Work In Progress

The orcs... didn't seem all that changed. They were aggressive, yes, but worked together and respected strength. There was little playing for power as they built their huts. Even those on the mountain looked bored upon the sight of the cube, making note that they'd need to build something rather large to hit it with.

...and that's terrible.

Suwako smiled... and then paused.

Suddenly, her hat flew off her head. Surprised, Suwako stumbled and fell onto her rear, tapping the top of her now-hatless head in surprise. "Ehhh?! Wha... what..."

She swiftly turned around in an effort to locat her hat, and saw it resting a few feet away, inside open to the sky. Frowning, Suwako approached... before quickly realizing what was happened. "Oh... so that's it? Well... okay. I don't want something like that around anyway."

All at once, a flash of whiteness erupted from the hat. It wasn't just a few, it was hundreds, no, thousands of Mishaguji. The sinuous pale serpents burst from the hat, massive spectral albino snakes shooting high into the air. Each of the Mishaguji's maws were open, displaying a fanged, red void within. Their eyes and mouths glowed faintly, letting off a wholly unnatural light. Suwako didn't move to stop them. She knew what they were going to do, and she allowed it. The Mishaguji wanted to feed. The sudden, vast increase in darkness, pain, despair... the serpentine gods could sense it. Even its existence lent them power, but they wanted more then that. The curse gods were beings of faith and of darkness, their existence built around the evil of a curse. And this new source of that darkness... it made them crave it. The curse gods wanted nothing less to tear it apart and devour it until nothing was left.

The sinuous spectral stone serpents moved like ribbons through the air, making their way to the mountain in a vast swarm.

After they had departed, Suwako reached out and picked up her hat, placing it back on her head. It blinked.

"Make sure you come back when you're done!" she called to the departing mishaguji, "No wandering around or getting into trouble!"

edited 20th Feb '13 9:44:52 AM by AnnoR

"Oh, dear. The toad, the monkey, and the dog have all screwed up."

Armok floated over to the pillar of darkness Yami had conjured up. He had interest in the object, which would induce conflict throughout the world. His dwarves would be partly driven by it though they normally heeded no evil or good source save their deities. Normally half of them would be made up anyway. "This monolith deserves a proper land around it. Would you mind if I lent my power to change the nature of this region to accommodate it?"

Mewtwo idled by himself as he and the Mew and Dittos had stopped rain dancing, that part over. He watched as things progressed, but he wasn't sure he liked it or not. Notable tones of evil popped up everywhere. He felt he could identify with some parts of evil in the way that his siblings, the Mew and Dittos, could not but there were depths even he could not understand which were freely created.

"Answering that question would require me to know about the nature of this...land you're going to create...creature.", Yami spoke pointing at the floating A.

"I must commend you for your creation though...those dwarves...greed, wrath, pride, gluttony, lust...I think I like them..."

edited 20th Feb '13 10:18:29 AM by Savato

In the distance, near Armok and Yami, a great cloud seemed to be drifting rapidly towards the two gods. As the cloud drew closer, its nature became apparent; The Mishaguji had located their pray. The black cube that put out such darkness, such evil... it made their hunger grow. To devour it... it was what they desired on every level. With a vast hissing, the storm of serpents moved rapidly, ribbonlike, through the air, slavering fanged maws displaying forked tongues emerging from a red void.

They would have their meal.

"Oh, dear. The toad, the monkey, and the dog have all screwed up."

"So, that's the command. We don't reck the surface of this little mud ball, but extend the pain."

The mad god Kefka floated in front his first angel, the two of them hovering miles above the ground. The worlds lightning and thunder had been thoroughly and successfully sown, but not quite as frequent as it was during its creation The beings would have to do more in the future to perserve their work, some things that might actually be worth fighting over, but that wasn't now.

"Try to teach the new humans about how to use the lightning, sooner or later. You'll be more than impressed at the tools of destruction they'll make."

To the law and for the good of man. All I need to live by.

The humans were frightened by the new world around them, although some of them started displaying signs of aggressiveness. One of these humans declared himself the leader, telling everyone that since he was "the leader", they all had to respect them. And those who didn't... would pay. Even with the pillar affecting the world, the humans continued to advance, building their first tribe and slowly discovering more and more about tools and how they could use the world around them.

But Kefka would hear something: the faint noise of someone yelling as loud as they could. If he looked down, he would be able to spot one of Father's early creations, Greed, looking up at him, trying to attract his attention, oblivious to anything that was going on around him.

---

"Impressive." Father said to himself as he watched the humans. Well, he could leave them alone for a while, couldn't he? Floating through the skies, he searched for someone to interact with, someone to pass time. And his mind was urging for him to talk with someone, someone he had suddenly displayed a level of interest he hadn't displayed to anyone before.

"Shinki?" Father said, once again approaching the other deity. He eyed her daughter. "May I please have a... private talk with you?"

The orcs had advanced themselves, perfecting their styles of martial arts as a religious practice and living in villages around the monastery where the high priests of Krezznorg would work miracles- healing, creating food and water, and giving strength to those who would go out and defend the orcs from threats to the villages.

In the forest, the tall, thin orcs given Crane Style leaped between branches, staying off the forest floor as a challenge- and to avoid the packs of raptors.

In the desert, they would climb dunes to get a good view of the world around them.

In the caves, they cut out homes from the mountainside using their bare hands and brought rockslides down on the creatures who would attack them.

On the mountainside... they punched away at the base of the pillar, gathering firewood from the cursed trees using their drunken boxing to dodge the arboreal blows.

The minotaurs, however, stayed underground, surviving on mushrooms and cave fish. It fit their rather passive martial art, after all.

...and that's terrible.

Greed's call rose into Kefka's purple ears. He was wondering when he'd be called upon. It might just be a good time to start with the hands off approach.

"Ramuh!" Kefka said, curt and high voiced. "See what the little alchemic wants. He has the look of someone ambitious." He waved his arm downwards, cutting a hole through the clouds and spilling the horror-light onto the earth. The archangel, without a word of question, spilled through the gap almost faster than the homunculus could hear.

"What is it that you want?" the angel asked, floating to a halt a few feet from the ground, "Son of the ever so wise father?"

To the law and for the good of man. All I need to live by.

Armok looked at the creatures coming for them, lesser gods of sorts. It would be troublesome to deal with them but they seem to be uncontrolled, he'd have to do something. So Armok tapped into Mewtwo and forced him to teleport here. "Your first direct task from me, Mewtwo. Destroy these things, they interrupt my work." The blood drained from the left half of Armok's body and into Mewtwo, making him into a being of godly power. The area which had no blood anymore was hallow, with a framework still outlining the A.

"It is a curse I use often in my worlds at least once. The ground will become desecrated, the plants become darkened and the dead spontaneously raise into undeath. Any dead of even minor substance, such as a body part that has been severed, will rise and attack the living. The sky will no longer rain water but blood. The species the blood comes from varies each time, drawing upon any living species in the world. My dwarves sometimes try to settle in these cursed lands. Usually they die in one way or another but sometimes they manage to live for years."

"I usually find some necromancers that learn how to manipulate the dead the same way the curse does after some time."

---

Mewtwo felt himself get yanked from his idle spot to the god that had created him. His body filled with a power unlike that which he has had before, half of Armok's being. "As you wish, Blood God." At last, Mewtwo would get to excercise his destructive force. Mewtwo teleported to just in front of the creatures, glowing with a red aura. "Psych Up, Miracle Eye, Psychic." Using Psych Up to copy the powerup the creatures got from the monolith, Mewtwo focused his power into a yellow ball at his mouth. The hyper beam however, took on red tones as Mewtwo focused more power into it. He released the powerful energy at one side of the crowd, sweeping the beam over the rest.

edited 20th Feb '13 8:53:51 PM by StephanReiken

"Bwahaha! That sounds like a great idea!", Yami complimented Armok. "It would certainly be a great curse to unleash onto the world. Feel free to change this regio-..."

As Yami spotted the snakelike beings, the glowing markings on his body darkened.

"If you could please excuse me? I have business to take care of..."

With these words, Yami's hand fused with the rest of the sphere once again as it enveloped itself in darkness. After a few seconds,this darkness had faded, revealing Yami's new form. His markings were green now and the sphere seemed to be separated into various disks, which immediately lit themselves on fire.◊

   Ashes to ashes.
Dust to ashes.
The living to ashes.
Everything shall burn!   , Yami shouted as he floated towards the cloud of serpents, trying to incinerate them.

edited 21st Feb '13 9:22:10 AM by Savato

The Mishaguji hissed, collectively, and the swarm suddenly shot apart. The mass of serpents swam through the air and broke around the blasts, ribbon-like movements looking unreal as they weaved around the destructive blasts. Even if it had hit, the serpentine curse gods were... difficult to properly destroy. And there were so many, all feeding off of the boost of power they had gained from the monolith... they were determined to consume it.

The Mishaguji surged forwards through the air, avoiding the destructive blasts in a bid to close the distance between themselves and the monolith.

"Oh, dear. The toad, the monkey, and the dog have all screwed up."

Armok watched as the other god charged into battle, and the two hadn't immediately destroyed the oncoming army. This would take a little more effort and Armok couldn't do his work properly while making Mewtwo into his Avatar. "Mewtwo, I'm changing the nature of your power to make you super effective against them. Use your Aura Sphere, they can't dodge that." With that, the red aura around Mewtwo shifted into a yellow aura of unrelenting light. A mental click happened as Armok unlocked higher potentials in Mewtwo he didn't have before.

---

The divine power of light filled Mewtwo, giving him momentary clarity into the nature of Mew and the Dittos. Pure innocence and good, and he had that now. He was about to stop creatures of pure darkness, to protect a monolith of darkness? It was confusing to say the least but Armok was the creator so Mewtwo would follow for now. "I understand, Aura Sphere." Mewtwo brought his hands to his side and focused his Ki into his hands. After a moment, he brought his hands forward and the orb of energy he created started shooting streams of small Aura Spheres spreading out to strike the creatures. The blasts were careful to completely avoid Yami, but such is the nature of Aura Sphere that they would never do that willingly.

edited 21st Feb '13 3:45:19 PM by StephanReiken

Almost instantly, the Mishuguji went down... and by the thousands, they burrowed into the earth, vanishing underground and into the depths. They weren't seeking a fight, though if they were cornered and had no choice whatsoever they would counter as best as they were able. Instead, they burrowed towards the location of the monolith.

They could almost taste it.

"Oh, dear. The toad, the monkey, and the dog have all screwed up."

"Hmmmmmm...."

The earth shook violently as the white serpents tore through the ground. Their rapid burrowing had caught the attention of the Rift Mother. The Mishuguji were something new, and more importantly, something fleshy. And there was little to teach them in the ways of smithing. Perhaps it was a good time to teach them fear. The very fastest of the creatures would find themselves crushed the upward surge of the titanic angel, and swallowed into the pit of destructive light that served as it's mouth. The earth around the surviving ones condensed greatly as the Rift Mother moved through and formed caverns large enough to fit a small city in.

"Feeeeed" The Rift Mother's simple intent tore through the minds of the Mishuguji, as the creature could not speak otherwise. The rest of the worm's body began whipping upward within the earth, having it face the horde of serpents directly. The earth above split violently into massive trenches, swallowing up whatever lay there before. The Mishuguji would have to be quick, if the rest were to live.

To the law and for the good of man. All I need to live by.

The rock serpents suddenly found themselves lifted out of the dirt atop something. The blinding, destructive light gave them no fear. The Mishaguji were gods. Curse gods, in the form of huge, stone serpents. To attempt to eat them was... not a good idea. The serpents ascended, a great storm of hisses of irritation as they flew up and away from this new obstacle. Why were so many things obstructing their quest for food?

They simply wished to devour this source of evil, and they were continually stopped? They desired to teach this thing a lesson for its attempts to consume them, to bring down a curse on it.

Suwako was disappointed.

She had split and followed the Mishaguji, and come to this.

A god of her nature can split herself indefinitely, and Suwako had started to become worried. As she surveyed the chaos beneath her, she sighed.

"I told you to eat and come right back, and you've been making trouble!" Suwako admonished the Mishaguji. At the same time... the huge worm seemed to be attempting to eat them, confusingly. Stone snakes wouldn't taste good, and Suwako was certain gods weren't edible. She had worried something like this would happen... and she'd hoped that the curse gods would've just consumed the evil thing nearby and just came back.

The earthe shuddered and violently shifted as Suwako waved her hand. Rapidly, it began to turn, in a bid to spin the Rift Mother around and send it back underground in the opposite direction.

edited 21st Feb '13 5:35:00 PM by AnnoR

"Oh, dear. The toad, the monkey, and the dog have all screwed up."

Earlier:

Arceus turned towards the mountain. "I suppose it was only a matter of time before that one started stirring up trouble." he muttered, and flew off to get a closer look.

Celebi, meanwhile, suddenly looked up as a thought struck her. "Oh! I guess this is when I'm supposed to do this..." She flew up until she was just above the treetops, and began to concentrate. A ghostly white veil would seem to descend over the entire forest from her height, draping itself over the trees for a brief moment, and then vanishing. This was followed by a faint, pleasant ringing noise on the edge of hearing for everything still in the forest, which would heal damn near any poison someone might be afflicted with, as well as negating the effects of the monolith.

And then Celebi fell down, crashing through a couple of branches and faceplanting in front of Suwako.

Now

Arceus arrived at the scene. The battle playing out below was starting to reach the point of absurdity. He decided to let the snakes keep trying for their meal, although if they failed, he would Judge this abominable thing himself.

edited 21st Feb '13 5:35:17 PM by Anura

A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they will never sit in.

Armok watched as the group of lesser gods retreated, and found themselves under attack by something else. He drew back his power from Mewtwo, the aura disappearing. Likewise the hidden power Armok had unlocked re-sealed, as Mewtwo was brought back to his original level. "If you want to join in that, I won't stop you Mewtwo. I will only call on you when I am disturbed in my creation process." Armok extended himself, creating a much smaller blood filled letter A and sent it on its way to Suwako, Goddess of these dark things. With that on its way, Armok turned his attention to the land. "I'll do it now." Armok focused upon the land at the point of the Monolith. The land started to darken, and a red cloud in the sky formed. It started to expand in a ring, desecrating everything in its path.

---

The small red, lowercase 'a' floated out to meet with Suwako and communicate its message. "Please restrain your minions from stopping acts of creation. You can do as you please after I've finished my touch on the land, but I do not like being disturbed in the process." After it was finished, it exploded and its little power dispersed into the air.

---

Mewtwo looked down at the chaos below. Despite his efforts those creatures were not all that injured by his attempts, even when powered by Armok. Mewtwo wanted to fight but he was not stupid, he couldn't risk this encounter. So he teleported up above, appearing next to Arceus much to Mewtwo's surprise. Mewtwo reflected on the insights that Armok and imbued into him, the overwhelming power of light that had filled him.

edited 21st Feb '13 6:12:01 PM by StephanReiken

Suwako would find that the Rift Mother was slowed by her efforts in moving the soil, though the creature was creates as an aspect of the planet itself; the ebb and flow of earth was as natural to it was the ocean to a fish. Though it's body wasn't aligned, it still pursued the bulk of the Mishaguji, seeking to swallow them whole. Whether it was an act of stubbornness, stupidity, or an overwhelming hunger was up for debate, of course.

The surface of the planet still shook violently, but the surface stopped splitting, having already relieved it's pressure. Large veins of gold were revealed, crawling up from the depths of of the trenches. Any living creature brave enough to traverse into the deep might become rich beyond imagining.

Suwako would soon find Kefka floating right next to her, not upset at the battle, but grinning madly. "Not even I know how this is going to end!" he exclaimed. "I like the little serpents, though."

To the law and for the good of man. All I need to live by.

The Mishaguji scattered in the air, then rejoined in a swarm hundreds of feet off before making an immediate beeline for the monolith below. Really... Suwako didn't even have a chance to chastise them for causing all this trouble! Well, at least they'd be taking care of that evil thing below. As for the huge thing in the earth... It might be something of the planet, but it did not have a mastery of it. Suwako, on the other hand, was a goddess of the earth.

She clenched her hand in a bid to hold the creature in place, tuning out the mad god beside her, and then twisted harder. She'd send the big worm back, deep underground.

---

The Suwako in the forest had different things on her mind. She wondered at the light and the sounds for only a moment, before realizing that something had happened to the cute little creature. With a gasp of surprise, she knelt down and attempted to pick Celebi up, worried that it may have hurt itself somehow.

"Are you okay?" she asked. "What happened?"

"Oh, dear. The toad, the monkey, and the dog have all screwed up."

"Who'd have thought, that it would come to this?", Yami mumbled..."So much destruction...But I mustn't let them reach it..."

Yami's disks quickly combined into the shape of his sphere again, the fire subsiding. Under another veil of darkness his markings began glowing red this time.

After finishing his transformation, Yami floated up to his mountaintop again, a small part of his sphere opening up, revealing a huge hammer, with which he smashed the monolith into thousands of tiny shards, which he then threw up high into the air, filling the sky with their blueish glow. What would the mortals call them? Stars maybe...

Yet a single shard didn't make it up into the skies and fell down onto the earth, humming ominously.

Kyubey noticed the strange snake like things slinking around. Curious, Kyubey jumped down from the tree and followed them. The other deities in the forest would notice the white cat-like creature.

He somehow managed to lose them somewhere in a large human settlement. It looked around for the snakes, though all he could find were the toga-wearing Wraiths, stalking about, and several humans drained of their energy, that or cowering before the strange force of darkness that has infested their plain. One person actually made him stay. A girl with short blond hair, with dirty and tattered clothes. He sensed something tremendous inside her. He walked to her and could hear her muttering something.

"I... I... I wish..." She was trying to say some sort of prayer. Kyubey's ears seemed to move a bit as the girl noticed him. She weakly took her hand and petted the Incubator, much to his confusion. "Can... you... help me? I... I want to see the light again... I don't want this despair... I want to hope... I... I wish I can make the darkness go away..." She weakly said. Moments of silence passed before the girl was in pain. Kyubey noticed a shining yellow egg of light emerge from her chest.

"The contract is complete. Your wish has been accepted through entropy. Now... release your feelings. Set the power free!" Kyubey subconsciously said. It took a second for him to realize what he just said. The girl grasped the egg of light, and in a flash of light, the Wraiths seemed to be scared away, some even exploding from the light. As the light faded, Kyubey would notice that the girl had changed. No longer was she hurt. No longer was she afraid. She stood, dressed in a strange outfit, like that of Persian royalty. She then looked to the Incubator, smiling as if to say thanks. She then pulled out a rapier from the palm of her hand and held it, running to the Wraiths to fight them.

---

Elsewhere, Madoka warmly smiled. It seemed that she did a good decision to introduce the Incubators to the world after all. For now, mankind was given hope.

"What's the problem?" Greed asked, his hands in his pockets. "Is your boss too lazy to come down and talk with me? Go call him. I've been watching Gluttony eat trees and random fruits while Envy plans how to attack one of the human settlements for too long. I want to talk to a deity, not a stupid angel."

The serpents were dismayed. The power had decreased, leaving them with little more then a fragment of evil. The Mishaguji let out a chorus of hisses and drifted around in the air. Their power had diminished with the departure of the monolith, and they no longer had something to feed upon... but there was a faint hint of it remaining.

With a hiss, one of the Mishaguji darted forward. There, there it was, a fragment of the monolith. There was hardly enough to go around... so it would have to reach the fragment first.

And, indeed, it did. Its jaws snapped down on the fragment in and instant, and it drew the dark thing into its mouth. The serpent's stone maw unhinged to allow the fragment to vanish into the red void in its body. It swallowed... and the taste, the darkness it had taken in... The newfound power, it all was utterly amazing. However, there was something the Mishaguji had not entirely accounted for. This new power, the consumption, it provided the curse god with a more defined existence. Before, it was a spectral stone serpent, but now... it had gained something new.

The Mishaguji's red eyes snapped wide as it abruptly tumbled to the ground, squirming. It didn't hurt, it felt... power? The taste of the dark thing it had consumed? But why did it... The curse god's massive body thrashed on the ground, and began to shrink...

Its body changed, rocky form smoothing out, spectral appearance becoming a more definite existence. The serpentine appearance dwindled, tail retracting, red eyes gaining round pupils...

It was a few moments later that the new form ceased to shift.

It stirred. In place of the massive serpent, there was now a girl. She retained the apparent albinism of her previous incarnation, but was now, well... human in appearance, at least.

The anthropomorphized Mishaguji blinked in confusion. She had just eaten something deliciously dark and evil... but now she was much smaller.

edited 22nd Feb '13 2:18:16 PM by AnnoR

"Oh, dear. The toad, the monkey, and the dog have all screwed up."

The Rift Mother was something powerful indeed, but it was little match for a god, of course. Deciding that it wasn't worth the effort for such an admittedly tasteless meal, it let itself be pushed downward, further into the planet. It'd resurge quickly enough, and who's to deny a free ride down?

"Feed........" it said, "''Feed........later....." Without another word, it began turning it's body downwards, to make the descent a little more comfortable.

---

"Well excuuuuse me!" Ramuh exclaimed at Greed. "I didn't know you deserved the honor of meeting my master! Especially after your Father's impertinence! I am an aspect of of my Master; our will is the same! Even if'' that means we both just like to destroy things..... I will speak to you, and if what you have to say is important enough, I will call for lord Kefka!"

To the law and for the good of man. All I need to live by.