polymods: (Default)
polymods ([personal profile] polymods) wrote in [community profile] polylogs2022-01-02 12:44 pm

Got the morbs.

POLYMYTHOS: VICTORIA'S SECRET

VICTORIA'S SECRET


Ⅰ. ARRIVAL & THE TEMPLE
You can read all about your character's arrival in the game lore.
The ferry pulls into port in the evening, when shadows are long and gas lamps burn through a veil of mist. Dozens of other ships are docked as well, with men unloading crates and boxes from their holds. Beyond the wet wood and lapping sound of the ocean, a city looms like a charcoal smudge on a purple sky. The air is smoggy and thick, and the river that flows from the sea into the city smells foul. Walk the cobbled streets and you will find that the city is crowded and filthy, but full of merchants, pubs, and theatres. Vast wealth and extreme poverty exist side by side.

In the center of the sprawling city is a temple with towering gothic spires and huge stained glass windows depicting all manner of beings that might be gods or angels or monsters. You could look for hours and still be finding new figures plucked straight from books of myth and religion. Inside, the main chamber has a grand vaulted ceiling, and dozens of pews line the aisle up to the altar, which is oddly anticlimactic compared to the lavish surroundings: just a plain stone table with a lit oil lamp in the centre. Two hallways branch off on either side of the room: one leads to private baths and a communal kitchen, the other to monastic style chambers with thin beds. Not the most comfortable place to stay, but it’ll do in a pinch!

Alternatively you can venture into the city and find yourself some other lodging - every Traveler has been supplied with some pocket money. Just be careful that it isn’t stolen by some street urchin. Travelers can also find an era-appropriate outfit that will fit them perfectly laid in the first sleeping chamber they visit.

Notes:
1. Unless this is your character’s first island, the High Temple and anything you may have stored there is off-limits this month.

2. Please remember to mark threads appropriately with Content Warnings when necessary.

3. The city greatly resembles Victorian London, and the technology and general way of life is all of that era. Feel free to explore the city! These prompts are a jumping off point - how they affect your character and their development is up to you.

4. Most food is safe to eat, and is consumable by non-human entities. Most. Some of it’s going to be pretty gross or cooked improperly, so be careful.

5. The people in the city are normal humans unless otherwise indicated. Killing them is possible and will affect the colour grading of your Scrywatch depending on the situation.

6. Have fun!



Ⅱ. SEANCE
CW: grief, past trauma.
Perhaps you overhear talk of it at a pub, or maybe you’re handed a small card as you push your way through the crowded city streets. Maybe you just wander in by accident. However it happens, you find yourself being ushered into the parlour of one Miss Mary Price: Spiritualist.

You and several other people are instructed to sit at a round table in a very dark and musty room. The walls are covered in thick black curtains, and maybe you’re the type to suspect that there’s someone hiding behind them somewhere. Once everyone is seated, Mary Price herself enters the room. The lights are all extinguished save for a single candle.

Mary calls out to the spirits. They communicate through a series of knocks, or the movement of a Ouija board. Someone at the table is put in contact with a deceased aunt who reveals the location of a family heirloom. Someone else is able to say goodbye to a son.

Mary Price looks at you with eyes so dark they look black, and asks, “What haunts you?”

Maybe you answer honestly. Maybe you don’t answer at all, but that doesn’t matter because the spirit tapping around the room is more than happy to narc on you and tell the whole room what or who it is that you cannot forget.

You can deny it all you like, but the spirits don’t have a reason to lie. And if you try to mess up the seance, you will spend a month being hounded by an angry poltergeist.

Notes:
1. The spirit can communicate through knocks, the Ouija, actually vocalising through the medium, or via ectoplasm.

2. What haunts your character does not have to be the memory of a dead person. It can be an event - maybe they’ve never gotten over losing that science fair in grade three. It is the feeling of being haunted that is important.

3. If you choose to trash the seance, the spirit will follow you for the rest of the month. It can range from annoying to actually dangerous.



Ⅲ. THE RIPPER
CW: murder, gore, violence.
You’re lost at night. Maybe you were in the pub too late, or maybe you were searching for more illicit fun - weren’t there opium dens around this time? - or maybe you just weren’t keeping an eye on the time. However it happened, you’re on the streets in the dark.

It’s very foggy; you can barely see a foot in front of you. The streetlamps look like dimly burning ghosts and when the odd person passes you they are felt more than seen, just a darker shadow in a world of shifting shades.

Very suddenly you hear a scream - short, and swallowed up quickly by the fog. Still, it’s enough to get you to turn and hurry down a narrow alleyway.

Sprawled on the ground amid a lake of blood is a body. It’s immediately apparent that this person is probably beyond help - their throat has been slashed ear to ear. Your appearance was not expected, however, and you can see that you’ve startled the killer: they’re running down the alley in the opposite direction.

You have a few choices: you can chase the killer and attempt to catch them, you can try to help the victim, you can get the authorities, or you can just walk away.

What will you do?

Notes:
1. The inspiration for this prompt is Jack the Ripper but you do not have to use that case as a basis for your killer.

2. You can get as involved with this as you would like. You can have your character catch the killer in a chase, or form your very own detective squad and hunt them down that way.

3. Naturally, walking away from a potential serial killer might not be great for your Scrywatch grading!



Ⅳ. RESURRECTION MEN
CW: dead bodies, grave robbing.
You’re not entirely clear on how you agreed to this. Maybe it was a barroom bet gone wrong. Maybe you’re broke enough that you need money fast. Or maybe you want to help some wannabe medical students. However it happened, you’re in the cemetery.

And you’ve got a shovel.

Time to rob some graves! You’ve convinced yourself somehow that this isn’t morally reprehensible, and so you and your partner are just going to get down to business! What corpse should you unearth? You feel like a kid in a candy store!

The problem comes once you’ve unearthed the body because it seems terribly familiar. Which is… creepy. Creepier still when it starts talking.

Maybe it’s a family member, or an old friend. Maybe an ex partner. Whoever it is, they immediately start telling your fellow grave robber about some incident from your past that you just. Can’t. Let. Go. Of. And even if you whack it with a shovel it won’t stop. Bad corpse! BAD Corpse!

Which of course is exactly what you have to try and do if you want this chatty Cathy of a corpse to shut the hell up.

Notes:
1. If you do NOT let go of this past event, the corpse will follow you the rest of the night singing Henry the Eighth I am, I am.

Sometimes I can still hear his voice...


Network · Logs · OOC · Memes · Plurk

mewnifestos: (Default)

iii

[personal profile] mewnifestos 2022-01-06 11:28 pm (UTC)(link)
[ Rather than visiting dodgy seances, Anders has been making himself at home in the local pubs, and thus is rather unprepared for random fireballs being lobbed his way. It's probably a minor miracle he isn't more than singed, as he steps out onto the street - just the edges of his fancy new coat, fur-lined at the lapels (the only piece of the era appropriate garb he's personally appropriated).

Anders has a bottle in his hand that he, also miraculously, hasn't dropped, as he pats down the lightly smouldering arm curled around his chest, spinning lightly on his heel. He's only prepared to take offense once he's certain he isn't on fire - but then the shock of the moment fades, anyway, and recognition is at least something of a relief. ​]


Your technique's improving, I'll give you that. Aim's a tad off, though.
unkindled_madness: (irritated)

[personal profile] unkindled_madness 2022-01-07 12:10 am (UTC)(link)
[Sephiroth doesn't apologize. Anders is clearly fine, so Sephiroth's gaze sweeps past him, searching. There's no visible sign of the poltergeist, for the moment, and he lets out a low growl of irritation.]

Something is following me.

[He wouldn't be as worked up if that was all it was, but he's happy to latch onto that in lieu of dwelling on the real cause.]
mewnifestos: (Default)

[personal profile] mewnifestos 2022-01-07 03:42 am (UTC)(link)
Something... you want to set on fire?

[ Anders looks over his own shoulder warily, turning back to regard the empty street. Sure, there are a few stragglers here and there, gathered under those flickering gas lamps - but they're far enough down it doesn't look like any one of them could have been Sephiroth's target. ]

Well, that isn't good.
unkindled_madness: (irritated)

[personal profile] unkindled_madness 2022-01-07 02:24 pm (UTC)(link)
Apparitions are weak against fire... but they're only vulnerable when they show themselves.

[The nearest lamp abruptly goes out, as if the poltergeist is trying to emphasize how little power fire has over it.]
mewnifestos: (Default)

[personal profile] mewnifestos 2022-01-08 01:10 am (UTC)(link)
Apparitions? What, you mean like ghosts?

[ Which aren't weak to much, to the best of Anders' knowledge. (Which, admittedly, isn't much.)

He takes a few steps toward Sephiroth, still cradling his side and still warily watching the street. ]


That's just what this place needs, isn't it? A haunting.
unkindled_madness: (arms folded)

[personal profile] unkindled_madness 2022-01-08 01:18 am (UTC)(link)
Supposedly. It could be some other manner of magic.

[He glances at Anders.]

Don't tell me you're afraid of ghosts.
mewnifestos: (Default)

[personal profile] mewnifestos 2022-01-11 01:39 am (UTC)(link)
Vengeful spirits, back from the dead to torment the living ceaselessly? Don't tell me you're not afraid of ghosts.

[ Anyone sane would have to be, as far as Anders is concerned - but, then again, this is Sephiroth. He'll probably claim to be afraid of nothing without batting an eye. ]

What makes you think you're being haunted, in the first place?
unkindled_madness: (arms folded)

[personal profile] unkindled_madness 2022-01-11 01:47 am (UTC)(link)
They're little more than shadows.

[Yep, zero fears, and not the greatest mental health here.]

...I was at a seance. [He says the word a little too clearly, having just recently learned it.] The woman claimed to be capable of speaking to the dead.
mewnifestos: (Default)

[personal profile] mewnifestos 2022-01-11 02:12 am (UTC)(link)
Ha! Hardly. And I've spent enough time with shadows to know.

[ Their opinions may differ, but their lack of comprehensive mental healthcare (or, like, any kind) is the same.

Sephiroth's answer does raise a brow, though, both in that someone would so openly be doing such a thing, and that he, of all people, would end up there. Questions for another, less haunted time, perhaps. ]


Oh, well, there's your problem. Sounds like rather foul magic at work, if you ask me.
unkindled_madness: (irritated)

[personal profile] unkindled_madness 2022-01-11 02:27 am (UTC)(link)
[Apparently the poltergeist takes offense to "foul magic" and chucks someone's lost shoe in Anders' direction.]

...it's irritating, but I didn't expect anything foul. I just didn't think they would have much to say in this state.

[Sephiroth gets a loose brick for that remark, which he steps back to avoid. Plenty to say, this one!]
mewnifestos: (Default)

[personal profile] mewnifestos 2022-01-12 02:07 am (UTC)(link)
Hey—!

[ He's not quick enough to fend it off, but he does get an arm up in time. Not the one holding his liquor, but the one cradling the conspicuous bulge in the side of his coat. Out drops Ser Pounce, landing on his little cat feet, but looking muzzy and half asleep as he blinks. ​]

'They'? Who's 'they'? [ Other than the one responsible for chucking shoes at him and his cat, that is. He's watching the street warily again - or, rather, anything on it that looks liable to come flying his direction next. ] And what do they want from you?
unkindled_madness: (wtf)

[personal profile] unkindled_madness 2022-01-12 02:19 am (UTC)(link)
Whatever deceased the woman managed to conjure. How should I know what it wants?

[He can't talk to ghosts and it absolutely did not communicate anything intelligible before he left, nope, not a thing. While he's also attempting to survey the nearby street, he does have to give Anders a Look for he feline that drops out of his coat. He had assumed the bulge was something less animate. More booze perhaps.]

...did you steal a cat?
mewnifestos: (Default)

[personal profile] mewnifestos 2022-01-13 05:21 am (UTC)(link)
Well it's after you for a reason, I assume.

[ More booze would've been a good idea, really, considering the mess he's stumbled into. Ghosts are probably the last thing on the long list of horrible things he's been attacked by, and although it's just been a shoe, so far, Anders isn't exactly pleased to complete the set.

Although that question does distract him for a moment, as he glances down at the orange tabby now idly grooming itself by his feet. ​]


What? No, of course not. Ser Pounce-a-Lot is my cat. He was a gift from home.
unkindled_madness: (arms folded)

[personal profile] unkindled_madness 2022-01-13 03:16 pm (UTC)(link)
I suppose it dislikes me.

[He's just unlikeable. There's no specific reason like maybe the part where he interrupted it and stormed out.

He watches the cat for a moment. It seems unremarkable and also entirely unconcerned.]


...is the cat special in some way?
mewnifestos: (Default)

[personal profile] mewnifestos 2022-01-16 01:44 am (UTC)(link)
With your charming personality? How could it?

[ If possible, he may be more sarcastic when he's drinking.

Though nothing could ever take the edge off his offense at that patently absurd question. ]


Is he special? He's a cat. Of course he is. [ To emphasize the point, Pounce does a little stretch and stands up to regard Sephiroth quietly. It is entirely coincidental. ]
unkindled_madness: (curiosity)

[personal profile] unkindled_madness 2022-01-16 01:54 am (UTC)(link)
[Yes, good, Anders understands his point.

Sephiroth regards the cat right back. A brief staring contest, perhaps, cat-eye to cat-eye. He doesn't dislike cats, just... doesn't understand the point of pets.]


...I see.

[But then his attention is drawn by a loud rapping sound along a nearby wall. Apparently the ghost doesn't want the cat stealing the show.]
mewnifestos: (Default)

[personal profile] mewnifestos 2022-01-16 02:07 am (UTC)(link)
[ Anders forgets, momentarily, about proving his point at that distractingly loud rapping. He drops down to scoop Pounce up, and the cat slinks over his shoulders in a fluid motion, obviously familiar with using Anders as his main mode of transportation. ]

Have you tried apologizing to it? You know, for whatever you must have done to offend it.
unkindled_madness: (skeptical)

[personal profile] unkindled_madness 2022-01-16 02:11 am (UTC)(link)
...you expect me to apologize to a ghost?

[Ridiculous. He barely apologizes to living people.

Besides, the ghost started it.]
mewnifestos: (Default)

[personal profile] mewnifestos 2022-01-17 03:57 am (UTC)(link)
You do want it to stop eventually, don't you?

[ And, like, maybe apologizing won't work. But it's better than getting bricks chucked at your head, right??

Actually, Sephiroth might not think so, Anders realizes, and starts to consider drawing up a glyph to protect himself, should this escalate. ]
unkindled_madness: (eyeroll)

[personal profile] unkindled_madness 2022-01-17 03:40 pm (UTC)(link)
[Sephiroth regards Anders flatly for a moment longer, but he's not quite so stubborn that he isn't willing to try it. A few simple words to rid himself of a pest. He has a glance around and then addresses the air:]

My apologies for interrupting your little spelling game.

[The real problem here is that he's incapable of sounding sincere, and there's a clear air of "now get lost before I burn you" in his tone.

The ghost decides to untie his bootlaces.]
mewnifestos: (Default)

[personal profile] mewnifestos 2022-01-21 01:04 am (UTC)(link)
[ Oh, come on. Even children can do better than that! Lying children!! Anders knows, because that is him. He's hardly ever apologized sincerely for anything in his life, and he's very obviously judging Sephiroth's form, here, drunk or not. ]

Well, it was nice knowing you. When this haunting results in your untimely demise, I'll be sure to give a nice eulogy at your funeral.
unkindled_madness: (lineface)

[personal profile] unkindled_madness 2022-01-21 01:39 am (UTC)(link)
I am not going to be done in by a ghost.

[But he will be appropriately wary as he crouches down to tie his boots, lest any more bricks come flying his way.]
mewnifestos: (Default)

[personal profile] mewnifestos 2022-01-23 05:02 am (UTC)(link)
Oh, that's going to make a fun epitaph.

[ Because he absolutely will be done in by a ghost, if he keeps on with this. How can he fight what he can't see?? Impossible. ]
unkindled_madness: (arms folded)

[personal profile] unkindled_madness 2022-01-23 03:02 pm (UTC)(link)
[It's entirely possible, and anyway, if the extent of the ghost's power is untying his shoelaces and throwing things, then how could it possibly murder him? But he's a little annoyed that Anders doesn't see this, so:]

...I'll haunt you, when I'm gone.
mewnifestos: (Default)

[personal profile] mewnifestos 2022-01-28 01:34 am (UTC)(link)
[ It's obviously just ramping up. Trying to unsettle him before going in for the kill. Classic haunting, doesn't he ever read any good books?? ]

Oh, please. You can barely tolerate me alive. You wouldn't waste your afterlife.

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