Open Player Plot: "Head Month"

[warmare]

Hello, Aion Teleos players of both sect affiliations! This is Rizu (Hayame/warmare) and Vee (Makoto/affal) here, bringing you a plot opportunity we are officially opening up to other players who are interested in getting involved! Content Warning for this plot include, but are not limited to: beheadings, abuse, severed heads, eye trauma, potential torture, etc.


Vee's art is amazing!!! (Warning: not super gory but there's a head in the full click-thru, y'all)

PLOT OVERVIEW:

After the violent and chaotic raid on Achamoth, Hayame managed to narrowly avoid corruption by kenoma and escape from the city -1 eyeball but +1 head of a sworn enemy named Makoto (known more commonly as just "M"). Though she thought it would be a sick trophy that would soon dissipate and leave only a shard she could bring back for experimentation on de-Kenoma-ing, the demon's special anatomy means that his head can be safely separated from his body without killing him, leaving him... very alive and very pissed off.

With Makoto's head in hand, she initially fled Achamoth into the wilderness, attempting to avoid endangering others or risking exposure of secret base locations by bringing the head to rebel territory until sure it was safe. She posted a Pleroma sect Communion post about this, asking for assistance with things such as supplies, asking magic-capable characters for warding/defensive/hiding spells, and trying to get someone to ask Tehri about the chances of Kenoma LoJack or if she knows a safe place to hide such a thing from the Regent/enemy eyes. Thankfully, she did! So Hayame is on the way to the forests of Lohkimareen near the Valley of the Innocent.

Makoto will be... along for the ride, oops, and having a very bad no good terrible month full of abyss nightmares, dealing with an angry centaur jailer in heat, getting aggressively washed so he doesn't get dirty, and whatever awful attempts at torture or shonen speeches that Pleroma want to inflict on him. Also, he'll maybe be looking a bit like a bondage victim, because you can't carry your enemy's head around and just let him overhear you and spy on you or yell at you the whole time??? Someone get Hayame a bit and blinders and ear plugs.

PLOTTING OPTIONS:

↣ Hayame will be making Makoto('s head) available to Pleroma sect members who wish to interrogate/examine/torture him, under her supervision. There are some things she will try and prevent (killing him, messing overly with his shard) for fear it might trigger some sort of Kenoma GPS or etc., but feel free to pitch ideas in the comments below or ICly in her Communion post. She is staying in a remote part of Lohkimareen far from Greentruth, however, and moving frequently, so you'll need to travel or portal. [OPEN TO PLEROMA]

↣ For a week or so in the beginning of his bodyless adventures, Makoto will be affected by the abyss after using the power granted to him by the Regent in the last rounds versus the Sanctifier. During this period, the nightmares of others may leak into his dreams, so if you would like to submit a nightmare for Vee to select from please use the comment below! [OPEN TO PLEROMA AND KENOMA]

↣ Because of her lost eye, remote forest location, and commiting time to moving between safehouses (safecaves & safetreehollows) instead of hunting or visiting villages with an animated head tied to her withers, Hayame will need medical assistance, food, and supplies delivered throughout the plot period. [OPEN TO PLEROMA]

↣ Once Makoto's absence is noted in Achamoth, Kenoma players are more than welcome to start pitching plot attempts to locate him. This notice could likely happen very quickly, as his headless body was left behind by Hayame in the streets of Achamoth. Feel free to use the comment below to organize group efforts! If you do the organizing for them elsewhere (Plurk, Discord, etc.), please still post them here once you've decided on a course of action. [OPEN TO KENOMA]

↣ UPDATE: According to current Kenoma player plotting happening below, it looks like we can expect some magical location/scrying/future seeing attempts, as well as a posse physically invading Lohkimareen looking for Makoto's head. Are there any characters who frequent the forest who might notice their presence and say something, either to Pleroma sect in general or Hayame herself? Are there any magic users who might notice attempts to scry or be able to tell Hayame "that's not a cold, bitch, that's a curse on u"? Though Hayame herself is hardly an endearing figure, are there any Pleroma who feel strongly about Sticking Together for Pleroma's Sake who might try and insist on helping or guarding or assisting in the case of a Kenoma posse attack? Feel free to use the comment below to organize efforts! [OPEN TO PLEROMA]

DECIDED OUTCOME:

The only decided plot point we for sure are working towards is that Makoto's head be returned to Kenoma custody before [Redacted] Month. ICly we're looking to have him either rescued, exchanged, or stolen back at the end of September, so there will be enough time to run some fun plots-within-plots and get some threads done. At this time, we would like to leave how he returns up to what developments are undertaken by both sects to either keep him or get him back. We will likely want to pick a solution OOCly by mid-September.

OOC NOTES:

↣ Because this plot deals with very dubious content, please be mindful of tagging for Content Warnings if you participate or thread about it.

↣ For obvious OOC outcome confirmation reasons we are posting this after the second part of the raid event, but please keep in mind that that this plot is considered to have ICly begun back on the day of the Achamoth raid (8/18). That means posts, threads, and actions undertaken in the first part of this player plot are backdated.

↣ Hayame will be taking her custody of Makoto's head intensely seriously-- it is unlikely anyone will be able to ICly convince her to let them have it, take him out of her sight, or even speak to him without her present. She will also be wary of who she allows close, and also warn people that he may still be dangerous. However, when it comes to threading with Makoto('s head), unless you plan to have your character do something that violates one of her "rules", you can just assume Hayame is there glaring and watching silently in the background. (Threads with both Makoto and Hayame are potentially available, just ask!)

↣ For the duration of the plot, Makoto's headless body will be in the care of J (tohell) in Achamoth. If you have something you'd like to use the body for (!?) please run it by the player and drop a note here.

↣ As needed, Rizu and Vee will field questions in the comments below. If we ask the mods a question about something we will provide the answers here also, if they're relevant for plotting in general. Likewise, if you ask a question of the mods about something, please drop the answer there. Sharing is caring!

↣ Though we will do our best to try and allow interested parties a chance to do things, please keep in mind we are just two people and may not be able to thread everything out. Likewise, we want people to have fun with plotting and trying to get Makoto's head back in as sensible/smart a way as it can go ICly, but please be mindful of metagaming, etcetera.

↣ Thank you for your interest, and we hope we can all have a fun time with this! ❤️

IC COMMUNION POST • SEMI-OPEN LOG • THREAD REQUESTS • PLEROMA PLOTTING • KENOMA PLOTTING • NIGHTMARE SUBMISSIONS • QUESTIONS & ANSWERS

Comments

THREAD REQUESTS

[warmare]

Rizu and Vee are just two little RPers doing their best, so rather than having the log be completely open free-for-all, we'd appreciate things being run by us either on Discord, plurk, or commenting here before tagging in! Thank you! We'll try to accommodate as much as we can, but in some cases we may ask to just exchange OOC comments about what will happen/what information can be gleaned!

Comment below- !

PLEROMA PLOTTING

[warmare]

A thread for plotting amongst the Pleroma- !

[bythelight]

Offering to heal Hayame a little if they cross paths (potentially.... at a hot springs? Or somewhere around the outskirts of Greentruth or something, we can work it out!)

Equally, putting in writing that if you want to be in a curse fight with Matt, Anduin can dispel a magical effect if you'd like it to initially work but both agree to then have it be removed by blond priest.

Small print: due to local impacts on his magic, any dispel would not be instant -- it would begin to fade over time according to taste. Equally, because Warcraft is Like That, there's a difference between a 'bad magical effect' and a 'curse'. If it's classified as a curse, he cannot undo it, if it's a bad magical effect and does not contain the word 'curse', he can dispel it.

It's stupid. I know. It's the way it is.

He will probably avoid weird head interactions because there is NOTHING in his skillset to help with that and, honestly, what a fucking nightmare tbh!

[vapour]

Kotetsu can help Hayame with getting her food, supplies, etc and things if she is willing to trust him and can contact him whenever necessary. He's a new Pleroma so he doesn't have any interest or need to deal with Makoto, but he's happy to play delivery boy to help out a warhorse girl taking her job as warden over a head seriously.

[leicesters]

As discussed with the mods, Claude will have access to the same anti-scrying magic as Hayame from acting as her go between to Tehri, so I'd like him to be able to use that to his advantage. My current idea is that he pulls off a bait and switch tactic where he tricks an initial group of Kenoma who invade Lohkimareen into thinking he has Makoto's shard on his person, and they'll have to hunt him down if they want to get it. In reality, he'll be leading the search party in the opposite direction to Hayame's location (probably into a nest of irritated dinos or a trap set by other Pleroma) while using the time bought to warn Hayame to relocate.

This would need some Kenoma volunteers to fall for the bait, and of course any Pleroma who would want to help him pull it off would be welcome too!

[lockedon]

slowly shambles my way in here

I spent a little time thinking about things and I thiiiink that if we do wanna do something relating to this plot, we can maybe start with a network/communion thread since those tend to be a little easier for me. Eustace was kind of MIA during her original announcement since he was...a shard....but if he heard about it he'd reach out to Hayame. I don't think he'd have too much useful information to give but he'd be willing to at least talk about his own experiences with the Regent and what he's learned (like the Regent spying on Emet despite not being physically present) to keep her (and thus the rest of the Pleroma by proxy) out of the Regent's clutches.

Depending on how that goes, we can probably transition to/start a threeway with Hayame, Makoto, and Eustace, though I don't have any concrete ideas about the direction of that thread other than Eustace brings Hayame supplies and Makoto is indignant that he's there.

Lastly, on an OOC level I don't mind volunteering him as part of the Pleroma posse when the Kenoma invade to snatch Makoto back, but I'm a little iffy on committing to anything depending on how the numbers shake out, since he is tragically not OP and I'm not looking to get him dissipated again or captured. Even if he has no love for Hayame, he is trying to be like Abel and help out his fellow Pleroma despite his own personal relationships with them, and would grit his teeth and stick around if knowledge that the Kenoma were coming for her ass came to light.

KENOMA PLOTTING

[warmare]

A thread for plotting amongst the Kenoma to get their lil rabid guy back- !

Rough outline so far.

[tohell]

During the Innocent's execution, J sought permission for a private audience with the Regent at a later date. Once that takes place, he intends to request the launch of an attempted search and rescue effort for Makoto, with Barnaby and a TBD number of allies. Specifics concerning those plans and how they might locate Hayame are in the works and subject to discussion.

[cutlery]

So! Sebastian is willing to help with this effort, since Makoto was a good conversational partner slash Demon Logic and “Etiquette” means that another demon owing you a favor is always a good thing. One of the ways he can contribute is straightforward, the other will require some further plotting!

The straightforward one is that Sebastian can assume the form of a crow, and I was already planning to have him out of Achamoth for a fair portion of the month to go visit places like Godsblood and learn more about Horos. So while very unlikely, it’s not impossible that he could coincidentally stumble upon Hayame + Makoto while out surveying. This, of course, is less fun, so I’d say leave this one on the table as a “if all else fails” way to locate them lmao…

Much more interesting but needing further plotting is that Sebastian does have Hayame’s eye. This is something he hasn’t told anyone about, and is planning to offer it to a Kenoma NPC (the Regent first and foremost), so they may potentially know to use it for scrying Hayame’s location, since that sounded like a potential option in chat! Otherwise if there’s a player character that would similarly know this is an option, hit me up and we can hash out how to get from point A to point B. Using it for scrying is just a thing Sebastian doesn’t know about at all! Despite being a demon, he’s very unaware of magic since it’s not really a thing in kuroshit hilariously

[semicharmed]

Wait a minute so if we have his body ....

Matt will TOTALLY OFFER to do a sympathetic magic tracking spell on it to locate his head, details here. Up to involved parties whether and how it works, but if he became aware of the situation he'd try to help for sure.

[sterngaze]

Liem owes M for forcibly bringing him back to Achamoth during the last event, so he'd definitely help with locating/retrieving him! If people narrow the search down to Lohkimareen, he can help with tracking them down the more mundane way, since he is a skilled tracker!

[hundredpower]

Barnaby will helping J in whatever way he can.

He's a search and rescue specialist; given his skillset he'd be the most useful at the tail end of the investigation once they've narrowed down roughly where Makoto is, but he'll be willing to offer support at all stages.

He'll start by visiting cities/towns around Achamoth and questioning the locals to try to find any eyewitnesses. He'll intentionally try to be unsubtle about it in an attempt to bait Hayame out, knowing she can track him down by scent. I doubt she'd take said bait under the circumstances, but lmk if you did want to do anything around that, Rizu 👀 (assuming they find out at any stage it's Hayame that took Makoto, that is!)

[zauneyete]

I will also offer silco for any reconnaissance or sneaking that's required! Since he can be invisible, it might be useful to have him about once we know the location of the body! I'm totally down for him either sneaking about to figure out the best way in etc if we want a stealthy route, or even just a way to get an idea of the guard situation!

[fallingsand]

now moved to the main plotting thread rip me

Also officially offering Bruno up for trying to divine where Hayame and The Head will be since he does future visions rather than scrying. I'm totally up for agreeing with Matt that, yep, they're somewhere with trees (or however the anti-scry spell ends up working if it blocks him as well).

[subsist]

sliding in here officially to say that kaeya will volunteer to be part of the retrieval party! makoto will be saved by animals or so help me god.

[expiera]

Submits candidacy to be part of the retrieval party/take care of fighting whether it's against Pleromas or aggressive jungle wild life, gonna need muscles and be PVP prepared just in case! Tracking dog optional, but the Kenomeows def need to look after their own o7

[lachtara]

BELATED but Emet would do what he can with the consideration that he wouldn't leave Achamoth to do the retrieval. Instead, he would rather stay behind to keep watch on the injured and the city as a whole. (Not that another Kenoma isn't important, but having everyone go after one person seems dubious.) But still, offer what support he can from a distance.

[fightforthejoyofit]

Z's been itching for a Proper Fight (one where they're not both full of Innocence Nonsense) with Hayame since Venera; while he's not particularly disposed to care what happens to Makoto he'll be down to join the recovery effort. No fancy scrying etc but he's a Hunter by nature so more mundane tracking etc is an option, and he can be Large And Obnoxious while other people do the stealthy stuff.

[cutlery]

Just dropping an update here! I heard back from the mods re: Hayame's eye (sorry again), and in short, the Regent will take it and pass it along for Xishen for scrying purposes if need be! Since my involvement with this is mostly via this tangent, idk what further to ask and when this may want to be done for the plot's timeline, so I'll direct any further coordination with the mods about this thread here!

NIGHTMARE SUBMISSIONS

[warmare]

Submit nightmare ideas for poor Makoto (affected by abyss power) here- ! Either summaries of the nightmare contents or narrative-scene-style is welcome!

sighs... cw: gore, vore, implied sexual activity

[sterngaze]

Liem’s nightmare takes place in a dingy, high-ceilinged room, dim light filtering in through a pair of round, dirty windows located high up on the wall. Heavy iron meat hooks hang from the ceiling, and although none of them are currently occupied, the space is filled with the charnel smell of old blood.

In this nightmare, Liem is in the room with a loved one—a dear friend, a past lover, maybe even a family member. Regardless of who the person is, the dream always goes the same: They come to him with an embrace, and then a kiss, and then more, heedless of the unsettling surround. In this state of unthinking, carnal intimacy, Liem dips his head to throat, shoulder, breast, wrist, first with his lips and then with his teeth.

He doesn’t even drink, but tears away mouthfuls of hot flesh to gulp down wholesale as gore coats both him and his ill-fated lover, who doesn’t even have the decency to pull away. The dream continues in a haze of bloody ecstasy until he finally wakes up with the ruin of that beloved person branded fresh against the back of his eyelids.

cw: amputation, forced breeding

[warmare]

Hayame's nightmare is based in a stable, specifically a single large stall. The stall is filled with hay, and there is the scent of something hot and urgent in the air as she hazily comes to consciousness. Her legs do not move when she tries to lift them, they are hobbled with ropes to prevent kicking. No actual words leave her mouth, because there is a bit biting in to the corners of her lips, her tongue sliding uselessly on the metal that keeps her mouth open and saliva dripping down her chin. When she tries to move her hands to remove it, to untie the bindings keeping her close to a slanted, table-like post, nothing happens... because there are no hands. No hands, no nothing, only the scarred, rounded shoulders of a jinba that has had their arms flensed off at the joint to render them incapable of caring for themselves without human masters.

But the most horrifying thing that she notices, as she struggles against her bounds and begins to work up a lathering sweat on her flanks desperately trying to escape... is that her tail has been trussed up to bare where she burns with seasonal heat. She becomes increasingly desperate, time blurs, but eventually... the stable door creaks open. The heavy clatter of antsy hooves shuffle across the ground, human voices mutter platitudes like thatta girl as hands pat her rump regardless of how she tries to kick or scream, as fingers check her readiness and discuss amongst themselves if she'll do better being bound tighter or if the stud they've chosen for her this month is strong enough to manage her as is.

Even the voices eventually fade into unintelligible background murmurs, though, as she realizes that she's caught the scent of the stallion behind her even though she's unable to turn her head to even see the face of the partner the stable master has chosen for her, beyond a hint of shadow and heavy, panting breath. Her teeth crack and grind against the bit, she struggles as she feels a groom tug her tail aside, panics when she hears another slap against the stallion's side to encourage him forward to mount-

Hayame does not usually wake from her nightmares until it's done and she's left shamed and broken on the breeding post, forced into the fate her own dam had lived, the one she had been trying to avoid all of her life. The fate of an Armless broodmare.

[cutlery]

I'll write something a bit more custom as well, but for now, some of the instances in canon of Sebastian just being the nightmare itself, since it happens consistently enough that I'm fairly sure he's able to influence and infiltrate peoples' dreams, but not concretely said enough that I would call it a powerset in an app, ya feel

Chapter 95 has spoilers if you're totally unfamiliar with the manga, but they're all about events that happen quite early on. Otherwise spoiler-free!

• Chapter 95, "Why is it that you made such a great sacrifice with even that soul of yours at stake to make a contract with me?"
  
• Chapter 101.5 (selection), "Professor, you should have no time to be writing this tale."
  
• Chapter 189, "Should you not train some more before you serve your dishes to your family?"

[vapour]

I was suggested to link this here as a nightmare idea for Makoto, it starts about 1/3rd the way in. cws at top of thread.

QUESTIONS & ANSWERS

[warmare]

Any questions you have for Rizu and/or Vee can be posted here, as well as any answers to questions sent to mods that can be shared here for everyone's general knowledge/plotting purposes!

Tehri-themed update

[warmare]

Tehri will be teaching Hayame (and Claude? that sneaky boi) an anti-scrying spell. (This was briefly established pre-OOC post, but details about it and how it might affect scrying attempts on the Kenoma side seem upcoming soon! Watch this space!)

Also, Tehri will be conducting an interrogation attempt on Makoto's head! Once that's done, a summary will be posted here!