C4S3: Act 3

Prepare. Prepare for EoA2, but greater. Bigger, better, and most importantly, much more disappointing. Thank you to the ones still here for sticking with us this long, and--

Who am I even kidding anymore. What am I, other than a narrator trying to thrust his way back into the spotlight, like the person who inhabited this mansion before me?

Leave me to finish your work, a great man you are. Threads of plot loose and unfinished. What a garment that would be to wear, if the amount of holes in the fabric wouldn’t get you arrested right away for indecency. This tablet is broken, the chair is squeaky, the window is cracked letting in a draft into the green office, paint starting to chip off the wall, revealing drywall only made of solidified ego holding together a metaphysical mansion made of promises built on the cliff of a legacy looking over an ocean of nothing but hatred and despair. But you and I both know, reader, that you’re not here for the edgy poetry of an angsty teenager.

You’re here for the show.

And boy, can I put on a show!

----

Phrody wanders through the strange golden city-moon. After a brutal battle with a couple of underlings, she certainly deserves the rest. Carapacians mill about in their ordinary business, when clouds begin to slightly darken the city below her.

When she looks into the clouds, she sees visions, of events that happened, events happening, and events yet to happen.

She sees a troll girl in a hoodie with purple bangs in an audience with the black king. You see her again in a temple of sorts, a statue crumbling, and an adult troll woman in a cloak appearing in its place.

She sees a short boy with messy hair meet a girl with green skin and a white sun hat through the window of a... tree?

She sees a serious young troll woman enter a club full of turtles and imps alike, who doesn't look amused with the situation.

She sees a troll in a welding mask wielding a staff listening in on his own consorts, cultists worshipping powers beyond their comprehension.

Another cloud passes by, showing a boy returning from an interdimensional mall to meet with his own consorts, a different breed of cultists.

She sees another boy-- troll-- no, human-- no, girl...? No, boy, deciding on an illusion in front of a tall mountain on his land, as he steps into a gate on its side.

She sees a different boy clutching a VHS tape, returning home after a long journey. The cloud zooms in on the tape.

She sees the cloaked troll from before, in a valiant fight against an unknown entity. The cloud flashes once, before revealing the previously unknown entity: a dodecahedron, floating above what appears to be the surface and deflecting all of her attacks.

Before you can see what happens in the end, another cloud passes by.

It's herself.

In the cloud, she’s fighting a Golem, much taller than the one she has seen, but she’s doing well, slicing away at its shiny, blocky metal exterior. She lands the final blow....

...and the cloud dissipates.

The Rogue of Life flies back to her room, and returns to the waking world.

----

Lukas stands in an unfamiliar bedroom, the walls being made out of a light wood, a different Skaia shining in through the circular window over a strange land of multi-colored plants in a purple soil. A small distance away is a mountain, no, volcano, that Skaia seems to shine directly above. Around the room is a bed that looks to be carved out of the same wood from the tree, with sheets made of a wheat-colored interwoven fiber. A desk carved from the same wood is also present, with a computer made of--

“OH MY HEAVENS!” A shriek comes from the doorway. A young woman-- wait. She isn't human nor troll, but instead has thick light green skin with thin lines on it like the veins of a leaf, with a collection of leaves for hair and a red flower on top of her head, which she quickly covers with a hat as she blushes in embarrassment. She's wearing a [dark blue dress](https://images.rewardstyle.com/img?v=2.13&p=n_36532692) that goes a bit past her knees with a light blue embroidered design across the front that looks like a lowercase Greek letter "rho".

“Who are you and what are you doing in my room?! I didn't have my hat on, you could have seen... oh my. ^^^^^^Although, ^^^^^^for ^^^^^^you, ^^^^^^perhaps ^^^^^^I ^^^^^^wouldn't ^^^^^^mind ^^^^^^as ^^^^^^much! I just alchemized a new dress, and I wanted to try it on, and I went to my room to get a matching hat and my goodness this is just awkward after awkward so my name's Azelea Rhodos what's yours???”

Lukas blinks, taken aback by the sudden appearance of the girl. “Lukas, Lukas Miller. Um, hi?” he says slowly, feeling kind of awkward from the situation.

“Yes, Hello, Lukas-- wait. Lukas Miller? I've heard that name from a television program I saw! The display glitched out, and I only got to see the part where they read off names. They listed my name, and mentioned you, and a relative I assume, but it switched back in time before I could hear anything more,” Azelea responds, recognizing his name with some sense of familiarity.

“That was my mom, and I'm here because I can teleport. No, I can’t control it. It sucks,” Lukas tries to explain his strange entrance.

“Teleportation? Skreb just gets stranger and stranger. Another note: what happened to your skin? Do you have a chlorophyll defiency? I'm sorry for intruding. And the leaves on your head are... wait a minute... you're not wearing a hat, how indecent! But you don't even have any…,” Azelea snickers to herself after her barrage of questions. She quickly grabs a spare straw sun hat she had hanging on a hook and hands it to Lukas. “Nevermind, just, here, put this on,” she says, handing Lukas the hat. Together, they talk about various things like the nature of the game, who sent them there, differences between their races, and at one point, [a brief interruption](https://www.reddit.com/r/RPGStuck_C4/comments/60lsae/c4s3_act_2_update_1/dj4v4xw/) from Azelea’s “friend”, Lantana. Azelea blushes throughout the entire conversation.

“Well, I hope you’ll see her again soon!” says Azelea, referring to Lukas’s mother, back at his Land of Flora and Fauna.

“I do too, but I have no idea when I’ll get home,” Lukas sighs. Azelea moves her hand closer to his.

“I guess you’ll find out when it happens!” she remarks, reminded that Lukas could go away at any moment without notice. “Well, in the meantime, how about we--”

Azelea doesn’t finish her sentence, for the next time she looks to her side, the Mage of Space is gone.

contemplatingDesigner [CD] began espering scenicExplorator [SE].

CD: lukas?

CD: what happened?

CD: we were talking, and you teleported away. was that what you were describing?

CD: are you in someplace safe?

CD: talk to you soon!

----

CD: it's been about a week, i wanted to see if you're ok! i figured out what to do with the forge!

----

CD: well, we did it.

CD: we beat the game, and we're about to step through the final door.

CD: my friend, lantana, was teasing me while we were talking, saying i had a crush.

CD: admittedly, he was kind of right, haha!

CD: i don't anymore, though. i don't think i'm ready for any kind of relationship like that, honestly.

CD: anyways, lantana's gotten a lot... saner, but he mentioned you, and i just wanted to catch up.

CD: our team leader's about to open the door. thanks for stopping by, and i hope to see you in the future!

contemplatingDesigner [CD] ceased espering scenicExplorator [SE]. (Error:crossTimelineScaleException YEARS AGO)

----

The Boss comes to the edge of a monolithic city in the middle of the desert she calls her land, and see a 10-foot-tall wall made of a jet black stone that looks almost alien. There's a separation in the wall marked by red lines, with cameras guarding it and a small screen next to it. She moves closer, and sees that it prompts her to place her hand on the display.

She follows the directions, prompting a new screen.

“WELCOME GUEST. PLEASE ACCEPT THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS BEFORE ENTERING,” text on the screen reads in all caps. A grainy robotic text-to-speech voice out of a small speaker reads off the sentence, as The Boss scrolls through the body of text.

“These terms and conditions create a contract between you and Capital K (the “Agreement”). Please read the Agreement carefully. To confirm your understanding and acceptance of the Agreement, click “Agree.”

A. INTRODUCTION TO OUR SERVICES

This Agreement governs your use of Capital K's services (“Services”), through which you can.... Our Services are…,”

The Boss almost nods off, but quickly regains her concentration. She decides to blindly press accept. The screen asks her to enter her name. She briefly hesitates, but has long since given up “Adanne”.

She is only The Boss now.

A partition in the black wall appears, allowing her to step through a gateway to a city much unlike the small villages she has seen elsewhere. The buildings in here aren't made of sandstone, but the same polished black material the walls are made out of. The ground is largely paved, or changed. There is no sand here, but there are a lot more turtles, who are perfectly fine with The Boss’s imp friend tagging along. In face, they appear to be fine with just about everything. Some of them have a glazed look on their faces, even though the place itself looks very active.

The Boss is skeptical. She briefly considers an idea of mind control, but nevertheless beckons her imp friend to follow her as she marches forward through the city, walking between the skyscrapers that surround and tower above her. They disorient her, all looking the same, pillars of black stone with rows of red windows and lines streaking down them, reminding her of the city walls, but she’s determined to find out what’s going on. She picks a building, and steps inside.

As soon as she steps in, she feels a pulsing from the ground, that she soon realizes is the bass of [funky music](https://youtu.be/ChX1Pgo8AMM) playing within. Her eyes adjust to the bright lights in the building, as she looks around, seeing masses of imps and consorts dancing along to the music. She realizes that the red windows on the outside were purely cosmetic, only seeing black walls plastered with screens in the massive atrium that she’s in. There are two balconies above you, filled with a similar mass of imps and turtles, with columns with their own screens holding the balconies up.

Around her, the floor looks like it was ripped straight from the 70's. Parts of the floor that aren't flashing multicolored disco lights are covered in shag carpet. Aside from the carpet, the tables look ultra-modern, glass rectangles elevated on black columns, with stationary "bubble" chairs around them and the occasional turtle dancing on one. The music plays on, as all the screens light up with a design of a silhouette of a snake with an afro and headphones, along with the letters "DJ K" signed across the bottom.

"HOW'RE Y'ALL DOING TONIGHT!" a voice echoes over the music, coming from the screens, met with the cheers of the inhabitants of the building. "IT'S YA BOY, DJ KAIROS HERE DROPPING SOME KNOWLEDGE ON YOU PARTY-LOVERS!" More cheers are heard throughout the crowd, as the speaker pauses for applause. "I'D LIKE TO TAKE THIS OPPORTUNITY TO REMIND Y'ALL OF THE RELEASE OF THE HOTTEST MIXTAPE ON THE MARKET! THAT'S RIGHT, YA BOY'S BACK AT IT AGAIN WITH A FRESH SET OF JAMS THAT'S SURE TO RAISE THE ROOF!" The consorts cheer a third time, some jumping off whatever table they were dancing on, and one fainting.

"Now, how I give y'all a bit of a sneak peek of what's coming up next, for you music lovers in the crowd?" The crowd begs for whatever may be next, the lights blaring. "I CAN'T HEAR YOU!" The crowd cheers even louder, something you didn't think was possible.

"NOW THAT'S WHAT I LIKE TO HEAR!" he says, the music cleanly transitioning into [the next track](https://youtu.be/2rmhNrBfRLU).

The Boss gives the imp a questioning look, realizing that talking over the blaring funk music won’t work. The imp nods its head slowly, as another imp walks up to the duo, and offers a tray of lotus-like flowers.

Her imp friend steps back at the sight of it, and shuts his eyes tightly, while the Boss briefly considers taking up the offer, but something in her gut says no. She politely refuses, but the imp insists once more, taking one for itself. She refuses again, and the imp shrugs and walks off.

Her imp-friend sighs in relief. The Boss tries to ask what it was, but her friend refuses to answer, and doesn’t want to mention what just happened. He suggests to get out of here, but at the same time, he looks longingly toward the elevator. He snaps out of it, and directs her towards the door.

The Seer of Time opens the door and goes back out in search of answers.

----

vsauceMichael [VM] is now online.

VM: Hey MS, Michael here!

Lysander thought he finally caught a break from the insanity of his land, a twisted amalgam of all of the campaigns he has ever written, when a metal hawk stares at him from a treetop and catches his eye. The hawk takes flight with a loud flap once, soaring straight up to the treetops, much taller than most forests you've ever seen pictures of. A robotic caw emanates from its beak, looking down on him.

VM: It looks like you were snooping in places you shouldn't be!

VM: Or... were you really supposed to be there all along?

The hawk circles the air above Lysander, slowly ascending, analyzing its surroundings, analyzing him. It caws once again, before making a sharp right.

VM: What you said was the exact text I spoke to Jeff. This is an idea, passed from person to person.

VM: Does that mean it's... a meme?

The hawk hovers, before flying forward and up through the trees, making a loop as it soars.

VM: But what about the universe?

VM: Each S-B session, a new set of people from a previous universe create a new universe. Every time it happens, it gets reflected through the lens of their own thoughts.

VM: Does this sound familiar?

The hawk flies backwards and upside down, reorienting itself 80 feet in the air above Lysander’s head.

VM: They change, they evolve. Almost like the universes are... living!

VM: And over billions and billions of years, life changed, leading up to you and me!

VM: Small mutations, adding up to the greatest meme ever created: evolution.

The hawk does a nose-dive, straight towards Lysander, before stopping near the ground. It hovers in front of him, and he notices something off about it. The eyes aren't natural, they're small black cameras with red lights behind them, shining in his eyes. Its coat of feathers is elegantly painted on wings of metal, and hidden behind its feet are small jets allowing it to hover. It stares at Lysander intently. "ANALYZING...."

VM: I'm a meme, you're a meme, and every living organism you have ever seen is their own meme, unique and billions of years old!

VM: Universes are their own memes too, born from the interconnected network of Paradox Space!

The hawk opens its beak, revealing a small speaker implanted in the back of its throat. “INTRUDER DETECTED. STATE YOUR IDENTITY.”

VM: But... what is Paradox Space?

Lysander backs up, raises his hands in surrender, and announces “I'm not an intruder, Morrigan!” to the hawk monitoring him, referring to the character who specializes in bird-disguised security drones.

MS: Primordial soup, I'd be willing to bet. The same stuff a regular universe isn't made out of.  Aether

“Ko-” Lysander decides against switching to that body. He saw how well that went the last time he tried. He switches bodies again.

“...Icon. I need help,” he tries. The bird scans his face further.

“POLYMORPH DETECTED,” the drone concludes. “FURTHER ANALYZATION REQUIRED,” it states further, scanning his face again as he tries to concentrate on maintaining the illusion as best he can. “WELCOME, ICON.”

The hawk rests on the tree branch, and a komodo dragon dressed in a black and purple sweater comes out from behind one of the trees.

“Looks like you're getting a little rusty, eh?” Morrigan chuckles to the Heir of Heart.

----

“The Overmind created the remainder of his Council with the newborn Paradox Space, and gave them a duty that no other could accomplish.
The one of four faces is to bring Hope to the Furthest Ring, and to oppose those who Rage against him.

The one of six faces is to guard the universes with sound Heart and Mind, and to make way for the game of S-B.

The one of eight faces is to populate the stars and planets with Life, to protect from certain Doom to play the game.

The one of ten faces is to bring the Light of wisdom to the new life, and separate them from the Void of Paradox Space.

The one of twelve faces is to have the rules of S-B reside with him, to bring Breath and Blood to the perfect game.

And lastly, Himself, the one of twenty faces, is to rule over all Space and Time with his infinite benevolence, knowledge, and power.”

Yanniy reads the plaque in front of her carefully. Around the room, there are six pedestaled statues of geometric objects, of four, six, eight, ten, twelve, and twenty faces. There are six smaller plaques with two aspect symbols each on them that fit in the slots on the pedestal. She solves the puzzle with ease, placing each pair of aspects with their respective statue. She has been in this crypt for a while, solving these puzzles and moving forward. The door to the final room opens, and the room begins to glow.

Behind the tetrahedron appears an upward equilateral triangle on a simple drawing on a body, hovering above a pentagon, with dots that look like stars around it. The configuration of the triangle floating above the body vaguely reminds Yanniy of something she saw earlier on Derse, the appearance of the Black King.

Behind the cube, there is a cube with two circles that kind of look like planets surrounding it.
Behind the octahedron, there is a carving of an octahedron in the center of eight smaller carvings of circles, but one obscured by a black mark. Around them, two snakes like the one on the SABRX interface bite each others tails in the shape of a grand circle.


Behind the decahedron is a magically-enchanted carving of glowing dots that move with you with a decahedron in the middle. There are strange glowing bubbles in the mix of the dots, too.


Behind the dodecahedron is a carving of a dodecahedron in the center surrounded by the 12 symbols that she saw. The symbols seem to radiate power.

On the floor surrounding the icosahedron are carved glowing lines connecting to the other five shapes, along with a glowing carving of a book around the pedestal with the pedestal in the middle of the book.

Yanniy steps inside the open door. In front of her lies another room, this one with carvings of the twelve symbols on the wall. The symbols for Time, Space, Life, Hope, Void, Light, Mind, and Heart glow, with the other four glowing softer than the others. A statue of the dodecahedron is in the center.

"As the Overmind presided over His creation, He noticed an error in the timelines. A perfect creation shall have no imperfections, and in an act of wisdom he sent the Noble Circle to reclaim the universe and the descendants of the players to play once again in the game of S-B. Soon, the universe shall be reclaimed, and Paradox Space made perfect once again,” an inscription reads.

There is no door to open. The Book of the Void calls to Yanniy, as she withdraws it from her sylladex and opens it.

"The gods grow proud, their hubris overtakes

their wisdom and their judgement now obscured

and when a god steps forth, their conscience makes


their testament to death and death assured"


The text in the book is accompanied by a depiction of a cloaked woman with a wand dueling against the dodecahedron, twice her size. The statue in front of Yanniy seems to radiate power, and begins to crack at the sides.

"The gods were made to rule their universe


the SABATH leading them to destiny


a rebel suffers to eternal curse


an act of impulse carried desperately"


The statue continues to crack, light shining from its core. The room begins to heat up around Yanniy, the stone absorbing the warmth, the warmest she ever felt since she entered this cold new land.


"And those who rage against the Council, they

are dealt a hand of fire in return


and soul and bone shall separate from flesh


as hope is vanquished, fuel left to burn"


The statue grows brighter, the walls disappearing around her, the floor beginning to crack, the book glowing with it, primordial chaos enveloping her with only the white noise of the shifting fabric of time and space.


"And with the anguish through the players cries,


with faces twelve, the Broken God shall rise."


The statue breaks with a loud crack, shards flying in all directions. The light dims, and disappears. The Book is out of the Prince’s hands and in her sylladex. Her eyes are closed.

When she opens them, she sees a troll cerulean-blood woman with messy, chest-length black hair in a cloak with a symbol on the clasp holding it together at her neck, knees pressed against her chest. Upon seeing Yanniy, she slowly stands up, and stares at her.


“The Grehij child,” she says, looking up at the Prince of Void.

----


Kervad has to catch his breath.

He just slaughtered a basilisk three times his size, and took it down miraculously. His weapon, the Nightstormer, is impressed by his power, but as he was about to congratulate his wielder, the ground rumbles.

This is where the real fun begins, Kervad, he says, the ground shaking, until a ghostly skeletal being claws its way out of the ground. Kervad stares up at his new foe, but shrugs, chugs a health potion, and looks at him with a determined expression.

The lich screeches at Kervad, a warning for what’s to come, but Kervad withstands the attack, and charges with the Nightstormer, a direct hit on his foe. The lich summons three skeletal minions, who immediately spot Kervad and begin to attack. Poisonous claws dig into his skin, but he grits his teeth and goes for another attack on the lich while guzzling another potion, landing yet another direct hit. The lich lets out yet another unearthly screech, attempting to blow him back, but it doesn’t work, only making Kervad tougher. This is it, the Nightstormer beckons.

“F#$%. You,” he says to his foe, making one last charge towards it, as it explodes into a greater pile of grist than he’s ever seen before. He catches his breath one last time, as he spots a figure in a plague mask and black cloak and hat sitting in a beach chair off to the side.

“Holy Kek, 🅱️ervad, no wonder why you're the Light player, because that was lit fam 🔥🔥🔥🔥 XDDDDDD” the figure tells him, impressed by the fight he just witnessed. Kervad stares at him quietly, before blinking once.

“Who are you?” he tentatively asks.

“My nama Jeff and i'm basically a doctor 🙃🙃🙃🙃” Jeff responds. Kervad asks the Nightstormer for his opinion, and he comes to the same conclusion: he is indeed Jeff, nothing more, nothing less.

“So, what do you mean by Light player?” he asks the strange man in front of him.

“You'll figure it out 🙃” he responds, shrugging. The Nightstormer begs to be released from this mortal plane.

“So, what are you doing here?” Kervad asks.

“To tell you you did good, and to find another guy here: Vsauce Michael? Kinda tall, wears glasses, a bit of a full goatee beard, not much hair, and every time he says something, techno jazz music starts playing…,” Jeff describes. Kervad shakes his head.

“Sounds like a human thing,” he shrugs.

"Darn 🙁🙁🙁🙁" Jeff replies, while Kervad stares at him some more.

"Were you the one that sent all those monsters?" he asks slowly, but Jeff shakes his head.

"No, there's another guy that did that, but I'm not the one to tell you about them 🙃🙃🙃🙃" Jeff shrugs.

"...Alright then; Anything else?" Kervad wonders.

"Oh, yes, of course, dank memes, do you have any????" Jeff asks with extra enthusiasm this time. *This man is a lunatic,* Kervad sighs internally as he starts to turn around, not wanting to have to deal with this stupidity.

"I take that as a no, understandable have a nice day 🙃🙃🙃🙃" Kervad blinks, and Jeff isn't there anymore.

Kervad walks to a nearby cave, attempting to find the pirates that brought him here unintentionally. Instead, he finds carvings on the sides of the walls of various ~~deer~~ geometric shapes. Along the left wall, there's a tetrahedron, cube, octahedron, decahedron, and dodecahedron in a circle around an icosahedron. On the right wall, there's a carving of a sun, a circle with 10 rays equally spaced from each other.

Further in the cave, there is a fire with cloaked sharks around it. Kervad listens quietly.

They're saying things. There's one sitting on a bigger log than the rest. He appears to be holding a sermon.

"There once was a legendary hero, a Page, who was promised to us to deliver us from Cetus's wrath. Our oceans are polluted by oil and murk, forcing us into a life above water, of piracy and immorality. The Page was supposed to clear the water with the power of Light, and let us return to the water where we may swim freely once more. The Page never came. Instead we turn to you, Ahura Mazda, oh brilliant wisdom, to ease our torment and hold back Cetus's wrath!" a figure on the bigger log says, the rest intently listening.

*The page? Light? Huh. This seems very culty,* Kervad thinks to the Nightstormer, as the sharks in robes begin chanting an incantation. He reaches out to try to stop it, but the Nightstormer reacts.

*Don’t,* it says to Kervad. *It won’t work.*

*Wait, so they’re summoning something that bad?* Kervad wonders, as he looks at the ritual in front of him.

*They're summoning a member of the Council of the Overmind. Getting them to listen to anything if you're a player is nearly impossible, let alone a consort as part of an S-B session,* the Nightstormer tries to explain.

*That sounds crazy, like summoning a demon!* he watches from just outside the cave, trying to learn what their fate is. Suddenly, they stop, as the fire burns in the center. The fire is extinguished with a loud crack, and a new voice starts, without any object attached to it.

[You have called me to this session.](/gold)

*They actually did it?! I have seen people trying to summon a Councilmember for millenia with no response!*

"Oh great Ahura Mazda, we call you to this session to-" the shark gets cut off.

[I know exactly what I was summoned to this session for.](/gold)

"I apologize, oh Great One," the lead shark bows, and steps off of his log.

[The Page is closer than you think. He is here with us, not just in spirit, but in physical form. Show yourself.](/gold)

*Oh Sh$%,* Kervad’s heart pounds, and very tentatively, not wanting to completely enrage this powerful being, peers into the cave, taking a few steps forward. Counting the cultists, there are around ten of them. Upon his arrival, they all gasp.

[Bow, Page.](/gold)

Quivering slightly, cowed by this thing's demeanor, the Page of Light bows.

----

An endless market with endless aisles stretches around Theo. He has seen [the news](https://www.reddit.com/r/RPGStuck_C4/comments/60lsae/c4s3_act_2_update_1/), and it hurts.

“5hocked by the news too?” a troll in an official-looking uniform for a shelf-stocker says. Upon closer inspection, Theo sees that she has glowing white eyes.

“I am, in fact. My parents fought these unholy bastards and so will I,” Theo declares to the worker. She gives him a slightly amused but worried look.

“Uh. You do realize that they are 5ome of the mo5t powerful being5 in Paradox 5pace? And what happened with your parent5?” she asks the boy.

“They forged a new universe from the ashes of the old one. I'm told my father spoke with them at the end of times,” he replies.

“5peaking with the horrorterrors them5elve5? That'5 a recipe for madne55! What did they 5ay to him?” the troll gasps. Theo looks down at the floor in sadness.

“He… he couldn't say. It took a toll on him. He did gain some power and used it to help kill the Kings,” he tries to answer.

“Oh my. You mean the C1 Incident?!” she asks. A few passersby quickly turn toward her direction upon her saying “C1”, but she acts like nothing was said, and continues. “You’re one of their 5on5?” she says, lowering her voice slightly.

“Yes. I am Theodore Jackson-Rabbit, son of Zach and Ezra, first of their name and scion to this universe,” he announces. The limebloods mouth is agape, in shock.

“My gog,” she says, before drawing him closer. “Li5ten. They hate your father for it, and they hate you by proxy. You're lucky you didn't get 5potted by a horrorterror or a 5ubordinate. 5tay 5afe,” she whispers. “My name i5 Quinta Gotano, from 5e55ion Phi-Tau-5igma-21B, shorthand notation. Doomed timeline #1618. Alpha me i5 probably off having fun ruling over a univer5e. If you 5ee her, tell her 5he'5 a lucky ba5tard,” she jokes, before keeping a serious face again. Theo talks with her for a while, until the subject of aspects comes up stemming from a discussion on how to get out of the Furthest Ring mall.

“Unle55 you're a 5pace or a Void player, the 5kaian Magicant i5n't your be5t bet, and I don't even know if it can lead to the Furthe5t Ring,” she explains.

“Unless I'm a what? I don't understand a lot of what you’re saying, unfortunately,” Theo tries to understand.

“...well, you're not pretty far. You'll figure it out. 5tay 5afe!” Quinta smiles, but Theo wants answers.

“What? So far? So far in what?!”

“Your 5e55ion, 5illy!” Quinta giggles. ”You don't even know the a5pect5 yet? They'll be very important 5oon,” she continues.

“Oh, those,” Theo says, remembering the stories of his childhood. ”I know only that of Life and Breath, those of my parents. Void and Space are other "Aspects" then?” he asks.

“Correct,” Quinta answers, and elaborates. “Twelve of them. Time, 5pace, Life, Doom, Light, Void, Hope, Rage, Breath, Blood, Heart, Mind. My 5e55ion had 10 player5,” she reminisces. “La5t name5 I can remember were Priman, Mbilii, 5antri, Kwa5hi, me, Chayaa, 5eptem, Bavalu, Dokkuz, and la5tly, Sunyaa. Yup, that's 10,” she counts. “Therefore, our 5e55ion had 10 a5pect5. Every player get5 one a5 part of their Title, which mean5 a whole ton of 5tuff I never got to figure out. Becau5e I'm dead now!” she grins.

“You know, despite the tales my parents told, I still do not fully understand the death and redeath in this blasted game. I see. How do I discover my aspect?” Theo wonders aloud.

“By going through your 5e55ion,” Quinta answers without missing a beat.

After a brief conversation on the nature of his session, the Knight of Hope kisses her hand and says a goodbye. He sees a cultist from before opening a portal where he came in, and steps through it, back into the Incipisphere.



----

Everything flashes blue.

Marcus’s head spins as the world seems to expand and collapse around him for a split second. He blinks, and suddenly he isn’t in his house anymore. He’s somewhere else on his land, away from the River in a valley where he can tell that once the River used to flow through here, but it's gone. A husk of a village is nearby, lifeless and cold.

He feels alone.

Without skipping a beat, Marcus heads to the empty village, drawing his new weaponry in case there's any of the monsters he met earlier nearby. He heads to the empty village. He doesn’t see any monsters.

There are just empty huts, desolate and abandoned, in disrepair. They line an indent in the ground where the river used to be. There are lines in the indent, like a stick writing in mud. One has a crude drawing of a cube, with two squares connected by 4 lines. The other is a few feet away.

"I'M SORRY SON"

Marcus disregards the cube, and goes to the words.

[Dad?](/ue) he says out loud, but there is no response. A gust of wind howls and rustles through the straw roofs of the huts unnervingly. Marcus shakes his head, and goes to look around the empty village. He finds a hut in disrepair, that the wind was rustling through. Written on the side in black is a note.

"I'M SORRY I COULDN'T BE THERE FOR YOU"

Marcus commits the note to memory, and continues to search, when he sees a glint of light coming from a hut out of the corner of his eye. Marcus is ready to grapple whatever is inside if it attempts to attack him, and steps forward.

There is nobody inside.

The hut has a mud floor, and crumbling dark green walls. A broken cushioned chair sits in the corner, a table on the other side, and a VHS tape on the ground in front of Marcus, only labeled “THE TRUTH” in blue ink. Marcus picks it up, and walks out of the hut. He sees more drawings in the mud beneath his feet.

"FOLLOW THE RIVER BACK HOME"

But there still is no River. There is only the small valley where the River used to run through. In the distance, you see green lines of the River over the hills, and farther, blue dots floating in the sky.

Along the way, he meets [a foe to fight with his weapon he alchemized](https://www.reddit.com/r/RPGStuck_C4/comments/60lsae/c4s3_act_2_update_1/djy3c1f/), swiftly dispatching the ogre before moving onto the RIver bank in front of him, a welcome sight from the hostile world outside of its glow. He peers inside.

He sees a vision of his father’s face in the ripples of the luminescent green water, which he hasn’t seen outside of photographs since he was 11. The face washes away in the current, replaced by a cloaked woman approaching a temple of sorts, a monolithic building in the shape of a dodecahedron. You can’t make out details, as everything is outlined in waves of water, but you can tell that the cloaked woman has tears in her eyes.

She appears to be crying. She wipes the tears away, and proceeds into the building as the current washes this scene away from the Maid of Mind’s eyes.

----


Lukas turns his phone back on, to find these messages, and responds. They have another conversation, about the time Lukas was threatened by a fate of being a living chair for the rest of his life.

CD: That sounds like something Polybius would do, based on the rumors.

SE: yep

SE: fun guy

SE: then he praised his boss or however that works that I wouldnt be breeding

SE: what are the others like?

CD: There are six.

CD: The d4 doesn't have a name, but it pops up in various places. It "possesses" different entities. Right now, I think it's the Black King of a session.

CD: The d6, Euclid, is a First Guardian. The most powerful one, apparently. His energy doesn't come from the Green Sun, rather, it's just from himself. He oversees the rest, or something. Very elusive. Dangerous.

CD: You know Polybius, the d8. He created the species that were chosen to play S-B. Very... nitpicky. He refuses to talk to anything that isn't the Council or his own creations. He acts like everything is... beneath him. Technically, we are.

CD: The d10, Ahura Mazda. He never appears physically, only as a voice, but we know that the d10 is his symbol. He acts like a messenger sometimes, when the Council doesn't speak to us directly. He also made the species that Polybius created... aware, or intelligent, or something. Very formal, even for a Councilmember.

CD: The d12. It isn't safe to talk about him. At all. Considering what just happened.

CD: The d20, The Overmind. He created Paradox Space itself, and made the Council to do his bidding. Nobody knows what he's like. The ones who saw him directly don't usually live to tell the tale. The ones that do live are usually only alive temporarily, to be a pawn until they lose their usefulness.

CD: The ones that see him, live, and aren't ordered to be a pawn are connected to something bigger.

SE: well they sound like a stand up group of fellows dont they?

CD: They're... themselves.

----

“Gone,” a woman whispers softly to herself, cerulean tears streaking down her face. “Gone,” she says again, burying her head in her hands, sitting cross-legged on the ground. “She’s gone,” she says a third time, the white void stretching infinitely around her in a corner of Paradox Space, where she is truly alone.

She slowly gets up, beginning to walk, a beaten wand at her side as a relic from her days as a player of the same game that took her daughter from her. She hops once, to slowly levitate and drift through the plane she’s in.

“Why did he take her,” she grips her wand tighter, gritting her teeth as she continues to walk. “Why her and not me,” another tear streaming down her face. “Why her,” she repeats, looking down at where she stands. Her final destination is close, and with her Space aspect powers, she navigated to it to fulfill one task: revenge on behalf of her daughter. A grand temple shaped like a dodecahedron stands in front of her, as she enters.

A large snake-like white behemoth with a tail curving along a ramp in an indentation of infinitely tall statue-lined walls with his dodecahedron-shaped head connected to his tail through a ramp in the indentation in the center. He arches his back, and looks down at the woman who stands before him. The temple disappears along with the rest of his body, leaving only the dodecahedron.

“It was you,” the woman whispers, looking up at the slowly rotating dodecahedron in front of her. “It was you,” she says once again, this time much louder. “You sent the meteors, you sent the horrorterrors, you drove her insane and you were her death!”

“She was her death,” a voice emanates from the polyhedron. “She was the one who pulled her eyes out with her fingernails, digging into her brain through the flesh behind her own eye-sockets, proceeding to--”

“STOP IT!” the woman begins to weep. “I’ve seen it myself, and I don’t want to hear it again!”

“I was proving a point. I did not cause her death. Her own mental faculties failed, making her kill herself,” the dodecahedron says nonchalantly.

“You knew it would happen! You knew that she’s sensitive, you knew the horrorterrors would kill her, and you always had it out for our universe in the first place!” the woman says back.

“Your excuse for a universe is an anomaly, a blemish upon the infinite beauty and perfection of Paradox Space. Your behavior is a blemish in turn, as trolls are usually never supposed to see their own offspring. Clearly, your mental faculties are also failing, having an unnatural attachment to your--”

“Can you please quit it with the psychological lectures for once?” Feraku interrupts his monologue.

“Has it not been mentioned that you have not properly addressed me a single time during this terrible excuse for a conversation? Your ‘daughter’ is dead. Your daughter will never miraculously come back from the dead. Leave my presence at once!” his voice echoes.

“Then it’s come to this,” she says, drawing her wand and firing a bolt of lightning at the dodecahedron, who swiftly deflects the attack using one of his faces. The bolt of lightning is redirected right back at Feraku, taking a direct hit to her chest. She recoils in pain, gasping for breath, but not giving up, circling the dodecahedron while flying, cloak billowing in the wind, as the monster dodges or deflects all of her attacks.

“Stop this at once!” the dodecahedron commands, but the troll does not give in. She flies directly above it, and flies straight toward it once it’s below her, but instead is met by a psychic barrier projected outward, also in the shape of a dodecahedron. She bounces off, landing a few meters away from her opponent, sliding across whatever could be considered the floor of the abstract realm. Her opponent hovers above her as she clutches her shoulder. There is no fear in her eyes.

“This is your punishment for your transgression against a member of the Council,” the dodecahedron flashes once, rotating slightly faster. “On count of attempted assassination, a futile endeavor, you shall be banished, never to bother our harmonious society ever again,” he enunciates. He shines brighter, the woman blinded, but not saying a word throughout this process. At the last moment, she reaches for her cloak, and wraps herself in it.

Feraku coldly accepts her fate, as she is teleported to a far-off land.

----

Of course she was struck down. Insolence and rebellion has no place in the Grand Design.

Every being, mortal or immortal, has a part to play in the grand scheme of Paradox Space created by the Overmind as a display of power and generosity to all beings under his eternal wisdom and grace. In return for his infinite generosity, they shall play out their part, however big or small, until their eventual death. When one refuses to play their part, they have committed a terrible act by defying the Council, and must be subject to a fitting punishment.

A fitting punishment that was for her. She will enter once again into a game that she thought could make her own but never was hers to keep. She will be trapped within the next cycle to watch as a generation sprung from the old builds their own future, left to die in a frozen wasteland created by a Denizen of Void, reflecting her own blindness caused by her unnatural attachment to her own offspring.

Behold the Grand Design of Paradox Space, patterned with the Natural Order, and gifted to all beings on its many planes. Witness the grand game of S-B, its cycle repeating myriads of times, each turn creating a new universe from the old, dotting Paradox Space. Bow to the overseers of its infinite beauty in gratitude for existence itself, and know that transgressions against The Overmind shall never go unpunished.

I am Dyeus, second member of the Council of the Overmind, Overseer of S-B, and Enforcer of the Natural Order.

Remember.

----

ZT: it is done.

ZT: the beast at the core of my first planet has been slain.

ZT: her name was Hemera, and with her death, the power of Life is mine.

ZT: i am on my way to the second planet. i have no idea what lies in wait for me next.

ZT: wish me luck.