#party members start getting attacked by undead as we take longer and longer to solve the puzzle

[5unrider]

riddles and puzzles in d&d remain the most humbling things ever, especially because they're usually pretty straightforward and easy, but everyone in the history of ever has a negative to their intelligence modifier (IRL) - but the funniest part of last nights session was me correctly guessing that the answer to the first riddle was 'reflection', and wanting my sorcadin to go to the waters edge to look into the water … and everyone complaining that we shouldn't go near the water because it was cursed. (the next part of the riddle was, in fact, in the water)

[acesydneysage]

My thoughts on how an Alchemist revolution could go

I turned some of the initial points into a one-shot, but I'm very unlikely to actually write anything that sees all of it through to the end, so I'm laying out what I imagine would happen. I could follow the initial fic's format and just write cutesy domestic fluff with hints of what is going on in the Alchemist revolution in the background, but who knows

In The Golden Lily, Sonya thought Sydney's blood might be key to a vaccine, since it was undrinkable to Strigoi. Later, in The Fiery Heart, in their visit to Inez, we find out that it's because her blood is coated in human magic. That makes it taste foul to undead vampires, and also broke her Alchemist tattoo, by countering the compulsion of Moroi magic with human magic.

She eventually uses a similar principle to make the tattoo breaking ink she gives to Marcus, and that she uses to help the other re-education inmates in Silver Shadows.

So, with that in mind:

My initial idea was that one of Marcus' operatives, who got tattooed with Sydney's ink, would suffer a Strigoi attack. Their blood would turn out to be undrinkable. Since Sydney's ink breaks the Alchemist tattoo, the receivers blood would get coated with human magic, like a witch's.

I would like it if that person was one of the people Sydney helped in re-education, because I'd like to think those people stayed loyal to her, and maybe see her as a leader. Just because it's really touching to me how she was still worried about others, and risking herself to help, while she was going through her worst nightmare.

In my fic I went with Sydney's roommate Emma, "the Sydney Sage of re-education", because I really love her. She really did turn out to be the Sydney of re-education, at least in part, because while she was repeating the party line and trying to seem cooperative, she was actually a badass rebel who fights back. There are other reasons, I'll get to that in the end.

Sydney's ink potentially working as a Strigoi vaccine is something important enough that she would risk her truce with the Alchemists to investigate. And since the ink also makes people immune to their mind control, the Alchemists wouldn't work with them like they did for the spirit vaccine. I truly believe that they value their control more than human souls.

I'm sure Declan’s blood will be important to the spirit vaccine. They couldn't mass produce it since it required a recent Strigoi restoration, trapping the spirit before it left the blood, while his blood is described as brimming with spirit. But Sydney and Adrian don't want their son to be experimented on, so that's just more incentive to seek an alternative.

I think Sydney’s ink wouldn't work on Moroi, going by the logic of the magic described in the books (human magic wins out in humans), but helping humans is already a big deal, and it could maybe work on dhampirs.

Meanwhile, the Alchemists have been getting polarized. When it's revealed that some of them were helping the Warriors of Light in the end of the series, while Warriors were keeping Moroi captive, that causes controversy. They eventually start to get divided into factions.

After the US re-education center burns down, those who oppose re-education try to defend that it not be rebuilt, and that other centers be shut down. There are symbolic concessions, but they eventually get basically re-education by another name. Similar things happen when it comes to demands for more transparency, and less authoritarianism in general.

And of course there's a reaction to progressive demands. A hardcore anti-Moroi faction is amenable to teaming up with the Warriors. They're tired of "fighting evil by cataloguing it."

If this faction wins out, they won't actually care that Sydney is blackmailing them into letting her live with proof that they worked with the Warriors, since they openly want that, and they consider her continued existence a humiliation. So Sydney and Adrian wouldn't be able to sit out this fight.

There are more and more defectors who simply leave and join Marcus (or go into hiding and try to stay away from that whole mess). But out of those who stay Alchemists, as things start to devolve into an actual civil war, the moderate faction has a lot of infighting about joining up with the rebels.

That's at least in part because Sydney is one of their most notorious members, and while they might not want to see all the Moroi exterminated, marrying one of them is still going way too far to a lot of them.

So, let's talk allies. Sydney definitely put Marcus in touch with more witches and taught them how to make the ink. And I think besides kidnapping Moroi and dhampirs, the Warriors could be capturing witches too, which would turn them against each other.

In re-education, when it's revealed that Sydney has magic they say that has happened before, and I imagine they handled it with the same amount of compassion. I think maybe Chantal is a witch too and that's why she was fown in the punishment level with Sydney.

Alicia definitely showed that some witches might be willing to work with them for their personal gain, but I think as a community they would protect their own. They wouldn't look kindly on Alchemists torturing witches. And even if they were born into the Alchemists, they chose to be witches, so their allegiance to them would take precedence in their minds. Sydney's coven and Ms. Terwilliger are definitely on board.

I think the rebels might be able to get the Keepers on their side, since they have a complicated relationship with the Alchemists, where they seemto deliberately keepthem dependent. Marcus' stated goal for a long time was helping Moroi on their own terms, that's what he did for a long while. He definitely didn't have any plans to topple the Alchemists in the Bloodlines era, he didn't thinkthat was possible. So they occasionally helped them get better technology and resources that the Alchemists don't want them to have, and they promise to help them further in the future. That gets them the Keepers sympathy.

The Moroi government obviously isn't gonna side with the anti-Moroi faction, but I think they'd try to stay out of the conflict and not be dragged into the fighting for as long as possible. But they've come to depend on the Alchemists too much to keep them hidden, and they're now in chaos.

With the Alchemists weakened by a civil war they aren't really doing a great job of keeping up the masquerade, Moroi secrecy gets very precarious.

Now. While Alchemists claim to be very worried about human souls, absolutely no one in the VA universe seems that worried about regular humans' lives. They don't even know about the existence of Strigoi so they could protect themselves. And yes, there are humans who'd work with Strigoi. Strigoi seem to have zero issue finding those humans as is, they simply tell them about vampires themselves when they wanna get servants.

Now there's a vaccine that could help protect humans, and really reduce Strigoi's capacity to feed, but you have to actually apply them to humans. And more and more supernatural events are being sloppily covered up since the Alchemists are otherwise preoccupied.

I'm sure there are some valid reasons for the masquerade, and humans might not behave amazingly towards supernatural creatures, but leaving them completely helpless to this threat isn't very ethical, and certainly not when you have a vaccine that could help them.

And honestly, as cliche as that argument is in discussions of monster hunting, humans could potentially take the Strigoi out, we have some pretty amazing weapons. Or we could be massively incompetent about a problem that we are fully capable of solving. You know...

So the supernatural world gets revealed, and that makes the Alchemists pretty obsolete. Of course, although they have been weakened by the decade(s) of infighting, that doesn't mean they lose all of their resources and connections all at once, but it would be a huge blow their relevance.

They get splintered into a lot of different groups that can still cause trouble, but they're no longer the omnipresent shadow organization they used to be.

And if this whole process took about 15 years, Declan and his buddies would be neatly protagonist aged in time to deal with the huge upheaval and the new mess of problems brought on by the integration of the Moroi and human world. And he'd more capable of thinking about his own relationship to the spirit vaccine and making his own decisions.

So most of this post was written to be understood whether or not you read Silver Stars, but this final bit is more about what could directly follow. When it comes to the fic I was more worried about the characters and their feelings, and excuses for domestic fluff and hurt/confort. So here's the fic on AO3 and on Tumblr.

In the end of The Ruby Circle, there's indication that Zoe Sage and Stanton, with the incentive of Sydney's blackmail, will be trying to reform the Alchemists. I don't really think they're reformable, attempts to extinguish re-education would basically result in rebranding. @sydneysageivashkov has some lesbian!Zoe head that I think are pretty compatible with my headcanons for an Alchemist revolution, and what Zoe would be doing during that initial period.

I think it could take a few more years, 3 or 4, for Sydney to actually have to leave her home and go into hiding. Declan foes actually get a little bit of a normal school experience. I imagine this whole process going very slowly, as the situation gradually deteriorates. And the witches would now claim Sydney as one of their own, making it a bigger problem for the Alchemists to attack her directly, lest they make enemies of the whole magical community.

By the time Sydney has to go into hiding I imagine Zoe is gonna have to leave the Alchemists as well. The other reason why I chose Emma for the first fic, is that she was in re-education in part for her sister's actions, so it shows that the Alchemists wouldn't be above hurting Zoe for Sydney's actions.

Sydney has very important reasons to join the revolution, and in fact she might eventually not have a choice, but she knows that once she officially breaks her truce with the Alchemists her whole family and even her fellow re-education inmates that she got amnesty for.

I imagine Sydney, Adrian, Eddie and Declan could spend a while hiding in a ranch very out of the way that Chantal and Duncan got themselves. Insert Adrian joke about that escape plan where cute blonde girls had to wear cow girl outfits.

Duncan has been shown to be pretty hesitant to risk going against authority, and Chantal is even more psychologically messed up than Sydney and the rest of them. Sydney feels pretty awful about placing them in danger, but they're both very grateful to her for helping them escape. Also Chantal is a really badass witch, although a bit unstable, I'll eventually find something to do with that, revolution wise.

But Sydney and Adrian would eventually leave and get more active roles in the revolution. I would very much like it to be an actual collective movement and not one special girl bringing down the Alchemists by herself, but I think Sydney would have a pretty prominent role after everything she went through.

This is way too long, but I had fun with it, and if you got this far, thank you for reading 😀

[matazz]

letters roy endoza never sent

so i wrote these because i wanted to write out roy’s feelings to the party members. it was mostly a way to vent, but during the time, i really did want to send them - but my DM never let me (if you’re reading this LOL).

there’s something a bit sadder about it being letter’s he never sent.

in my head, he left along the journal that he wrote as well with the letters he left behind. i guess canonically i can say that the party never ended up finding them. 

group letter (written after roy left the party & before the gala)

for the group, i had fun while we were charading around finding ancient artifacts and solving puzzles. i’m going to miss our adventure, but i have to leave. i’ve involved myself against the fate of the universe, a crime against all odds. i’ve loved knowing you all and you’ve all helped me so much but i dont want to involve you anymore in it. more importantly i feel as if that my actions may draw a rift in your beliefs and i dont want to seperate that bond. please do not look for me. i’m afraid i serve no purpose in this mission with the champions anymore. i dont think the gods (and even myself) consider myself to be a champion anymore. to be quite honest with you, i don’t know what the consequences are or what might be from my actions but i will deal with it myself. i’m going to be honest. i appreciate all of you, and you’ve helped me in learning so much. about the world, magic, and other people. but i don’t want to involve any of you in my life and i don’t want to see any of you ever again. please do not try to contact me or find me. this is my departure letter. i am safe, and i am well, and i dont want to be involved with the champions anymore. i hope everybody does well. i’m sorry i left without saying anything but it had to be this way. it’s better for me this way, for everyone. i’ll stay safer this way. if the gods tell you to locate me, please ignore them their calls. i can not say why, but if you trust me at all, please believe me when i say i’m safer not meeting you. sincerely, roy endoza.

To the group (i think this was written the day of the gala, but before the Thing happened)

To the Champions, I’m not sure when this letter will deliver, so you might receive it a bit late. I’ve left for a while to pursue my own goals and research some things. I'm not sure when I'll be back, or if I'll even be back at all. There's been so much nagging at me that distances myself from all of you and I don't really feel like I belong so much anymore anyway. I don’t know whether or not my research is going to succeed, but if on the event that something happens, please don’t look for me. To be quite frank, I don’t really want to involve any of you in my research and I’m afraid that meeting you is only going to be a liability to me. On the unlikely event that my research turns out to be negative, I'll come back; however if that’s not the case then please don’t try to contact me and do not look for me. I can not stress this enough, but what I’m about to go through with is going to upset the gods and more importantly, all of you. It hurts to leave like this, but I have to say farewell. I loved travelling with most of you and I’ve learnt more about the world than I ever could have just staying at my house in Origin. Thank you so much for the adventure. Perhaps for the last time, Roy Endoza.

To Ayce (written the day of the gala i think)

Ayce, I’m sorry I wasn’t able to talk to you before I left. To be honest, I couldn’t bring myself to do it and I haven’t had the time or the nerve to say anything. I regret all of that, but you deserve at least something before I leave. I can’t continue our relationship.. I’ve felt distant for a while now, and it’s been nagging at me but I don’t think we’re good for eachother at all. I’ve been a dishonest man to you despite the fact that you’ve been honest with me the entire time. I know it makes me an asshole. You deserve so much better than I could ever be to you. I wish there was more I could say. You've probably figured it out already, and if you have then I already know it was pretty selfish or stupid of me to start this relationship despite the fact that I've known all along how it was going to turn out. You don't have to forgive me. I wouldn't either. And if you haven't figured it out, then I hope it wasn't so terrible for you. I've enjoyed my time with you. I hope you find someone better. Roy.

A letter to Ayce (written like the day roy left)

ayce i have a lot i’ve been meaning to say to you but havent had the time or the nerve to say anything. but i need to say it now because you deserve these words. i can no longer continue our relationship. i’ve redeemed myself but in doing so, i’ve gone against the world; but more importantly, to you. i love you very much, and i wish i could have come to the ball with you and danced. i would have loved to; but i have a lot going on and i dont want to involve you, or anybody else in our charade, involved in my problems. i’m sorry i could not say it to your face. i hope life treats you well. you deserve so much better than i could ever have been. with love roy

Letter to Ayce (dated from the week before roy left)

ayce i’m writing this because i didnt have the nerves to say this in person, and i apologize for that. to be honest, the more time passes the more o begin to think our relationship was a mistake, so i’m officially parting ways. i never lied when i said i love you. i still do, but i just dont think it has worked out or even will. i think our morals are too different; and i cant find myself being with somebody who finds it so easy to murder a person. no matter how terrible she was, i thought that you of all people may have disapproved after experiencing death already. i also found myself attached to Fox, so his leaving leaves a hole in my heart. ialso despise Atlas; but i digress, none of these are even the main reason i’m leaving. to be quite frank, i’ve never seen this mission with the gods as important. my dreams, my goals, my redemption; they will always be first. this mission with the gods has just been seen as a side quest for me. partially because i don’t trust the gods myself. if we take everything we’ve heard at face value, then why should i trust God’s that have left the world to ruins before? they don’t even trust us enough to tell us what has happened in the past. in my opinion, they’re either incompetent and lazy or not telling us the actual truth of what we’re doing; or even what they’re doing. they aren’t powerful. if they were, they could retrieve the keys themselves or defeat beshaba’s group themselves. i just can’t bring myself to want to do a mission anymore where i have to obey people who can not trust us enough to let us know basic information. meeting you was a bonus, but i think it’s time for me to move on. this wasn’t a decision i’ve made because Fox left; i’ve been thinking about this for a while. neither my goals or morals align with anyone elses. i want to be good, but i’m only a wench in a perfectly working clock. as of recent events, i also don’t want to explain myself to Atlas of all people, but i can’t bring myself to tell you about myself either. i may return, if only for more information or perhaps even the gala; as much as i do not care for the gods, i’m still interested in the keys and the power within them. if i meet you there, i know it may sound selfish to ask, but i hope you may give me one last dance. roy

a notebook. it’s a bit worn out and has some torn pages.. it was left behind with roy’s stuff and all the letters

‪entry 47‬ ‪[torn out page] ‪entry 53‬ ‪i’ve retrieved a letter from a dream telling me to visit latham and retrieve a key. i’m curious, so i’ll check it eventually. it was definitely odd.‬ ‪entry 55‬ ‪i met a young boy. his name is fox. he’s some sort of shapeshifter. he’s quiet, but his presence is nice company. he also received a similar letter to mine. i have a feeling we’ll be travelling for a while.‬ ‪entry 62‬ ‪we retrieved the key & met some other ppl with letters too. we’re heading to a trinket store back in origin now. i dont wish for them to know of my life so i’ve found a way to steer them as far from possible to finding out about myself. i’ll probably visit ma too.‬ ‪entry 63‬ ‪an elf woman named leera attacked us after i told her i wasnt going to give her this key. i dont like her. she seemed very cocky.‬ ‪entry 65‬ ‪delilah is kind.. i feel like i’m able to trust her. i asked her a question about my goals, vaguely, and it turns out that ayce asked a similar question. based on the message in his later i get the feeling he’s undead.‬ ‪entry 66‬ ‪[torn out.] ‬‪entry 69‬ [‪torn out] ‪entry 72‬ ‪we’re travelling to copper coast now for another key. if it werent for ayce, i wouldnt see any other reason for me to come. fox is still around, but i feel like he's doing his own thing. the other two arent big presences for me to care about.‬ ‪entry 73‬ ‪atlas is a werewolf? i didnt think those were real. this group keeps getting stranger. first a shapeshifter, second an actual living zombie, third a werewolf.‬ ‪ive continued my lie to the rest of them. they all seem to have believed me, strangely enough‬ ‪entry 74‬ ‪copper coast was very pleasant. i wish to come back someday.‬ ‪entry 88‬ ‪this trip to clandesteine has been a disaster.. what the honest fuck‬ just happened ‪entry 90‬ ‪fox told everybody about himself, finally. i feel this huge sense of pride?? i’m very proud of him. i dont understand why i feel so attached to him but i adore him so much‬ ‪entry 92‬ ‪((incoherent scribbles, kinda like “vsdjfsasifwnqkosdkv”)) i think i accidentally implied to ayce that i love him romantically and i think he loves me too... i’m freaking out and i dont know how to react... i think he thinks i’m cool and romantic but i didnt mean to be. ‪entry 93‬ in all honesty, i just wanted to tell him he needs to be more cautious of me. a part of me wishes he could figure it out himself so i dont have to tell him. ‪seriously! i dont know how i did that! i do love and adore him too but i feel like shit.. i dont deserve him, especially considering who i am. on the other hand, i hope he never finds out the truth about me.‬ ‪entry 94‬ ‪oh my god. atlas killed a man and ayce and fox proceeded to tell the guards. i feel sick. i’m currently at home but if they say my name at witness testimony i’m royally fucked. i dont know. i might just run for it and live in myr’s peak. maybe no one will find me.‬ ‪entry 95‬ ‪the group managed to get bailed out using ty’s name. benefits of being friends with rich people?‬ ‪fox found my poster though, so he saved my name during eyewitness testimony. i told him the truth. its been the first time i told someone how i really felt. he wants me to tell ayce but hes the last person i can tell. ‪entry 97‬ ‪we’re in lunarden! it feels nostalgic to be back. i want to go back to every place i miss. i took ayce to that me and nori used to go to back in high school. i think shes currently performing in solardome? i miss her‬ entry 97.2 ‪i came up with a few different ways to complete my goal. i have a few more probing questions, but i will have to ask later. i think i’m getting closer to the answers‬ entry ‪97.3‬ ‪[scribbled out over so that you cant read it] ‪entry 98‬ ‪i’m planning to get completely smashed once we get to solardome. i feel like i deserve it.. ive been pretty stressed and havent got laid. i’m crying remembering that ayce might not even be an option.‬ ‪entry 98.2 ‪i love ayce so much, and its confusing. am i just sexually frustrated? am i just lonely? am i just

sad? i feel guilty because it tears me apart. im confused because i love milo still, too. i know i should tell him the truth, its whats right but i know he’ll hate me. i dont know what to do. (extra note inbetween the pages, torn out but still there: to mom. i love you venhfrhdy mcuh. thank you fir everhything. yes. roy.) entry 98.3 what happens if i succeed? i hope ayce doesnt kill me. entry 100 ‪good morning. ayce & i are officially dating. were in solardome atm; i dont remember much of last night but i remember thinking he‘s beautiful. is it wrong to fall for him?‬ ‪entry 101‬ ‪[torn out] entry 101.2 [torn out] entry 101.3 ‪the blackness on my fingers has risen up more than it has before. its almost hard to write with my hands anymore. [the rest of it is torn out] (torn note inbetween the pages hi ayce. its unrealistic you'll ever find this but there's some things i want to say. back when we first met, i lied to you as a reflex when you asked me why i'm dealing with necromancy. to be honest, i could kind of gather you were undead, but i still lied anyway. my story is personal, its hard for me to be honest. i know i'm an idiot, and i'm sorry i used you. to be truthful, i still am a horrible person and for the entirety of our relationship i've already known that i was using you and i've felt so guilty about that. my feelings are complicated, but i've never lied when i said i loved you, and i still do; but i still want to bring milo back. i made a mistake and i want to fix that. the truth is that i still love him too. i know you deserve better. i'm sorry about lying to you. roy) entry 102 a dragon made us experience our dreams and nightmares. jade's scared of blindness and bugs. a valid fear, in a way. and she was dreaming of doing shows. i think it was supposed to display a feeling of happiness and joy, but it was just spooky since we all experienced her dreams with no sound. i never realized how scary it was to be deaf until i experienced it. atlas' was morbid. people were dying and there was so much gore. then there were people saying they owned him. i knew he was a bad person but it was scary to see all of that again. he dreamt of a workshop with a girl and a young boy. it seemed sweet, with a tinge of nostalgia. i would have never expected him to have dreams. he just seems like a horrible person with no sympathy to me, but i guess he has feelings. i still think he should go to jail, but i feel like he'll just try to kill me if i say anything instead. fox's was sad. we got thrown into a void of empty space where we were surrounded only by dopplegangers and a vaguely humanoid figure. he seemed so lonely and upset. he's scared of being forgotten by us and that made me so sad. i adore him, and he's grown a lot since we first met. i gave him a hug when we went into his dream sequence. i hope he knows i will never forget him. his dream was sweet. he just wants to save people and hang out with us still. i think he'll go far, and i would love to be there for him still when all of this is over. (there are about 2-3 pages with entry 102 that are torn out) entry 103 a new discovery. the world isn't flat? the god's are using their powers to “lock off” the rest of the world. apparently sanctuary is only a small part of the world. that was a really weird discovery to find out? it's kind of hard to believe, but at the same time, not. apparently they keys we've been collecting hold the respective power of the gods, and they're used to “open” the gateway. i have no idea what that means. apparently beshaba wants to use our keys to do exactly that. and also they can kill the god's? entry 112 when we came back to lunarden we discovered that delilah and allen were kidnapped by atlas’ syndicate. i knew atlas was trouble. i hate having to associate with him. we’re going to save them yet it makes me nervous. entry 114 i feel like i almost died in there. we saved the others and no one was hurt though. we’re going to trip back to lunarden and then travel through the travel gates back to origin to try

avoid people. allen mentioned something about strange readings. i have a feeling i know what it is. i’m going to ask lathandar questions. entry 115 nvm we encountered leera. this group genuinely scares me. I’m travelling with people who are down with murder. i should seperate. she uncovered my posters to them and i want to die. she also mentioned the last key at a ball. i need to bounce. lathandar also confirmed my suspicions last night. entry 116 fox left before i could. i feel bad. like maybe it was my fault. i miss him. we have to continue though. entry 117 its so hard to find a bag of holding. i just want to have this spirit stone around without having it in the open. entry 118 we’re in origin now and delilah let me rent out her bag of holding. an absolute kind soul. we bought tickets to the ball. so expensive. i wish i didnt do that. entry 123 [torn out] entry 124 [torn out]