The stillness of the void is disrupted by the appearance of a dilapidated cargo vessel, its prow streaming with plumes of fairie-fire from its jump.
Behind it the miraculous tear in space and time that humanity barely understands has already collapsed. Blessedly unwitnessed by human eyes.
Before the hull has even had a chance to cool it crashes into the veil of micro-debris kicked up by the nearby asteroid field, wherein lies its destination.
As thrusters burn to induce the vessel’s drift towards the mining outpost it was so suddenly instructed to divert towards, the scant handful of crew within begin to stir in their cryopods.
None of them know yet that this shuffle of their cargo run is likely to change their lives.
But that is for later, for now there are questions to be answered…
===
Greetings and welcome to The Haunting of Ypsilon-14, a One-Shot in the Mothership TTRPG system. This is a very deadly Sci-Fi Horror game, so brace yourselves!
Mothership is a roll-under d100 system. We’ll be doing Bo2 here, to soften the edge just a bit. Generally if you’re rolling dice it’s because you’ve fucked up or haven't planned well enough anyway. Doubles are crits, if they’re above the Stat/Save you’re rolling against then that’s a crit fail. If they’re below, that’s a crit success. Where skills apply, they raise your effective score by +10 for Trained, +15 for Expert, and +20 for Master (you can stack them if you’re clever).
Claude Gaumont had been but a boy when the spark of the Emrean Revolution had blazed into a wildfire, and since the first moments, he had yearned to be one of his people’s champions. The war had gone on, and he had learned more and more about the cause, but when had strength and nerve enough to have a hope of deceiving a less conscientious recruiter and finished the most basic of training at arms, the war had come to an unceremonious end.
That had been half his lifetime past, and ever since, he had yearned to find the battleground where the fate of tomorrow would again be decided. Vitelia seemed to have been that place, and many others had thought the same. A wrong assumption. The Revolution in Vitelia, it seemed, had not been theirs, and Claude had been forced to flee his comrades in the face of a sudden downpour of defeats.
A minor noble called Di Avolo had sheltered the Revolutionary, a stray flower of the Red Garden that he had found and put in a glass vase. Both knew it wasn’t for Claude’s sake, though. He was a toy, an item in a collection. The shame was the price of survival and comfort. All of the others who had not fallen in battle had been rounded up and deported to the wastelands, or scattered and fled on their own. The Utopian Front had left the lot of them in the cold- and even now, Claude repeated to himself…
“Why?” He asked out the window, to the crowd outside, assembled to listen to the man who had vanquished the <span class="mu-i">Giardino Rosso</span>, to that man himself. “What turned the League against us, to side with tyrants?” In the same room was his new patron- as well as a guest of Di Avolo’s, a young man around fourteen or fifteen. He had a certain handsomeness, but his grey eyes were heavy with a discontent, restless boredom, an empty searching that Claude felt some kinship with. A son of a friend of a friend of Di Avolo’s, visiting here to broaden his experiences, but the boy had little interest in the outside that Claude had seen besides looking at it from a window.
“What an obvious question,” Di Avolo said, “So obvious a child could answer it.” He glanced to the boy, “Well? Go on, tell <span class="mu-i">Signore della Rivoluzione</span> why the Revolutionary League deemed he and his lot unnecessary for their Dawn. We’ve discussed what has been happening here enough.”
Claude could not protest. Di Avolo kept him housed and fed on a whim.
“Do I have to?” the youth said dully, “It’s obvious enough to not be interesting.”
“Indulge us. Tell this man how he came to be here.”
Jail Quest: a text adventure occasionally illustrated.
A night of drinking and a failed attempt to cheat on cards had landed you the strangest job slash community service sentence you've ever had: ensuring Gongalla Gaol survives the reality storm called Singularity.
Now you travel around with your employer and a handpicked crew to survey the four Reality Anchors. Hey, beats being tarred and feathered, right?
You are Rosa Montagni, once again on the road towards the north of North. After that successful raid on the Singularity cultist cave, you've returned back to Pinewatch to tie up loose ends - one of which involves a bit of child actor kidnapping. Hey, he's affiliated with the cultists anyways, luring kids into the hands of the cultists. The other loose end is the 'sleeper' cultists still in town - but you captured them with the assistance of the burlesque theatre girls, whom you worked together to set a trap in a play they've always wanted. Cultists apprehended and delivered to the guildhall, Jed Stuart gives you the reward you seek - directions towards the North's reality anchor. Jed's info is way more detailed than Hammy's vague directions - and so you once again charter Lightning Ling's autowagon services. Which brings you to your current situation...
You are Kyle Mercer. 23 years hellbound. Killer, loving brother, blood enthusiast, all around bad news. You're pretty used to being the most dangerous person in the room at any given time. Right now is a notable exception.
The nightmare thing smashing its way out of the Black Room in Valerie Hedgepeth's basement is, what they call in the industry: a problem.
"<span class="mu-i">Nemesis!</span>"
Black, icy water sloshes around your boots, steadily filling the basement. You feel a cold shiver run through you, mirroring the frigid, ethereal wind blowing form beyond the Veil. Not good.
XXX
Nemesis Quest follows a bad man doing bad things for bad reasons.
I aim to update twice a day around 5:00 PM UTC and 1:00 AM UTC. I will update more often if there's a clear consensus or I have the time.
Notes: Surprising no one, I'm a fucking retard. Kyle is not 25, Kyle is 23. Candi is 24. Oops. I literally spent a week agonizing about power balancing/power scaling and shit but fuck it. I'm God. QM Fiat.
XXX
You're powerful. Beyond strong, beyond tough, you're someone's worst fucking nightmare. With Valerie and her daughter's blood added to your menagerie of souls you feel the hunger within you deepen, dropping out like the sea floor. Like a turbocharged engine you're going to need to fuel the killing machine you've become. Every kill won't necessarily grant you new powers, but if you abstain for too long you'll find yourself running on empty.
<span class="mu-s">POWERS
>What Doesn't Kill You (Sally) Serious wounds don't stop you.
>Make Them Disappear (Mall Hobo) You leave no forensics.
>Behind the Veil (Lasker City Hooker) See the Veil.
>You Should be Dancing (Rupert) The power of suggestion.
>Speak of the Devil (Valerie Hedgepeth) Appear where they least expect.
>Make them forget (Valerie's Daughter) You are hard to identify.</span>
A world where might makes right. A world of Jade and Gold, of Phoenix and Dragons, of Pills and Talismans, of Martial and Spiritual arts. A world where diligent training yield strength, meaning freedom. A world where loneliness means death, meaning social chains. A world still unfair, as the ones reaching the heavens are most likely born rich - be it political riches of the aristocrats, power of secret knowledges and hidden realms of clans, or lucky enough to be born one-in-a-thousand genius.
This was not the case of Quiet Word - that is, (You). Your current skill level is on par with other genius of your age. But where they were graced with secret techniques and special care, you just had lucky encounters leveraged to the best and a knack for navigating social situations.
You own a trove of techniques for such a young cultivator - more than you can study efficiently, but your strength lies in the impressive amount of Bonded Spiritual Beasts - A Phoenix spirit, a Horse spirit, a Snake spirit and a Wolf spirit. Speaking of that last one, you didn't told a world about him to anybody. As a scion of the Primordial Wolf spirit, its father warned you of its worth and how people could want to rip it away from you. Especially in such a ruthless and public environment than, say, a townwide cultivator tournament. Previously mentionned worth comes from its ability to Fuse without restriction - fusion being a secret of the higher ranking of your sect, secret you have almost completely rediscovered on your own, and freely shared with your sect-siblings (but not your masters). Alright, the Primordial Wolf might have helped you on that point.
Recently, you took the mantle of elder brother to twelve younglings; you won for the second time the local town's tournament; you get in some weird pact with a gardener and you broke through the first minor realm of second stage. All is nice and well - if you set aside your concerns regarding a certain prophetic poem including words about fated dao partner and the most-dreaded rightful fear of falling behind.
<span class="mu-i">"I took my first breaths long before there was rain."</span> -Unknown source, possibly an Astropath attached to the <span class="mu-i">Xi-40 Explorator Fleet</span>
This shouldn't be working. It's impossible for it to be working.
You possess an amount of Strain equal to your Conditioning score. When attempting actions beyond your current capacity, you gain a point of Strain. Attempting to Strain while at maximum Strain will result in a Strain Check. During a Strain Check, roll 1d10 for every point of the relevant Parameter. Results that are 6 or above count as one success. Results of 10 count as two successes. Three successes must be rolled to avert a critical failure. Fail or pass, after a Strain Check, you cannot Strain again until you restore your Strain by seeking shelter.
<span class="mu-s">This quest allows you to designate a second-choice vote on decisions with three or more options before Write-Ins.</span> When votes are totaled, the option with the least votes for it will be removed, with votes for that option instead being changed to the second-choice of those voters. Second-choice votes are also used to break ties. This helps increase the accuracy of votes, but is not mandatory. Please specifically mark your second-choice as such if you do so.
Vote stay open for a minimum of six hours, but will usually take longer.
A note: My writing style is pretty dry, but don't mistake that for it being serious.
Your name is Shelly Suzume. A member of the White Fang. You didn’t start out this way, and you certainly never expected to join them, but at least it’s temporary. Probably. Then again, you did receive an offer to lead one of its branches. The idea is… enticing, but it’s something you still need to think about, especially since that branch happens to be in one of the scummiest places imaginable.
Speaking of scum, you just witnessed one of the most… interesting meetings you’ve ever attended. You saw most of Kuchinashi’s underworld big shots with your own eyes. Then again, at this point, the entire city is the underworld. You probably left a good impression on them. Maybe.
Your boss, Taylor, just allied himself with the Black Sheep. That doesn’t exactly sit well with you, but, well… politics aren’t really your thing. Or at least, you haven’t had much reason to deal with them, yet. If you accept Taylor’s offer, that might change.
Oh! And also. You infiltrated a Black Sheep’s underground weird warehouse-gallery-tunnel thing. Nothing too bad here. Just a few bodies here and there. Poor souls, victims of… something.
And to top it all off with a golden brooch, you accidentally ran into (most likely) the two most dangerous people in all of Kuchinashi. Maybe even Mistral. Just skulking around, exploring the same warehouses as you.
It is the 41st century. Great star empires that span galaxies make up the Factions of known space. Two decades of war saw the Factions united against a common foe; the Neeran Empire. With the Empire's defeat the Factions are once again at peace, but few are willing to risk falling into complacency and malaise once more.
Great star fleets still ply the space lanes, keeping the peace and keeping a watchful eye for new threats. These fleets, once built for war, are increasingly being turned towards exploration. The neutral Navigators Guild leads the expansion, plotting new safe routes to distant galaxies. Meanwhile the Factions Alliance military act as their guardians, protecting the explorers and evaluating threats to Faction space.
The Alliance fleets still act as the defenders of Faction space, guarding against external threats. Called on to police the borders of the former Neeran Empire and support exploration efforts, they are stretched thin on all fronts. Fortunately there is no shortage of old soldiers and adventurous youths looking for a cause if the price is right. Some are more sought after than others.
In the Neeran Wars all the Factions suffered to some extent. Entire worlds were destroyed, stripped of life or reduced to rubble. The heart was torn out of the Shallan Federation while the Terran Alliance and Dominion of Royal Houses staggered from lost worlds and a refugee crisis. Worse the Dominion fell into civil war at the worst possible time.
The Dominion civil war saw many dozens of Houses conquered by their neighbours or otherwise overthrown. Some simply saw a change in government, changing sides and aligning themselves with their former enemies. Others would be annexed or dissolved outright. Even years after the conflict its remnants still linger. The dispossessed are Knights and nobles of Dominion Houses that have lost their lands and territory. Many still have personal fortunes and enough resources to be dangerous.
Knights Errant are made up of those dispossessed still determined to take up arms in some cause. Entire chapters of Knights Errant exist, some choosing to defend the Dominion, others simply banding together for safety. Regardless of reason these knights are often some of the best warriors in known space and a resource the Alliance does not hesitate to draw upon.
Your House may have long ago fallen but there is still hope for the future. Work for the Alliance protecting the exploration fleets will be dangerous but could provide the tools and opportunity necessary to some day restore your House.
<span class="mu-i">"Happy Birthday, Our Brave Boys. You are now twenty years of age and it is time you embark on your Youthful Journey so that you may learn and grow to return home as men. Make farewells to your family, your friends, and your neighbors, for they will surely miss you, but never forget the Memories you made with them, so you can share them to new friends you will make from across the nation. Make us proud and become the man we need to preserve and continue Our Memories." </span>
Every month, around 10,000 boys are shipped to Sleepy Waters for their twentieth birthday. They travel by rail or paddle streamer from their home village or town, most taking no longer than 16 hours on their voyage. It was a common sight to see so many old boys traveling during the last day of every month, carrying nothing but the clothes on their back, some cash for when they become hungry on their way to Sleepy Waters, and a slip of paper containing their personal details.
Sleepy Waters was not a pleasant sight to behold, entirely devoid from the expanse of farm fields and meadows nearly all boys are accustomed to. Those from the capital aren't as shocked as their rural counterparts but it was sill undesirable for its dull colors and muddy tracks, though the chimneys of smoke was more familiar to them. The boys entered Sleepy Waters on foot, forming a few of the longest lines under a canopy, turning and weaving to fit as many under to get away from the unfortunate rain.
Upon approaching the head of the line, one would come across an older gentleman in a dark uniform demanding each boy's slip of paper in exchange for a metallic tag with a string of numbers. He would copy the number onto the slip of paper given to him and call for the next boy.
***INTRODUCTION*** Greetings, this is not meant to be a conventional quest, instead mimicking some previous threads on /tg/ where I just shared my worldbuilding while drawing cute soldier boys. Often times people will ask questions about the setting or project themselves as a character in the threads, writing their thoughts, dreams, desires, and fears. I almost always entertain every remark and comment in the form of a drawing as the threads move onto a short story following the anons' until into a story's conclusion.
The real purpose of this quest is just for me to draw cute soldier boys.
You are young goblin with big dreams you want to become King of the Goblins!
You're about to leave the food scrap pits. How did you survive?
>You are strong goblin. When a carcass dropped into the pit you where one of the youngest goblins able to stay near and contest with the larger goblins.
>You are smart goblin. You figured out there was food inside the bones no need to fight over the scraps of meat when you can just but open that sweet jelly.
>You are social goblin. You formed a group with some of your birth brothers; your group would cause distractions to steal away meat and share it with each other.
How did you leave the food pits?
>You found an exit you're many of your kin didn't know about. Allowing you to journey into the caverns.
> You were taken from the pits by your older kin, judged to be ready to serve the tribe.
