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With This Ring (Young Justice SI) (Thread Fourteen)

Discussion in 'Creative Writing' started by Mr Zoat, Jan 27, 2019.

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  1. Darko

    Darko Connoisseur.

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    Possibly, or this was just the quickest way to get there and unfortunately there were bodies there.

    And even if they did grow up the mortals worshipping them may have inflated their egos.

    Or disable them or Brand them.

    Going with them is his best bet of finding a cure for his patients.

    He could have also been saying 'Dominion', like trying to figure out what dominion the god who did that has.

    Don't underestimate her.

    The lady was a Titan, so she was a force of nature.

    In mythology Hera is a goddess of marriage, not a subject you'd view as being that powerful compared to say thunder, death, the sea, the sun etc., but she was able to kill giants.

    Rhea for all we know was the weakest Titan, but she was still a Titan.

    The least powerful nuke can still do a lot of damage.
     
    Last edited: Oct 18, 2021
  2. Vaermina

    Vaermina Well worn.

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    You literally can't win... Even if you kill Paragon he will just re-spawn and keep coming back forever because there's no actual way to kill him...
     
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  3. moralrelativity

    moralrelativity Recovering pendant.

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    I get it, they're in control of this portion of the surface. The second one seems largely redundant.
     
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  4. Mr Zoat

    Mr Zoat Dedicated ragequitter

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    Thank you, corrected.
     
  5. NightmareWarden

    NightmareWarden Versed in the lewd.

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    Dang, I was hoping we’d get to see Hyperion and a Sun-Eater taunt each other. Now Hyperion is spending time with Hypnos, I guess. Maybe Grayven (Renegade-Paul) will bring one to Celestia at some point! He finds the best gifts.
     
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  6. Darko

    Darko Connoisseur.

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    Zoat, either change this to 11th September or add 12th September over the link in the spoiler box.
     
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  7. Mr Zoat

    Mr Zoat Dedicated ragequitter

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    Thank you, corrected.
     
  8. Signaller

    Signaller Know what you're doing yet?

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    What are the rules about which concepts New Gods can have as their domains? Is it any concept or sub-concept, or just single-word ideas and related themes?
     
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  9. Khornelius

    Khornelius Overlord of the Underworld

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    You know last chapter I meant to make a comment about, not believing someone is dead unless you see their body. But apparently the rumors of the gods being dead were not exaggerated.
    Now we just have to see how Sparta will act moving forward. If she’s power hungry, she’ll probably try to steal the powers of Paul and the other gods that he brought with him.
     
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  10. Stsword

    Stsword Versed in the lewd.

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    They might be revivable as long as the seeds are intact. The first one was just left comatose after having their seed taken, after all
     
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  11. Michael Vonica

    Michael Vonica Know what you're doing yet?

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    Is Sparta breaking rule 3 on the evil overlord list?
     
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  12. Zig

    Zig Not too sore, are you?

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    The rules are more of what you would call guidelines
     
  13. Gantradies

    Gantradies Not too sore, are you?

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    Looks like a Premature villain gloat to me-
    Wanna take bets on if she claims to now be “invincible”, or words to that effect?

    … $2 that within 20 minutes she’ll be screaming at her guards to “seize him, SEIZE HIM!”
     
  14. Sockmonkey

    Sockmonkey I trust you know where the happy button is?

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    I have to agree on this point. It's one thing when it's characters most of us are at least passingly familiar with, but we haven't gotten to know these guys well enough to care about them.
    Now with ones like Xor, most of us didn't know anything about him at first but we had enough one-on-one time to get to know him as a person before going on his quest for justice, which gave us further insights into him as a character. Love him or hate him, we know the guy now.
     
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  15. BlueMangoAdea

    BlueMangoAdea Alive. For now.

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    I personally just don’t tire of OL’s adventure around the universe, but I suppose I can’t speak for everyone.
     
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  16. Doccer

    Doccer I trust you know where the happy button is?

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    $5 on on demanding OL to kneel.
    $6 on just taking his ring.
    $10 OL gets her to gloat her evil plan.
    $50 she massively misunderstood how much she be getting out of her Apocalypse deal and thought she could nail them too.
     
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  17. Threadmarks: Sungate (part 35)
    Mr Zoat

    Mr Zoat Dedicated ragequitter

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    11th September 2012
    20:56 GMT


    Sparta herself isn't actually all that physically imposing. About one metre eighty tall and… Moderately muscular. Clearly fit, but thin like a marathon runner rather than bulky like a weight lifter. Nothing particularly special about her armour: standard New God gear with the addition of a plumed helmet.

    But…

    I used to read a comic called Erfworld. It was set inside a wargame, where a selection of 'divine' artefacts were drawn as computer generated 3D models while the rest of the art was 2D.

    That's what looking at her feels like. And I don’t know… Why.

    Athyns freezes as he sees his gods in their weakened… No, dead, state. Some of them are wounded -Thia and Oceanus in particular look like they've been in the wars- but the others are more like Phoebe. Some sort of… Assassination? None of the other Ascendants in attendance appear to be equipped with tools of assassination, and I'm not seeing any Mother Boxes.

    "Lady Sparta. Or.. is there some other form of address you prefer?"

    "Sparta. Just Sparta." Complete In Myself.

    "Sparta, then. I am the Illustres of the Orange Lantern Corps. The… Late owners of the facility invited me here to disarm certain devices left here by the previous-."

    "I know why you are here. You are to remove the Maltusian weapons from beneath the planet's surface."

    "True enough."

    "They are now mine." What I Have I Will Hold.

    I shrug. "We've been without them for a billion years. I'm sure we can cope. May I enquire what you intend to-?"

    "No, you may not. And you, Athyns."

    "S-parta."

    "You will command the garrison to stand down." Kneel Before Your Goddess!

    "Why would I do that?" "No."

    All of the Ascendants in the room other than Sparta reach for their weapons.

    "Perhaps if we could go over your political objectives, that would help us-."

    "Because your gods are dead, and if you do not then your soldiers and you will join them." Kneel To ME!

    "I am willing to negotiate a surrender. I will not kneel to you. Unlike these-" he looks around at the attendant New Gods. "-children, I remember the limits of the responsibilities Rhea gave y-."

    "You WILL NOT SPEAK HER NAME TO ME!"

    Flames flare along her outside, darkness pools at her feet and I feel… Telepathic-. No, mental magic pressure even through my defences. Okay, link my tattoos to the area between my body and my armour…

    Ah. A little better.

    So, she can use the power from the Seeds… At least a little. Or… Okay, she knew Rhea, or… Was working directly under Rhea when whatever happened happened. That might explain how she had access to ships and wasn't directly involved…

    Why hasn't she disintegrated the gods' bodies?

    I mean, she clearly hates them. They haven't had their wounds cleaned up in the way that I -as someone familiar with Hellenistic funeral rites- would expect if they were going to be respectfully interred. They're on display, but I doubt that she arranged them like this for my benefit. She was doing this anyway.

    If Rhea was planning on doing something with Karrakan, why didn't she do it earlier? Was she just letting it develop by itself? No. She was having sex with the locals and allowing her descendants to have the run of the place. That's not something someone trying to stay above it all would do.

    Did she want to rule personally? No, nothing in the stories the Amazons tell of her suggests that she had any desire for personal political power. She is considered admirable for defying Cronus to protect Zeus and causing the events leading to his overthrow, but she turned Zeus down when he wanted to make her his mother-wife and queen. And I haven't heard anything about Rhea being a temporal ruler.

    Okay. The Seeds are fragments of her siblings. Which might well mean that she couldn't use them, because she has her own titanic magic which wouldn't be compatible with theirs. So-.

    Was the point of the demigods… Was she trying to breed descendants who could use them? Because if so, she appears to have succeeded in Sparta.

    But she knew Sparta. So… Presumably she knew that. Or didn't care.

    Oh. She didn't just create the gods using the Seeds; they were created specifically to enable their use. If the gods are to be believed, because the demigods were making such a mess that they were required. If they're not… No, the Ascendant side hasn't offered an alternate explanation as to why Rhea created the gods. They just claim that they killed her afterwards. Which is possible, but I'm not seeing a motive.

    But the gods didn't try fixing Karrakan. Instead, they piloted the moon away to start again somewhere else. So it's not just about power. Anyone with access to New God technology can geoform a world without -for example- sun magic or mind magic. It's about political authority. A demonstration of power.

    "I will speak the name of my mistress whenever-."

    "Do you want a power ring?"

    Sparta looks mildly confused as she tears her attention away from squaring up against Athyns.

    "You could probably fix Karrakan a lot easier. Seriously, I reglaciated my planet's poles and cleaned up our oceans in a few weeks. Given how well motivated you are, I'm happy to either give one to you or lend one to you. Heck, I'm even happy to help out myself."

    "You-?" She frowns. "Why?"

    "I find that helping people with their problems makes them favourably inclined towards you. And I am interested in your technology."

    I take the spear out of subspace, point pointing at the floor and orange strands connecting me to its tron lines.

    "New God, right? I haven't really had a chance to use it much before -and I've never really been a spear-man- but this just feels natural. Is this how all your equipment works?"

    "We call ourselves Ascendants."

    "Right, and that helps distinguish you from the people from New Genesis-"

    No particular reaction.

    "-and Apokolips."

    That got a slight intake of breath. Good show.

    "So while I am interested in who your supplier is-"

    I deploy a hologram generator and have it create images of the various New Gods I've met, with particular emphasis on their equipment.

    "-for your equipment, I'm mostly interested in studying it myself rather than acting against them. Are you willing to put me in touch?"
     
    Last edited: Oct 19, 2021
  18. Chojin Patriarch

    Chojin Patriarch Veteran Lurker

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    Some significant bits of Godspeech today...
     
  19. BlueMangoAdea

    BlueMangoAdea Alive. For now.

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    As much as OL puts his foot in his mouth pretty often, he also has many occasions of talking very smoothly, especially when given time to think about what he should say before he actually talks. It's great.
     
  20. Darko

    Darko Connoisseur.

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    'bulky'

    'were drawn'

    They wouldn't have them in the first place, seeing as they're using Apokoliptian equipment.

    Well she's confident.

    The rest of the universe probably can't cope.

    So she can use their power.

    Maybe she wants trophies.

    Of course he tried to do that, of course.

    'Sparta looks'

    Though you used ice tech for that.

    Ohh, Paul.

    Still offering bad guys more power.

    Have you learned nothing?

    Though seeing as this is Apokoliptian tech, geoforming the planet may not result in a paradise but in a hellhole, so Titan magic it is.
     
    Last edited: Oct 19, 2021
  21. Handlewithcare

    Handlewithcare Versed in the lewd.

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    I freely admit I have no idea what is going on.

    The gods abondened the planet so Sparta made a deal with someone from Apokolips to save it?

    Sparta herself killed Rhea for power?

    The gods did?

    Puh
     
  22. BlueMangoAdea

    BlueMangoAdea Alive. For now.

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    I really hope she does not plan on giving them to Apokolips.
     
  23. Darko

    Darko Connoisseur.

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    Well your hopes may be answered, since I'm pretty sure she may give them to Grayven.
     
  24. Dakkan Sall

    Dakkan Sall Random Encounter

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    Well, yet another sign that Sparta's been fibbing. You don't get that angry at the person you're claiming to be avenging.

    And having limits on her responsibilities... and from there presumably her power/authority... It's looking like (at least in part) she wanted to sit with the big kids and got told no.
     
  25. Darko

    Darko Connoisseur.

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    I think she was angry at Athyns for thinking that he knows more about Rhea than she does.
     
  26. Chojin Patriarch

    Chojin Patriarch Veteran Lurker

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    Much as her depiction in the comics showed. I'm impressed, though. No flashy ornamentation to drive home her status, no spikes of villainy, just deadly serious and direct functionality. I suppose her Authority is written into her follower's souls via her Divinity, though, so I guess she feels she has nothing to prove?

    Or many Japanese animated series of the early 2000's, who used CG models for large mechanical things but traditional animation for human characters... So there's quite the uncanny valley about her, eh?

    Perhaps Sparta has some manner of Ascendant with a focus on stealth, and they've gone unnoticed? :p At least Athyns hasn't immediately gone into a battle-rage.

    Hmm. Telling bit of godspeech there. I can't honestly believe that she's not doing this out of some form of ego... Could she be trying to lie to herself, I wonder?

    ...Well, shit. She knows about that? I wonder, who could have told her, hmm?

    To continue the gun analogy I used yesterday: That would be like leaving a loaded pistol with the safety off, in the hands of a toddler. There's no happy ending there...

    Of course, that's assuming she can't work out how to trigger them, much less aim them. Let's hope OL's playing a long game there...

    ...And people were joking about that in thread. Somehow, though, I don't think that'll work on him...

    Yeah, that would be the Divine equivalent of throwing out a double middle fingers, I bet...

    She seems a little desperate. I wonder why. Perhaps she's not as in control of the situation as she seems to think, while Athyns remains... Unconquered.

    Oof, big berserk button there, it seems. Evidently the lady has some issues with the late Titan...

    Much easier to focus, I suppose, when you're not being blasted by all the powers at once...

    ...Huh, that is an interesting question. Could it be that the Seeds remain linked to them, even when the power is being directed to another?

    And, as with the plan in the comics... How many other worlds did she do this with? And what happened to them?

    The joy of being so temporally distant from the time these legends were still sung. So much has been lost to time...

    Or perhaps she saw Sparta as a failed prototype. A Proof of Concept that she had no intention of empowering...

    That kind of goes along with flying around a starship made from a hollowed-out moon... I bet Rhea had planned for the titans to return to Earth and take up rulership from their cousins.

    OL! Read the room! ...Then again, I suspect the two of them were about to go for their weapons and have at it.

    And she clearly wants things intensely enough to be able to make use of one... But, uh, OL? I don't think she'd pass any kind of psychological qualifications...

    ...True, he does do that quite well. Earning those sweet circumstance bonuses to Diplomacy checks...

    Hmm... Wonder how you'd do with a giant sword, I wonder? ...Ooh, imagine a Power Ring fused with New God tech...

    Yes, while I know New Genesis isn't entirely lily-white (Good is not always Nice, after all,) i don't think they'd look too kindly on their tech being used for this.

    ...Whereas those of the dark would. So, either Grayven or one of the Nobility. And I can see it going down well if Darkseid found out. A great deposit of powerful weapons if Sparta succeeds, nothing lost but a few sets of armour and weaponry if she fails.

    And I find myself wondering what the other Ascendant present are thinking...

    Of course OL would turn a tense audience with a conquering goddess into a business deal. Still, I don't see Sparta taking this abrupt change of subject lightly. Bet her first words tomorrow will involve an order to be silent... At least it's clear Melinoë and her cousins aren't here, their presence would have been noted. So there's that...
     
  27. Dakkan Sall

    Dakkan Sall Random Encounter

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    Hmm... yeah, could be. Depends on just that the "limits" she had were I suppose; whether they were just on her authority at the time, or if it affected her actual divine power somehow.
     
  28. BlueMangoAdea

    BlueMangoAdea Alive. For now.

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    He’s not just suggesting a business deal. Remember that Sparta’s followers are unaware of the tech’s true origin. By showing that the tech was not invented by Sparta to the audience, he’s somewhat undermining her. Not sure what his endgame here is, though.
     
  29. Bomaz

    Bomaz Know what you're doing yet?

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    I'm confused, was Sparta secretly Rhea? She seems to become Rhea part way through
     
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  30. Fellow

    Fellow Know what you're doing yet?

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    Oh my goodness! I didn't think you could still read this. I thought the whole thing was taken down by the creators. Thank you, Mr.Zoat! I thought i'd never see this webcomic again.
     
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