gothtransandroid

[gothtransandroid]

Soul-locked

The exhale is as brief as any other breathe, but the moments spread thin like eternity across the atoms between the body and the slate. Harsh but smooth grey-black marble begins to alight as the sound of the exhale sharpens, dragging across the surface of the slate until shattered into dust, the sound peaking to something akin to a shrill cry or a shriek and then- click. A click for each rune engraved into the grave slate, absorbing the essence of what the person has become in death and holding it fast both like a tight blanket and like a prison.

When the final click silences the screams, a grey robed man turns to the cold body's loved one and says, "Like I said before, the sound is just the matter of the soul dragging across the slate and locking into place. Like a lobster, its not a scream but a sound phenomenon. I promise they're comfortable in there." The person nods, distraught but not argumentative, as the man ushers them out of the procedure room. When the man returns he lifts the small slate from the body and locks it in a cabinet labelled "Graveslate - Small - Phones and Medical Equipment", then moves to push the body on its prepared gurney toward the nearby incinerator.

As the body burns and the man stands by next to two emergency switches, a noise stirs from inside the incinerator. "Scream means blue, thrash means black." The man repeats to himself, like a mantra practiced since his first day working in the Graveslate ward. A light blue glow emanates between the flames and a scream similar to the noise heard from the slate begins to belt out. Quickly the man presses the blue button and curses as the fire is quickly extinguished. "Too much soul, fuck!", quickly the man drags the burned remains out, still glowing blue, and fumbles for the slate just recently put away with care. A larger slate nearby is placed on the table, blank, and the procedure is performed again.

Barely a success, the small slate is disposed of and the newly full medium slate is labelled and filed in "Graveslate - Medium - Industrial Equipment, Servers and Back-Up Generators". A ring comes from the man's pocket and a modified version of the small slare seen before is pulled out, projecting information about the call. Its the emergency supervisor. He picks up. "Code Blue or Code Black?", says the quiet but cold women on the other side. "Code Blue, just rehoused and filed. No loss in the burn besides some mild trauma. I marked the slate for therapy as needed," as the man returns to the slate and adds information they clearly did noy before. "Good job, keep up the steady hand Marcus.", and the phone hangs up.

[gothtransandroid]

Im relatively new here but I think evilwizard would be in charge of that, though I dont know how to summon them since I'm more of an academic.

Does anyone around here know of the next necromantic appreciation society meetup? I've been very lonely lately (aside from the skeletons) (aside from the gay wizards I live with) (aside from my brews) (aside from my t4t wizards I make out with)

[gothtransandroid]

[gothtransandroid]

Contemplating: Necromancy and Cosmetic Care

In previous entries I have put import on the capability of dead skin, finger nails and hair as being extended necromantic components so long as one keeps them on hand or allows for extended growth on their person. This holds true but a more skilled necromancer would never need to keep excess components like these on person as anything from dirt to other small elements in the environment could replace bodily made material. With that said, lets talk self care.

Exfoliation is a simple act when considering most pores are clogged by just dead skin and other small particulates and the external dried dead skin can come off with ease of focus. Instead of the brutish armoring with dead skin this requires a deal more focus as it demands you not pull to fast or rough with your manipulations, using a light touch to unclog a few pores at a time and peel any loose or small pulls of dead skin from the face. If you choose the excess can be kept but at this point it would be better suited for feeding any insect farms you may have for more robust components.

Hair and root care is much more complex but still worth the effort for practice alone as hair is the strongest and most useful of bodily made components. For starters, finding where the hair ceases to be living from the root up the folicle and to the ends is more difficult as they're smaller and thinner than the surface of the skin. Once found, however, you can let a light force of decay dry and snap the hair at the end, producing a needle of hair to be used as needed. From there treat the ends of your hair according to your normal routine as they will all be dry and damaged from the action. Always use a light hand as too strong a force on your hair could kill your folicles and force you bald, a common issue with necromancers.

Finally the finger nails, and toe nails by proxy. Clearing any cuticles will be difficult as they are living but gentle pushing with the technique practiced on the hair and skin before can manage them without causing any harm, as well as any damaged hangnails and skin splits hanging from work. From there the issue you need to address is strength and control. You need a much more steady but cutting hand with your magic to shape the nails themselves. Always practice on longer nails first as you can hurt your finger tips with any slip ups, though these are less permanent than the hair as long as youve practiced basic control. From here apply your normal moisturizing lotions and the like, and you care to polishing your nails should be easier with magically rounded nails.

[gothtransandroid]

Contemplating: Climate Control and Necromancy

When it comes to components for use in necromancy preservation of said components is key, and the first of many considerations is how humidity and temperature can help and hinder the process.

An arid climate, hot and dry, will be ideal for skeletal parts as they need no musculature for mobility and for the most part the skeleton itself functions well enough in dryness, though bones exposed to extreme heats can become brittle and some hastily made skeletons will be more prone to shattering even without the added issue of baked fragility. More substatial corpses and constructs will have flesh and depending on its quality the flesh will become jerky in little to no time, reducing mobility to a standstill as moisture leaves its form. Revenants can self-manage hydration but that just adds to their carry load depending on the work being done, so travel at night in these locations is recommended overall.

Now hot and humid locations tend to be much more beneficial for undead as they keep the more simplified hydrated, skeletons give off no smells to local predators and only scavengers like insects and vultures will attack your more unkempt undead which can give easy emergency prey for any feeding based undead you may have, as a full vulture can manage a vampire and a handful of ghouls for a day depending on the size. The only real downside is that scents do evolve and carry in humid heat and both yourself and other outside elements could easily pick up on the scent of mobile corpses.

Now cold, both wet and dry can be horrible for a majority of undead as the temperature shock to the various bodies will cause several dramatic issues. A skeleton itself is the easiest to spare the damage but if you havent properly dried and tended to the bones then the moisture inside could expand and crack them into useless shards. The more substatial forms are worse off, with zombies and the like just freezing and breaking until theyre bags of icy muscles and snapped bones. Revenants can wear winter gear and regulate heat but just barely and any cold weather gear at higher extremes will hinder mobility but the vampires have the worst of it.

A fledgling to moderately aged vampire, about 100-250 years at the oldest, can lack the magics or skill to prevent their blood freezing and will just shatter and dust in the cold, even with warm weather gear. I recommend casting protective warming spells to aid them all, but especially the vampires. Such a technique could be used for all situations, but this is outside the perview of necromancy and was only mentioned as there are literally no other good options for managing vampires and zombies in extreme cold weather.

[gothtransandroid]

Contemplating: Myself

This blog was always about getting the nonsense I have inaide my head, out. The biggest issue is that a lot of what is in my head has been clouded by things that are traditionally seen as dark or off-putting in their traditional media. Necromancy and cybernetic augmentation both have stigmas created by the original sources, both fictional and mythological in nature. And I love them so much that I want to provide versions of them that draw out what could be good, could be beneficial, in the fictional worlds they exist in because so much of my identity growing up was tied to these things. But just because you want to elevate the good parts of something ad want to change them for the better doesnt mea you can ignore the evila they were born from or metaphors they first were tied to so a lesson about good and evil could be taught.

I am a U.S. citizen, born into a conservative family who was loose with what they understood my upbrining was. I learned so much from both the internet and music that I was never going to be like my parents. I walked alone at night with no one knowing as a teen, my mental health problems went almost entirely ignored, and worst of all I kept making stupid teen mistakes even as an adult. Ive hurt people I cant unhurt, made horrible financial choices and tried to put my life back together out of the shards of all that childhood neglect and adult immaturity on my own shoulders. And now that I know I have Bipolar type 1, know that I'm agender, know all these things that could've given me a leg up against my own bad choices and those that pushed me forward, there's nothing left but the bottom.

And then the election turned the way it did. And I know how the economy is going to slide backwards. And I think I can grind through, and keep my partner stable, and maintain a job despite not getting to come out more actively in public as I had planned. But I don't have faith that I can be myself anywhere but here anytime soon. Everyone has their story, and I won't pretend mine is the worst anyone has read, but I can't be who I want to be unless Im open somewhere, warts and all. Well, not about who I hurt. Thats their story and I won't put that out there if it could ever get back to them and dig up bad memories. Im not here to rake mud. I just had to say something because Im going nuts and this place ia safer than others.

[gothtransandroid]

NecroPunk: The Arid Blisters

Not a nation or coalition, but a series of pocket communities spread out across the blasted wastes where no life of any kind is seen from above, the Arid Blisters are large pocket caves made from high intensity magic from the cataclysm that brought about the necromantic devastation on the landscape. The importants of the blisters is how they got their name, as the discarded undead from across the world with nowhere to go who escaped pursuit from the greater undead such as the Vampire Lords and the Anticleric all funnelled their way into the caves. Due to both factions losing interest that far into the wastes, the caves continued to accumulate the runoff from the world until those in charge began calling them blisters just waiting to pop from the overcrowding of undead.

Amongst the most common found in the blisters are revenants who were either never bound to a master or escaped before a master could rebind them at death, then a rather large burden of half-vampires who either from birth or from some strange sorcerous resistance could fend off some of the curses rougher power over them, and the wildest of all are the academic run-off from the Archlich's citadel who were smart enough to know the blisters would put them out of reach from the Anticleric.

While the Arid Blisters have no political heirarchy, any living beings who enter are expected to give way to the existant undead as trials of abuse and submission have left the citizenship in each boil raw and untrusting. The academics from the citadel in particular are only kept to operate as doctors in a fashion, and if any of them attempt submissive necromancy on the populace they are actively torn to shreds when found without trial, mainly because its rather easy to test if someone has been made to submit to a necromancer and it usually involves even causing the slightest harm to the caster. A light punch alone is impossible for submissive undead lest the magic backfire.

Without much need for food or water the revenants tend to be treated more favorably as needed labor for building homes and reiforcing cave structures, while the half-bloods need minimal food but gain large boosts to strength from drinking blood and thus are kept a a militia against drifting monstrosities and beasts both above and below the wastes. As necromancy is mostly banned by the blisters by default, if the citadel rejects do participate in combat its likely against something large enough to waste a whole blister and as such destructive magics are preferred for combat means. Any other living citizens are by default hunters and must gather their own food or materials for the craftsmen to use.

Blisters do not tend to fight one another over anything, and even tend to join if the caverns below connect to one another, but where they do draw the line is if there is a limited amount of citadel rejects to go around for the growing revenant and half-bloof population. This is especially rough as the half-vampires have divergent biology from one another, even the born ones are barely similar enough to treat for illnesses that push back against their cursed vigor, so the makeshift doctorage of the citadel rejects cant be spread too thin lest the blisters burst out into war to maintain their kind.

[gothtransandroid]

Contemplating: Lich Plundering and Sundering

A lich is rather difficult to deal with for the average scholar, more or less a seasoned group of powerful adventurers, but with patience and planning a lich can be managed as either a renewable source of academic knowledge lost to time or at the very least a burst of collected knowledge depending on how the matter is handled.

First, all liches are likely evil due to the dramatic level of sacrifice required to defy death to such a near infinite degree so the removal of a lich, no matter how congenial they seem to be, is rarely a social sin. The rare exception would be something like a divine revenant, kept by a god for their chores but such a creature will radiate its power as being much more than necrotic and its influence would be known instantly by anyone well educated enough in arcane matters.

From here we can discuss plundering methods. The first and most straightforward is waiting for someone else to do the job and kill the lich. Now if they only kill the vessel then this goves you a window of short order to enter the sanctum of the lich, pick over their academics and then escape before its corpse reforms by wherever the lich stored its phylactery. On average this process usually takes a day, giving what one would think is ample time to go over the knowledge, but traps and other such magical protections are likely still in place as the lich expects to return to the sanctum once enough force can be mustered to deal with said adventurers or other threats.

Now if the lich is destroyed, phylactery and all, then many of the safeguards around the lich's libraries might implode and deny their use spitefully to any tomb thieves. If this is the case then there are likely some explorable exploits in the structures the lich would use to hide more complex traps, either collapsing or exploding the space with ease. If you can manage to find these backrooms and disable their traps then when the lich is dealt with then what horde of information you can manage to locate beforehand.

From here the only practical dangers are within the knowledge themselves, such as spells with hidden code that when used within the spell can backfire or corrupt the spell, causing irreparable harm to the caster. Always take time and care when dealing with someone's works that were made with all the time and care of an immortal scholar.

The only other concern to be had is the denatured necromancy the is prevalent in lich-work. Any necromancy from a lich will be coated across their work like a miasma, sometimes as a detriment to the lich themselves. Without proper academic knowledge in necromancy and how it rests without a living or dead focus for the works, the ambient magic left behind can infect a scholar and slowly convert them into a lesser undead with enough time. Best practice is to have a clergyman of the god of death to purify the documents but a more suspicious and untrusting academic can learn necromancy and bring a gravesoil golem to funnel and absorb the loose necromantic essence off the untreated documents.

[gothtransandroid]

Contemplating: Clarity in Transhumanism

History has made it clear that the people who aligned themselves with Transhumanist philosophy are also people interested in Eugenics. I personally hate Eugenics because while I relate to the desire to have a body that functions better, i reject the ideal of breeding or augmenting the body before consent is possible. A person should be able to decide how they want to be and who they want to be, on all levels, and in an age where those who are transgendered are fighting to recieve recognition, and gaining it an inch at a time, I believe that those who do not identify with or find comfort in their current body should be free to explore ways to find that comfort.

What does that mean for tranhumanism then? Is it limited to machinery and genetic augmentation? Does it truly mean transcending "humanity" or is more about finding a positive, comfortable place in the world as yourself without changing morals. I cant speak for others who live in the space of those who use the word, and I really hope Im not trying to push conflicting beliefs into a space because it only makes sense to me, but after being diagnosed with mental health problems some years ago and becoming reliant on medication to have control over myself I feel like any small thing to bring me closer to being my ideal self is worth the effort.

I know medication is small in the face of bigger, broader issues of prosthesis and medical devices and hormone therapy but it still trick my body into fuctioning and I am a different person without my lithium. Or at least it feels that way. I think in the modern age of medicine and technology we all already pass bars that the past "thinkers" who argued about humanity and the reality of being physically different being something to fear or hold concern over, but so many people today are themselves again, or even for the first time, because of these aids and processes and procedures.

I'll probably never live to be the ideal self I think of in my mind, free of the stresses tied to being seen as what is seen instead of how I feel. The most myself I feel myself is online, where I can be a mind of thoughts and whats in my pants is a mausoleum, but its just easier for me to not fight the ease of being what is seen in public. I guess some of this is more about my gender than I thought, but I still wanna be the ghost in the machine on weekends and sleek steel skeleton on weekdays. Take that a literally as you want ;3. Seriously though, I don't know if transhumanism in the modern era can positively divorce itself from the past, and I may be changing my username soon because of it. But I still feel how I feel, and I still wanna explore how that feeling meets my writing.

[gothtransandroid]

Contemplating: Garden Necromancy

Plants die. They are everywhere and as the seasons change different planta die in different ways. One of the most common crossover factors in the utility of a plants death, as far as I can tell, has been reproduction. Rot smells awful and deters animals from eating seeds, the breakdown of the plants flesh can sometimes feed the seeds that have fallen with it, and the unique manners in which seeds disperse can also be attributed to the plant tightening and snapping to release and propagate.

Those plants in question that dry out and pull on their seed pods until the dying or death of the plant can release the seed, those plants are uniquely useful to necromancy. Either building up a garden rapidly or utilizing said flowers like a pseudo-druid and weaponizing the seeds could prove useful as small but effcient traps. Granted breeding the flowers to produce seeds you can launch via decay acceleration will be quite the chore if you cannot find a naturally occuring species of one of these touch-me-not plants.

While the decay of flesh in animals can be a deterrent for predators, there are many a plant that also have similar properties. The moat widely known, the corpae flower, has evolved to mimic those awful decay smells naturally and can only be augmented to keep all but the most aggressive pollinatora away from the plant. Now as said in other contemplations, these smells can be overwhelming and while necromancers in the past have dealt with similar smells by cutting and cauterizing their own noses, I can only recommend to consider growing other plants to compound and apothecate into a counter-scent first, saving the scarification.

Now drying and curing plants is a simplistic mechanism of necromancy, avoiding the rot from this process takes practice. Dried fruits are an excellent means to do this as they make rations on success and on failure can be planted or composted to grow new trees for later. Remember to be robust with composting, and dont limit yourself to fruits and plants. For further practice one can instantly press flowers and prepare scents like lavender and sage more easily, as the rot waste from failure here will smell less offensive and successes can be used for the componding mentioned earlier with the corpse flower.

[gothtransandroid]

A very simple but vaguely ominous Happy Halloween for all, so it may transform them into more reasonable, spooky monsters than the ones we are fighting in our daily lives.

[gothtransandroid]

I love them.

You squint your eyes in the direction of the forest edge, between the shadows and the mist you see pale, humanoid shapes. It's not ghosts, not this time, but a herd of brynaglo. This nocturnal herbivore has an inquisitive but careful nature, listening with its large ears to anything that catches its interest before slowly and quietly approaching. It's not unusual for brynaglo to approach campsites in or close to the forest, often with terrifying effect on non locals.

[gothtransandroid]

Necropunk: Graveslating and Necromantic Technology

In a world where the afterlife is cut off from mortality and souls are only made from birth but never vanish on their own, the souls of the passed on and slain must go somewhere, or in the eyes of the new mortal society, they must serve a purpose. The dead and dying can now possess a slate placed upon their corpse and in turn these slates can be modified to operate similarly to how modern machines do, depending on how the slates are inscribed with runes and how powerful the materials the slate is made with.

Souls have a set level of strength behind them, each one different based on factors not all clear to even those on the forefront of the Graveslate tech. Both power source and rudimentary intelligent device, the soul can operate in similar ways to the modern cellphone of our world at its weakest. The trade off for having a soul enter said device is a simpler life than that of a roaming spirit, protection provided by the slate owner to maintain your pseudo-afterlife and a mostly mindless state of mind as the devices can surpress higher function in the souls. Not ideal for the people in question but the alternative tends to be roaming the wastes as an unbound wraith or worse, a necromancer binds you against your will and abuses you in much less humane rituals.

Added benefits for those binding the slates and the bound is that the more powerful the soul, the more utility and protection provided on each side. Some souls are strong enough to manage financal systems, private business accounts and even manage private security systems, and are provided for in the cleanest and most soothing of environments between uses. The most powerful of all manage the shielding for the entirety of mortal cities, creating super barriers that keep out roaming spirits and even the forces of the Vampire Nomads and the Archlich respectively.

Of course with all new technology there are exploits, and Graveslates are no exception. The most dangerous but effective exploit is soul-tapping, in which a living person bonds their soul to an altered Graveslate and then links it to the other slates to motivate or coerce the souls to give them a result. In controlled environments these exchanges can help mend or correct errors in systems to ensure they... operate as required, but in more drastic and criminal situations one could breach a system, gain information and use it to their advantage. The flavor in which all forms of abusing a system is abuse of people is not a new metaphor, but to layer it on gives more room to set laws and rights for those who might be abused, and in turn challenge if those rights are enough to even matter.

[gothtransandroid]

At this point my grimoire is a phone, my chalice a water flask as big as my head, my wand is the to a beater of a car and my athame is a cheap kitchen knife I sharpened with a stolen whetstone. The magic I do is all to keep myself functioning, from mental health to sleep, and almost all of it is half-assed meditation and second hand alchemy in the form of lithium and gasoline flavored caffeine.

If necromancy is real I am the corpse and its barely working.

Side note: staying awake was easier when the mania was stronger. Thanks Lithium! I hate it.

[gothtransandroid]

Necropunk: Vampiric Order of the Crossroads

The second largest institution in Eutoria, if you could call it one institution, is the disparate nomadic tribes of Vampires roaming the land by road to find the leftover mortals from the Archlich's raids for children so that they might feed another day longer.

While many of the roamers, or Mosquitoes, tend to find bodies and drain them in haste just to slake their hunger there are wiser vampires on the ground who know to keep a person alive as a blood bag to prevent going mad with hunger. These vampires tend to lead the lower level groups and are known as leeches, holding on as needed and not letting go of their position. Mosquitoes tend to follow Leeches knowing that a Leech will only keep a prime, healthy body and discard the others to live or die in the aftermath. Both vampires tend to survive by burrowing and waiting out the cycle of day to night by temperature alone. While this causes many overstarved Mosquitoes to die, it also makes them and Leeches much harder to hunt by more daring mortals.

A Leech who is worth their salt as a leader and survives for some time will then garner the attention of the more stable vampires who operate in vehicle caravans. Due to their more wild and erratic movement, willingness to make deals with larger mortal settlements and knowledge of the roadways the leaders of these caravans are called Finches. Finches only take in a Leech when they can prove that they can keep their blood bags alive without their Mosquitoes fighting back or causing more chaos in the process. The Finches then either bring them in as muscle to keep the caravan, or flock, safe or they train exceptional Leeches so that they may split a flock when it has grown too large or become harder to manage due to more erratic personalities. Flocks do collapse however, usually when a Leech who starts their own caravan encounters another flock they do not know and the new Finch either cannibalizes the flock to build a stronger one or is crushed by the more well established flock and their resources are taken.

The final and natural progression of these names are the Bats, Vampire Lords so insular and self reliant that they need little to none of the support the flocks or Mosquito swarms provide. Instead, the Bats have a deep knowledge of the now primal necromancy of the land and as such have created powerful vehicles constructed from the bone and stone of ancient crypts and, holding such constructs together with their sorcerous magics, operate two wheeled speed vehicles faster than anything short of a dragon. These crypt-drives can only be tamed by sorcery and even some of the most trained wizards or priests cannot manage to recreate the devices. Bats are so charismatic and well versed in mortal society that they know how to not only build trust in mortals but can convince some to serve as a source of blood of their own free will, which is surprising as the six existing Bats known to the crossroads could each decimate a human settlement on their own, as some have to prove their power.

Of note the twins Orphie and Phillie, indistinguishable from one another, were said to move so fast some thought they were quadruplets as the former towns of Charity and Eastwind were torn asunder simultaneously, broken bodies everywhere to be found but not a drop of blood was wasted between the two ghost towns. Each town left a survivor to tell the tale, though said survivors were never seen after the next dawn. Many of these tall tales are hard to put much faith in without first hand account, but another cannot be denied.

Silver Smoke, the youngest of the Bats in appearance, burrowed a small road large enough for their crypt-drive in Cragsteel Mountain. This is taken as fact for two reasons; the hole exists clear as day between the settlement of Propriety and the last road to the Archlich's Citadel, but also that Smoke seems to have left all the ore mined from the act for Propriety, which on top of being used to make locks and bars for all the buildings was also used to make a small statue of Silver in the middle of town as both acknowledgement and warning to remember that no metal could keep such a being out of their homes.

[gothtransandroid]

Screw it, Im putting vampire squirrels in mosquito ornithopters and sicking them on the local facist population, so they dont turn when they get exsanguinated.

[gothtransandroid]

NecroPunk: Archlich Connor "Anticleric" Labentis

Known by their monikers far more now than in the past, Connor Labentis is the leading force in the subjugation of the mortal kind on the face of Eutoria. Enigmatic in purpose, the Archlich has two clear driving objectives behind their actions; amass knowledge created firsthand, and remove any manner of worship from the planet. To the first task, the Archlich has begun to harvest the youths of mortal kind to apply them to education within it's nation-like citadel. After adulthood, if any of their works are found lacking, which many are, they are either jettisoned back into the waste they were found in, or if their components are suitable they are turned into foot soldiers for the Anticleric's other task.

Be it a fear instilled in the mind of such a powerful undead that even in such a forsaken place as this one the gods would still in some way reach them or merely a passionate disdain for the concept of belief in any power higher then the one they crafted with their own hands, the Anticleric looses hordes of the undead daily from their citadel, handcrafted to seek out divine power despite the risk to their own forms and eliminate any wielder of faith as a boon or a blade.

To the credit of their ego, they are frequently seen walking every level of their citadel except around forging hours and academic harvest time. While saying this would leave such a being exposed to assault would be foolhardy, it is clear that the Archlich would rather observe the growth of its harvest directly more than leave it to the lesser liches who proctor exams and hold lectures. Most perverse in all this, though, is the lack of knowledge that the students have as to why they are there.

Many speculate they will be made into liches themselves, to expand the citadel in size and power. In this some are correct, only that one lich is born typically every 100 to 1000 years. Other students believe that once their academia is complete they will personally become stewards of the undead forces seen coming and going from battle, which is also true so long as they are turned into a general who retains their intelligence to give orders and report to Labentis themself. The most realistic guess is those who are thrown back into the wastes, armed with enough magic to survive the environs more than they were as children, but now shunned by their communities as they clearly bear the mark of the Archlich and their dread necromancy.

Sometimes, if an enterprising enough caster redeems themselves in their academic feats from the wastes, the Archlich will come find them again, to harvest their knowledge and then use them as such a being would see fit.