Lurabo was getting tired of the darkness covering her planet.
She gotten into the habit of finding the High Ladders. They stood like mountains across LoLaS, and at the very top of them, Lurabo could attempt to draw the Sun card from the tarot deck.
She'd managed it twice now, and the result had been the bright spotlight spreading across the pitch dark sky, becoming an actual sky rather than just a single pinprick of it.
She wasn't sure what would happen if she accidentally drew something other than the Sun, but she doubted it would be any fun. Thankfully, she was pretty sure she was too lucky to draw something else.
She'd been on her way up to the third High Ladder when she found the stone bed with a symbol on it like the sun. She supposed it was all but certain that this was another location she was meant to draw the Sun card. If not then it was terrible advertising.
Either way, she figured it couldn't hurt to at least check with the others on what they thought. She sat down on the stone bed and took out her messenger, sending out a mass message to the other players of the session to ask if anyone knew anything about the stone beds.
There was no immediate response from the others, and with the messenger open the yellow blooded troll could again see the chat he'd had previously with Dustine.
She still wasn't sure what had happened to Dustine after he'd logged off to apparently go save Risura. She hoped they were alright, and hoped that Mutosi got a nice smack upside the head. She sighed, already getting bored waiting for a response from the others. She supposed she was the only one who wasn't incredibly busy with something important.
Just as she was about to stand up and draw from her tarot deck, a flash of red spinning gears appeared in front of her, Jeff materializing out of seemingly nothing.
"Hey, what time of it?" Jeff asked nonchalantly.
"Uh.. eleven fifty AM?" She said, only to then have to provide the actual date for Jeff, who didn't seem to even know what years it was.
He sighed in relief, "I was worried I jumped too far ahead. After I got the consorts to the sprite I kinda had to hurry to avoid being seen by past me and paradoxing us all to death. Anyway, what were you asking about?"
Lurabo blinked in confusion about what in the hell Jeff was talking about, and so decided to just focus on what she did understand.
"I was just asking about this stone bed." She said, indicating to the stone she was sitting on. Jeff looked down at it, "Oh the quest bed, yeah you should stay on that. Don't get up from it, and don't draw anything from your tarot deck until absolutely necessary." "Alright, any particular reason?" Lurabo asked.
"Yep, the best reason in fact." Jeff said.
He then promptly time teleported away without actually saying what 'the best reason' was.
Lurabo sighed. Jeff had always been a bit odd, but since the game started, he was getting to borderline detached from reality levels of strange.
Then again, she was playing a game that had either ended the world, or a game that had saved them from an inevitable apocalypse, so maybe her attachment to reality was a bit stranger than Jeff's leaving it behind at this point.
She remained sitting on the quets bed for several more boring minutes, deciding to pass the time by scrolling through the previous messages.
Of all the players in the session, she figured that she'd probably had the least amount of time to actually message the others; if only for how much time she had to spend climbing up ladders.
She found Aspico's post about the 'classpects' as they were called and began looking them over.
Light, the aspect of, appropriately enough, illumination. This can be literal in the form of actual light, or metaphorical in the form of wisdom and the uncovering of hidden truths. The Light aspect also deals with probability. For good or for ill. Historically, one of the Creators was a Seer of Light, and could naturally predict the outcomes of events when tied to knowledge or probability.
Lurabo found this interesting.
She supposed there was a bit of probability in her use of her tarot deck. One wrong draw and she could do more damage to herself than to anything she was trying to fight. She scrolled down to the classes next.
Maid, the active creation aspect. Unlike the passive creation of the Sylph, which is used for healing, the Maid is not specifically a healer, though they do tend to be support players. Their power is the literal, physical creation of their aspect. Historically, one of the Creators was the Maid of Life, and had the power to create life energy for an otherwise dead body, returning them to life.
Lurabo thought this over, curious what these classpects were about. Did she get to choose a set? Or was it completely unrelated to the game they were currently playing?
Before she could scroll up to check with the previous messages to find what Aspico's point had been in posting this list had been, a loud thud signalled a large creature landing on the same platform Lurabo was currently occupying.
Looking up, Lurabo felt a sinking feeling as she looked over the three Alabaster ogres, the five Jade Basilisks, the two Brimstone lichs, and the swarm of ten or fifteen Brick imps.
Of the ogres, all had cyborgetic left arms and long hooked claws from their left, long hooked tails and laughing clown faces. The basilisks had long scorpion tails and pincers, their limbs extending in thorned vines and poison spitting flowers and their heads wolf-like.
The lichs both had long gator mouths and turtle shells, mouse ears sprouting from their heads and eyes glowing with cybernetics. The imps were all in the air with jet wings, sharp beaks, and armed with tommy guns and cuesticks.
They all swarmed on Lurabo at once. Her initial instinct was to draw form her deck, but remembered Jeff's warning to wait until absolutely necessary and remain on the quest bed no matter what.
Grumbling at what seemed like an arbitrary rule, she instead took out the Arcane, holding the magical staff aloft as she focused her natural telekinesis. The wave of mental energy surged through the area, pushing the monsters back away from her.
She send a blast of magic into the swarm above her head, reaching down to the Slicer Suites and sending a few bladed cards at the ground enemies. Her cards managed to kill one of the basilisks, and her magical blasts were making short work of the imps overhead.
She grit her teeth as she focused her telekinesis to slow the firing of the ogres missile launching to prevent herself being blown up.
She surprised herself by how long she managed to hold out with this, getting all of the imps, the other basilisk, and one of the lich before she ran out of bladed playing cards. The Arcane had grown hot to the touch from repeated firing, and threatened to break if she kept going, and her head was now splitting from the headache of repeated bursts of telekinesis.
Her left arm went numb from a blast of magic from the lich, she had a bullet in her foot, a bleeding yellow gash in her leg, and while the ogres appeared to be out of missiles, they were still moving forward to attack directly while the lich prepared its next spell. If now wasn't 'absolutely necessary' she wasn't sure what was.
She reached down to her tarot deck, drawing from it. When she saw the card she'd drawn, her blood went cold. She had not drawn the Sun like she'd been expecting. The card she was drawn was the Devil.
The last time she had drawn it, it had been the death of her lusus. And in the seconds before she lost consciousness, she realized this time it was the death of her; her heart exploding in her chest.
She collapsed on the quest bed, the monsters looking on in confusion at her sudden death. Then, they looked on in even greater confusion as she rose from the bed, glowing bright yellow.
When she landed back on her feet and returned to consciousness, her wounds had been healed, and her clothing had been changed to a new outfit. She had a hood up now and the symbol of sun, of the Light aspect, on her chest. Her legs were wrapped in bandages now.
On top of that, a pair of thin, delicate yellow butterfly wings had sprouted from her back.
The Maid of Light had ascended.
In the moment of stillness before the monsters began moving again, she realized why she'd been drawn to those two descriptions in Aspico's post.
She reached down to her tarot deck, tapping into the powers she felt she should have now-or perhaps had always had and been using without knowing. Creating extra luck for herself, the yellow blood drew from the deck, holding up the Tower.
The card's power of disruption and failure spread through the monsters, causing their mechanical attributes to all malfunction and explode at once, killing them all instantly. She whistled, impressed by her own draw; and by the light radiating off of her. She took out her messenger and sent a follow up reply to her last message about the quest bed.
SOI: Nvrmind, figured it out.
Jeff had arrived on Furlok's land. It had been a rather distressingly intense time for him to deal with creating Consortsprite.
He'd found four of his favorite consort folk form their kingdom-one of each species-and slowed down time for them just enough that he could explain what was happening and why he needed their help.
The consorts were a rather calm, docile people, and it had been easy enough to convince them to enter the sprite at first, but he had wanted to make certain that they were all entirely aware of what was happening and what being in the sprite would mean. They wouldn't ever be capable of not being in the sprite.
They'd be fused together permanently. Even with this knowledge though, all four of them had been fairly pragmatic about the whole thing, understanding that they were needed to do this.
They accepted the task and entered the sprite together, first the crocodile and turtle, then the salamander and iguana.
It only occurred to him after the fact that reversing that order would have made the enemies on his land, and by extension the final boss, much weaker and easier to deal with, but he was in a hurry.
He wasn't late yet and didn't want to be made so by indecision. After leaving Lurabo's land, he went to Furlok's, finding the session's space player standing on her quest bed at the top of a high spire.
She seemed to be trying to find a way to kill herself so she could god tier without it hurting. She was out of bombs, so her only option were her bladed paintbrushes, and she seemed rather averse to pain caused by herself.
Brendon wasn't there to help with the consensual murder, as he was off enjoying his new moirallegiance with Valtina.
Jeff rolled his eyes, slowing down time so Furlok couldn't respond fast enough, and flew down to the teal blood, slamming his bat into her skull with as much force as possible.
She blacked out instantly, her skull cracking as she collapsed on the stone bed.
Jeff sighed, supposing he should probably work on his swinging strength. If he couldn't one hit skill a normal troll he wouldn't be able to do too much damage to the boss. He drove another powerful bat swing into Furlok's head to finish killing her, then back up off of the bed so she could ascend.
Furlok floated off of the bed, body restoring itself as she spread large teal wings, her clothing shifting into a black thief's outfit, boots replacing her shoes and a hood and cape appeared, the space symbol (a white circle spiral) on her chest. The Thief of Space had ascended. And then she bitch slapped the Heir of Time.
"Ow." He said simply.
Furlok grumbled in annoyance, "I was gonna do it myself." She said.
"No, you were gonna stall and stall and stall and I don't have the patience for it." Jeff said, "let's get back to the frog machines now. Time player is supposed to help the Space player with it."
