Unreliable Narrator

The party's just getting started.

IC: Vhisola | Ga-Metru | Vhisola's Studio Vhisola felt herself being dragged, but she couldn't talk because the disc's effect hadn't worn off. She didn't know what was going on, she didn't know who was pulling her. She was scared. OOC: drag away @Onaku

This RPG runs through March. It ends officially in the last week of March. If people want to see their characters and the story progress I'll be running another game that picks up after this game ends.

OOC: Waited too long, the cops say hi. IC: Reliable Narrator | Ga-Metru | Vhisola's Studio Even as the Informant spoke a kanoka flew from Vhisola’s launcher at him. The first freeze disc was the warning shot. She wasn’t playing around now. Vhisola was having a bad day. When she came home she’d hoped things would get better. With the standoff she’d weighed her options: she couldn’t outrun Okuo let alone the bigger ones, she certainly couldn’t hide anywhere, so taking aggressive action was all she had left. Vhisola hated having bad days. “I said get out of my house!” Even as the disc flew towards Informant whatever glass still rested in the frame of the floor to ceiling windows exploded as a squad of bordakh began squeezing themselves into the already cramped apartment. Vhisola had no clue how they got here so fast, but she was grateful for their arrival. She heard more scrambling down the hallway towards her open front door. The bordakh fired stun staves at everyone, discs careening off the walls and breaking dishes in the kitchen. The robotic police were interested in control of the situation, not in preserving anyone inside just yet. A disc hit Vhisola and her body seized up, knees buckling as her body tumbled to the ground in the friendly fire. Her breath came in ragged shallow gasps. It would wear off, she thought. It would wear off, right?

I'm so glad you like the puzzles! Making puzzles is one of my actual jobs. If you all like these disc puzzles, get prepped for what I'm bringing in April. Them gonna' be some chonky puzzles.

IC: a... lizard I guess? | Le-Metru | The Notch I dreamed this morning of being in high school. My seifuku was in the Spring variant. A new year began! I could smell the cherry blossoms and umaboshi plum musubi. Senpai noticed me after I ran through the hallways with a hose full of cactus juice. He was beautiful and scaly, just the kind of senpai for me. And then I woke up on my rock. I was a lizard. I ate a bug. It was time to search the trash. Water made a circle around me. I would not drown. I am a brave lizard. I ate the water. I ate it until I could roll away. I am so full. I wish I could go back to dreaming. I must find more bugs.

IC: Astrologist Nixie | Ga-Metru | The Great Temple "The stars tell our natural destiny, if we watch closely," Nixie said. "Thank you for visiting The Great Temple. If you wish to pray, you are welcome to find an open alcove." She bowed softly, then departed from Toa Tekmo leaving him with the small dried flower in his hands to wonder at the fragility of the world's balance. OOC: @Toru Nui IC: Reliable Narrator | Le-Metru | The Notch As Sans went on his gentle ride through the chutes the trip continued at the same pace. It almost felt like a joke. The Notch, famed for its thrilling and dangerous chutes, couldn't possibly be this easy? The chute he was in twisted and turned like a lazy snake, his Ta-Metru disc carrying him swiftly with the current. Sans felt the chute lift up, and he was rose sharply until the chute ended with an exit port. Out of the chute Sans realized he was in a dilapidated building. A small lizard scurried along the ground looking for food in the trash left by transient matoran and the ceiling sagged where moisture had accumulated over time, dripping out into a half-full bucket with a slow plip-plip . An open area where the window used to be revealed Sans was a few stories above the transit station of The Notch where the Cartographer and the surprise matoran were sitting and having a snack. A small set of stairs led to a ladder that descended back down to the transit station. OOC: @Azibo

IC: Astrologist Nixie | Ga-Metru | Great Temple Wait," Nixie countered as Tekmo rose to leave, "let me give you something as a token of appreciation for you keeping this a secret." She reached into the satchel she carried her astrological gear in and pulled out a small book. Inside were some pressed flowers, one of her few hobbies that aided to the general contentment of her life. She pulled out one from the back pages of the small book and gave a soft sigh before handing it over. It was a small pressed flower, purple and blue, with a brown stem dried with age. "Please take this. It was from her. She gave it to me on my Name Day."

IC: Astrologist Nixie | Ga-Metru | Great Temple Nixie watched Tekmo's thoughtful silence with growing concern. She'd said something she shouldn't, and her actions caused anger and confusion. Her life was for studying stars, finding peace, and sharing the joys of The Great Spirit. Her life was not for sewing malcontent and chaos into the minds of others and the world at large. Besides, her superiors had ordered her silence on Tuyet's end. But it happened here, in the very Temple she sat in! She'd been in the room when Tuyet's star was snuffed out. She'd seen the horrible mess her killers made. She knew Turaga Dume was right to brand them as traitors and have them arrested. She'd scrubbed the floor clean while her tears fell into the soap and water. It wasn't right. Was hurting herself with silence not against the tenets of her faith as well? "Yes," Nixie said quietly. "She was. And she was the best of them."

Onu Metru Puzzle: What I loved about this puzzle was that the disc hunters bypassed a lot of the content through creative on the fly ideas. Never be afraid to try something! Since that happened I'm not revealing the secrets still on level 12. Location of the Disc: Level 12 Containment Chamber The Catch: Another matoran already got there, broke the chamber, and accidentally triggered the powers of the Great Disc (6-1-9). Each time the disc reconstituted the matoran at random, it would latch onto something else alive and slowly grow. This Abomination continually tried to escape the disc only to activate it again. Part 1: Finding The Right Floor and Location There are a number of ways to go about this puzzle. The way the disc hunters chose was to research the archives by floor level for mentions of the Great Discs. They found three floors missing all data for the past three months: 6,7, and 12. This point is solid guessing and deduction. Looking at each floor from the elevator shaft would have given the information needed. Attempting to inspect the elevator vestibule for clues would have revealed more on level 12, but the disc hunters never took that route. Instead, they exited on level 6, fought a strange black tentacle, and then continued down the trek. The discovered an intersection on level six, went into the construction zone, and found some Bohrok in stasis as well as a hole in the floor. This hole was recently created by the hunting Abomination made by the Great Disc. The disc hunters also met Kilo-M9 who had information on the Great Disc’s location and who placed it on level 12. Going down the shaft, the disc hunters skipped level 7 and went all the way down to level 12. Here they fought the Abomination as it continued to try and pull itself away from the disc. This is where Vashni did something creative: used her mask of mutation. As a GM I had to think how this would work. In the end, it made sense for the Abomination to be pulled into the shape the mask demanded, which drew the disc from its resting place to the disc hunters instead of the disc hunters going to the resting place as initially expected. Part 2: Removing the Disc from the Abomination How: Place the Abomination in some form of stasis so that it stops activating the Great Disc. The disc hunters chose to have Kilo-M9’s energy draining bubble be the answer, but there were multiple ways to weaken the Abomination and several were mentioned before being acted upon. In all, the disc hunters of Onu-Metru showed really good communication and creativity! Best of luck in Po-Metru.

IC: Reliable Narrator | Ga-Metru |Great Temple "Some scholars say the Ga-Metru disc was flung into the sea behind The Great Temple. We dove for the disc many times with nothing to show for it. The remaining members of the Mangai would know the true answer I would assume," Nixie replied. "They did hide them so many centuries ago, after they defeated the terrible Kanohi Dragon. However, since their betrayal there's been no word about the locations of the discs. And with Tuyet's death -- " Nixie stopped, a hand flying to her mouth in shock of what she'd admitted. Her eyes were wide with fear as she turned toward Tekmo. "I- I wasn't supposed to say that. Please don't tell anyone." IC: Reliable Narrator | Le-Metru | The Notch The Alpinist dove into the middle chute, hurtling down at a steeper rate than Turaga Sans. He picked up more speed, and went through more twists and turns and even a full loop! A tiny discarded hammer from a long-ago work project zipped by in the chute. It bopped the Alpinist’s shins before rattling on down the tube walls and getting stuck on the spacer gasket between two adjoining tubes. He could glimpse Sans going along his gentler track every now and then, and at one point they almost crashed as the two chutes entwined, but then the Alpinist’s chute current carried him off to more dangerous areas. Finally, the ko-matoran floating on his disk through the pressurized protodermis reached a three-pronged fork. Would he go left, right, or stay the course? He only had a moment to decide, and his keen eyes picked up the telltale colors painted above each path as they’d all seen above at the chute station. Meanwhile, the Cartographer and the Waif got to know each other a little better. They shared their meal of spiced jerky while sitting on the ground by the chutes. It was a minute or so before the Cartographer noticed something odd about the boards they’d assumed were for riding in the chutes. There were four longer than the rest and they were painted with colored circles as well as small graffiti: Sled 1: Green Circle, “Maybe” Sled 2: Red Circle, “No” Sled 3: White Circle, “Don’t Go” Sled 4: Black Circle, “Broken?” Someone had already tried to solve this puzzle and left their notes by the looks of it. Were they trustworthy? Searching around the chute station more revealed there indeed was a fourth chute. It was probably broken. There wasn’t even a mat covering the opening. A chute that required a two story vertical drop off the side of the station to even reach couldn’t possibly be active? There was even mold growing around the gasket lip of the chute in a black ring. However, painted on the ground underneath where the boards were and where the bandaged matoran slept was a black circle to the left of the other three chutes.

Jabali approved, @Darth Jaller. Loving how you wove her into the world.

And that is character growth.

Congratulations, the Onu-Metru Great Disc has been recovered!

IC Reliable Narrator | Onu-Metru Disc Hunt The effect of the bubble took hold on the mutated matoran shaped amalgamation. Vashni felt a sense of warmth and calm come from it on the psionic plane, wafting a cozy glow as the effects of the spasming and reconstituting continued to lessen. For a moment a small bit of black goo broke off into its own small crab, which scuttled across the body before merging back with the whole. While the Great Disc of Onu-Metru continued to be stuck fast to the hands, which melted in and out of form, the rest of the body maintained the shape Vashni created. Finally, the effects of Kilo-M9's actions took hold completely. The fingers pulled away from the disc. Thank you. We are free. The disc kept the goo alive, and with its removal the black substance formed from the organic components of many rahi in the archives turned to liquid protodermis in the krahli's draining bubble. Ooc: congratulations! You have the disc 6-1-9.

OOC: @Azibo, @Onaku, @EmperorWhenua, and @Crimson Jester IC: Reliable Narrator | Le-Metru | The Notch As Sans dove into the chute on the far right side, he felt the current take his frail elderly form. He was swept through the chute quickly, but not as dangerously as he expected. He rode through several twists and turns where a few chutes joined back with his route until a junction approached where the tube split into three choices: left, forward, or right. With only a moment to choose his course Sans noticed three colors painted on the walls of the junction: going left was white, going forward was green, and going right was red. OOC: @Keeper of Kraata, etc. IC: Reliable Narrator | Nynrah Wreck The air was cold and wet in the eye of the storm, and night made seeing difficult. However, Skorm’s elemental affinity for shadows made seeing in the night as easy as seeing during the day. A general inspection of the beach as he walked revealed a few things of note. First, the name of the Nynrah airship was legible. It seemed like a joke for a craft as large as this to be called The Tactical Panda, but there it was painted in gold and green. Second, there were no trees and very little plants at all. Plants here were nothing more than lichens growing on the Northern sides of boulders and seaweed bulbs washed up the sandy beach by the tide. Third, below The Tactical Panda’s dangling stern was the opening of a grotto. A small stream gurgled out from the grotto and joined the sea at the edge of the beach.

I approve of his approach, but that doesn't mean he's safe.

OOC: Pushing forward... Tunes for the road: "Commanding The Fury" from The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. IC: Reliable Narrator | South Of Destral | The Ripple As Skorm made the call, a strong gust of wind forced the vortixx pilot’s hand: he could no longer control the vessel or stop it from entering the storm. The ship and its crew were pulled into the dark mass of rain and wind and lightning. Even with the Captain's speech about the weather conditions, nothing could truly prepare them for living through it. Rain pattered against the blast ceiling of The Ripple. From the inside the crew heard it like a thunderous drum rhythm, egging them forward into the storm. They braced themselves for the worst as they flew without course, the pilot and crew doing their best to maintain altitude in the turbulence. The softest shafts of starlight glittered in the thin strip of air between ocean and roiling chaos. They mirrored on the waves below, making the ocean seem like the Heavens of another world. Inside the storm the howling gale buffeted The Ripple mercilessly, sending the airship on an unavoidable course through the slanting sheets of rain and the sudden bolts of lightning. The booming ripples of thunder were constant, like a great timpani on the inside of everyone’s heartlight making them quiver with the feeling of their own mortality against the greatness of nature. For some, the storm was home, the lightning coursing through the sky their feeling of peace and a grounding current in their lives. For others, it was sheer terror. Varxii saw them first, her gaze pulled by some indescribable elemental connection. Kanohi shaped scales glittering in the reflection of lightning, long snake-like bodies writhing in the storm, maws full of sparking electricity, the two kanohi dragons dancing eternally in the clouds. As soon as they appeared the kanohi dragons were gone, leaving everyone aboard to question if they truly saw them or if the storm addled their minds. Then, The Ripple flew out from the maelstrom and into the blissful eye of the storm. They saw the Heavens far above, the Red Star once again watching their flight from the night sky. In the eye of the storm was a solitary excuse for an island, little more than two small hills protruding above the vicious sea. It was blanketed in the wreck of a massive gold and green airship, the hull leaking protodermis onto the sandy beach like a river cascading down the side of a mountain. Scorch marks coated the outside of the twisted hull. The vortixx pilot of The Ripple singled out a small strip of barren rock further down the beach for landing, and before long everyone aboard had the opportunity to walk on solid land. They had arrived.

League: Defending bluffs from vahki and toa, using walking tanks with hagah cannons on them to attack airships Metru-Nui: bum-rushing to the bluff to stop the cannons from blowing their airships up.

IC: Astrologist Nixie | Ga-Metru | The Great Temple "Of course, Metru-Nui is a place of welcome and worship for all in Matoran society, especially now with the war." She paused as they stepped through the open doorway of the Great Temple. Soft prayers echoed from the enclaves where matoran asked for blessings or prayed for the fortunes of others. Lightstone sat in ancient sconces made by Ta-Matoran smiths in the early years of Metru-Nui's founding. Even the innocuous sconces were older than many of the matoran who lived in the city. Before the coliseum, the Great Temple had been a place of government and communication. Now, the divide cleanly placed the powers of the Turaga in the Coliseum and the powers of the Great Spirit in the Temple. Astrologist Nixie led Tekmo around the outer circle of six great rings inside the Great Temple while they talked. The closest ring surrounded the mystic suva once used by the Mangai. Pillars and arches divided each ring. "The nature of the discs is uncertain. We know them to be far powerful when compared to something as strong as a level eight. Even after all these centuries, no smith has achieved the same level of purity of construction or purpose. The protodermis for those discs was purified with a unique and arduous rite. Unfortunately, the rite of purification was lost to time. Even Turaga Dume does not know it. But, if a level eight disc can be formed into a great kanohi, only the greatest smiths of Ta-Metru could truly imagine would a level nine disc could make." She offered Tekmo a seat as they reached the quarter mark around the ring. "Does that answer your question?"

IC: Reliable Narrator | Ga-Metru | The Great Temple When Tekmo mentioned someone damaged the gate to the access tunnels the priestess' kanohi pakari gained an amused expression. If she assumed he was the vandal Tekmo couldn't tell. "Astrologist Nixie at your service, Toa Tekmo," said the priestess as her diminutive fist made contact with his much larger fist. She beckoned for him to follow her towards the main entrance to the Great Temple as she continued to speak. "It's understandable that you seek the Great Discs of Metru-Nui. What do you wish to do with the information about their locations? Turaga Dume surely couldn't give you anything else with which to serve the Great Spirit?"

OOC: As requesed @Toru Nui. IC: Reliable Narrator | Ga-metru Disc Hunt While Triki was lost in the access tunnels, Tekmo left the alley and made his way towards the Great Temple proper. The Great Temple was at the end of a long boulevard of contemplation, with pilgrims watching the Silver Sea’s waves crash against the walls raising them above sea level. Scriptures and legends were carved into alcoves along the boulevard, stories Tekmo knew as a toa and heard around evening cooking fires as a matoran. The temple itself loomed above, commanding unfettered faith in the Great Spirit on the surrounding views. The Great Temple of Metru-Nui was conical in shape, with beautifully carved windows and gables on its upper stories. Seabirds made nests in these gables, left alone during the brooding months by matoran priests and cleaned away when the next generation could fly. Lush moss grew over the entirety of the Great Temple, forming a plush ground for Tekmo to step on. It was comforting for the toa of plantlife to be among his own element. Eight spires of varying heights rose from the sea around the temple’s main structure. These were pillars to faith, cloisters for the devout, the sick, and the homeless. A ga-matoran wearing the robes of priesthood approached Tekmo through the soft mist of rain filling the air. She smiled and bowed sofly, before offering the gesture of friendship: a fist bump. “Welcome to the Great Temple, Toa Hero. How may I be of service?”

If she's reclaiming the term instead of it being an insult then Waif is approved.

IC: Reliable Narrator | Silver Sea When Thom finally dug himself out of the crater his crash landing made in the Rocky beach he couldn't believe his eyes. Somehow the vahki had teleported him with kanoka discs into the middle of a war. The sensation of twenty discs hitting at once may have left a burning mark on his psyche, but a warzone was the closest he'd been to Zakaz in a long time. In Thom's hands was a large gun. It fired something called a cordak round, an explosive round. At his hip was his trustworthy firework revolver -- new and improved. Around his neck was the collar: it blipped every time he held his breath, he couldn't take it off, and a small dastardly drone followed where the collar went broadcasting to a stream somewhere in the Coliseum. Ooc: by the powers of timeskip welcome to war @Dane

IC: Reliable Narrator | Coliseum Prisons As Lhikan went to ask his next question a door opened from down the hall, accompanied by the mechanical sounds of vahki on patrol. A squad mother stopped by Thom's cell. It stared for a long time through the power removing field, then said; "You are being acquitted of all crimes, Dark Hunter. You will be released if you accept the terms of the acquittal: you will wear a tracker for monitoring of future illegal activity. You will report your weekly expenses to the Coliseum. You will liberate islands from the League on behalf of the matoran of Metru-Nui. Do you accept?"