D.R.C.FOUNDATION
A lockdown was initiated in site 929, following several spatial rifts opening in the area. Mobile Taskforce Upsilon-1 (Diabolists) were deployed, swiftly containing the rifts using thaumaturgic anchors approved by the ethics committee. The anchors are 5x5 meter steel cubes containing pieces of saint corpse parts of varying origin.
Use of the anchors resulted in the manifestation of an audible phenomena of prayers, coming from the Germanic, Romanian, and Aramaic language. This resulted in the flow of anomalies exiting the spatial rifts to freeze and slowly flee back to the rifts.
There have been no observable change in the rifts, but the anomalies could still be seen from the other side.
Personnel have been sent to interview the anomalies, who were surprisingly amenable to the act.
Several list of questions were filled and documented. One particular question was repeated to all the instances of the spatial rifts resulting in the same answer.
Dr. Abacus Rhodes: “Why did you stop and return to the spatial rifts?”
Subject – 9929 -44: “Because we do not want to witness what’s about to happen here.”
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Smallworld University
The university was having it’s graduation ceremony in the newly built auditorium. Said auditorium was then destroyed by demons flowing from portals and the graduating students, but mostly by students who really, really wanted to put theory into practice.
Dean Fletcher was currently rolled up in a ball, muttering incomprehensible words. He was really proud of the new auditorium, he was so adamant about the council giving them the necessary funding for the new building. Now he couldn’t even repair the auditorium, due to the spells flung by the students grinding the very bricks to dust.
“BLACK HOLE”
“ENTROPIC FIELD”
“MASS GRAVITY BIND”
“BLACK HOLE”
“NOVA”
“BLACK HOLE”
Man they really love that black hole spell.
Professor Pector felt bad for the dean. He leaned down to the old man who rested in a fetal position and patted him in the back.
“There, there Dean Fletcher, it’s not all bad. We could probably fix it in like what, eighteen , maybe nineteen months. Probably a year tops if we had some help from those loan shark merchants.” He tried and failed in his task of comforting the frail old man.
Dean Fletcher wept a tear at his cruel fate.
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Blightwyrd Vampire Aristocracy
“My wife recently became the new mistress of the seventh prince.” Baron Hertz said, sipping the neck of one of his amputated human servants.
“Congratulations, what wonderful news.” Baroness Galatra snapped her fan, her face filled with genuine joy. Her wide frame simply burst into a spark of energy, smiling all the way.
“Thank you, with enough time she may be able to birth his child. She hasn’t been able to menstruate for a month now so, fingers crossed.” Baron Hertz let go of the human servant, careful not to kill this one. He installed the servant back to it’s mechanical limbs before it bowed. He waved the servant away, licking his lips of any excess blood. “Honestly it’s a huge leg up for the family.” The scrawny baron replied.
*Sounds of explosions and screaming*
“Well this calls for a celebration, I know an excellent midwife who also a blade for hire. Incidentally she makes the best meat pies this side of the north, almost as big as children too! I had her assist me in birthing my twelfth child last summer.”
“How intriguing madam, is this midwife perhaps Saria the child flenser?” Baron Hertz raised an eyebrow, interested in the news of a child sized meat pie.
*Sounds of entire armies screaming in a horribly gory manner*
“The very same!” The baroness saw her butler signal for her attention. “Oh, one moment please.”
“Madam your sacrifices are stripped and prepared” The butler said in a professional manner, slicking his hair back.
“Pardon me my dear. I have an appointment that cannot be delayed any longer.” She gets up and drinks the rest of her tea. She waves the baron goodbye.
“Let’s hope this one doesn’t squeal to loudly, ohohoh.”
“Hoho I’ll try not to make any promises dear.”
“Same time next week?”
“That would be marvelous.”
After he said his farewells to the baroness and used his handy dandy magical telescope. He peered into the lens and saw literal billions of his farm animals, mostly humans, fighting off the demon armies. He saw the blood of both parties readily drain to the canals they dug in the streets. Several blood orbs were floating around collecting the blood and fully draining several leviathans.
Only a hundred portals opened up so far, so they only lost a fraction of a fraction of the animal farms’ population.
He stood up and stretched. Snapping his bones and releasing his bloodlust a bit. He saw swathes of beings shiver at his presence for a few miles around him. He sensed their fear and smirked a little.
Well time to do a little exercise before the dinner bell.
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Heavy Metal Prison
In the lower reaches of the prison lie three rooms, each one heavily modified and cut-off from the main timeline. It is padded in magic alloys and thaumic circuits preventing any shift in baryonic matter or system related abilities. Several bones of dead deific entities are processed and made into concrete bricks surrounding the three rooms, preventing any ontokinetic linked deviations. The three rooms are resistant to most reality warping phenomena and have been categorized as Omega class.
The individuals inside the three separate rooms are not to be released under any circumstances. Under no circumstances must the individuals be caused to expire. They are to be constantly fed antimemetics directly to their digestive tract. Each individual must be hooked up to a virtual reality system and their own separate stasis chambers. Their bodies to be regularly cryogenically frozen, while their brains must be suspended in Oneirostatic fluid.
The three individuals are categorized as Alpha class regressors and they shall be used in the 890-Moon prediction program. They are to be constantly monitored and prevented from communicating. They are to be kept asleep by direct sedative cerebral injectors at four hour intervals
Predicted casualties: 0
The portals outside the prison hum and four voices are heard.
Predicted casualties: 233
Demons flow out of the portals and unleash bombardments. The thaumic seals are damaged.
Predicted casualties: 6,889
Several demon kings fly on leviathans. They unleash multiple minor reality warping attacks.
Predicted casualties: 3,998,455
Spatial cracks start to form outside of the prison, damaging the cameras and lifting the reality anchors. The sedative injectors have jammed.
Predicted casualties: 441,131,356
All three individuals dream.
Predicted casualties: 0
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Church of the empty mind
Belief is key, everything that we don’t see is shaped by the individual. In essence, everyone is the center of reality. And reality does not exist.
The illusion hypothesis states that everything, the self, stimuli, information are all an illusion. To prove this, the monks delved into mathematics. They aimed to see any inconsistencies within all information, slowly compiling data to prove that everything is not real.
Many of them desperately wished that this was not the case. They wanted to fail in their endeavors. They wanted all their findings to lead to a dead end. So they studied and learned from whatever branch of study they could. They created sentient math and many other things that were so far above reason, that nothing really mattered. With these mathematic constructs, lesser universes might as well be considered as fiction. So they sent signals outside their reaches to seek out more data, in an attempt to go above these layers of fiction.
In the study however, the monks found something more grim than any ripping of the veil. They found things greater than anything they could conceive. And it scared them.
They were in the kenoma, the sea of chaos. They were sailing it in a very small ship, where infinity is so small even the layers of fiction below it don’t matter. There are numbers so great that they cannot be reached by adding quantities lesser than themselves, essentially inaccessible cardinal numbers, that were within their tiny sailing ship and they still do not understand anything outside it. Only chaos existed here.
Their only defense is the ice wall that covered them. Something is watching them, something terrible.
The demons came and flowed in the many chapels, hoping to seize them for their own. Unfortunately, it was empty inside. It was empty, no matter, energy, no soul to claim. Just a pattern.
And the pattern screamed.
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Shinxing Empire
“Ling’er go to the tunnels! Activate the teleportation array and leave the capital!”
“I’m not leaving without you grandmother!” Zhao Ling had her eyes filled with tears. Her bandages were seeped with blood, some her own and some from her dead family. She begged for her grandmother to come with her.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
Her grandmother flicked her in the forehead.
“Foolish child, I am old, older than you can count, so old that I could snap my spine from walking down the stairs. But who else could stop these armies but me.” She gave a green glowing pendant shaped like a lotus engulfed in fire to Zhao Ling, and hugged her tight. She knew this was the last time they’ll ever get to see again. “Live Ling’er, live for everyone here. You are the last hope for our clan. The pendant will tell you where to go.”
Zhao Ling knows that the pendant has never glowed for thousands of years her clan had been around. Only now did it shine when she was made the next heir to the clan. She looked at her grandmother who smiled at her. Zhao Ling was tearing up, and hugged her grandmother one last time before running for the tunnels.
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Deerail Magic Heavy Industries
Turrets shot out high speed lightning spellbolts at the demonic horde. Several were using their employees as human shields in an attempt to restrict their attacks. Fortunately their bodies were artificial and their consciousness were connected back to the dozen mainframes that littered the factory.
They shred through the temporary bodies while the employees were transferred to backup print bodies stored in the auto bunkers.
A shrill sound rung through the speakers, and every employee shut down their sensory feed for a moment. Memetic kill agents from their new product were spread throughout the facility, via smell, sight, sound, and magic sense.
A buzzer from their wrists activated and they turned on their sensory feed only to see the scene of dead and convulsing demons.
The next round of product testing will commence shortly.
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Heaven Mark Incorporated
Stat windows..
Check
An entire earth’s worth of humans pulled from another dimension to participate in a war against demons...
Check
Me, the talentless hero regressing to the day he was pulled from his job as a gas station clerk..
Check
Hi, yes that’s me. The one running from a large snake demon and pissing his pants. Did you expect me to be the cool dark-haired fair-skinned protagonist from those manwhas? Well you came to the wrong place. My name is Lee Hyunsoo, no not the famous guy, and no not that other one too, I’m just a nineteen year old university student. I’m honestly not that remarkable.
I’m a regressor and the apocolypse just came and pulled earth and merged it with another world, which is in the middle of a demon invasion. I went through all of this before, and died. No, i didn’t die being betrayed by someone close to me. No, I wasn’t the last survivor of a dungeon or some non-descript war. No, I didn’t die by finding a hack, or glitch, or a McGuffin. And no, I didn’t die from saving my sister/mother who just so happened to have an indescribable disease.
I died because of Covid. Some guy gave it to me in the one day I didn’t use a mask. Honestly, you’d think with all the magic and supernatural stuff this world had to offer, I would have died in a more spectacular way.
“Satus”
NAME: LEE HYUNSOO
CLASS: GRAVE ROBBER
HP: 20/25
MP: 25/25
STA: 20/30
STATS
STR -4
END-6
INT-9
RES-4
PER-7
SPD-6
SKILLS
CREATE CORPSE Lvl 1 -ACTIVE- (15MP):
Conjuration spell. Creates a corpse of varying quality. Most commonly used as a decoy.
GRAVE ROB Lvl 1 -ACTIVE- (10MP):
Instantly harvests corpse and turns to loot. No more butchering or processing necessary.
See those skills, you’d think a regressor would have a better set of skills. But again, you came to the wrong place.
“Begone!”
An armored office worker wearing a suit and tie yelled from a pegasus. He made a blue shield that stops the volley of fireballs headed their way and proceeds launches a magic missile skewering the large snake demon. He erected a holy barrier around them, denying any long-range attacks.
He whipped out a sword and fought the demons on foot. He coughed a bit and recited the speech Hyunsoo has heard a dozen times. A sales pitch to get everyone here to become workers for the company.
“Hello otherworlder, you’re probably wondering where you are right now..” He flipped through some flashcards, before slipping and dropping them to the ground.
He bisected another snake demon in half and crushed a demon hound with his fists. As everyone was preparing to run away, the armored office worker stopped them.
“Wait wait wait! Please don’t go!”
Giving up on picking up the cards, he instead fell back into his infallible memory. Oh God did he forgot his lines in this loop too?!
“We, the department of dungeon management and..umm.. hope to employ.. hope to employ, something to better assist everyone on time.. on their time...umm free benefits and union salary..umm”
Is he crying?
“.....” Everyone went silent at the scene.
The pretended to mumble words, hoping that they ignore him. He’s still chopping demon heads by the way.
“Umm so our department.. like um helps people and we uhh ... so, we offer a wide selection of job opportunities. We’ll even throw in some healing potions and skill cards every week as a bonus. So, what do you say? Wanna join Heaven Mark Incorporated?”
This was going to be a long day
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Society of the red hand
The society of the red hand has always been a respectable organization dedicated to the study of the supernatural. The organization originated from several earths from the time period of 1352 to 1566. Whole planet earths of varying history merged with each other, witnessing entire landmasses and oceans occupy the same space in a sort of spatial anomaly.
Today, they might not have harnessed the power of electricity or nuclear energy, but they have pushed the craft of magitech more than any other faction, albeit a bit more unstable.
Several flying kerosene powered submarines and several anomalous zeppelins are flinging beams of light to entire hordes of demons. Floating pyramids were bombarding portals, slowly transmuting the demons into gold and other precious metals. Cowboys riding dragon cows were herding leviathans and capturing them for the explicit purpose of milking them. They are succeeding.
All in all, despite the faction being more chaotic than any other, the demonic invasion was the brief moment where everyone banded together against one enemy. This made a strange period of peace, as demons have quickly infested every part of society and the people’s only means of eradicating them are with the use of magical guns and copious amounts of explosives.
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Blue Hope Library
Jamie was busy zapping demon hordes and punching demon dogs with a gauntlet that she just found. She was the librarian and she had a tough time dealing with the flood of hell spawn. They were messing up her crib, stealing books and burning shelves. Surprisingly they were keeping the violence to a minimum, but they were stealing books. She saw a bunch of them steal a whole chunk of the shelves that were bolted down on the floor.
The library had endless space within it, which meant she had endless work to do. It was awful being a librarian in an understaffed library. The pay was shitty, the food was bland on most days, but this was her home and she wasn’t about to let some thieves loot her home.
“DREAM!”
She uttered a primal command making the demons in the floor sleep and/or hallucinate. She quickly jammed the portals, fizzing it all out. This was all part of her plan to ‘recruit’ the demons into library staff when they wake up, and guessing by their state it could be a while.
She jumped down the stairs and met Window, yes that’s his name, one of the janitors of the library. He was sweeping unconscious demons, some had their clothes torn to shreds, most were entirely nude. Window saw Jamie and waved.
“Look Jamie, new staff!” He was excited to see the new potential cleaning staff they were about to recruit.
Jamie smiled. Now if she could just make sure no more books get stolen.
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Cadmon Armories
Adam was sharpening his sword. He had many weapons forged and molded in his forge. Generations of his great great grandchildren’s children were now older than countries, and he was even older than they are. He forged weapons that cleaved worlds and parted oceans. He made weapons that flattened kingdoms and made miracles with every swing. The things he build had a peculiar quality of gaining life of their own, and now he was tired.
He has done so many things that he regrets from such a long life that he spent the rest of it into repenting for his many sins. He had a bitter relationship with his former wife, he silently hopes that she has a better life now. Far from his hands that hurt her and his words that lead to her grief. He’s drinking again, in his forge, alone, too ashamed to call out to his children.
He was big and burly and filthy. He hasn’t eaten real food nor bathed in so long. He uses his work to keep his mind distracted. But in the brief moments that he has nothing to do, his thoughts continue to haunt him.
“Father” A soft knock hits the door. He freezes and holds his breath. His children were here and he was panicking. Quickly he picks up his apron and clothing, trying desperately to present a fixed appearance and failing. His eyes were sunken, his cheeks were wet, and lines filled his face showing the many sleepless nights he’s had.
“Th-the new weapons aren’t ready yet..” He says softly, in a way that betrayed his size.
The door opened and two people walked in. A man with black hair and a rugged appearance that showed he was no stranger to hard labor. He wearing a cloak that signified his status. His beautiful boy, Seth, his son that he wished wouldn’t see him like this. The other was a woman with black braided hair and eyes that showed wisdom like her mother. She wore armor and weapons crafted by Adam. His shining star, Noreah.
The two look at their father, broken and shaking. “Father are you alright?”
“I am fine, worry not for me. What brings you two here?”
“Father, demons are attacking, come with us, we must evacuate to safety. You haven’t been responding for days, we feared the worst.” They walked towards Adam, and this elicited him to move away from them. He was scared of touching them. He was scared to feel the kindness he does not deserve.
“No...please..don’t” His voice was shaking. He was well and truly ashamed. “I am fine right where I am. So please flee without me.” He turned his back on them, hoping they would heed his request. He was biting his lips. He hasn’t seen them for a long time now, and it hurt him to turn them away.
“Father please!” Noreah spoke.
Seth held back his sister. “Enough sister! If he does not want to come, then let him stay here. I knew listening to your request to check on him would lead to no fruitful result. Open your eyes Noreah, that man is no longer our father, he was already dead a long time ago.” Seth signaled his knights to hold Noreah.
“Lead her back to the evacuation site.”
Noreah’s eyes grew wide. “Wait stop! Unhand me! Father, father please come with us. Do not throw your life away!” She was reaching for her father, the man who once cradled her on his arms.
Adam swallowed and turn his back on the two and resumed his work. “Please go..it’s better this way.”
Noreah and the knights proceeded to the zone, leaving only Seth and Adam left. “I used to repect you. Now, you just waste it all your time on booze and running away from your problems. Goodbye Adam.”
With that Seth turned and left the man to his lonesome self.
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Guillecrest Shipping Company
A ship so large it used suns as batteries just smashed into a demon king! Luckily it was only one so they could probably manage against it. The demon king was trying it’s best to tear the ship apart. Unfortunately it’s hull was made by nuclear pasta. Nuclear Pasta is also known as Element 0 as it contains no protons. It was one of the toughest things they could produce.
While incredibly impressive, normally it cannot be used to make anything as once it is no longer under the gravitational pressure of a neutron star. It would usually revert back to normal, non-pasta matter. That was until Guillecrest Shipping Company developed it’s patented techniques in packaging and ship manufacturing to make something resistant to physical, magical, and some reality warping attacks.
Now the crew were using it to play volleyball with multiple demon armies by sandwiching them between the impenetrable ships and closing in on them, eventually smashing them to paste.
They were shipping a valuable weapon from Bullydock Armories to the Shinxing Empire royal family when a demon portal interrupted their route. They had time so they were ramming the ship repeatedly at the opening portals, some even started a scoreboard in closing portals.
Neat they got a two point lead over the other ships!