The Tale of Felissan

[Felissan]

This is an interactive story. Use votes to decide how the story progresses.

So! You're Felissan! And you're going on an adventure! Heck yeah!

But before you start, you need to really know what you're getting into. First, what exactly are you? That is to say, what would be the best word to fill the phrase "You can't be Felissan without being a ____"?

[Felissan]

For the record, I currently can't advance the story because it's tied. Come on, guys.

[Felissan]

An absolute beast with a sword.

Indeed! You're a wandering swordswoman, said to be one of the finest on the continent. You've been traveling all over the world for years with your sword Arondight, a legendary blade that was gifted to you on one of your first adventures. You're always looking for new challenges to hone your talent, and become a legend that won't be forgotten anytime soon!

Speaking of which, you're on a road to your new quest - you can finally see your destination on the horizon! But where are you going, and why?

[Felissan]

swordslands the sowrdplace that makes swords
u r to receive the legendary blade coolbaled and kill like a hydra or something with it
but you gotta collect the 8 things in the 8 architectural structures to make the key to make the coolbaled or something idk

Ah, right! You really need to stop forgetting important things like that, it's getting annoying.

Coolbaled is the central element of this region's founding myth - it was the final sword made by Mardatin, the Lord of the Forge, before his apotheosis. It was used to vanquish evils thought to be invincible, and rallied the people's souls through tales of its deeds. When Mardatin was ready to leave this plane of existence, he unmade Coolbaled by turning it into a powerless chunk of metal, that could be forged back into its former self by a forge enchanted with eight artifacts. He entrusted those to his followers, commanding them to guard them until the day Coolbaled would be needed again.

Since then, over twenty thousand years have passed, and human civilization was nearly annihilated several times - but the buildings the artifacts were kept in still stand to this day. Mere centuries ago, Mardatin's followers have once again reclaimed the Forge Palace and made it their nation's capital, but the other sites still stay undefeated. The royal family embedded Mardatin's Heavenly Amethyst into their crown, and pledged to offer it to whoever would enter the palace with the other seven artifacts, as surely that person would be a worthy inheritor of Coolbaled.

The tale of Coolbaled resurfaced throughout the world when the hydra Jhenurohs started its rampage through the Swordslands, destroying cities in its wake. Indeed, it was found out that an old prophecy had foreseen its rise, and told that this very sword would be the weapon that would defeat it. Adventurers flocked to the Swordslands on their quest to fulfill the prophecy and earn Coolbaled, but not a single one has succeeded so far. Will you be the one to change this?

Of course you will. Duh! This is far from the first time you've dealt with quests of this magnitude. This world is overcrowded with deities, as people ascend to godhood every other day or something. All that backstory may make it sound like the stuff of legends, but you know what else is the stuff of legends? You are.

Anyway! After gathering some info in town, you've made yourself a map of the artifact sites, planning to go through them one by one, starting with the crater of Mount Dalorick. It is where the Last Leaf of the Ancient Tree is kept, and according to unsuccessful adventurers, it's guarded by a demigod that tested them to see if they were worthy of Coolbaled. And that's where you are now. You enter a shrine on a ridge in the crater, and find yourself in a dark room with an old man standing in the middle. He seems to be waiting for you to do something first before he'll talk to you.

[Felissan]

do an epic swords trick like with an apple

You start juggling with Arondight. You're pretty damn proud of how you're able to make it roll on your entire arm without cutting yourself! But that guy isn't, apparently. If you had to put the look in his eyes into words, it would be along the lines of "You want to be proven worthy of our most precious treasure, and

this

is how you do it?"

In hindsight, you're really glad you didn't eat Arondight at the end of your tricks.

[Felissan]

This thread got roughly 15 views since the last post, and yet nobody has answered. There's no reason not to suggest an action or vote on an existing one - unless you don't want the thread in your egosearch at any cost, that is. Your input is what makes the story live, and we can't go on without it!

[Felissan]

insult his mother

"Your mother is so fat, she, uh... she can't g-"

The old man sighs. "Sorry to interrupt you in what I believe could have been a fascinating fact, but it's nothing more than a mere depiction from her worshipers, as is often the case with any being associated with abundance."

"Now that the silence has been so eloquently broken, I take it you've come here to be tested in hopes of being Coolbaled's next wielder. And your performance so far would leave a bit to be desired... If I was the one to test you, that is. Fortunately, there's someone else here with us who can speak much more about you than I ever will..."

Seeing the confused look on your face, he points to your hip...? You glance at it to see if there's something weird with it, but nothing's changed with it since you've entered the shrine.

"Your sword." Oh! Right. Wait, your sword? "I take it you've never spoken to a sword before? It's not as complicated as it sounds. You'll just have to place it on this pedestal, and I'll handle the rest myself. Of course, you're free to decline, but I don't see how you could earn Coolbaled otherwise..."

He slowly walks to the back of the room, to take his place behind the pedestal he mentioned. It's so far away from the entrance, the darkness almost entirely hides him now.

Do you trust him?

[Felissan]

yeah sure fam

You draw Arondight from its sheath, and put it down on the pedestal. The old man places one hand on the hilt, and one on the blade, before closing his eyes. The sword starts to glow faintly at first, but progressively brighter. As the room gets flooded with the reddish light, it seems to fade away from existence. Soon, there's nothing in sight but you, the man, and a blinding flare. You shield your eyes from it, until it suddenly seems to stop. Where your sword used to be, you see a strange little creature that seems to be in a deep sleep. It's like some sort of fairy, except it really doesn't look like a fairy at all - it's more reptilian in nature, and its wings look like those of a bat rather than a bug. So, a dragon fairy? Why are you thinking about this? It's probably all going to be contradicted in a moment anyway.

"Just as I thought, your sword comes from the Swordslands. But I didn't expect such a precious relic! It's none other than an orphan blade. If the legacy of the First Kingdom of the Blades was still known to this day, kings would surely declare wars over such treasures."

"Orphan blade?"

"Sorry, I keep talking as if our culture wasn't lost to time. After the ascension of the Lord of the Forge, we proudly inherited His mission to create the world's finest swords. But as we quickly found out, a sword made by a mere mortal couldn't ever be considered worthy of our task. So instead of limiting ourselves by remaining as ordinary smiths, we took an approach that defined our civilization for this whole era: we would strike deals with greater beings, where they would grant us a sample of their power, which we would use to create vastly superior weapons for them. One key aspect of those deals is that we were always allowed to keep a single sword from each deal, so they wouldn't all be lost to divine battles - and those are known as orphan swords."

"Ah, so you're telling me Arondight was made with a dragon's power or something?"

"Exactly. To be more precise, its metal was alloyed with a dragon's blood. I was no smith myself, so I couldn't tell you what it means for your sword. But I can assure you that makes it one of the greatest swords ever made by a mortal. Anyway, I should wake it up, so I can hear what it has to say about you."

Arondight slowly gets up on its feet, and flaps its wings, as if it was pulled up by a puppeteer. It then opens its eyes, and looks around.

"Am I... back to the Swordslands? It's been an eternity since someone last talked to me... Oh, hey! Felissan!"

The moment it noticed you were here, it tackled you in what was most likely supposed to be a hug. You didn't expect so much force in something the size of your arm!

"I guess its reaction to finally being able to meet you in person speaks volumes about its opinion of you. But enough of this! Arondight, can you introduce yourself?"

You sigh in relief as the weight on your chest flies back up.

"I am Arondight, orphan of Nelind. I was an heirloom of the Queinnec family until I was lost in the war against the necromancers. Since then, I've been found and lost again by numerous adventurers. In the current cycle, I was donated to a monastery, then lent to Felissan during a quest, and she could keep me as a reward. I've been her only weapon since that day, and now here we are."

"Right. Now tell me, how did your first meeting go? After all, your first impressions of her are more than relevant to this test."

"Of course! But first, we'd probably need to hear the story from her, since I missed most of the context back then."

"Sure! You see, it all started when..."

You can't believe it was confirmed to be a dragon fairy, by the way.

[Felissan]

wiat what are we supposed to input an action for

The prompt is for you to give the backstory for that quest where you got Arondight.

Also in general if I don't give a prompt, you can do pretty much anything as an action.

[Felissan]

She says, "Back in the olden days of yore, I was walking down the dilapidated path of the forest I once called home when a Princess came across me and shouted, 'Miss, I know that you are a fair maiden such as myself but I desperately need your help to attack a evil ogre and I have yet to pass a noble knight in these woods outside of my kingdom.'

'Ha ha ha!' I laugh uproariously 'There are no knights in these woods! The peasantry here like their money too much to tolerate such ruffians! But regardless of any knights, I shall agree to your quest.'

We traveled many a days until we stumbled upon said ogre. The ogre gave a mighty roar. The princess and I took out our weapons. I had a lowly wooden stick since I was of said peasantry and we are not known for our abundance of wealth to afford strong weapons. The princess surprised me by taking out brass knuckles.

The three of us all fought valiantly. Despite this, the evil ogre could not withstand the barrage of attacks from the princess and I. Just as we were about to kill said ogre, it deals a moral wound to the fair princess.

The ogre dies and the princess turns to me, 'thank you for your help, here is your reward.' She began to glow and turned into a most brilliant sword. I picked up the sword and knew that I could no longer be a peasant any more

I began my new life with the sword which shares the same name as the fallen princess,

Arondight."

"That's... nowhere near what I remember. Of course, only seeing the world through dream-like visions is a massive hindrance, and I think I can roughly see how this got deformed into my memories of being given by a monastery... But seriously, taking a human form? You'd think I'd remember that."

The old man seems angry about what he's heard. "It is only natural that these memories are gone. Trying to alter a sword can leave it damaged forever, even moreso when giving it the shape of a living being. There's a reason this was seen as a great crime! But let's get back on topic: Felissan's story makes it sound like she was inspired to start her adventures by a bond she felt with you. When she first held you in her hand, did you feel something similar?"

"Yes! I've met many swordsmen in my life, but I could tell from the start that she was unique among them."

"Then that can only mean one thing. You are linked in what was known as a master's bond. Felissan won't ever wield any sword as well as Arondight, and no swordsman will ever wield Arondight as well as Felissan. The two halves of a master's bond rarely ever meet each other; you two are the first I've seen with my own eyes since the Lord and Coolbaled themselves."

You turn to Arondight for a second to see how it reacts to this. It's dancing in place and crying tears of joy, probably holding screams back to avoid interrupting the conversation.

"I suppose this is in our favor for this test?"

"It sure is. In fact, it's enough on its own for you to pass my trial."

Oh. That was easy.

"But there's something I must warn you about. There was a time when you wouldn't have had a chance at this same test. Coolbaled is a divine weapon, that no mortal is worthy of. But now, it's in grave danger: when the Forge Palace was taken, I had a look at the new royal family. And there's no doubt about it: they're some of the most corrupted people I've seen in my life. It was only a matter of time until they took the artifacts by force and defiled Coolbaled. So I took the seven remaining artifacts and hid them in a place only I know. Now, all you have left to do is to get the Amethyst and leave this land with Coolbaled so it doesn't fall in the wrong hands."

"Wait! What about Jhenurohs? It will keep destroying the Swordslands if nobody can use Coolbaled!"

The old man shrugs. "Then so be it."

Silence falls between you. You plug your ears by instinct, just in time to not be deafened by Arondight letting out a loud scream of joy it's been holding for a while now.

He tells you where to find the artifacts, making sure you don't forget since even writing it down on a map would be too dangerous.

"Do you want to know anything else, young woman?"

[Felissan]

dog idk

You shake your head. The old man nods, and turns to Arondight. "Then it's time to return."

"Very well. Bye, Felissan! It was great to see you!"

Arondight flies up to the old man and lies down in his arms. The light that has been surrounding you the whole times seems to start returning where it came from, into Arondight. Soon, you're back in the darkness of the shrine, and Arondight has turned back into the sword you've always known. As you take it back, the old man has one last thing to say.

"Before you leave, there's something I must offer you. Please, take this necklace. It holds the spell you've just seen me cast, and will let you speak with swords anytime you want.

You take the necklace, and wave him goodbye as you leave the shrine. You climb back out of the crater, after what has felt like an eternity. Seriously, it's not often that you do so much talking! When you reach the edge of the crater, you take one last look back, only to see that the shrine had vanished while you had your back turned.

From here, you have an excellent view on the Swordslands. It really does look the exact same as on your map, which you take one more look at to decide where you're going now, pondering your options.

[Felissan]

the shopping mall of underworld treasures

You take a moment to try spotting the mall on your map, only to eventually remember it only exists in your imagination. And you're already focused on your current quest anyway.

[Felissan]

Amethyst Cave.

They weren't very good at hiding the locations of the jewels when they named the places.

After getting baited by that one landmark with a misleading name for one too many times, you come to the conclusion that maybe you're not in a good state to think right now. You pull out a blank scroll in hopes that it will help sort your thoughts about your quest. After a while, you end up with a short and simple summary of it.

Your goal is to get Coolbaled forged. For this, you need both the seven hidden artifacts, which are hidden in one spot only you know of, and the eighth, Mardatin's Heavenly Amethyst, which is held by the royal family, who will give it to you if you show them the other artifacts. However, you were warned that they're evil and probably want Coolbaled to be theirs at any cost.

Thinking is hard! But now you think you'll come to a coherent conclusion, that isn't caused by a coincidentally named place.

[Felissan]

go and murder all of them

You set off to the Forge Palace. There's one easy way to make sure the royal family doesn't get its hands on Coolbaled!

As you arrive, you tell the guards that you demand an audience with the king to talk about Coolbaled. After a bit of waiting, you're escorted by a group of royal guards through the labyrinthine hallways of the palace. You can't help but wonder how much of this sprawling structure is still unexplored to this day.

At the end of what felt like an eternity, you end up in the throne room. The king is waiting for you, sitting in his throne. "Greetings, adventurer. I take it that since you bothered to meet Us, you must have some new insight on the quest for Coolbaled. Did you-"

You interrupt him by drawing your sword and running toward him. You would have killed him on the spot if you weren't stopped by a sword pointed right at you. You have no idea how you could possibly momentarily forget the existence of the guards. Now that they have your attention again, you see them circling you. You feel like you might have overestimated yourself a bit for a second.

"Drop your weapon!" a guard says. Of course, you have no intention to do this. Instead...

[Felissan]

Whistling for backup, nobody adventures alone.

You whistle, and wait for a response. Some of the guards keep an eye on the door, but not enough for you to get away. But nobody ends up coming in. Which leaves a couple possibilities: either Alexei got lost in the palace from trying to not get noticed, or he didn't manage to get in at all because of the security, or you forgot to tell him to come here entirely. As you ponder this, you feel a sudden pain from your shoulder, and see a sword's tip sticking out of it. You collapse, and look up at the guards. They make some really funny confused faces as they see you fade away. That almost makes it worth it every single time!

---

"And that's all the progress we've got so far. We're getting ever closer to completion, but we're stuck again until we get some more insight from Her Majesty's research."

"I see... But do you still not know what Her Majesty intends to do with the spell once it's complete, Professor?"

"I'm really sorry, my lord, but she hasn't told anyone on the team a single detail about its purpose. We only know the functions of the limited sections we work on. They each feel so disconnected, we're simply not able to piece it out from what little we know."

"I'm surprised she trusted you with such a complex project, but I'm glad to see you're always delivering all the effort you can despite the difficulty."

You're cut just before you can say goodbye by an ineffable feeling, that is so familiar by now that you immediately know what happened. She has returned.

"Professor, I'll have to leave you. The intruder has come back."

"Ah! Thankfully we were done here anyway. Godspeed, Lord Felissan!"

You exit to a balcony and look at the horizon. The Tower of Light is too far away to be seen from here, but you still have to get there as soon as you can to send the intruder back where she came from. Time to get moving!

[Felissan]

Speak to Arondight, ask how it's feeling and for advice for direction

Speak to... Arondight? You don't know anyone named Arondight. The name does ring a bell though, come to think of it...

Yes! You remember. One of the only times you tried talking to the intruder before dispatching her, she did mention this name, but you have no idea who it's supposed to be. You'll probably never know, since now she attacks you on sight and ignores any attempt from you to figure things out about her homeworld.

Speaking of her, you really need to go to the Tower of Light before she exits it.

[Felissan]

Hmm, gear up and move to the Tower of Light

You rush to your private quarters and have a quick look at the available equipment. Unlike the capital, this keep misses some items that would perfectly fit the situation's urgency. You can still put together some gear that can make for a good backup, with a bit of creativity: a spatiomancy staff, a focus-oriented sight mask, and wave-amplifying gloves, along with more "mundane" elite mage equipment.

Once you're done putting everything on, you open your window and stand on its edge. You cast an interfaced space distortion spell tied to your body, powered by a focus you create inside your heart, and prepare the unexpectedly useful for once Xarion's Wings spell to be instantly deployed when it's needed. Finally, you start drawing large amounts of energy from the castle's reserves for an artillery launch spell. Professor Rostand probably won't be mad about this last part.

Probably

.

Mere minutes later, you've landed a third of the way across the continent. It turns out that gliding is actually a much better method for magic-assisted travel than people give it credit for, though teleportation makes it obsolete in most cases. You've managed to aim your landing to be within walking distance of the Tower, though you could probably have done better if you weren't distracted by thoughts of astronomers panicking at the sight of what could seem like an unpredicted celestial event. But it doesn't matter, since you're able to reach the Tower fast enough that it doesn't make a large difference.

The Tower of Light is one of the greatest mysteries of this land. It predates all known civilizations by unknown amounts of time, and is used as a gateway to this world by a mythical being commonly called "the intruder". She is seemingly immortal, as any attempt to kill her appears to only send her back where she came from, to return some other day. Her intentions still aren't known to this day, so the top floor of the tower was secured with a binding spell that slows her down in her attempts to enter our world, buying some time until someone comes to deal with her. And most of the time, this someone is you.

As you finish climbing the stairs to the top floor, you see the barrier flickering. Without wasting another moment, you dive inside to confront the intruder. She stops swinging her sword at the barrier to ready herself for a fight and stare at you. You return the stare, and prepare yourself to cast at any moment. Spatiomancy is almost never used as a combat discipline, and you're up against a formidable swordswoman. This should be an interesting battle.

[Felissan]

Fight the swordswoman

You decide to focus on the fight and not get carried away by complex spells. You start with one of the first spells a combat magic student learns in their training: Dual Elemental Blades. It's a classic for a good reason: it is simple enough to barely require any concentration to keep it running, and it is trivial to adapt to any school of magic, and yet it can be a major threat in close quarters. As you cast it, two thin space rifts form as extensions of your forearms. These may be a bit unwieldy, but they would cut through the intruder's light armor like a hot knife through butter.

She takes this as a cue that the battle has begun. She immediately approaches you, cautiously trying to force you into an uncomfortable position to create an opening. You manage to keep a good distance from her for a while, but it's obvious that as long as this remains a straightforward sword fight, you stand no chance at beating her with your inferior swordplay. She eventually manages to get you with your back against the barrier, in what would normally spell defeat for you. But as she must have suspected, you were merely buying time until you could finish mentally preparing your second spell: Phase Divergence.

This is easily the most influential spatiomancy spell across all fields of magic. It appears to split an object into multiple copies at first glance, but it's really more complex than that: it is still only one object, that isn't bound to a single position in space anymore, instead existing in multiple locations at the same time. It is almost always used as an engineering component of complex spells, with nearly endless ramifications for its applications, but some wizards have another, much more exotic use for it - casting it on themselves, to gain the ability to effectively control multiple selves. With some experience, it becomes second nature to move these separate "bodies" near-independently through basic interactions between them.

With that, you have now broken the symmetry of the fight in your favor. Applying pressure from two locations at once allows you to take control of the flow of the fight, and you end up flanking her. You lunge forward for what appears to be the final bout, as there's no possible way for the intruder to avoid attacks from two directions at once. But as you swing your rift blade at her, she parries the blow from one of your selves, and suddenly a blinding green light flashes from her sword as it collides with yours. As the light settles down, it becomes obvious what happened. Her sword's latent powers allowed it to collapse your space rift on contact. Drat. Seriously, half of the reason she's so dangerous is the sword alone. Now you're back to square one without a weapon. You'll need to get more creative now.

[Felissan]

I'd appreciate a tie-breaker. But anyway, thanks to both of you for not just inputting "vanilla" prompts!

[Felissan]

Compliment her swordplay

"Well done. This battle may be far from over, but your outstanding skill with a sword allows you to stand up to me quite well. You'd probably be my peer in a fight if you were able to channel your sword's draconic powers and shape them to your will."

Over the years, you've developed a pretty accurate ability to tell what people are thinking from the way they're looking at you. Right now, you're pretty sure the intruder is getting ready to defend herself because she misled herself into thinking that what you've just said was some sort of trick. But you really meant it! To her credit, it did give you a short break from fighting, and let you come up with a better plan for this fight. Which is...