The Lady was speaking with her Nephew, MacFarren and his people were looking over what is left of the troops, and the two vampires on the cieling are having a quiet discussion when Rob suddenly screams and 3 Archon Class beings become visible around him, each with a hand IN his head, they look to be in pain to.
The Elemental Balls all rush to him, then try to blast the Archons with everything they got, doing their best to protect their creator despite the beings being far beyond them in power.
All 4 beings glow very brightly - the 'battle' last for about 10 minutes before the Archons just vanish and Rob drops to the ground, small lightnings playing off of him. He lives, but is unconscious.
The others gave them lots of room and just watched. None know what happened but they all got theories, some of which are pretty close to correct as it appeared the Archons were trying to control him.
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Darren postulates, "I am wondering now, how much of his memories really happened and how much was put in to him by those creatures."
Lady Ann DelMarko Canns, "What were those Things ?"
Female vamp, elegantly dressed, standing on the cieling, "Archons of the Neutral order I believe. From here it looked like they were trying to make him a puppet and likely they were what was making him think that the Gods were talking to him."
Other vampire on the cieling, looking more like a Noble'esqu type adventurer, "But why did the elementals all suddenly attack them like that ? It was a strange scene."
No one has an answer to that. The Elegant one walks down and kneels in front of the softly glowing man. She holds a hand out near him, "Interesting, he has some kind of shield around him which is protecting him even though he is unconscious."
Darren grunts, "Well give the nature of those still here, I can understand that need. Also several of those lightning elementals are still here. Which is odd in and of itself. Those normally don't stick around after their summoner loses consciousness."
Duke DelMarko, "Normal elementals don't try and attack upper level spirits either, but these did. Which means he is likely far more than he appears."
The Lady nods, "His aura still says God to me. Strong and with that glow that normally only the divine have."
Elegant nods, "Point. Though I have seen advanced holy men have such an aura. People whose understanding of the universe and it's workings that is so advanced that they seem like gods to the rest of us."
Adventurer woman nods, "Well you are an ancient, so I can see that."
Elegant, "Ellenor! I am Not an Ancient, I am barely over 500."
Lady Ann smirks at MacFarren, "Your over 500 if I recall."
MacFarren nods, "612 next Marchest, and Lady Agatha is older than I am by a lot. She was claiming five hundred when I was still in my swaddling clothing."
Darren just grins, "She is like human women, claiming a younger age even though they obviously are not that age. In your case my dear it's all your accumulated memories that points that out."
Lady Agatha huffs, "I will maintain my age, no matter what you all say."
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Its the noise that wakes me more than anything, my head is pounding but the voices that have filled it sense the Skworg event are gone. I look around in my own head and notice the absense of these other memories. Just a 'list' of skills and powers I now have and the abilities to use them like I was born to them instead of recently aquired them. I get the feeling that what ever happened someone over stepped their authority, or at least I hope it was something that simple.
Still holding my head I open my eyes to see a face of someone I do actually remember from a long long time ago.
"Lady Agatha Ravensblack Fire-Soul, your over 3132 when I last saw you on the fields of Carmine, which for me was centuries ago. Before the Tremere got me." my voice is trying to sound female and the center of my head Really hurts, about where the 3rd eye spot is, but then it fades away.
She looked at me when I called her name as did several of the others. I feel the memory fade.
She kneels in front of me, "Oh my Gods, Tillin ... well her soul at any rate." she looks at her companion, "Tillin was 4th generation and a high holy person back in the day. Before she was murdered by some childer who thought they could steal her power in some strange ritual."
"Ritual of the Blood Rose." I cough, "Canabalistic ritual used by some blood drinkers, trying to steal the power and potential of older vampires. Never works, other than to drive the participants insane." I really want a pain killer now, this is a worse feeling than what the cleansing left behind.
Lady Agatha nods, "Are you still Tillin ?"
"That was not my name back then, never understood why you always called me that. I remember good sized chunks of many past lives, others tiny pieces and a few not at all. Seeing you triggered that one memory rather strongly though." I semi grouse.
She scoots a little forward, "I called you Tillin cause your given name was a mouthful that I never got right. So I just nick-named you. I do that to people all the time. Unless they have easy to say names. So what is your name ?"
"So tempted to make up a long complex one just for you." I say with a little evil smile, she smirks, "But my name is Rob. I am not using the rest of my name as it's a bit of a moot point seeing as I was snatched from my home universe and dumped here."
MacFarren scoots around to the far side of the lady, "So Rob, what just happened ?"
"I don't know. I felt something strange, well stranger than normal, and did an exorcism on myself. Not the first time I have had to do that as sometimes spirits try to take over people like me." I look at Ravensblack, "I was born with spirit sense this time around." she nods, "As such some of the more agressive spirits and sometimes higher or lower forces try to take people like me over, so they can interact with the world. So in defense I learned to use exorcisms on myself. This one really hurt though. Normally at most I get a bit nausious."
MacFarren nods, "There were 3 beings that looked like Archons, all had a hand IN your head."
I sit there, then roll on my back and stare at the cieling, "So that is what was going on... Ever sense I took out the Skworg I have had all these strange memories that were not mine, flooding my mind. Telling me things but it was like 3 seperate lives where triing to over write my own self memories."
Darren nods, "Forces out there decided you would be a perfect tool for them and were trying to make you what they needed you to be. Those sorts don't care if your willing or not, they just force themselves on you."
I sigh, "Lords of Light and Mercy protect me." nothing new happens.
They all looked ready to run when I said that.
Darren, scooting closer, "Who are the Lords of Light and Mercy ?"
"I consider, "Tyr God of Law and Justice, Amora, Goddess of Love and Romance, ... she is one of the few love gods that is not overly vain or sleeps around with anything that catches her fancy. Hope is Elpis, a child of Nyx and the mother of Pheme the Goddess of Fame and remown. Clementia is the goddess of clemency, leniency, mercy, forgiveness, penance, redemption, absolution and salvation. I don't know if Life has a name as it really is the Spirit of the Universe, with out it litterally nothing could exist. Undead included as even you all have souls. But when I call on the Light, that is the source of it really."
Darren ask, "What about the Lady of Mysteries ?"
I blink, slowly sit up and sigh, "The only Lady of Mysteries I know of is the Faerun Goddess of Magic, Mystra. The fact that the title worked with my spell casting just tickled me and I really did not think much about it to tell the truth."
MacFarren, slapping a hand in to his open palm, "Rob, were you ever a holy warrior ?"
"No. That was something that was being fed in to my mind. I am not a duke or royal either as my people are a democracy, we don't Have Nobles or such anymore. Now anscestorally speaking, I am descended from such, royals, kings and so on but that was 10 or so generations ago and again, in an alternate world so moot here really. I was a writer of fiction, I worked in stores as a clerk. Now I did study staff fighting and at one time I could do a wind strike, but till I came here I did not have these other skills. What ever force sent me here loaded me up with a bunch of skills and powers I did not have preiviously."
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Agatha nods, "Butterflies ?"
I nod, "Or moths, but the majority looked like monarch butterflies, they surrounded me, all talking about different things, then went away and I was standing in the middle of a field, scared out of my mind."
She nods and sighs, "That is how I got here over a thousand years ago. Strange talking butterflies, they surrounded me as I was out hunting, next thing I know I am in a cavern system and having to find my way out past some very nasty dark elves who seemed to think I was a divine being and needed to be locked inside a rock so they could venerate me better. I got the hell away from them. They were insane."
I nod, "Heard of some druids who did similar things to vampires, but used tree's. would say they were gods and trick them in to letting them lock them inside of tree's. They did not believe that and were just trying to remove the vampires from existance."
She nods, completely believing That line of logic.
Lady Ann ask, "Are you a champion then ?"
I shake my head, "At most a mystic and minor exorcist, at best Nnn ..no. I have fought demons and evil spirits before but not part of any organized faith or religion. I was born early and had lots of illnesses and such from that. What ever sent me here removed most of the injuries and birth defects but left me my bad leg, some scars and this massive gut, that one I did not have before. Well a little bit of one, but not to the size it is now." I pause and think, "I was my own person and self right up till I got knocked out after blowing up that alien space ship. You all call the Skworg Palace. When I came to, something was at that point trying to alter my memories and change my inner narritive as to who or what I am."
Darren nods, "Your defenses were down because you were unconsicous. So the moment they could certain Gods tried to take you over and turn you in to their tool. But that does not explain the elementals."
I slowly nods, "My blessing, I get it now. I called on the Light, Justice and Mercy - they were trying to purge these others out of me. These others who kept telling me that Mercy was a scary being, that the Gods of Justice were the mean self rightous types and so on. They were trying to break my connection to the Gods I have worshipped all my adult life, so I would work solely for them. The Elementals, um, I created them. Well their physical forms really, the spirits have always been here."
Agatha nods, "An enlightened individual with a great deal of personal experience with spirits and psychic power. But also someone with a creative mind capable of thinking up new ideas. Yes I can see why certain gods would want to control you. They call themselves the Gods of Balance and Neutrality, but their actions tend to be a bit darker than that.
I am not a nice person, being a vampire as long as I have been and all, but even I have ... ok I am lying, I take over peoples minds all the time. But I am evil. Neutral sorts are not supposed to do Evil like that."
"Neutral sorts, in my experience, are usually more evil than Evil sorts really. They just lie to themselves better." MacFarren grunts.
That gets some general amused laughter.
"Congradulations Raven, your neutral now." I state to the dark haired lady. She snorts but does not comment at that. "On the plus side, all their meddling in my head has given me the skills to match what they were trying to make me. Unlocked a bunch of things I have spent my life trying to learn to. So that is nice. Hmmm" I mutter something and a picture appears in front of me. Its my cats, sitting on my kitchen table, waiting for me to get them thier dinner. I miss them terribly.
Agatha leans over and looks at the picture, "Cats, really ?"
"My cats, specifically Beterguise and Sister. The Black one is sister. Betel is my scaredy cat, afraid of most things but good at hunting bugs and lizards. Sister is my tough girl and people person. She is sweet and has the tiniest little meow." I sigh.
Ravensblack stares then sighs, "Right, your a new and different person than the one I knew. The one I knew kept trying to awaken my mind and teach me about the importance of being Aware."
I snort, "First key of awareness is intuition."
She nods, "That's the saying she kept repeating to me. I see it's still in there."
"I know 5 of the 7 keys now. Don't claim to understand what they all mean though or how they all intereact with each other beyond the obvious."
Agatha just sits hard, "Oh SO that is why your aura is showing up the way it is now." she looks at the Lady Ann, "High end Holy type, I was right. Not a god, just his understanding of the nature of everything is higher than is normal." she looks at me, "To people like us, your aura is almost divine and looks like a gods. It's just your understanding that makes it look that way." she nods. I personally don't get it, sure I worked out what some of the keys are, but I am no closure to understanding what they mean or how they all fit together in to the cosmic balance slash understanding of Grok.
"None of that is important to me right now really. It's all a hobby these days while I work out more important things anyway. Like how I am going to survive in this world."
Ravensblack snorts, "Ok, right, bring us down to the mundane stuff. SO Master Rob, what skills did the chaos bugs give you and what skills did you have Before."
"I got more magic than I know what to do with. They replaced my native language with the local magic language, other than the slang activation words. Those are all in my native language, go figure. They increased my skill with a sword, I only ever used wood swords prior to coming here. Um, added to my skill with a staff and put ALL the Storm fighting techniques in my head and the skills that go with them."
Darren chuckles, "Explains the lightning really. But can you teach what they gave you ?"
"I don't know. I have limited experience in teaching anyone anything and well my few attempts at it did not turn out well. One fellow went evil, one just decided that all the stuff I tried to teach him was evil and tried to turn me over to a group who wanted to kill anyone who they see as evil. Pretty much anyone not of Their faith really. Fortunetly the country I am from allows for any religion as long as they obey the laws, so no human sacrifies or such allowed. Which meant that those people could only yell at me and persicute me, but nothing else."
MacFarren inhales past his teeth and nods. Seems like every culture has people like Those in it.
Agatha has to ask, "What do you mean one student went evil ?"
"He wanted power, so he took what I taught him and worked out how to make a pack with a devil. I had to banish the Things he summoned. They sent things to kill me, so I had to call on higher powers for protection. It was a huge mess that did not end well for anyone." I sit up and look at her, "In your terms, he went infernalist."
She nods, "Ah, That level of evil, yes ok that is worse than we, as a society, allow. " she looks at MacFarren, "We don't generally like anything more evil than Us around."
He snorts at that.
I am staring in to the middle space, wondering what else was done to me, what other things have been changed and I am not consciously aware of. Truthfully I may never know. But I do know I need to increase my spiritual defences now. But I am unsure how to go about that.
"MacFarren, amoung my new skills is the power to heal others, even regenerate lost limbs if needed. No magic in that ability but I can enhance it with magic if I need to." I look at them, "To heal or harm are both in my skill set now, and it includes an increased understanding of first aid and some medical knowledge from my own people, including a few you may or may not know of."
He nods, understanding that to. More advanced people, greater understanding on how the body works and thus better medical skills to. Even the low end side maybe better than what they know now and I am offering to teach them that to. He understands the value of that and the healing powers as well.
Some of the others are chatting with that other vampire, who snorts, "What you Believe that ?" rather loudly.
Darren looks at them and the mage sighs, "She thinks we should demand proof of Master Rob's claim of the kind of technology his people have."
I shrug and pull out my phone, turn it on, so it chimes, lights up and vibrates. I let it go through its sequence, then pull up the music files. This is a nice phone, it's on board memory capacity is 128 gig and I got it from the manufacturer, so it's unlocked and not set up for a specific company. So lots fewer junk apps taking up all that lovely memory. So I got most of my music library on it. As well as some nice apps of my chosing.
I play David Bowies 'White Wedding'. I watch as they all stare at me and my glowing 'magical' device. Looking at MacFarren, "This little device is a multi functional device of a type I mentioned previously."
That shut up that Ellenor creature nicely. MacFarren grins, "device that can do millions of computations that helps in your society."
I nod, "Communication device, music player, calculator, capable of taking pictures and showing them. Recording events for showing later. I can write hundreds of books on this and more. If it was still connected to the network, it had the ability to find almost anyplace on my world, maps for all of it. As seen from orbit, which is about 300 miles straight up." Ellenor looks like she wants to shrink in on herself. The mage like he wants to take it appart. MacFarren just looks thoughtful, but it gives him some hope for what I can maybe teach his people. Which as a business man, means possible profit. I think Ravensblack wants to turn me in to her new pet. But I remember her. I know who and what she really is. She was the first elven vampire in my old world. Before the elves and such left. She is also 2cd generation, though no one else I think knows that.
I point at her, "No trying to turn me in to a pet. I will tell them your true story if you try that."
She fades from view, "You remember that ?"
"How your people turned on you cause the gods of your people are small petty persons who can't stand anyone with a longer life span than them ?" I nod, "Oh yes. That story has stuck in my memory for many life times. Still ticks me off how they treated you cause one overly amourous vampire got fixated on you."
She nods, "I hated him for a long time, but over time I started to understand how that came about. Guilty of the same sin myself, a few times now."
Lady Ann is just Next to me, "Wait, you know her hidden history ?" she is in 'gossip mode'.
I look at her, "Well I was There, sort of. Who I was back then, reincarnation cycle and all that." she nods and makes a gimmie gesture, "No I am not going to just tell you. She is sitting right there and with her speed and power she can get through my defense field pretty easily. It would kill me, but likely cost her an arm at the very least. I got my shields layered, each step worse than the one before it. I think the Fire and Holy Radience would be the worst for you lot."
Lady Ann stops, then, "Wait, you have a Holy Radiance as a Shield ?"
I smile, hold up my hand and up my 'wattage' meaning the hand glows with Holy Light. AND I am suddenly vampire free as they moved to the walls.
Lady Ann shouts, "OK I BELIEVE YOU!" I tone it down and she and the others share a look.
Ravensblack sighs, "So That is what is causing the Divine aura, sneaky bastard."
I shrug, "I fought demons and needed the protection from them." I look at MacFarren, "That is from my own world and a side effect of that mess I told you about." he nods, grinning. Old training and while not a Holy warrior, I do have some priestly type skills just because of my past and what I did. Minor demon hunter instead of greater, still to some kinds a formidable sort.
Still powerful mage and skilled at soloing. He still wants me to work for him in some fashion.
He sighs, "Are you recovered enough ? We still have to find the other knights."
I nod, "3 of them have been located by my ball lightnings. They are just awaiting orders to paralyze them."
Lady Ann sighs "He has 6 knights and that only accounts for 4 of them."
MacFarren, "I suspect the others are up top controlling the population."
I levitate myself upwards and sigh, "I love magic" the mage chuckles about that.