The Open Door (megacrossover)

[Aranfan]

Currently I'm trying to clean up Curst, but my party keeps dying. The town guards are worthless against most of the demons. And when I try to micromanage my party so that Ignus is casting spells that can actually hurt people I keep ending up with more than half my party unselected and all the bad guys are ganging up on Ignus.

[holyknight]

Actually, without giving too much away, I can say that the explanation in this story for the balance issue has more to do with long term survival than an actual moral system based on balance. Essentially the 'balance' is more to keep both Heaven and Hell in line and to keep from killing each other and destabilizing reality than it is because both are somehow 'necessary'.

.

AHHHH!!!!

So, the primordial role of the "Balance" on those two planes, it's on a sense, avoid like hell, long periods where "good" or "Evil" would prime over the other, resulting on cascade effects on their own, limited sections of the Empyrean/Warp/Immaterium, and causing disturbances big enough, to possibly rip the containment barriers what keep the Daemon-plagued Warp at bay and away from their own realms......

The near absolute lack of knowledge, even for Daimakaichou Hild on OMG, except by Kamisama, and likely the 90% of the ones on Ao's dimension......unless they are with honesty to try to keep any of the higher beings of those realms away the F#ck of any REALLY malignant, Warp based entity.....given that while having advantages, also, high-end psychic beings like "Demons and Gods" from those realms are like 1st degree food, for the nastier and badder denizens of the Warp, and a point to "bleed" into the material realm, and bring even more havoc....

[Garlak]

I have to admit I like the idea of a "balance" being necessary because otherwise daemons will be created, even less.

Happy people don't make monsters.

"Balancing" two opposing forcers means conflict.. both because the two forcers are anathema to each other, and because they will grow on their own, so you'll have to "prune" them occasionally. And those clashes will create all that emotion-driven warpenergy you were trying to avoid.

Alternatively, what happens when you're killed, and you've left no one around with the knowledge of WTF is really going on? Or when people start to realize that they can't get any peace because of you and rebel?

If you're the overlord of a universe, it'd be better to take over the warp and craft it to be what you want, or shut it off. Find a way to stop the formation of daemons by making it impossible for emotions, or just bad emotions, to enter the warp.

If you're that powerful, warpbeings aren't a concern for you. You could redefine the warp or how daemons come to be. Stalemating good and bad people in the mortal world just means you're a huge dick who doesn't care what happens to people, and you're too lazy to put in a bit of effort to fix the problem permanently instead of constantly meddling in mortal lives.. The multiverse sucks if where there is any sort of peace, the gods spend time pitting mortals against each other because they can't be bothered to rewrite the laws of that reality to save EVERYONE a lot of headache.

[Academia Nut]

You're all thinking about it the wrong way. The 'balance' in OMG is really more of a truce between the powers because the primary object they fight over is Yggdrasil, as in the thing that controls reality. Eventually they probably realized that they were in a MAD situation if they kept fighting. Heaven had the upper hand in that they still had control over Yggdrasil, but if they forced it into a war of extinction with Hell they were sufficiently equally matched that there was the risk of utter annihilation of everything. So they cut Hell a deal. They would keep control over Yggdrasil, but they would each get their own territory and balance thing out so that neither side would get too pissed during the truce. It's a pretty crappy arrangement if you're the mortals caught in all the little proxy conflicts of their little Cold War, but when the cost of failure is annihilation, both sides tend to be risk adverse.

Or at least, that's my take on it. It's also why both sides were interested in Lars, particularly Hell. If they could tip the balance of power sufficiently far to one side that making a final strike might be sufficiently likely to result in victory, then it would be immensely worth it.

[rodon]

Or at least, that's my take on it. It's also why both sides were interested in Lars, particularly Hell. If they could tip the balance of power sufficiently far to one side that making a final strike might be sufficiently likely to result in victory, then it would be immensely worth it.

Interesting, but keep having this strange want to have Lars 'wed' Hild.

Perhaps if the Almightly goes for the shot gun wedding, and pulling a few strings to include either/or Hild herself or Urd instead (Grandbabies!). Of course, the Almighty might then throw Lars at the faithless in D&D to 'bulk' him up, not that they would complain at Lar's offer considering the alternative. Hmmm... make Lolth his official mistress until Skuld is old enough, not to mention the possible need to change Lars from a gender neutral to male (or close enough,... Grandchildren!).

[rodon]

Going though some Neon Genesis Evangelion pictures and came across a tan Rei in a slightly different verison of a plug suit. This thought, popped into my head, 'what would have changed if Gendo had performed the unit 01 test instead of Yui.'

Actually, from what I see, the suit and chair in the unit is better than the one in cannon. Although, the plug suit has 13 on it and not 00.

How would Lars fair if he was thrown into a world like that, with or without the warp.

As Yui Ikari watches Lilith, a portal opens up before it, and though it flies something straight into Lilith. *Third Impact*

Yui blinked as she tried to remember what happened, the thing flying and hitting Lilith... Orange? Wait a moment, was it a bit drafty in here. Looking down she noticed her bare body, with her cloths on the platform beneth her. Trying to cover herself up as she grabed her cloths, Yui tried to hurriedly put them back on. Only later would she notice the large sign that had replaced Lilith, saying in big, bold, and comforting letters, although how could the letters be comforting she had no idea. "Sorry, my mistake."

And another idea, since Murphy doesn't favor one side or the other, how would Lars fair if he was thrown/summoned into mainline 40K. How would the standard deamon hunting/banishing work on him. Not that I would expect him to last too long there.

[TheClueless]

You're all thinking about it the wrong way. The 'balance' in OMG is really more of a truce between the powers because the primary object they fight over is Yggdrasil, as in the thing that controls reality. Eventually they probably realized that they were in a MAD situation if they kept fighting. Heaven had the upper hand in that they still had control over Yggdrasil, but if they forced it into a war of extinction with Hell they were sufficiently equally matched that there was the risk of utter annihilation of everything. So they cut Hell a deal. They would keep control over Yggdrasil, but they would each get their own territory and balance thing out so that neither side would get too pissed during the truce. It's a pretty crappy arrangement if you're the mortals caught in all the little proxy conflicts of their little Cold War, but when the cost of failure is annihilation, both sides tend to be risk adverse.

Would this deal also cover demons that were outside of the multiverse that Yggdrasil *directly* maintains?

I'm asking because the information that we have - as readers - seems to indicate that Ao and all of the other D&D Overgods are originally from the "My Goddess" reality. Secondly, the information we have is that it's only due to Lars that "the Almighty" feels that has to be a way to safely travel through the Void (between realities). This in turn suggests that not only were Ao and all the other Overgods weren't left out in the cold on purpose, it also strongly points towards them being a (relatively) small number of survivors of those who were trapped outside of Yggdrasil's direct influence.

There are some D&D realities where I would think that an *Overdemon* would fit in much better than an *Overgod*. Dark Sun comes to mind. Not to mention Ravenloft!

The Clueless

[Academia Nut]

Would this deal also cover demons that were outside of the multiverse that Yggdrasil *directly* maintains?

I'm asking because the information that we have - as readers - seems to indicate that Ao and all of the other D&D Overgods are originally from the "My Goddess" reality. Secondly, the information we have is that it's only due to Lars that "the Almighty" feels that has to be a way to safely travel through the Void (between realities). This in turn suggests that not only were Ao and all the other Overgods weren't left out in the cold on purpose, it also strongly points towards them being a (relatively) small number of survivors of those who were trapped outside of Yggdrasil's direct influence.

There are some D&D realities where I would think that an *Overdemon* would fit in much better than an *Overgod*. Dark Sun comes to mind. Not to mention Ravenloft!

The Clueless

Yup, you're on the right track. Combining this with the info we got from the Nanoha characters like thirty chapters ago will definitely help lead you in the right direction. There's also a reason the "British Invasion" thing got stalled, and that was because I suddenly realized the cosmology in a more structured way and had to rethink things in such a way that it made my original plan unviable due to the fact that they shouldn't be able to find one of the universes I was planning on sending them to yet.

Three guesses which universe, and you'll only need one. And then you will go "Oh shit, this is going to involve large swathes of the multiverse getting exterminated, isn't it?"

[Jim Starluck]

Three guesses which universe, and you'll only need one. And then you will go "Oh shit, this is going to involve large swathes of the multiverse getting exterminated, isn't it?"

My money's on Doctor Who.

[Academia Nut]

Ah hell with it: the wibbley wobbley timey wimey ball from Doctor Who is basically at the opposite pole from A!MG, both of which sit in a line with the Buffyverse. These three universes are critical to the integrity of the multiverse... so you should probably be wetting your pants now as only one group actually has their shit together. There are other critical universes on this list, Haruhi being one of them, but the remaining three are probably not the sorts of guys you want having anything to do with the maintenance of the laws of physics.

[Darth Raptor]

I just now got caught up with this, and while it's unlikely to win any (pretentious) awards, it's one hell of a ride. IMO, it suffers from the strain of its own ambitions. My biggest problem is that you spend too much time on certain arcs to the exclusion of all others, though I'm well aware of why that's the case. However, unlike others, I do NOT have a problem with your favorable portrayal of the forces of Chaos as sympathetic anti-heroes, although credible and, dare I say sympathetic opponents wouldn't hurt. Beyond that, it's a fun read and entertainment is the most important thing, so good job.

[Aranfan]

Yeah, I'd like to see more nBSG. And SG1. And Nanoha.

[TheClueless]

Ah hell with it: the wibbley wobbley timey wimey ball from Doctor Who is basically at the opposite pole from A!MG, both of which sit in a line with the Buffyverse. These three universes are critical to the integrity of the multiverse... so you should probably be wetting your pants now as only one group actually has their shit together. There are other critical universes on this list, Haruhi being one of them, but the remaining three are probably not the sorts of guys you want having anything to do with the maintenance of the laws of physics.

And all four of the named "keystones" (and probably all seven "keystones" that (currently) exist) - for the entire "true" multiverse - are *inside* The Great Barrier?!? I hope, I really *REALLY* hope, I'm misunderstanding you here.

(Not that having them "just" maintain The Great Barrier is that much better.)

Talk about poor zoning decisions.

Of the named "keystones", the one that seems to have it's paperwork in order is the "My Goddess" reality. Although, you *might* include in Who-verse - since we're not talking about the local grimdark levels - before the "Last Great Time War" pretty much exterminates the Time Lords.

(Given the importance of the Who-verse in Thousand Shinji/Open Door cosmology, I don't think we'll be lucky enough to for the "Last Great Time War" not to have taken place.)

Now I have to wonder if newChaos made a big mistake when they played that little game involving Sunnydale's Halloween, or if Tzintchi *really* pulled a fast one on everyone. Before now I *just* thought he had given potential power boosts the to the Scoobies, changed what would have ended up happening with Cordy, and distracted at least three of the bigger Warhammer 40K factions. But now, I might have to add "got the Buffy verse placed under new and - better/safer - management" to that list.

(Beyond this point I'm reacting to some posts both here and on SpaceBattles. This is, obviously, all IMO.)

Personally, I like newChaos as the protagonists. They aren't White Hats, but I definately see them as protagonists. Twisted, selfish and quite easily said to be evil? Yes. But still, the protagonists. Of course, some familiarity with WH40K and NGE certainly helps me see them this way. (After all, Nalifan wouldn't be quite so ... sympathetic? ... if he was always around priests of Illmater and/or Eldath; but since there's normally a few slavers / soul - binders / cannibals / ect... around, it's easier to see him as a protagonist.)

For example, my take on the "Vita at the newChaos Hospital" part is that most of the drugs in her system are either to deal with her injuries or to keep her from being able to make an escape attempt. (Particularly one that involves lots of violence and death.) Sure, at least some of the drugs make it easier for newChaos to try to corrupt her. And alcohol makes it easier for guys to pick up girls (unless they're the designated driver) in bars, which - while not the most endearing notion - isn't illegal the last time I checked.

As for newChaos needing powerful opponents, they already have some. (And who knows what will happen due to the Stilleto's journey back home?) The major Warhammer 40 K factors that are looking for Sunnydale. The TSAB. The "My Goddess" PTBs. And the Ori. It's just that none of them know where newChaos' home is. Yet.

Tzintchi made sure that nothing tied (directly) to newChaos got used on any of the Sunnydale costumes. At least part of the reason for this action is that he realized that oldChaos, the IoM and the Eldar (at the very least!) would become interested in Sunnydale due to what would happen on Halloween. And Tzintchi wants all of them - for the forseeable future (even for a god!) - as far from newChaos as possible. Mainly because all of them could beat up on newChaos like a drum.

The dangers that the TSAB - both it's elite personnel and it's warships - could present to newChaos should be pretty clear. If they aren't, just remember these two facts. First, a *minor* warship's main weapon inpressed Tzintchi enough that he made a mental note to ask newChaos' engineers if it was possible for newChaos to produce the same system on the same size scale. Second, the only follower of newChaos who we definately know could match up with one of the elite TSAB personnel is also one of the handful (literally) of living humans to bear newChaos' Mark of Chaos Undivided.

Lars was terrified by the reality altering power the "My Goddess" dieties had. (Admittedly, he wasn't that impressed by most of the demons, but..) It's also clearly stated that - to Lars' senses - Belldandy "felt" like she was at the same power level as *Daemon Princess Hikari*.

IMO, the Ori battles versus newChaos would be ending differently if the Ori themslves could directly participate. The local Accended community however, would (in most cases quite happily, IMO) go after any Ori that breaks their rules. On the other hand, newChaos just seems to have to keep it's Daemon Princess(es) (and the gods themselves) out of the neighborhood. Plus, the Ori have (finally) figured out (after some nasty losses) that - when dealing with groups like Space Marines without your own equivalent - planetary bombardment should be your first option.

The Clueless

[Jim Starluck]

I have to agree that newChaos are the protagonists, but I can't help but want to see them humbled some how. So far they have suffered setbacks and screwed up occasionally *coughBorgcough*, but nothing that's made that big of an impact. Especially not to Tzintchi and The Girls themselves.

With regards to the TSAB... I somehow don't think they're going to automatically have a clash right off the bat. What happened in the Stargateverse was a heat-of-the-moment type thing, and I doubt either side is going to let their foreign policy be dictated by their subordinates' actions.

[Skyfox120]

Ah finally got registered... and it only took me tow months

What I'm curious is if/when Tzinnitch and co are going to give field tests for there space marines. So far only the stargate verse has given them experience in ground combat...

Also I can't help but wonder about the Necrontyr and C'tan back in Tzinntch's corner of hte multiverse. Since they never developed the NEcrons, where did there tech lead them and how Many C'tan are left (Keeping in mind that in cannon WH40k, the C'tan ate each other until only 4 were left)

[darkjedi521]

Considering Ao's roots as an office clerk in OMG, it makes sense why D+D divinity is all about the portfolio. Of course a paper pusher is going to care more about the form than the execution of the office.

[Academia Nut]

Chapter Forty-four: Siege

The industries of House Roreril had ceased their incessant pounding five days ago, reducing Menzoberranzan back to its preferred state of a low susurration of half heard voices whispering rumours and conducting business. But it was not business as usual, for the past five days had been tense ones, with much scrambling about by all parties as they tried to discern why the Spider Queen had gone silent.

Then why all the gods had gone silent.

The air was charged with fear beyond the usual tinge. Everyone was waiting for something to happen, for someone to make a move. It was only a matter of time.

The drow had no proper conception of thunder. Oh, their wizards could conjure forth lightning, but for the most part those bolts were paltry things in comparison to the true fury of a summer’s storm unleashed. They had never truly heard the apocalyptic crash of air displacing.

Until now.

The silent Roreril compound’s courtyard suddenly issued forth a trio of explosive bangs that grabbed the attention of the entire city, for nothing like that had ever been heard before.

A few seconds later a trio of hard iron spheres, specially enchanted with a modified form of the antimagic field spell, slammed into the House Baenre compound, shattering once enchanted stone. One shot smashed into the central family living area, crashing through a door and then bouncing on a manic pattern through the halls, killing two orc slaves and an unlucky minor priestess that had been moving towards the door to see what the banging sound was. The second hit the main barracks and just stuck in the stone, the shrapnel wounding a minor soldier. The third struck the still being rebuilt main chapel and demolished a statue of a priestess.

All around the three shots there were little pools of darkness where the faerie fires that coated the stonework had gone out, snuffed by the antimagic fields on the cannonballs.

Back at the Roreril compound diviners hired specifically for this task, or rather hired and not told exactly what it was that they were doing until the first shots were fired and they thus had no way to back out from an attack on the First House as they were already involved, used their magic to discern the effects of the initial ranging shots. Mages loyal to House Roreril had already been used to make the final corrections on the howitzers with a less expensive form of divining magic.

The natural radiation of Menzoberranzan and the wards about the House Baenre compound made scrying difficult, especially on the living members, but those were immaterial problems in that the mages only wanted to see what parts of the compound had been hit and they could judge by the extinguished light.

“Barracks shot was on target,” one of the mages reported.

“Living area on target but went deep inside the house,” a second replied.

“Chapel area on target,” the third announced.

Nodding, Skuld said sternly, trying to hide just how upset she was by the cold, clinical violence she was perpetuating, “Reload, and keep the same settings as before. Like we instructed, the sequence is high explosive, incendiary, and then fragmentation. If a shell fails to detonate, continue with the sequence anyway.”

The loading crews, human and dwarf slaves selected for their quick learning ability and proficiency with machines, had already been swabbing out the hot barrels, ensuring there were no sparks. The howitzers were ugly, inelegant machines, muzzleloaders trying to do the same job as breechloaders, but Skuld didn’t trust the industry they had built yet to be able to make safe, reliable breeches.

Meanwhile, much closer to the destruction, Lars watched from a concealed position and noted quietly, “Nice shots.”

Is momma doing good? Momma kill bad people?

The tiny little daemon growing within Lars had within the past few days of heightened emotion developed enough intelligence to begin communicating with him, and it was about as innocently bloodthirsty as a baby daemon could be. Lars and Skuld had also settled on gender pronouns and decided that for the sake of sanity they would go with what required less explanation to confused people later.

Although they had decided that when they first talked to Skuld’s family they would call her father at first to give them enough time to explain before the smiting happened.

Momma’s doing well; she’s setting up to kill lots of bad people. Now stay quiet little one, poppa has to assassinate someone.

Yeah!

Crouched at the edge of the compound along the fence, Lars carried the one rifle they had decided to make. A brutish gun, it could only be carried by someone with Lars’ daemonic strength and only fired well by someone with his intelligence. It was a .50 calibre rifled breechloader that took brass cartridge rounds. It could fire a 600g steel jacketed lead armour piercing bullet at about twice the speed of sound.

It was a beastly creation that had sucked up a lot of time and effort to make, but Lars could handle it and knew what to do with it.

A series of explosions rocked the House Baenre fence, causing the metal strands to sway back and forth. Kobold slaves from House Oblodra had just planted demolition charges around several of the posts, demolishing a massive section of the fence. Since the Spider Queen had gone silent the magic controlling the fence had died out, but it was still a barrier and if it unexpectedly powered back up that would not do for it to remain a danger.

The shuddering boom of the quartet of less advanced cannons, brought up with the rest of the army fielded by Oblodra and Roreril under cover of magical concealment in the past few hours, signalled the doom of the main gate. With the loss of the fence, House Baenre’s days were probably now numbered whatever happened. The other drow houses would see this as a massive sign of weakness and start circling like sharks about a bleeding seal on an ice floe.

Lars intended to club that seal a few times and then kick it back in the water.

“Come on… come on… yeah, your personal magic isn’t working, but you’ve still got magic items, right? And you’re basically a medieval warlord at heart, right? So you have to see what’s happening. Oh, you might usually have your own magic so you can stay in the safety of your throne room, but unless you want to rely upon a male you’re out of luck. Come on…” Lars whispered silently, urging his target to appear.

Matron Mother Yvonnel Baenre stepped out on to a viewing balcony.

Lars smiled at the inefficiency of the loading crews. They could take up to three minutes between each shot, and if the high explosive shells the plan called for had landed the matron might not have stepped out like she did.

The rifle didn’t have optics, but Lars didn’t need them. His psychic powers let him reach across the gulf of the multiverse, with some mechanical help, and make contact with other minds. When outside her compound, Yvonnel was like a sparkling gem in the sun, as were those around her.

Lars aligned his rifle, adjusted for the drop, and fired. The range was about four hundred metres, plus or minus five percent, and the height was maybe twenty metres above his position. Some of the souls that had made him up, especially the other northern Europeans had been hunters in their lives. With no wind, no breathing to foul his aim and such a flat ballistic profile for the powerful gun, the shot was well within Lars’ ability.

Still, he technically missed. He had been aiming for Yvonnel’s centre of mass as the magic about her would probably warp the path of the bullet so he needed to make sure it went where he wanted it to. Unfortunately, quality control was still abysmal by the standards Lars and Skuld were used to, and the bullet moved faster, and thus dropped less, than Lars intended.

Then again, to say he missed was to say that instead of hitting her in the torso, he instead hit her square between the eyes with a .50 bullet still travelling faster than the speed of sound. There was a brief flash of light as the magic items that surrounded her body in layers of force and distorted space attempted to turn aside the bullet. Yvonnel had protection exceeding that of full plate armour. The gun in Lars’ hands would have been classified as a light anti-material weapon where he came from.

To say that the daughters and guards standing around the matron mother were shocked when the thousands of years old leader of their house suddenly had her head violently explode was an understatement.

Lars broke open the breech and let the smoking cartridge fall out as a tentacle brought the next round up and slotted it into the hot barrel. Snapping the whole assembly back into place, he cocked the hammer once more and aligned with the next target on his list: Triel Baenre, the first daughter of Yvonnel.

This time he missed his targeted area while still hitting scoring a lethal strike again, overcompensating for the previously high round and striking Triel lower than he intended, just barely missing the stone banister of the balcony in his estimation. Still, with a round that big the shock of having one of her kidneys and the surrounding pieces of liver and intestine blow out her back, along with the hydrostatic shock that destroyed her heart and lungs, Triel tied nearly as quickly as her mother.

Not pressing his luck any further, Lars immediately abandoned his position and made for the main Roreril/Oblodra camp to report his success. Besides, he was down to his last round. The things were damned difficult to make when everything else was demanding resources.

For now.

A contingent of driders, freaky things that looked like a cross between a drow and a spider along the lines of a centaur, lead by a spider covered Rask, were already assaulting from the roof of the cavern, while the battle between the wizards of Baenre and the psychics of Oblodra was heating up.

Oh and a dozen invisible mages no doubt heading off to attack House Roreril. The fact that the high explosives shells had landed and reduced rock to flying rubble and severely weakened the structural integrity of several buildings probably had something to do with their heavy response.

Pity for them Lars didn’t need his eyes to see them. Finally his last shot, the most difficult really as he was attacking a flying object, landed in the centre of mass and sent the remains of the wizard’s heart and lungs and bits of rib and spine flying off into the darkness.

Lars grinned with satisfaction as the flight scattered, shocked by this unexpected attack. The dead body suddenly appearing in the air also alerted the attacking forces to their presence and anti-invisibility forces immediately went to work.

Rejoining the main army, Lars met up with the artillery forces, transforming his outer appearance from camouflage gear to a commissarial uniform, although he gave it his own personal touch by liberally adding barnacle encrustations and the appearance of being waterlogged. If there was any way of making a commissar look scarier, it was to make him look like a drowned, undead commissar rose from the ocean depths, not even death keeping him from kicking ass.

“How goes the battle?” He asked while handing his gun off to a servant, a slave really but he made sure every individual turned over to his or Skuld’s care was treated with as much respect as they could get away with under the circumstances.

The incendiary rounds chose that moment to arrive. Two of them failed to ignite on impact, a problem they had anticipated might arise, but the one that hit the broken rubble of the barracks went up in a spectacular fireball as a mixture of gasoline, kerosene and a thickening agent ignited.

A few seconds later the one that hit the main family living area also ignited.

The drow had thought that they understood fire. They were wrong. Ever since Prometheus had made his gift to humanity, fire had been theirs to master and control. No other species had ever relied upon the flame so much, had learned from it and respected it and used it the way humanity did.

The drow did not face the radiant heat of lava or the solid burning of a wood fire or the instant burst of heat from a wizard’s fireball or a dragon’s breathe. No, this was hot, hungry flame that stuck and burnt, that flowed and dripped and was hot enough to cause fat to weep out and burn like a candle. This was napalm, or at least the closest thing they had to that destructive, sticky stuff. There wasn’t much of it in each of the shells, but what they did fire scared the hell out of those facing it.

The drow noble in charge of supervising the cannons shrugged and said, “It goes well. You succeeded in your task?”

Lars nodded and said, “The matron of House Baenre and her heir are no more.”

The officer smiled and said, “Then Baenre is no more. Its leaders are slain and its defences are being destroyed. All that is left is to subdue the twitching body.”

Lars frowned and said, “That is always the messiest part. And House Baenre still possesses a number of powerful mages, enough that they might wound us with their death thrashes, such that other houses look to our forces with the same eyes that we looked at House Baenre.”

“With House Oblodra we will…” Lars did not hear what the noble said next for his attention was suddenly taken away by his otherworldly senses suddenly picking up something bad about to happen.

Lars was in communication, but his abilities also leant him to doing crude sensory work if the situation called for it. He knew what a warp storm looked like. He knew what the sudden surge of energies could do, especially to those sensitive to them. This wasn’t quite the same, for it involved the Weave instead of the Warp, but it was similar in structure.

Lars blinked for a moment, those all staring at his blank eyed expression before he said in a panic, “Cease all magical operations, now! Tell the psychics to batten down as well… no, I don’t care if you understand that word, just tell them that we need to stop everything we’re doing right the fuck now. Go on the defensive and stay out of the air. Cut off all spells. Just tell everyone no magic, you got that? I need to warn those at House Roreril.”

Taking off at a run, Lars launched himself into the air, shedding most of his outward appearance for the horrific bat-thing form that carried him along until he arrived at the Roreril compound just in time for the trio of howitzers to go off in the courtyard, throwing the fragmentation rounds that would hopefully play merry hell with anyone trying to extinguish the burning napalm.

If they were really lucky they would hit a mage wasting dispels against the fires that only spread when water was thrown on them.

At least they hadn’t tried experimenting with magic to make chlorine trifluoride. The ability to make something that could cause sand to burn wasn’t worth the risk of making something that could cause sand to burn.

Crying out, Lars said, “Cease all magic now! Something bad is about to happen.”

“What is the meaning of this?” Aruvixa asked as she stalked out of her observation shelter.

“I can feel a… wave… of magical distortion approaching in the Weave. I would not want to have any arcane magic going when it hits,” Lars explained.

Aruvixa looked at him suspiciously for a moment before she glanced over at her nearest wizard advisor and asked, “What do you think?”

The wizard hummed and hawed for a moment before he nodded and said, “Master Lars may not have a firm grasp of the theory behind Weave magic, but his instincts and abilities are beyond what we wizards can dream of possessing. If he says something bad is going to happen, I say we trust him highest.”

Nodding, Aruvixa announced, “Shut down all use of arcane magic, now. With any luck this will damage House Baenre. Speaking of which…”

“They are dead, Matron Aruvixa. The head has been taken from the serpents, so to speak,” Lars replied as something niggled at his senses. He could feel arcane magic shutting down all around him, but there was still a strong signal from…

Lars turned to Skuld who was looking incredibly frightened indeed.

The artificial connection was still there and still actively drawing energy from the Weave to sustain Skuld. Skuld had a pained look on her face. Approaching her, Lars whispered, “What happened?”

“The… the goddess in charge of magic here just died, and it’s damaged the system,” Skuld replied back, tears starting to well up in her eyes.

Lars raised an eyebrow and he asked, “Is there anything you can do? You’re a… you know…” They had fastidiously not spoken of her true nature, the risk of someone overhearing.

Skuld shook her head. “No, I can feel the damage. It will take some time to repair, time I don’t have. I can’t shut down the link… Lars I’m scared. There’s a huge wave coming for me and…”

Lars shut his eyes in pain before he said, “I can sever the link. We can ride it out.”

“It’s not going to stop until the damage is repaired. That could be months. That could be forever. And I don’t have the same reserves of energy I did when I arrived,” Skuld replied.

Is momma going to be okay?

I don’t know.

Finally Lars said, “There is an alternative.”

“What?” Skuld asked.

“There’s… another Weave, it’s in between the gaps, lying under the one everyone seems to know about… but the fact that its pretty unknown and its much darker seems to make it more dangerous in my mind,” Lars replied.

Skuld looked at him and said, “Do you think it would work?”

Lars nodded. “Yes, I can feel the energy in there when I examine it. We need to make this decision quick though, the wave is going to arrive within a minute.”

Skuld was quiet before she nodded and said, “Do it.”

A psychic knife sliced through the connection Lars had made between Skuld and the Weave, which caused her to immediately drop to her knees as she began to burn through her only personal supply of magic at a ferocious rate.

Then the wave hit and everything relating to the arcane went wild. Faerie fires burned painfully bright or were extinguished, the ring of heat about the city’s central pillar Narbondel went erratic, and general chaos took over. It was particularly bad over at House Baenre where they were using extensive magic to try and contain the damage inflicted and counterattack. The results were not pretty, to say the least. Oh, sometimes the magic was magnified spectacularly and sometimes it fizzled, and sometimes it went out of control and destroyed the caster while other times something completely random happened.

“It’s raining daffodils… remind me to kick the ass of whoever was in charge of this…” Skuld noted weakly as she collapsed.

“Duly noted,” Lars replied grimly as he sliced open a piece of the shadowy version of the Weave, completely unaffected by the disaster, and spliced it into Skuld with the hopes that the dark, oily energy was compatible with Skuld’s divinity.

Lars got his response right away as Aruvixa started to praise him for saving the house from disaster. He watched the dark energy surge into Skuld and rapidly undid the spell that kept her bound to Aruvixa. Lars did not have time to jump for joy though, as that was not the only thing that happened.

Skuld went into a convulsion as the colour started to drain from her face and her veins began to go starkly black beneath her skin. Weeping, she said, “Oh… oh Almighty! I can feel her mind! She’s jealous! She’s jealous!”

Grabbing her, Lars forced her up and made her look him in the eyes. He asked, “Who?”

“The one in charge of this magic! She’s so dark… so jealous… so evil!” Skuld cried out.

Lars looked at her and said, “Then kick her ass if she’s evil! You’ve got a bit of daemon in you, if you’re going down, go down swinging! And show that medieval bitch what computer science means Miss Norn of the Future!”

Skuld looked at Lars for a moment, her face twisted in pain; before she began to mutter under her breathe a series of algorithms, incredibly complex formulas and instructions that were part computer programming, part quantum physics, and part fundamental reality editing.

“What’s going on? Why can I no longer feel the spell in her?” Aruvixa demanded angrily.

Lars looked at her and considered a dozen possible things before he decided Skuld was more important… and deserved her shot at revenge. He walked up to her, backhanded her hard enough to send teeth flying, and then said, “I’ll deal with you later. For now, anyone who wants to interfere with Skuld here goes through me.”

Going back to Skuld, Lars could see the connection between Skuld and the shadows grow and evolve at a rapid pace as she sought to do what had not seemed necessary before: hack the system and boot out the previous administrator. Magical energy flowed into her and then spilled out in the form of shadows. The symbols on her cheeks and forehead morphed about and faded from purple to a deep, almost black, violet. Her hair seemed to grow longer and darker while gaining a life of its own, becoming a flickering thing.

Lars could only watch on as the whole thing took place, ensuring that nothing happened to her. Everyone else watched in awe at the strange transformation.

Tears were starting to flow freely down Skuld’s face, evaporating as they fell into wispy shadows that disappeared quickly against the darkness of Menzoberranzan. She paused in her incantations for a moment to say, “She’s so much more powerful than me.”

Having gone through the souls within him to glean some sort of knowledge for Skuld, Lars said, “It’s Shar, right? Shar is the goddess of darkness.”

Skuld nodded as her body was wracked with another tremor from the effort she was putting into it.

“Use her portfolio against her,” Lars replied. “She is the goddess of loss. Make her lose this. Make her lose everything if you can. Attack her mind. Let her know that everything she cares for will be taken from her… and oh dear, I do believe that this battle is yours and yours alone from this point on.”

“What?” Skuld cried out in horror as Lars took a pained step back and fell on his ass.

A twisted look crossing his face, Lars said, “I do believe that another sliver of your being transfer over at some point between cutting you off from the Weave and splicing you in to the other version, and it was enough to finish the maturation process for the one inside me. Oh boy… this is going to hurt…”

A strange spasm passed through Lars’ body, one that would have been physically impossible had he been constrained by bones or three dimensional physics while a strange sort of un-light poured from his eyes and mouth for a moment.

“Yup… those of you who have not seen the movie Alien should probably look away. Those of you who have should probably run screaming right now. Does anyone want to look after Skuld for a moment while I lay down and scream for a bit?” Lars noted through glazed eyes that were starting to wander about his face.

Surprisingly, one of the dwarven slaves assigned as a loader, a poor bastard named Steb who had his throat cut out years ago but had somehow survived and continued to live despite a missing voice box, stepped up to help support Skuld. Aruvixa, now unsteadily regaining her feet, looked ready to try and order her terrified troops to attack, but before she could make the attempt to snap them out of their stunned awe Steb walked up to her and beat her back down before returning to Skuld.

Sometimes it really paid to be nice to the help.

Skuld's whole body tensed up as she fought mind to mind with another goddess, it came as something of a relief for Skuld when her wings, followed by all of her angel, burst out of her back.

Skuld had gathered enough power to manifest Noble Scarlet, and now her angel had joined in to the mental assault on Shar, adding a wordless song to the most epic hacking in the history of the Forgotten Realms. Unfortunately she too seemed to sicken with exposure to the Shadow Weave.

Thrashing about on the ground, Lars managed to force his bubbling, frothing form into a semblance of stability long enough to ask, “What’s wrong?”

Her teeth clenched, Skuld replied, “My angel… she can’t handle the shadow magic. She’s a being of light, not darkness.”

Manifesting a single stable mouth, Lars said, “There is always light in darkness. Think of a lunar eclipse and how the moon does not go dark but turns red in the umbra.” He then destabilized again as his amorphous form began to ooze and stretch, a face on the inside pressing against his skin in an attempt to get out.

Skuld was silent for a moment before she said, “Scarlet in the umbra…”

Noble Scarlet let out a loud wail and then was no more.

She was no more because she had been transformed into something else, something new. A tinge of shadowy grey had seeped into the white feathers of her wings; her blonde hair had gone dark like Skuld’s; and her skin had become like the palest, finest alabaster. But not all the colours had seeped away, for her eyes glowed a brilliant copper red like the most spectacular lunar eclipses, and she seemed bathed in a halo of such light.

Skuld was the Norn of the Future, the Goddess of the Undiscovered Country. The secrets of what was unknown were hers. The future lay in the shadows, in the tiny, lightless realms of quantum mechanics or the vast gulfs of space between the stars. From the tiny slivers of the daemonic she had received from Lars she remembered the Stiletto in the endless voids of space or the Warp.

Far away in the Underdark, the avatar of an ancient greater goddess screamed in agony as the Shadow Weave, her creation, was forcibly ripped from her and she was locked out of it by secrets she could not understand. For all of her divine intellect, Shar was still limited to the methods of thought Ao had allowed, and she had never conceived of the sort of cryptography Skuld threw her way.

In a flash Skuld completed her transformation as she tied herself into the Shadow Weave and became its new centre. Her hair was still the flowing shadows, but if you looked hard enough at it there were tiny points of light like stars, a reminder that even in the darkness there was still light if you knew where to look. Her angel’s hair was similarly ethereal.

Everyone had stumbled back in terror as the transformation took place, except for stubborn Steb, who remained next to her in silent vigil through the entire thing, loyal to Skuld and to Lars’ request.

With a final psychic cry, the thing inside of Lars exploded out with a burst of otherworldly light and indescribable colours and landed with a wet plop on the ground next to him. All in attendance not blessed with daemonic or divine resilience promptly forgot the horrid form as it quickly shifted to a much more pleasant shape; that of a female drow child possessed with rather strange eyes, dark as the oceans, and pale marking on her face reminiscent of those that Skuld had. She ‘wore’, as much as daemons could wear things made out of their own essence, a loose sort of gown and her white hair was unbound at shoulder length.

Oh, and she was currently wearing a hungry grin that would make a shark turn and run.

Pulling himself back together, Lars grabbed on to the child’s leg and said, “No eating anyone right now dear.”

The little daemon turned to him and gave him the saddest look imaginable and pouted, “But poppa, I’m hungry!”

“Yes, but we like some of the people in here,” Lars replied before he looked over at Skuld and asked, “Are you alright?”

Inhaling deeply, Skuld nodded and said, “Yes… this will take some time to process properly, but Noble Umbra and I should be alright. Ugh… there are so many little errors in this system…”

“We’ll find your mallet, wherever it went, and you can debug it later. Right now though, I do believe that some revenge is in order. You or me?” Lars asked Skuld.

Skuld tilted her head to the side before she said, “I want to get to know my daughter first, and I think you got it worse what with the baby eating and the pregnancy.”

Nodding, Lars said, “Fair enough.” He then turned to Aruvixa with an enormous grin and said, “Hey Aruvixa, did I mention that my charge here was a goddess from another world? Since I’m feeling in a bit of a generous mood what with just giving birth, I’ll give you what you always wanted. A long shot at unlimited power. How's that sound?”

Seeing the writing on the wall, Aruvixa asked fearfully, “Unlimited power?”

Lars shrugged and said, “Suit yourself, but unless you have unlimited handling capacity, you probably shouldn’t have wanted it so badly.”

He then grabbed on to a piece of the Weave that was in a low state and jammed it into Aruvixa, being careful not to swap bits of soul with the bitch. Her eyes went wide as she felt the new trickle of power in her and the insight into Lars’ mind and what he had seen and experienced… and how utterly outclassed her entire civilization was against true power, power wielded effortlessly by humans of all creatures.

A moment before the energy surged back up to full power, Aruvixa understood what she had been dealing with and could only let out a tiny terrified whimper as she soiled herself, the very same crime she had her sister executed for all those months ago.

Then the strand surged back to normal size and beyond with the latest ripple in the Weave and Aruvixa was carried away, her soul consumed by the raw magic and carried away, leaving only a burned husk of a body behind.

Once the steaming corpse of the previous Matron Mother hit the ground, Lars asked, “Does anyone else want to piss me off today?”


Far away, a tiny creature looked up in surprise before twitching its rabbit-like face and going to where it had stashed its one treasure. In its wake a small squadron of enormous dark green spiders followed, their colouration more invisible in the darkness than pure black. The shadow spiders followed the tiny creature with the loyalty of those who knew their place in the pecking order and what both defiance and obedience brought.

Think was back!

[Garlak]

"If there was any way of making a commissar look scarier, it was to make him look like a drowned, undead commissar rose from the ocean depths, not even death keeping him from kicking ass."

Yyeep. That's a winner, right there.


So. Skuld has taken over the Shadow Weave. How was Shar still in control in the first place--that is, how was she still a goddess? I thought Ao threw a fit and "demoted" everyone.. or at least put them on forced leave without pay, heh heh he. Anyway, I'm sure Ao is screaming "not as planned!" right about now. Hope he doesn't decide to smite this "opportunistic upstart" that hijacked a goddess's domain merely minutes after he cleared house.

What's going to happen to the other Weave; Mystra's weave? Will Skuld absorb it too; not immediately of course, since it's pretty much raging.. but is she going to try and calm down the "storm" or take over when it calms? Is Skuld going to gain all/some of Shar's portfolios.. or will she be a bit different, perhaps adding Technology, Futurism/Metahumanity, Progress and such to her portfolio? Will she even HAVE such clasifications--she might have merely (hah, "merely") changed her nature rather than took over a portfolio. Maybe kamisama will decide to see how she handles this.. you know, let her have some responsibility, get some experience.. of course that would come LATER, heh.


"Congratulations, it's aHRRKglArebwi9gleajw@ifik!1.fshhh...."


Is Lars going to take over House Roreil, possibly impersonate Aruvixa? ...Oorrr does he simply want to leave the Drow? but it doesn't seem like he'd leave the slaves and such hanging.. Methinks he'll be too busy dealing with divine matters to worry about staying in the city of the drow..

[von Neufeld]

So, the plot twist is revealed. Great chapter.

Why did you decide to give the shadow-weave to Skuld, instead of having her take the normal weave?

[Academia Nut]

Because it would piss Shar off to no end. And if I hadn't suggested it, no one would have actually thought I was going to do it. And I like throwing incongruous things at each other and making them work together like explosion welded pieces of metal.

[Robo Jesus]

Far away, a tiny creature looked up in surprise before twitching its rabbit-like face and going to where it had stashed its one treasure. In its wake a small squadron of enormous dark green spiders followed, their colouration more invisible in the darkness than pure black. The shadow spiders followed the tiny creature with the loyalty of those who knew their place in the pecking order and what both defiance and obedience brought.

Think was back!

So the bunny is the most feared one. Why do I get the mental image of a bunch of Monty Python characters saying "We told you so!"

Also, why do I get the mental image of Skuld now going a bit loopy over BABY NAMES?

[Academia Nut]

So the bunny is the most feared one. Why do I get the mental image of a bunch of Monty Python characters saying "We told you so!"

It's a bit from Discworld too, but yeah, it's like the jokes about how you should always be afraid of the little guy in a gang of thugs because you have no idea what he's capable of to stay with the rest of the group.

Also, why do I get the mental image of Skuld now going a bit loopy over BABY NAMES?

Probably because you just implanted the idea in my head?

[Robo Jesus]

Heh.

Ok, serious review time noa. First off, the scene showing the transition of depowered-Skuld into uber-Skuld falls emotionally flat. The reasons why is that it's taking place with people all around her in the midst of battle, and they are totally ignored. They're in a battle first off, so there should be a bit more 'chaos' around them as this is happening. Secondly, the peoples, from the random battle mages under hire, to Aruvixa, to the staff of house Roreril should be reacting to Skuld screaming, grow wings, watching those wings develop into a 'celestial' being, then start screaming something about the goddess Shar. Third, what language is Skuld speaking in when she's saying these things, and can the people around her understand?

These three things need to be addressed for the scene to work perfectly, and not fall emotionally flat as it currently has.

[consequences]

I disrespectfully disagree.

The other people, their reactions, and the murthering great battle by drow standards don't matter at all. They are now the equivalent of the unending failpile of first level npc class characters that a PC with epic and legendary Leadership has, and simply can't make use of because they no longer have any ability to influence any conflict that the PC might choose to notice. Ignoring them emphasizes(possibly unintentionally) their utter insignificance.

And besides, his side's in a holding pattern right now, because they don't want to explode, and the other side is busy either exploding, or getting the clue that they don't want to explode.

[Academia Nut]

Yeah, the battle was in a lull while everyone tried to deal with the sudden surge of wild magic, and this is one of those 'What are you going to do?' situations for mere mortals, what with the inability to actually do anything. I could make a few changes, and I might actually, but in general I'm happy with the broad details.

Also, I see in my head a new picture. Skuld in commissar clothing but transformed by her contact with the Shadow Weave, with her transformed angel floating out of her back like they typically do in A!MG. Next to her would be Lars in his 'Davy Jones' commissar get up. And between them would be the little daemon child.

In other words, a family portrait.