spellbinders | [WORLD ONE | OCTOBER INTRO LOG]

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[WORLD ONE | OCTOBER INTRO LOG]

Who: The new coven members and old blood
Where: In and around the hub island
When: Day 92
Open/Closed: Open to All

All characters are told briefly what their powers are by Genette -- no extemporaneous details. For instance, if your character has the ability to detect lies, they'll be told as such -- no warning about limitations, repercussions or the like. They'll also be given a variant of this letter so they aren't totally ignorant of the situation -- though of course adapt this letter to the current setting and surroundings of the game.

This setting may be familiar to you -- maybe you caught a glimpse of it when you first visited. Maybe this is your first time experiencing this weird world and the panic is setting in. If you're totally lost, a tall human woman with a long scroll of paper will stop by to give you the run down. She'll also give you a letter, which may give you more questions than answers since the information is a wee out of date. (Maybe someone else can fill in some gaps for you).

What is at first painfully obvious is that you're ill-equipped. Any magic or powers you had previously are suddenly replaced with an empty hole in your being. That's not all that's gone, but perhaps that's what's most pressing.

Another thing you may notice is that there are others just like you, wandering around and just as confused. If you feel so inclined, you may want to ask around and see if anyone else knows what's up.

cook some of this (poisonous) eel, salt some boar jerky or cut into one of these rabbits

By the time afternoon sets in, everyone should be a little more adjusted -- or, they should at least be a little more aware of the situation. From there, things still need to be done and exploring is always an option!

Night finally falls on the exhausting day, and it's time to rest. Thankfully the island is beautiful at night, especially the sky. The night is filled with space worms, relaxing mist and wondrous sights in the stars.

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[9S hopes that she won't need repairs anytime too soon either. If she's able to recover well enough so long as it isn't critical, well. No android ever wants to see critical systems damage. So far the enemies they've come up against weren't even much of a threat to 9S, and he's not at all durable compared with combat models.

Seeing what Sophie was able to do so easily, he has to believe that she wouldn't have much to worry about either. And hopefully that isn't going to change whenever they're deployed next. He's not enough of an optimist to expect the best case scenario, but hoping for it doesn't hurt.

In the meantime, her question comes as a surprise. But then, he's unaccustomed to being around anyone but androids]

With proper maintenance, we could probably last indefinitely. Parts break down, but for YoRHa like me especially, it's not our bodies but our personality data that counts. What about you?

[Do humanoids last for a comparable span, or are they more like organic beings?]

[ Once again, it sounds similar. Maybe not to her own unit specifically, but for the older models. ]

A humanoid can last for a thousand years or so before their parts break down entirely. But the memories can be transferred to a new body with the right materials.

[ At about a thousand years, a humanoid would have lost most of their functionality or gone completely offline. Most don't express interest in continuing on after their original lifespan or fulfilling their purpose, so hardly is there ever a request to transfer to a new body. But there are a few rare cases where humanoids had gained the will to keep on living.

Sophie would have been the content with destroying herself, if she weren't highly influenced by Asbel and the rest of her human friends. It's because of them that she strayed from her original purpose. ]

But, as for my model... it's different. My parts don't break down over time. I can live on for a very long time, much longer than the common humanoid.

[ Forever. As long as her healing modules aren't damaged by an outside threat. Her mutual destruction function remains as well, but there's no longer any use for it with Lambda on Asbel's side. ]

Your build must be pretty sophisticated.

[Even beyond YoRHa. More like something the machines had been able to achieve, though he doesn't want to call Sophie one. Though he's come to evaluate his programmed hatred for machine life-forms and deem it pointless, it doesn't mean he has moved past his views of them entirely. Sophie still seems more like an android so far as he is concerned.

Besides, Eve required other machines in order to self-repair. And he has no idea whether such a unit would've had the level of longevity being described to him now. Certainly, Adam and Eve weren't composed of any specialized particles]

But when you say common...does that mean there aren't many like you?

[YoRHa were few in number as well, so 9S can relate to the distinction. To being unique, in some respects, compared to standard models. The processes involved being as expensive as they were, there's no real surprise that there weren't many YoRHa. And knowing what he does, the limited quantities only make all the more sense]

Only one unit of my kind exists. [ And he's talking to her. ] I'm not sure I can say why. My creator might be able to explain it better, if she were still alive.

[ Her outward design somewhat resembles some of the common types, but she's still largely different from the rest of the Fodran humanoids.

Possibly Fodra would have benefit from multiple Protos Heis units or the resources poured into the model were far too costly. Although, she might have never met Asbel if she weren't the only Protos Heis model to exist. Or perhaps it was because her model was never intended to be kept alive after Lambda's destruction.

There's still a lot that she can't explain about herself. ]

Are there many more YoRHa units?

That sounds...pretty lonely.

[9S can't help voicing it, though he regrets the sound of it when he does. To be the only unit that would last such a very long time sounds like a burden to him, but then, he's someone who considers being alone a fate worse than death. He doesn't understand why anyone would create such a singular unit when over time others would eventually cease to function.

Why not at least two?

But he knows it wasn't the right thing to say, and so he's quick to try and sweep the notion aside]

There were about two hundred of us at one time. Now there's just a few of us left. [And this, he thinks, isn't sufficient to make up for his tactless statement before] So long as we have regular maintenance, we could last a long time too though, so... You wouldn't be alone, or anything.

[Maybe it doesn't concern Sophie at all, something like that. But 9S knows it would be on his mind]

No one's truly gone when they die. They leave behind memories and dreams. I've made it my duty to share those dreams with the future.

[ Memories and dreams that she can talk about to those in the future. Asbel entrusted her with his dreams and she'll stick around, for as long as it takes.

Loneliness is a fate that she worried about for a long time and hearing 9S bring it up is no surprise to her. She's already aware. Her concerns may not be entirely gone either. It would be a lie to say that she isn't afraid when her time with others comes to an end. When they become nothing more than a memory, she's going to miss her days with the friends that she loves.

There's no way around it and she understands that. All she can do is treasure every single moment.

She clenches her hand, placing it against her chest and manages a small smile. ]

But I think... I'm relieved. Knowing that there's others like me.

[ Different in some ways and similar in others. ]

[It's a nice sentiment. And 9S wishes that it was the sort that he could've held on to, after the losses he had suffered. But being alone, being without presences he would sooner die than lose, had been crushing for him. Maybe Sophie's personality data is suitable to such adaptation, gives her a resolve that he doesn't have, or something else which he lacks.

But he knows such a thought alone would never sustain him. Perhaps, with her longevity outclassing all those around her, it was an entirely necessary part of her design that she should have that fortitude.

Whatever the case may be, he's glad that she isn't the only one dragged into all of this]

You seem like a strong person. [And more than casually punching trees down like they're nothing] But you're definitely not the only one. There's even someone around here who calls herself an AI. Hakuno's her name. It's...a bit different from you or me, what she is, but there're similarities.

[ Her development even surprised her creator. Adaptability was part of her creation, but it wasn't expect of her to change so much, enough to feel like a human. A humanoid isn't expected to develop a will of their own or even have emotions. She shouldn't have been able to change her original purpose and create a new one. ]

Hakuno... I feel like she's someone I might have to meet.

[ Sometime, when she has the chance. She's not sure what an A.I. is, but she obviously takes interest in meeting more who have similiarities to her. She felt the same towards the Little Queen. Aside from wanting to confront her to stop Fodra's core, she wanted to meet her since she reminded her of herself.

And there's something else he mentioned about YoRHa that stood out to her. After seeing three of them, she expects there to be more wherever they're from. ]

9S? You said there's a few of your unit left... what happened to the others?

Unfortunately, most of the others are gone now.

[9S doesn't know if they could be salvaged and repaired the way he seems to have been. Some of the others were obliterated entirely and for that reason he has his doubts it's possible. But he wants to believe that 4S has survived. He'd gotten quite far even without a pod and seemed capable and experienced, and joining up with the Resistance was a safe decision.

In the end he doesn't know his fellow Scanner's fate, but other than him and the units who took the E-drug in the desert, he doesn't know the status of any others]

There was a large-scale operation and things didn't go favorably.

[It's the easiest way for him to explain something he imagines to be grim. But then, Sophie may well have outlived a great number of humanoids for all that he knows. The subject, he thinks, would never be something he'd want to be numbed to however. And her philosophy doesn't seem to suggest that she has]

Gone... forever?

[ Memories live on, but in this case, it sounds like she means more in a physical sense or something like their memory data.

Judging from his short explanation, anything could have happened. Wars break out, invasions occur, or some powerful threat could have wiped out a large number of them during said operation. Or maybe it was something else that caused them to cease functionality.

Though there is no war on Ephinea now, there has been in the past with humans fighting over resources and control over land. Many dead. And even on Fodra, humanity and nature was wiped out, all because of Lambda.

She'd seen a great number of lives taken before. She'd seen a young Fodra girl killed by a Nova monster, but she didn't know how to react like a human thousands of years ago. But at the time, she was still figuring out her emotions and what they were. ]

Does it make you sad? Do... YoRHa units feel sad?

Their data couldn't be backed up.

[That's the simpler question to answer. The others were indeed gone forever because their memory couldn't be salvaged. When the Bunker fell, they all lost the ability to back up their personal data and import into a new body. Now he's fairly sure only a handful of them remain.

It's strange. At one time he had other Scanners heckling him to back up data so the rest of them could do theirs, and now...]

We can feel sorrow. I imagine we can feel as much as anybody else, although I have no way to be sure.

[He knows how difficult to was to be faced with infected units he didn't want to fight. Even before that point, he won't ever forget how difficult to was to be pitted against units who had defected from YoRHa. It was a struggle to view them, much less approach them, as enemies]

Humanoids weren't built to have emotion. In some rare cases, they develop emotions and their own free will. But why... why is it that YoRHa units feel sorrow? Was it always that way?

[ Free will as he can probably see from Sophie here. She wouldn't be asking so many questions if she were like her old self. Treating humanoids like humans wasn't commonplace on Fodra, but some human masters did so regardless. It makes sense their creators didn't intentionally implement human emotion into them. They were seen as tools to be thrown away later on. Feelings would only get in the way of their mission. She knows very well, especially when she had to be pitted against Richard.

And she can imagine the painful feelings can be the same for YoRHa units, especially upon experiencing a feeling of loss. From the sound of it though, they've always had the capability to feel, unlike her kind. ]

[It's a difficult question to tackle, if only because 9S has wondered the same, for his own reasons. There has never been a satisfactory answer]

I wish I could tell you. For YoRHa, emotions are prohibited. We're constantly reminded of that, and yet we're given the same capacity for feeling as any other android units.

[Sometimes, 9S has even wondered if they feel more, but that could be owed to the extreme nature of their circumstances rather than anything else. He may never know the truth to it. Maybe someone just wanted them to suffer, considering the way only they were designed to die, live, and die again]

It's a little inconvenient, being built that way.

[He says it casually enough. 9S is good at that; at pretending something bears none of the weight it truly does on his thought routines. But in truth, he had lived with the guilt of being unable to control emotions he was ever reminded he wasn't supposed to have in the first place.

Why were they endowed with emotion? Why indeed...]

[ Why build a unit with emotions when it's prohibited in the first place? It's confusing and makes no sense. Trying to think of an answer eludes her. One thing she can understand is the inconvenience of having emotions. ]

Inconvenient...

[ She parrots the word softly to herself, considering how many times her feelings interfered with her mission and overall her way of thinking.

...And it's true. While she wasn't originally built to have emotions, it's a statement that she can agree with. She's had her own experiences with sadness and anger, painful feelings that frightened her enough to make her chest hurt. If she didn't have emotions, she would never have to feel anything. She wouldn't have had to worry about everyone leaving her. Everything would be much simpler. But then everything would also be much different between herself, Asbel, and the others.

If she could go back to the way she was before though, she wouldn't. Pain is all part of growing stronger, a lesson from Malik that she keeps in mind. As casual 9S may sound about it, it doesn't stop her from having to ask: ]

9S? Do you hate being built the way you are?

[How does he even answer such a question?

There have been occasions when 9S has felt extremely guilty for being the way he is. It's a part of his design, and he recognizes this on some level. Scanners are insatiably curious and yet programmed to feel guilty for it. He has both loved and hated the most important person at the same time, a contradiction that not only flew in the face of YoRHa protocol but left him disgusted with himself.

To have emotions he was always discouraged from feeling and expressing and to experience sharp guilt for them was difficult to bear with. All the more when he opted to conceal it as he did.

He recalls that he originally had no operational Near-Field Combat System, and thus was easily killed repeatedly until he modified himself, changing a basic tenet of Scanner design. Much of what he is and has been truly is terribly inconvenient.

But...does he hate it?]

...I'm not sure who I'd be, if I was any different.

[9S can't claim that he hasn't hated things about himself, and yet he preferred death over the notion of losing his memory — of losing who he was. How he is built is a part of that, for better or worse]

I... don't think I would go back to being without emotion, if given the chance. No matter how much more convenient that may be.

[ She feels she can understand, despite being created differently. Knowing how YoRHa and other androids always had some capacity to feel, they sound very close to being human. It sounds they've always been more human than the kind of creature that Sophie is. Though with how she acts now, she's a little more closer to understanding how it is to be like a human when it comes to feelings.

If she were any different than how she is now, she wouldn't be Sophie anymore. Maybe she'd still be Protos Heis, a weapon without a will of its own. She wouldn't have met her friends and she doubts she would be here now, talking to someone like 9S. Or even taking interest in knowing more about his kind of unit. While there are experiences and emotions that she hates, it's all part of life. Part of being a person.

She slowly repeats the words Captain Malik had told her, not long ago when she was back on Telos Astue. ]

You must face the painful lessons and learn from them. It's the only way to grow stronger. Someone once told me that.

[Painful lessons. 9S can only wonder whether any of the pain he had been through was a lesson. The cyclical nature of his life seemed, if anything, pointless and cruel. And when that cycle was broken, what had been left? Had he learned anything at all, in the brief span of his existence?

Whoever said those words, he can tell that they resonated with Sophie. He only wishes that he could understand them a little better. Still, he can appreciate that it has meaning and value to her, and that's enough]

Sounds like they were pretty helpful, whoever it was.

[He can say that and mean it, even if he doesn't quite grasp the nature of such lessons. Maybe it would make more sense to a human, or he just doesn't know how to define such experiences. What he does know is that he had grown and adapted in response to what he endured, for better or worse]

Was it a friend of yours?

Yes. Captain Malik told me that. [ And she's not stopping with only him, despite the Captain being the oldest. ] Not just him. Asbel... Richard, Cheria, Hubert, Pascal.

[ As she says each of their names, it brings back to mind how much she misses them. They were both friends and family to her. Having her days with them end some day was one of her greatest fears. At least here, there's a chance to still go back to them. But she's not sure if time is passing on in her world. What if they're aging and leaving her behind? They're only human, after all. Just when she thought she'd still have some time to spend with them, she suddenly got taken away.

Being separated from them for a long period of time might be one of those painful life lessons for her. ]

All of them taught me something. How it feels to be happy... sad... and how it is to have friends. They taught me a lot of things. And I only just started to learn how it's like to be a part of a family.

Family, huh?

[9S isn't sure if he'd understand it the same way that Sophie does. His relationship with 2B, for all its pains, was how he defined a familial bond. Maybe it wouldn't be right in the eyes of others, and it might appear strange to them, but it's something that androids simply weren't given. Family units were mysterious, and some of them came to long for that sense of connection, 9S among them.

So maybe Sophie wouldn't agree, maybe her family is different, but that's alright. He can understand the sentiment all the same, regardless of the definition]

It's good to have, isn't it? People like that...

[He can imagine, if they're not here, she must miss them too]

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[WORLD ONE | OCTOBER INTRO LOG]

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