma necessary to back it up. This makes it incredibly adept at bending others to its altogether malevolent will, at least insofar as humanity is concerned. Beyond that, it is very skilled in the arcane arts as mentioned previously, rivaling (and some even say surpassing) Dracula himself in many a field.
WEAKNESSES Given the fact that the being the other members of the Dark Council interact with on a nightly basis is little more than an avatar, and not even the strongest one in the Outer God's arsenal at that, Nyarlathotep can be violently slain just like any other human; though it cannot be said to fall to sickness nor age, hunger nor poison, nor a natural death. And even if it should fall in the mortal plane, such a fate will not injure or affect the god itself, save to set its plans back temporarily. The Outer God's magic also isn't instant by any means, at least not when it comes to anything more powerful than a minor cantrip or spell. Those usually require varying investments of time and material in order to properly cast, as opposed to merely uttering some words or flicking one's wrist.
PERSONALITY TRAITS Nyarlathotep is a rather unpleasant mixture of sadistic, malicious, mocking, cynical and cunning.
BACKSTORY Nyarlathotep has existed since time immemorial and interacted with humanity under many a guise and many a form over that span of our reality's existence. Usually to sow madness and chaos wherever it goes, but also to tend to the cults of its kin and amass armies of followers for itself from time to time. It was Nyarlathotep also who whispered in the ear of Abdul Alhazred, influencing him to pen the dreaded Necronomicon. A foul tome whose cover is bound with human skin, and upon whose pages the rituals required to summon the Faceless God–along with the rest of its maddening kin–are transcribed in ancient blood. Despite these and many other feats, though, perhaps none was more renowned or unexpected as the Outer God showing up at Dracula's castle to claim a seat on his council.
The mirror Nyarlathotep carries is actually the means by which it communicates with the rest of its kind, being a window to the court of the Daemon Sultan itself. Although it doesn't need to make use of a tool like this strictly speaking, it did so on a whim anyway. Nyarlathotep can seemingly conjure and banish the mirror at will as well, though in those rare moments it does leave the thing lying around in a conspicuously easy-to-reach location, it is highly advised that one simply ignore the insidious drone of trumpets and ceaseless stream of blasphemies emanating from it. More than that, it is also recommended that one resist the urge to stare at whatever nameless horrors lie in wait on the other side. That overbearing sense of curiosity you feel? It is not your own...
"Targets located. Proceeding with sterilization protocol."
Appearance Thanks to a full-body conversion, not much remains of Adrian Lichter the man. Granted, his humanity was always questionable, even before the wars that scorched a majority of the planet and killed vast swathes of humanity. Forcing the rest to make their way in the wastelands that had been left behind... Standing head and shoulders above most men, Lichter cuts quite the intimidating figure thanks to his augments and cold, mechanical way of doing things. As such his appearance rarely seems to change. Instead it consistently conforms to function over form no matter the circumstance, though at times he may shake things up by mounting the additional weapon platform or two. Typically a shoulder-mounted missile rack of some sort whose targeting systems are linked to his optics, wolvers mounted in each arm, or a retractable arm cannon, although he has fielded more outlandish modifications in the past.
Faction Solo.
History Born in the year 2375, Lichter had a troubled childhood to say the least. Brought up in the decade preceding the Corporate Wars, Adrian's life was filled with conflict and struggle as the price of goods steadily increased due to corporate greed and maneuvering. Compounding this issue was the kid's generally toxic attitude and outlook on life--formulated in part by his parent's increasingly dysfunctional relationship--which only worsened over time as he matured, eventually culminating in what can only be described as a deep-seated hatred for the overly emotional nature of humanity, as well as the inefficiency that inevitably resulted from it. Then the wars came, and with them the final nail in the coffin to cement Adrian's misanthropic worldview. At first he didn't pay much mind to the conflict between megacorps, seeing it as yet another example of humanity's shortcomings, though they eventually managed to recruit everyone from his neck of the woods through less than savory means.
Thus it was that, at the tender age of twenty-five, Lichter saw combat for the first time. It was here in his very first skirmish that he lost three of his limbs to an enemy grenade and had to undergo cybernetic replacement surgery. When he awoke, however, he was not upset. No, quite the opposite actually. He was downright elated, for at long last he had managed to correct at least some of the inefficiencies present within his own form. Even so, he recognized the fact that there were a lot more modifications left to go before he was truly perfect. Adrian began taking more dangerous assignments and posts closer and closer to the frontlines as a result, until eventually the only organic part of his body left by the end was his brain, though calling it such would be somewhat of a misnomer considering just how far from baseline his neural structure had drifted at that point thanks to extensive modification. Regardless he would continue to serve for many years afterwards, albeit as the perfect killing machine thanks to his new mechanical nature. It took the bombs falling and the formulation of the Megacity Plan for him to finally be recalled from active service, not that he minded of course.
Or that he really could...
In any case, Adrian would go dark during the years that followed, only to reappear in the recently established Megacity-01 when a trio of gangs (whose names have long since been forgotten) attempted to blow up the Spire. Though the details of what went down that night are fuzzy, and worsened further thanks to highly embellished retellings peddled by the stupid and greedy, the massacre that followed over the next seven hours remains etched within the public consciousness still. How could it not when the only thing to dominate the holo-feeds for weeks on end was an image of Lichter standing atop a pile of burning corpses, dead gangbanger in hand as he awaited orders, all while the on-site MCPD officers cowered in fear?
Cybernetics Adrian makes use of a heavily modified military-grade cyberbody outfitted with the following: Two sets of interface plugs, a chip slot, pain editors, link set (smartgun, vehicle, data), optics suite (low-light, thermograph, targeting scope, anti-dazzle, heads-up display), cyberaudio (radio, tight-beam radio, and cellular links with scrambler, scanner, enhanced range, amplified hearing, sound editor, level damper, linguistic translator), wolvers in both arms, quick change mounts for the installation of additional weapon subsystems, radiation and EMP shielding (complete with detectors and warning systems for both).
Some additional upgrades have been installed over the years as well, either by the GeoNet's governing AI or by his erstwhile corporate overlords in order to make him a more effective asset on the battlefield. These upgrades are listed below.
Environmental Assimilation System: The exterior patterning and coloration of Lichter's cyberbody can be selected. Internal memory stores 24 different camouflage patterns (desert, urban, snow, etc.) as well as rat black and olive drab coloration, all selectable by the borg.
Autoinjector: This is a small, refillable drug injector which can dose the brain with psychoactive chemicals.
Ammo Hopper: This is a back-mounted ammo container with an electrically-powered belt feed. It can be modified to carry almost any type of ammo, and holds 20x the weapon's standard magazine capacity.
Black Box Recorder: This is a built-in synaptic recorder, which--as the name suggests--records and stores on chip everything the borg experiences during its mission. It is used for post-mission analysis and debriefing, and it records what happened to those borgs who didn't make it.
Chronometer: Lichter's cyberbody has a built-in timekeeping unit with stopwatch and alternate time-zone functions, all displayed on the HUD.
Ambidexterity Sub-Processor: This allows Lichter to use either arm with equal effectiveness, and at the same time.
IR Thermal Dam: This system absorbs IR emissions until they can be safely bled off; this is done in a random pattern, so that it does not appear to come from a humanoid source.
Locator Beacon: A radio signal unit with a 100 kilometer range, because you want to protect your investment.
IFF Transponder: This emits a coded, Identify Friend-or-Foe signal so that friendly patrols, smart mines, and air support won't mistake the borg in question for an enemy.
Satellite Link: This high-powered microwave communication system (which utilizes a transmitter chip embedded in the skull) allows communication with friendly satellites, giving instant access to battlefield data, intelligence, and updated orders. It also has a global positioning system which can pinpoint the borg's true Earth location to within 5 meters.
Wolvers: Among the longest and deadliest variants of implantable blade designs--that also just so happen to be inspired by and named after the claws of the titular weasel--wolvers are inserted along the back of the hand. Whenever the hand is clenched, the thin, triangular blades telescope and lock into place, remaining extended a full foot until the hand is relaxed.
Equipment Zastava Mk. 45 HMG [Primary - Modified]: The Mk. 45 heavy machine gun was engineered by the best and brightest of Zastava with two core functions in mind: One, to be mountable on armored vehicles, and two, easily installed in and around defensive perimeters. In other words, it was designed as a heavy-hitter that was meant to be bolted down. No one within Zastava ever considered the idea that anyone could--or indeed would--want to carry a gun this massive anywhere, whether they were loaded with cybernetics or not. But, as usual, it seems the human will found a way. The Mk. 45 HMG can sometimes be found cradled in the arms of heavily modded solos and gangsters, as they're the only people capable of withstanding the powerful recoil. However, the Mk. 45 cannot be reloaded easily by one person in combat situations, unless they happen to have a built-in ammo hopper and modified gun, effectively making it a one-hit wonder. Still, this hasn't proved a major drawback for most. By the time its clip is emptied, there's typically no one left to shoot at anyway.
Remington XS-2 [Secondary]: The XS-2 is an unusual breed both because of its bizarre appearance and its unconventional technological foundation. Instead of firing ordinary buckshot, this electromag shotgun launches small, razor-sharp steel spikes. Critics argue that the XS-2's heaviness and bulkiness make it unreasonably inconvenient for practical use. Its advocates, however, point out that the American-made shotgun is undeterred by walls. Officers within the MCPD belong to the latter group. After many trials in the field, the XS-2 has proven itself consistently effective at bringing down even the most heavily chromed Mods.
Quirks
Speaks in a bassy monotone.
Is completely robotic in thought. Possesses no emotion or human traits beyond the shape and look of his body, although even that is debatable.
Doesn't sleep. Ever. Can go into standby for long periods of time, however.
Haunts The Spire: Located at the very heart of Megacity-01 is the Spire. This upper class sector is the only place where it isn’t cramped, there are trees, and things aren’t always breaking. As you might expect, the Spire is home to the Heirs, MCPD, any decent stores, and the members of E Street that have stayed in the Heirs’ good graces. Dominating the Spire is a massive tower that gave the area it’s name. Housed within this building are the CPU for the GeoNet AI and the servers that maintain it. In addition, several floors of the Spire act as luxury apartments for the richest Heirs. To even own the smallest space within this massive tower is considered a major status symbol.
"I carry within myself the knowledge of those who came before. All those who fell by our hand. The road to penance is a long and arduous one, but it is one I walk nevertheless."
Ship Class Capital Ship – Also known as Sovereign-class, the two-kilometer-long capital ships are the most well-known Reaper subtype. Their main weapon is a spinal mounted "magnetohydrodynamic" cannon with a yield of 132 to 450 kilotons of TNT, which dwarfs the main gun of an Everest-class Alliance dreadnought. No known ship, not even a dreadnought, has been known to survive a hit from this weapon. Capital ships are also armed with multiple cannons in their "tendrils" capable of shearing through most opposing vessels in a single hit, a point defense system (similar to the GARDIAN systems favored by organics) for anti-fighter and anti-projectile purposes, and are capable of unleashing swarms of Oculus drones to engage fighter-sized craft. They are extremely durable, capable of taking the continuous and simultaneous fire of four dreadnoughts before they start to lose their kinetic barriers.
Role: Capital Ship.
Physical Size (roughly): 2 kilometers in length/height.
Physical Description: A Reaper is essentially "billions of organic minds, uploaded and conjoined within immortal machine bodies."
In terms of physical design, Reapers bear superficial resemblance to a cuttlefish or squid, with a bulky semi-cylindrical body, a tapering plate over the rear and five tentacle-like "legs" or arms extending from its front end, in addition to six jointed legs extending from its body. The rear-most of the larger legs have crescent-shaped extensions. Colossal in size, Reapers are known to range from 160 meters to over 2 kilometers in length.
The core of any Reaper is constructed in the image of the species that was harvested to create it, while the exterior follows a standardized design that is most efficient for their purpose. When the Reaper fleet is revealed in dark space, they are shown to all share the same basic design, but with great diversity in limb number, shape and orientation, some with extended heads and others having multiple glowing lights. This may illustrate the variety of Reaper subtypes, as it is revealed during the Reaper invasion of the galaxy that several different varieties of Reaper exist.
While the outward appearance varies between subtypes, all of them retain features of their forebears, the Leviathans, an ancient aquatic race that dominated the galaxy in ages past. The largest known Reaper ships essentially copied the Leviathan form while the smaller ones diverge to varying degrees.
Armament/Complement (roughly): The main gun on a Reaper capital ship dwarfs that of the Alliance's Everest-class dreadnoughts. No dreadnought has yet survived a direct hit from the weapon. Estimates put its destructive power anywhere from 132 to 454 kilotons of TNT. Even if the target is hardened, as in the case of a surface-based missile silo, the gun can instead bury the target beneath molten metal. Precise targeting computers and correctors also give Reaper weapons a longer effective range than organics' dreadnoughts or cruisers. The kinetic barriers on a Reaper capital ship can shrug off the firepower of a small fleet. Weapons specifically designed to overcome shields, such as the Javelin, GARDIAN lasers, or the Thanix series, can bypass the barriers to some degree. The difficulty is getting close enough to use them--the surface-mounted weaponry on Reaper ships, similar in principle to GARDIAN, presents an effective defense against organic species' fighters.
History of the Ship: A former member of the larger Reaper armada slumbering in dark space, Thoth had been one of the many capital ships assigned to harvesting the Asari. A task it took to with unrelenting efficiency. Once the Crucible was activated and fired, however, Thoth ceased its assault and left the planet the process the new perspective that had suddenly been foisted upon it. This caused it to gain an understanding of organics it hadn't possessed before along with the rest of the fleet. In the years that followed Thoth would aid the various species in their rebuilding efforts. When all was said and done it would begin an unending voyage across the vast gulf of space, its own form of penance for the atrocities it had committed, sharing and collecting knowledge from/with whoever it met.
When Daniel came to it with his offer, Thoth accepted, seeing it as just another step on the long road to redemption.
Notable Crew: N/A.
Unique Technologies Indoctrination: Reaper "indoctrination" is an insidious means of corrupting organic minds, "reprogramming" the brain through physical and psychological conditioning using electromagnetic fields, infrasonic and ultrasonic noise, and other subliminal methods. The Reaper's resulting control over the limbic system leaves the victim highly susceptible to its suggestions. Organics undergoing indoctrination may complain of headaches and buzzing or ringing in their ears. As time passes, they have feelings of "being watched" and hallucinations of "ghostly" presences. Ultimately, the Reaper gains the ability to use the victim's body to amplify its signals, manifesting as "alien" voices in the mind. Indoctrination can create perfect deep cover agents. A Reaper's "suggestions" can manipulate victims into betraying friends, trusting enemies, or viewing the Reaper itself with superstitious awe. Should a Reaper subvert a well-placed political or military leader, the resulting chaos can bring down nations. Long-term physical effects of the manipulation are unsustainable. Higher mental functioning decays, ultimately leaving the victim a gibbering animal. Rapid indoctrination is possible, but causes this decay in days or weeks. Slow, patient indoctrination allows the thrall to last for months or years.
The usage of this tactic--as well as nanides and husks--has since fallen out of favor among the Reapers following their merger with organic life at the end of the war. As such, Thoth doesn't typically make use of either system, though they still exist.
Eezo Core: Speculation in the Codex suggests that each individual Reaper has a massive element zero core which, coupled with the likely enormous quantities of energies at its disposal, allows it to generate the staggering mass effect field needed to land ships of their size on a planet.
Viruses: The Reapers are known to use highly advanced computer viruses for other purposes as well, such as to subvert synthetic species that do not willingly join them in their conquest of organic civilizations. Synthetic intelligences would eventually be harvested anyway as they are not a part of the Reapers' ultimate goals. Reaper viruses are not unbeatable; on at least one occasion an unshackled artificial intelligence was able to counteract one.
Nanides: Aside from computer viruses, the Reapers employ other forms of microtechnology, a notable example being nanides, or microscopic robots. Reaper nanides are used in the harvesting of organic species, often deployed through devices such as dragon's teeth to convert organic beings into the mindless, aggressive cyborg husks. Husks are used as ground forces and shock troops by the Reapers, overwhelming their organic enemies and breaking their morale. Occasionally, to bolster husk defenses the Reapers will employ devices known as Barrier Engines that cocoon individual husks in a durable biotic barrier or possess certain husks to improve their combat prowess. For long-range offensives they usually outfit their husks with integral weaponry, although Reapers have been known to also manufacture handheld weapons like the Reaper Blackstar.
General Capabilities: The Reapers are technologically superior to the organic species of the galaxy--but the degree of that superiority is a matter of debate in the intelligence community.
The Reapers' thrusters and FTL drives appear to propel them at more than twice the speed of Citadel ships. Estimates of their location in dark space suggest they can travel nearly 30 light-years in a 24-hour period.
Reaper power sources seem to violate known physical laws. Reapers usually destroy fuel infrastructure rather than attempting to capture it intact, indicating that Reapers do not require organic species' energy supplies. Consequently, the Reapers attack without regard for maintaining supply lines behind them, except to move husks from one planet to another. Unlike Citadel ships, Reapers do not appear to discharge static buildup from their drive cores, although they sometimes appear wreathed in static discharge when they land on planets.
Reapers recognize each other through a complex Identify Friend/Foe system. Reaper interrogation signals do not simply look for a friendly transponder code, they look for a friendly intelligence. If other races attempted to steal the IFF for themselves, the IFF comes with a virus that can potentially disable any system it's connected with.
Though they are sentient machines, the Reapers have habitable interiors that can transport a crew, either to help spread their indoctrinated slaves or to allow these slaves to tend to them, probably both.
Vulnerabilities: However, the Reapers are not invincible. When the Reapers go into states of hibernation between cycles, they are vulnerable. By taking refuge in dark space, the Reapers ensure they will not be discovered by accident and destroyed while they wait for their vanguard to open the Citadel mass relay. A concentrated effort by the fleets of organic races could also destroy a Reaper even if it is at full power.
Thus, although clearly technologically superior to the Citadel forces, the Reapers have experienced casualties in their battles across the galaxy. This indicates that, theoretically, with the right intelligence, weapons, and strategy, the Reapers could be defeated. Unlike the mass effect relays that they created, Reapers do not have quantum shields. Locking itself down at a quantum level would leave a Reaper unaware of its surroundings until the shielding deactivated. Instead, Reapers rely on kinetic barriers. In the case of a Reaper capital ship, these kinetic barriers can hold off the firepower of two dreadnoughts simultaneously, but three clearly causes strain, and four typically results in destruction. Weapons designed to maximize heat damage, such as the Thanix series, show better results against the Reapers than pure kinetic impacts.
The barriers of a Reaper destroyer are less formidable than those of a capital ship. It is possible for a single cruiser or many fighters to disable or demolish a destroyer if they can get within range before they are themselves destroyed. The Reapers' energy sources are also not infinite. For example, to land on a planet, a Reaper must substantially reduce its mass. This transfer of power to its mass effect generators leaves the Reaper's kinetic barriers at only partial strength. Additionally, Sovereign was destroyed while assuming direct control over Saren. The feedback from Saren's death seemed to entirely overload Sovereign's shields. Current Reapers do not seem to suffer from this design flaw, however. Reaper capital ships can turn faster than Citadel dreadnoughts, but to do so, they must lower their mass to a level deemed unacceptable in combat situations. Consequently, it is possible for a dreadnought to emerge from FTL travel behind a capital ship, then bring its guns to bear faster than the Reaper can return fire. This is a poor tactic, however, against Reapers flying in proper formation.
"It is the duty of every Zeylan to propagate and preserve not only our own civilization and species, but those we find around us, should they prove themselves worthy of it of course."
Personality: Ervax's personality is difficult to parse into language that less advanced lifeforms can understand, as with most of the higher races inhabiting the universe at large given their incredible advancements in both the material and sociological sciences. Suffice it to say, however, he is not overly malicious nor cold and cunning. Similarly to the rest of his race--and indeed most post-scarcity polities in which the struggle for material or psychological comfort and/or wealth is no longer an issue--he is actually quite idealistic, believing like most among his people do that life deserves to be propogated and preserved no matter the cost. Be that the lives of his own species or others, it hardly matters to him or the rest of the Zeylans. This is reflected most clearly in the way they construct their ships strangely enough, as each one is designed not only to function as a vessel with which they may traverse the stars, but as weaponized arks also. Cradles capable of rebuilding, propagating, and preserving any civilization, culture, or species they come across from the ground up.
Unfortunately, not all races are idealistic in quite the same way. Many are cruel, believing that all immortal life should be destroyed for the sake of avoiding a downwards spiral into stagnant decadence, while others seek to withhold the gift entirely so that only they may lay claim to it, exterminating those who seek it no matter the reason. Others still hold that only they should have power over the universe, being the only ones wise and resourceful enough to properly rule it of course, which inevitably sees them fall into tyranny as a result. The Zeylan are no exception to this, for though their goal is noble, they still decide which species thrive and which ones die. Indeed, they often carry out such sentences themselves - dooming entire worlds because the species which inhabit them are predicted with nearly 100% certainty to become a threat if allowed to spread.
Thankfully Ervax is rather moderate in this regard--at least when compared to some of the more hardline members of his race anyway--and has yet to eradicate an entire species like them. Truthfully, he hopes he never has to. This is not to say that he is a pacifist, however. The Zeylans definitely have their fair share of enemies considering they operate in the same spaces as the polities mentioned above, many of whom Ervax and his people have not only encountered, but fought. No, he simply will not genocide an entire race unless he has no other choice. And even then it will be an act that will haunt him for the rest of eternity.
Other than that he has a penchant for exploring and meeting new people. He also enjoys sculpting and creating planetary biospheres in his free time.
Appearance: Considering the extensive technological and physiological modifications the Zeylans have made to themselves over the hundreds of thousands of years they've existed, very few of their baseline traits remain. Those being, at most, their head crests and psychic abilities. Otherwise practically everything about what constitutes the average Zeylan has changed to match what you see before you now. A more humanoid body plan overall combined with a hulking figure, extreme hight, unusual skin pigmentations, clawed hands, and a lower half composed entirely of tentacles for a plethora of purposes. From locomotion to manipulation and, in the case of one particular mass down there, pleasure.
And that's not even getting into all the bio-synthetic modifications they've made...
Biography: Ervax was born like most modern Zeylan are. From the genetic mingling of his parents, more specifically the tube they had placed said material in. Regardless, after a period of accelerated incubation out he popped, ready to take on the world. From here he had the normal childhood one could expect for a member of his race, and once he came of age he was given his own starship, which he christened the Hand of Antares - having been inspired by the many legends and myths his people held about that place. With that he began his eternal mission like many Zeylan before him.
Abilities & Equipment Operations: Per standard inception protocols, the necessary comprehension required to pilot and manage your starship has been transferred to your brain via a mix of direct download and retroactive inscription recall. While a good deal of your starship is automatically managed, should the extreme ever occur and you need to step in directly, you'll find yourself more than capable.
Personal Sidearm: Even when you can sunder worlds, occasionally a softer, more personal touch is required. Others may see a meagre thing at your side, but unleashed, your weapon is more than enough to core through heavy power armor and mechanized infantry with ease.
Combat Skin: This support shell is the apex of design for personal combat. Utilizing solid light, reference-locked energy fields, and adaptable smartmatter, this combat skin has a multitude of capabilities and functions. Allowing for massively boosted strength and reaction time, the combat shell also adapts to any attack that is made upon its skein, massively mitigating or outright nullifying incoming damage depending on the severity of the attack. It also acts as a sophisticated support system both physically and psychologically, constantly monitoring its wearer in order to mitigate all forms of attack, from the physical to the memetic. As part of this, it allows for retroactive editing of traumatic psychological events should the wearer ever be significantly impaired by the more damaging of entities one might encounter, while also shoring up mental resilience. It also negates the need for sustenance and downtime, and as a final bonus, its exterior can be customized to suit the wielder's personal aesthetics.
Psyker Awakening: Either through circumstance or biology, your mind has awakened to a new power, and is now capable of reaching beyond the flesh to cusp and mold higher-dimensional energies. While weak at first, time and practice will see this power blossom into an earth-shaking force with manifold applications.
Knowledge Download: Learning without comprehension is a wasteful thing; an affliction you can no longer claim to have. The technological basis of your starship has been opened to you, gifting you with the most valuable possession one could have: Understanding. While it's doubtful you could improve on such, depending, such comprehension and knowledge would be most valuable in the right hands.
Combat Augmentation: Per standard equip, your mind was gifted via effector download with the requisite knowledge to handle both body and ship in combat. While it's feasibly questionable as to when you'd find yourself locked in close-quarters combat with others, having mastery of voidship tactics should serve you well regardless.
Lord of Admirals: The understanding and comprehension of legions of tacticians and experts at battle has been gifted unto you. Beyond this rote knowledge is the inception of a shrewd and calculating acumen designed for the act of war. Should any fleet face off against you with the intent to win via superior tactics, they will find themselves sorely lacking.
Intelligence Augmentation: The alteration and repair upon your arrival within your voidship results in several upgrades - your intelligence has been radically boosted beyond its previous limit. The result is rather impressive, giving you near perfect memory and recall, as well as increased cognitive comprehension and speed.
Biomechatronic Interface: Your brain has been augmented with a suite of biocybernetic cognitech enhancements and processors, giving you access to a wide range of sophisticated capabilities; enhanced comprehension, increased thinking speed, access to AR layers via direct nerve induction, seamless and intuitive VR immersion, hacking capabilities, technopathy, and so on.
Biological Upgrade: Your flesh has been augmented via extensive genetic engineering; you move faster, think harder, and understand quicker than before. Every part of your body has been improved above and beyond the norm for your species. You are a paragon in every respect; not only in mental capacity, but in physical strength as well, as this augmentation includes extensive applications for combat and pure, unadulterated survival.
▬▬ Hull Type ▬▬ Geometric: There is simplicity in mathematics. Sometimes the more advanced things are, the simpler they become. While your starship may not evoke beauty with artistic lines or sweeping curves, there is a statement to be made from such simplicity, and the power it holds.
▬▬ Size Category ▬▬ Dreadnought: The master of fleets. Few are capable of building on this scale, and yours is already a cut above. The mere presence of your ship is enough to deter entire armadas, and catch the attention of galaxy-spanning empires...
▬▬ Stardrives ▬▬ Alcubierre: This powerful stardrive deforms space around the voidship, forcing it to coast along on a self-actualized wave of spacetime accelerated beyond superluminal velocities. While obscenely fast, this stardrive is fairly obvious to those entities who are capable of monitoring for such things, and what it excels at in speed, it lacks in dexterity.
Fold Drive: This stardrive distorts the geodesic structure of spacetime, momentarily forcing two disparate points to become one. This drive, while allowing for instant translocation, mandates a massive power draw and depends upon accurate astronavigational data for truly long jumps, as complications may arise otherwise.
▬▬ Realspace Drives ▬▬ Subspace Trawl: This realspace drive interfaces with the geodesic skein formed from the relationship between realspace and higher-energy dimensions, effectively pulling or pushing the ship along spacetime itself. While not as nimble as an Inertia Drive, it has the benefit of not requiring any gravitational disturbances or mass ejecta for propulsion.
▬▬ Power Source ▬▬ Disjunction Core: Harvested from rare high-energy events that can occur in the more tumultuous galaxies, this generator harvests energy from an eternally expanding subsumed knot of spacetime - in effect, a caged baby universe, inexhaustible and without end.
▬▬ Ship Intelligence ▬▬ #1n3: This machine intelligence was designed with the intent of being the perfect companion and second to the ship's captain. Loyal without question and perfectly capable of executing tasks and goals with the intent to defend both starship and crew, this intelligence, once awakened, will quickly become a boon companion and friend for the eternal journeys ahead of you.
▬▬ Secondary Systems ▬▬
Self-repair & Maintenance: Your ship has been equipped with a sophisticated set of repair, engineering, and fueling elements, stripping away the need for a crew.
Medical: Considered mediocre by your ship's builders, this medical suite is advanced enough to turn back the tide of death itself if need be; as long as decay and the irrevocable disruption of the patient's neural state have not yet occurred, their body can be repaired.
Captain's Cabin: Your personal demesne within the ship, crafted to your specifications, aesthetics, and preferences. The only real constraints are the engineering limits involved as stipulated by the size of your ship, and maybe not even then...
Bridge: The command throne from which your ship heeds its master. Style, appearance, aesthetic - all is assembled at your will.
Passenger Quarters: Far from palatial, this series of berths is more than enough to satisfy the need for rest and relaxation possessed by the individuals you bless with the privilege of boarding your vessel.
Shuttlebay: Size is a statement, but it can be awkward on occasion. The need to descend from the heavens to the earth can occur from time to time. Should such a situation arise, your ship possesses at minimum two self-maintaining shuttles to convey you to your destination. These artefacts are capable of multi-atmospheric operation and transporting fairly sizable cargo, as well as personnel.
Telepathic Control Link: A specific command module has been linked to your brain's neural-vector state, allowing for remote monitoring of your awareness without interruption or blocking. This allows for command and control of your starship when not aboard, as well as communication with any ship AI should the need arise.
Chrysalis Generator [Requires Telepathic Control Link]: The pleasures of direct flesh-to-flesh interaction is often a sirens call a captain cannot ignore. And despite the power their ship possesses, the chance of failing their captain is not remote. But even something as final as death is not insurmountable. Specific modules and engines are now irrevocably linked to your corporeal vector, continuously cognizant of the state of your flesh. Should lethal damage occur, the system reacts, translating your neural organs from your doomed body to an awaiting chrysalis that then proceeds to reconstruct your corporeal shell as it was prior to destruction. Due to the weakly acausal nature of this system, it can react even in the face of complete and total bodily destruction. While the reconstruction process is far from simple, leaving you immobile (though not unaware and insensate) during your restoration, it is perhaps preferable to the alternative.
Biosphere: A dedicated portion of the ship has been reformatted to accommodate a terrestrial biome with features and atmospheric systems of your choice. May be purchased multiple times.
Virtual Space: A fast time-accelerated virtual universe (or multiple) allowing for a myriad of functions, from education to entertainment.
Epicurean: A specialized space set aside for the explicit production and preparation of rare and indulgent foodstuffs. Extinct species, long-lost flora, distilled, rare essences - your dining experience will be as such to humble a god.
Smartmatter: The majority of your ship's internal habitable space has been augmented with programmable smartmatter, allowing for rapid and painless reconfiguration of its internals on the fly. While often seen as a sybaritic luxury, this also allows for surprising combat utilization, should boarding crews become a problem.
Internal Heaven Array: Going above and beyond the normal emergency forcefields ships possess, this array encompasses the entirety of the ship's internals. This not only allows for rapid and excessive defensive measures formed from energy fields and solid light planes, but it also allows for more subtle tractor effects, allowing for matter manipulation and control.
Spatial Compression: Bypassing the constraints and limitations of normal space, all or part of your starship's interior has been folded into a higher-dimensional envelope of constructed reality. This gives your starship more room on the interior than the exterior would allow.
Stasis Crypt: Portions of your ship have been constructed with the purpose of housing hundreds of thousands of individuals, kept perfectly within stasis.
Backup Core: While remote to the extreme, there was always a possibility that your primary AI's core could receive terminal disruption that its auto-repair and defensive systems would be unable to mitigate. While automatic systems would be capable of managing the starship, the loss of such an asset would be difficult to recover from. As such, your AI's core has a mirrored hot backup in a hardened vault, allowing for recovery from catastrophic loss. However, rather than a hot backup, you can instead select another AI core to be active simultaneously, allowing greater management flexibility for you and yours. You can select this option multiple times.
▬▬ Engineering Systems ▬▬
Drone Command Array and Bay: A portion of your ship has been repurposed for the construction, maintenance, and in-field management of a fleet of combat drones. While not as powerful as your starship's main offensive and defensive arrays, being able to envelope and aggress from multiple angles and battle zones can be useful. All drones come equipped with your ship's FTL drives, should the need to engage in a superluminal battle across multiple light years arise. The specialization of these command systems and bays means that construction of such is typically much faster compared to other, general purpose systems.
Heavy Drone Array Augment [Requires Drone Command Array and Bay]: The drone command and deployment system has been upgraded extensively. This not only allows you to deploy, manage, and construct more drones than before, but you can also field larger, more powerful independent assets.
Drive Redundancy [Cannot Be Taken With Lighthugger]: For whatever reason, the makers of your voidship saw fit to make sure it was more than capable of traversing the barren gaps between stars. It possesses more than one method of superluminal drive, giving it a flexibility few can match.
Command Core: While remote, the possibility of destruction is present. The central command core of your starship has been augmented and designed with this possibility in mind. Not only is it independent of the rest of your starship in terms of power and propulsion, but a specific manufactory module has been engineered within for the express purpose of harvesting resources needed for the construction of the ship itself - allowing for the entire starship to be rebuilt from nothing should it ever be lost.
Teleportarium: This system allows for the formation of apertures which bypass the space between two separate points by tunnelling through higher dimensions, allowing for spatial translation to and from your starship.
Warchive: Not merely a pattern vault of small and heavy arms, autonomous assets, weaponry, vehicles, armament, armor, and so forth, but an archive of information on enacting interplanetary war. Comparatively useless without a manufactory base, it is still an informative treasure trove of such topics. Paired with a manufactory, you can build armies fit to conquer worlds.
Manufactory: A specific portion of your starship has been devoted to heavy industry, allowing for the rapid construction of various buildings, stations, vehicles, tools, and personal armaments. While internal yards are your primary construction resource, your assets can be deployed beyond the confines of your voidship's interior to allow for planetary and void-side operations, assisted by such things as independent harvest drones, disassembly and construction arrays, and manufactory automata. In addition, this includes the requisite pattern archives necessary to start a modern industrial infrastructure on your settlement of choice, should you see the need to do so.
Shipyard [Capital and Dreadnought Only]: Your starship has been extensively augmented with the requisite processing, manufacturing, and egress bays required to construct other starships. The only real limitation is size, though dedicated manufacturing could enable you to eventually duplicate your starship in its entirety.
Phase Cloak: Enveloping the ship in a spatial manifold, this perfectly conceals your vessel from any possible detection. The only limitation is the lack of ability to affect anything outside the manifold, though this does not prevent your drives from functioning.
Singularity Core: This processing core's main physical computational array is housed within a manifold superstructure via spacetime metric engineering, allowing for physical components and computational speeds that would not normally be feasible under realspace conditions. This speed allows for modeling and research above and beyond what anyone would consider realistic, allowing you to push science and engineering to heights undreamt - or mastering technology you should encounter in your travels, regardless of its form.
Biomedical R&D: A specialized research facility based around biological repair, augmentation and other particulars - among them specialized gynoid and bioroid construction facilities, mass cloning, customized engineered organisms, and extensive biological and cybernetic upgrades.
Engines of Creation: Creation is often more of an art than a science, a skill rather than a rote equation. Your voidship has been equipped with the necessary databanks, editing faculties, and deployment pylons designed around terraforming barren planets from the ground up. While far from a quick process, few can deny the power of creating an entire biosphere. To give life where there once was none is stunning indeed...
Gravity Lifters: Less a single item and more a deployable network of linked artefacts, this system allows for both litho and stellar lifting, and enables quicker methods of mass harvesting and breaking up gravity wells overall.
Scripture Aura: Care was taken to culture specific structures within your ship - patterned bionueral clusters that draw upon higher-dimensional energies and spacetime constructs. These clusters are keyed to correspond both to your ship's governing intelligence and your will as captain. These adjuncts allow your starship to project psychic dominion upon those within its grasp, engineering specific conduct dictated by your overt command or subconscious desire. This structure also has offensive and defensive capabilities, assisting in guarding your psyche from deleterious influence alongside projecting telepathic screams during battle. You yourself remain immune to any damaging effects of this capability. While the ship itself may be flesh and bone, you as the captain are its heart and soul.
Empyrean Module: Sequestered inside a full-immersion pod, you link up directly to the starship, controlling its every facet as if it were a part of your own body. The improved reaction and management time is considered by many to be quite the tradeoff, given the particulars involved in entering and exiting the Empyrean Module, while others would (and do) swear their lives on it.
Gravity Tractor: Both a tool and a weapon, a gravity tractor warps gravity around a single target, allowing it to be pulled, pushed, or held immobile in relation to your starship.
Auspex Baffle: Augmenting your starship's formidable battle capabilities are a plethora of systems designed around ECM and ECCM. While not true stealth, this electronic warfare suite is designed around the art of confusing and distorting the readings of other battlefield equipment, allowing you to break target locks, throw off and confuse automated weaponry, and other such usefulness.
Astrometrics: An array for computational modelling and analysis of stellar events, cartography, and auspex data. While useful for long-range analysis of potential navigational mishaps, it is also equipped with a plethora of sophisticated scanning equipment, allowing for pinpoint observation of minute targets hundreds of light years away. This also allows for sophisticated side-scanning of higher dimensions for intrusive targets, should the need to locate and target hostile entities in those realms arise.
Effector Beam: Utilizing ECM, ECCM, and long-range field manipulation, this module enables long-range hacking without the requirement of physical contact. Short-range hacking can also be supplemented through the use of battle nanonics, allowing for quicker and more robust access.
Alchemical Forge: Drawing power from higher-order dimensional realms, this forge allows for the transmutation of energy into matter. While energy-intensive, it effectively frees your starship from the need to take in raw materials for construction or repair.
Grand Hull: The sophisticated hypertech of your starship enables it to grow beyond its initial size and configuration. While slow, age and activity will see your starship evolve to become progressively larger with a requisite increase in capability and power.
Ark: Your ship was meant to be more than something to breach the lonely divide between stars. It was meant to be a savior. A hope. To carry with it the dreams and souls of an entire species if need be. Your ship has drastically increased in exterior size to that of a small planet, at minimum. While that size does invite difficulties, it does offer the odd opportunity at camouflage - who would believe such a gargantuan artefact to be mobile to begin with?
▬▬ Weapon Systems ▬▬
Buster Cannon: Utilizing spatial-warping technology and specialized alloy rounds, this weapon fires off physical ammunition at an appreciable fraction of c.
Warhead Launcher: Utilizing electromagnetics and gravimetric assist, this system fires off self-seeking warheads armed with Hotdust-static nodules of antimatter perfectly paired off with normal matter, allowing for much greater and far more reliable detonation yields. This system can be purchased in both missile and torpedo form. While both function semi-independently and are self-seeking for identified foes on the battlefield, missiles are both more maneuverable and much faster than their torpedo counterparts, though lacking in comparative range.
Heavy Warhead Launcher: A specialized torpedo launcher designed around the variable-yield quantum filament warhead. These weapons hold quantum filaments contained in a stasis field that, when released, trigger a nuclear disassembly shockwave, horrendously disrupting local matter as well as putting out massive bursts of high-intensity radiation.
Plasma Impactor: Utilizing electromagnetic forcefield tunnelling, this weapon enables an intense pulse of molten matter as ammunition - effectively, a high-speed continuous railgun stream. While powerful, it has little control or finesse in regards to precise targeting, though the results are devastating.
Blaster Cannon: Utilizing matter-edition and compressed deuterium, this weapon system fires tightly grouped packets of weaponized antimatter. While the range is equivalent to any proper electromagnetically-accelerated cannon, the nature of the projectile can cause splatter effects upon impact, oftentimes causing secondary effects or, in rare cases, no effect at all.
Hadron Stream: This launcher accelerates a flow of particles up to near superluminal velocity. Upon impact with the target, the resultant interaction with normal matter results in massive flares of discharged radiation. Despite the energies utilized, this weapon is not one meant for pure devastation, as the resultant bursts of radiation are typically lethal for a voidship's crew as well as severely damaging to on-board equipment without ruining the ship itself. As a result, this is a particularly potent, if cruel and unusual method of securing starships as salvage, though its effectiveness is nearly degraded to nothing if the ship still has active shielding.
Corrosion Launcher: Often considered a typically exotic form of torpedo, this weapon is nothing of the sort - instead, it is a carefully managed and engineered bolt of strange matter. Upon making contact with a baryonic mass, the strange matter begins to rapidly convert nearby mass to match its own type, resulting in cataclysmic degradation and corrosion of high mass voidships. Putting aside the damaging bursts of radiation the corrosion effect results in, the violent alchemy and structural degradation of starships can often result in them literally shaking themselves apart should they be under acceleration at the time of impact.
Slicer Beam: A projected tunnel of energy that rips apart molecular bonds and bypasses almost all forms of armor. Only exotic and unusual defenses can hope to stand against its onslaught.
Subspace Filament Control: This system manifests virtual filaments of subspace energy from projector arrays placed around the ship's hull in a tightly controlled manner, allowing for pinpoint short-range surgical precision that breaches most, if not all, forms of armor without pause. The tradeoff of such precision is the limited range (comparatively), making it a potent and devastating short-range weapon system.
Rift Generator: This weapon system utilizes resonance energies to crack space and time, creating seething rifts in the spacetime continuum that spew out cataclysmic energies. These rifts are mobile and often seek out the nearest source of high-energy input, making it a potentially devastating--albeit suicidal--form of battlefield control, but none can deny the destruction they can invoke.
Anti-Superluminal Warhead: A packet of unstable superdimensional energies set to detonate that disrupts enemy superluminal drives. The specific tuning of this warhead allows your preferred method of travel to remain intact and unmolested.
Subspace Displacer Warheads: Internally manufactured warheads place atop 'normal' missile stacks that, when detonated, displace everything within a variable yield radius into subspace.
Virtual Light Optical Batteries: A barrage of virtual particles fired off from higher dimensions that rapidly decay in normal space, but do so at superluminal velocity, allowing for devastating energies delivered at extreme range.
Angel Light Bridge: A powerful battlefield dominance weapon that enacts sophisticated energy control over a projected 'core' manifested outside the ship's hull. Once activated, it allows for the fleet-slaying projection of a near unending onslaught of energy condensed into beams and tracking warheads. It will, however, require energy buildup before firing.
Hypometric Lance Projector: This system utilizes weaponized spacetime engineering by projecting a lance of phase-change state that renders the physical presence of baryonic matter a mathematical impossibility. While contained within a strictly localized projection, the resultant effect is devastating as sections of the target are literally written out of existence.
Soliton Wave Generator: This weapon creates a standing soliton wave in the geodesic skein of spacetime. The intense gravitational perturbations that result have devastating effects; while the effect on a target below a certain threshold is minimal, this weapon's true power is displayed on large collections of matter, as planets, gas giants, and even stars are slowly disassembled from the wave effect.
▬▬ Defensive Systems ▬▬
Void Shield: Projected energy screen that shunts all damage into other-dimensional spaces. Can be overloaded, but it effectively mitigates all damage until this threshold is surpassed.
Angel Shield: Manifested planes of hard light sheathing your voidship. This sheath envelope does not allow for 100% coverage of your vessel, but what sections are protected require astronomical amounts of energy to break through.
Reactive Shielding: A cadence manifold system has been integrated into your voidship's defensive screens. As a result, it reacts to any and all energy directed at it by re-shunting the majority of said energy outward from its surface in a combination of massive electromagnetic surges and radiating shockwaves, turning nearby space into a hellstorm of energies with your ship as its center. While not effective against capital ships, this system can be devastating on both fighter craft and fragile projectile weaponry.
Storm Envelope [Requires Reactive Shielding]: The manifold system integrated into your energy screens has further extended its kill radius. Additionally, its effect has intensified, resulting in a leapfrogging effect that causes lightning and shockwave nimbuses to jump from starship to starship, fighter to fighter, missile stack to missile stack. It stands as a robust, albeit passive, defense and gauntlet that few could survive long enough to get close to, let alone bypass.
Singularity Projectors: While short-range, this automated system utilizes disjunction inductors to cause artificial singularities to bloom within a specific location projected outside of the ship. Short lived, these crushing gravitational blooms have multiple functions - from forcing aside weapons fire of all kinds to anti-fighter properties, the intense distortions ripping apart any fighters that would so much as dare to come into close proximity of your vessel.
Subspace Hardening: The exterior hull is charged with extra-dimensional energies, granting it strength well above and beyond what is possible with standard nuclear forces. Excellent for use when you are planning to ram and board other ships.
Hypermatter Augment: The exterior hull of your starship has been transmuted into an alloy that only has a passing relation to normal matter. Not only is it insanely difficult to damage, destroyed portions of hypermatter will regenerate and repair without any input of energy or mass.
Adaptive Hull: A mix of biological and hypertech, your ship's hull has been augmented with a reactive and evolving system that works to mitigate the effect of damaging energies upon itself. While never 100% perfect, this can have an impressive effect on attacks that would otherwise be effective and/or crippling.
Temporal Actuator: A field projector that enables temporal altercation within a localized target, effectively locking down starships within bubbles of temporal stasis, or rapidly aging them within a field of locked acceleration. When configured for wideband targeting, it can be utilized to great extent to inhibit incoming fighter craft and warheads.
Shield Hardening: The energy management/redirection capabilities of your shielding systems are robust to the extreme, allowing for truly cataclysmic amounts of weapons fire to be managed by your defensive screens without thought or concern.
Goddess Halo: The shielding system of your starship is powerful beyond measure to the point that it can envelope other starships within its protective embrace. This also allows for pinpoint reconfiguration of the shield's geometry, enabling the englobement of specific targets either in space or planetside.
Environmental: Extensive care has been taken to allow for your ship to manage whatever potential encounter it might witness when sailing the void. This enables the craft to traverse a multitude of environs without concern, from the depths of a solar corona to the crushing extremes of a gas giant.
Hyperion Lock: Specific engines within your ship have been tied to the structures and systems that make up your defensive network. When activated, the ship's energy field becomes attenuated to local reality, resulting in a complete and utterly perfect defense against any and all attacks directed against it. While useful, the complexity of the system does have some drawbacks. For one, it negates propulsion, leaving the ship effectively immobile (barring normal stellar and gravitational orbit). For two, the effect lasts a limited amount of time--roughly thirty minutes--and requires over a day of reformation of the analysis engines within your ship before they can be brought online again.
Singularity Block-Form Mathematics: The most extreme and esoteric of defensive technologies. When the very nature of reality can become fluid while traversing realms both fantastic and horrific, measures must be taken to protect against inimical hazards. Utilizing high-order mathematics to generate an artificial naked singularity and warp-space, this module stabilizes reality around the ship itself, preventing intrusion from hostile actors, be it passive or active.
