Canis's heart

[soulping]

The moment you step through the mirror door, you seem to - slip, as if the floor were made of wax, but when you fall there is no floor to catch you; only darkness.

You fall for some time. Eventually, it feels as if you're not falling at all - but rather, floating . . . and some time after that, it almost feels as if you have no body at all. The light from which the entrance of Canis's heart is disappears quickly, and you're left with nothing - not even your own screams, if you have any; nothing seems to leave your throat, and there's no sound at all, besides. Even the rushing of wind is gone, and your own pulse seems to fade away. . .

. . . what penetrates your consciousness next is the soft sound of music. Someway or another, you find yourself on a white platform; you're dressed in plain clothes of your team color, all items gone from your person. In front of you, four stones float; all perfectly square and identical to each other. Each have images - a sword, a staff, a bow and arrow, and a sparkling circle . . . you understand what you must do.

CHOOSE YOUR CLASS
WARRIOR - MAGICIAN - ARCHER - ACOLYTE

CHOOSE YOUR CLASS | IRC: #swordheartonline! | PORT BAGHENNEN | LOCATION SELECT: 1 2 | AREA O█E: S█RE█G█H | AREA █WO: DU██ | AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██ | AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██: 1 2 | ██E█ ██U█: B███████: 1 2 | ?????: ███████ | TRUE HEART

Comments

CHOOSE YOUR CLASS

[soulping]

[ please individually choose your class. if you become an acolyte please be aware that you may have to partner up with someone else. no explanation is given, and you no longer have your items. supernatural skills are off, save for the most basic necessary illusion for lupus's body. learned skills and physical skills are limited to not exceed the human limits. ]

[wingtamed]

WARRIOR

[criticalbark]

MAGICIAN

[barrette]

MAGICIAN

Re: CHOOSE YOUR CLASS

[bestwestern]

WARRIOR

[ofobedience]

ACOLYTE

PORT BAGHENNEN

[soulping]

You understand this is PORT BARGHENNEN. How? You just do. Despite it being a "port", you don't smell any sea breeze - actually, you don't "smell" anything at all. Sure, you're "breathing", but there's nothing to "smell". How weird.

It's definitely a town though, you can tell - there's the ever present bustling of people, a number of various people wandering around and going about on their daily lives. The main road - the road you're closest to, is paved yellow, and you can see several vendors advertising their goods to the people.

[wingtamed]

. . what kinda heart is this supposed ta be.

Re: PORT BAGHENNEN

[barrette]

[ Sparrow looks around thoughtfully, though she makes a bit of a face when she realizes she doesn't smell anything.

...and then attempts to tie her skirtdressrobe...thing up higher. ]

There's no way I'm gonna be able to run around in a long dress.

Re: PORT BAGHENNEN

[bestwestern]

[this warrior is going to check what the vendors have ]

[criticalbark]

[ POKING AT THE FIRST PERSON SHE SEES ]

[ofobedience]

[it's tempting to stay right where he is in the grass (so nice and peaceful), but that's not what he's here for, right? so he gets up, starts walking, expression just a little guarded]

REVIVAL

[knighttolast]

You're falling, falling, falling - and suddenly, you're here again, in PORT BAGHENNEN, in the grass, just as you were before. The only evidence of your trip is that your clothes are likely ripped from whatever damage you had and you only have the bare minimum of life right now: 1HP.

On the bright side, reviving was painless and you're only sore from whatever wounds you obtained earlier! Not only that, but you actually still have all your items and EXP which is a blessing, let me tell you.

[wingtamed]

[ hp potions hp potions where are the hp potions. ]

LOCATION SELECT

[knighttolast]

As you step outside of the town's limits, a hover menu appears, rectangular and glowing; a list appears, and you can choose to either go to the area or read the description of the area. . . . something's wrong with the menu. The words don't seem to be loading fully, giving you only a glimpse of what the area contains.

> PORT BAGHENNEN
> AREA O█E: S█RE█G█H
> AREA █WO: DU██
> AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██
> ██E█ ██U█: B███████
> ?????: ███████
> CUSTOMIZATION

[wingtamed]

[ one, two, three, maaybe four, and question marks.


question marks, how suspicious. how mysterious.

> ?????: ███████. ]

> ?????: ███████

[knighttolast]

You stand in a red-carpeted hallway, in front of large, polished doubledoors, with gold hinges and doorknobs encrusted with diamonds. On either side of the door stand full-body knight armors, poised to point broadswords over the doors. A soft piano music plays in the background.

[wingtamed]

[ let's just ssslowly approach the doors. with his sword held to his side. ]

> AREA O█E: S█RE█G█H

[knighttolast]

You enter AREA O█E: S█RE█G█H. It's a nice forest path which leads to a clearing, when you go further beyond . . . the trees aren't tightly packed, but rather sparse - letting the light through so you can see clearly, not that there is anything to see, if you're looking for signs of life. A few flowers seem to have spurt up on the road, but - they've been crushed. Moreover, they don't. . . . look right. If you stare long enough, they become pixelated, glitching out before reappearing - completely upright - before reappearing trampled on the ground and without pixels. That's. . . kind of strange? Oh well.

Once you enter the clearing, there are a number of things here. . . small jellyblobs of all team colors. All of them have little "LVL 1"s floating above their heads. There are also a few clear-colored jellyblobs, with LVL 4 floating above their heads.

[ofobedience]

[well that's disconcerting. he feels vaguely unsettled and kinda wishes he wasn't here alone, but he is, so he bites his lip and tries to ignore it.

the jellyblobs look sort of cute, though? he thinks about touching the one that matches Barghest's colours but...maybe he'll just examine one of those clear ones instead. just a close look. he's curious :|]

> AREA █WO: DU██

[knighttolast]

You enter AREA █WO: DU██. . . it's a desert biome with nothing but sand on either side of the large rocky mountain that you stand on, currently. You could go down, back to PORT BAGHENNEN, or you could go up. . . there's little foliage or anything here to speak of, except dead plants that seem to . . .not fit in this environment? As if someone tried to plant something in this area and then, due to the sun and the lack of nutrients, it shriveled up and died. Only, like, a few of them. In fact that's the only foliage you see on this mountain.

Re: > AREA █WO: DU██

[bestwestern]

[ taking a closer look at the dead plants ]

LOCATION SELECT

[knighttolast]

As you step outside of the town's limits, a hover menu appears, rectangular and glowing; a list appears, and you can choose to either go to the area or read the description of the area. . . . something's wrong with the menu. The words don't seem to be loading fully, giving you only a glimpse of what the area contains.

> AREA O█E: S█RE█G█H
> AREA █WO: DU██
> AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██
> ██E█ ██U█: B███████
> ?????: ███████
> CUSTOMIZATION

. . . for some reason, an area's been stricken off and grayed out; you cannot select it.

Re: LOCATION SELECT

[barrette]

[ ...that's. that's alarming and she really hopes it doesn't mean what she thinks it does, but she selects

> AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██ ]

> AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██

[knighttolast]

You enter AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██.

You enter AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██.

You enter AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██.

You enter AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██.

You enter AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██.

You enter AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██.

You enter AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██. . . but it seems there's nothing there. Is there nothing there? There must be nothing there. Your eyes can't seem to focus on anything in the room - is it a room, even? For some reason, all your senses are confused, everything is out of whack, you don't know what's going on. . . . you, you, you

You enter AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██.

There is nothing there.

Turn back?

Re: > AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██

[barrette]

[ that's... that's disconcerting as fuck, but she's going to try and step forward, hands held out to feel for something, anything ]

C-Canis?

> AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██

[knighttolast]

pl█a██ █top pl█a██ █top pl█a██ █top pl█a██ █top pl█a██ █top

You wake up flat on your back, staring up at the ceiling of a tannish gazebo. It feels warm, but not hot, and out of the corner of your eye you can see the clouds softly rolling by. . . everything seems to be so peaceful, it's vastly different from the chaos that you'd been in before.

You have entered AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██.

pl█a██ █top pl█a██ █top pl█a██ █top pl█a██ █top pl█a██ █top

Re: > AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██

[barrette]

[ she stirs slowly, sitting up and rubbing at her eyes before trying to look around and see where, exactly, she is.

the last she remembers, the ground swallowed her, didn't it? was it a passage? ]

> ██E█ ██U█: B███████

[knighttolast]

You enter ██E█ ██U█: B███████. It's as you expect—as familiar as you remember it. Homely, with the pillow pile in place and the smell (smell?) of food in the kitchen. . .this is Barghest.

It's nice. Moreover, it's home, and you're overwhelmed with a sense of peace. Unfortunately you have no place to relax here, because everyone's already in the pillow pile - everyone. . . people you might not recognize are here too, but if you've been here since the very beginning, you'll remember these are the first Barghests. Echo, Eltanin, Corvus. . . as well as a smaller Lepus and Lupus. Aquila and Sirius are in the middle of the cuddle pile with Canis, and two great big seals wrap themselves at the base, creating a protective circle. All sleep peacefully . . . but - ?

Something is wrong. If you look closely, they begin to pixellate; the whole room seems to fzzt out of the picturesque scene, flickering between two: the peaceful team sleeping, and. . . . blood. Blood, blood, blood. Eltanin's missing a foot; Echo's head has been lost and red stains Aquila's lips. Everyone is mangled on some level, or distorted - broken legs, smaller body, and bloody all over, the selkies shifting into black tendrils that coil around the team, suffocating them, and the entire living room torn apart and broken.

. . . . but then it flashes back to the peaceful scene, perfect and unmarred. . . . well, mostly unmarred. The entire earth shakes every so often, with small tremors in the ground, though not enough to cause much alarm.

[wingtamed]

[ nnnope, turning to walk RIGHT BACK OUT. ]

> AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██

[knighttolast]

The entire area is the same as before - the gazebo stands tall, with the infection torn away; still, the entire place is flooded with twisting vines and flowers, dead shrubs. The gardener is plucking away at flowers, as usual - but every time he picks a flower, two appear in its place.

Re: > AR█A THR██: █MOT█O██

[barrette]

[ looks around and makes a face when she sees "Sirius" pulling up flowers. ]

Hey! We're back!

> ██E█ ██U█: B███████ > ██E█ ██U█: B███████

[knighttolast]

You enter ██E█ ██U█: B███████. It's as you expect—as familiar as you remember it. Homely, with the pillow pile in place and the smell (smell?) of food in the kitchen. . .this is Barghest. 

This time, in the pillow pile, there is Lepus, Lupus, as well as Draco and Cepheus. No selkies wrap themselves around the pile, but black wings seem to shield them all regardless. They're all transparent to various degrees, untouchable and unreachable. . . all is peaceful, though occasionally some images glitch into pixels before returning to normal.

Re: > ██E█ ██U█: B███████ > ██E█ ██U█: B███████

[wingtamed]

[ those sure look like his wings. how great. looking back to devotion. ]

Where're you?

CUSTOMIZATION

[knighttolast]

When you enter through the door, you find yourself in a forest clearing, similar to AREA ONE'S. In front of you stands Canis - and a hover menu next to him. He's all decked out in knightly armor, looking ~totally majestic~ and even posing. . . . . !

What a loser.

Re: CUSTOMIZATION

[barrette]

[ uwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa how cool ]

Canis!