Avatar of Mokley

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Recent Statuses

4 yrs ago
Current I'M BACK(?)
6 yrs ago
got coffee, got music, ready to roll.
6 yrs ago
kinda distracted by writing fanfiction whoops
1 like
6 yrs ago
Ever write a few chapters of something you're really excited about, then a few days later reread it and it's boring as hell? :D
5 likes
6 yrs ago
There was a shooting at an art show where I had a painting hanging. I'm so shook.

Bio



I have no idea what I'm doing.

Most Recent Posts

I'm interested

Awesome! Thanks Sailor! 💚

All, I've edited the first post with a simple character sheet. Will work on a proper OOC tomorrow. Still totally open for anyone who wants to drop in!
*kicks the door down* Why hasn't no one showed up here yet? This sounds AWESOME!

Aw thank you dragonfly!! 😄

Quirky, weird, and lovely!

I dig it.

Woohoo! Thanks abstract! 💚

Couldn't think of a good character concept to go with this; I think I have something now though. I'm interested.

Yooo thanks cosmos! Curious about that concept! 😮


"You won't find a one of us much like the other. A friend of mine, she pulls down the sky and flings those Rue right into the solar system. This other guy, he'll shove his arm right down that Rue's gullet with a fistful of fire. I once saw one hypnotize a Rue with a few words and a pendulum. What I do, well, that's complicated. But we're all here for the same reason... mostly. We're all Howls."



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RUE: Entities of many forms or no form, depending on whom you ask. They exist in a dimension that overlaps our own and sometimes appear as ghosts, shadows, mirages, and hallucinations.

HOWLS: Humans with a natural ability to perceive Rue. Most people go their whole lives without ever knowingly encountering a Rue. The Howls, however, can see-- or hear, or feel, or smell --when a Rue is nearby. Many Howls take side jobs that passively utilize their unique skills, some are on a mission to bridge communication and harmony between the Rue and humanity, while others make full-time profession of hunting down dangerous Rue. The Howls are so named because most Howl-born infants spend the majority of their waking hours screaming, oversensitive to the perpetual, uncomfortable clash of dimensions.

DARKLIGHT CORRIDOR: A subway train that traverses natural cavern networks deep underground, transporting passengers and cargo between settlements and civilizations. The caverns are infamous for strange occurrences and Rue interference.

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SETTING AND PLOT

The little city of Oaken is quietly nestled in a lush valley between looming mountains. The rooves slope the color of rust, the clock tower has a funny wooden bird that chirps the hour, and on every bright cobbled corner is another notice board calling for the assistance of Howls. Oaken is a Howl city: a place magically protected against all intrusion by Rue, where Howls can rest and live in peace.

On this sunny morning, a new flyer is posted on every corner: an elderly healer requests a group of Howls to accompany her on the Darklight Corridor with a cargo of medicinal herbs for a distant village suffering from a strange and debilitating ailment. She cannot pay much but promises comfortable hospitality and good food along the way. Interested Howls will need no experience.

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GAMEPLAY

This RP will be character-driven and decision-driven. Those who make no decisions, who do not act, will not have much fun here. This RP will keep moving, things will keep happening, as long as the characters make them happen.

In other words: the world will react to your character's actions, not the other way around.

At the same time, be sure not to steamroll or ignore the other players. I'm well aware that anyone could drop out at any time and leave conversations unfinished, but try not to let that possibility get in the way of interaction and communication. The relationships and teamwork among the PCs will make or break this RP.

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CHARACTERS

Characters may be anyone of any background, with any reason for joining the healer's journey. They may have grown up in Oaken, are stopping by for a rest, or are here on vacation.

Characters who work well with others are highly preferred: you will be RPing with each other as much as with me. The GM reserves the right to question or reject any application for ANY reason.

These are the character restrictions:

  • They must be new, inexperienced, or otherwise a casual dabbler in Howl-related work. There are no seasoned veterans and no know-it-all experts. Everyone is on a relatively level playing field: a low level bright-eyed newbie. I will build the world around the story as we go, which means we're all learning about Rue together. Besides, this is a very easy, underpriced mission that no experienced Howl would ever bother with.
  • Each Howl may have one or two innate magical abilities that only work on Rue and/or the Rue's dimension. The same ability cannot be used to affect the real world or other people. Abilities manifest at different stages of life and for different reasons: you could start without an ability and discover it during gameplay.
  • Non-Howl characters are cool too.
  • No, you can't be a Rue.
  • You're free to invent what life is like in Oaken and outside of it, but everything is subject to GM veto. This only happens if something you created conflicts with the plot or setting.
  • If the character came from the outside, do not assume your own premade locations or cities. The farthest reaches of this world will remain entirely under GM creation and control for very good plot-related reasons. Suggestions, however, are welcome!
  • Don't keep secrets from the GM. I need to be able to account for every character's personal arc as I'm developing the main story. When a character surprises me with secret information in the middle of a scene, I have to stop everything and rework the plot to accommodate it. Please PM me any information that you want to keep hidden from the other players, and we can work together to weave the mystery into the plot.
  • One character per player. All NPCs, including family members, are entirely mine to control. If you don't want me to control your character's friends or family, they must remain in the background and will not engage with the story at all. One player using multiple characters not only is an unfair advantage, but it forces me to keep track of too many moving parts.
  • If you feel the need to be Different right out of the gate, please take a moment to consider why.
  • I know what some of you are thinking. The answer is "perhaps." PM me your ideas.




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INSPIRATION






GM Notes: It has been three years since I've made one of these. I'm going for something casual, fun to mess with, and tropey as hell. Will probably clarify and edit this as things solidify in my head.
Yes I am bumping this three year old thread, bite me.
Hhmm we could do something like knock you guys out and take you to the hospital.... 😏

That'd be a prime situation to bring in other Ze to assist.
The Hospital

*OH. You're ALIVE.* Something snide dripped in Fluke's voice, crackling interference in Iris' earpiece. *You didn't just hear that explosion? Archer and Steel Rose were inside. It's over, our leader's gone so what's the point.*

The sun blazed high overhead, shrouded in a film of rising violet smoke that sent the birds spiraling down into the spaces between the great gnarled trees and cracked clay buildings. An echo of screams haunted the streets. Fire sirens wailed in the distance.

Ahead, the dome of the hospital glistened with moving reflections of the smoke. The round door in the top of the roof had begun to slip shut the moment the healers and their stretcher had descended through it. The opening narrowed, nearly closed by the time Iris could complete her approach -- but she could see through the glass prisms of the dome, the rainforest of trees and flowers like a hidden world deep inside, swarming with spots of bright orange where the healers traversed the weaving lanes. The motorbikes landed on a wide stage at the center of the forest, converged with orange robes by the time the motors stopped.

From other angles, she could see more rooms within the hospital: a cafeteria, a waiting room, a hundred patient rooms with pulled curtains.

In the center of a wide empty hallway, an old man stood alone, thin as paper and reeds, leaning like a stick against a walker. He tilted back his shivering head, and though he was so far away, Iris would have the distinct feeling that he could see straight through her, like a needle shot into her soul.

"Hello, Iris," said a gentle voice in her head, the same way she had heard the voices through the ring still in her possession.

*You do whatever makes you feel like a hero or whatever,* Fluke interjected. *I'm leaving before something else happens--*

*Archer! Cedar! Listener, Iris, Fluke, can you hear me?*

The Highrise

Rose's light beam cut like a knife through the roiling undulation of darkness and smoke; a vaporized hole punched the stunned shadows, which recoiled and scattered like a swarm of black wasps for the heartbeat Rose needed to stumble down the stairs. All around her, the walls and the floors and the ceiling were shaking and crumbling as if the world itself was shattering with the pitch of screams that stormed in the roaring smoke that smelled like cinnamon and burned flesh--

The Nox at her shoulder gripped tight despite Rose's thrashings, locked against her arm like a new appendage, but at least it wasn't reaching for her mask, nor making any attempt to possess her, as if it couldn't tell which part of her was the face. Still, Rose was on the floor and her gunblade out of reach, and the Nox weighed heavier by the second, twisting her arm as it pressed her shoulder into the floor and the ceiling cracked and rained plaster upon her while the smoke billowed dark down the stairs toward her feet--

*Finally, you feel like responding.* Fluke's voice in Rose's ear scraped with static. Iris, too, could hear everything. *You sound like you're about to ask for help. Remember you're the one who went off on your own.*

Rose would hear the scrape of her gunblade being picked up off the writhing floor, though the smoke now had engulfed the last shreds of sunlight around her.

"Close your eyes," said Archer.

A beam of light flooded Rose's prostrate body, and the clinging Nox disintegrated with a screech. The air around her cleared, like a bubble of freedom beneath a dome of writhing smoke that would descend again in a few precious seconds. In the sharpened gray clarity, Rose could see the door that would lead outside--

--and between her and the door stood Archer, with Thorn dangling slack in her dark hands. Her mask was gone, and her head was engulfed in the inky black shine of a thousand Nox eyes, like writhing, slurping spiders. She didn't move nor respond again, like a statue, like a doll in her likeness, hollowed of all thought.
💜 Please take care Lucky!!! Hope all will be well soon! 💚💙
Woohoo! wb! 🎉
Please take care and be well drew!! 💜💚
The Highrise

The wall cracked and a deep fissure split the doorframe like firewood. While the roots twisted, the door groaned under strain and pressure. Cracks spidered across the moldy drywall, which shattered in broken chunks to the shifting floor at Rose's feet. With a lightning-strike *POP!* a deep gash cracked the door in two.

A shine of white light glimmered through the gap, then a little shining translucent ball-- no bigger than a lens flare --slipped out of the broken door and dove immediately into Rose's open bag. The left motor skate shimmered momentarily before the light was gone.

"FOUL DEMONS! BACK!" cried Ruskali above. "I WIELD THE POWER OF TRUTH! YOU WILL NOT--"

A sudden hush dropped into stillness.

The roots had stopped moving.

Like the abandoned set of a silent movie, the hallway and the broken doors seemed suspended in time. A held breath.

...tor meht hctaw dna yrd meht knird...

The dry, dark whisper, like black cobwebs, hissed in Rose's ear.

The Nox had attached itself to her back, and crept around her neck like the brush of a feather.

*ka-BOOOOM!*

The ceiling of the far side of the hallway collapsed in a violent billowing cloud of violet smoke that smelled like burned flesh as it rolled and crashed toward Rose like a tidal wave, devouring the hallway and everything in it.

The Rooftops

From Iris' vantage point, she could see almost all of Rig: the gargantuan roots twisting between clay buildings, treehouses dangling from great shaded branches, the spark and flare of bright flags and murals along the winding narrow streets below. A murmur of starlings swooped out of high branches and undulated in the sky to her left, so close she could hear the flutter of their quick wings.

Beyond them, closer on the horizon across the water, a darker cloud shimmered ever closer...

*ka-BOOOOM!*

Behind her, in the distance, a chorus of shrieks and screams accompanied a billowing plume of violet smoke that rose out of the crumbling highrise.

Below, unaware they were being followed, the three orange-robed healers looked back over their shoulders to see the violet cloud rising against the sky.

They said nothing, however, that could be overheard through the ring.

The two motorbikes and the stretcher revved faster over the rooftops, headed straight for the hospital: a round glass building nestled among great twisted roots, shining in the sunlight. They hovered over the center of the honeycombed dome while a wide round doorway opened in the top, and they gently descended inside.

*That's it.* Fluke muttered in the receiver in Iris' ear. *Archer's dead, or something. I can't find any of you and I'm done trying. Maybe you're dead, too. Worst training exercise ever. I'm telling the council you all suck.*
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