Archived threads in /qst/ - Quests - 491. page

Now then, let me formally introduce myself. I'm Chainmail, 24 years old, single, virgin (I told you I did it for the children). I'm a(n):

>Cantor - Natural spellsingers, they can only memorize half the normal number of spellsongs, but they never forget a spellsong after singing
>Composer - The most flexible of all spellsingers, Composers do not memorize spellsongs beforehand but can use them on the fly, they can only sing a limited number of times a day however
>Mute - Mutes are specially selected from those who are born deaf and dumb. They cannot sing, nor can spellsongs affect them, consequently they are trained from birth in assassination and espionage.
>Phage - Despicable motherfuckers that follow in Faggle's footsteps and eat the brain flesh of dead (and sometimes living) spellsingers. They've done it enough times that their bodies have adapted and now brain flesh is the only thing they can eat, animal, human, spellsinger, commoner, dead, alive, it doesn't matter, they eat it all. Whenever you consume brain flesh you can instantly memorize an additional spellsong from your list.
>Book - Books are, in a word, geniuses. They are masters of memorization, They can memorize a number of spells equal to their intelligence stat, but memorizing exhausts them and they have wait twice as long before attempting to memorize again. They also get the most pussy (or so I've heard).

Roll 7d10 for your stats:

Strength
Dexterity
Agility
Intelligence
Charisma
Endurance
Luck

Rolled 5, 4, 10, 4, 1, 3, 7 = 34 (7d10)

>>337206
Composer

Rolled 7, 1, 8, 10, 10, 2, 7 = 45 (7d10)

>>337206
>Composer

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>>329357
"Nnyn...nnynn....NYAA-CHOO!"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_bjXnWMgiY
The sneeze echoes throughout the plaza grounds, bouncing from wall to wall in reverberation, blaring in the ears of everyone in its cold vicinity—but no one is hit with its screeching pitch harder than the fell monster looming just up ahead.

What would have been an endearing cry under any other context is the straw that breaks the Numel's back here. Emma rushes to cover the scruffy kitten's mouth, but it's too late.

The fleshy lumps, bumps, and pustules festering on the beast's back, head, arms, legs, face—everywhere—begin to vibrate, vibrate with an irritating—flaring—intensity. Its slimy skin shivers, not out of fear, but out of realization.

It's not alone.

"Uggnnnnnnggghhh......"

No longer shrouded by the darkness of the night, the larcenist reveals itself to be the husk of a rotting amphibian—a mindless pocket monster covered in blisters and pus-packed pockets—some popped, some not—with acidic gunk perpetually dripping from all its orifices. It's a sight to behold, and a sight to dread.

"Maaaaa..............TOA!"

The beast snaps in your direction, facing your party with an almost hypnotic gaze in its beady eyes. Everyone—even Looker—freezes like a Deerling caught in headlights. Anxiousness scales in fear of another unpredictable reaction, but surprisingly, it never comes.

Time slows to a crawl and for the next few moments, a staring stalemate ensues between you and the creature.

"What the.." mumbles Looker. "Why isn't it... reacting?"

"Not only is it not moving.." Serena whispers. "I don't believe it's breathing, either.."

>Engage the larcenist and its mind games?
A) Try talking to it, you know, "treat others like you would want to be treated".
B) Stay completely still. Don't make a move.
C) Attack it before it can attack you!
D) Approach it very, very slowly without startling it.

>>329357
>B) Stay completely still. Don't make a move.

Welcome to /qst/!

>>329362
B)
Stand Still, Stay Silent

The FBA was monolithic now, but it came from humble beginnings. The Federal Bureau of Advancement, employer of Tim Sharp and nearly fifty thousand others, was incorporated as an arm of the U.S. government on October 5th, 1934. It was commissioned to research new agricultural methods, helping to relieve the hardship laden upon the people of the central states by towering windstorms of dust and debris. The Bureau was an immediate success. By curating the nation's finest strategists, scientists, and engineers, the organization managed to undo decades of poor farming practice and convert the Plains region into an oasis. This was not without its drawbacks, and as the climate shifted, the FBA took up the work of preventing any negative impact on the nation's weather. As their budget grew, so did the Bureau's workforce, and new divisions were created. World War II was the greatest windfall yet, and the Bureau was drafted to help in the fight abroad. They began working on increasingly fantastical projects, attempting to gain control of the weather, the minds of men, and even the fabric of spacetime itself.

Tim was more of an odds-and-ends kind of guy, which is why he worked alone under a fake storefront in the worst neighborhood in Bridgeton. He'd heard there were other FBA outposts in the city, but his only contact was the quarterly memo and a five-figure check for his research. After twenty minutes trudging from the post office to his shop, he arrived with letters in hand. Shedding his rain coat, he walked past myriad shelves filled with secondhand trinkets and musty books. He could see Chuck, the shopkeep, with his feet up on the back counter and his nose in the latest issue of Annals of Aviation. Tim called out, "Hey Chuck, how's the weather treating you?"

He looked up bluntly from his magazine. "You're a real damn comedian."

Tim hoisted up the wooden divider separating the back room from the store area, only to have it slammed back down. "You know the drill, I'm gonna need to see your badge and the weekly password."

"Christ, you and your procedures, it's like you're a robot. Are you face blind or something? I've been here for two months now." Tim was talking belligerently, but he'd already pulled out his wallet to get his ID. He knew Chuck wouldn't budge, but sometimes he liked to remind the man of his unerring ways.

"You know as well as I do that they have this place bugged, and the second I let you downstairs without a badge we're both getting shanghaied to HQ with a couple of batons up our asses. Here's a notepad."

With his shaky pigeon scrawl, Tim scratched turnstile into the notepad. Chuck gave it a quick glance, along with a twice look-over of Tim's badge, and he lifted the barrier for Tim's passage. "Try not to blow anything up today, smartass," quipped Chuck as Tim made his way over to the lab stairwell, memo in hand.

That's it for the intro. Time travel incoming. Post any suggestions for what's to come.

>Something of interest in the Bureau memo?
>A nearly-complete experiment in the basement? (apart from the time machine, naturally)
>A new character, like an FBA inspector or a lab assistant?
>Ideas for where the first successful journey through time will land Tim?

Tim currently has a shitty fountain pen, a wallet, and a packet of crackers on his person.

>>337566
>Ideas for where the first successful journey through time will land Tim?

1810.

Red, we're hot-headed

>>328801
>White- Can use frost breath as a natural power, easier time learning ice magic, more resistant to the cold

Let's be white dragons, and kill all the black dragons.

>>336432
Baby Eric’s main interest in life was biting things. His two razor-sharp buck teeth assisted him in the careful severing of a myriad of objects, including (but not limited to) rope, cheese, tarps, certain thinly-stretched metals such as wire or forks, bone, wood, all matter of plant material, candles, gummy and wool. Eric, being only a baby, could not talk so much as shriek, and the only word he could utter was perhaps the most important word of all: his last name, “TRUMP”.

In the aftermath of the fire, the fate of the three children was very much in question. The days to come were filled with long periods of waiting in cramped, upholstered old rooms and the shuffling in and out of various old family friends expressing their condolences. But none of the condolences had any of their intended effect, and indeed, the only comfort that could come to any of Ivanka, Donald Jr., or Eric now would be the loving embrace of their father himself, or the soft Slavic chiding of their mother, or even the muffled sounds of bickering between them heard through the walls of their large, happy manor home.

You now sit in the office of the man assigned to resolve your situation, Mr. Beasley. You know Mr. Beasley very well from his years of service to the Trump Organization, where he was one of your father’s most trusted employees. His thin, quivering lips rise up from the page he’s been studying so intently and greet you- “Children, I have some very good news for you all.”

But first, some business to take care of. Who will you be playing as for this adventure, Ivanka or Donald Jr.?

(Some rules:

My discretion for choosing who gets the action. Quick response, repeating digits, cleverness, non-chaos will influence my decision.

I will roll dice to determine the effectiveness of your actions.

Interstitial discussion is encouraged here.

Have fun!

And please clap.)

(Really? No one is interested in playing a Trump-themed quest version of A Series of Unfortunate Events?)

>Cute and sweet

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>>328165
You decide to be cute and sweet with your reply. Why not? It's not like your some girl in the middle of a park without her memories or anything.

You text Danni and get replied back pretty quick. Apparently, they're at Reneville R.R... now if only you knew where that was, it would be helpful.

What should you do now?

>Continue to text back
>Check for a map app on the phone
>Check around park
>Write In

>>328207
A.

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For a temple dedicated to Pani, their hospitality certainly leaves something to be desired. Is one of the faithful's central tenants not to provide bread and water to any weary traveler whom they come across? That's what your mother used to tell you when you were still but a boy. As the echoes of the lone guard's footsteps slowly fade you turn your attention to the chamber you've found yourself in.

It's much the same as it was the last time you were here, walls carved with figures bowed before the glory of Pani and the domed ceiling depicting a four-breasted woman with more arms than you have time to count. Unlike the room teleportation array beneath the city of Nazir, there is but one structure in this room. Two ornately carved pillars rise up from a platform at the center of the chamber, the runes on each still softly glowing in the dim light provided by what you can only assume are enchanted pedestals. The fires burning atop each simply hover a few inches above the stone.

Nothing in the room strikes you as being responsible for controlling the portal. You try channeling a little vys into the twin spires themselves, but that doesn't seem to do much of anything. There are nine sheltered alcoves branching from this central chamber, and then of course a stairwell leading further into the temple complex.

Actually, now that you take the time to examine the geometry of this place it's rather strange. The central chamber has ten sides, each adjoining alcove seems to have five. Lines of black stone running along the floor form a dizzying lattice of interconnected octagons and other lesser figures. It's almost as if the entire room has been set up as some sort of vast runic array, or rather as a part of some larger runic array. You're honestly not quite sure what to make of it.

Dismissing the strange geometry of the room, you resolve to try and finish off those last few chapters of the book on the Shaping Arts. There are benches in each of the branching apse, so you decide to take a seat before an enormous statue of bare-breasted Pani wearing a necklace of skulls and holding aloft a monstrous severed head. It's never been your favorite depiction of Pani, as a blood-soaked protector of creation, but it allows you to position yourself such that when the guards inevitably come searching for a horned intruder they won't immediately realize you're still here.

The leather-bound books slips easily from your cloak and you flip quickly to the page where you'd last left off, marked as it is by a thin strip of cloth. When you'd stopped reading the author had remarked that some among the High Council were rumored to have destroyed their shell without dying as a result. The only mortals without a shell you can think of off the top of your head are the disciples of spirits. However, from what you understand your earliest ancestors enslaved spirits with far more frequency than they worshiped them. Thus it seems unlikely that this would be the case.
(1/3)

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Reading on, the book begins to delve into the limitations of the Shaping Arts. Though a powerful tool, the author admits that the practices described in this work are not what many might call practical. They're useful if one wishes to conceal their identity or heal wounds which have become internalized as a facet of how one views themselves. They're also a boon for the narcissist who seeks perfection of form. However, if one finds themselves challenged to defend themselves against a skilled swordsman, even the most talented shaper of mind and flesh would find themselves gutted upon the sands of the arena if the entirety of their efforts were devoted to advancement within the Shaping Arts.

Thus, the author emphasizes the necessity of mastering both armed combat and something he calls the 'Greater Aspects' of magic. You can only assume that these greater aspects are what you would call the five basic elements, though you have no real way of proving this assumption. It just seems the most logical explanation. The author also mentions that repeatedly altering one's form into and out of some specific configuration can allow even a novice of the shaping arts to achieve that same configuration without the need for meditation a well prepared practitioner of the Shaping Arts ought never be truly unarmed. What this means exactly, the author fails to elaborate.

The book goes on to mention that though a skilled practitioner may achieve unrivaled control over the minds of others, it's very difficult to actually change someone's opinion on an issue via the shaping arts. Shaping Arts, the author asserts, cannot be used to simply control someones' thoughts. Even once a memory is removed, the subject may recall having that memory even if they can't bring to mind the memory itself.

Nor is replacing a single memory sufficient to drastically alter someone's personality, unless of course that memory is tied to the shell itself. In this case, its removal or alteration can have wide ranging effects upon the way someone else perceives the world. However, altering memories so deeply ingrained is no simple task. Locating them within the husk requires the manipulation of every aspect of the mind.
>Shaping Arts: (15/17 Chapters Read)

(2/3)

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You're just beginning to read a segment on the relationship between the shell, the shard, and the husk when you hear metal pounding against stone, the temple's guards no doubt coming to investigate your presence. It certainly took them long enough. You could have been off slaughtering innocent pilgrims by now if you felt any particularly desire to. They pause at the foot of the stairs, their erratic thoughts giving away their position even though you can't actually see them. However, as you passively examine the guards and the chaotic slurry of thought formed by so many men standing in formation, you notice something odd. The man at the head of the formation, though you can sense his presence, does not seem to possess a mind of any sort. At least, not one that you can detect.

>Reveal yourself to the group, in as nonthreatening a manner as you can. Surely they'll listen to reason.
>Wait until they fan out to search the room, then jump out and give one of them a good scare. What could possibly go wrong?
>Write-in

Rolled 7 (1d10)

>>327666
mystery box

>>327666
Let's go FULL CORPORATE.

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>>327671
There is no mystery box

>>330450
>>You feel the world snap into place and begins waiting with bated breath

>>330450
>>You feel yourself shudder as weightless nothing slips in your pores as the world grows dim

Rolled 2 (1d2)

>>330462
>Option B

>>330496
Option C

Looks we rolling. 1 for B, 2 for C.

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You stretch gingerly in the early morning, utilizing your subterfuge to not wake the sleeping girlfriend and risk her wrath. You step lightly to the central table in your shared room and begin praying to the God who may very well hate you. You find a few spare minutes to study your spellbook. By the time you're fresh and ready for action Rowe opens her eyes and stretches herself, uttering a lazy sound of contentment as her body vibrates with a large yawn.

(Mornin' birthday boy) she greets you sensually. Her face scrunches a bit. (Is not sleeping weird for you?)

“Eh, I still mentally drift off and time seems to pass faster. Although I do miss dreaming some. Can't complain too much though. I live and sleep next to one.” You give her your most dashing smile and she laughs, before throwing a pillow in your face.

(Real smooth.) she thinks as you approach.

. . .

Right as you finish your morning 'exercise routine' you hear a knocking on the door. Rowe slips out of bed and puts on a robe. The bath kind not the 'look at me I'm a wizard' kind. She gingerly opens the door and peeks her head out.

“HAPPY –” the sound of three voices cut out as they realize Rowe is at the door and not you.

“I told you they would be fucking,” Eve comments, voice muffled by the door.

Rowe looks back to you and you roll your eyes before quickly throwing on a silk robe of your own. You sidle up behind Rowe, looking at your visitors over her head.

You see Ed and Quissonce and you know Eve must be there too, hearing her high-pitched voice previously.

“HAPPY BIRTHDAY!” they repeat, Ed lifting up into your line of sight a cake unfit to be eaten in lieu of a proper breakfast. It is filled with candles.

“None of us actually know how old you are,” Quissonce mentions slightly embarrassed. Of what component of this interaction you can't quite determine. “So we just stuck all the ones we had in the cake.”

“HOW OLD ARE YOU?!” Eve shouts at the top of her lungs, more a demand then a question.

>I'm [Choose a number between 18 and 26]
>I'll never tell

>>327186
"I'll never tell you, sucker! You'll have to beat it out of me!"

whisper to Rowe "I'm 19."

too young?

>>327186
22. Long enough to be a vet in a war.

>>326517
-I am not alone-
Rock’s broken halo flickers and sputters one last time before winking out for good, the raised earth forming her animated body tumbling to the ground as lifeless dirt.

“Rock?,” you call out beneath your breath but you know not to expect an answer. When a spirit dies in the mortal world it is instant and irreversible. Her link to the Dreaming broken, Rock had retaken her natural form. A nothing, a lie, just a dream and a thought of a mind much larger than yours.
It’s just all too sudden, you don’t know what to do. She’d come out of nowhere and vanished just as quickly.

Hiss stumbles to her feet looking somewhat dazed.
“What was that? Is it dead?”

“She was Rock.”

“Oh, was it?”
Hiss blinks.
“Good. She was always a bit too sanctimonious for my lik-what is that!”

You follow Hiss’ gaze and look up. The stars in the night sky are moving. The constellations are different. A ring of stars suspended over the burning city of Taldenral.

“Oh fuck off,” Hiss says as she realizes what she’s looking at.

There’s no constellation in all the sky of all the world that is that large. It’s a halo, one large enough to encircle the sky.
For a single moment all the voices in Taldenral are stilled as Teln and Quedeshi alike all stare up at the sky.

And then the sky splits in half as the halo manifests, an imperfect ring that breaks the sky and forms a window to the whirling ochre chaos beyond. Someone screams but their words are snatched away as the wind reverses. Fires are instantly snuffed out, voices drowned out and ears numbed by the howling wind as the Gate pulls air into itself with the force of a hurricane.
The night is banished, Dream-light painting the city ochre far stronger than mere sunlight ever did.

And then the discordant Dream beyond the rift is marred, a long red hand reaching through and gripping the intangible rim of the Gate as if it were naught but a physical window. And then another and another, a massive thing that looks like nothing more than an ever-increasing number of red hands pushing against the fabric of reality.

The arms beyond are obscured and for a brief moment the sky above resembles nothing more than a child’s painting, painted hand-prints pressed against the sky in a muddled overlapping mess.

And then something breaks and they push through, bloody hand-prints with stick-thin arms extending behind them and as they pass through the halo they change, the image of limbs fading to reveal a myriad of spirits with halos of their own.

Hiss sits down, her hands held helplessly in the air. An odd gesture to come from her.
“You know Cennen, if you’re holding onto any unique brews of incredible and never-before-seen power, now would be the time.”

1/2

>>326524

>”I don’t have any on me but if I get enough time to brew somehow…”

>You need to find the others! You can’t afford to be alone right now.

>You need to find a defensible location and hole up there.

>Where’s Aashenpreet?

>Recover the Deep Priestess’ corpse.

>Use Potion (Specify)

>It might be best for you and Hiss to flee the city. This is too much.

>Other

>>326533
>”I don’t have any on me but if I get enough time to brew somehow…”
>Where’s Aashenpreet?
>Recover the Deep Priestess’ corpse.
Unless we can shrink it with a Eugene brew just grab the head we chopped off

Link to the 4 page RISIS manual
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-eEXU_AejAkREFJMkFZZDV5dVU/view

>>336233
Michael.

>>336233
Abdul al-salim. Bring the light of Islam to these filthy masses.

>>329770
Try to smash the glass.

>Gender
Male

>Appearance
Shaven with no tattoos. If we have discarded clothes, they're a suit and cricket cardigan.

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>>329770
>>Submit Action
>>Submit Gender
>>Submit Appearance
Pick up a knife or something close to it, along with something to cover ourselves up, then try the door.

>Gender
Female
>Appearance
Pic related

Grab a scalpel and bone saw and exit, remain on the defensive, try to remember anything that happened.

Male, teenager, lanky and brunette

>>326679
>Ser Ruwyn Dayne

>Money: 18 stags

>Strength: 5 Combat: 1 (+1)
>Agility: 4
>Constitution: 7 Health: 1 (+1)
>Charisma: 12 Charm: 2 (+2)
>Awareness: 3
>Intelligence: 1

>Army: 112 Mounted Knights, 3000 Levy


CLAIMED!!!

I am here and I am ready Jon.

claim

Also posts ending in dubs or trips will cause a random event to occur, this can be a good or bad thing.

>>329058
*The "posts" must be replying to an OP post, and suggesting the next action, not just any post*

>>329047
>Human
Need that balance between intelligence and industry.