5188/A Forge Left Cold

A Forge Left Cold
Date of Scene:	07 April 2017
Location:	Lumiere
Synopsis:	An attempt to explore Umberdark Tunnels further deposits everyone at a very different place instead.
Cast of Characters:	974, Count Kord, Inga, Priscilla, Kushiko, Tomoe, Staren, 20

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Carna (974) has posed:
    The Umberdark Tunnels, part of the subterannean area of Barrowville known as 'Guillotine Square', is a place that little exploration of has been possible thus far. The only one to really venture beyond the starting point is Carna, and according to her own records of her solo visit, the entire geography and appearance was different from the version of the Umberdark Tunnels that have been seen by others in follow-up visits. There's always the possibility she just wrote down something incorrect in her journal, but given the odd temporal disturbance (illusion? Hallucination?) of two identical flaming trains barreling through, in opposite directions, while reproductions of the same explorers arrived and reproduced the actions of the Elites from moments prior right across the tracks from them, the possibility of some strange shifting landscape is not out of the question.

    Further evidence to support that idea is presented when, instead of the catacombs-like place that Carna reported seeing, or the subway tunnels that others have seen, arrival via one of the Shrines of Light, drawing all within and then reforming them from shimmering radiance on the other side, leaves them standing in a darkened locale rife with pillars. They are not the support columns within the subway, as there is no sign of any tracks or tunnels.

    Instead it's just a space of indeterminate scope, with stone pillars arranged as though trees in a forest (if a very strange and artificial-looking forest). There is no immediate sign of ceiling, and the floor is a featureless, non-reflective black... Solid of some kind. They're standing on it, obviously, but there's no sign of WHAT they're standing on, and trying to illuminate it reveals nothing. It just takes in the light and gives nothing back. Staring too long into this blackness may start to cause an odd sensation like hunger. But a hunger that does not belong to those experiencing it.

    This is obviously not any place any of them have been before. Enark, a hook-nosed man in heavily-patched robes, so aged that they are gray where once they were blue, blinks around in confusion. He clicks on a flashlight he purchased during a visit to the outside world, where people actually have stuff like working flashlights. Unlike Carna, who views the rest of the Multiverse as an extension of Lumiere, a place to explore and scavenge, rather than a refuge, Enark has greatly enjoyed the convenience of access to functioning civlizations and their accomodations. As such, he's a bit better stocked by virtue of familiarity with modern technology, and an awareness of what would be useful in exploration of Lumiere.

    So he has a flashlight, and a pocket multi-tool, and small, easily transportable tools like that. He did not purchase a crowbar, because it would be harder to carry when he is also transporting a satchel full of bottles and potions and reference books. The type of things he is actually specialized in using.

    Also because they have Crow.

    The pointy-eared Shadow lets out an elaborate sigh as if in relief when Enark turns on his flashlight, casting itself into the light produced so that it has a frame of reference for existing. "Wow! This place is going to be tricky to get around in! It's really easy to get lost if you don't have something to mark your progress!"

    Carna, warily evaluating their surroundings, notes Crow's seemingly familiarity, and turns to look at the Shadow, stuck in a 2-D form for now due to there not being enough light to make full use of its '3-D' imitation.

Carna (974) has posed:
    Enark frowns and asks, "When were you ever here before, Crow?"

    Crow hesitates, its excited expression changing to a confused one. "I... Don't remember. Maybe I wasn't?" D:=

    Carna refocuses on the pillars, her anxiety level sitting at an even '8' on the 'freaked out' scale. "There are too many places to ambush us from and too little visibility. Perhaps we should leave and come back, to see if it changes to something less odious."

    Enarks looks to the others for their feedback on the idea, though he says, "We have not made any attempt to explore yet. Perhaps we should at least look around before abandoning the sear--"

    "NO." Carna says emphatically. "I do NOT like this place. We should leave. Now. We came here seeking rumors of a forge. This is clearly not it."

    Crow looks back and forth between Enark and Carna conflictedly, then whines, "Mommy, daddy, please stop fighting!"

    Enark snaps, "This is not the time for your tomfoolery, Crow." Then he focuses on their allies. "What do you all think?"

    Crow mutters to itself thoughtfully, "Maybe some Jerryfoolery then?"

    Carna just keeps looking furtively from pillar to pillar, turning around periodically but unable to put her back to anything due to all the open space.

Count Kord has posed:
    Kord appears atop a great abyss of black and has to spend a solid minute trying to get used to the visual dissonance of it. His wings -- strange spectral manifestations that barely look like wings and more closely resemble large scarf-like arms -- manifested entirely on reflex because he thought he was moments away from plummeting into the black. It was quite a reaction to see out of him when he is normally not quickly spooked during these visits. His head turns to focus on Crow in apparent thought, his feelings on the living shadow already clear to those who have spoken to him over the Concord radio frequencies.

    He looks aside to Carna after that and gives a soft, "Hnn," to her misgivings, as if disapproving of her very natural, pragmatic fear of the open space.

    Kord starts walking. As always, he doesn't wait for the others when he does this. He just goes. Those wings remain visible on the off chance he needs to move quickly, and he IS keeping an eye out for oddities among the multitudinous pillars and the seemingly endless, hungry blackness at their feet.

    He can't help but keep looking down at his feet now and then, expecting the empty 'floor' beneath him to crack open in barely perceptible teeth.

    "I hate this place," he declares, despite his continuing progress onward.

Inga has posed:
Inga did not bring a flashlight because she's a witch, and her boyfriend is a wizard that breaks most technology. Turns out she doesn't need one. "Lumos," she says, and the runes carved into her staff glow, for whatever the light is worth. She isn't sure it can penetrate the darkness here.

"I haven't heard people complain so much about a world since last we went to mine. I wish I could find comfort in that somehow," she sighs. She's dressed as usual, long dress, cloak, hair braided down her back. The place is certainly unnerving, but there are places she'd less rather be, if that helps.

To Enark, she offers a shrug. "I know not. It is not what was expected, but perhaps this is where we need to be, if not where we want to be," she offers.

Priscilla has posed:
    A sprawling forest of nonsense pillars atop an even more nebulously defined plane of blackness is far from one of Priscilla's ideal choices of place to explore, but she'd be a dirty, fluffy liar to say that it doesn't compare favourably to infinite, screaming hell trains. Kord isn't the only one thrown for a loop by the floor, but the kind of stern misgiving Priscilla stares at it with is something altogether different, with a suspicious, mildly cross stare that seems to be daring it to remain solid, as if she expects something stranger than a sudden, bottomless drop.

    After a good staredown with the floor, she produces a tiny, sparkling stone with a phasing aura of seven beautiful colours, and then drops it on the ground like a candy wrapper. Though it doesn't seem to cast any light, it's visible at an arbitrarily long distance against the black. "Now, we hath such." she replies to Crow, lightly patting a small, silver-strung case at her hip, before thinking to activate her own light source; some sort of glassy crystal the size of a large marble, that gives off only a very gentle, pure glow.

    "I wouldst consider our current situation to be a better card than many we couldst hath drawn from the same hand. Do not allow thine anxiety to get the best of thee, in lieu of obvious threat."

Kushiko has posed:
Right now, Kushiko was pret-ty happy she decided to deploy Nova Prime to this particular call for assistance as it were. She did enjoy the occasional non-standard contract as it were, but the real reason? This freaky little displacement meant her ways of getting around, of leaving energy would really be useful.

Helios was definitely going on full tilt when it came to scanning. Not that it would necessarily /help/ all told.

<"No plan really ever survives contact with the enemy. Rumors can be completely wrong after all. Before we go any further, let's go over /exactly/ what we know, and what we suspect."> Surrounding Nova are orbiting spheres of solidified energy that serve as a nice little lit beacon for the time being. Not that it helps much given the abyssal black... well.

Yeah, this is not necessarily something that's going to be easy, but the faceless Warframe, as much as she might just start walking and moving on, she's wanting to get /some/ measure of what they may be dealing with , documenting the area before advancing any.

Tomoe has posed:
The Umberdark Tunnels were nothing to laugha bout really, there was a lot of danger here nd being dead was no more protection than being alive here. Tomoe just did her best to relax. She moved on ahead keeping alert as she could she pait attention to Enark and Crow are also noted and she pauses to cast a small spell to generate a mote of light to help her see. 5R
"...Crow? I'm not even sure what to say to that."

She then keeos with Count Kord and she tilts her head a bit.

"I have no real love for it myself..."

She took a deep breath and did her best to keep in formation.

"We could be here alone or without a good party. Your right Priscilla."

Staren has posed:
    Staren arrives prepared for scouting. Walking with him are five animate metal unicorn pony statues with cameras and radios built in, carrying smaller drones on their backs.

    Staren's first reaction is to use a flashlight to try and find the walls... He grumbles a bit as they're either VERY far away or made of the same stuff as the floor. Oh well. He deploys a breadcrumb positioning system and activates his inertial tracker, just in case. Also, he checks the walls and floors with other sensor types -- infrared, ultraviolet, T-rays, ultrasound... to see if anything makes them visible.

    In response to Carna and Enark's exchange, he replies, "It /is/ dangerous... we could stay here by the shrine and let automated scouts find the extent of this chamber..."

    And after he says that, the pony golems start to walk off... phone-sized quadrotors take off from four of them, while the fifth causes a more dramatic visual effect -- a swarm of dozens of tiny blimps the size of insects inflate, floating into the air and propelling themselves in all directions with itty-bitty propellers. The blimps move about a half-dozen meters per second, and the quadrotors three times that -- although most of the drones aren't going full speed yet in case of invisible walls.

Carna (974) has posed:
    It seems that Carna has been outvoted. Despite the fact that her hackles remain raised (and that she now has enough skin regrown to hypothetically support actual hackles if she had any), she continues to accompany the others. Her chances are better with them than without them for now. In the absence of ability to tell where an attack may be coming from when/if it does, she keeps an eye on the floor.

    But she does stop to look back at Staren when he provides his idea. "I agree with Sir Staren. I see no reason to risk ourselves exploring this place when we could have others do it for us." Even with the markers being set down, and Staren's scans of their surroundings (which seem to just produce more of the same readings as their immediate environment, out into infinity as far as he can tell), this just seems like a bad place to wander around in.

    Kord's detection of scents, however, and one in particular, seems a clear indicator that the exploration will continue, and in a specific direction. It's now a much stronger possibility this is exactly where they needed to come to in order to find what they're looking for.

    Crow makes the best use of the various sources of light provided, jumping from one to the other when necessary to avoid being swallowed up in the greater darkness. It often has to move from pillar to pillar, or from person to person, due to the floor's flat refusal to give back anything given to it.

    There isn't even any sound of their own foot falls upon it.

    As they progress, with Kushiko's energy trail, Priscilla's shining stones, and the tracking methods provided by Staren's technology in the form of automatons, the scent becomes strong enough for anyone with olfactory senses to detect. Along the way, Carna reports what she had heard regarding the forge. "With the halting of the train that Sir Kord, Lady Tomoe, and Sir Dorian faced, the tunnels became more passable to others. Lanterns have come back from exploration speaking of their mapping efforts uncovering signs of metalworking, or outright seeing tools of a forge. Those who came back to report these did not thoroughly investigate what they saw, more interested in trading Dead Lights for their maps. But those who have gone in search of what was found have not returned to confirm the rumors. If there is a forge, it may be well-guarded. And if it is guarded, it is important. A means of making something new in the land of the dead is unspeakably valuable. But it might be even more so."

    Gradually, the pillars seem to cluster closer and closer together. Forming two parallel 'walls' like they are funneling the explorers down a passageway. At the end of that 'hallway' seems to be another area. A flat disk of metal, very spacious, with grates in the floor not unlike the drains that the blood of the Marble Guardian they faced emptied into, in its own dungeon. At the center of the platform is an anvil, with a large hammer, and other instruments of a blacksmith laid against or near it. There do not appear to be any walls or ceiling. If they exist, they may be made of the same material the floor was back there.

    It's just a big open space with exactly what they came for sitting open and unguarded.

    "This is obviously a trap." "This seems like a trap." "That sure is a trap!" Carna, Enark, and Crow say at the same time before stopping to look at each other.

Count Kord has posed:
    Kord keeps having to slow down to reorient himself like a confused bird, and eventually just decides to float through with little wingbeats so that he doesn't need to worry so much about the level of the floor or its lack of sound. It does wonders for his comfort. He makes sure people can keep up with him as he moves and he doesn't seem particularly inclined to stop as he goes along. Their progress through the monotonous depths is given some noise from the soft airy noise of his flight.

    When they reach the forge itself it is with Kord floating in for a landing. He approaches to about the safe range that everyone else does and stares toward the anvil with no small amount of trepidation. The metal disc is the first 'solid' ground he had seen for a long time and yet he can't help but mumble something to himself. He mumbles a little prophetic phrase to himself, as if paraphrasing a bit.

    Kord boldly approaches and steps on the metal disc and endeavors to approach the anvil, careless of what Carna, Crow or Enark have said about it being a trap. Whatever danger it possesses doesn't seem to deter him.

Staren has posed:
    Staren's mapping software tracks the dozens of automated scouts, but it seems like they're just mapping infinity... At least there don't seem to be any weird spatial effects going on yet, though. Staren grunts assent as Carna explains that while lanterns have come back from mapping efforts, none who searched for the forge have returned, and this means there's something down here. "If people want a way to make stuff, I'm sure the League would be happy to help as long as they can find a way to get something in return."

    But then the scent leads them in a direction where the landscape begins to change. Staren calls some of the drones to specifically follow him -- one of the quadrotors and about ten of the microblimps collect at and cling to one of the pony statues, which follows the group.

    And hey, there's the forge! "It can't /possibly/ be this easy." Staren says, although he doesn't send drones ahead to scout it yet, either.

    And then there's something else strange -- something he wouldn't notice unless he were looking for it, since his devices are so heavily automated, but fortunately he has a muse. Dawn informs him there's another wireless network here, and he starts trying to connect -- first seeing if it's unsecured, then trying his own codes in case more time shenanigans are afoot and it's his own network from the future, then checking if it looks like it's using some outdated protocol he can crack.

Kushiko has posed:
At the very least, there's not going to be a party split up.

Sadly, she doesn't really have a sense of smell the same way Kord does, so beyond her Warframe's systems giving her bits and pieces of data, there's not much to go on--but that wireless signal /is/ something.

Something that Ordis, with a little bit of more advanced self-securing networking, pounces on, so to speak, using Kushiko's systems to piggyback his signal through. <"Conducting network probe and identifying."> And there goes Kord. <"Well, I was thinking of popping the proverbial trap,"> Kushiko projects a slight deadpan in her voice, the Nova Prime Warframe gathering Void energy together herself to unleash a wave of energy shortly. Not just yet though. No sense in showing the hand.

Inga has posed:
There's something of this place that reminds her of something, but she can't quite grasp it. Dream-like, it seems. She ponders that as they walk through the eerie, unfathomable darkness. Not even a sound from their footsteps, which is quite unnerving once one notices it.

They come to the place that had been searching for. Probably, anyway. It seemed too easy, and yes, like a trap.

Might as well spring it and be ready. Inga slips her knife from her belt, ready to ward everyone with her blood magic.

What was that about a vampire, though...?

Until something shows itself though, perhaps Inga can get a read on the hammer and anvil. IT is much easier with people than with objects, but with an object used often by one person there might be a bit of frayed wyrd clinging unperceptively that she may be able to read. Her pupils widen as she lets lose the Sight, focusing on the hammer.

Toph Beifong (20) has posed:
    Normally dark places aren't a problem at all to the blind metalbender. But what kinda stupid in places like this doesn't carry vibrations? Sure, she can sense the pillars and all, navigating by them, but no sound of footsteps... that's not good at all. It might explain why Toph has been quiet all this time as she's followed the group, clearly not happy about the fact that she's literally blind for once and unable to get an overview of the area and what else might be here.

    Sticking close by Inga, somebody she knows, Toph walks after them. It's easier for her when more nad more pillars seem to cluster, and Toph idly walks near them to run her hand against them. When they get to the flat disk of metal she visibly perks up, and she speaks up for the first time since they entered this place. "Finally!" Kord isn't the only one who walks towards the metal disk, as Toph hurries towards it, only to slow down as she reaches it, crouching down to place her fingers against it. Just in case it /is/ a trap. Either way her metalbending will tell her. "Maybe it is that easy," she asides to Staren as she tries to determine whether it's safe to step onto the metal or not.

Tomoe has posed:
the party speaks over the comm a little bit and she listen and then at the mention there's a wireless network down here? That gets Tomoe's attention but she's aware Staren's far better suited to handle that sort of situation so she'll leave it to him to handle that and it's not like she's got an easy access to her web functions. Sure she could do it but she would be exposed to do so.

She keeps the light spell up now and is busy tracking down the rest of the party. It seems now they can move through the tunnel but she's still a bit uneasy who knows what might be lurking down that tunnel, they never found the supposed one who had put those poor souls into it as fuel, after all. So she was keen to keep alert.

"I have to agree this totally smells of a trap to me as well. However we're going to need to trip it."

more chatter goes on for a moment as she nears the Anvil she has her shield out with the ever rippling chain of names rippling across it's surface, Tomoe herself? Is trying to get a closer look, she's keeping an eye out for pressure plates, tripwires and just about any other sort of trap she can think of, she's already to spring into action to take a hit for anyone else in the party should it come to that.

"Anyrthing on the wireless Staren and no I doubt that is is going to be that easy."

She checks back on Inga and on Toph seeing they are at least all right for the moment. So far so good but she's very much on high alert.

Priscilla has posed:
    Because someone had to do it, and because Priscilla is not silly, wandering through the seemingly-infinite (it could very well be near enough, considering Lumiere's scope) blackness involves her intermittently dropping more prism stones here and there as markers, spacing them out just so that one is visible from the other, and genuinely hoping each time that it doesn't fall through the nothing that supports her weight and tumble into bottomless darkness. The group might be in need of those to find their way back to the Shrine of Light.

    She slows down on them, and then stops altogether, when there starts to only be one direction forward. Arriving at the 'forge', though, engages her in a different line of thought than whether or not it is a trap. "Mine concern is otherwise. If this legendary forge is such that all that comprises it is an anvil and some tools, what possibly couldst attract one to venture all the way here to use it? For what reason is there to hide it so? Art such basic, mundane fixtures impossible to find elsewhere? Aside, I see precious little else of what one wouldst consider vital. Such as a furnace." Priscilla goes wide around the grate, though she decides to peek through it all the same, and drop a prism stone into one of the gaps to see if there is actually a drop underneath, or if it's just more pseudo-solid black.

Carna (974) has posed:
    As the explorers gather at the edge, some proceeding onto the solid surface and hearing the now-loud noise of their own feet after the trip across a silent floor, and others watching (like Carna, but probably to see if anyone dies and from what, rather than whatever everyone else's reasons are). Priscilla dropping a stone down one of the grates produces a clinking noise as it its something and then ding-ding-dings off other things the whole way down, until it's out of hearing range. Seems there is a long chute of some kind, likely with bends in it, back and forth. So whatever is underneath the platform is potentially different.

    Kord and Tomoe proceed onto the large metal platform as well, though they approach the anvil instead of messing with the grates. As reports of a wireless network come in from two of those present, and the heavy smell of iron (or blood) combined with sulfur fills the air, it seems the decision has been made to trip the trap. Whatever that may be. As Kord and Tomoe approach the anvil, they may find it's much... LARGER than it initially appeared given how long it's taking to reach it even while flying, and the way it keeps growing in their sight. But eventually, they will reach the 15-foot long, 10-foot tall anvil, and may note that there are a lot of weapons lying around on the opposite side of the crafting tools, out of sight of the entrance.

    There are no sign of bodies, because, for better or worse, Lanterns don't tend to leave more than blood stains or impressions of their deathly energies behind when slain. But it becomes pretty obvious, pretty quickly, what the cause of the disappearing Lanterns might be.

    All those discarded weapons, dagger, swords, scythes, bladed whips, unfinished armor, remains of ancient metal works, all begin skittering across the floor, and clattering together, forming into roughly humanoid bodies made entirely of sharp and lethal.

    And these weapon golems then leap at Kord and Tomoe with their scythe hands and their scimitar feet and their bodies of whirling, stabbing death. But at least only Kord and Tomoe are getting attacked! That's LIKE a good thing!

    Crow can only reach as far as the light cast by the others will let its shadowy self project, but thanks to Prisccilla carrying her light source with her onto the platform, enabling seeing the anvil and the attackers, there's at least enough light for Crow to form the most tenuous of connections... And attempt to use these to seize Kord's and Tomoe's shadows by its edges and pull them back out of range of the ambushing golems, if they need the help. The pull is weak due to how frayed the tendrils, how they blend into the darkness ahead, but if even if neither of them need the help, they at least have the option of a retreat if the situation changes.

    Given the only ones with direct line of sight to the metal monsters are Kord, Tomoe, Crow, and Priscilla, the Shadow sets about yelling, "HEY WE FOUND THE TRAP. PLZ HELP KTHX." D:=

    Enark stays where he is and starts casting water shields on everyone to blunt the impact of blows. Carna doesnt see how stabbing things made of swords will help at all, so instead scans for anything that looks like a control mechanism or something. Maybe this wireless thing is connected.

Staren has posed:
    Staren stands there, distracted by his computer until the fight starts. Then he focuses on the distant figures, and pulls the laser sniper rifle from his back to begin firing at the weapon golems, trying to melt them a weapon at a time or blow them apart with the ablative effect.

    If it looks like Kord and Tomoe are in serious trouble, he pulls a missile launcher from his bag and starts trying to flash-melt the weapon golems with plasma explosions. The lack of Union support does discourage him from using them just because he has them, however.


    Dawn, meanwhile, carries on trying to access the wireless network for him.

Toph Beifong (20) has posed:
    It appears that Toph is a bit distracted as she places her hand on the metal, narrowing her eyes as she moves onto the plate after a few seconds to use her feet as well. "There are tunnels going down here... and I think it's really hot down there too," she informs the others. Makes sense, this is a forge after all. While the others approach the anvil itself she keeps on 'looking' at the metal around them... though her head snaps up suddenly, right before the metal monsters assemble and come to life. At that moment Toph is already heading forward, and she throws her arms forwards, concentrating on the metal monstrosities as she twists her wrists around, intending to bend their limbs around them and hopefully keep them in place. "OKAY, this place has magic mumbo jumbo all written over it!" she calls out, her focus entirely on the metal golems as she attempts to bend them into metal clumps.

Inga has posed:
Luckily, magic mumbo jumbo is where Inga lives. While Enark is throwing water wards, Inga is throwing blood. She begins to move until she can get the others in her sight, then quickly tosses out a few blood-wards to those in the path of the weapon golems.

Compared to the old blood an sulpher smell, Inga's smells almost refreshing!

It also sort of shimmers. Bees are weird.

With Toph here, the metal thing should be scrap in no time. Wise to bring her along.

Count Kord has posed:
    Kord progresses forward and squints behind his mask as it becomes increasingly clear that the perspective is not quite what it appears. As he rounds the anvil and makes note of the weapons and armor just laying all over the place, he slows and takes extra care not to bumble into what is an inevitable ambush. Thankfully, everyone's paranoia has rubbed off on him and the moment he hears skittering he is backpedaling away from the abandoned equipment. He snaps his head around to watch an old battered longsword slide across the metal surface, and crouches in preparation of what might happen in just a moment.

    As the golems form and start lunging at him and Tomoe, he takes to the air immediately, taking advantage of the higher ceiling to remain out of melee range. After that, the only way the golems would be able to hit him is with a good throw or with a bow or gun of some flavor, making it a bit harder for him to get caught in the middle of a whirlwind of blades. He draws his scythe from its holster and flicks his wrist to unfold it with a spray of sparks. Instead of using it, though, he points with his left hand down at the golems and emits a pulse of Dark energy down at them. The pulse comes out as a directed wave, trying to hit multiple targets or at least blanket any larger ones with the damaging magic-like energy. This attack makes an appropriate WHUMPF sound as it fires. "Appears to be the right place," he observes with no shortage of amusement. "What killed the first owner of this equipment that came down here?"

    He makes sure to keep track of where the forging tools are, on that note, and just the whole platform as a whole.

Kushiko has posed:
There's more than one way to skin a cat, or in this case, deal with metal golems. Made of weapons. <"This is a new experience,"> Kushiko almost dryly muses aloud. Well, with the dearth of light being as annoying as it was, now that they had something?

The funnels of light on Kushiko's back and the back of her head glow brightly as the control surfaces spread, the control rod on her forearm twisting and sliding away into an open stage. Ribbons, streams of energy rapidly coalesces together until she can gather it into a nascent orb, /slamming/ it into the ground, though the gesture is not necessarily something to do much to the ground itself.

What happens next is a radial band of energy begins to grow outward, casting light luminously with lilac, but not blindingly so--and dousing surfaces with volatile antimatter energy. More to the point, doing so to the golems foremost, as her Void control over her power means that while Priscilla, Tomoe, Kord, Staren and Toph along with Carna and Enark might yet feel the impacts later, they won't be harmed.

That's precision control for you.

Regardless, the effect her Molecular Priming is doing if it works is to weaken and slow down those golems to the point that Toph could probably easily turn them into bombs--the energy touching the metal seems kind of ... /warping/ really.

Tomoe has posed:
Tomoe almost rolled a Thief when it came to SAO but she changed her mind at the last moment in character generation, so oh she can do on traps is to face check for them the hard way. Which could prove to be very fatal to her now. Still she going to do what she thinks is time to do. She looks around as she finally /gets/ up there with Cored and stares.

"Looks like we missed a party..."

She glances about looking at all the weapon and just as soon as she says it.

Golems made out of weapons okay this was new to her, and she pulled Dawn Breaker she moves to parry block and otherwise engage the things as they got quite a bit of trouble here but she should be able to hold out for the moment at the very least.

The clash of steel rings out as she parries and attacks but there are a heck of a lot of them. For the moment, she feels the shadows she's thankful she's got a way out and will make use of them should she need to but for now she's going to engage the weapon golems.

"Count Cord you ever fought anything like these before? These are a new one for me."

The magical attack is welcome from Cord while she handles the more traditional way of engaging the attackers and soon she's getting the idea they should hopefully have more back up and then Kuskhiko shoes another reason why she's so valuable as an ally and hopefully friend. Rather than as an enemy.

"That's right all on me! You want a fight you got one!"

She taunts out at the weapon golems.

Priscilla has posed:
    Priscilla feels pretty justified not stepping on the grate now. Less so because of the strange, aggregate weapon guardians; assuming any random environmental clutter is capable of killing you is part of exploring Lumiere. It is, oddly, Toph's assertion that there is a heat source further down, that worries her. Hearing the prism stone clink and clank on the way down like that, she can't possibly imagine it'd be all that useful to have the fire so far away from the hammer unless it could come up through the grate from below. It reminds her somewhat of a torch pit.

    On the actual subject of the weapon golems though, Priscilla believes that her current company has it well in hand. Adding metalbending to the usual team, in particular, makes it an ostensibly unfair matchup. Briefly, she busies herself with trying to see if she can put a hole in the grate, if not by physical cutting, then by breathing out on it and letting the crystals do the work. Failing that, she will wait until combat subsides, and then approach the anvil at her normal size (because she happens to be just the right height to use something that stupendously large), and gather some tools to see if anything magically strikes her. Lumiere is known for inserting unbidden thoughts and knowledge into one's mind.

Carna (974) has posed:
    Crow retains its connection to Tomoe's shadow at least, losing contact with Kords when he takes to the air, diminishing the shadow he casts. With the buffing efforts of Inga and Enark, Crow even manages to try to grab the shadows of some of the golems to hold them in place. And any hits Tomoe takes should be more or less absorbed by the double-layering of blood magic and water magic.

    Kushiko's debuffing effect weakens the automatons as they engage in dazzling displays of martial prowess that would not be expected of mere golems. But when one's entire body is made of dozens of weapons, some degree of skill is necessary to even get around on all the sharp points that substitute for appendages. Their efforts to attack Kord are thwarted by his moving out of range, taking lasers to their bodies that heat their frames and alter their structural integrity, and their pursuit is slowed by the particle attack. With blasts of dark energy slamming into the golems, Tomoe warding them off with her skills and blade while simultaneously drawing their questionable facsimile of attention, and Toph tearing them apart while they're distracted and staggered, soon the ambush is no more.

    Though it's easy to see how things with no vital organs, no discernible power source, and no 'weak points' could have been a much bigger problem for most people who came here without a metal bender present to restrain or disassemble them.

    The grate sends up sparks when attacked, but does not seem easily damaged. The breath attack is another story, making the bars over the grate brittle and more easily broken. There are multiple of these grates around the area. The dark stains around the grate that Priscilla stands at, however, implies the source of the blood-iron smell may be here. And at the other, similar drains.

    Crow lets out a dramatic sigh of relief when the fighting ends, while Enark just keeps staring warily at the remains of the golems (or the still-active-but-disabled ones if there are any such), and Carna remains right where she has stood the whole time, at the edge of the platform and still on that featureless, lightless, soundless floor. Only when it appears all evidence of combat has ceased, does she begin to scout around the edges, prodding over the edge with a sword and discovering an unpleasant fact. "There is no floor off of this platform. Do not mistake this pitch for the same as that which we crossed to arrive here."

Carna (974) has posed:
    Priscilla has, for the most part, ignored the whispering voices, except for when they originally called her here, right at the first discovery of Lumiere. Like most others present, their hold has been tenuous as a result. Kord is the only one who has received significant communication, for the most part, due to his willingnes to listen. And so far, he has heard nothing in this place. But as Priscilla listens, and stands at the anvil, that changes.

    The heat source far below begins to rise. It rises and rises, heating very quickly, and with their metalbender here, they should still have ample warning, as whispering voices rise within the minds of the Queen and the Count, until, as though they were transmitters of some kind, the voices extend to those near them as well. They repeat only one word, over and over, with growing volume. Their emergence to a mighty shout coincides with the heating of the anvil from below, until it bursts into a pillar of fire shooting high above.

    That one word:

            DEIFACTION.

    The flames swirl back down into the anvil, but the metal never stops glowing and radiating an intense heat. The floor opens in places, coverings sliding aside, as levers, racks for holding weapons, crates of ancient metal gone to rust, and more of the stone pillars from outside, all rise up out of the platform, transforming the barren surface into a workshop.

    Crow seems to change in the fire light. It seems... Not just more substantial in the flickering flames, given the shadows produced, but more solid. More whole and complete. So much that one could almost reach out and touch it. Crow looks at its own shadowy hands, noticing the change itself. "...Coooooool!"

    "That's one way of putting it," a distorted but familiar voice calls from above. Where Ordis would have tracked the incoming wireless signal to. In the light produced by the flaming anvil, it is visible that on a floating metal platform, leanding on a handrail, is a staticky figure. A silhouette that matches one of those present.

    "Hello, Staren. I knew you'd make it here eventually."

Staren has posed:
    Staren looks up at the figure for a long moment.

    "...So."

    ...

    "...I'd ask what you want, but that's probably what you were about to ask me." Staren walks forward onto the metal. "So... do we grant eachothers' wishes, or...? Perhaps you have an exposition dump for me or something? Explain how all this works...?"

Priscilla has posed:
    It seems Priscilla's estimates as to whence forth the flames come had been right. Her suspicions that a giant anvil and tools couldn't be all that there is to this place, likewise. The destruction of the forge's self-defenses seems assured, and so, secure in some knowledge of what the surrounding grades are for, and armed with Enark's knowledge that a very long drop awaits her outside the central partition, she steps up to the smith's place, and reluctantly opens her mind to those loathsome, dry whispers.

    She does her best not to flinch, nor to stand back, as the wave of heat and light pricks her skin and stabs at her eyes, remaining in place where the dark had spoke to her strongest. "Deifaction?" she repeats the word out loud, rolling it around in her head with equal parts fascination and concern. Out of all they had ventured around Lumiere, talk of gods --of deities in general-- had been sparse to non-existent.

    And then the rest happens. Not having to crane her neck all that much to look up, Priscilla glances to the static figure with faintly pained knowing. "Ah. So there were more of thee, in the end. I cannot say I am gladdened to learn of such, but all the same, perhaps hopeful that thine own situation is . . . less dire."

Kushiko has posed:
Angrily, a voice chimes in the vicinity of Kushiko towards Staren. It's Ordis, the sinewave of his pulsing a bit as he remarks, <<What do you think this is, that freakin' **TROPES** story?>> There's so much distortion from the moment of anger Ordis displayed, before politely remarking, <"I do not think that's going to happen. Prepare for--*//mortal combat//*--"> And there goes the glitchy Cephalon again.

Kushiko just kind of sighs a little bit. She'd gotten onto the platform herself and she had benefitted from not listening to the voices that counsel Kord and have begun wiggling their way into Priscilla. Benefit, perhaps, of being what she is, not necessarily embodied here. Not that it /doesn't/ screw with her sometimes. (It does)

<"Deifaction?"> Kushiko repeats, Nova's head tilting towards where Priscilla was. Part of her impulse is well to do to attacking, but given what happened with the 'other' Priscilla and Static-Staren's appearence here, she's mildly reluctant.

Count Kord has posed:
    Kord is suitably impressed and startled when the platform emits great columns of fire. The Count's head rings with that voice, deafening yet carrying no real sound, as Queen Priscilla takes up the tools of the forge. He does look about with idle curiosity

    With no more threats to speak of, however, besides perhaps the glimmer of a 'Staren' up there, the cloaked man floats down to stand on the platform and get stock of his surroundings. He almost repeats the word as well but instead fixates a thoughtful gaze on Priscilla. To her inquisitive tone he offers some speculation, "It is a forge that is meant to shape a god, or instrumental in that task." He tilts his head toward the anvil pointedly and back up to her.

    He turns his head and fixates his gaze on Crow.

    His gaze turns to look at the shadowy abyss that surrounds them.

    And he muses, almost at a whisper that would get devoured by the roar of the flames, "A god of shadows, perhaps."

Toph Beifong (20) has posed:
    Luckily it's easy to deal with the metal, and Toph lets out a quiet sigh of relief as they handle that. Though she does look troubled as she senses something from far below them. "It's getting warmer down there. I suggest we do what we need to do before it gets even warmer. I can feel the metal melting."

    It's a rather unnerving thing when the floor changes and things rise up, revealing racks, pillars and levers alike. It's even more surprising with the person calling out from above, and Toph frowns where she stands, entering a defensive stance just in case the fight isn't over yet. And it appears that Staren knows this person. "What's going on here?" she asks him. It would be nice to get some answers! Not to mention, what do the others mean? "Deification? Like, this place is here to make gods or godlike people or what?" Why can't people put things simply? Kord's words makes her snort a bit. "I hardly thought forges were the type of things to make people or things gods..." Just how would that work anyway? Is it related to how the metal weapons shaped themselves into humanoids or what?

Inga has posed:
Inga frowns deeply as whispers fill her mind. Not that hearing voices is anything particularly novel to the Seer. It is pretty much an every day occurance and thus does not disturb her as much as it might. It /is/ annoying.

THE voice, is far more clear.

Oh...oh, well that is interesting. Inga looks toward Crow, frowning softly, her brow furrowed in thought as she mentally adds another note to the growing list in her mind. It's all coming together she thinks.

And she isn't the only one thinking along those lines.

Then, another Staren. Inga's eyes widen. Again, this isn't the first time being faced with someone's double (okay, its the second) but it is a bit alarming.

There is a small, cheeky voice at the back of her mind wondering why he doesn't have a goatee.

Inga looks toward the others, gauging their reactions. Staren, naturaly, is taking it all with logic and snark. As expected.

Tomoe has posed:
Tomoe will indeed owing Crow one for later given she's not in the best state to fly right right now. So she keeps to the ground but Tomoe is agile and she often uses her foes as a means to get around even if she end up getting hurt in the process it's far less than them getting actual hits. She shift she strikes and several sword skills are employed here. She learned to fight more by experience and some help from the skill assist system in SAO. It's caused her to have a very strange fighting style, she needs to work on it but it also does catch some people of guard. And with Kushiko's help she just keeps hacking and slicing into the constructs and She also makes sure she keeps her ally covered as best she's able. She figured out she's got to make a guess they have to damage the weapon making the up or find a way to force them to break apart.

"Maybe i should mix it up a little bit."

The purple haired Salamander twists and turns now but it seems it's not needed as they take down the last of the constructs and it seems they have someone or something that has been watching them.

"Now what..."

Carna (974) has posed:
    The Other-Staren looks down at everyone. Some have to do less head-craning than others to look up. Some are blind and don't need to look anywhere. When Staren asks his double what Other-Staren is doing here, and if the staticky figure will provide an exposition dump, the sound of annoyed confusion is in the near-identical voice that responds. "What? No. You know why you're here. I'm here for the same reason you are. You MUST have figured out I existed before now, right? This is a so-called 'God Forge'. Or 'Forge of the Gods'. A place for gods to make things. Or to use gods or parts of gods to make things. You know, like in the books?"

    Even though there's no face visible, the impression of searching Staren's features for signs of understanding is there. Other-Staren looks to Priscilla. His fingers on the handrail work open and closed a bit. "My situation is about as dire as yours. We're all prisoners after all." That cryptic bit of speech appears to be all that he feels inclined to give to the queen right then. 'Eyes' in the bottom of the floating platform open and close. Like cameras shuttering, but made from some kind of crystaline ocular organ. They watch everyone present, darting back and forth.

    "It's time to stop playing dumb. We have the same goal. If you trust the people you're with, you don't need to hold out on saying it. You researched how to fix Lumiere, and this was your answer, right?" Other-Staren still seems to be prodding Staren, as if searching for the 'correct' response.

    Carna is as lost as Inga and Toph. Crow seems fascinated, but no less aware of the circumstances here. Enark seems... Discomfitted.

    "Err... So this is what a God Forge looks like then? I admit I thought it would be a bit more... Glowy. And elaborate. Perhaps more well-lit or well-kept or well-hidden." Enark remarks.

    Other-Staren slowly turns to look at him, and Enark shuts up, trying to play it off like he was speaking to himself.

    The duplicate then focuses back on Staren. Very intensely staring eyelessly. Waiting.

Staren has posed:
    Staren scratches his helmet. "...Well, damn. Guess I missed my chance to predict that situation, huh... Yeah, I knew you existed. This is a way to make things, but the 'God' part we didn't know, nor that it could 'fix' Lumiere. We don't even have any parts of gods with us... Sounds like you have information we don't. We were still just... gathering information, we didn't have a /solution/ yet."

Priscilla has posed:
    Priscilla's shoulders move in the faintest approximation of a shrug at Enark. "Thou wouldst certainly be forgiven the thought." she says. After all, her familiarity with god forges is . . . well, not precisely grandiloquent, but certainly less dour and ominous than this. The eyes from beneath the grating get a look from her, and then she quite promptly steps back to the solid blackness from where they came, frowning as visibly as she ever does at the peeping crystals.

    "I wouldst not sayeth that entirely true." Priscilla says to Staren, however. Extending her upturned palm, a blood-hued flame, round and split like a staring eye, springs quietly to life above it. "There is, at least, the matter of the Marble Guardian."

Inga has posed:
Inga leans on her staff. There's been so much damned walking and now so much standing. Annoying.

"A forge of the gods...or a place to forge gods," she says quietly. She remembers her conversation with Crow. "Mmm, I do not that that necessarily true either," she says after Priscilla. Though she is quite confused about the Marble Guardian, and raises a brow to convey such.

Staren has posed:
    "Oh... was that a god?" Staren replies to Priscilla. "How can you tell?"

Toph Beifong (20) has posed:
    The talk of a Marble Guardian does get Toph's attention, and she turns her head slightly towards Priscilla. "That sounds kinda omnious." It depends whose side the Marble Guardian is on though. There's one question from other-Staren that catches her attention. "What do you mean by that, 'we're all prisoners'?" Who are 'we'? Is he referring to Priscilla? It's so annoying when people feel the urge to be all sly and secretive instead of just telling it as it is already!

Kushiko has posed:
<"It's complicated.">

That is the voice answering Toph, somewhat without presence as Kushiko speaks. <"Matters of prophecy and other... ways that Lumiere tends to have it's own rules regarding how things work here."> Which tends to be pretty chaotic as it stands. <"That aside, I could use a little refresher on some of it. Our memory does not behave as it should sometimes."> Least in regards to the Marble Guardian.

Tomoe has posed:
She looks at the Other-Staren for a moment she's now not sure just what is going on? Is it a copy? Is it a test? A echo? A mind trick? Did another Staren Unifiy somehow? She doesn't know but she doesn't move to attack either. She listens for the moment and she tilts her head back to Staren for a moment. It certainly acting like STaren to be sure, but just what is going on around here.

"Some times the more simple things is more apt."

She ntes to the other STaren for a moment and she takers step back. This is up to Sraren here it seems for a moment.

"No I had no idea about the divinity part either."

She goes quiet ya this isn't her pay grade thoughs he's clearly thinking and she looks to Inga as she asks a very good question.

"Inga's got a good point. Is this to make others gods, or forge weapons for gods?"

Carna (974) has posed:
    Other-Staren lets out a sizzling static breath at Staren's answer, as though struggling to keep it steady. "You have access to all human knowledge. You have access to the only person in Lumiere who still knows where to find SPECIFIC knowledge. And you even have THAT thingp--" he points at Crow. "--so you can get whatever you need without messing with the mimics. And you never even looked up how any of this works? How Lumiere keeps reanimating things never interested you? It never pinged your scientific curiosity? Seriously?"

    Other-Staren sweeps a hand at everyone. "You travel around with all THESE people, who I assume keep you around specifically because of your intelligence and your deductive reasoning skills, and you never proposed to them, 'Hey, if this place is broken, maybe we should figure out how it works so we know if we can repair it. Oh, hey, and we have a NEARLY INFINITE LIBRARY that we could research it in!' That never occurred to you? Really?"

    Priscilla bringing up the Marble Guardian and Inga's resultant confusion causes Carna to lean towards Inga and say, "It was the ball of chains and molten blood that you were summoned to aid us with. Your divine influence was a potent weapon against false divinity. The eye Queen Priscilla causes to appear floated above the creature when we fought it."

    Enark nods to confirm that recounting of events, though he seems embarrassed somewhat by Other-Staren. "Err, Staren does not bear all the blame. As the caretaker of The Library of Murdered Knowledge, I also could have proposed--"

    "YOU AREN'T THE PERSON I'M SUPPOSEDLY BASED ON!" Other-Staren yells over Enark. "You're just some lame fake librarian! I wasn't EXPECTING you to be smarter than those around you!" Then he whirls back to face Staren, and his head lowers as he draws in another sizzling static breath. He practically staggers back a few steps. "No." he says quietly.

    "There's no way you're my template. There's no way I could have been based off of someone this incompetent. You becoming the new God of Reason? The Gearworker? The Worldcrafter? As much as such titles are meaningless mysticism for the consumption of the rot-brained Dead around here, and 'gods' local terminology for 'beings of indeterminately greater power than those that worship them', they still require a base acceptance of qualifications to apply."

Carna (974) has posed:
    Other-Staren shakes his head. "You lack those qualifications. But I'm not unforgiving. I believe that, like me, you are compassionate. You want to save lives. To save everyone. To stop death itself, and forge immortality for the masses, so we never have to lose anyone ever again. Not like we've both lost at the hands of murderers and monsters." Other-Staren's breathing speed up until it clutches in his throat for a moment, but then he swallows hard, stares at Priscilla with a hostility that can be discerned without even seeing a face.

    He knows what she did. And he blames her for it.

    He refocuses on Staren, one hand gripping the handrail again. "But it's not too late. We can still make things right. All the answers are right there. You wanted an exposition dump? Fine, here: The reanimation mechanism of Lumiere is a physical thing. Well, psuedo-physical, psuedo-conceptual. You can interact with it. And that thing you encountered after entering the painting, the World Mimic? When the Multiverse reordered itself, it was integrated. If we modify the reincarnation engine, and extend that mimic's reach, so that it copies EVERYTHING, then when anyone dies, anywhere, they'll be remade. Right here. And they can walk right out with a body that will come back from death. We euthanize this sick, defective existence once -- just ONCE -- and everyone gets a free pass to eternal life. Sure, they'll technically be dead, but that'll solve issues of hunger and disease and so forth. If we modify the physics of this place we could maybe even change what 'dead' means."

    Other-Staren's voice has grown more excited as he speaks, more enthusiastic about what he's discussing. Like Staren when he's discussing something he's interested in to a captive audience and just dumps a load of speech on them all at once.

    "Don't you see? Death can't take anyone from us, when they've already died. DON'T fix Lumiere. This 'malfunction' is the answer we've been looking for! Forget the stupid prophecy! Prophecies are bullshit!" Other-Staren holds out a hand towards Staren. "Join me, brother. Together we can make it work. We can save everyone. No more suffering. It'll all be RIGHT for once. We can DO it. It's not just a pipe dream. It can happen. Now. Today. Help me end everything, and then we'll just restart it with new parameters that we decide upon."

    The Unpainted hisses out, "We might not be exactly the same, but I know you better than anyone else. This is what you really want, deep down. I know it."

Carna (974) has posed:
    Enark seems to have gone very pale when Toph asks what Other-Staren meant by everyone being prisoners. Like something just clicked for him, in combination with the talk of the World Mimic. A discussion that was had with Carna back when the Multiversal reordering occurred. When they'd thought it might be some kind of apocalypse.

    Carna is still utterly lost, but she is reaching for her hand crossbow. Just incase the answer Staren gives isn't what Other-Staren wants and it turns hostile. Crow is remaining completely silent and just looking back and forth between Staren and his fizzling duplicate. Like there's something... Something the Shadow is almost understanding, but not quite.

    Crow looks towards Kord, as if hoping the Count will have the answer. Kord knows lots of things, right? Won't the Dark Lord of Pokemon know the answer to this too? Enark is smart as well, but is looks like Enark is about to pass out. "What do we do?" Crow asks. Of Kord. Of Priscilla. Of Kushiko. Of Toph. Of Inga. Of anyone around who cares to answer. "Should I be... Doing something here? Is there something I can do to help?" D:=

    The Shadow looks to the burning anvil, and asks again. "What should >I< do?" =:<

    Enark gathers enough of himself to answer Tomoe. "The latter, I think. Though I suppose mortal champions, gifted with some of a god's essence, such as a tooth, or a lock of hair, or just some of their Light, could gain a weapon here. I assumed it required a god of some stripe to actually forge the weapon though--" Then Enark breaks off and looks at Priscilla. And then at Kord. The two people that loud voice seemed to radiate from. And Priscilla is holding the 'soul' of the Chains of the Dusk Sun, the Marble Guardian they slew. Could that be...?"

    He regains enough of his composure to say to Toph, "It was a monster designed to stop people from fixing this world, or advancing in doing so. We slew it, but it was a foe that might not have fallen so easily without superior numbers, firepower, and the influence of Lady Inga's divine benefactor."

Count Kord has posed:
    "There's just one flaw with what you're saying:"

    "The World Mimic won't remake anyone, not truly. They won't remember who they were. They won't BE who they were. And there are no guarantees that it doesn't just eat everything and no guarantees that these copies will even be passable."

    "And if you are saying that you intend to include my world into this foul plan of yours, I want you to come down here so I can remove your half-assed copy of a spine. Not because I cannot reach you, but because it would save me the inconvenience of coming up there and having to chase you. Not only is it my duty to stop asinine plans that threaten the flow of life and death in my world, I find your existence and your motivations repulsive."

    Kord seems ... quite unhappy. Philosophically unhappy. It's one of the few times he's directly threatened someone. He isn't going up there to fight Faux-Staren, of course. He is momentarily distracted by Enark's words, turning his head to look toward him and then to the God Forge. "Then... I could use it, as well as Priscilla," he points out, in case anyone needed that clarification. He points at Crow, and then says, "Crow. Why don't you try to help the Queen here? Maybe what you can do is help us forge something of that Marble Guardian." He makes an emphatic gesture toward the forge. Crow has been an anomaly since square one, not fitting anything else they've seen here. If Crow is a god, then...

Toph Beifong (20) has posed:
    The answer she's given makes Toph let out a snort of annoyance. Different rules and such aren't easy to handle, especially after she joined the Paladins. But luckily Other-Staren is ready to give them all the information they might need for this. And she can't say she likes it. With every word he says, the more Toph frowns, and at one point she extends her finger and /points/ directly at other-Staren with a look of anger on her face. "You should stop spouting bullshit. Killing people and then giving them 'eternal life', is that really life at all? Have you considered whether people want this or not? Some of us like being alive, and seriously... Prophecies might be bullshit, but you don't fix stuff by making it more broken! Why shouldn't broken things be fixed anyway? Hard times are part of life, giving up on life just because it's hard...? Give me a break!" Heck, she finds herself agreeing with Count Kord here. Being yourself is important is important for most people. And if this place is broken... if they can improve things by fixing it... then why not.

Staren has posed:
    Staren crosses his arms as his double calls him on not fixing Lumiere... He holds his tongue until his double has said his piece, though, and he does look slightly annoyed... until they propose an alternate solution. His eyes light up. So that even as he next speaks, he's starting to smile.

    "I've made mistakes. Honestly, I didn't think anyone here would have written down how it worked... that they would have readily accepted the way things were seemed more likely. And given the way people revive here... fragments of memories, devouring eachother... I didn't see this as a ressurection method worth investigating."

    "The Multiverse is /filled/ with flawed methods used only by the desperate. You know my old backup plan was to come back with a freaking /demon/ in my head?" He shakes his head. "I probably would have gone insane from the nightmares before I could purge it."

    "The final truth you don't see is that for all my smarts, I'm rubbish at influencing people. I can't save a world without allies who want to save it for their own reasons, whether multiversal or native. So my modus operandi is to follow along on things like" he gestures at Carna, "Carna's quest, looking for opportunities to do good along the way."

    He hangs his head. "You're right. I've failed you and I've failed many others, because I'm not perfect enough to see all the things I need to se, do exactly what I need to do, to solve everything. Sometimes everyone fails, and there's no hero at the end, and a lot of people lose..."

    He lifts his head and steps forward. "But this world has YOU! You saw what I didn't. You found out about the reincarnation engine..."

    He holds his hand up in a 'woah, hold on' gesture.

    "However... There are some flaws in this plan to work out. As it is, the way reincarnation works here, is no good. We need to make sure we can change that. Second... Some people may not be able to handle immortality." He gestures at the angry Kord. "We need a way for them to escape before they go mad or something. Third... if you want to extend this to the entire multiverse... That's..."

    Staren shakes his head. "The people of many worlds would consider it an attack. Some might have actual afterlives to go to. As much as it pains me to let people die, if you don't limit it to people who give their permission, you'll just end up with a group of heroes showing up and blowing everything to hell. Could we maybe make it so that it only affects people who come here and undergo some process to connect themselves to the mimic? More will come and be saved over time, as holdouts see others become immortal... Or simply through attrition."

    "It's the start of a good plan. We could help a lot of people. But there's a lot of work to do yet before we know it's possible, really possible, in a way that saves everyone instead of creating a future of strife and suffering."

    He looks up at his copy expectantly.

Priscilla has posed:
    Static-Staren is, ultimately, someone Priscilla cannot find it within herself to direct fury, or even scorn, towards. Staren criticizing Staren might be worthy of it under different circumstances, but even apart from the lengthy time the Tharmas' flawed creation must have stewed in this dark and eternally dying world, Priscilla cannot bring herself to lash back at him for the simple memory of what she'd had to do to- do /for/, her own double; her responsibiity as part in this world's bizarre prophecy. It's difficult to want to shout him down, after killing one of his own. Isn't something like that how the original Staren had turned out?

    "I see then, that I was once correct in presuming as much. That caution and self-imposed code, as strained and forced as it may seemeth at times, is what separates Sir Staren from this madness." she sighs out instead, 'pocketing' the weird 'soul' with a twist of her hand. "As it wouldst appeareth presumptuousness is thine sin as well, for if thou hast need of us, or of the Library tower, thou hast only to seek either for thineself. Thou shouldst knoweth as well as any of us that thou art unlikely to survive such an attempt by thineself. Come down from thine perch, and rid thineself of this place. Nothing to be found here shalt maketh thee whole; thine creator despaired himself of that for a reason."

    "Asides . . ." Priscilla's arm twitches; her fingers curling so tightly into her fist that her nails draw blood. "The World Mimic is out of the question. I hath plans for that creature that shalt be denied not."

Kushiko has posed:
Oh yes. /That/ Marble Guardian. That helps. It has been some time. Memories flood back into the Tenno, the young child so distant from this place making a quiet sound over her lapse in active memory. Things begin to connect in places that weren't quite there, back to the World Mimic, back to well. /Everything/.

It's probably a very good thing that Valkyr isn't the frame Kushiko's utilizing right now.

So she steadies herself a bit. Look for another option. <"Not everything is yet as it should be. Or something. Chaotic aspects of the worlds here and beyond."> Seems like she's channeling some of the quirky, space-time mindedness of Nova directly. No, everything... it's like the Orokin in a twisted sense. Twisted immortality. To Crow, the faceless Warframe's diodes seem to flicker with that pale lilac light. <"Reject this one's offer, this ones words."> In regards to Other-Staren at least. Not that she was going to suggest that the Shadow fight in any regard so helping with the forging could work.

At least that was her thought in any event. <"Do what you want with yourself, but don't drag any of us along with it. Death can't take anything from you because you have NOTHING to begin with! Nothing that's real!"> It's a rare case of Kushiko displaying more emotion than her Warframe is capable of, the voice of the young girl who has seen too much, been through too much without even knowing it.

Tomoe has posed:
Tomoe as the Forge? Speaks she listens but she grows troubled as things just start to get more and more heated the Other-Staren flips out on. She's thought about trying to figure out how to fix things but it's above her head in how it works. Well she could get the basic bit for a moment she tilts her head now looking to Enark. She then turns her attention back to Other-Staren and does not take her eyes off them.

They speak of how things work and she pays close attention to it. Then speak of a mad idea to her she feels her skin crawl about it, still the temptation is there? She can see part of the argument and she takes a step forward a pace and looks at them for a moment.

"I have lost many people, if I am behind honest but this?"

She looks to Staren now she's starting to get the sale of what the Other-Staren is offering.

Enark also gives a very useful answer about the nature of the forge and that helps at the very least to get an idea of what they are playing with here.

"It's true Toph we had some serious help with that."

She now has a better idea, and Count Cord brings up a hell of a flaw as she notes.

"I don't have the right to make this sort of call for my world."

Thoughts though of dead friends from SAO, Mai most notably. Dead Family come to mind but yet? Would it really be them? She would be lying to herself though to not admit to herself she wasn't feeling the temptation, yet? Something doesn't feel right here.

Staren has posed:
    "Oh my god guys, what's with all the 'you're not real, you're not a person' nonsense?" Staren looks between his allies. "What makes him any less real than us?!"

Count Kord has posed:
    "The fact that he has yet to choose his own identity and clings to the one his creator gave him instead," Kord points out. "This crusade infuriates me because it is a broken mirror of yours and it could threaten my people. No being that pretends to be another is ever truly whole or real."

Kushiko has posed:
For a half moment, Kushiko falters, then her Warframe glances Staren's direction. <"Only in the strictest sense. He and who knows who else that still exist by way of that Mimic are just that. Pale imitations that seek to embody what we are, rather than any other possibility. From conception they are bound to what they think we are, to become that. If they are not real, they are enslaved to concept with no choice.">

Staren has posed:
    Staren crosses his arms. "If thinking you have to live up to someone else's purpose, or not thinking for yourself, makes someone your enemy, buddy, you have a /lot/ of the Multiverse to go through." he waves a hand at Not-Staren. "Also, he's NOT just aping me! He went and did original research to find out stuff we didn't know! That required original thoughts I didn't have!"

Priscilla has posed:
    "Because I hath looked deeply into the soul of the one other like him, as thou hast yet to do for him. It is not a matter of personhood, but a lack of choice. A destiny of adherence to a task and role decided for him, and others as him, through repetition and imitation of thee. Do not maketh him a slave to the persona crafted for him as a painter's tool. Do not seeketh to encourage him to remain a vestigial shadow of thee, in this story." Priscilla looks very severely to Staren, laying one hand upon her collar. "I believeth, at least I, hath the right to say as such."

Count Kord has posed:
    Kord looks aside at Priscilla as he appears to be ready to say something more. He stays quiet at that point, nodding only in affirmation of what she's saying.

Staren has posed:
    Staren holds out his hands. "Am I any different? Whether through evolution or a creator deity long ago, I was born with certain values encoded in my brain. I searched for a purpose and in the end I decided that something is written only in my brain or my soul, is real enough. /Everyone/ does it..."

    "Most philosophers just come up with justifications for the morals they already have. 'God said so'. 'You just SHOULD be good and here's how'. Even Kant and his 'act as if your choice could be a universal maxim'... that's just imposing your OWN morals on the world!"

    "Noone's come up with a REASON for values to be what they are! No hero-philosopher has said 'welp, I found morality, here's the mathematical proof deriving it from physics, I'm gonna follow this now' and if they DID they'd be seriously fucked up in the head!"

    "That's what we did in the Union, we did what we knew was right and if other people disagreed with us, tough cookies. I gave up on arguing to other people that they SHOULD be good long ago. Either they value it or they don't. And if they're INCAPABLE of valuing it... like some fey, or a hungry tiger... You kill them so they don't hurt people who CAN share your values."

    For emphasis, he reiterates his conclusion: "We're ALL just following our programming. That doesn't make us not people."

Carna (974) has posed:
    Other-Staren listens to Staren, just as Staren listened to him. No matter what body language is seen to indicate emotion, he keeps his peace until the end. But when Staren starts talking abouw how he's bad at influencing people, the Unpainted Staren looks at the people around Staren who are so upset at the idea proposed.

    Kord's fury and hate. Toph telling him how awful his idea is. Tomoe rejecting it on behalf of her world as Kord did for his, though for different reasons. Kushiko being in no rush to die, no matter what promise lies after. Staren listening to it but not accepting it, even considering ways to improve it, or alternatives.

    When Staren speaks of how he knows he isn't perfect, can't see all the solutions, and trusts in the people around him to keep his head on straight, to make sure he does good along the way while helping others instead of trying to take on everything himself, the Unpainted figure looks at all the people who stand with Staren, the friends and allies who Staren himself agrees with, only to disagree with moments later and argue on the duplicate's behalf. Even though they're supposed to be intellectual inferiors, unable to see the solution right in front of them, the solution that might not be as perfect as Other-Staren thought it was.

    There's a profound ache in his voice when he begins to speak, the desire to have what Staren has, to share in the companionship. Even as they seemingly turn on him to disagree with him, they do not HATE him for his idea. "I just..." Even if one of the companions he was destined to have was taken from him, as he listens to the one who 'freed' her from the cycle, he begins to think 'what if I gave her a chance? What if I gave all of them a chance? Maybe her killer isn't what I thought she--'

    But then he lets out a cry of pain and claps a hand to his right shoulder as he practically falls to his knees, hanging onto the rail with his other hand. When he strugglingly regains his footing, the Unpainted withdraws his hand, and for a brief moment there's a glowing red handprint, claw-tipped, on Other-Staren's shoulder, before it fades away.

    The Unpainted stands back up, his uneven breathing slowly stabilizing.

    Then he says coldly and calmly, "I knew this wouldn't work. I should have listened. You're just too weak to do what's necessary." Then he looks towards Kord as the blackness behind him splits into a dripping red line, as though someone had slashed the darkness and made it bleed.

    "I'll be sure to remove your ability to resist before I bring you back."

    Then, the floating platform retreats into the glowing-red blood portal thing, and the opening seals itself shut afterwards.

Carna (974) has posed:
    Enark stares in shock at the sudden reversal of attitude. Only a moron wouldn't be able to tell something happened just then that they don't understand. "Well, that was abrupt."

    Toph, with her practice at listening, would likely have been most keen to the complete chance in voice from the poor creature that just left them in a slurp of rent space spiralling closed. From an impassioned, if distorted, reproduction of Staren's voice, to something LIKE Staren who could calmly order the death of everything and promise the loss of free will to those who would fight back.

    Seeing the glowing red hand print isn't necessary to know something is seriously wrong here. In so many ways, on so many levels.

    Crow, furtively, hesistantly, like a house cat uncertain of if it's welcome but determined to push its way in regardless, slides up next to Priscilla, and forms one of its shadowy appendages into a hammer. The other hand is placed on the flaming anvil, and where pure-black fingers touch, sparks fly back as though peeling the darkness away and revealing a gleaming, golden, gauntleted hand. Ornate. Marvellous. A work of art worn as armor.

    "I think... You can wield me like this." Crow looks back at Kord. "And I think Mister Kord can too. Maybe this is what I'm here for." Then Crow looks to everyone, aware of the atmosphere that has formed thanks to this encounter with the Unpainted. Then the Shadow says, calmly, and very seriously. "Maybe not all prophecies are bullshit."

Staren has posed:
    Staren gets a sinking feeling when his double declares him weak. Not exactly despair or betrayal... For all his arguing, he doesn't know if the double HAS a psychology anything like their own, for certain. But he doesn't know he /doesn't/, either.

    It's more like... infinite possibilities collapsing into a troublesome but not entirely unexpected truth.

    "Don't do this!" He shouts, reaching out a hand.

    Then after he disappears, Staren sighs, and his arms drop to his side. "You heard what I said." he mutters, crossing his arms.

    If his double's values are a threat to people... He must be killed.

    Then Kord says he's being controlled and Staren sighs in relief.

Kushiko has posed:
There's a large swath of things that strike Kushiko's mind when it comes to the notions of 'programming' and what not, given what she went through, what she remembers and beyond.

<"And you make your own decisions what you want to do. People... follow certain morals, beliefs after they all agree to it. Good or bad. And there's been some BAD ONES as much as there is good ones.">

Sometimes, being unable to emote properly is a pain in the ass. <"... Follow your own path. Even when others make you take the path they decide."> One of her hands clenches into a fist, practically shaking for a few moments. <"Even if it's only ONE time in your life..."> A morose, distant tone fills her voice. It's something else for certain she's dwelling on. But what that is, she won't be saying, and instead looking towards the way back now.

Tomoe has posed:
Tomoe looks at the unpainted Staren as things just go to heck and back. She feels a chill there is something going on who has been playing the other Staren and she wonders is there an other her? Is there an other of /everyone/ who have invested in teh effort to understand and perhaps end up helping. She's not sure where to go from here in the end. Other than they need to keep going forward and figure lout how to fix what is broken.