Alice stood dead-still within her soul, vacant eyes sitting upon utter nothingness, her back to one of the rough walls therein.
Her mind was still trying to catch up with the missing memories — no, not memories, it was worse than that. The memory was still there, but all emotion and meaning had been stripped out of it, leaving only vacant images and smiles that meant nothing.
This was a thousand times worse than just amnesia.
But, as she wallowed in her own misery, a thought emerged, flickering like a candlestick on a rainy storm; ‘Someone did this to me,’ whispered the seething flame, and the fire grew. The spark within Alice’s eyes returned, if barely. She stood up from her seated position and stepped sideways and out of her own soul, the papers she’d found earlier that had provoked her impromptu breakdown still tightly clutched in her hands.
Methodically, Alice read every single line of text that was still legible and not dissolved into a mess of strange ink and broken paper. After a minute of meticulous searching, she found it. At the bottom of the document and to the right, a name.
‘Nessus.’
The candlestick ignited into a nuclear blaze, Alice’s eyes turning into needlepoint pinpricks. “I’m going to kill you,” she whispered in an almost gentile manner, as if she were soothing someone to sleep and not making a declaration of deadly intent.
There was a shard of blackened emotion coalescing within her heart and, with each heartbeat, the shard sliced into it, reminding her of what she’d lost. Instead of shying away from the emotion, Alice held onto it with all her strength, uncaring of her own psychological torment.
Chest burning with seething hate and armed with a burning need to understand, to know what had happened to her, Alice stepped once again within her soul and stared at the three doors within the pentagonal room and the three objects that floated close to her core.
Without hesitation, she stepped towards the closest one to her left, grabbing the doorknob and both reading the prompt as well as trying to discern the class’ true purpose and feel.
This door was painted a pure shade of swirling carmine and she could almost feel it rattle beneath her grip. The frame appeared to be made of dripping red and rusted barbed wire, and she definitely could hear screams of torment right behind it.
But right before she touched the doorknob, a prompt appeared out of thin air.
[Tiering up.]
The process will replace your skills with improved versions of your previous ones or completely new skills, depending on the synergy and similarities between your previous and selected Class and Profession.
For every even tier, a single Core skill will be awarded. Potency relies on compatibility.
For every odd tier, an extra skill for each Class and Profession will be awarded.
That was kind of a relief if she was being truthful. She honestly expected to be left to the wolves, not a single explanation of how anything worked within sight. Nodding to herself, she finally grabbed the doorknob.
[Agony’s Herald]
Let it out let it out let it out let it out.
Screams of madness and wails of rage, howls of fury and shrieks of despair. You drink it all, you relish in it all, you enjoy it more than anything else.
Shed the frailty of life, and become one with Agony.
Bonuses +5 Vitality, +11 Power, +4 Free per LV.
Alice pointedly stared at the door, almost opening it there and then, but a niggling voice in the back of her head that sounded awfully similar to Marie's started chewing her out. She knew that pumping Power as high as it could go would drive her insane, but the appeal was there. To let oneself drift along the currents of madness, uncaring of anything or anyone, or incapable thereof.
No mental anguish assaulting her senses, no dull memories that felt like a tooth that had rotten off and popped out on its own, leaving a deeply felt absence.
Alice stepped away from the door, reluctance dancing across her visage. At least she’d take a look at the others.
[Chained Horror]
You have touched the divine, however unknowingly. Bask in His presence, and accept his gift. Let fetters of hate dance on the winds of war, for He comes.
Bonuses +6 Vitality, +6 Power, +2 Control, +5 Free per LV.
This door was entirely made out of chains, with some kind of unidentifiable black sludge dripping from each link that vanished before hitting the floor. This time there definitely was something bashing the door from the inside, monstrous howls echoing from beyond the amalgamation of chains accompanied by the clinking of metallic links in a rhythm that could almost be called a funerary march. Alice considered it for a moment, before discarding it. She didn’t want to be tied to a single method of defense and attack, as versatile as her chains had proved themselves to be.
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And all of that was without touching on the incredibly creepy description. She didn’t want to be anyone’s puppet, apparent god or not.
[Haunted Inquisitor]
Something you don’t understand has left its mark on you, and with it, the obsession and yearning for true understanding. Tear away at the facade of obscurity and grasp true understanding, whatever the cost, the method, or whoever stands before you.
Rip it all away, and let the horrors of every truth you uncover wash you ashore oblivion’s coast.
Bonuses +3 Vitality, +4 Power, +4 Control, +5 Will, +5 Free per LV.
This door was strange, in the sense that it seemed to be the most mundane of them all. It was made from an unknown wood that was impossibly gray with stripes of black running all along the grain. Frowning, Alice put her ear to the door and flinched when she heard a cacophony of ghostly whispers just beyond the flimsy-looking door. If she focused a little more she swore that she could start to comprehend them…
Alice shook her head and stared at the Class’s description. The urge to just barge open Agony’s Herald was still there, contained, if barely.
She bit her lip and turned towards the objects floating within her soul’s core. The first one had the appearance of a partitioned cube that kept changing and morphing, like a demented sorcerer’s Rubik’s cube. Almost like with the Inquisitor door, if only she could stare just a bit longer, just a tad deeper, she was sure that she’d be able to uncover its secrets.
[Marked Sleuth]
Something you don’t understand has left its mark on you, and with it, the obsession and yearning for true understanding. Uncover the unknown, banish ignorance regardless of the price, and weep at the beauty of true enlightenment.
Bonuses: +2 Agility, +3 Reaction, +3 Perception, +3 Will, +2 Control, +5 Free per LV.
With a deep breath, Alice stepped towards the next object. This one looked like an old, dusty oil lantern that still somehow held a flickering light within it. The light felt like the last hope at the end of a horrible tunnel full of ghastly horrors, flickering and tiny, but unyielding in its advance.
It appealed to Alice but, at the moment, she wanted something more suited towards discovering the secrets of the Ether itself and not the world around her. She still wanted to explore and see Aethas for all that it had to offer her, but she couldn’t do that while blindly stumbling around her surroundings, not truly understanding anything.
[Deep-Dive Explorer]
You have touched what it truly means to explore the unexplored, and have come into contact with things well beyond your comprehension. This is what it means to be an explorer.
Bonuses: +5 Agility, +5 Reaction, + 2 Perception, +4 Free per LV.
Shaking her head, she discarded it and proceeded towards the next object, this one being an old, dusty tome splattered in faded blood. There were secrets within its pages, lost to the light and the knowledge of everyone. Taking the tome in her hand, Alice felt the weight of a thousand buried and forgotten halls in the palm of her hand, whispering sweet nothings that spoke of glory and lost arts.
Alice dropped the book. The secrets it spoke of rang true, if hollow. There was lost knowledge to be found, to be sure, but she didn’t know what she’d find along dusty and rotten rooms underground, left alone for millennia. No, she wanted, needed concrete knowledge.
[Forgotten Scholar]
You have tangled with the unknown and the forgotten, as well as the forbidden. Go forth, and bring light towards the dark places that plague an ancient world.
Bonuses: +5 Agility, +4 Reaction, + 3 Perception, +5 Free per LV.
Alice nodded to herself as the lost feelings within her memories ached like a phantom limb. Grabbing the cube, Alice stepped towards the unassuming door and opened it without hesitation.
Losing herself to madness sounded well enough on paper, but it wouldn’t let her acquire her objective nor experience this new world.
As hot as the flame of her hatred burned, there was still a flicker of self-preservation within the inferno.
Tiering up. Please stand still.
Alice felt a shift within her soul. The chains above were still there, but they had gained an almost curious sheen to them that mixed with the brutality of their form. The edges and spikes along each link now held a malicious light to them, as if eager to bind, restrain and tear and shred.
The dull rock that her soulspace had been made of shifted, now turning into a smoother, more polished stone with streaks of red and white intertwined all along the surface. With a start, Alice realized that the room was now around a fifth larger than it had been before. The space was still kind of cramped and would’ve been even more claustrophobic if it weren’t for the open ceiling, but at least now she could take a stroll without bumping into anything.
[Acolyte of Pain] → [Haunted Inquisitor]
[1.6 Mindtap] Minor ease of access and use of Psi Ether for broadcasting purposes.→
[2.1 Unholy Seal] Increased ease of use and access of Profane-aligned Ether.
[2.1 Let Them Scream] Your agony is theirs. →
[2.1 Ghastly Conduit] Feast on their torment, ravage their mind.
[Initiate Explorer] → [Marked Sleuth]
[1.4 Wanderlust] — Enhanced ease of travel when navigating unknown terrain. →
[2.1 Unnatural Intuition] The hidden and the unknown hold less sway over you.
[1.3 Northstar] — Enhanced sense of direction and intuition when navigating unknown terrain. →
[2.1 Traumatic Certainty] Paranoia and mania rolled into one, have an affinity for knowing when things will go sideways.
Core skill acquired, synergy detected.
Core skill rewarded. Tiering finalized.
+10 to All characteristics.
Smiling, Alice pored over her gains and new skills, murder in her mind.
She was going to get out of this hole, one way or another.