text 💎 un: Tohsaka Rin

[defenceless]

[shortly after the storm clears on may 11th and the network connection between both sides of the group is reestablished, the following post appears:]

We're fine, as far as I know. I don't think anyone's dead, at least.

The storm that separated us was brought about by a Dakal named Pomarr. Some of you may remember her as our feline friend who sold her soul to Ryba—or whatever it is she did—to continue to live on after death.

She swept us to an island that looked like it was raised from the seafloor. It wasn't a vacation, but there were definitely remnants of what those big cats must have called home.

Her plan is to revive her entire race, in the same way Ryba "revived" her. As if life-or-death deals with shady goddesses aren't concerning enough, she wants to grant Ryba the power to carry out this mass revival by having her suck Nalanni dry. Pomarr understandably doesn't care much for Nalanni after she drowned everyone she loved; in fact, she showed us this in morbid detail. She's taken Nalanni. Hence, all the Nalawi losing their Gifts and all of this inconvenience we have to deal with.

Pomarr knows where Nalanni is, but she's asking us not to interfere, and she wouldn't give us the opportunity to speak with Nalanni when I requested it. For some reason, she didn't expect that we would be suffering like the Nalawi are. She's promised to try to fix that.

What do we do now, ALASTAIR? I can share anything else you want to know about our meeting with Pomarr, or Yukimura Sanada-san or Mr. Keats can, but this is most of it. We have a situation where the balance of this whole world might be upended if we sit and twiddle our thumbs.

I don't think I need to remind anyone of the potential consequences of messing with either goddess. Or a litter of zombie cats roaming free.

(( ooc: infodump for rin, yukimura, and keats' conversation with a dakal npc, for one of the plot slots! feel free to handwave your character (in either the marooned group or the left behind group) learned this info by reading the post or talking with rin/yukimura/keats/another recruit. yukimura and keats may also be replying to tags! ))

Comments

[hellshaped]

[Considering the one they threw a bomb into had something akin to a prison in it...] I would guess a volcano. But, well. Good luck figuring out which one.

Anyway, I wouldn't be too hard on people... a lot of 'em aren't used to this kind of thing. Fighting the all-powerful.

[adlantisag]

How have you accomplished it, before?

[hellshaped]

Fighting the all-powerful? Same way I fight everything else. [Which is to say, with a lot of punching and getting thrown around.] Gods can die. Gods have weaknesses. We just need to figure out what it is.

[adlantisag]

Tell me. What gods have you defeated, Hellboy?

[ Settling in for story-time. It's a welcome palate cleanser to all the friction she's been dealing with. ]

[hellshaped]

[He's not a great story-teller, but he'll do his best...]

Hecate, goddess of witches, was cursed so she couldn't stand the sunlight. That one was easy. [He's being modest. Still, pushing her out a window was easy enough.]

I've fought other things -- more or less demi-gods, I guess. It's hard to explain. But they can always be killed. Fire, stabbing, that sort of thing.

[adlantisag]

The Goddess of Witches....

[ Wait. Haven't they had this conversation before? ]

Your...'queen'?

[hellshaped]

[Oh... he'd forgotten he told her about that. He really needs to stop drinking so much.]

Yup. Goddess of Crossroads, Queen of Witches, blah blah. So, I threw her out the window and she turned to dust, right? But her blood was linked with somebody else, a vampire. So he lived... then died. Well, exploded, really. He exploded, and his blood -- her blood -- moved to someone else. She was different after that. Kept popping up to harass me.

But like I said, somebody did something to her. Stole her powers. I don't know where she is now. Dead for good, I guess.

[adlantisag]

[ Agreed on the drinking. ]

You...threw her out of a window?

[ What, like it's hard???? Kida's pretty sure they can't just toss Nalanni from the top of Nalalona. ]

And...her blood? A vampire--?

[ wh a t ]

Can you explain that again? Please.

[hellshaped]

[Maybe not, but it's all about finding weaknesses. Nalanni is presumably fiery in some way, so perhaps she'll just melt like the Wicked Witch.] Because she was cursed; couldn't go out in the sun --

[Wait, is this the first time Kida has witnessed him going full nerd about his (former) profession? It's possible.] Oh. [Sometimes he forgets that most people didn't grow up around the same stuff as him and then lived it every day for 60-odd years. He gets wrapped up in jargon and just keeps going.]

Do you know what a vampire is? Let's start there.

[adlantisag]

[ Go gentle with her. She definitely didn't grow up around the freaky occult. ]

I have heard of such a thing. Creatures who drink human blood, yes?

[hellshaped]

Right. So, legend goes that Hecate is the mother of all vampires -- this one in particular made a blood pact with her. A piece of his soul to be reborn. [Sound familiar?]

So, because they were linked... magically, by blood, by soul; whatever you want to call it -- because they were linked like that, once she died, her spirit still lived on in this vampire. And once he died, her spirit went to somebody else through another blood link. I'm kind of fuzzy about the details of that one, but the point is... stuff like this, goddesses and rebirth, they're a lot harder to kill than you might think. We need to be smart about it.

[respired]

I will search the lot if I must.

[ He shakes his head, going on. ]

Hard on them? They are challenging me.

[ He just wants to slay in peace. ]

[hellshaped]

I know. But if you didn't have experience with it, what would you think? You just need to show them you know what you're doing. [Actions speak louder than words, blah blah.]

[respired]

I wear the remnant of an old god on my body. If that is not enough to convince them of competence, I cannot fathom what will.

[ As to the rest of it ... ]

But in truth, they are clearly squeamish about the idea of attacking a god on principle. I admit, it is not an attitude commonly encountered in Azeroth.

[hellshaped]

[Hey bud, that's all great and stuff, but --]

Wait. Go back to the other part about wearing a suit made of god?

[respired]

Dreadplate is forged from the hardened blood of Yogg-Saron, called Hope's End. An old god, now defeated. A creature of many maws -- and many tentacles.

[ LIKE A CERTAIN OTHER GOD HE'S HEARD OF HERE ]

[hellshaped]

Jeez. [Eloquent as always.] Let's just hope it holds up against another one, I guess.