Lords of Creation, The Second Age

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

"There are outposts for harvesting time and storage, but they're all underground." He answered. "There used to be stopping points for travelers coming to the city by foot, but those were all abandoned because of the war. Safer to come by boat. Excuse me, do not touch that."

The human, indeed most of the people on the boat were human, pulled his hand away from the bass floating over the deck.

"No one touch anything that glows until we've had a look at it." The Reasonable calls down. "In fact, drop anchor. Stop the ship, I don't want...." He looked over the ship in confusion. The sailors, catching his vibe, realized what he had. Amid the glowing mess around them the ship had stopped moving all on it's own, despite the wind battering on the sail. The ship, amid the confusion, had dropped anchor.

A man on the deck, his bearing identifying his as captain as much as his outfit, called out for who had dropped anchor without his permission. To everyone surprise the answer came from below, a booming, frothy voice that sent ripples through the river.

"I DID!" it boomed. "WHO HAS MORE AUTHORITY THAN ME IN THESE MATTERS?"

[Tsubasa & Wen Tien]

Gravas recovered from the shock quickly and yelled back, "Your actions, if they're what created this life, are affecting BOTH of my domains in ways I don't like! Come on out and show yourself you mongrel!"

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

The seams of the ship begin to glow with an ethereal white light the pours up from the bowls of the vessel. There's creaking and the sound of splitting wood, and as the deck and sides of the ship visibly bloat out the captain orders his men and passengers over the side. They go, spilling into the river with a cadre of splashes and making for the shore as the creaking and snapping intensify.

Suddenly the sides break, jutting out on beams if wood. The siding of the skip breaks further at the ends, separating into five pieces. Like hands. The Reasonable could only gawk. He had seen something like this before, and was reasonably sure where it was going, but that didn't stop him from being stupefied by the sheer silliness of it.

The arms twisted, embedding themselves in the river mud and, with a mighty push the entire ship was launched into the air. Almost unnoticeable a small white petal was thrown from its stern, but then there was a mighty crack as the prow broke apart. No, not broke. Split, perfectly, down the middle. They unfolded out as the mast came down, and as the mast lay on the deck the twin pieces of the prow were somehow flipped upside down and fastened securely down on it.

"Yes, those would be the shoulders." he said, hand on his forehead and a look of utter annoyance on his face.

The stern split next extending out on two lengths of wood.

"And the legs."

The behemoth landed back in the river on two legs, the wave produced carrying anyone who had not yet made it to shore the rest of the way.

"And then come..."

Out of the hole produced by the split prow came a large wooden head level with the three gods. The thing looked, or at least bore the shape of, a human man in full armor, cape billowing in the breeze, and eyes that shown like white stars. A colossus of wood and rigging. A ship that walked like a man.

The Reasonable was now burying his face in his hands. He considered, just for a moment, killing it before The Babysitter and The Veteran ever laid eyes on it. "I'm not even supposed to be here today." he growled.

"I KNOW NOTHING OF DOMAINS, BUT I WILL STOP WHERE I CHOOSE TO STOP. AND I CHOSE TO STOP HERE, TO SEE IF I COULD. AND I COULD." He bellowed at Gravas.

(??? = Create Race)

[Tsubasa & Wen Tien]

Gravas glares back at the wooden construct undaunted, "I am Gravas, Goddess of Wind and Water. I demand to know who you are and what you are doing today of all days."

Magnas continues on as the wind begins to blow eerily and a yellow pelt appears on her shoulders, "I am Magnas, Goddess of Metal and Lightning. This is the world Gammara and we are its guardians, are you friend or are you foe?"

Gravas' voice whispers in the Reasonable's ear, "Introduce yourself too, please. We should at least show some unity against this unknown being."

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

The Reasonable sighs. "Yes, of course, you're right. ! am-"

"SILENCE!" The former ship says, staring at Gravas, his eyes glowing brighter than before. "YOU ARE THE WIND?" He asks with some trepidation. As naturally as a flesh and blood creature he gets down on one knee, sending out a wave that crashes into the thighs of his former crew, and bows his head. "MY MASTER." He intones, with reverence surpassing any that the Goddess had ever heard before. "I KNOW NOTHING. I REMEMBER SAILING ON THE HIGH SEAS, YOUR MERCY GUIDING ME AND BEARING ME SAFELY ALONG TIME AFTER TIME THROUGH EVEN THE MOST VIOLENT STORMS. BUT THESE MEMORIES ARE ONES I DID NOT EVEN KNOW I HAD, UNTIL TODAY WHEN YOU STEERED ME UP THIS RIVER."

[Tsubasa & Wen Tien]

Gravas' eyebrow rises in slight surprise, "I see, so then tell me, who is it that brought you to life? Because someone is causing life that isn't native to this area of the world to appear for no fathomable  reason."

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

The giant raises his head. "LIFE." he utters to himself. "YES, I HAVE BEEN BROUGHT TO LIFE." The giant closes his eyes, muttering to himself, trying to remember. "SOMETHING HIT ME ON THE STERN, I THINK."

The objects that so far had been slowly floating down toward the water started to move away, down behind the giant, congregating in circles around something in the water. The Reasonable moved closer, over the giants shoulder to check it out, as the whole mass of itself emerged in formation, following behind one particular petal. The trail of objects snaked past The Reasonable and circled the giant, who stared at it in confusion. It was apparently very interested in him.

[Tsubasa & Wen Tien]

As the petal floats around the animated boat, Magnas rushes forward in a flash of lightning and cries out, "Lightning Tempest!"

Suddenly, the air around her fills with bolts of lightning that dance around, moving to strike the petal and the objects behind it.

(Use of skill: Lightning Rush and domain)

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

The lightning bounces around from, scalded fish and stones falling, blacked from the sky. The giant stand up and moves back from the display, as does the reasonable.

But the lightning that converges on the main petal doesn't seem to have any effect at all. In fact, it just seems to take it in, making the small thing glow slightly brighter.

The petal turns its attention to Magnas, floating over and regarding her now.

(Domain: Goddess of Energy. Or if that doesn't work I just use my power stat of 4 to tank it.)

[Tsubasa & Wen Tien]

(Conflict Points: Magnas 18, Gravas, 20, Reasonable 20, Vim 25. Magnas lost 2 CP as her Power is 2 and Vim's is 4, as Vim deflected her attack, Magnas lost... well face in the pride meaning of the word. The Reasonable and Gravas haven't joined into the combat yet and thus haven't lost any CP. That fine with you?)

Magnas blinks then grinds her teeth in anger, "Gravas! Help me to take down this annoying god!"

Gravas grins, "Alright, then let's do this!"

At this, Gravas quickly forms a sphere of water as Magnas charges it with electricity the two fling a combined whip of lightning and water at the petal. (Magnas' Power (2) + Gravas' Power (2) + Gravas' Skill: Water Laser (2) = 6)

(Pretty sure that Magnas' and Vim's powers over their domains cancel out and it reverts to being Power vs. Power in the first part of conflict)

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

(Yeah, that's okay.)

The trail tilts up at the coming whip, seemingly curiously. The whip collides with the petal with a blast of light..... and around two dozen electric eels fall down into he river.

(I'm using power 4 and Miracle Worker 3 to defend that, because if it cuts down the cost of life related miracles it should be enough to make mundane animals easily.)

[Tsubasa & Wen Tien]

(Ok, so let's see, that's a total of 7 vs. 6. CP: Magnas (17), Gravas (19), Vim (25))

Magnas and Gravas blink at the unusual defense before yelling out, "Reasonable! You think you can do anything to help us? I don't think we're strong enough with just our own power, we're going to need your help!"

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

"Look at it." he replies, pointing to the entity that had now turned it's attention to the rivers new population of eels, bouncing between each one before the confused creatures swam down into the water. They all submerged completely and the entity let out a tone like the sound of a small bell.

"Do you think your lives are in any danger?" He asks.

(Presences 3, Oratory 3. Have my computer back, so I'm copying his stat block to the wiki now.)

[Tsubasa & Wen Tien]

Gravas looks at the petal then looks back at the Reasonable, "If our lives weren't in danger, we'd be able to communicate with it. Can you communicate with it? I highly doubt it from the way it just 'rang' like a bell."

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

He shrugs and floats down to water level. "Excuse me?" he says hopefully. This begets no response. Putting his hand on his chin, he extends one arm outward and waves it back and forth quickly. The movement seems to attract it, and it flows over, following the movement of the hand with what was almost certainly its head. He slows down, the thing bobbing along with the hand until he stops. He gets the impression that the entity is confused by this, and it floats down and taps taps the hand a few times.

He shakes his head (causing the thing to look up at his his face) before turning to the pair. "I'm not even sure it knows it's under attack."

[Tsubasa & Wen Tien]

"Is that so," Gravas replies. "Then how about you find a way to make it avoid doing things like this unexpectedly in places where mortals tread. I'm sure that they don't need surprises like this... Nor do we."

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

"I wonder." He said, floating away to the other side of the river. He picked one of the (rapidly growing, he saw) plant stalks and, with a exertion of power, turned it into a bug.

The entity stopped what it was doing and floated over to him, before looking down and following to bug.

"Nova." He said. "It must have come here because it felt all that power Nova unleashed." He watched as the thing chased the bug into the plants. "It must have been going somewhere else when it got sidetracked in the Five Isles. Because it's stupid."

He looked around at the extreme fertility of the area around him. "First things first is to get it somewhere nothing grows, because this is going to be a jungle if we don't." He exerted power power in his finger to catch it's attention then started to lead it away from the waters edge and into the desert.

[Tsubasa & Wen Tien]

"Very well," Magnas replies. "We'll follow you to see what happens, unless you'd rather us not."

Gravas looks around, then nods in agreement.

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

"That would be very kind of you." He says, leading the thing away from where things could grow. The thing, to it's credit, bobbed along obediently.

"MASTER! WAIT." Called out the giant. "WHERE SHOULD I GO? DIRECT ME!" He said, stomping out into the desert after them.

On the opposite shore, on the old land road to the city, the first mate looked to his captain. "How are we going to explain this, sir?"

The Captain looked at the ship disappearing into the distance and put an arm around his first mate. He cast his gave weary his weary men and pulled the ships funds out of his coat. "We're going to get drunk and pretend we hallucinated this."

Th entire crew agreed that that was as fine a plan as they'd ever heard.

[Tsubasa & Wen Tien]

Gravas floats up to the giant's shoulder and sits there whistling various songs about sailing.