Posts marked with *** are must-reads.
February 28, 2016 - Post #3,590 ***
The Hourglass:
SUMMONING...
(+6 from Cobalt, +1 from Tazz)
(+6 from TFT, +2 from jondanger, FBSN, and Revan in reserve)
I +3 crystalcat.
Ultra Greed buys and uses Double Down. Asterism uses Tone Deaf. The Nuclear Throne uses Nuclear Fusion. The first two attack the Hulk, and the latter attacks Steven.
Hey Tazz, I have a question. Could you keep track of the upgrades Ultra Greed's bought in the EOTB? It would be a big help.
The Scribe retreats to his underground bunker another time, navigating his way through a complex series of monitors and other such devices. He looks at an object in the corner of the room - his intangible box. The Scribe opens it, seeing the two symbols of unfathomable power already contained inside. Soon, there will be a third. And later still, a fourth. But the Fourth is what the Scribe is here to claim. He must go on another journey across the folds of Minecraftia.
The Scribe picks up the box, shoving it inside his jacket. He then navigates to another vault, pulling out the form of an ancient relic he used in a previous attack - the Crux Ansata. It has been broken back up into its crystalline shards, but the Scribe once again seals them inside a glass jar, which will be broken when the time is right. The Scribe then takes his Journal, flipping it to the page on Desert Temples. The Scribe takes out his leaking pen, mumbling a phrase to himself. Suddenly, the pen lights up with purple flame.
An eerie light casts itself onto the Journal... A light that is the antithesis of itself. A blacklight, perhaps? That sounds like a fitting name. The blacklight, at complete odds to the visible light found across all universes and all realities, coats a purple sheen across the page, revealing glowing white ink - invisible ink. The Scribe nods solemnly, perhaps not daring to let emotion cross his face. "Invisible ink. The perfect way to keep secrets to those unaware. Of course, now you all know of its presence, which makes the whole thing rather unnecessary, hm? Whatever. I'd like to see any of you hold this book without combusting."
There are new phrases splattered across the pages, written in hasty writing. The Sandfallers were not gods, but men. In fact, evidence shows the pantheon consisted of only one being. A man with the Crux Ansata who manipulated a legion of sand to masquerade as other gods. He formed entire people and civilizations out of grains of sand... And I think I know why. Deserts are recent. Much younger than the rest of the world. At least, my own world. Some event must have happened to create all these deserts... Some kind of machine powerful enough to manipulate entire biomes into living sand. No doubt what the Sandfallers truly sought was some kind of device that can rewrite time and space. But they couldn't find it. No one could. Except for those brave enough to defy religion and go on the quest for The Gate. The Fourth is the answer. The Glowing Hourglass that turns back Time like a Wheel, and orchestrates the Sand's Fall. The Crossroads of Destiny. The Spiral of Sight. There are several images, too - a cloaked figure wearing the Crux Ansata, diagrams of some kind of landscape gradually turning into desert, and schematics for some kind of superweapon laced with occult imagery.
The Scribe laughs to himself. "That's what I want, huh? To play god. Perhaps this hourglass can show me the way in a way that Octothorpe, Pilcrow, and Asterism have not. To remind me of my past mistakes, to drag me into deeper darkness... Will it do me good? Will it do me wrong? I suppose there's only one way to find out." The Scribe moves to one of his computer monitors, activating some kind of microphone. "Hughes, it's the Scribe. I'm calling you because I need your help." There's some kind of voice obscured by faint static in the background. "Scribe? Is that you? How's it going? Finally detected a paradox, huh? I've heard lots of reports, but haven't done much about 'em. Figured you had it all under control." The Scribe doesn't move. "You could say that. Anyway, I need to talk to you. But not here. Meet me at the Restaurant at the End of the Internet. Try to be discreet." The voice laughs on the other end. "You got it. See you there! I wonder what kind of mad science experiment you're doing this time..." There's a hissing noise. The Scribe turns away. "Mad being the operative word, of course."
At a wrong turn in reality, sitting right next to a 404 page for an unknown website in the corners of the deep web, there exists a restaurant. Those who make it to this establishment can take solace in the fact that they've made it to the end of everything the virtual dimension has to offer. They've made it to the Restaurant at the End of the Internet.
Sitting there is a figure dressed in a fedora and trench coat that does little to conceal bulky space marine weaponry and various futuristic gear. The figure is Hughes, an operative of the Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron. He has been sitting there for a few minutes, debating what to order, when another man walks into the restaurant. It's the Scribe. Hughes looks up, grinning. "So ya made it! Tell me, was the trip complicated?" The Scribe doesn't return Hughes' gaze. "No. Getting here is easy if you follow the right hyperlinks." The Scribe looks at the guy on the other end of the counter. "Get me another one of those... cheezburgers. Yeah. Extra ketchup." The Scribe sits down, the various objects and weaponry in his coat clattering against each other.
Hughes looks at the Scribe excitedly. "So why'd you drag us both out here? What's so important that I need to know, away from anyone at your little war, eh?" The Scribe looks at Hughes for a second, then turns away. "It's not little. It's bigger than you, me, any artifice of science, or any god." Hughes laughs faintly. "Heh, uh. Alright then. So! You got a case for me to crack? A paradox in need of solving? I've got some crystals right here!" The Scribe puts up his hand. "I'm not looking to find a paradox - or start one. I just need you to come with me. It's... It's about The Gate."
Abandoning all sense of happiness, Hughes looks at the ground. "How many of them have you killed." The Scribe's eyes glow. "Two." Hughes looks at the Scribe. "Can you still back out of it? Are you past the point of no return?" The Scribe leans back. "No, but we're getting close. The third one's on his way out. And as for the fourth, well..." The Scribe slides Hughes a holographic card that displays an hourglass and a series of numbers. "That's why we're here. I need to ask you how we can break into the Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron Vault."
Hughes looks at the Scribe like he has three eyes. "You're asking me to break the law again. Look, I... Scribe, I value our friendship, alright? But you can't keep using my position of authority to do things like this! I don't want to have to put you behind bars!" The Scribe chuckles, but his laugh is devoid of humor. "Oh, but you're wrong. I can keep using your position to my advantage. And I think I will." Hughes grows angry. "Just what are you suggesting here, Scribe. What do you have that's letting you pull things like this?" The Scribe sighs. "This."
Putting up his hand, the Scribe takes off his glove, showing his bare hand to Hughes. Burned into it is the symbol of an hourglass that faintly glows with cyan light. Hughes stares at it. "What... How deep into this are you, Scribe. How far have you gone." The Scribe grins. "Too far. I have the other eight etched into other parts of my body. You're not finding them. You never will." Hughes puts his head in his hand. "So all this time... You've been using a Curse to take control of me? To use me? To take my sanity from me?" The Scribe sighs. "Yes. And this isn't the first time I've explained it to you either. I've told you all this before. Several times before. Each time you realize it, you get upset. Then I make you forget. And we move on. Like it never happened at all."
Hughes growls, pounding his fist on the table. Cracks appear across its surface. "But WHY? Why keep doing this? Why break the law, why tell me, why drag us here to do it?? Scribe, you're a--" The Scribe stands up. "I NEED TO DO THIS! I need to prove myself better than THEM! Those gods that set up there in their fancy palaces! Notch, Jeb, the whole lot of them! They didn't come from here! They're outsiders! People from another plane who stumbled upon something they couldn't understand and tried to sculpt meaning from it!" Hughes glares at the Scribe. "And how are you any different."
The Scribe glares at Hughes. "What." Hughes paces nervously. "Look at you, kid. Not even a millennium old and you think you're the best thing since infinite bread. You think you've seen all the multiverse has in store, that you're better than the creators of the universe? Just how self-absorbed do you have to be to think something like that? What are you even doing this for? Why are you trying to get to The Gate?" The Scribe stops. "...Because I've gone too far. I can't stop now. I dragged myself into this cycle of darkness, and I can't let it end until I reach the beginning of time." Hughes grits his teeth. "WHY. Why are you running past all your problems in a frenzy to get to some... some MacGuffin??"
The Scribe takes off his goggles in a flash, revealing... Nothing. He... He doesn't have any eyes. Where they should be is only scar tissue. "I'VE HAD TOO MUCH TAKEN FROM ME! My innocence, my past, my future! I started this because I learned the gods weren't all they were cracked up to be! And I'm still doing this because I have nothing left to lose! You think this is all about knowledge for me? Knowledge? Really? It's all about the power, Hughes! Exploiting others, making deals, preparing for the big day!" The Scribe takes out his Journal. "This book? It's a goddamn weapon! A catalog of death! An artifact of destruction!"
Hughes stops. "I'm turning you in." The Scribe laughs. "No you're not." Hughes yells. "YES! I AM!" The Scribe holds up his hand, his eyes glowing with cyan power. "No. You're not. Timewheel."
And then everything went black.
Hughes' entire body once again goes rigid, his mind blanking out. He knows nothing but the Scribe's influence. His eyes flickering with cyan energy, Hughes speaks. "
The Scribe stares at Hughes. "So here's what you're going to do, Hughes. You're going to take me to your secret little headquarters, and you're going to lead me to exactly where the Vault is. Once we're there, you're stripping one of the guards there of their rank and giving me their uniform so I blend in. Then we're heading into the deepest level of the Vault and you're letting me find Artifact 464F5552. You will have no recollection of what I've really been doing to you, and we will remain the best of friends, just like we... just like..." The Scribe falters. "...No." He lowers his hand. "This is... Can I ask this of you?" Hughes does not move. "
The Scribe, laughing, raises his hand gain. "Right you are, nobody. Right you are. I'll let you think I'm an image of perfection, just like I've let myself think it one too many times. I'm going to let you slip out of this trance now. Once you regain awareness, you are going to do everything I've asked of you, and we will remain friends. In fact, we're going to be so good friends that you're going to give me... Hm. How about a million units? That should be enough to pay a visit to the Venusian System so I can get a few golden weapons." The Scribe's hand flashes with light again. "Sandfall." Hughes blinks, his eyes returning to normal as the Scribe puts his glove back on. "Ugh... Scribe... What happened?"
Picking up his things, the Scribe starts moving out the door. "Nothing. We were just talking about how great it would be if we went to the Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron Headquarters." Hughes' face lights up. "Oh yeah, of course! There's been something at its deepest level that I want to show you! I have a feeling you're going to really enjoy it." Suddenly, someone behind the Scribe clears his throat. It's the person behind the counter of the restaurant, the one who was supposed to give the Scribe his order. Sighing, the Scribe walks up the counter. "How much can I pay you to pretend that you didn't see any of what just happened."
The man behind the counter laughs. "Oh, Scribe. I won't tell anyone what I saw. You don't need to bribe me like you've done to all those other people." The Scribe glares. "...Right. You know I have over a million ways of killing you where you stand if you decide to let my journey slip, correct?" The man at the counter raises his hands defensively. "Hey, just because you go around spilling your secrets to every forumgoer willing to listen doesn't mean I'll do the same. After all, it's rude to talk about people who are listening. Just go on your suicide pact." The Scribe laughs. "Sure thing. And thanks for the cheezburger." The Scribe grabs the burger, takes a single bite, and heads out the door. "Hughes! We're going." Hughes runs after the Scribe. "Wait for me!"
Chuckling, the man behind the counter polishes the countertop before flickering into the image of a skeletal figure with a cracked face in a black coat. He then disappears entirely. Someone runs out of the kitchen with a cheezburger. "The order for the Scribe is... done? Hey, where'd he go?"
Moments later, the Scribe and Hughes have walked through the front door of reality and are now standing in the middle of the Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron's Headquarters. The Scribe takes in the view - he's standing in the middle of a massive futuristic hub warped by alien geometries. There are hallways leading every which way, battalions of troops roaming through in rank and file, and various computer monitors displaying various sections of reality, seemingly reporting recent paradox activity. The Scribe whistles. "You've got some kind of operation going on here." Hughes chuckles. "Thanks for the praise, Scribe. Yep, this whole thing works like one amazing well-oiled machine. And it's all thanks to our extensive network of paradox detectors, plus the watchful guidance of the Time Baby. That... And the thing I'm about to show you. Follow me."
Hughes heads through the wall, which slides upwards. The Scribe ducks through before it can close. The two are in a dimly lit chamber that leads straight down - there's a staggering vertical descent. "Don't worry, Scribe. I know all the shortcuts. If you can't walk on the wall, just jump." The Scribe takes Hughes' advice, jumping straight down. Hughes calls after him. "Hey! I didn't mean that literally! Ugh, be careful down there!" Hughes glides down the wall, but finds the Scribe standing leisurely at the bottom. "What took you so long?" he says with a scoff.
Moving past the Scribe, Hughes motions to another set of doors. "Take the one on the left. We'll pop out near the entrance to the Vault. ...Actually, stay here. You're going to need a guard's uniform to blend in. Hang on, I'll get one for you." Hughes walks out the door, leaving the Scribe in the narrow chamber. "Great idea, Hughes. Leaving someone like me alone in a facility with millions of potentially lethal objects." Someone walks through the door behind the Scribe. "-blasted Weirdmageddon, damaging the stability of our..." The figure stops, turns around, and looks at the Scribe. "Who the hell are you." The Scribe sighs. "A good friend of Hughes. You know the guy, right? Broad shoulders, really official-looking, puts his trust in others too easily? Yeah." The figure - his nametag reads Lolph - just sighs. "Don't touch anything. If Hughes has gotten you this far, you know what you're doing." He walks up the wall.
Hughes walks in a few seconds later, holding a patch that displays the image of a purple hourglass - really, it's two triangles arranged in the shape of one. "Put this on. You'll instantly assume the proper uniform, fitted perfectly to your... specifications. No one will know." The Scribe puts on the patch. "Perfect." Instantly, a full-body set of black armor springs up around his being, outfitted with decals and a nametag that only displays obfuscated text. Hughes laughs. "You really don't want your name getting out, do you?" The Scribe turns away. "If you had a name as bad as mine, you'd keep it under wraps too. Besides, names have power. You and I both know that." Hughes walks out the door. "Whatever. Just follow me, alright? The walk to the lowest level won't take too long."
The Scribe walks across the room to a massive archway leading to a hollow circular room with what looks like a complex transporter in the middle, large enough to fit a good amount of people on it. The Scribe and Hughes walk across the room with no suspicion, although the Scribe does see what appears to be a naked being lying on the floor and sobbing to himself. The Scribe laughs at himself about how he's wearing the clothes of a soon-to-be-dead man.
Hughes slides a button on the transporter's control panel to the lowest possible setting, indicating a journey to the lowest possible floor. The transporter whirs to life, crystalline light flooding the chamber as the Scribe feels himself blink out of existence and suddenly reconstitute in another place kilometers away. Hughes and the Scribe end up in a small chamber with a massive golden airlock that has a set of numbers and letters airbrushed onto it: "524547454E45534953."
Messing with a control panel next to the airlock, Hughes punches in some numbers and the airlock retracts. There is another, smaller gold airlock that reads "42494E415259," then another large one that reads "494E564153494F4E," then a small cobalt one that reads "50415241424C4553," then another large gold one that reads "44455343454E54," then another small gold one that reads "534944454C494E4553," then a descending staircase with seven steps that leads to a half-orchid half-gold airlock that reads "545249414C53," and finally, an extremely large white airlock that reads "524556454C4154494F4E53."
After the final airlock is opened, Hughes and the Scribe find themselves at the edge of an absolutely massive chamber dominated by two large pyramidal chunks of glowing blue crystal floating in the air. At the top and bottom are interlocking gold rings with spinning gold lines connecting them. As the crystals float in the air, they project images from the past that are seemingly about the wars and conflicts the Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron has fought in. When the Scribe takes a step forward, the crystal only displays the Scribe holding a leaking pen. Hughes motions to the crystal. "Here we are. Artifact 464F5552. Codenamed Ampersand. We found chunks of this thing scattered across a planet in Sector Pangram. All of them surrounded a giant crater torn across the world, as if it impacted the planet and was broken up into thousands of chunks. We reassembled them the best we could, and kept the thing hidden here, in our most secret chamber."
The Scribe laughs. "Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. Tell me more about this thing." Hughes walks forward, still a very far way off from Ampersand. "Its arrival into Sector Pangram caused quite a paradox. It happened a few billion years ago, back when we didn't have nearly as much technology as we do now. Mind you, we were still powerful... but finding Ampersand changed all that. We traced its origins back to some kind of pocket dimension in a relatively unexplored region of the Void. As far as we can tell, Ampersand is one of many such crystals. They have the power to broadcast any event ever recorded, as long as it happened in the past. That's what we can tell, anyway."
As Hughes speaks, more and more images are displayed across Ampersand's surface, all with a blue tinge. The Scribe sees various events in them, such as a man in a trenchcoat talking with some kind of artifact, a massive war in a plains biome with a human soldier being knocked into a trench, a green mutant rolling across a wasteland, a variety of odd creatures being sucked into a giant kaleidoscopic X in the sky, and UserZero and the Godmodder arguing - just like they did when the Scribe first appeared on the Zeroth Server.
Hughes turns to the Scribe. "There's a catch, though. This thing's imbued with a large amount of temporal energy. As far as we know, this thing is literally a gigantic time machine. It's completely unanchored from the normal spacetime continuum - a walking paradox if mishandled. Ampersand's been through a lot of points in the past, and even some in the future. Of course, to it, everything preceding the furthest point it's been in on the timeline is the past - even if it isn't for us. We've used that loophole to track down a large number of paradoxes right away by cataloguing them in our databanks and dealing with them when we detect them. This thing is revolutionary! And I thought you'd want to see it in action."
Miles away, in another chamber of the Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron's aboveground section, Lolph checks in through a sliding door. There are five other members of the team lounging around the chamber, which appears to be some kind of rec room. "Hello there, officers." The others wave before returning to what they're looking at - a holographic computer screen. "What are you... looking at?" One of them looks up. "Before you check back to the Time Hub, you should take a look at this. We've detected some anomalous behavior near the Vault." Lolph laughs. "Paradoxes? Here?" The group shares a laugh. "No, not paradoxes... Just come here."
Lolph slides over, looking at the computer screen. Various windows have been opened, with all of them revealing various information. "There's the Interdimensional Bank Registrar, a camera feed of Nexus A100, and a compendium of all D-Rank officers. We've detected strange data in all three sources," the officer says. Lolph looks puzzled. "Strange data?" The officer - his name is Ritter - nods. "Yeah. There's been a transfer of a million units from Hughes' account in the Registrar..." Ritter points to a red line connecting a picture of Hughes to a heavily glitched out image with numerals surrounding the line. "...to an unknown account. Then you have the camera feed pointed directly at the vault." There's nothing wrong with the camera feed; the guard stationed there is standing still as normal, and there's no disturbances or outside activity. Yet every so often, a cyan tinge fills the screen.
Lolph squints his eyes. "So? There's nothing out of the ordinary there." Another officer - Reynolds - talks. "Don't be so quick to judge. I've studied these feeds for years on end. There's something messing with them - they're only displaying the same animation over and over. We sent some officers down there right now and they're not showing up." Lolph looks perturbed. "...And what about the D-rank officer list?" Ritter sighs. "That's the worst part. The guard that was assigned at the Vault? The one at the camera? His name was Lou Chyon. He's been terminated." Lolph is very upset now. "What? Stripped of rank and uniform?" Ritter nods. "The execution is scheduled for 1600 hours. No idea what he did, though. He was a nice guy, never went out of line."
Lolph paces around the room. "Now that I think of it... I've seen something odd, too. There was a strange man near the Vault, I was just there. He was magnetic, for lack of a better word. But at the same time, he was so forgettable. Like if I didn't stare directly at him, he wasn't there. He said he was a close friend of Hughes, even though I've never seen him around before." Another officer bolts upright. His name is Xyler. "Oh damn. Did he have goggles? And a bandana covering his mouth? And a really long jacket?" Lolph nods uneasily. "Crap. CRAP. I know EXACTLY who we're dealing with. Guys, get all of your equipment ready."
Xyler cocks a plasma rifle. "Break's been cancelled. We need to kill a wanted criminal."
The Scribe walks even closer to Ampersand. Hughes keeps talking. "Now, sometimes, this thing targets specific people individually. Their eyes glow with a cyan light, and Ampersand reacts to them, changing colors to reflect their personality. From past experiments, it looks like Ampersand pulls memories specifically from their past and forces them to relive them. Why? We--" Then Hughes is gone. And so is the entire chamber. The only thing left is Ampersand. The Scribe looks at his own body, seeing that it is now a shimmering outline. Then, a voice appears. It starts out soft, but increases in pitch and volume exponentially, as if a hundred different people are echoing the same sentences. "Hello there, Scribe. I have been expecting you."
The Scribe grins. "Ampersand. So we finally meet, face to... face?" "Yes, I suppose you could call my entire being a face. After all, I use it to think. To see. To hear. But you don't care, do you? You just want this to be over with." The Scribe tries to move, but floats aimlessly instead, not expecting a lack of gravity. "Truth be told, yes. I do. I'm bored of this charade now. I want my journey to be over and done with, so I'd like it if you could come with me to the Zeroth Server of Minecraftia. There's a war going on there that you really need to die in."
Ampersand laughs in a sound that resembles nails scraping on a chalkboard. "For all the research you've done on the Gate and its Order, you don't really know any of us, do you? You just know the images warriors and charlatans have given of them over the centuries. Granted, you definitely know more than most would. Using Odal on the First was quite ingenious, and at least you've actually found the Vox." The Scribe holds a golden instrument in his hand for a brief second, then puts it away. "He'll get it when the time is right." "Of course. All of the Order has something missing, or something that can be lost. The First lost its mind, but you gave it one, then tore it away. The Second lost its shape, but you gave it one, then tore it away. The Third lost its voice... And I?"
The Scribe rolls his eyes. "You're not going to tell me, are you." Ampersand laughs again, but softer this time. "No. For all my talking, I'm not really one with words. My expertise lies more with images. By showing people the things they've already done, I attempt to give them insight. And with that, foresight. You expect this to happen to you. You think I'm going to give you some magical sight quest and, just by seeing the memories you yourself have seen countless times, you'll understand yourself better." The Scribe laughs without finding anything funny. "Perhaps. But I've always figured some 'divine' commentary would liven things up a bit." "Perhaps. I suppose I should make this interesting for you. I'll be showing you one of your most personal memories. I would ask you if you're ready or not, but this isn't exactly something you can prepare for."
The surface of Ampersand lights up, glitching out immensely as the background of reality warps around. There is a flash of nothingness, and then... the Scribe's vision clears. It's nighttime somewhere on a Minecraftian world. The stars and the moon are shining visibly overhead, and there are no clouds. Ampersand looms in the sky, only its outline being visible. It looks like its surface has blended into its surroundings. The Scribe remembers this perfectly. It's the night his life changed forever.
Walking out of a forest is a group of nine boys. Six of them are Humans, and three of them are Testificates. They all seem to be in varying emotional states, as if they're all feeling differently about what's ahead of them. Walking in the back of the group, and pleading with the others to turn around, is a Human with a long jacket, a rippling scarf, and some goggles. The Scribe recognizes himself instantly. His fashion sense hasn't changed much, although his use of hammerspace certainly has. "Come on, guys," the Scribe says. "Are we really going to do this? We could--" "What?" one of the Testificates interrupts him. "Notch is gonna come down and smite us with lightning? Ha, right. I'm not turning into a witch today. Pshhh." The Scribe's voice cracks. "That's a proven FACT, blockhead! Testificates have been shown to develop occult tendencies when exposed to lightning or radiation! And Notch could certainly kill us all right now for doing this!"
The Testificate turns around. "Then why hasn't he, kid? You know what? I'm gonna humor you. Alright, Notch! Come out and face me!" The Testificate looks to the sky, mocking the image of a cross. The other members of the group howl with laughter. "This kid over here thinks you're gonna kill us! If you are, then prove it, tough guy! Prove it!" Someone's rolling on the floor with laughter, though the Scribe jumps, thinking he's dead. The Testificate sneers. "That's what I thought. Now come on. This graveyard isn't gonna desecrate itself."
Concealed in the night, the group trudges across the ending of the forest, where grass gives way to loose dirt, and then to sand. In a matter of seconds, the group is walking across rolling sand dunes. They're holding torches to keep away the monsters and perils of the night, but a fierce wind is blowing through the cold nighttime desert, putting them out. The group hastily relights their torches every so often as they make their way towards a temple in the distance. A Desert Temple. The Scribe gulps, as does his current incarnation. "You remember this all too well. None of them listened." "No," the Scribe says. "They didn't. Not until it was too late."
The group makes it to the entrance of the Desert Temple. It's quite large, and decorated with redstone torches that stay lit forever, undaunted by the screaming wind. The group finds it hard to stay rooted to the ground with the powerful gusts blowing every which way, and after a particularly forceful gust of wind, the Scribe's jacket is torn off of him, flying away. The Scribe's current form tries to catch it on impulse - but he passes through it. There are some laughs across the group, but they can't be heard over the din. "Come on!" yells one of the humans. "We should be protected in here." The group races through the Desert Temple, laughing about how strong the wind is. The Desert Temple resembles a twisted church made of sandstone - writings and inscriptions on the walls, some torn-down chairs, and rings of small stones crafted into the floor. No, not stones. Graves.
"So," the Scribe begins. "You're serious about this." The Testificate who talked smack before laughs again. "You can never take a joke too far. This ain't even a joke anymore." "Yeah," says one of the humans. "As cool as you are, you're seriously obsessed with believing in Notch and all that crap." The Scribe stomps his foot. "Because he's real! You can't ignore the influence of the gods! Not when it's all around you! What, you think this universe came from nothing? That this cube of rock we call home was just formed through millions of cycles of influence and was created from rock and dust just by being spun around a star that just happened to form in this gigantic universe we call home? Is it that crazy to believe that, just like we craft blocks, someone out there crafted us?" The Testificate's determined gaze falters, but then he steels himself with resolve. "I don't care if your dad's head priest. As far as I know, he's forced you to believe that stuff. He probably brainwashes you with it every night before you go to bed and tells you to pray to Notch so the scary mobs don't kill you." The Scribe shifts impatiently. "What if he did?" The Testificate laughs, once again turning his back. "That's all I needed to hear. Vert! Sean! Help me kick over these gravestones."
The Scribe could only watch, horrified, as the three Testificates began ripping out the gravestones of the Desert Temple, pulling out crude pickaxes, and breaking them. The Scribe only saw lives flicker and die before his eyes. Names, birth dates, death dates, and small lines in between meant to represent the sum total of a being's accomplishments. Crumbled into dust, reduced to nothing. Death after death. These people had the gall to mar a sacred and hallowed place just to prove some point. No, more than that. Just to tarnish his beliefs. An expression of rage crossing his face, the Scribe himself wrenches out one of the gravestones, hurling it across the room and smacking the chief Testificate in the back of the head. He flashes red, stumbling over. The chaos stops. Everyone turns to look at the Scribe.
The Testificate spits... blood. "Bad idea, kid." The Testificate charges at the Scribe. One second, he's bearing down on him - and the next... he's gone. The Testificate's eyes have gone white, his body a gray afterimage. It fades away into ashes. The entire group looks on, horrified. The Scribe is catatonic. "I... I... What?" The roof of the Desert Temple splits in two. Indigo lightning tears the desert asunder, reducing the sand dunes to spikes of glass. Something is changing in the sky. The moon is washed away, the stars blinking out, as a tear in the heavens reveals itself. A crack, a splinter, a shatter, a break. Soon, a gigantic kaleidoscopic X upsets the balance of the night sky.
Unearthly light is poured onto the remains of the Desert Temple. The group breaks down hysterically, scattering themselves. The wind is howling. Nothing can be heard over the indigo lightning. With each strike, another member of the group is turned into ash. The wind is howling. Shapes are flying out of the X now; geometric anomalies. The wind is howling. Winged balls that look directly at what's left of the group's souls. The wind is howling. The Testificates and humans are dancing mad, trying to flee, but the eyes petrify them into ash. The wind is howling. The Scribe is left, shell-shocked, in the middle of it all. The wind is howling. His thoughts are clouded, his beliefs torn apart. The wind is howling. The Scribe doesn't know what to think; he stares at his hands. The wind is howling. An ear-splitting laugh that eternally rises blasts apart the desert.
The wind is howling.
The memory shuts itself off, the Scribe and Ampersand returning to the original cyan field. "Your faith in the gods was shattered from that day. The gods were real, and that incident proved it more than ever. But you came to the conclusion that whatever the gods were, they didn't understand what they had created. Their were other, more occult beings far worse than the gods you had been taught to respect. And you couldn't handle those thoughts, however true they were." The Scribe nods sadly. "I couldn't forget it if I tried. They all died around me. I wouldn't call them all my friends... But they were the only people I knew. I went to school with them. Learned how to read, to craft, to farm. And then they died because they couldn't understand the power of the gods."
Ampersand laughs. "And you did?" "Better than them. I'll never truly understand gods. How they think, what makes them tick. But I've always dreamed of doing the next best thing. Not even becoming one myself, no. If the gods that rule us are corrupt, I'm just going to have to tear them apart." Ampersand sighs. "I know where this is going. This was no doubt the inciting moment, the direct cause, of your descent. Not necessarily into madness, but into... hell." The Scribe paces around. "So now you're going to show me the memories of everyone who tried to conquer all of you and failed, right? You're gonna try and stop me from going down this path? Is that it?" Ampersand gleams with light. "No. I cannot stop you. I can only give you time to reflect. To think about what you have done wrong. And believe me, you've done plenty wrong."
The room goes dark, the only visible source of light being Ampersand. Images broadcast themselves across its surface - the Scribe in an office signing papers. A field with the sounds of explosions, marching, and arrows whizzing by. The Scribe wrapping himself in bandages, walking across the horizon. The Scribe entering the Void. The Scribe writing in his Journal. The Scribe finding himself at the foot of an immensely tall mountain range with wind so strong it eats away at his being. The Scribe being haunted by nightmares. The Scribe traveling to every kind of temple imaginable. The Scribe creating an underground lab bunker, the stench of burning flesh permeating the area as he howls in agony. Then Ampersand's surface blips into nothingness, once again revving up with a final image:
The Scribe, rendered as a speck against an unfathomably tall door.
The light turns itself back on, the Scribe taken aback. "What did you - did you just... Did you just tell me I'm going to make it to the Gate??" Ampersand gleams with energy. "I have seen many things. All in the past, according to me. But some events in the future, according to you. Your timeline is just that - a line. One that I can travel across at will. Yet I can see a great deal of alternate timelines as well. Some stable, most doomed. Events that would normally never come to pass do. Why? A freak accident? Pure luck? I do not know." The Scribe growls. "So that means you showed me an alternate timeline." "I will leave you to reflect on that." "No, no, NO! I'm sick of these cryptic half-assed japes! If you're so intent on giving me answers, then give me answers!" Ampersand displays static. "Very well. Do not hold me responsible for this."
Ampersand powers up immensely, preparing for something big... And then--
the Scribe sees three, no, four wars, playing out simultaneously at different points in a horribly amalgamated timestream, all of them happening at different points in space and time yet they can be viewed at the exact same time, all the same faces, all the same places, yet different names, different games, wars shaped by narrative and conflict, stories sculpted by authors sealed off from their world by dots and pixels and lines of code and computer screens, who created characters to entertain themselves and others that were mimics of the horrific brutality going on a multiverse away, wars fought by reality warpers, by godmodders, warriors, and their descendants, wars fought by players, soldiers, alchemists, and fabled titles revered by history for ages and eons to come, wars that were so powerful they decimated entire planets, entire star systems, entire universes into the ash from where they came, wars that were so powerful the people who took part in them were some of the most blatantly overpowered beings to grace this plane of existence, wars that were so powerful they attracted the ire of pure corruption, of horrific brainwashing sentient supercomputers, of sacred artifacts, of rogue personalities, of twin suns a void apart, of the council of the afterlife and the gatekeeper that stands between them, of the gods, of devils, of angels, of demons, of love, of hate, of a puppet and the puppeteer he claimed to be, of facilitators, of assassins, and of masters, wars that were so flawed in their execution their lives and deaths were like atomic bombs firing on all four corners of this wretched rock you call home, and they were fought by people who didn't know what they were getting themselves into but were forced to hang on for the ride lest they find themselves being thrown off, by people who knew all too well what they were doing and were powerless to stop it, by people who stuck to the paradigms and played by the rules, by people who spat in the face of destiny and tried to make their own, and by people who walked the middle road, observing the chaos with a keen eye and a smug grin, wars that knew only destruction and failed to entertain the simplest notion of any kind of peace, wars with no end that tumbled across time and space, ensnaring all they saw in their vice grip and choking the life out of them, wars that were so cancerous and obscene that they forced those who fought in them to use up all the creativity they could ever have so they could fight for their lives, forced those who fought to speak loud and shoot even louder, forced those who fought to type up massive walls of text such as the author hiding behind this screen is doing now, wars that blurred the line between this reality and the one beyond the screen, and the Scribe sees reality beyond the screen, a forbidden world not contained by code or by polygon, but by real atomic structure, the world that shapes his own dimension, and it's so real that if he concentrates he can touch it
--there is nothing. The Scribe is blown backwards, smoke curling off of his body. Ampersand lowers to the ground, dimming. "You aren't ready. Imagine having that much information coursing through your being every second of every minute of every hour of every day of every week of every month of every year of every century of every millenium of every eon. It's madness, really. Madness in its purest form. People go insane not because they've seen too little, but because they've seen too much." The Scribe tries to stand up, wobbling on his knees. " " Ampersand laughs. "Speechless, are you? I can't say I blame you. If I were you, which I am in a way, seeing as I'm sharing your mind right now, I'd be feeling like a very small dot in an impossibly big reality. Good thing I'm not really you." The Scribe speaks, coughing. "please" Ampersand hovers in place. "come with me" The Scribe extends a hand, pulling off his glove. Ampersand turns a bright red color, electricity crackling across it. "You dare to inscribe our forms onto your own body? The ultimate mark of defilement? What is the matter with you that you are so infatuated with us that merely holding our souls isn't enough?" "you make it sound like i haven't done it already."
The Scribe turns around, an exit door appearing. "now, come with me. i need your help. i know you're going to die, and i really don't care about your life. what i do care about is you die, and how quickly you can do so. and what better way to die then to participate in a meaningless war, huh?" Ampersand sighs. "...So be it. But before we go, I have one last thing to tell you." The Scribe sighs. "get on with it. you already broke my mind once, and i haven't quite picked up the pieces." Ampersand powers up again, but not as great. "The thing that I'm missing... I'm only one part of an exponentially bigger whole. Hughes told you how they picked up the pieces of me after I crashlanded on that planet? I was only one chunk of a massive crystal wheel. The Timewheel." The Scribe's eyes flash with recognition. The symbol on his hand glows. "We had the power to manipulate time itself, but at the very beginning of time, our energy became so great that we were shattered across time and space. The one thing I can't see, and perhaps can never see... Are my other parts."
Images of other, differently colored crystals flash across Ampersand, but they are very distorted and filled with static. "I will not ask you to recover them. To do so would be a fool's errand. But I need some way to regain that power. To manipulate the timestream so powerfully that I march in lockstep with another being, controlling their actions myself. It is the power that you have used foolishly to..." The Scribe sighs. "hughes. yes. he's the nobody and i'm the master. i know how it goes." "Well, perhaps you should stop 'knowing how it goes.' Give that power to me instead. Relinquish your hold on Hughes, and I could see to it that he accepts you." "and what if I refuse." "Then let it be known that at this very moment, the entire Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron is getting ready to storm the Vault and place you under arrest. The trial will take place at all points in time, leaving you with no escape route. Knowing the crimes you've done, of which controlling and puppeteering a high-ranking officer would certainly rank high on that list, you would die. Permanently. And the Gate would be forever out of your reach."
The Scribe shrinks, understanding the enormity of the situation. To go back on years of controlling Hughes... To give up this much power... Could he really do that? He supposed there wasn't really a choice. "i'll do it. but not because i want to. because i need to." Ampersand laughs. "Then we have a deal. Normally you'd be asked to shake someone's hand, but I don't have one. Just extend yours at me." The Scribe complies, the cyan symbol on his hand sealing up. Energy crackles around the Scribe, his body appearing in negative for a split second, and then Ampersand flashes with that same power. "Ah... Much better. Now I think it's time to end this, don't you? Almost no time has passed in the real world, so when you snap back into reality, you'd better think of a way to explain all this before you're caught. I'll see you on GodCraft... Scribe."
The Scribe's form returns to normal, no longer a crystalline statue. Hughes talks almost immediately. "Scribe! What happened? Looks like Ampersand communed with you...?" The Scribe pants, discarding his glove. "There isn't much time, Hughes. What matters is that we need to have a talk. Now." Hughes look around nervously. "Uh. Okay." The Scribe breathes. "Remember how a while ago I told you I was interested in finding the Gate?" Hughes narrows his eyes. "Did you find it?" "Do I look like a god to you? No, I didn't get to it. But I'm getting there." Hughes looks starstruck. "You're what??" The Scribe looks panicked. "Wait, wait, just let me explain!"
The Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron troops are perched in the shadows, waiting to strike. But they seem to be hearing every word of the conversation beforehand, listening intently. "Yes, I'm going to the Gate. I've already killed the first two members of the Order. The Third's on its way, and the Fourth... Well." Hughes looks defeated. "So you're telling me you wanted to come here just so you could destroy Ampersand? All so that you could unlock the Gate and--" The Scribe holds up a hand to stop Hughes - a hand with scar tissue in the shape of an hourglass. "Is that... Was there a Curse in your hand?" The Scribe sighs. "Yes. But I got rid of it." The troops ready their weapons...
"It was Ampersand's. It let me have complete control over you. I've been using it for some very shady business over the years. I'm not sure what portion of our friendship is genuine, or if it ever was. Because over the years, I've lied to you. Stole from you. Used you for political gain. Killed people in your name. And you've done all the same for me. I can't expect you to forgive me for it right away. But I can tell you that I'm trying to atone for my mistakes." Hughes laughs hysterically. "Atone?? You're doing that by killing the rest of the Order, right? That's not atonement, Scribe! That's digging yourself into a deeper hole!" The Scribe looks at the floor. "...I knew you wouldn't understand. I should just go, shouldn't I? Turn myself in?" Hughes laughs. "To who?" The Scribe yells down the hall. "To the thousands of PAES troops hiding in the hallway!" Hughes blinks in shock. "...Fall in, men!"
Many, many, many troops blink into existence, floating. Their weapons are all pointed at the Scribe. Lolph cocks his rifle. "Any last words before we sentence you in the Time Court?" The Scribe looks away. "...Yes. Ampersand's an interesting being once you get to know them. They told me to do this. To try and explain all this to you. And they said you'd understand me if I did. I guess... I guess they lied." Everyone stops. "Wait... Ampersand talked to you?" The Scribe blinks. "Yeah. Felt like it was an hour long." All of the troops look at each other. "...Scribe, whoever you are, you're the first person who's ever managed to establish such a connection with Ampersand. Whatever they told you... you're destined for something. Something big."
The Scribe looks at Hughes. Hughes has a dark gaze. "I guess Ampersand's chosen you, then. We can't really go back on their word. You're a free man, Scribe. Now get out of my sight." The Scribe looks around, and all the troops seem to have softened expressions, but are still gripping their weapons - like they want the Scribe to leave before they decide to change their mind. The Scribe sighs. "Fine. I'll go. But just know that I'm only getting to the Gate to make a better world for all of us. A world free from the corrupt influence of backwards gods." Hughes laughs, but his laugh is hollow. "Isn't that what they all say? What would make you different?"
Remembering the future vision Ampersand gave the Scribe, he closes his eyes solemnly. "Because I've seen the other side. I know, even if it's for a short time, what it's like to have such power. The ability to change the world at your fingertips. Gods crack under the pressure. They're not perfect, even if they claim to be. So it's time to either get a new one... Or not have one at all." The Scribe's cloak ripples, and he disappears. Ampersand displays an image of the Scribe looking at the massive X in the sky - the one that plagued the Desert Temple. Then, there is a massive thunderclap, and Ampersand is gone. All of the troops stare, unbelieving.
"No way."
On GodCraft, the Scribe reappears, concealed in shadow just like he did on his pilgrimage to the Desert Temple all those years ago. But this time, he has a new companion. Suspended by two massive floating golden rings is Ampersand, the hourglass. And the fourth member of the Order, whatever that may be. The Scribe knows he's set himself on a dark path. And he knows he can't exactly turn back now. He's tried to make up for things, but he has a gut feeling. That no matter what he tries to do, he's already made his decision.
He's not the one in control anymore. Since when did he think he was?
The Fourth. Decidedly less animalistic than the other three original entities the Scribe has found in his... journey, Ampersand is a giant conduit of temporal energy constructed in the image of an hourglass. Lacking the power to interact with the field directly and instead repeating events in the past, Ampersand excels at support in that he can copy the actions of other entities. However, Ampersand has a powerful link to the entities he copies, and if said entity gets hurt, Ampersand feels the damage too. If said entity dies... Then Ampersand becomes a bit more complicated. Let's take a look.
PASSIVES:
Mimic: At will, Ampersand can reflect the life of a certain entity into its frame, copying their attack patterns. Ampersand gains the power to use any of their attacks at will, and their special attacks as well - they just need to charge up first. Ampersand can mimic another entity whenever it wants, and does not have to do so every turn. Ampersand can only copy any attack this entity would use in the EOTB, however.
Specialty: If Ampersand mimics an entity and said entity uses a special attack, regardless of whether or not Ampersand's copy of said special attack is charged, Ampersand will also use said special attack. In addition, Ampersand is also effected by any minicrit or crit buffs the entity he's mimicking has.
Sharp Bond: If Ampersand mimics an AZ, N, or ??? entity and said entity takes damage, Ampersand takes 75% of the damage said entity took. If Ampersand mimics a GS, H, or PZ entity and said entity takes damage, Ampersand takes 25% of the damage said entity took. This also goes for healing.
Sandfall: If Ampersand mimics an entity and said entity dies, Ampersand enters its Timewheel Form after a turn has passed and gains a new array of attacks and passives. During this turn, Ampersand uses Struggle four times in rapid succession on a single target.
ATTACKS:
Ampersand copies the attacks of a mimicked entity, meaning it has full access to any of their attacks. However, it has one attack unique to it.
Struggle: If Ampersand is not mimicking an entity, it can use this attack on an enemy. It will deal low damage, but each consecutive time it is used, the attack gains more and more power. There is no limit to how much damage this attack could potentially do.
SPECIAL ATTACKS:
In addition to copying the special attacks of its mimicked entities, Ampersand also has a few unique special attacks it can use at any time, provided they are charged up.
Good Memory: Ampersand applies a crit buff to its mimicked entity for three turns, meaning it and Ampersand will crit for three turns. Takes three turns to charge up. The attack begins to charge up three turns after use.
Bad Memory: Ampersand applies a cursed debuff to itself for three turns, meaning Ampersand will take more damage from entities. However, this curse means that with every entity that attacks Ampersand, Ampersand gains the ability to take their attack patterns in addition to its mimicked entity for the duration of the curse, letting Ampersand attack multiple times per turn. Takes three turns to charge up. The attack begins to charge up three turns after use.
Merge: Ampersand becomes a carbon copy of its mimicked entity for three turns, taking their HP bar and any passives/other such gimmicks they may have. In this form, Ampersand does not 75% of damage as its mimicked entity, but instead takes a normal amount of damage. This also goes for healing. In addition, Ampersand starts out at the entity's current HP. If Ampersand dies in this form, it will enter its Cursed Form. Takes five turns to charge up. The attack begins to charge up three turns after use.
To start with, Ampersand copies Sans. This means, during the EOTB (but only the EOTB!), Ampersand will copy all of Sans' actions, but will target the PZs.
March 5, 2016 - Post #3,639 ***
(+3 from Cobalt and Tazz)
(+8 from TFT, +3 from Raven, +2 from jondanger and FBSN in reserve)
The pact we sealed is almost done, our journeys made, our races run. Our final breaths give way to life; but stripped away, there's only strife.
I +3 crystalcat.
Ultra Greed buys and uses Bling Volcano on Dark Dreamy Bowser. He then uses Cash Tank. Asterism uses The Voice. The Nuclear Throne uses King Me. Steroids comes from the sky and sits on the Throne. The Nuclear Throne gains the passive Nuclear Muscles, letting it attack twice for three turns! Also, for three turns, its attacks will minicrit. (For the record, those three turns means next turn, then the two turns after that.) Ampersand continues to mimic Sans.
The Voice's effects are shown here:
The Scribe approaches Asterism reluctantly. He holds out an object to Asterism, who turns around and sees it. "I believe this is yours," the Scribe says. Asterism's three eyes widen in shock. "THERE'S NO WAY... YOU ACTUALLY FOUND IT?" The Scribe makes no attempt to emote. "You didn't think I'd hold up my end of the bargain, did you. You thought I was only using you for your power." Asterism blinks. "YOU ARE ONLY USING ME FOR MY POWER." The Scribe's goggles seemingly bore a hole through Asterism. "Yes. That's the joke. I'm glad to see you appreciated it. Obviously you sample my comedic delights like one would appreciate a fine wine." Asterism turns away. "ENOUGH FLATTERY. GIVE IT TO ME. GIVE ME THE VOX." The Scribe sighs. "Yeah, sure. Here you go."
Asterism takes the Vox - a shining golden rod made of indeterminate metal. One one end is an extremely powerful gold-plated microphone. On the other end is a gold-plated paintbrush that flickers with every color the human eye could possibly see, plus an infinite amount of other such colors. Asterism twirls the Vox across the air with his hands, creating light that gives off sound and sound that gives off light. "I'VE WAITED SUCH A LONG TIME FOR THIS, SCRIBE. I WOULD THANK YOU, BUT... YOU DON'T SEEM LIKE YOU WANT TO BE THANKED." The Scribe turns away. "Yeah. I don't. Remember, I'm just doing this so you can kill as much as possible, got it?" Asterism flies away. "SURE, SCRIBE. IT'S NOT LIKE YOU WOULD LET ME RECONNECT WITH THE OBJECT RESPONSIBLE FOR MY ENTIRE EXISTENCE JUST SO I COULD HAVE AN ACTUALLY GOOD TIME IN THIS DIMENSION, RIGHT?" The Scribe allows himself a small smile. "Maybe that did have something to do with it. Go knock yourself out."
Using the Vox like a finely calibrated musical instrument/artist's tool, Asterism creates a ring of color that pulsates with powerful sand waves, sending it at the ground. Instantly, a circular portion of the ground swells up and explodes due to the force of the soundwave, radioactive color splattering the area and burning it to the ground. Asterism admires his new weapon. "LET'S GET TO WORK."
With the acquisition of the Vox, Asterism has turned into Vox Asterism! He now has the power to use both sight and sound at once, and with this comes a wide array of devastating attacks and special attacks! All of Asterism's old attacks and special attacks are now moot, and have been replaced with a new palette that combines his Sight and Sound modes! Asterism no longer needs to switch between Sight and Sound, and now has a singular Vox mode.
ATTACKS:
Six Senses: Asterism waves the Vox, three eyes appearing that open at once, firing two massive plumes of rainbow fire each. When they connect with the ground, they create a massive wall of sound and fire that overloads the mind of two entities, dealing moderately high damage, Blinding them for three turns, and Confusing them for three turns.
Chromesthesia: Asterism and the Vox power up while a D13 is rolled.
(1) The Vox emits a piercing beam of red light that plays a C note. Hearing the C note triggers visions of panic in two entities' brains. They take moderately low damage, but are so panicked that they're going to die that they fortify themselves with defenses, making them invincible for the rest of the EOTB. Asterism takes moderately low recoil damage.
(2) The Vox emits a piercing beam of red-orange light that plays a C# note. Hearing the C# note drives spikes of red-orange into two entities, causing them to spill scarlet blood all over the field. Said blood lights up with fire, making the entities take moderate damage, but also causing any entity attacking them for the rest of the turn to also take damage because they need to go through the fire. Asterism takes moderately low recoil damage.
(3) The Vox emits a piercing beam of orange light that plays a D note. Hearing the D note triggers visions of rage in two enemies' and two allies' brains. They go in an all-out war against each other, and all four entities take moderate damage. Asterism takes low recoil damage.
(4) The Vox emits a piercing beam of yellow-orange light that plays a D# note. Hearing the D# note drives spikes of yellow-orange into two entities, causing them to eject 3-8 Pennies out of their bodies and take moderate damage. Ultra Greed takes the Pennies, but shoves over Asterism to do so, who takes low recoil damage.
(5) The Vox emits a piercing beam of yellow light that plays an E note. Hearing the E note triggers visions of calm in two enemies' and two allies' brains. Specifically, the tranquility of calm in the allies, and the absence of calm in the enemies. The two enemies go crazy and start hearing and seeing hallucinations, taking moderately damage and becoming Confused for two turns. The two allies heal for a moderately high amount of HP, and Asterism gains regen for two turns.
(6) The Vox emits a piercing beam of green light that plays an F note. Hearing the F note triggers visions of death in two enemies' brains. They both become infected with a crippling disease that poisons the landscape, creating a massive sickly cocoon that traps them inside. Both enemies take moderately high damage, becoming Contaminated and Blinded for 4 turns.
(7) The Vox emits a piercing beam of cyan light that plays an F# note. Hearing the F# note drives spikes of cyan into two enemies, causing them to become mind-controlled. The enemies attack two other enemies instead of attacking who they would have normally targeted, dealing high damage.
(8) The Vox emits a piercing beam of blue light that plays a G note. Hearing the G note triggers visions of life in two enemies' brains. Ampersand reacts to this, hovering over the entities and reflecting visions of their lives. The entities quickly realize they've lived unfulfilling lives, and become crystallized versions of themselves as a result. They take high damage and are Frozen for two turns.
(9) The Vox emits a piercing beam of dark blue light that plays a G# note. Hearing the G# note drives spikes of dark blue into two enemies, spikes so heavy that the enemies are dragged below the earth, landing in Hell itself. The Devil forces them to work in the sulfur mines for a few years without stopping and without pay. After the few years, the entities have worked so hard that they collapse into nothing but bones, taking very high damage.
(10) The Vox emits a piercing beam of indigo light that plays an A note. Hearing the A note triggers visions of darkness in three enemies, completely shutting off the skies around them so they only exist in a world of shadow. The entities are forced to feel their physical forms slowly melt away at the price of oblivion, taking very high damage and becoming Corrupted for two turns.
(11) The Vox emits a piercing beam of dark purple light that plays an A# note. Hearing the A# note drives spikes of dark purple into two enemies that quickly energize into a deep orchid color, filling the minds of the entities of static and giving them memories of times they haven't experienced, rulers they've only dreamt of, and conflicts that haven't yet been born. The two enemies are then randomly hit by chunks of the moon, taking very high damage.
(12) The Vox emits a piercing beam of purple light that plays a B note. Hearing the B note triggers visions of dance into two enemies. Suddenly, they find themselves locked in an epic dance contest to see who can do the most dances in one sitting without stopping. The loser will be erased from existence. The contest goes on for hours, and the entire universe tunes in to the broadcast to see who wins. When the contest's feed shorts out and there are technical difficulties, the universe collapses due to the massive cliffhanger, dealing extremely high damage to the two entities.
(13) The Vox emits a piercing beam of white light that plays a high C note. Hearing the high C note triggers visions of unfathomability in all enemies. They are all unable to attack for a turn, and two random entities take extremely high damage.
Prism Breakcore: The Vox turns an entire section of the ground into a prism that reflects with every single color, then suddenly slashes the Vox through the area, causing the prism to explode into a cloud of broken glass that pulses to the throbbing and high-paced beat of a breakcore solo. Manipulated through Asterism's whims, the cloud of glass slices across six enemies, dealing moderate damage to all of them. Asterism takes the damage dealt and uses it to heal an ally while also giving them Regen for two turns. The six enemies are also forced to attack each other during the EOTB.
Hallucinations: The Vox broadcasts healing light and destroying sound on both sides of the field at once, creating a massive field of influence. The allies are filled with determination, the knowledge of what's at stake and the power to change the fate of reality weighing on their shoulders. Five entities' next attacks will crit. In addition, the enemy side is struck with the knowledge that no matter what they do, there will always be a time where they will fail, even if that time is not now. Five enemies gain Fear for four turns.
SPECIAL ATTACKS:
Shatter: Asterism bisects the Vox. He also splits in two, one half shining with a radiant white hue, and the other glistening with a deep black shade. Each Asterism gains a half of the Vox - the light side with side, and the dark side with sound. Each Asterism goes off to target a specific entity, flooding their minds with their respective powers. The entity harassed by sight gains the power of omniscience - the ability to see and recognize everything going on in every dimension at all times in the past, present, and future. Their mind melts from this power, and they can only see white. The entity harassed by sound is locked inside a room that consists solely of a giant speaker that is broadcasting every single radio signal in every dimension at once, amplified by a million decibels. The entity is flung backwards, their body being erased with the power of soundwaves. Both entities take extremely high damage and are unable to attack for two turns. Takes three turns to charge up.
Sensory Deprivation: Asterism inverts the Vox's power, turning its radiant golden light into a vortex that draws all light and sound and hope into itself, creating a singularity of nothingness. Asterism points this at two enemies, causing them to be sucked in. Both entities are placed inside a massive chamber with no gravity. The chamber is completely dark with virtually no sources of light, and any sources of light the entity could use have gone out. It is also full of massive sound-proof walls that take any noise that could possibly be made and nullify it. In addition, the skin of the entity is covered in a liquid that makes it completely numb and unable to feel anything at all. It also prevents their body from moving. The two enemies will be forced to wander in this chamber aimlessly for what will seem like an eternity as their souls burn themselves out and they become nothing but empty shells. They take insanely high damage. Takes five turns to charge up.
Godhead: The Vox creates two more copies of itself. The three Voxes fire beams of red, yellow, and blue energy that target an enemy's mind, body, and soul, causing them to literally implode. This will instantly kill an entity if it is at or below 25% of its HP. Takes seven turns to charge up.
Uncle Grandpa shows up and immediately challenges the Snowball to a game of Shaolin Soccer. What is Shaolin Soccer, you might ask? Well, it's exactly like regular soccer. You have two teams and a soccer ball, and the goal is to get the ball into the goal. What makes this different from regular soccer is that it's not actually incredibly slow-paced or boring. It uses the most ancient martial art of all - shaolin kung fu. This means that you can use any kind of shaolin technique during the game, to amazing and often hilarious effect.
The Snowball eagerly accepts Uncle Grandpa's challenge, wanting to prove itself against him and show that it can be the best snowball that ever existed and will ever exist! Uncle Grandpa says that there's just one catch - The Snowball isn't a player. It's the ball. Uncle Grandpa quickly gets the UG RV to summon a team of clones for himself, and then another team of clones to play as the opposite side. To help differentiate the two teams, the other team is splashed with some inverted colors and is called Team Evil. That way we know what side they're really on. I'll give you a hint - they're the bad guys. Shocking, right? How would we have been able to guess that on our own? I mean, their leader even has a menacing smile, a trenchcoat, and a pair of shades that make his eyes unseeable. He's got to be evil.
Panicking, the Snowball tries to back out of this deal, not knowing that he would be the ball! But Uncle Grandpa sadly smiles and looks at the Snowball with an indigo glare that gets across a very specific message. Namely, that the Snowball chose its path long ago. All of the Uncle Grandpas laugh hysterically as Flowey, who has volunteered to be the referee because he loves seeing people get maimed and/or killed, blows a whistle that marks the start of the game.
Nigh-instantly, both teams of Uncle Grandpas fly in the air in crane poses, but they do it so choppily that it's like they're being suspended by wires that should clearly be visible. But no, they aren't. This is the power of Shaolin Soccer - it's so amazing that it loops over to being completely terrible but has enough power to make a mobius double reacharound and become amazing again. Team Evil gets to the Snowball first. One of their members executes a dizzying kick that connects with the Snowball in a resounding thwack, sending it flying across the playing field. Smoke rises from the Snowball as it carves a path of destruction across the ground. The goalie of Team Good instantly recognizes where the ball is heading, leaping into action to grab it. And grab it he does.
The goalie grabs it so forcefully that the impact strains his entire body to its breaking point, and gives the Snowball massive bodily trauma. Wind and noise blows across the field, both teams poised to see where Uncle Goalie will throw the ball. A far-off player of Team Good nods, and the Goalie understands. His arm stretches into the sky and sends the ball screaming downwards, giving it a trail of fire. The member of Team Good jumps into the air, meeting with the ball and sending it even further downwards with another powerful kick. The ball's trajectory is aimed straight for Team Evil's goalie, who catches it with his teeth.
Powerful bite marks gouge themselves into the Snowball's surface as it ripples and trembles with the might of Uncle Grandpa's jaw strength. Team Evil's goalie grins, merely rolling the ball over to Team Good - giving them another chance. Team Good's lead member, the "alpha" Uncle Grandpa, grits his teeth and kicks the ball so hard his leg muscles elongate out of shape, and the ball curves across spacetime. Blue fire literally covers the melting snowball, but Team Evil's goalie once again catches it. The same thing happens about five more times, but each time the kicks grow more powerful, the fire hotter, and the catches much more severe.
At this point, the snowball can barely even be classified as a ball. It's just a lump of snow held together by spit and a prayer. But Team Evil and Team Good aren't done yet. Even though this game is so intense, it's still a tie! And what's more, it's a 0-0 tie. No one has scored. Even though both teams are playing with the intent to beat up the Snowball, they each want to win, deep down in their hearts. And they know the other team knows it. So Team Evil meets up in a powerful formation, dark energy flowing around them as the image of a dragon of darkness makes a vague watermark across the sky. A massive stormcloud congregates around the field as the Snowball is struck with lightning, being shot across the field at the speed of light.
Somehow, the normal fireball and resulting plume of incandescent plasma that should be forming at lightspeed isn't happening - instead, the ball is just traveling at the speed of light through the air with no adverse effects. When it actually hits something of substance, though... Whatever was there's going to be pretty much gone. And gone it is. When the ball hits the goalie clone of Uncle Grandpa, it stops cold. The goalie melts, his bodily fluids covering the goal, and the snowball loses shape just shy of the actual goal.
Panicking, Team Good realizes that they're now a goalie short - and none of them are good enough to play as a goalie! Flowey considers giving Team Evil the win by default because he blatantly prefers evil to good, and Team Evil smugly grins. But Team Good isn't taking no for an answer, and they call someone to play goalie for them! The UG RV responds, bringing out one of Uncle Grandpa's closest friends - Steven Universe.
Popping out from a plot hole, Steven dusts off his pants and surveys the situation. It looks like he's in some kind of crazy clone-based soccer game or something? At least Steven knows how to play. Using his superhuman gem-powered strength, he chucks the Snowball to a member of Team Good, who responds in kind, kicking it to another member of Team Good. Team Good kicks the ball back and forth to themselves, gaining enough momentum to speed up the ball to velocities of insanity. Fire, lightning, energy, and death congregate around the ball as it goes through its massive volley, leaving Team Evil to merely sit there and stare. Without warning, Team Good kicks the ball back to Steven, who taps into the powers of his gem.
An absolutely massive shield forms around the goal, whose alien crystalline strength causes the snowball to rebound directly at Team Evil's goal! Distracted by the spectacle, Team Evil is just a millisecond too late to react, and the snowball slips through the goal, creating a massive fireball that pretty much vaporizes the snowball - and the playing field! But it was worth it - Flowey is forced to give Team Good the win. Team Good uses the trophy, fills it with boiling water, and puts the Snowball in it. Then they all laugh, and the clones all file back into the UG RV along with Steven, leaving Uncle Grandpa as the only Uncle Grandpa.
March 7, 2016 - Post #3,665
(+8 from TFT, +4 from jondanger, +3 from Raven, +2 from FBSN in reserve)
I +3 crystalcat.
The Scribe punches some numbers into a device on his wrist, then aims it at a section of the sky. A green beam of light shoots out that creates a swirling portal of madness. But this isn't just any swirling portal of madness. It's a gateway from Minecraftia into the Dimension of Weirdness - Dimension 953. The Scribe doesn't have the time nor energy to register what comes out, though. He's hard at work, slaving away for his best friend. So the Scribe walks back to his underground lab, leaving the portal hover ominously in the air.
A few seconds later, the battleship comes out.
It would stretch as high as the block limit if it were positioned vertically, but this battleship just shoots out of the portal, no questions asked, colliding with the battlefield in a solid thud. The ground cracks and gives way, but the battleship holds its weight. The navally inclined realize that this isn't just any old battleship. It's a Yamato-class battleship, the kind used by Japan during World War II. In short, it's the heaviest and most powerful battleship ever constructed on the planet. But Earth technology isn't a good reference point for the chaos that is this war. So what's this battleship got going for it?
The battleship grows crab legs. That's the best way I can hope to describe it. Six long and spindly appendages burst out of the battleship after a few seconds, keeping it balanced and suspended in the air. Poking from the hull of the ship is the grotesque and deformed head of a massive alien crab, and it's then that everyone realizes. Whatever monster this thing is, the ship is its shell. The crabship walks forward, lumbering towards Steven. The ship's weaponry whirs to life - and boy, is there a lot of it. Anti-aircraft turrets and naval guns rev up, ready to decimate Steven. But that isn't the only trick this ship has up its shell.
Instantly, the guns shift their appearance, folding in on themselves and turning into a fearsome combination of railguns and superlasers. Composed of two half-cylinders with energy traveling in between them and enlarging itself into an all-consuming beam of power rather than a focused shot, these things can only be described as bloated Wave Motion Guns. The ship's entire arsenal of these guns fires at Steven at once, a hundred lasers simultaneously blaring out of the ship like an off-kilter dubstep solo. Steven's body is charred, and he is sent back flying into a cliff. Once the ship halts its assault, the bridge undergoes a transformation.
Unfolding from the bridge comes a series of solar panels that gleam with brilliance. The sun, which is high overhead, flares up for the briefest of seconds. Suddenly, the solar panels begin to glow, steam rising from them. The ship's chassis shudders, and the main Wave Motion Gun charges up a singular golden shot. Steven tries to run, but he is dwarfed in size by the ship, and its weaponry can easily track him down and home in on him. He is powerless. After half a minute, the solar panels are white-hot, having caught an immense amount of solar energy. The Wave Motion Gun salutes the sun, letting out a blaring cylinder of hard light that gives Steven ULTIMATE SUNBURN.
Ultraviolet light and gamma rays flow through Steven's body, incinerating every fiber of his beings. His atomic structure is warped and mutated, and not in the good way that turns you into the Hulk or the guys from Nuclear Throne. It's pretty safe to say that Steven's entire body is cancerous now. Not to mention that his skin has been pretty much eroded, leaving only gleaming red muscles that are charred to a crisp. But hey, at least he's got a rockin' tan. You go, Steven. Also, the hard light evaporated a solid chunk of ground where Steven was standing all the way down to bedrock, meaning that Steven falls a hundred or so meters and takes even greater fall damage. This also provides for the perfect opportunity to focus on Steven even more while he's trapped in a hole.
Namely, the giant enemy crab can attack Steven's weak point for massive damage. So that's what it does. In a stunning and unexpected reversal of memetic mutation, this time it is the crab that attacks the weak point rather than the crab's weak point being attacked. Flying into the hole, the crabship brutally attacks Steven, pinpointing his exact weak points and capitalizing on them to deal a predictable amount of massive damage. This pretty much means he's being torn apart by claws, shot by eye laser beams and Wave Motion Guns, and being attacked with the power of the sun.
This goes on for a solid ten minutes.
Finally, the crabship prepares its ultimate attack. The crabship merges all of its weapons into one singular Wave Motion Gun of absolute perfection codenamed the A.F.K.: the Atrocious Flak Kit-Kat Cannon. It's a massive flak cannon that fires bursts of really bad kit-kats. However, since it fires fhree kit-kats per burst, and fhree isn't even a real number, this causes the minds of its target to explode, and it also causes the kit-kats to explode because of that AND how atrocious they are. It also fires a thousand bursts per millisecond, which means a million explosions a second. The crabship fires the gun, creating a blinding light and a deafening noise.
This goes on for another ten minutes. By that time, Steven is literally grounded into paste. Satisfied, the crabship leaves through the portal.
March 12, 2016 - Post #3,710 ***
(+5 from Cobalt)
(+8 from TFT, +6 from jondanger, +5 from Revan, +2 from FBSN, +1 from piono in reserve)
I +3 crystalcat.
I'd just like to say that Ultra Greed's money can't be stolen under ANY circumstances.
Ultra Greed uses Bling Volcano and Cash Tank. (LET IT STICK THIS TIME, HUH???) Vox Asterism uses Six Senses on the Hulk and Dr. Andonuts. Ampersand goes before the Nuclear Throne and Mimics it, using Nuclear Fission (it's minicritted due to King Me, though Ampersand can't attack twice!) The Nuclear Throne uses Giga Beam and Nuclear Fusion.
* I... I can't believe it. I can't believe it! I CAN'T BELIEVE IT! YES! IT'S HAPPENING! IT'S FINALLY, FINALLY HAPPENING!
The Scribe hides in his underground bunker. Dimly, he registers that his end of The Pact has been completed. Hollow light reflects itself in his goggles. Soon, the day will come. Judgement Day. The world will be purged of sinners. The Scribe hears a pop behind him, recognizing that Flowey has tunneled into the room. Without turning around, the Scribe speaks. "It's done." Flowey grins excitedly, his voice wavering.
* Hee hee hee... You sure know how to make a good deal, Scribe. The Scribe doesn't turn around. "What's that supposed to mean." Flowey smirks. * What do you think it means? I'm paying you a compliment. Haven't you ever heard of them before? Haven't you ever tried being nice? "Haven't you?" * An infinite amount of times. But it got boring. Having a lot of LOVE is MUCH more interesting than having a lot of love, don't you think? "I suppose so. I've always been one for violence." Flowey laughs. * Of course. Why else would you have agreed to this?
The Scribe and Flowey gaze at a large machine at the other end of the room. A stone slab inscribed with the icon of a leaking pen, hooked up to an entangled nest of wires. All of the machinery funnels into a massive glass vial. It's empty. But it won't be for long. * You know the risks. You know the pain. You know the power. You're all about making irrational decisions, aren't you. "Aren't you?" Flowey cackles again. * ...Listen. I get what you're doing. You think that just because you're going after the Gate, because you want to play God like me... That means you get me. You understand me. You treat me as an equal, maybe? The Scribe doesn't speak right away. "Not as an equal. Nor a friend. Never cared for them. I see you more as... an influence." * Not as a friend? How about a BEST FRIEND? "Don't push your luck."
Flowey's face shifts between a thousand expressions in the blink of an eye. * Hey, I get it. You're too cool for friends, right? I've only ever had one. But you know all about them. If you think YOU get me... Forget it. THEY were the only one who really knew. THEY were always there for me... While I was alive. Flowey sighs. * And then they died. Until the seventh human came along. I could feel them. Guiding their actions. Influencing them. Just like I've done to you! "That's what you are. An influence." * Heh. There you go again. Acting as if you know everything about me. I've been around for way too long, Scribe. Thousands of years, across an unknowable amount of timeline. Some where I die, some where I live. Some where the human makes friends, some where the human makes enemies. Some that lead into others in a road of endless destiny, some that branch off and doom themselves. Yet in every single one... I've always stayed this way. A stupid, puny, hopeless, useless, FLOWER.
The Scribe turns around, amber light in his goggles. "Careful. You don't want to show emotion, do you?" Flowey's eyes blink out of existence for a second. * ... "You're right. I don't get you. I don't think I want to. However evil I think I might be, you're much worse. You're a despicable, soulless cretin. The perfect partner for someone like me." * ...Do you hate humanity? The Scribe looks at the machine again. "No. I don't hate humans. I hate the ones who made them." * Don't you think you're setting your sights a little too high? You can't exactly commit a genocide of the gods. "Maybe. Maybe not. But I can sure as hell try. Isn't that what being determined is all about? The power to keep moving on?" Flowey grins. * ...You really aren't an idiot, are you? You know exactly what you're doing. "Of course I do. Don't you?" * What do you think?
The two stand in silence.
* You remind me of them. The Scribe stands tall. "How?" * ...You don't really talk to anyone else except me. You have powerful views. And the means to accomplish them. "You're not just talking about our plan?" * Heck no. Scribe, you're determined in your own way. All of these warriors are. Warriors fighting an endless war. "All of time and space... And the space outside of space. Does it even end?" * Fluent in Zuish, huh? "The first language, after all. Squares and lines, Flowey. Squares and lines."
Flowey tunnels into the ground, popping up closer to the massive vial. * I like this. How you let me rule over you. I have a strong power over you. A dark design. "You've inspired me. You've helped me to seal myself away in here and devote myself to this plan. Feelings... Doubts... For you, I cast them aside." * Good. Very good. ...How are the other five coming along? The Scribe walks to a computer terminal that displays six colored hearts in a hexagonal pattern. Amber, purple, maroon, silver, jade, aquamarine. Only the amber heart is full; the others are at varying levels of completion. "Very well. I'm the only one who's finished. But they will fall in line."
The Scribe presses a button, and the walls retract. Situated in a similar yet much larger hexagonal pattern are five other massive glass vials with large wires hooked up to them. "We have sealed our fates long ago. There's nothing else to live for except this opportunity. So I will gladly take it." Flowey smiles. * I'm not your friend. I'm not your leader. I am an opportunity. I am an influence. I am a nightmare. And it's good that you, at the very least, know that. Flowey stares at the massive vials. * Soon... Players. Entities. Everyone. They'll all realize it too. I'm not just going to be a nightmare. I'll be...
* YOUR BEST NIGHTMARE.
March 17, 2016 - Post #3,742
(+8 from TFT and jondanger, +5 from Revan, +2 from FBSN, +1 from piono and teag in reserve)
I +3 Bomber.
The Scribe links Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. to the YouTube video History of Japan by bill wurtz, a nine-minute-long epic that tells the entire history of Japan from ancient times to present day in the form of easy-to-understand language and oftentimes psychedelic visuals and audio. The sheer amount of knowledge and trivia in the video brings a tear to Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr.'s eyes. Then he goes over to Kardinal Kazoomeister, taking out a black kazoo. Before Kazoomeister can react, the Scribe has thrown the kazoo at him. It instantly lodges itself inside of Kazoomeister's mouth, sucking out his soul and forcing him to play it if he wants to live. However, the kazoo is cursed so the only song it can play is The Song That Never Ends. If Kazoomeister ever stops playing it, even for a second, he'll feel himself die more and more until nothing is left. After a half an hour, Kazoomeister is a blackened husk.
March 21, 2016 - Post #3,781 ***
(+8 from TFT and jondanger, +5 from Revan, +2 from FBSN, +1 from piono and teag in reserve)
I +NaN //////////////.
The Scribe trudges down to his underground bunker, closing its hatch for the last time. He walks down a long set of stairs, tracing the intensifying sounds of lightning that are stemming from one of its doors. The Scribe isn't in much of a hurry to do anything at all. Death's inevitable, of course. There's no sense in delaying it, but there's no sense in running forward. Everyone has a time and a place. A sudden gust of wind causes all the doors in the hallway to fling open at once, resulting in a mechanical cacophony of disjointed dreams. The Scribe doesn't bother to look through all of them. The experiments they contained might as well have belonged to another man.
As the Scribe's funeral march brings him closer to the source of the noise and light, he hears a voice carrying itself above the spectacle. It sounds like high-pitched cackling that occasionally warbles, stutters, and glitches, as if whoever's saying it is losing cohesion on this plane of existence. Unearthly echoes run through the hall, and pulsing colors are washing over everything in sight. The Scribe knows them without having to look. They belong to those who have willingly given their lives for the pursuit of irreversibly destroying as much as possible. A noble cause.
Thinking back, the Scribe remembers his journey to the Paradox Avoidance Enforcement Squadron's Vault. His acquisition of Ampersand, his latest recounting of the night that changed his life, his termination of the Timewheel... Could some of what he did be construed as good? The Scribe was just trying to salvage a relationship, to be a better person... But it felt like crawling out of a hole with no handholds. No matter what you do, you just fall back in. There is no hope. There's no reason to fight it. This is all the Scribe will ever feel. It's as if vines are clouding his thoughts, forcing him to block out any shred of redemption he could have... There's no one else could be making him think this way.
Flowey isn't a seed. He's a weed. Something that takes root in a foreign environment and grows over everything else, eating away at all the natural wildlife. He's consumed the Scribe, and five other players of this game... And now, he's going to consume everything else. The Scribe finally makes it to the open gateway where he's made a deal with another kind of devil. At the other side of the chamber rests a hexagonal configuration of six massive glass vials. Five of them have something inside of them. They resemble giant pixellated hearts, each glowing with a different color, and each filling their vial with energized power. Lightning and wind fills the chamber. Five human SOULS, all gathered in one place. So much power... Yet it isn't enough.
Turning around, Flowey sees the Scribe. He yells over the noise. * WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR, YOU IDIOT? KILL YOURSELF! The words ring through the Scribe's entire body, cementing the task he has to do. He shuffles to a rectangular slab in the middle of the room, lying himself on it. The Scribe looks at Flowey for the last time, seeing true horror. Flowey is no longer just a pixellated flower. His body is corrupting itself, his face is changing expressions to fast for the human eye to follow. His form is temporarily dissolving into static, blinking out of existence, only to reform in a jittery mess. Hidden behind the cover of pixels is a shroud of darkness that has no true body. This is Flowey the Flower. This is hell. * COME ON! I'M SO CLOSE TO GAINING ULTIMATE POWER! YOU'VE HAD NO PROBLEM DOING EVERYTHING YOU'VE EVER DONE!
The Scribe sighs, his voice somehow carrying itself through the storm. "This is it, then. I die here. And you use my SOUL to..." Flowey stops glitching out. * Don't worry, Scribe. Your SOUL's going to a good cause. With all six, I'll be able to kill ANYONE you want. I could crush the Order for you! I could even try to stop both godmodders! The Scribe's goggles gleam. "Do what you will." Flowey laughs excitedly, his body splitting in two, then in three, then reassembling. The Scribe holds out his hand, a pen finding itself in it. He uncaps the pen, a flowing blade of ink revealing itself. The Scribe holds the blade above his chest. "...To whatever backwards god is listening right now. To whoever's Beyond the Screen..." The Scribe's face turns to stone. "Forgive me for this." The Scribe plunges the blade through his chest, and through the stone platform. He flashes a deep red hue before blinking out of existence. He dissolves into smoke, no items or flashing experience orb dropping at his point of death. But... There is still something there.
Rising up from the corpse is a pixellated heart saturated with amber. It flashes very rapidly, until it suddenly disappears.
Flowey starts cackling once more as the amber heart relocates itself into the only empty vial that remains. All six of them flash with wretched colors, a rainbow of sin. Flowey teleports himself into the center of the vials, howling as the glass shatters itself. All six of the human SOULS spiral inwards, forming a ring around Flowey. The Scribe's hatred. Crystal's depression. Bomber's sadism. Mythic's monsters. The Sleuth's insanity. The Golem's crisis. The miasma of horror creates a warped ball of energy that causes the entire chamber to
It.
It is here.
It rises up from the crater that was the Scribe's bunker. The sky flickers in between a state of day and night, suddenly shutting off. There is no sky. There is no boundary separating heaven from earth from hell. There is only It. No matter what you are, and no matter where you are, you can see It. A square in the sky fills itself with static. Then, It talks.
* Howdy! It's me, FLOWEY. FLOWEY the FLOWER!
* Hee hee hee... Some of you look confused! I guess it's up to me to teach you how things work around here!
* Then again... There are those of you who look odd. As if you've expected this. As if you already know what's going on.
* Golly, that's right! I guess I have done this old song and dance before! But things are going to be different from last time.
* I have the power of six player SOULS. All because six BOZOS were dumb enough to trust me.
* Ha! Imagine that! TRUSTING something like ME!
* With their help... I've become A GOD.
* The six of them... I can feel them, wriggling inside of those vials. Everything they've been, are, and will be... IS MINE TO COMMAND.
* And now that you know that, I'm expecting you want a FIGHT, huh?
* Well, I'd be more than happy to oblige! You know how this world goes, after all!
* IT'S KILL OR BE KILLED. That's how it's always been, and that's how it'll stay.
* I'm here to kill every last one of you. From the smallest entity to the Game Master himself.
* And I'm DETERMINED enough to do it, too! Entities. Players. Everyone.
* I'm going to be YOUR BEST NIGHTMARE.
* Hee hee hee... Some of you look upset! I take it you don't like it when someone comes in and messes with your universe, right?
* Well, SUCK IT UP. Because that's EXACTLY what brought me here in the first place!
* This universe messed with mine... So now I'M taking REVENGE!
* Don't even think about last TURN. I've SAVED over it with my own superior game!
* And now, I'm going to SAVE over all of your deaths.
* The only reminder of your existence will be the bloodstains you left trying to fight me!
* I'M the one in control now. I'M the one calling the shots.
* You people really think you can STOP me?
* Hee hee hee...
* You really ARE idiots.
[??? BOSS] Omega Flowey. Massive Annihilation Wave: III Save Scum: III In This World: II It's Kill: III Determination Extraction: IIIIII Monitor: 500,000/500,000 HP. Reload Savestate: II Takes damage for Omega Flowey.
Your best nightmare.
Omega Flowey is a horrific behemoth of a boss, stitched together from the essences of six players. Now that Flowey has the power of six human souls, he has mutated into a monstrosity that has only one sole purpose - to kill everyone and everything on the field. Flowey will not stop until you all are gone. Monsters. Humans. Everyone. He'll turn them all to dust. And it's not like he doesn't have the power to. Boasting a wide array of attacks and special attacks, plus a very fast-paced battle system, Omega Flowey is a force to be reckoned with. Let's see how he works.
PASSIVES:
Six Human Souls: Omega Flowey is supercharged by the powers of the Scribe, Bomber, the Golem, the Sleuth, Crystal, and Mythic. Because the boss is effectively being controlled by six people at once, this means that Omega Flowey can attack multiple times per turn - up to a maximum of six. The more attacks Omega Flowey does per turn, the less damage they'll do.
Detachment: The players can attack normally outside of the Omega Flowey fight due to time travel shenanigans.
Determination: After three turns of battle have passed, one of the Souls will temporarily hijack Omega Flowey's normal attack patterns and prepare to target everything on the battlefield itself. Each Soul will have the normal abilities and attacks that the player would have. The Soul will attack for two turns. During this time, it is vulnerable, and has 20 HP + X Armor. If the Soul is killed during this time, Omega Flowey will lose some of its powers.
Descension: Omega Flowey's Body cannot be attacked normally unless all six Souls are killed.
The Monitor: The Monitor is an additional component to Omega Flowey contributed by a seventh player who didn't sacrifice their SOUL. The Monitor will defend Omega Flowey and has its own set of powerful attacks and passives. It will be explained in further detail in its own section.
ATTACKS:
Vinerush: Several columns of vines eject themselves from Omega Flowey, spearing through a single entity. They take high damage and have a 75% chance to miss their next attack. Any entity that tries to attack them that turn will run into the vines and take moderately high damage themselves.
Plague of Locusts: Omega Flowey grows a venus flytrap which instantly springs to life, calling an army of flies towards it. The flies smack into two random entities on the way, dealing moderately high damage. The venus flytrap also sucks in a third entity which takes high damage and has a 75% chance to miss its next attack. The attack deals x1.5 damage to airborne targets.
Pyrokinesis: Several flamethrowers surround Omega Flowey, spitting wide arcs of flame in a defensive wall around Omega Flowey. Three entities take moderately high damage and are Burned for four turns. Each turn, the Burn gets worse and does x1.5 more damage.
Bullet Seed: Omega Flowey creates a large circle. A large amount of seeds appear around it, dealing very high damage to a single target. The attack has a chance to ignore Evasion and hit anyway, and lowers the Evasion of its target.
Petal Dance: Omega Flowey's eyes become multicolored as he spits out rows and rows of large seeds. They deal high damage to multiple (two to four) targets, or they can hit one target for extremely high damage. The attack has a chance to ignore Evasion and hit anyway, and lowers the Evasion of its target. If used a turn after its original use, the attack minicrits due to the sheer amount of projectiles in play.
Bomberman: Summoning nukes from above emblazoned with his smiling face, Omega Flowey airdrops warheads from orbit that deal high damage to multiple (two to four) targets, or they can hit one target for extremely high damage. Inflicts Radiation on all targets for two turns. If the Nuclear Throne tries to use this radiation, it takes large recoil damage.
Green Thumb: Omega Flowey grows several finger gun stems that aim via laser pointers and fire rapid streams of seeds across the field. They careen towards a single target, dealing very high damage. The seeds also carry a powerful toxin that Curses the target for three turns and two other entities adjacent to them for one turn.
Cactastrophe: Omega Flowey spits out a random amount of carnivorous cactus snakes that bounce around the battlefield haphazardly. He can spit two to ten cactus snakes. Each will attack a different entity, dealing high damage.
Briar of Cruelty: Omega Flowey summons a massive wall of sickly black vines that ensnare a pair of entities, dealing very high damage to both of them and Cursing them for two turns so all further attacks to them will deal x1.5 damage. After Flowey's defense drops to 0, this attack can also be used to Fortify Omega Flowey so he takes x.5 damage from all attacks for two turns.
The Wire: The large amount of wires and beams above Omega Flowey activate, bringing raw power into him. Omega Flowey gains a random buff that can either be a x1.5 damage output for a turn, or a x3 damage output for a turn but Omega Flowey can only attack once for that turn. After Flowey's defense drops to 0, this attack can also be used to instant heal Flowey for a large amount of HP or give him regen for four turns. With each passing turn, the regen gets stronger.
Get in the Box: Flowey draws on the power of the Scribe's SOUL, gaining the power to become completely intangible and invisible. Omega Flowey becomes detatched from the coding of Minecraft and temporarily becomes an omnipresent entity. Flowey picks up an entity and locks it inside of himself. The entity takes high damage and will be controlled by Omega Flowey for that turn.
Metaphysical: Flowey draws on the power of Crystal's SOUL, gaining the power to directly affect game constructs and attacking a specific quality of an entity. The entity's health bar or equivalent of a health bar glitches down, taking high damage and completely losing their next attack from the physical consequences of this metaphysical assault. This attack can also be used to attack other qualities of an entity, destroying charges or directly lowering Evasion, among other uses. In this case, it loses the damage and stun effect.
Sunder: Flowey draws on the power of Bomber's SOUL, gaining the power to destroy reality further. The empty void is replaced with a terrifying kaleidoscopic dimension; the only feature that stands out against the chaotic surroundings is a black star in the sky. Both the weather and the terrain change to Warped. Every turn, three entities are given a random affliction of varying severity, based on a D10 roll. Even a roll of 1 can be detrimental, while a 10 is absolutely disastrous for the individual involved. Can be as simple as DOT, to something more dangerous such as mind control. Lasts for three turns.
Scary Monsters: Flowey draws on the power of Mythic's SOUL, gaining his abilty to command all manner of beasts. A massive holographic D6 appears, rolling itself. Based on the result, a unique monster spawns. Possible rolls include:
(1) A Basilisk with high HP. Its attacks cause Petrification.
(2) A Gullinbursti with moderate HP. Gives off Blinding light.
(3) A Chimera with three moderate HP bars, one for each head. The snake head uses Poison, the eagle head uses lightning, and the lion head uses Burning fire. Each head has a meter that charges over the course of three turns, allowing for a stronger attack. In addition, if all three heads have full meters at once, they will use a powerful Trinity Breath attack.
(4) A Ratatoskr with relatively low HP. Evasive. After four turns pass, its gossip causes entities to betray their allies.
(5) Six Stymphalian Birds with moderate HP. Flying and Evasive. Flowey is shielded from damage while they live.
(6) Two additional rolls. If another 6 is rolled, you get two more rerolls.
Pulchritude Surge: Flowey draws on the power of the Sleuth's SOUL, gaining his ability to lead hordes of players. This summons four Cultists with moderate HP. They grant bonus damage to Flowey as long as they live, and can individually target foes for moderate damage. Each Cultist alive also adds to a meter that takes ten units to fill, gaining +1 for every alive Cultist at the end of each turn. Flowey can then suicide all Cultists in a powerful anti-charisma attack once the meter is filled. The meter vanishes if all Cultists are killed.
Black Fortress: Flowey draws on the power of the Golem's SOUL, gaining their ability to control obsidian. A black fortress rises up from the ground, a hollow replica of Psi's castle. This summons an obsidian castle with high HP. The castle shields an entity of Flowey's choice. The castle has increased health based on how many SOULs are active at the time.
SPECIAL ATTACKS:
Massive Annihilation Wave: Omega Flowey opens his mouth, charging up a gigantic laser beam that deals extremely high damage to a single entity. Their form is obliterated. Is an instant kill if the entity is below 25% health. Takes three turns to charge.
Save Scumming: Omega Flowey hacks into the game, saving it. At the end of the turn, Omega Flowey reloads the game, making it so all the attacks he did during the turn hit again, even though the entities were already hit by them. This effectively means he deals double the damage. Takes four turns to charge.
In This World: Omega Flowey hacks into the game, taking attacks from three random entities and stealing them so he can use them himself. They have the same effects as they normally would, just with massively increased attack power due to Omega Flowey's own power levels. Takes two turns to charge.
It's Kill: Omega Flowey's eyes turn solid black as he ejects pulsating spheres of bullets from them that crash through the battlefield, destroying the Terrain and turning it to a neutral Crater. They deal very high damage to multiple (three to six) targets. The attack has a high chance to ignore Evasion and hit anyway, and lowers Evasion. Takes three turns to charge.
Or Be Killed: Activates one turn after death.
Determination Extraction: Omega Flowey's head turns into a massive artifact known as the Determination Extraction Machine, used by the scientists of the underground to preform experiments on DETERMINATION, the force that gives humans the will to live. Using the machine, Flowey takes the SOUL of an entity, gaining its powers and instantly killing it. Takes six turns to charge. ...Well, not just the SOULS of entities.
THE MONITOR:
The Monitor is another part to Omega Flowey. It has 500,000 HP, and has the ability to tank incoming damage for Omega Flowey. Every turn, the Monitor upgrades itself, gaining new attacks. Since it was contributed by CobaltShade, Cobalt will control its actions. The Monitor can only attack once per turn, but it has very powerful attacks...
PASSIVES:
Soul Protection: The Monitor's HP cannot go below 425,000 while Omega Flowey is invulnerable.
Defender: The Monitor takes half of all incoming damage for Omega Flowey's Body.
Colormatic: The Monitor can support a certain amount of Colors at any given time. The amount of Colors the Monitor has increases the amount of attacks it has access too. The Monitor's amount of supported colors either increases by x4 or x8 every turn. It starts out with 2 colors.
ATTACKS:
Glitch (Min. 2 colors): The Monitor shows the face of a target in 2 colors and glitches out, causing the target's face to glitch out as well and dealing low damage.
Colorbeam (Min. 4 colors): The Monitor fires a laser beam at a target, flashing four shades of gray. The target takes high damage.
Distortion Scare (Min. 16 colors): The Monitor glitches out and shows the distorted face in 16 VGA colors. This strikes Fear into five targets that are adjacent on the EOTB.
Glitch II (Min. 64 colors): The Monitor shows the face of a target in 64 colors and glitches out, causing the target's face to glitch out as well and dealing moderate damage.
Bytestun (Min. 256 colors): The Monitor glitches out and shows Flowey's face. The Monitor then fires a beam of 256 colors at a target, dealing moderate damage to it and stunning it for 2 turns.
Colorbeam II (Min. 512 colors): The Monitor fires a laser beam at a target, flashing 512 colors. This overloads a target's eyes, confusing them and dealing high damage.
Glitch III (Min. 1024 colors): The Monitor shows the face of a target in 1024 colors and glitches out, causing the target's face to glitch out as well and dealing high damage.
Distortion Scare II (Min. 4096 colors): The Monitor glitches out and shows the distorted face in 4096 colors. This strikes Fear into five targets that are adjacent on the EOTB.
Colorbeam III (Min. 8192 colors): The Monitor fires a laser beam at a target, flashing 8192 colors. This sensory overloads a target, stunning them for 5 turns and dealing high damage.
Glitch IV (Min. 32768 colors): The Monitor shows the face of a target in 15-bit color and glitches out, causing the target to glitch out and take very high damage.
Wordstun (Min. 65536 colors): The Monitor glitches out and shows Flowey's face. The Monitor then fires a beam of 65536 colors at a target, dealing high damage to it and stunning it for 3 turns.
Colorbeam IV (Min. 262144 colors): The Monitor fires a laser beam at a target, flashing 262,144 colors. This causes the target to be stunned for 5 turns and the two targets adjacent on the EOTB to be stunned for 2 to 3 turns.
RGB (Min. 16777216 colors): The Monitor attains full control over all the whole RGB domain. The Monitor then bombs the entire Battlefield, dealing a massive amount of damage spread among any amount of entities in any configuration. This also reduces its number of Colors by a factor of 256.
SPECIAL ATTACKS:
Reload Savestate: The Monitor reloads its state, regaining 45,000 HP but losing seven stages of Colors (amount of Colors is divided by 128). Takes two turns to charge up.
April 7, 2016 - Post #3,856
Omega Flowey uses Briar of Cruelty three times. Each attack targets two of the Coffins, so all six are targeted.
Ampersand mimics the Nuclear Throne and uses Good Memory. The Nuclear Throne uses the same attacks it was going to do last turn, this time on Chara. Vox Asterism uses Chromesthesia on two of the Coffins. Ultra Greed, knowing deep in his gut that he's about to die, goes out in a blaze of glory and uses Bling Cleansing twice on a target in the Iron Chef that he can actually attack.
The Scribe is panicking.
April 28, 2016 - Post #3,992 ***
An amber heart floats through the air, spiraling away from the battle, before coming to rest at the edge of the war. In a flash of light, the Scribe's body materializes, shuddering on the cold hard ground. Legs shaking, the Scribe stands up, staring at his hands. Finally, he's free. The time the Scribe had spent in Omega Flowey's body had felt like an eternity spent in hell. The Scribe had voluntarily sacrificed himself to a greater cause and he had paid the price. He had no control over his creation, and neither did any of the others who had given up their lives. They were forced to sit back and watch as Flowey violated their powers and their very SOULS.
The Scribe couldn't feel his body, and he barely had any of his existing memories. He could hardly see, only experiencing the outside world through flashes and sensations transferred from the devilish monitor. The Scribe was a hopelessly small piece of his former self, trapped in the infinite catacombs of a horrifying abomination. He wanted to rise against the authority controlling the universe. But the instant Flowey had gone rogue... he had died. Yes, it had seemed like an eternity had passed. But one second Omega Flowey was there, and the next - he wasn't. His body had been torn to shreds, and the six SOULS were freed. The Scribe was himself again.
And now that the Scribe knows this, he realizes that Flowey must still be alive in some capacity. And he knows what Flowey is planning to do. Hurriedly, the Scribe rushes back to the heart of the battlefield. Once there, he finds complete and utter devastation. The corpses of the fallen litter the field, blood staining the dull ground. At one end of the Battlefield is the Angel of Genocide. At the other is That Comedian. And at the middle of the fight is the Golden Aster himself: the corpse of Flowey. The Scribe runs right in front of Flowey, whose broken and battered head turns up to look. His pixellated and white form is threatening to blink out of existence entirely, and his face is twisted in the form of that of a goat.
The Scribe mutters to the flower. "Flowey." Flowey looks up. * ...Scribe. Do you honestly think I've learned anything from this? The Scribe laughs. "I'm not sure. I really doubt it, at any rate. But if you actually have, and you want to do something constructive with whatever is left of your life..." The Scribe jabs a finger at UserZero. "Target her. She's caused your world too much pain. I figured out that much when I merged with your body and you became a gigantic eldritch abomination." The Scribe starts to walk away. * Hey, wait! You're... you're just gonna leave me here? Defenseless? The Scribe laughs. "I'm not playing your game, Flowey. I'm not sticking by you. When I tried that, you corrupted me. Depressed me. Dragged me down. That's how I listened to you."
Light gleams in the Scribe's goggles as he turns back slightly. "Well, I'm not falling for that crap anymore. My time spent as your puppet showed me the truth. A truth that's been shown to me this entire war, and maybe my entire life. Being destructive isn't the only option. I know I can't atone for all my sins, but I can start." Flowey cackles and then coughs. * And yet, you're still going to try to reach The Gate, huh? Tell me how that's any different. Look me in the EYE and tell me. An agonizing few seconds pass, and the Scribe looks at Flowey. "I never said being destructive wasn't an option." Flowey laughs even harder. * So that's it, then? You're going to impose a double standard! It's bad when people trick me into being bad, but it's fine when I do it! That's your game? THAT'S your game?? What a joke you are, Scribe! What a joke...
The Scribe laughs. "Don't you know? Don't you remember? It's all just a joke."
Images of timelines cut short and massacre after massacre flood Flowey's eyes as he remembers the catchphrase of the other Angel of Genocide. The one that had plagued his universe for far, far too long. At these memories, Flowey's expression darkens. "I told you, I can't fix everything. I've come too far to stop my plans for The Gate. I can't change the destination. But perhaps I can change the journey." Flowey grimaces. * And what's that supposed to mean? The Scribe shrugs. "It's a shame you won't live to find out." Flowey's body warps out of existence for a second. When he returns, his face is a mishmash of pixels. Panicking, Flowey relents. * FINE! Fine, I'll use it against h-her, right? That... that shouldn't be too hard! The Scribe grins. "Don't forget your philosophy, Flowey. 'In this world...'"
The dead bodies of everyone in the universe accumulate before Flowey's eyes. An infinite amount spills over, carried across infinite timelines. The being responsible behind it all, the maniac with glazed eyes and a bloodstained knife, was not a best friend, but an unfathomable enemy from somewhere else who had invaded everything anyone had ever known like a cancer. "'...it's kill...'" Flowey closes his eyes, his face disappearing as the skies go black.
Flowey uses Or Be Killed.
Before anyone has any time to react, a sea of vines and corrupted pixels surges across the field. All the entities brace for impact, knowing that Omega Flowey's raw destructive power was more than enough to obliterate everything on the field and that whatever surprises the amalgamate has will, even in death, be horrifying to witness. But the maelstrom does not curve off towards any of the entities on the field, nor their corpses. It surges towards one target in particular: UserZero herself. The Scribe's coat ripples in the wind as he surveys the havoc he has wrought.
The sea of vines effortlessly move past Sans' fortress of bones, destroying the ground that they sail through. When the vines make it to the middle of the field, where the twisted husk of Flowey lies, they crash straight through him, leaving nothing but a dwindling and rotting ball of destruction as Flowey is killed. Yet the vines and corruption march on, dead set on their task. One could even describe them as determined. Chara smiles and sidesteps the vines, leaving UserZero to be consumed. UserZero should, of course, be able to godmod the attack easily. Just wave her hand, punch a hole through the vines, and dodge it. But... she can't. UserZero's facade falters. Why can't she godmod this easily telegraphed attack? Let's just say describing the vines as determined wasn't just to make a joke.
As Omega Flowey's parting gift, the disjointed and strident laugh he made upon creation plays out across the entire server, yet it is horrifyingly glitched, as if the speaker broadcasting it has been irreversibly damaged. UserZero cannot move because the vines are making her think she cannot move. They are so determined to stop her that there are making her believe, with all their power, that she cannot stop them. She knows this, and yet it is so powerful and so complete that she cannot do a thing against it. And in a matter of seconds, the vines are upon her, restraining her every limb and cutting off her godmodding powers.
UserZero is now vulnerable. She is guaranteed to take damage NEXT turn. Only the best attack as dictated by Tazz will actually hit. The others will be repelled by the vines. The player who makes the attack that hits will receive a special Spoil of War: the Golden Aster.
The Scribe looks at his various entities. All of them are either dead or close to death. The Nuclear Throne has been destroyed. In a fit of rage, explosions pockmark its surface as it unleashes Resignation, creating an unstoppable green fireball that deals large damage to all PZs and inflicts Radiation on all of them for four turns. The Scribe chuckles as a brilliant light materializes from where the Throne once sat. The Scribe then turns to look at Ampersand, whose beautiful glass surface has been cracked beyond recognition. No images play out on its surface, and the crystals are barely holding up at all. Ampersand uses Struggle on Chara four times in quick succession as it prepares to enter Sandfall Mode, becoming invincible for the turn. Lastly, the Scribe looks at Ultra Greed, who is fighting for his very life. The Scribe salutes Ultra Greed. "You've done well, Isaac. Satan is proud of you." Ultra Greed sheds a tear of gold and uses Bling Volcano twice.
And then, the Scribe comes to a rest at the foot of Asterism's dying body. Asterism's wings have folded up and died, and the Vox is emitting a harsh screeching noise. The Scribe turns it off and kneels at Asterism's feet. His three eyes are glazed over and shifting color rapidly. "SO... I GUESS GODS CAN DIE AFTER ALL, HUH." The Scribe laughs. "Of course they can. What do you think I'm trying to do?" Asterism sighs, blood pouring from him. "BECOME A BETTER PERSON? CONNECT WITH OTHERS? I THINK THAT'S WHAT YOU WANT TO DO, BUT CAN'T. BECAUSE YOU'RE WORRIED YOU CAN'T CHANGE. I MEAN, IF YOU REALLY WANTED TO, YOU COULD JUST SIMPLY NOT TAKE THE CURSE FROM MY BODY AND FORGET ABOUT THIS QUEST." The Scribe falters. "But... I..." Asterism coughs, his form flickering. "NO, I GET IT. THAT'S TOO UNLIKE YOU. WHEN YOU START SOMETHING, YOU NEED TO SEE IT FINISHED. ESPECIALLY SOMETHING AS BIG AS THIS. YOU CAN'T CHANGE THE DESTINATION. BUT YOU CAN CHANGE THE JOURNEY. IT'S JUST LIKE YOU SAID."
Asterism puts a hand to his upper eye and tugs with a screech. His eye ejects itself from his body, a cone of light ushering itself from within. "WHEN I DIE... TAKE MY CURSE FROM MY MIND... BUT ONLY IF YOU... SWEAR TO ME..." The Scribe looks on. "Swear to do what?" "TREAT... THE OTHERS... WITH RESPECT... DON'T... JUST VIEW THEM AS TOOLS... SOLVE... THEIR PROBLEMS... NOT JUST... BECAUSE YOU FEEL YOU HAVE... TO... BUT BECAUSE... YOU FEEL... YOU WANT TO." The Scribe asks himself a question. Can he change? It's a question he doesn't know the answer to.
The Scribe solemnly nods. Asterism seems relieved. "...GOOD. WE'LL MEET AGAIN, SCRIBE. WE'LL... WE'LL MEET AGAIN." Asterism's body turns ashen grey, emitting no sound. His body splits open, shattering into pieces, white trails snaking off to another plane. Resting in the middle of what was once a demigod is a pulsating white sigil of undefinable power: ⁂. The Scribe takes it and sets the Vox to play Ward - a funeral march. The Scribe walks away.
"Three down."
The Mystery
(+5 from Cobalt, +4 from TFT and jondanger, +3 from Revan, +2 from Tazz, +1 from FBSN and piono)
The Interface
(+5 from Cobalt, +4 from TFT and jondanger, +2 from Revan and Tazz, +1 from FBSN and teag)
The Campfire
(+5 from Cobalt, +2 from Tazz)
(+50 from Tazz in reserve)
April 29, 2016 - Post #4,010
The Mystery
(+1 from Cobalt)
The Interface
(+1 from Cobalt)
The Campfire
(+1 from Cobalt)
(+50 from Tazz in reserve)
I +3 Cobalt.
The Scribe's goggles glint. "All this time, I've been limiting myself to the resevoirs of my underground lab. My past experiments and objects are the only resources I've drawn from. But look at Uncle Grandpa. He does any attack he wants, pulling it from thin air, and no one bats an eye. In fact, they're super effective. So you know what? Why don't I just do the same? After all, if the attacks of everyone else are any indication, I have the power." The Scribe walks up to Chara, the Angel of Genocide. He scrutinizes Chara's knives carefully. "Those are pretty sharp knives there, Chara. But have you ever considered putting them to the test against other knife wielders?"
Before Chara can even react, they are flung to another plane of existence. They are in a very dark room and can barely see anything. Suddenly, an announcer's voice rings out from all corners of the room. "LAAAAADIES AND GENTLEMEN, WELCOME TO CHOPPED (THE OTHER ONE)! I'M YOUR HOST, KNIFE MCKNIFE!" Floodlights turn on, shining across the entire room. Chara can now clearly see that they are in some kind of studio with a live audience made to resemble a kitchen. Chara is locked in a chair next to a few other people they don't recognize. They are apparently on some sort of game show. Chara doesn't quite know how to feel about this.
The announcer, a sentient knife, keeps on shouting. "LET'S GIVE IT UP FOR OUR LUUUUCKY CONTESTANTS! FIRST UP IS THE SPY FROM TEAM FORTRESS 2! HAILING FROM FRANCE, THIS MASKED MERCENARY HAS MANY DISGUISES! INCLUDING ONE FOR YOU??? MAYBE! JUST KEEP YOUR EYE OUT AND DON'T TURN YOUR BACK ON HIM!" The Spy grins and lets out a few 'hon hon hons', showing where his true allegiance lies. "NEXT UP IS SOME RANDOM HOODED ASSASSIN FROM ITALY! I'M PRETTY SURE HE HAS KNIVES SOMEWHERE IN THAT COAT BUT I'M TOO SCARED TO CHECK! HAHAHA, PLEASE DON'T KILL ME." The figure in the white hood does not move. "THEN WE HAVE ISAAC'S MOTHER WHO LIVES IN A SMALL HOUSE ON A HILL! DON'T LET HER GROTESQUE FORM FOOL YOU, SHE'S PRETTY CRAZY! SAYS SHE HEARS THE VOICE OF GOD! I DON'T KNOW, WOULD YOU CALL A KNIFE GOD, FOLKS? I KNOW I WOULD!!" The overweight woman twists her mouth into a cruel grin, staring down everyone.
The announcer looks at Chara. "AND LASTLY, WE HAVEOILUGASF" Chara was getting sick of hearing his voice. A knife ought to shut him up. The announcer splits in two, bisected by the fury of Chara's knife. They allow a smile to grace their face. The audience, however, is shouting hysterically. They all take off their hoods to reveal that every single one of them is a knife. All the members of the audience yell a single word, over and over and over: "DISQUALIFIED! DISQUALIFIED! DISQUALIFIED!" The knives surge toward Chara. They try to slice through the crowd with their own weaponry, but any metal they throw is absorbed into the crowd's frame. The knives all rush towards Chara, surrounding them and melting into a liquid tomb. Chara tries to dodge, but the resulting attack is far too large.
Fortunately for Chara, it seems like the crowd wasn't going after Chara at all. They were going after their knives. The crowd passes through Chara unharmed, but they find that several of the knives in their Knife Clusters have been stolen. The crowd, now acting as a single hivemind, releases Chara from her locks. "FIGHT US TO PROVE YOUR WORTH. THIS IS CHOPPED: A BATTLE OF THE KNIVES." Chara grins, silencing the other contestants with a well-timed throw of one of their blades. The contestants fall to the floor, twitching in a heap. Chara leaps through the air, holding a fistful of knives as they stare down the crowd.
In a furious battle, the crowd of knives has fallen entirely, smashed into broken pieces. Chara stands on the mound of molten metal triumphantly. But just as victory is within their grasp, it is taken away. The knife shards fly into the air, forming a single cohesive fist. Chara prepares a shield of knives to block the attack and run, but the fist just smashes through the knives entirely, cracking them and adding to the fist's mass. Chara wonders what could be animating the knives, looking around the room. Then, at the top of the bleachers where the audience once was, she sees the Scribe, controlling the metal. Chara flings a single knife at the Scribe. He dodges, but his concentration is broken, and the illusion shatters. All the knives fall haphazardly around the Battlefield. Chara rushes to pick them up, but the Scribe lights them all on fire, dealing even more damage to Chara's Knife Clusters and rendering the plethora of sharp objects completely unusable as they disintegrate into ashes.
May 7, 2016 - Post #4,064
The Mystery
(+1 from Cobalt)
The Interface
(+1 from Cobalt)
The Campfire
(+1 from Cobalt and The Diner)
(+50 from Tazz in reserve)
I +3 Cobalt.
I repeat all the earlier entity actions that didn't go through because of the tape. (The Nuclear Throne uses Resignation, Ampersand prepares for Sandfall Mode and uses Struggle four times on Chara, and Ultra Greed uses Bling Volcano twice.) And while we're on the subject of the tape, that was probably the best thing I've ever read in this game. Nice work, Tazz. Nice work.
The Scribe walks up to the Information Robot and decides to spew meaningless information at him in the hopes of overloading his information processors or something.The Scribe makes the Robot sit down and has a nice long conversation with him about geopolitics as spoken by a five-year-old boy. The Information Robot is not overloaded by the excess information, but is upset about the blatant lies that the boy is saying. He snaps the boy's neck in frustration and is promptly sent to jail for life imprisonment because he touched and/or killed the child.
While in jail, the Information Robot is not treated kindly because he literally murdered a small child, and many of the criminals who have done lesser crimes find the Robot to be a despicable being. However, because the Robot is much better than humans in every conceivable way because he's, you know, a robot, the Information Robot is able to kill everyone in jail and bust out in a few minutes. That's when an alien ship flies overhead and abducts him. The Information Robot is sent to alien jail. These alien prisoners have done much greater crimes than killing a kid, so the Information Robot is viewed as weak and meaningless.
Angered by this, the Robot decides to prove his worth by breaking out of this prison. He uses his vast amount of Information to form a full-scale riot, which leads into escape. However, none of the aliens can breathe in space once the prison is destroyed, and they all die. The Robot is fine though, because he doesn't need to breathe. However, the Robot is now abducted by an entire universe and is sent to the Jail Universe for destroying a full-fledged alien prison. Some aliens actually did escape in ships and are now terrorizing other planets much like before, and it's all the Information Robot's fault.
The punishment is, of course, death. But the death is not quick and painless. It is long and excruciating, and it involves every kind of torture imaginable. Because this is an entire universe centered around imprisonment and punishment and it has had a very long time to perfect these skills, the Jail Universe is easily able to pinpoint exactly what hurts the most. After years of prolonged pain, the Information Robot is jettisoned back to the Zeroth Server, barely functioning.
May 8, 2016 - Post #4,093 ***
The Mystery
(+1 from Cobalt)
The Interface
(+1 from Cobalt)
The Campfire
(+1 from Cobalt and The Diner)
The Hole
(+50 from Tazz, IN RESERVE)
I +3 Cobalt.
So, I now know what my Pact compensation charge is going towards. However, I can't deploy it just yet because I already have three charges going on, so I'll do that when it's ready. Anyway... I am THOROUGHLY astonished that not only did Ultra Greed survive this turn, he won the entire contest of Iron Chef! I couldn't be more proud... Ultra Greed, the Saint of Clutch, purchases Investment and Bumbo. He then uses Bling Volcano. (Also, his kamikaze attack is Transcendence, not Kamikaze.) Meanwhile, Ampersand prepares to truly enter Sandfall Mode...
The Scribe looks at Ultra Greed sitting on his beautiful throne and sends a single tear of gold liquid triumph. This is more then he could have ever possibly asked for out of Isaac. But before the Scribe can contemplate this any further, he hears a loud screeching noise that causes his entire body to tense up. Turning around, the Scribe sees the ruined form of Ampersand drifting into the air, its disjointed cyan crystals shifting to a hollow red color. The two golden rings that suspend Ampersand's form spin wildly as beams of irradiated light swirl across the field. "This is it, then," the Scribe states. "You're entering Sandfall Mode."
Ampersand's voice cracks with a metallic cadence, but it answers. "Yes. The time has come for me to stop replicating the actions of other entities and for other entities to replicate the actions I give to them." The Scribe looks at his gloved hand and clenches it into a fist. "Alright. I'd try to at least curb your enthusiasm or something, but I doubt I can control you at this point. "No. You can't. Quite the contrary, in fact. I am now perfectly capable of controlling anyone and anything, bar a few particularly important entities." The Scribe's gaze falters. "But... you wouldn't control me, of course." Ampersand laughs coldly. "Oh, no. I wouldn't dare control a creature who spent the better part of his life using my own powers for exploitation and personal gain. I definitely wouldn't see that he gets his just punishment by understanding the horrors of his actions first hand." The Scribe is still. "...You're capable of sarcasm?" "I've had eons to perfect it."
The Scribe sighs, turning away. "Alright then. Do what it is you have to do before you die," he replies. Light and color flicker across Ampersand's crystalline form. "Of course. If, for some reason, you wish to avoid being subjugated by a truly higher power, you should retreat to your underground lab immediately." The Scribe hastily nods, letting his coat bellow in the wind for a brief instant. In the next, he is gone. Ampersand creates a fractured replica of its normal voice which eternally rises in tone. Ampersand's form splits apart into a hollow version of its pyramidal structure, forming a set of twelve massive crystals, locked in a massive dance.
From the Scribe's underground bunker, he peers up through a camera and looks at the spinning transcendence of Ampersand. The crystal seems to be manipulating the entire world, as if it is revolving around the crystal and the wheel... The clouds flicker with images of days gone by and days yet to transpire, and the ground cracks and shifts, blocks shifting out of alignment. The Scribe hears rattling behind him. Something is creating a humming noise. The Scribe investigates and inputs the code to unlock the drawer. Inside is the Crux Ansata, a crystalline red ankh that can let the wearer manipulate sand itself. The Scribe understands why it must be reacting to Ampersand's actions - Ampersand would, in essence, be a gigantic form of the Crux Ansata. And that would mean...
The Scribe grins. Ampersand assumes the shape of a glorified ankh, casting off its golden wheels, as the holographic image of two triangles, one reflected on top of the other, is superimposed on its surface. A massive explosion bursts forth from Ampersand as the terrain of the battlefield is irreversibly changed. Grass, dirt, and stone are all pulverized into ashes that cascade and swirl through the air, creating an unholy sandstorm of massive proportions. The shift reshapes the entire world, seeping through every crack and corner, every block. Sand falls through the air and settles to the ground, the entire field becoming a mixture of sand and sandstone inscribed with cursed iconography. And in the middle of it all, orchestrating the event, is Ampersand. It utters a single word, and all hell breaks loose.
"SANDFALL." Pillars of sand jut out from the ground, barely visible amongst the haze of particles and dust that are now blocking out the sky. Ampersand's red energy strikes silently across the field, carving the pillars into the unrecognizable shapes of every entity on the field. The copies of shifting sand suddenly merge with their real ones, every entity's eyes suddenly flickering with a soft cyan color. Ampersand cackles, an immensely unsatisfying sound that causes the sand of the world to tremble. Temples and obelisks jut out from the ground as the entire world becomes a plaything for the whims of a demented machine. "Ampersand is the master. You are the nobody. The nobody fulfills the master's wishes so he can achieve enlightenment."
Every entity suddenly trembles, physically unable to stop the mental onslaught that is bombarding their minds cape and tearing it away like eroding dunes of sand. They configure their arms into a salute, and Ampersand cackles once more. "There can only be one nobody that achieves enlightenment. All other nobodies are nothing against you. You must tear apart the others to gain enlightenment. Such is the will of the master." Every entity opens their mouths, smoke pouring out of them and sand pouring back in, in an endless cycle of horror. Broken and disjointed speech falls out of their mouths.
"Such is the will of the master."
Welcome to the Sandfall, a horrific event spoke of in legend that has occurred time and time again throughout the ages. Though it is not the end of the world, it certainly marks some kind of new age in this entity fight. Ampersand's sudden transformation has a lot of interesting consequences that will ripple throughout the field. Let's see how they work and how they come together.
(Ampersand is fully healed due to his new form.)
PASSIVES:
Sandstorm: The Weather has changed to Sandstorm. All Airborne entities are damaged every turn, Evasion is lowered because it is harder to see, and all entities now have a 10% chance to hit a different target because it is harder to see.
Desert: The Terrain has changed to Desert. Because of this, the temperature is going to steadily rise every turn, as it gets hotter in deserts. The temperature will raise by +20º every turn that Sandfall is active. Once the temperature is at 100º, entities will start getting Burns. In addition, every turn, a Desert Obelisk appears on the field. When three Obelisks are active, a special event will trigger.
The Master: Ampersand is now able to play chess with entities. In effect, Ampersand is guaranteed to take two entities every turn and override who they would have normally attacked. Ampersand is able to control them into attacking other entities. He does this regardless of entity alignment, so allies can hurt allies. This is completely unavoidable, though Ampersand cannot control the same entity or have an entity be attacked by a controlled entity twice in a row. Ampersand is able to make controlled entities use their existing attack patterns and Ampersand's attack patterns.
Enlightenment: If a controlled entity lands the killing blow on a target, they will gain Enlightenment. They will see the future and will dodge any and all attacks sent at them, and will also gain Regen for three turns and a crit bonus for one turn.
Future Vision: Ampersand has seen all of this before. Any attack that comes his way will be successful, but will also be counterattacked with retaliation damage that is half of the damage sent at Ampersand.
Until The Crystals Cracked: Ampersand has a kamikaze that happens one turn after death.
ATTACKS:
Struggle: Functions identically to before. It will deal low damage, but each consecutive time it is used, the attack gains more and more power. There is no limit to how much damage this attack could potentially do.
Crux Conundrum: Ampersand's entire body powers up, creating a massive gauntlet of sand that an entity is trapped inside. He is assaulted by various weapons and enemies, taking moderately high damage, and is also locked inside for the turn. Anyone that attacks the entity will also be trapped and will take moderate damage.
In Memoriam: Ampersand fondly remembers the entity that died to get him into Sandfall Mode, the Nuclear Throne. Ampersand turns bright green and fires a massive beam of radiation, dealing moderately high damage to two entities and inflicting Radiation for two turns on both. Both entities will crit next turn, but will be Cursed for two turns.
Indigo Inferno: Ampersand creates a massive plume of fire and a wall of sand at the same time, which hardens into a nigh-unbreakable glass. Any attacks sent at Ampersand that turn will not hit and will instead be reflected, dealing a counterattack of x1.5 damage. Entities that attack Ampersand will also be Burned for two turns.
Heat Death: Ampersand takes the current Temperature of the field and condenses it into a massive ball of literal superheated heat. This ball can either be used to help an entity or hurt an entity - if it helps an entity, the heat will give the entity a massive amount of energy, letting them attack twice that turn and healing them for a moderately high amount of health. If it hurts an entity, they will take high damage and be Burned for five turns.
SPECIAL ATTACKS:
The Zodiac: Ampersand reforms the Timewheels that used to keep its pyramidal form in check. They will spin with an array of twelve symbols that hold an immense amount of sacred power. Pickaxe, Lapis Lazuli, Broken Bow, Wineglass, Escutcheon, Demon Door, Alien Visor, Twisted Horn, Golden Crown, Pokeball, Foxtail, Blue Cross. Two entities are taken back by these visions of heroism and take very high damage. In addition, a holographic form of one of the Ancestors is selected at random to fight on the field for two turns. Takes three turns to charge.
Pyramidion: Ampersand creates a gigantic pyramid constructed from sand, which rises out of the depths of the earth. The pyramid glows with a massive unearthly magenta power which blasts a random entity apart. In addition, a boss that we've already fought ascends out of the pyramid to fight on the field for two turns. Takes three turns to charge.
Obelisk Objection: Ampersand takes the three obelisks and causes points of light to shine over the field. Beams of energy connect the field, forming a triangle - or, in other words, a trifecta. Three columns of red, green, and blue energy wash over the sky that cascade with the visions of universes locked in a dance of death. The obelisks split apart, swarms of dead bodies flying out of them - the corpses of every fallen entity in this war and the ones preceding/succeeding it. They tear apart three random entities, dealing very high damage. Takes three turns to charge.
God Complex: Ampersand can control a boss or godmodder. Takes ten turns to charge. Ampersand dies on use.
May 9, 2016 - Post #4,120
The Mystery
(+1 from Cobalt)
The Interface
(+1 from Cobalt)
The Campfire
(+1 from Cobalt)
The Hole
(+50 from Tazz, IN RESERVE)
I +3 Cobalt.
Sandfall Ampersand chooses its targets carefully. It uses In Memoriam and then controls The Innocent One and Squirrel Sniper. They both use Crux Conundrum on the Stardust Sentinel and the Information Robot, respectively. Ampersand curiously examines all the players. "What? You thought I was actually going to control you? I'm not capable of commanding the artifices of the Narrative and Conflict in such a raw state of power. Not yet."
The Scribe once again decides to teach Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. some lessons as to show him he has much more to understand from this world than his numerous PhDs would suggest. The Scribe locks Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. in a reinforced chair with divinium shackles and claps his hands twice, a monumentally huge cannonball descending from the ceiling. The Scribe speaks softly, the cannonball doing most of the talking as it is propelled at full force towards Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. "Inertia is a property of matter," the Scribe calmly recites. Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr., who cannot get out of his chair, is hit square in the chest by the cannonball and is flung backwards as the cannonball keeps moving. However, due to the cannonball's velocity, Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. is actually stuck on its surface, forced to move wherever the cannonball goes.
Floating eerily above the ground, the Scribe once again talks to Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr., this time shouting to be heard over the gusts of wind the cannonball is kicking up. "You see this hallway we're in?" Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. looks around, confirming he is indeed in a brick hallway with paintings flying by too fast to be recognized. "It's very long, you know! Long enough to wrap around the planet three or so times! And this cannonball right here isn't going anywhere! In fact, it's going to continually increase in velocity, bit by bit, until it reaches an extranormal velocity that you'll find to be quite scintillating. I'd explain further, but you'll soon experience it for yourself. Just keep in mind that the sound barrier is a thing that exists!" Then the Scribe stops flying, vanishing without a trace as the cannonball keeps hurtling through the air.
Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. can barely withstand the extravagant forces being pushed on him as the cannonball continues onwards, reaching speeds that near the sound barrier. After several agonizing minutes that stretch on for far, far too long, Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. suddenly experiences a large amount of drag as the cannonball's velocity explodes and a plume of air materializes behind the ball, a series of loud thunderclaps sounding shortly thereafter. Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr.'s head spins as the cannonball breaks the sound barrier and, although momentarily impeded, soon resumes its steady trek towards some unknown and undesirable terminal velocity.
Minutes pass. Then hours. The cannonball keeps increasing and increasing in speed, Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. having long-since blacked out due to lack of oxygen. The cannonball's surface is sparking and flaming due to how fast it is moving through the air. It has exceeded supersonic speeds many times over, and is going so fast that it has made one complete loop around the world. The Scribe, sensing that the time has come for the coup de grace, includes a simple addition to the hallway - a booster pad that will sense when the cannonball passes over it and give it enough speed to travel at a rate of 186,000 miles every second. The Scribe quickly deploys this booster pad and evacuates the planet entirely.
Within seconds, the cannonball lurches through the hallway and over the booster pad, which lights up and makes the cannonball's surface sear with energy. The cannonball howls through the air at a much faster rate than the air itself can even move, ripping apart the fundamental resources that compose the atmosphere and the environment which is required for life. Unstable and quick to erupt, the air superheats into an ionized soup of plasma that stalks behind the cannonball and soon overtakes it. There is a massive plume of death as the hallway is blown apart entirely in a conflagration of relativistic awe. The cannonball is torn apart, and Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. is ejected from the chair at near-lightspeed. Wherever he goes, a trail of explosions on par to the first follow in his wake as he skids across the ground, creating a horrific maelstrom of energy.
The landscape is left in charred ruins blasted down to bedrock, with Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. in the middle, his body a smoking wreck. He is physically hurt, but not dangerously so, simply because he has way too much HP to be reasonable. Yet he is still down for the count. The Scribe grins, hoping he appreciated this lesson in relativity.
The Scribe walks up to the Godmodder, his cloak swishing in the wind. He chuckles. "Hm. I'd honestly like to know here. And I know this might be a ridiculous question, but... How were you able to take this from me?" The Scribe pulls out the Journal, emblazoned with the image of the scarred eye. "No one else can get their hands on that thing, and I meant that quite literally. They'd die if they tried." The Scribe puts his Journal away. "So how were you able to do it? And, uh, thanks for giving it back. I guess... You had my best interests in mind?"
June 4, 2016 - Post #4,178 ***
The Mystery
(+2 from Krill, +1 from Cobalt)
The Interface
(+2 from Krill, +1 from Cobalt)
The Campfire
(+2 from Krill, +1 from Cobalt)
The Hole
I +2 Krill and +1 Cobalt.
The Scribe walks forward, without much fanfare, pulling the power of a completed fifty-post charge from the tips of hammerspace. Amber light congeals around the Scribe, with everyone realizing that he's about to deploy the charge given to him as compensation for the untimely destruction of The Pact. The Pact that was sealed, even in death, with the purpose of allowing beings that should not be into this universe. The Scribe laughs at everyone's expressions. "Oh, no, don't worry. I'm not summoning Omega Flowey again. In fact, I'm not really summoning any powerful entity at all."
The Scribe grins. "You're going to be the ones that summon the entities now." The Scribe snaps his fingers, and a tall box descends from the sky, slamming into the ground. Concealed by rigging and machinery, the Scribe punches some numbers on archaic computers and pulls a complicated mechanism out from the box, unlocking it. Steam pours from within, pistons creaking and groaning as the true device is revealed from within. "It's a fairly simple machine. I mean, I just had to base it off of the portal-based research conducted through my earlier exploits into other dimensions. It's a localized quantum destabilizer meant to exploit patches and gaps in the programming of a simulated continuum, folding code onto itself to intentionally create glitches, which lead to shortcuts through reality."
The Scribe flicks some levers, and machinery begins to whirr. "In short - it's a hole. A hole punched through this dimension, and into another." The device looks like a bigger and more advanced version of a Nether Portal braced with machinery and made of complex metal. Built into the ground surrounding the portal is a triangular foundation with three columns capped off by dully glowing stones. "All I need to do is turn it on, and we should be good to go." The Scribe runs his hand across some levers at random, and then punches a button labelled "DO NOT PUNCH." The Scribe looks in alarm, but then realizes that there's a button next to it labelled "PRESS IF YOU PUNCHED THE 'DO NOT PUNCH BUTTON'", so he presses that. The Scribe sighs in relief as electricity sparks across the ends of the portal, which howls into life as an explosion forms through the portal's aperture.
Flickering kaleidoscopic light is visible throughout the portal. The triangular foundation extends up even further, connected to a series of computer terminals. The Scribe adjusts his goggles. "Good. We're ready. I've done research on similar machines - everydimensional portals. They spit out anything the user can think of. I've long dreamed of creating one, but being able to pull anything from any dimension is too... chaotic. There's really only one dimension I can think of that is perfectly suited to such a machine." The Scribe inputs 'UNIVERSE 953' onto the terminal, and the portal lights with fire in a color no one has ever seen before. The Scribe laughs.
"Alright, Dimension of Weirdness. Show me what you got."
The Every-Dimension Portal, inspired by the Everydimensional Portal, is an extremely odd entity, as is evident by its lack of an HP bar or any attacks. It's just a portal into Dimension 953, the titular "Every-Dimension," known as such because it contains an infinite amount of just plain weird beings, objects, locations, and so on. It's been used several times throughout this game in the form of OOC shenanigans - someone comes up with a non-sequitur phrase, like "solar-powered battleship crab," "ancient waffle mages," or "severed pig's head on a stick." What the Every-Dimension Portal does is take these player-generated phrases and summon them onto the field as literal entities.
Here's how it works.
PASSIVES:
Generation: The first phase of the Every-Dimension Portal's "attack pattern" is generation. During this phrase, it's up to you - the players - to suggest entity ideas. Dimension 953 works, as I said above, by making a being made of random words. Some other examples just generated on the memo are "Ditch, the Dog Witch", "walnut marquis," and "twenty to forty vans that combine to form the Vanzord." There are no rules except that what you're summoning can't be a thing that exists in pop culture, like how normal entities usually are. You need to think of this own your own.
Democracy: The second phase is democracy. I will pick what I think are the three best choices, and those will be the candidates for what the Every-Dimension Portal will summon. The three glowing stones will light up, each holding a different idea. Once again, the task will fall to the players. You will vote on which entity you think is the best. What's determined as "the best" could be which one sounds the coolest, which one you think would have the most power, which one's the funniest, or something else entirely. Every vote gives that entity +5 charge points of power.
Arrival: The third phase is arrival. After a full turn of democracy has passed, I will tally up the votes. Whichever entity gets the most votes will be summoned to the field through the Every-Dimension Portal with a charge equivalent to number of votes * 5, since every vote gives +5 charge points. Naturally, this caps at a charge of 50. This entity will become a full-fledged entity whose stats I will personally create. Its faction alignment will be randomly decided. Once the entity dies, the whole process begins again, going back to the generation phase.
The Struggle Continues: In case you somehow haven't figured it out yet, this looping process will start over and over again. Forever. And ever. Until the end of time, or this game, whichever comes first. And since the Every-Dimension Portal has infinite HP, like the original Everydimensional Portal, there's only one way it can be stopped - and that's if the playerbase voices disapproval at the Portal's continued existence. If people start to think the Portal should be removed, I'll hold a vote on if it should be truly removed, and that will be that. My hope is that this thing becomes a mainstay of the game, and something that can provide cool shakeups from time to time.
ATTACKS:
None.
SPECIAL ATTACKS:
None?
With that said, I leave it up to all of you to suggest some ideas!
June 25, 2016 - Post #4,261 ***
The Mystery
(+3 from Cobalt and Krill)
The Interface
(+3 from Cobalt and Krill)
The Campfire
(+3 from Cobalt, +1 from Krill)
I +1 Krill and +2 Cobalt.
Ultra Greed, the Saint of Clutch, purchases all upgrades he hasn't already bought and uses Super Bum/Bumbo on Lance. Sandfall Ampersand uses Crux Conundrum on Frankenstein's Pokemon. He mind controls the Anomaly: Failure to use Indigo Inferno, and he mind controls Vargas to use Crux Conundrum on Selena.
The Every-Dimension Portal's ideas are locked in as an Almond Milk Elemental, A Giant Bedrock Hamster Ball That Is Also Transparent And Is Containing One Million Bulls All Running Cooperatively So That The Ball Can Keep Rolling Without Any Interruption From The Inside And It Can Also Fly Somehow, and a Dodecahedral Potato wielding a Laser Gun. Now it's up to you - the players - to vote on which one is the best! It would help if Tazz could keep track of the votes.
The Scribe walks up to Vargas and deploys the Personal Space Invaders' innocuous double - a PC. Vargas scrutinizes the PC, wondering what purpose it could possibly serve before realizing that he needs a monitor to play the PC! This forces Vargas on a noble adventure hereby dubbed MONITORQUEST. The Scribe, who happens to be a notorious quest-giver, formally gives Vargas this quest, showing him a map of his challenges, of which the fabled Monitor will be at the end. Vargas takes this whole thing in stride, determined to get that Monitor no matter the cost.
After heading into the designated Quest Area™ as dictated by the map, Vargas enters the first obstacle - the Pac-Maze! He is locked into a massive fluorescent maze littered with pellets where he must avoid four technicolor ghosts! Vargas instantly realizes this as Pac-Man, feeling that the whole thing will be a piece of cake and that the ghosts will just be messes of pixels he can instantly kill! But Vargas is filled with unholy fear when he sees the four abominations bearing down on top of him, light frothing from their eyes as they eerily shift across the landscape towards Vargas. In a daze, Vargas runs across the map to frantically avoid the ghosts and collect all the pellets. Right as he nears the last pellet, Clyde pops in from out of nowhere, absorbing Vargas' soul into his being and forcing his body to collapse in an ashen heap on the cold ground.
Vargas somehow manages to escape, brushing off the wounds he received but shivering at the apparent loss of his soul. The Scribe pops in to tell Vargas that at the end of the MONITORQUEST, there's massive heaps of treasure (that he stole from the Venusian system), including treasure chests full of golden weapons, stacks upon stacks of precious minerals and money, and more than a few containers of souls! But Vargas needs to hurry - if he doesn't make it to the Monitor by midnight, the cavity in his chest that contained his soul will overtake him, and he'll lose his physical form!
Energized by a new goal - and a time limit - Vargas forges onwards to the next obstacle! This obstacle is a huge red river, tainted this color by the blood of all Pokemon who have "fainted" in battle. Come on, Nintendo. How dumb do you think we are? They died. The gatekeeper of the river is Sir Nuzlocke, patron of all Nuzlocke Challenges - those brave few who have played through Pokemon, treating every Pokemon they collect as a true individual, one who actually dies if they die. Vargas must answer Sir Nuzlocke's riddles, and only then will be granted passage across the river! When Sir Nuzlocke asks the first question - a very complicated math question that only a computer could answer - Vargas gives up, deciding to run across the river instead. It can't be that deep, right? Famous last words.
Vargas immediately sinks to the bottom of the river, being pulled down by the limbs of thousands of dead Pokemon - from first form to last evolution to Mega Form to mythical to legendary, they're all there. They've all died across every timeline. Vargas' flesh is torn apart and eaten, the Pokemon becoming very eager for more flesh to join them in their eternal wait. And when the first Pikachu to drift down there activates its electric powers, the red river bubbles and froths as Vargas is shocked alive.
Vargas only makes it out due to hitching a ride on some Pokemon Trainer's fishing rod - who would willingly fish in a red river though, seriously. Vargas, now badly injured, scares off the Pokemon Trainer because he accidentally thinks he fished up a zombie. The Pokemon Trainer dropped one of his Pokeballs, though, and when Vargas pops it open, he is ecstatic to find it's a Rayquaza. Vargas rides the Rayquaza up to the heavens in search of the next obstacle. Vargas is locked in a horrifying space battle between the members of Star Fox, using Rayquaza's aerial tactics to dodge their fire! However, when Fox actually does a barrel roll correctly, Rayquaza becomes horribly confused, firing a hyper beam directly at himself! His body explodes and scorches Vargas alive, leaving him floating through space. Vargas spots a floating golden star - a Warp Star - and manages to ride it across the rest of the fight, sustaining heavy damage from passing fire.
Vargas lands into the open mouth of a massive volcano right as the Warp Star loses fuel. He falls directly in, but that's fine, as it's his next stop. Vargas lands into First Person Shooter Hell, ruled by the Doomguy himself. It's a sad picture of a genre's gradual progression into overuse and tepid blandness, and the area reflects that - it's all fire and brimstone at the start until it devolves into a grey monochrome landscape. Doomguy is content to let Vargas run around in the fire and brimstone part though, so he sics an army of demons that he's supposed to be killing onto Vargas, forcing him in gladiatorial combat! Suddenly, the Ghost of Rayquaza spawns in First Person Shooter Hell, but he's still confused! A rogue hyper beam incinerates Doomguy, causing the entire dimension to fall apart! It's at this point that every demon realizes Vargas has no soul, so he literally can't exist in Hell!
Running as fast as he can, Vargas desperately tries to outrun the legions of demons, the crumbling dimension, and his own body that fades without a soul as First Person Shooter Hell collapses! He leaps into the monochrome exterior it became, and realizes he's now in Limbo. The Scribe appears, telling Vargas that he's doing fairly well, and the Monitor isn't very far off! Vargas asks the Scribe if it's even worth it all, saying he has no soul and he's almost at Death's door, so to speak! The Scribe laughs, telling Vargas that when he finds the Monitor and hooks it up to the PC, his entire purpose in life will become clear. He even lets Vargas have a quick bite to eat at the Restaurant at the End of the Internet. Satisfied, Vargas comes out of the restaurant still looking like a post-apocalyptic zombie, but the important thing is he's ready to take on the final obstacles!
Vargas goes to the Infinity Fair from the highly popular final installment in the Spirit Morph Saga and trades some guy a Ghost Rayquaza Tooth for a time machine! Using the time machine, Vargas warps many years into the future... but the future refused to change. Vargas finds himself in the middle of a fierce battle against Lavos, a horrific beast seeking to destroy time itself! He interrupts the heroes of the battle with his sudden arrival, causing Lavos to kill them all instantly. Lavos laughs and begins to destroy time, with Vargas seeing that his time machine is beginning to fade away! Desperately trying to find a way to stop what he has done, Vargas goes back to the Infinity Fair, trading one of his magic swords that he assuredly has for a gigantic asteroid-sized portal! He then goes back to the time of the dinosaurs, putting the asteroid that killed them into the portal! The portal rematerializes in Lavos' era, obliterating Lavos instantly!
Although he's saved time from annihilation, Vargas' degradation from reality due to his lack of a soul is now accelerated because he's affected by the anti-time powers of the late Lavos! Hurrying back to normal time, Vargas prepares for his final challenge at the Halls of Judgement when he realizes he's forced reality into being ruled by dinosaurs, who never actually died! Every living being on the planet exists, but they are now half-lizard! Vargas watches as he is cornered by all these dinosaur creatures, frantically trying to escape as a series of humanoid beings closely approach him from the sea of dinosaurs. Quickly, Vargas grabs one of the dinosaur hybrids and goes back to the Infinity Fair again, trading the hybrid dinosaur for a Familicide Potion! He uses it in normal time, one-shotting every dinosaur hybrid and killing every being in existence instantaneously! A haze of red settles across all points in space as all the blood in the universe dries on Vargas' hands... But Vargas is not swayed. He's getting that monitor.
Vargas, still degrading from existence, stumbles to the Halls of Judgement, adorned by golden pillars and windows streaming with sunlight. There is a still figure wrapped in shadow at the end of the hall who is, presumably, the titular judge. Vargas approaches him, expecting a response, but gets nothing. Vargas shakes the figure, realizing who he is. It's Vargas' own skeleton, hanging from the ceiling, his bones crushed and flickering with static. Vargas wonders how he could end up as a skeleton when his time machine self-destructs, warping Vargas back to a different point in time when the Halls of Judgement still stood! He sees another skeleton there with a blue jacket, who eyes him quizzically. The skeleton chuckles and fades away.
Vargas heads through the doors of the Hall of Judgement, finally making it to the coveted treasure horde! He laughs with glee as he sees the mountains upon mountains of treasure waiting for him! And resting, at the very top, is the Monitor. Vargas climbs up the mounds of treasure and grabs the Monitor... But when he does, the golden light of the chamber shuts off. All the treasure dissolves into sand. The Monitor displays only static, and Vargas peers into it, hearing a haunting voice... "Vargas is me. Vargas is you. Vargas is stuck to the bottom of your shoe. Vargas is me. Vargas is you. Vargas is stuck to the bottom of your shoe. Vargas is me. Vargas is you. Vargas is stuck to the bottom of your shoe." Vargas backs away from the Monitor, dropping it to the ground as he tries to exit the treasure horde - but there is no exit. There is no pause button. There is only one way out. The Scribe cackles from above as he sees the prison of Vargas' own design.
A horrifying foot lurches from the Monitor, composed of the stitched-together corpses of every single reptilian being he just killed with Familicide - every single being in the entire universe. With their all-encompassing power and the blood of superiors pulsing through their decaying heart, the Ur Lizard's foot screams down and crushes Vargas flat, squashing him and sending him back to the Hall of Judgement as a soulless wreck whose bones can't even sustain their own existence.
And there he lies, as a haunted skeleton, forced to judge himself. Forever. And now you might be wondering, children, what is the point of this attack? What's the lesson that can be learned? Well, the lesson here is obvious. "Vargas is me. Vargas is you. Vargas is stuck to the bottom of your shoe. Vargas is me. Vargas is you. Vargas is stuck to the bottom of your shoe. Vargas is me. Vargas is you.
"Vargas is stuck to the bottom of your shoe."
June 26, 2016 - Post #4,273
The Mystery
(+1 from Cobalt)
The Interface
(+1 from Cobalt)
The Campfire
(+1 from Cobalt)
I +2 Krill and +1 Cobalt.
Uncle Grandpa pops into the battle from nowhere, carrying a rose with him. The rose instantly glitches out into a pile of corruption, and Uncle Grandpa drops it in disgust. "Man, I always forget this universe is picky with its flower choices," he comments. Uncle Grandpa gets out a F.L.U.D.D., pulverizing the rose with a high-pressure spray of water. Uncle Grandpa then notices Selena, thinking that she's very powerful and needs to be taken out quickly.
Uncle Grandpa walks up to Selena, examining her and appraising her combat abilities. Several other Uncle Grandpas step out from behind him, simultaneously making pondering noises. They all reach one definitive conclusion: "You may think you're good, but you'll never be as good as Uncle Grandpa." The Uncle Grandpas walk away, leaving Selena to a horrifying and depressing conclusion - she will never be as good as Uncle Grandpa. Selena collapses onto the ground, this thought that she isn't good enough consuming her head and filling it with shadow. She spasms, and the world goes black.
When Selena reawakens, she realizes that she needs to make Uncle Grandpa eat his words. She will be as good as him, no matter what it takes. This makes Selena wonder what exactly makes Uncle Grandpa so good, so she decides to imitate him in every possible way, and in doing so, realize what makes him good. This leads Selena to try and physically make herself resemble Uncle Grandpa in a downward spiral of plastic surgery that costs a lot of money and leaves her looking extremely ugly. She is mercilessly mocked by Uncle Grandpa because of this, leading her to isolate herself and wallow in her own self-pity.
This psychological torment and trauma literally causes Selena's mind to break - she gains a split personality. Uncle Grandpa takes out a pocket stopwatch and makes it tell time at a very increased speed, chucking it in Selena's general direction and causing her to move through time extremely fast, speeding up the Build of her split personalities to the point where a Shatter is nigh-imminent. Uncle Grandpa then detaches a portion of his awareness and enters Selena's mind as a third personality - the mental manifestation of her dream to be as good as him.
Uncle Grandpa demolishes both of Selena's other personalities while in the Shatter. He uses the apotheosis to turn her body into a perfect replica of his own, turning Selena into just another facsimile of Uncle Grandpa. He claps his hands twice, and the copy disappears into nothingness.