New Premium Items: Celestial Seer!
Posted on September 05, 2024Well. Never mind. I won’t keep waiting.
Pythia: Awww, Chrysa… But Zephyr told us that she’d help with this project! She promisssed!
And yet, she’s flaked out - again. I haven’t seen her this flighty and frenetic since we were acolytes…
Little wonder. She’s doing badly. All of my fellow Mystics are.
Pythia: What? What do you mean?
Hm. I suppose the three of them have been successfully concealing their inner turmoil from you, as well as their friends in other Remnants. But it takes quite a bit to fool an oracle of Autumn.
Pythia: Hold up! Is THAT why you’ve been preparing so many extra offerings for this prophecy about the Gods – wait, no, I mean, about the – WAIT, I mean, YES, they’re still Gods, obviousssly, but they’re also…
“Thaumaticians.”
The Golden Colosseum certainly was due for a wake-up call. Frankly, I’m amazed our myths have lasted this long. Centuries of conviction on the battlefield. Telling every doomed Remnant that we had all the answers. Leaving those of us who doubted to fend for ourselves.
As Mystics, it’s our job to keep the Remnant running, or people start dying. The Snarls are only too happy to exploit a crisis of faith. But the revelations about the Golden Age have been coming too quickly. The news is too much to digest. The stakes are too high.
And so Zephyr is dashing about from panicking worshippers to anxious acolytes, pulled in far too many directions at once – and too filled with restless energy to admit she’s overbooked.
Which is still better than Valeria. Who, naturally, is doubling down. I’ve never been fond of her overenthusiastic devotion, but now? It’s hard to have a conversation that doesn’t veer into zealotry…
In contrast, Kosmas has taken the new information to heart. Too much so. I’ve certainly always been committed to uncovering the truth of the Gods, but we have only so much information. Rereading the same reports over and over won’t reveal anything new. It will keep him awake at night, though…
Pythia: …And?
And? I’m not sure how Gallus and Quintina have reacted. We rarely interact -
Pythia: No! What about YOU, Chrysa? Aren’t you going to talk about how this is affecting YOU?
It isn’t. Obviously. I’ve been a committed atheist for years. Hints that our Gods may have merely been a collective of power-hungry mortals? Hardly a surprise. They’re certainly disrespectful enough of my time, interrupting me constantly with their prophecies.
…Although. There has been something strange and different about my prophecies lately. And that is unsettling me.
I keep half-hearing prophecy snippets, far weaker and more distant than they should be. But when I open my transformation to them, I don’t channel the new messages in a trance the way that I should. None of the usual sleeptalking.
Pythia: More like sleepWALKING! Yesterday I had to heroically sssave you – would you believe that you nearly walked into a tree?
Yes. Waking up with a faceful of leaves was a clue.
Anyway. Today we’re trying a different tactic – a direct reading. I’ve managed to get my hands on three items that will hopefully provide an effective anchor for prophecy. A broken piece of crystal from the Snow Globe’s tomb of the Benefactress. A tiny stolen marble from a strange Cirque Faerial tent that shifts its location. And a small painted card with a strange symbol, found among the artwork in the Gallery Trappings vault.
Pythia: Why those Remnants? Ooh! Because those are the three places that the Lucky Venture helped us find?
Because those are the three places where that rogue AI, Specter, woke Scourges and stole Golden Age information – yes, don’t interrupt, I recall that she targeted the Cosmic Solarium, as well. But that was the home of Specter’s creator. She had no personal reason to visit the others. Only a need for information.
And now that Specter is trying to find the Unmaker and destroy our universe… I’d love to discover more about what she learned.
Hopefully, this ritual will let me wWwWALK THE PATHS, RETRACE THE STEPS, REVEAL THE TRUTHS!
USE OUR KNOWLEDGE, WIELD OUR WISHES, HEED OUR WARNING!
Pythia: Woop! There she goes! Better grab my stylus and jot this down – huh, look at that! The Snow Globe crystal is growing and – YIKES! Shattering into shards, becoming the Tattered Celestial Seer's Crown –
A BLESSED SILENCE WE OFFER YE, O PROPHET OF AUTUMN! TAKE THIS REPRIEVE FROM OUR CACOPHONY OF VOICES! HEAR AT LAST THE FAINTEST REACHING WORDS, THE FAINT AND DYING VOICE! HEAR THAT MESSAGE MOST URGENT: SOON SHALL ALL YE HEROES BE OFFERED A DESPERATE CHOICE!
Pythia: Yikessss…. I don’t like that… Okay, okay, there goes the marble, growing big, too! Aww, and swirling with a bunch of stars and clouds like a Tattered Celestial Seer's Orb!
THROUGH THE ARRANGEMENT OF CONSTELLATIONS, WE SHALL DIVULGE THE TIME WHEN THIS CHOICE MUST BE MADE! FROM THE APEX OF THE CONSTELLATION OF THE LAMP, TO THE WANING OF THE FRESHLY-RISEN CROWN – THAT IS WHEN YE MUST LISTEN! THAT IS WHEN YE MUST CHOOSE!
Pythia: ‘Lamp’… ‘Crown’… Oof, how is anyone supposed to remember when those constellations show up? WOAH, the painted card is now practically the size of a Gallery Trappings portrait! Look at her, framed by that Tattered Celestial Seer's Card!
MUCH OF OUR KNOWLEDGE WAS TORN TO SHREDS, BUT SOON YE SHALL BE OFFERED THE STORIES THAT WERE PRESERVED! SO LONG, SO LONG, THESE WORDS KEPT SAFE… YE CANNOT MISS THIS OPPORTUNITY, NO MATTER WHAT THE COST!
Pythia: …Is she done? OH! Chrysa’s transformation outfit – it’s changing! She’s shifting into some kind of Graveglow Celestial Seer's Shirt and floating Graveglow Celestial Seer's Skirt… with a shining Graveglow Celestial Seer's Belt around her waist like a chain… Are the Gods dressing her up for some kind of fancy occasion, or special event, or…
Wait… The outfit is shifting again? Into an Edgy Celestial Seer's Jacket and Edgy Celestial Seer's Pants-
wWwRetCHed eCHo, DO NnNnNoT DdDdDARe to –
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I CcCcAnnOt –
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wiTHOuT a –
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hHhHEar me –
AAAAAAAA!
Pythia: Chrysa? CHRYSA!!!
AAAAAAAaaaaaaugh… My head… Ugh. Did you get all that down? Give me that tablet – and a snack.
…
Hm.
Hmmm.
So. Some vital but completely nebulous choice is getting offered to us. Typically cryptic. At least “the apex of the constellation of the lamp to the waning of the freshly-risen crown” is obvious enough – that’s September 24th to October 1st. Only a few weeks away…
Gather supplies, Pythia. If we’re going to have any chance of being prepared, I’ll need to spend all the time until then in active meditation and outreach.
In the meantime, let’s tell our friends in Hope to strengthen bonds and make alliances – I think we’re about to need as much help as we can get.
