#apothecaryforwearysouls

[callsignbaphomet]

You should talk about Berserkers more <333

Aw, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to ignore the ask. I was super fixated on finishing that thing I was working on and wanted to finish it first for two reasons. I was super fixated and that would answer part of this ask. Sorta. I'll post that later.

Also I'm sorry if I sound incoherent I took some Benadryl and everything's fuzzy right now.

So. Berserkers.

Okay so I basically love the idea of the berserker and all that but found it lacked a little...panache. At least to me anyway.

Berserkers are essentially a long lived type of humanoid warrior. While out of berserker mode they look identical to regular humans in every way. In fact, there is no way to tell if what you're looking at is a human or a berserker. However, when they shift into their berserker mode they turn into hulking, muscular humanoids that stand somewhere between 8 feet and 9.5 feet tall and weigh anywhere between 350 to 490 pounds. That's without armors and their weapons. Aside from getting really freaking big they conjure up armors and weapons, adults conjure up two weapons. The look and style of the armors and weapons differ from individual to individual but each armor and weapon depends solely on the culture of the berserker.

Let's use Loke for an example. He's Norwegian so his armor and weapons will reflect that. He's a Nordic or Norse whichever you wanna use berserker so that'll reflect on the style of his gear.

Aside from hulking out and conjuring weapons these fuckers are strong and I mean S T R O N G! They're one of the few non-humans that can and dare to go up against the divine in a head to head battle and make them sweat and work for their victory. They're not mindless in this state but they are super quick to start fighting and once a berserker picks a target there's not much that'll stand in the way of them defeating their target.

Also their armor can sustain damage and even break but the amount of force that has to be used in order to break their armor is fucking mental. Now, just because the armor breaks it doesn't mean it's permanent, if the armor breaks the berserker shifts back into their human form until it regenerates which can take a few hours depending on the severity of the damage. However, their weapons will never break or dull or rust. Speaking of, a berserker doesn't need to shift into berserker mode in order to conjure their weapons, they can do so at any time they need. Like so.

Another change I forgot to mention is that while in berserker mode their eyes tend to glow in whatever color their eyes are and that also happens when only conjuring a weapon. Yeah, Loke has green eyes but the red comes from when he was resurrected so Loke's kind of a special case. The electricity surging through the axe isn't normal either. We'll get to that.

Now, berserkers may have their roots and origins in magic but they cannot use magic, not in human form and much less in berserker mode. It's not that they aren't permitted, it's just that they cannot actually understand magic so they can't really learn it. I had to nerf them somewhere lol

Yeah, I know, the doodle is contradicting everything I'm saying but again, Loke's kind of a special case.

If a berserker should ever decide to try and learn magic it would be one hell of a gargantuan task as like I said, they don't actually understand it so they don't bother, besides, with their raw power they don't need magic. Hell, they don't need a rocket launcher either...

When they're young berserkers can conjure a range of weapons to try out and practice with them to sort of get a feeling as to which two they feel most comfortable with, then iirc by their late teens they've already made up their minds as to which two weapons they feel comfortable with and stick to those two only. Since they specialize in two weapons they become like an extension to them, they pretty much master that weapon and become devastating with them.

In the case of Loke he chose a two headed axe like his dad has and the bow and arrow like his mom has.

Like I said, these guys are long lived but they seldom get to fully enjoy that because they're a warrior species. Fighting is in their blood so most die in battle. And these fuckers are extremely tough to kill which means that they tend to die brutally and bloody.

They don't have some jacked up healing like other species have, they'll scar and aren't immune to diseases both inherited and catching.

Loke for example has asthma, hemophilia (which is crazy when you really think about it and what he is), astigmatism, can't see well up close I forgot what that one's called...you get the idea.

Now! Magic and Loke. Okay, so he's idolized his mom for as long as he can remember and always wanted to be like her. Since he was a little boy he asked his mom to teach him how to use magic and while Sanaa knew it was damn near impossible she humored. This took a very long time, we're talking 30+ years for him to get but Sanaa taught him a small trick she often used that can turn one arrow into thousands of arrows that rain on the enemy. She also taught him to conjure an element, in his case it's lightning, to wrap itself around his conjured weapon. These are things that would take a child a few months to get but since Loke's a berserker it took that long. This was kind of a pretty big deal as vommon berserkers just can't really do that but he persevered until he got it. Then it took him some 20 odd years or so to be able to consistently pull it off. Now he can do it in his sleep like it's nothing and it serves to intimidate others and impress others like his mom's side of the family. When they first saw it their minds were blown to hell and back and those people don't get surprised by anything.

So if the berserker is based on the person's culture, what about those who's parents are from two different cultures? Easy. The armor and weapons take aspects of both parents.

That pretty much cover the common berserker. Then there are arcane berserkers of which ONLY AND ONLY the Nyota people can be arcane berserkers. However, if a common berserker and an arcane berserker have a child that child will also be an arcane berserker and be considered a Nyota descendant.

More on arcane berserkers will be on another post I'll post later.

[headcanontheshitoutofsoulsborne]

@apothecaryforwearysouls replied to your post “Hey guys, confess your stupidest "Mistake I made...”:

I believed in my heart of hearts that upgrading the broken straight sword fully would lead to a cool upgraded version lol <3

​You embraced your inner Zero Lenny. I am so proud of you!

[apocritast]

Tagged by @vodkafolie (please go look at their art it's amazing and the way they work with colorsssss) to share the 5 top tracks you've been listening to:

(I don't know how to do fancy embeds lol so I'll just list them)

Prayer for Rain, by The Urge

The Cricket and The Hamster, by PhemieC

The Dirt I'm Buried In, by Avatar

Firestorm, by Danny Schmidt

Howl, by Florence and the Machine

Tagging @rxttenfish @ratlastheseus @callsignbaphomet @apothecaryforwearysouls @vanilachai @bookoramaenderteeth @nightmaredaisy , and anyone else who wants to but also no pressure!

[callsignbaphomet]

I feel like Jelani and Angelus are big dumpling folk <3

(Lol I have many headcannons for your boys, I daydream often)

Well, dumplings ARE Angelus's favorite food. Specifically steamed dumplings. Jelani's partial to them as well, mostly because Angelus is so into them, he's not picky about how they're made or what they're stuffed with though.

Ngl, totally wanna hear about the other headcannons lol!

[callsignbaphomet]

@apothecaryforwearysouls surprise second secret lil Bulbasaur!

[callsignbaphomet]

@apothecaryforwearysouls

Lol I'm partially kidding but not. He's so picky and when he says no to veggies he simply will not. Not an easy puppy to fool.

And Uthorim, my dear, will learn of Jelani's struggles with a hyper carnivore, energy drink chugging, coffee loving, candy scarfing pain in the ass when it comes to food ❤️

[callsignbaphomet]

@apothecaryforwearysouls I see so much potential for builds suited for our boys! This bitch is gonna be so much fun!

[callsignbaphomet]

@apothecaryforwearysouls

There's a lot of people so I'll just stick to key people lol.

Jelani: He was terrified of him. He was bleeding out and had just regained consciousness and he sees this unknown man looming over the hole he was thrown into and he's never seen him before. Everyone he had ever met up to that point hurt him in some way and he wasn't sure what new twisted form of torture his abusers were coming up with but as soon as Jelani went down the hole and spoke to him softly and wrapped him in his coat and carefully carried him out he sort of relaxed and didn't let go of him until they all arrived back at the compound and even then Jelani had to carry him directly to the doctors because he didn't wanna let go of him because at that moment a lot of things were happening, there were a lot of people he didn't know, a lot of yelling and shouting, his abusers were threatening to kill people and some man he didn't know was claiming to be his grandfather but Jelani remained quiet and quietly reassured him that everything was going to be okay and that he was safe now. That was the very first time someone held him and spoke to him instead of hitting him or stabbing him or abusing him in any way and actually spoke to him instead of yelling and shouting at him or threatening him. That's why Angelus formed that safety link to Jelani. It was the very first time he felt safe.

Aleksey: He didn't see Alek until days later but he did hear his voice. When he clung on to Jelani he'd buried his face on his chest and didn't look up out of fear. He never met Alek before and was confused when he heard him tell him he was his grandfather.

((The reason Aleksey hadn't come to get Angelus was because when Nicholas sold Angelus Nicholas told Alek that his wife and son had been found by slayers and were both killed. So all those years Alek believed Angelus had died when he was 2 years old until one of the abusers had grown a conscious and wrote to Alek and told him EVERYTHING.))

Loke and Trevor: I put them both together because Jelani is never far from his brother and Trevor was always close to the two siblings. When Jelani handed Angelus over to the doctors he didn't see him again for almost a year. His initial recovery was not easy or pretty and it took doctors a very long time. From getting him to relax to rebreaking bones to set them right and a bunch of stuff I don't wanna mention here. Anyway, once he was okay enough to walk the premises he actually sought out Jelani who was, to no one's surprise, with Loke and Trevor. Jela introduced him to them and he was afraid at first but when they spoke to him the same way that Jelani did he felt safe enough though it had to do with the fact that Jelani was there. With time he formed a close bond to them as well and even learned to communicate non-verbally because of Trevor and he was the one who taught him to write while Jelani taught him how to read and Loke taught him to express himself better without fear.

Ginger: She's like a little sister to him and both instantly formed a strong friendship given the fact that both are arcane users and powerful ones at that. She didn't know anyone and once Angelus initially recovered he had the habit to make sure any new people weren't feeling alone. Once they got to talking and found out each were magic users it was almost instant friendship.

Uthorim: Oh, he instantly thought he was lovely. He really gravitated to his face because to him he looked really kind and soft though he noticed he was big and strong so he also instantly thought he was hot. Angelus was the first to notice that Uthorim was focusing a lot on Loke and very subtly nudged at Jelani and both got a kick out of watching Loke not realize this teddy bear of a mountain of a man was flirting with him. Don't worry, Jelani told Loke lol.

[callsignbaphomet]

The boys's "redone" presets. Angelus was the one that was changed the most. Ish. Least was Loke. Managed to better Jelani's scars...which like an asshole I neglected to take a shot of them. @apothecaryforwearysouls

[callsignbaphomet]

@apothecaryforwearysouls

Ngl I saw the video and rebloged so quick I didn't notice the tags. Super curious about the comparison though.

[callsignbaphomet]

@apothecaryforwearysouls

You're not wrong actually. Anything that's considered art he does. He likes using his hands a lot (and for once I don't mean it THAT way lmao). Not to mention the huge irony that OP was making a unicorn cuz Angelus LOVES unicorns.

I live vicariously through this puppy so he's like prodigy levels of good when it comes to art, he can do do hyper realistic to toony and stylized and he's damn good at it. Uses all sorts of mediums as well.

I've always said that if he wasn't doing what he currently does he'd either be in game development, comics, animation, or anything tied to art.

[callsignbaphomet]

@apothecaryforwearysouls

Lmao

I was gonna say that's Jelani and Angelus going feral on Trevor's dick.

[callsignbaphomet]

@apothecaryforwearysouls

That put the dumbest smile on my face! :D

Guess it has to do with me being bilingual. I spent several years in Tampa, Florida where I learned to speak English so maybe it's a combo of all that. Yeah, I'd learned to speak Spanish first but we left to Florida when I was in 1st grade so it was kind of a shock to the system to start learning another language though I started lessons here.

I'm gonna be brutally honest, I consider English my first language since it was the one I fully "developed". I don't like speaking Spanish tbh with you. Since we moved back here permanently back in the mid to late 90s I haven't stopped speaking and consuming any media in English and I mostly speak that.

1. For fear of forgetting.

2. Like I said I don't really like Spanish lol.

[callsignbaphomet]

@apothecaryforwearysouls

Lmao I don't even know where to start. So Oracle is a paramilitary PMC that has ZERO ties to any government, country or anything really. Like there are no ties.

Oracle has several goals but the biggest one is making sure humans don't obliterate non-humans and vice versa. Aside from that this world, setting, whatever you wanna call it deals with anything and everything paranormal.

Look, my dumbass 14-year-old ass was watching a James Bond movie one day and I thought, "Huh, what if this shit had werewolves in it?" and so Oracle was made. Actually, it was made later during the summer of 2000 'cause my mom's ex had promised we'd have a fun family summer of traveling the island and doing so many fun things. I bought a journal to document it all. Midsummer rolled around and we did nothing and my journal was blank so I took that previous idea and fucking RAN TO THE HILLS WITH IT. 23 years later we have this massive as fuck all world in my brain that I bother everyone with.

Anyway, Oracle started with 3 men. A werewolf, a vampire and a human during the height of the Akkadian empire! The werewolf is actually the man that is now known as Aleksey Malakhov aka Angelus's grandfather aka Jelani's father-in-law/mentor.

He had a different name back then I just forgot and I don't feel like looking through my hundreds of notes and files to find it.

By the way, Aleksey is Sumerian. He's been around for a while now. In fact he was one of the very first werewolves. All 4 of the first werewolves are Sumerian and yes, they are still alive today in 2023. How? Werewolves are VERY long lived but not that long. It's part of the original curse. The first of every breed inherets the curse and has to live with it forever.

Spoiler alert. With Angelus being the FIRST and frankly the only Crossedbreed he is also cursed. He can't die. He just hasn't realized that but Aleksey knows it and doesn't feel like telling his grandson will help in anyway. Is that a bad thing? Probably but he's doing it out of love. Angelus had been suicidal for decades and had attempted suicide so many times he lost count after 200 times. He's doing far better now a days though.

We don't have just werewolves here in Oracle. There are werewolves, vampires, fairies, monsters--shorter list is what we don't have: aliens. Idk it's not my thing. If you wanna say there ARE aliens in Oracle then who am I to say there aren't any.

As I kept expanding Oracle I wanted to add people from different cultures, backgrounds, ethnicities, believes, religions, faiths. We have EVERYTHING here. When I say I have a metric shit ton of OCs I mean it with my entire chest. I want to represent everyone. Easier said than done 'cause I wanna be accurate and respectful and a lot of times that means doing a lot of research and sometimes it gets tedious. I'm just one man behind all of this fantastical nonsense.

Yeah, I mostly talk about Loke, Jelani, Trevor and Angelus because those are my comfort characters and I know them better than I know my own damn self. Not gonna sit here and lie, Jelani's at the forefront for any and all Oracle things. Everywhere I am online I use him as a pfp. He's the mascot if that makes sense. I am extremely proud of this character and I love him so much. He's to Oracle what Pikachu is to Pokemon. Idk if that makes sense.

Oracle doesn't just focus solely on the PMC. There are so many things that make up this setting. There's groups of humans that hate and fear anything that isn't human and want to kill them all off. The most infamous being the Council of the Knights which admittedly has been a thorn on Oracle's side for a few centuries now. We have problematic vampire covens who think of non-vampires as cattle and make shit difficult for others. We have a death cult led by a very unstable woman who created a virus that destabilized actual fucking deities into destroying shit with the help of a deity (actually it's a Concept but that's too complicated for now). There's also deities themselves that every so often wanna start shit. Because of that we have people like the Nyota tribe from Kenya who have dedicated their entire lives to keeping a rogue and exiled Maker imprisoned so They don't start Their stupid nonsense again.

What the fuck is a Maker? There is a hierarchy when it comes to deities.

Iirc it's demigods, gods, and finally Makers. Makers are the gods of the gods. Those are like actual creators, they make the rules and shit but they also break 'em. They're complicated. There is NOTHING above a Maker...except for the Concepts. The best way I can explain a Concept is that they are ideas and the very first Concept is the Concept of Existence. There's the Concept of Evil, Concept of Concequense, Concept of Good, Concept of Nothingness and many more. CoE and CoN are opposing ideas that have been at each other's throats since always.

Concepts intervene in life but they don't at the same time. They also only exclusively communicate with Makers. Only Makers. Jelani has an...interesting role with CoE and some other Makers and by extension with CoN. I can explain that in another post cuz it's a lot and complicated.

So as for what kind of creatures Oracle has? Like I said I wanna add any and all cultures so there's everything to pick and choose from. I've even invented a few. Are there cryptids? Yes! In this setting things like the Mothman, Bigfoot, Nessie, Jersey Devil and just basically all cryptids are just creatures from other planes/realms whatever you wanna call them. Some people use planes others use realms some others use other words. How the fuck did they get from one to ours? Easy. Portals. Portals are unstable and quite frankly scary natural phenomena that happens randomly all over the world. Sometimes creatures and animals get caught in them and get trapped in other realms. Sometimes it's a building, sometimes an entire town gets trapped.

Is there magic? Yes, there is!

Can anyone use/learn magic? Yes! We don't do that stupid "chosen one, only a select few can use or learn magic" bullshit here. Magic is an ability that anyone can learn to use.

Are there rules? Yes!.....I just gotta find that stupid file where I have it and I'll post it if anyone wants to know more about it.

Oracle deals with things of magical natures too as well as portals and planes. There are actual black sites where, and I use this word loosely, "stable" portals lead to other planes that need to be checked every so often. Not many Oracle agents have access to this kind of op by the way. It's really need to know level type shit.

So back to the founding of Oracle. These 3 men, these sell swords got together and went into business together and were like unstoppable. As time went on 3 became 6 then 6 became 9 and then we get to 2023 with Oracle still very much alive and kicking with thousands of agents all over the world with 6 branches spread across the world and 2 training facilities.

If Oracle is 100% independent from any government then how does it pay it's agents and employees?

Aleksey has invested very wisely, owns parts of companies, owns whole ass major companies that generate a bitch ton of money. All of these are made up by me obviously. Part of the profits from those hundreds of companies go into the pockets of agents, assets, and Familiars. It pays for weapons, gear, vehicles, gadgets, ammo, facilities, housing--EVERYTHING!

Look I don't know how realistic that is I'm horrible at math and economics so just go with it.

Wtf is a Familiar?

A Familiar is a person (non-human or human) that indirectly works for Oracle. They give information, keep an eye on certain groups, areas, phenomena and the like. Familiars can be approached by Oracle to join as agents IF they so choose.

There are certain rules that apply to certain characters, places, ideas, creatures and stuff but for the most part I like living things open to enterpretation and flexible.

I think C said it best. Oracle can be described as "weird espionage with a cosmic horror twist". It's got a tiny teeny alternate history to it too.

I hope that covers like the basics of Oracle. If you wanna know something else about the setting as a whole or specifically about Loke in this setting just ask.

[callsignbaphomet]

@apothecaryforwearysouls

Listen! That post + your tags are making me think up some ungodly and unholy scenarios here.

Loke violently fucking Uthorim is making me purr ngl. If I wasn't so goddamn terrible at writing smut I woulda written this shit already lol.

[callsignbaphomet]

@apothecaryforwearysouls

I am so here for this!!! Knight boyfriends with some epic ass weapons and scary armor. Yes!