kenoscomm | Entries tagged with ennead: set

[ Frieren's mind opens up; as before, on the surface it's a calm, smooth pond. She's not quite used to this, so the connection (at first) is a touch tentative and then as she feels her way forward it opens more until she thinks she's finally ready. ]

I have a question for all of you. And you may consider it a simple matter of curiosity; I won't take offense at being ignored.

[ There's a pause, as if she's collecting her thoughts. ]

How many of you are long-lived species? Or long-lived by virtue of who you are? My kind are rare, even in my world, so I can't assume others will be particularly more common here, at the end of the universe.

[ It's an open question. ]

appeale

Hey.

[ even to those who have only encountered Rudbeckia's presence in passing via Communion, something is noticeably different. her mind has always been something warm and friendly, deliberately appealing to make others feel at ease; she herself would withdraw timidly from the touch of another's mind, always guarded and cautious while doing her best not to seem so.

now, the landscape that surrounds her is unwelcoming and barren. those red sands that used to warm her feet have turned cold. and most significantly, not a trace of fear remains in her – but it isn't courage, or strength, or confidence that has changed her.

the impression of her blank stare is that of someone who stands on a ledge uncaring of which way she might fall. ]

What the hell did you guys do in the Oracle trial?

leicesters

[Claude's communion prescence has always been like a summer breeze; warm, easygoing, albeit difficult to read before it moves on. Now it has more of a brittle, bitter quality, like a looming dust-cloud he has to hold at a distance. There's no going back from this point when he knows things will only escalate from here, and so now seems like an important time to address his fellow Meri.]

The fight for the next Oracle will be on us soon. The Tribune may have been slain, but he entrusted the future of the worlds to us. Though he won't be able to help us see this through, we can still fight for him, and all the others we've lost along the way. We can fight for Springstar... and we can fight for Quetzalcoatl.

[There's a brief pause on this point. Her death deserves respect and acknowledgement, and she may not be the last to meet such a fate before the fighting is over.]

...We'll fight for your homes, too. After all, our worlds aren't that different, right? They might be flawed in their own ways, and there might even be some of you who would rather stay here when this is done. But every world and the life on it is precious, and it beats whatever phony world Yima and her followers come up with.

Speaking of Yima: I've discussed this with a few people already, but I suspect she's still alive. When the Blight almost destroyed Kenos, somehow she was still around. When I asked her about it, she said she wasn't bound by time like a normal person is. She can exist in different times and different places simultaneously; I don't know how it works, but maybe she even foresaw this attempt on her life before it even happened.

That said, it's just speculation, so we might as well play dumb and behave towards Zenith as if we're convinced she's dead for now. It'll be easier for us that way.

[Others have probably arrived at a similar conclusion, perhaps people among Zenith's ranks too, but it bears saying, particularly for those newly arrived to the conflict.]

Anyway, enough about her -- how about we use this opportunity for a little strategy get-together? We have a few new faces around, so feel free to introduce yourself and your capabilities.

For those of us who have been around longer, feel free to toss in an introduction too. More importantly, share what you know about Zenith and its current capabilities, in combat or otherwise. Any insight into their current thinking would be useful right now, too. What's their morale like? We know by now that some of them really hate our guts, and I wonder how much their desire for revenge is going to play into the next battle...

[He sounds casual, almost flippant, but there's a serious point in there he's sure he doesn't need to overstate: the more loyal Zenites are going to have some serious motivation in the next battle to get back at them, whether they believe Yima is gone or not.]

Let's not let our own judgement be clouded by revenge, even if we've sustained losses. We need to go into this with a clear head, looking toward the future.

Oh-- on that note, Hayame wants to speak with some of you about some further strategising either before or after the Oracle. Sorry that's a little vague, but I'm sure she'll talk to you about it properly when the time comes. For now, let's just focus on one thing at a time.

tattooism

Good evening, Kenos...

[The sense of Communion is less of a solid thing, an actual face or clear voice, and more of a sensation of smoke curling in the air, seeping into your senses late at night with a husky rumble and a fluffy(?), warm embrace.]

You must forgive me for calling during such a, hmm, fraught time... I take it to understand some VIPs have been killed... ? And then there was that dreadful light beam thing... Goodness, I've had so many tattoo clients the last few weeks I've barely managed to leave my studios to sate my hungers, let alone keep up with politics. I am an artist, you see, first and foremost.

Well, as an honorary Zenite I suppose I should at least be concerned that some wayward Meridian ruffian is going to sneak into my home and poison the poor Shard in my safekeeping to make it explode, like what happened to poor Mr. Michaelis'? I did see that...

[👁]

But I have something a little more personal to ask you.

Despite my long and adventurous life, you see, I have never been blessed with children of my own... So perhaps my maternal instincts are somewhat lacking? I am a little unsure as to how to handle the situation I find myself unwittingly embroiled in, so...

What does one do to gently encourage three young men with questionable hygiene practices to stop squatting in a small guest room with insufficient mattress numbers and become respectable and enterprisingly self-sufficient citizens of Highstorm?

I would appreciate any and all input on this pressing matter. Thank you~ ❤️

[A moment later, as if she had remembered this very important detail, she returns to Communion to add, (filtered away from a Certain Zenite Air BNB Host and His Three Tenants):]

Oh- And, apparently sex is off the table, so. Solutions that are not that, please! 💋

baltimores

[ This isn't exactly something he does. Not on this scale, at least.

This communion's presence is akin to stepping off into the vacuum of space, cold and dark and empty. A void without feeling, submersed into nothingness — but deep enough there's also the faint pulse of a drowned, hurting heart. And even though it's coming from Amos, there's the sense of him curiously poking at it like an open wound.

It has been a couple of weeks since he killed Cyrus, a fact he has not bothered to hide. A couple of weeks since he has been forced to contend with the responsibility he bears for the deaths of innocents in Springstar, and so — ]

Hey.

[ When he speaks his voice is soft, and gentle, and something that could maybe even be called repentant. Or at least trying to be, the concept being a very, very, very new one for him. ]

So, I've been doing some thinking. There was this time I got caught up in a mass casualty event. Lady I knew then was a nurse, so she was doing what she could, because it had to be done. She also took the time to spend time with the dead. All of them, I think. I didn't really get it then, but I think maybe now...

[ He trails off, fumbling with his words. That pulse maybe grows a little stronger, and then he's back. ]

I dunno how feasible it is, but we should be collecting the names of everyone who died during all of this. When we make the new world — [ because there is no doubt in his mind that Zenith is going to succeed, and their new world will be made — ] we can build some kind of monument. Put everyone's names on it. Give people a space to take their moments with them, even if they ain't here anymore.

I know this don't exactly fix anything, but it's a start. I can keep track of the names. [ There's another pause, and when Amos speaks again, he's much more sure of himself. ] I won't forget them.

warmare

[Hayame had plenty to say about this disgraceful farce the moment she had regained consciousness... But she waited. She waited, so that her emotions would be as locked down and as under control as she could manage. Until only harsh anger and the burn of judgement come through- at least, for now.

First, she addresses only Meridian.]

I hope you are proud of yourself.

Those of you who have been too weak to commit properly to this cause, content to let those with drive and will do the winning of Oracles on your and your world's behalf.

Those of you who claim allegiance to Meridian but have been content to play "neutral" and hide like a weak little bug in the shadow of those more powerful than you.

Those of you who could not draw a single line in the sand and loved playing friend or whore too much to break off relations with people working to ensure that the lives of everyone in your world are snuffed out permanently.

Those of you who have refused to shatter the shards of our enemies, whining about the sanctity of a soul, even though that is the only way to kill someone properly in this twisted world.

Mourn that sun goddess for the power she possessed that our faction has lost. Mourn the kindness she showed you, if you so wish. But I will impart a lesson unto you- If someone is kind to everyone, then their kindness means absolutely nothing. That empty-headed fool of a woman had her shard shattered by the very man whose shard she protected, after I and another killed him in the labyrinth of the Harbinger Oracle trial. If she had given that foul thing back to us so that I might crush it beneath my hoof, then she would be alive today.

That is what kindness of that nature will reap you. A disgraceful public execution at the hands of a wizened, corpse-gnawing gaki barely managing the veneer of a man.

If you wish to dedicate yourself further to the actual cause you claim to serve, or if you wish to train and empower yourself, I will gladly help you. It would be my honor.

But if your plan is to continue living the sort of shameful existence that helped allow for the assassination of Springstar's Tribune at his own godsdamned home, then either purge yourself of that treacherous weakness... or I will try to find the time in my days to do it for you.

[Maybe this is where she could stop, take a breath... But she does not. The rest, cold and hateful and roiling with anger, is said to everyone, Zenite and Unharmonized alike.]

To all those who still claim allegiance to Zenith... I will not waste breath trying to convince you of anything at all, let alone now, after what your faction has wrought upon countless innocents. Whether you are a poor thing who would abandon every life in your world simply because you were treated badly, whether you are a pathetic thing who cannot muster the will to hope for anything but that sacred bitch on high and a committee of degenerates making a new world for you to exist in, or whether you are a sick thing who delights in watching worlds burn and people die... I, Hayame of Echigo, do not care, and I will not show mercy to one any more than the other.

Unlike, it seems, the many dishonorable among you, I say this to you plainly and clearly.

I will disable you if I see you step foot in Springstar.

I will hunt down your cornerstones and smash them to pieces.

And I will kill you if you put yourself between me and the possibility of returning to my world and my duty.

... Ah, yes. To those of you who have still not chosen a side, even after seeing what has occurred this moon... My advice to you is to stay Unharmonized, to pick up a hoe, and to go tend crops in Alenroux. You obviously lack the determination required for this conflict... and the people require food. Go on.

If you need a recommendation for a farmer looking for labor, I know plenty. Do you fancy turnips, or buckwheat?

fursuit

[ It’s about two weeks after the chaos that’s hit Highstorm and Springstar both. The dust has had time to settle and people have started to pick themselves back up. And in that busy time, the Shard-Bearers of Kenos are touched by someone new. It’s a mind that gives the impression of vastness in the way that other gods and similarly supernatural creatures have. There’s dark, fragrant smoke of copal, and the humid heat of a rainforest. It probably feels faintly familiar to some, since there’s just a hint of that warmth that feels similar to a certain sun god(dess)…

But as it focuses, that warmth seems to be coming from a campfire, perhaps oddly. The logs around it offer you a “seat”, whether proverbial or not, and it’s only if you take one that the speak themselves will come into more focus. But the introduction that comes with it is much cooler (in both senses of the word) than the bubbly Quetzalcoatl. ]

Yo.

[ …Is that how the newest god is greeting the masses? Yep. Apparently so. ]

I talked to enough people when Kenos was jerking me around [ no, that was me, the player, ] that Communion is just more efficient. So, for those I’ve met and for those I haven’t, consider this a more formal greeting. You’ve removed my brother Quetzalcoatl and allowed me to descend in his stead.

[ And even though he’s identified Quetzalcoatl as his brother… The smirk in that statement is unmistakable. He’s pleased that Quetzalcoatl is dead. For those that know the mythology of the Aztec pantheon even faintly, this wouldn’t be a surprise at all, since Quetzalcoatl only has one enemy that would be glad to see the feathered serpent fall. ]

Name’s Tezcatlipoca. Tloque nahuaque. [ The Nahuatl is spoken with a sense of power that’s subtle, but still raw, even though there’s no one that would understand it. Still, it conveys the idea well enough—this is no minor god of that pantheon. ] If you know me, great, and if you don’t, well. Met your god Set one of the times I was stoppin’ by, and our whole deal is similar enough. I am conflict, so in the spirit of fairness, I’ve thrown my lot in with Zenith. Can’t have two gods that oversee war and conflict on the same side, yeah?

[ There’s humor in his tone that makes it seem like it’s a joke, but… No. It’s not. That’s a pretty significant part of his rationale for picking Zenith. Thanks Set!/Don’t worry about. ]

Anyways. All that formal shit aside, easy one to follow it all up. Ain’t often that I got a human body to enjoy getting fucked up. So, if you’ve got a preference for weed, hit me up. Workin’ on somethin’ artisanal there, but I wanna know the poisons of preference for the locals. Let me know what you get fucked up on, and I might even make it worth your while.

[ …So. You know. That’s one way to introduce yourself. ]

cutlery

[ By the time Sebastian reaches out in Communion, he’s already felt the fullness of his rage and taken it out. Viciously. It’s an occasion where he’s grateful for what Ryad provides, lest he had to express it in a more troublesome way.

Sebastian’s usual affect is warm and friendly, if with a polite distance, but today, it’s ice cold. His Communion is always expressed as something dark, but there’s a secondary sensation that comes today as well. It’s the unsettling sensation of being watched that makes someone’s hair raise. After all, there’s uncountable eyes in that abyssal dark. ]

I shall be brief. Someone broke into my home a few days ago and left a “gift” most unwelcome. A Shard belonging to someone from my home. Yet, though I kept it isolated to inspect it further, that did not seem to matter. It infected the Shard that Lady Yima gave me. A Shard that is now no more, for it burst. The soul that was in that little rock is no more.

[ His voice becomes more tense at that last sentence. It’s clear he’s very intentionally holding back his temper significantly. ]

I make this announcement for my fellow Zenites’ sake that they might destroy any they come upon immediately. Also to inform them that there is a way for these Shards to be tampered with that has been exploited. But let me also be clear.

I will find whoever was unwise enough to step into my home and play with my pet. I went through great lengths to obtain that soul, and I do not take kindly to being robbed of it. But there is no need for threats beyond that, is there?

[ So he says, but it’s crystal clear—Whoever it was, they’re in grave danger if they’re discovered. ]

tresemme

[ if you’re lucky, you’ve never heard this voice before. if you have, you’ll probably notice that he seems considerably less grouchy than he did making his greeting rounds in springstar and highstorm. tony has had time to settle in, and more importantly, he’s made some big decisions about what side he wants to support here.

…for now, at least, which is the quiet motivation behind his demanding communion. he seems utterly at home invading people’s minds, and there’s the sense of him stretching out like he’s been here the whole time and was just waiting for you to get home. ]

People here are from all different worlds, right?

[ rhetorical question, and he continues. ]

I want to hear from whoever’s been to Terra. The third planet in the Sol System. I know some of you call it Earth—the fact that you have a name for it means that you know about it. [ a pause. ] I’ll torture the knowledge out of you if I have to, but it’s easier for everyone if you just cough it up.

[ that seems to be the end of that, unless you’re a zenite, to which he then narrows his focus. ]

…sorry if you heard me say I want all the humans to die. I know we have to work together.

sterngaze

[A couple weeks after the conclusion of the Exalt Oracle trial, a communion message goes out to all Kenos’s shard-bearers — at a brisk mid-morning hour for Springstar residents, and evening for those night owls in Highstorm. Surely an agreeable enough time for all, yes? The voice will be familiar enough to anyone who listened in on the ambassador talk a Kenos month ago; it’s Liem, ~~mayor of Alenroux~~ Meridian’s resident straight man.]

Greetings, everyone. I have some updates to share regarding efforts to make Alenroux fully and safely inhabitable, which I hope you will be pleased to hear.

Last month, prior to the events surrounding the Oracle, a contingent of Springstar military overseen by several shard-bearers launched a multi-pronged expedition north into Alenroux’s forests, in order to locate the source of the monsters that continue to infest the woods. While I’m sure those of you who frequent Alenroux will have noticed that the flow of especially dangerous, augmented creatures mostly died off after the dismantling of Aetós’s underground facility, we have not been able to expunge the general monster population from the forest despite ongoing efforts, so this was an attempt to remedy that.

These expeditionary forces succeeded in locating three separate cornerstones and portals that were previously disgorging monsters. At this time we think it likely that they were connected to the timestream in some way that allowed creatures from other worlds to come through, but the portals themselves proved extremely hazardous to life attempting to breach from this side. All three have now been destroyed, and while we cannot say with certainty that there are no further portals out there, we are optimistic that this will allow the danger to those living in Alenroux to be further reduced by the joint forces still stationed there.

If you have further questions, you may direct them to me, or to Hayame, Akua Sahelian, Keitaro Miura, Gray, Byleth Eisner, Link, Kim Dokja, or Dee. [He means D.]

Profile

Kenos Communion

KENOS (Communion)

Entries tagged with ennead: set

[Open]

communion; open to all.

LOCKED TO MERIDIAN

ota

ota;

locked to meridian + ota

techalaniani. [cw: dr...ugs...]

pop rocks

open to all | questions and apologies

open | an alenroux press release

Profile

Links

Custom Text