The "Best" RPG Ever-49

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---

Everyone wound up at the same big table down in the first floor of the inn for breakfast. Aria was last, immediately behind Clera who was busy making sure she didn't fall down the stairs. "Hey, how are you?" said Lynn once the two of them finally sat down.

"I have good news and better news. I can walk without much trouble now—just getting up and down feels a little woozy still—and last night I managed to 'remember' my other name for the Beacon thing."

"..Is that 'past life' really something you want to know about?" said Zack.

"Yes! It's an interesting plot thread. I can't just leave it alone, right?"

"But it's not real. It's...someone else is putting memories, in your head. That doesn't bother you, at all?"
"It's about as real as anything else around here. Anyway, I won't stop being me just because of a few extra memories."

Rayna, meanwhile, was busy staring at Nora intently. She didn't even notice at first, and when she did she quietly looked aside a few times before finally being too flustered to not respond. "W-what?!"
"I'm pretty sure...yeah. I saw your face before we actually met. It was..." Her eyes flicked around, watching some unseen information scroll past. "...A really old request on the board said that a priestess of...Haestra had gone missing. And to contact certain people if she was ever found."
"I s-suppose that makes sense...th-the bandits who captured me s-said something about me being a missing priestess as well. A-and I've had d-dreams lately of being, there, and leaving. S-sneaking out."

"More of these 'backstory' dreams, I guess," said Lynn. "Complete with evidence showing up in the 'real' world somehow..."

"Who is Haestra, exactly?" said Katherine. "One of this world's gods, obviously, but..."

"I was curious t-too, so I read about her yesterday at the l-library," said Nora. "She of nature and the moon. Sh-she looks like a centaur with brown fur, grass-color hair. Th-there's a scar on her right flank, and sh-she's supposed to be responsible for blessing people to have powers like mine. In legends of the origins of b-beastfolk, she's the most often credited with c-creating many of them. Often her worshipers t-take people 'blessed' by her to serve as her priests, but...th-there really isn't any evidence that she ever ordered anyone t-t-to do that."

"Did you read about any of the other gods?" said Mira. "It seems like it'd be a good idea to be familiar with them, in case someone asks us something or makes a reference we need to understand..."

"Um, I-I skimmed a little, b-but I was mostly.."

"I can tell you," Clera announced. "The side of me from this world knows them well, and sent me an overview the night before last."

"Well, go ahead then!" said Mira cheerfully.

"Hmn. Haestra's brother is Demaeus, he of sorrow and storms. The god of weather and death, who guides the departed to the afterlife. He hides a scarred, disfigured appearance beneath a cloak and wields a scythe. His temples handle funerals, but he communicates with mortals the least of all, so whether he appreciates or demands any kind of worship at all is unknown.

"Sophol is the god of magic, progress, and the sun. He is said to have gifted mortals with magic, teaching them non-violent, utilitarian uses for it and being disappointed to see them turn it to the use of war. He grants inspiration to innovators, mages, and other kinds of thinkers. His statues are always missing their right arm, and hold either a book or a sword, or otherwise are outstretched empty. Despite his hatred of it, he is the closest thing this world has to a god of war, said to intervene in mortal conflicts to aid the wronged side—but the evidence that he actually does so is sketchy at best.

"Sophol's lover is Aphera, she of love and the stars. She is depicted as a beautiful woman, but the exact features vary wildly; sculptors are simply told to portray what they believe a beautiful woman looks like. Her temples house most weddings and are often the richest for money made off of them. She is supposed to be the most peaceful and gentle of the gods, but is also said to occasionally walk the earth wielding a whip of thorns to punish abusers of her domain.

"...And finally, Bimorphaeus, who has no set gender or appearance, over the domain of dreams and memories. He or she is belived to be the main messenger of the gods, frequently appearing in mortal dreams to pass on information, but at the same time is notoriously bad with words, preferring to use the 'language' of dreams—images, sounds, smells or direct concepts—to communicate instead. This makes it far more difficult to be certain whether or not a dream even is a message from him at all. Bimorphaeus is said to have granted some of those who he or she saw had no talent for magic psionic powers similar to his or her own, but quickly made it clear those blessed this way should not be made to worship him or her the way Haestra's blessed do."

"And that's all?" said Aria. "I mean, where's the god of evil and demons and whatnot? Those all sound pretty nice, not even very capricious."

"Then again, so does Zeus if you just give a general description," Lynn pointed out.

"If there is another god then nobody has ever encountered them, and Bimorpheaus has never informed mortals of their existence. Sometimes he or she is seen is as the ruler over the darkness of night, so thieves or spies will turn to him or her for help since no other god seems likely to do so, but even that is a dubious connection. Although they do tend to be very aloof toward mortals in general...wait." She appeared to have a realization.

"What?" Katherine was visibly resisting the urge to just mind-read it out of her.

"Clera—the one from here—said that when she was first brought to the white room with me, she was in a state capable of detecting all kinds of magic, and sensed an exceedingly powerful, complicated summoning spell at work. The kind of spell that would require a great deal of magical power and mental focus to cast; for mortals to do it would more than likely need a great many mages working in sync. If a spell like that was used to bring me here, then it is logical that a similar spell was used on all of us, which further increases the cost to perform such a ritual beyond anything even halfway reasonable."

"Yeah, I suppose that makes sense," said Lynn. "I couldn't think of something better than a 'summoning spell' to bring someone from our world to another using magic. And..we were all brought here somehow using a program on a disc, remember."
"You think there was some kind of technomancy involved?" said Rayna.

She nodded. "A big complicated ritual is ultimately a series of steps to be mechanically performed one after another. From a certain point of view that's exactly what a computer program is best at."

Dr. Kellen nodded. "And if indeed some large group of mages were responsible for us being here, then surely at least one of them would have contacted one of us by now. Or at least we would have heard about such an organization. On the other hand, the gods of this world are notoriously reticent. They rarely intervene in mortal affairs in a way that can be proven for sure, and even their 'messenger' speaks in oblique dreams rather than directly. They have among them a god of magic and innovation, and likely every one of them a far greater supply of it than any group of mortals could easily muster."

"You think we were brought here by the gods," Katherine summarized.
"It is a logical theory based on the evidence we have so far. And not only have we been brought, but each of us blessed with power and skill we did not possess before. Beyond that still, who else would be capable of 'creating' histories for each of us, complete with concrete evidence such as people and objects that make those histories appear quite real? However, it must be costly even for them to do all of this, which still raises the question of why."

"And why all girls?" Zack added. "That really makes no sense." Nobody could offer much more than a collective shrug of agreement to that.

---

Rather than everyone attempting to crowd into the Captain's office, it was agreed that just Zack would go as a representative to talk about possibly adding a few more bedrooms (although of course the wolf followed him out). But just in front of the door to the guardhouse, he ran into Reed. "Oh, hey there," he said. "I was just about to ask the Captain where to look for you."
"Why?"

"Well, your house is done."
"Done? It's only been two days!"

"Technically it's been three. We got some earth mages to get the foundation built, then I just needed to figure out how to arrange the rooms you requested. We have some pre-built pieces to teleport into place and slot together, and then added the furniture. I mean, it would usually take a week to build it the standard way, but the Captain paid up front for the quicker method."

"Oh.."

"Well, if you want to see it I can show you to the door, hand over the keys?" he said.

"Um. I guess so. I should get the others, then."

"Alrighty, I'll come with."

They went back to the inn, and everyone came out. Reed looked around at the group and said, "Huh. Seems like you've multiplied since the last time we talked, eh?"
"Little bit," said Katherine.
"I guess I really shouldn't be surprised. The Captain might as well be some kinda prophet at this point. Well, follow me!" He gave a wave and started off before anyone could ask questions.

There were a few parts of the city with a lot of doors seemingly placed too closely together on the wall to have anything bigger than some tiny apartments (or whatever this world's equivalent to that was); Reed led the way to one of those, and then pulled a keyring out, pointing out the door and its address. Then he offered the entire ring to Zack. "Well, there you go."

"Uhh...which of these is..?"
"They're all the same key," he pointed out; on closer inspection, their shapes were actually identical. "I had no idea why she wanted twice as many bedrooms and a ton of keys made, but like I said..."
"Wait, twice as..?" Reed just shrugged. So Zack tried the key in the door, and opened it into their new home.

"Anyway, enjoy the new house!"

The door from town was across from a door leading out to the front yard with Mira's ritual site taking up much of it. There was a fence fairly far out, and a small training yard with archery targets and dummies on it. The building itself was not quite a mansion or castle, but seemed huge as houses go, though for eight people to live there it would have to be. The first floor had among other things a living room, a library (with shelves but no books), a small blank room past some thicker walls that was probably supposed to be the meditation room, a kitchen and a dining room with a huge, long table in it. The second floor had eight bedrooms with a bathroom adjoining each pair (and there were a couple of smaller bathrooms in the first floor). Much of it felt like a modern house from Earth, though without any wall sockets or electronics to speak of. The appliances in the kitchen were differently shaped, but easy enough to figure out the functions of—oven, stovetop, refrigerator, just as expected. There was also a door next to the door to town that opened to a blank wall, which seemed slightly strange. While the place was fully furnished, it didn't have any books, sheets, toiletries or groceries in it, which meant a trip into town was necessary to get those.

Zack insisted that Nora take the bedroom neighboring his. Rayna and Lynn took adjoining rooms as well, and Aria went with Clera. That left the last two to Katherine and Mira, which they had no particular complaint about. For a while they explored around, familiarizing themselves with the layout, before having a brief argument on who should go buy what. Zack wanted to get his own sheets and covers and shower curtain, so Rayna went with him to buy those kinds of things and toiletries for everyone. Katherine knew what a fully-stocked kitchen would need, and asked Lynn to help her get everything from the store and/or market. Nora and the witch agreed to go looking for books, both regular and magical, for the library—after everyone settled on a budget to not go above in that endeavor. This left Aria and Clera at the house, for the obvious reason that the former would have a hard time running all around town to buy things at the moment and everything seemed to be pretty much covered by everyone else anyway.

---

"Well, you were just almost-visited by one of them," said Tsaron, appearing in the Captain's office.

Ezra took a second to glance in his direction, before continuing to rearrange the contents of a shelf. "I think your plan worked. But how did you get that architect to show up with such perfect timing?"

"Honestly? Luck in this case," she shrugged. "Although I wouldn't be surprised if that's technically a 'skill' I have too."

"You have some very nice items there, you know," he said. "Would you like some help with that top shelf?"

"I have a stool." He walked a little closer anyway.

"Is that the Storm-god's Favor in your hand?" he said, indicating a blue-crystal statue depicting a stormcloud. "Where in the world did you find one of those?"

"Someone was just selling it in the street one day. A man in a dark cloak claiming to have an amazing magical artifact doesn't get that much attention from the average citizen. And his original asking price was ludicrous."

"I can only assume you talked it down, as usual." She didn't respond, which was as good as an affirmation.

"Well, do you think this is the right move? Giving them a house is saying 'stay right here' as loudly as you possibly can."

"I haven't had any bad dreams lately. They had two days. And the dragon's domain, which she would not willingly leave behind, is right by here. Therefore..."

"And I suppose we're here, too. Do you think we're the last ones?"

"Possible. I have heard no news, good or bad, about the others. And I'm very good at hearing news. So if they're that far off the radar, I would guess they're either dead or trying not to be found."

"Hmph. I was doing that and I still wound up here."

"Ron, you wanted to be found."

"Hey now, I'm supposed to be the mind-reader."

Ezra stepped down off of the stool, and back over to her desk, placing the Favor on it as a display piece before taking a seat. "You could've left any time after you arrived, but you bought yourself a house and moved in."

"Fair." He shrugged, walking around to the front of the desk to sit in one of the chairs there, leaning forward. "Alright, so I wanted to see you again. Even though we split on such bad terms, we always got on so well before that. I suppose I missed having someone to talk to who has any idea of what I've been through. Won't you admit to the same?"

She shrugged. "It's nice to at least have someone I can be completely honest with. As long as we avoid certain topics I wouldn't mind the occasional chat."

"Oh believe me, I'm as eager to avoid that subject as you are. It just feels like flaying shattered horse bones."

"Good." She thought for a moment. "I have an appointment in half an hour. I know you're not terribly busy, so we'll need to arrange some way to communicate my schedule, hmn?"

"That shouldn't be too difficult. Just let someone else know what it is and walk them by my house every now and then. For the moment, I must ask what sort of heroic and wondrous deeds you did to get yourself the practical ownership of a whole town."

---

Sitting on a couch in their new living room, Aria turned the gem over in her hands a few times. Clera was nearby, watching. "Are you going to do it?"
"Of course. I can't think of a better time or place, too. I just...feel a little nervous still, I guess." She shrugged. "I dunno why. I'm just meeting someone, I've never met before really. But I feel amost like...I'm worried he won't like how I look, or who I am now. As compared to...a technically-fake person, who I never really was and only remember the tiniest bit about being. It's weird."

"Based on what we do know, I suspect he would simply be glad you are alive in any condition. Perhaps...that you are not hurting people."
"Heheh, thanks doc."

"How is your..."

"Bloodlust? Okay for now. I took some extra points in mitigating it not long after I woke up. It's...not exactly what my build's supposed to look like, but better that than flipping out while I literally can't fight. Anyway it'll help in the long run; once I'm the demon and the demon is me these points will still keep me less hungry and less crazy."

"Good..."

"Well, here we go!" Feeling impatient with herself, Aria held up the Beacon and said, "Ares!" For an awkward few seconds there was no response. "Uh...hmm."

"It is possible that the key phrase is not just your name. In case someone were to be in a crowd near

you with the same name, so that it would not activate by accident..."

"Oh. what about, 'I am Ares'?" No response. "Ares Ares Ares. Grrrr..my name is Ares! Wake up already!" She shook it in frustration, only to realize that it was finally reacting, glowing faintly blue. She stopped shaking it and watched the glow brighten steadily to a nice, visible glow, and then remaining that way. "...Okay, I guess that's it then?"
"So it would appear."

She watched it for a bit. "At least it's a pretty color...I-I mean, so now all there is is to wait. Now that it's active...hmm. If he takes so long to show up that I'm better and we go off fighting monsters, it'd really be better if he didn't try to show up where the monsters are. So we should keep this here, and I'll just write a note on the front door that says I'm out fighting monsters, wait a bit and I'll be back."

"..Or possibly the fence gates," said Clera.

"He's supposed to be a teleport mage or whatever, he might jump right past the gate. In which case...I'll put it in both places. And another note right next to the crystal in case he comes straight inside the house after it."

---

I found it best to disobey the writer's adage of "show, don't tell" when it comes to describing the house and living arrangements, because I really don't want to spend several paragraphs or possibly an entire part alone on them discovering its layout room by room and figuring out who's going to have what bedroom and so on when that's really not what the story is supposed to be about. Hopefully it's not too disappointing.

Also, lore! Lore I figured out a while ago and finally found an opportunity to say something about in-story. Hopefully not too clunky of a placement with it.