it's a mingle.

[softlyfalling]

Who: You and 2000 horrible imps
Where: Tokyo-F
When: Day 260

[ yeah this is still happening

go here to catch imps

go here for just weird status effects

remember to log your imp-catching. good luck ]

Comments

[crossmyheartandhope]

What, like. A signed paper...?

[maidenheaven]

It might be, or it might be some sort of item—though in my world, they were sigils on the summoner themself.

[crossmyheartandhope]

What, like - just writing on the skin?

[maidenheaven]

. . . Not exactly writing, uhm. . .

Can I see your hand?

[crossmyheartandhope]

Oh. Uh.

Sure...?

[Holds it out]

[maidenheaven]

[ holding it, and then making just

arcane sigil stroke things on the back of his hand, three in total ]

Like that—it isn't a language or anything, though. It's more like . . . a personal mark?

[crossmyheartandhope]

And that'll be on whoever called the thing?

[maidenheaven]

Well, that's how it is in my world, anyway. I couldn't guarantee that's how these creatures were summoned.

[ letting go of his hand, looking contemplative ]

. . . But a summoning requires a massive amount of energy—a person doesn't have enough magical energy to be able to summon anything by themselves, ordinarily. . . There are a lot of things that are strange about this.

[crossmyheartandhope]

So... if the energy ain't coming from whoever summoned it, where's it coming from?

[maidenheaven]

Well, this is Hell.

[ spreading his hands a bit ]

Magecraft often uses the ambient magical energy, or otherwise using the leylines—that is, the natural currents of magical energies in the earth—but since we're in Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if this place was teeming to the brim with magical energy.

[ then, placing a hand on his own chest ]

Moreover, we're all granted magical abilities ourselves—quite easily, in fact, with no apparent cost to ourselves to use them . . . so it's possible that whatever they've done to us has likewise left us capable of using our own energies, though more likely, we're all connected as terminals to some sort of conduit that allows us to use magic like this easily.

[ hum hum hum ]

Using that as a theory, perhaps the conduit was consequently a catalyst as well, so the summoning went awry . . . ?

[crossmyheartandhope]

What's a conduit?

[maidenheaven]

Ah—uhm. . .

[ hm

thinking about it for a moment ]

Consider a battery, and consider . . . an electrical appliance. The electrical appliance must connect to the battery in order to work. A conduit would be the wire, or the bridge connecting between the appliance and the energy source.

Essentially, it's possible that we are all appliances, connected by some sort of conduit that connects us to an energy source.

[crossmyheartandhope]

So you're saying we're, like... pulling energy from somewhere else, but something went weird with the conenction?

[maidenheaven]

It isn't that something went weird with our connection—it's that something went weird with the summoning's connection because of our connection.

[crossmyheartandhope]

I think I get it. So, because we're hooked into whatever this other energy is that we're pulling all our powers from, what woulda normally been okay with some kinda summon spell got all messed up. That it?

[maidenheaven]

It's possible—probable, in fact, if there was no catalyst for the summoning.

[crossmyheartandhope]

What kinda thing works as a catalyst for a summoning?

[maidenheaven]

Anything you can think of—the catalyst depends on what you're looking to summon. It might be a sacrifice, or it might be an object that once belonged to the summoned being, or it might be something that's associated with the being.

If there isn't a catalyst, then the summoner might be used as one. Hence—if there wasn't a catalyst, then the conduit might have affected the summoning . . .

It's also possible that any catalyst here is already contaminated—nothing we have here wasn't in some way touched by Hell, including ourselves.

[crossmyheartandhope]

So how do we get rid of em?

[maidenheaven]

I don't know. Like I said, there are a lot of things unusual about our situation, and I don't know enough about the summoning or the creatures to be able to guess . . .

[ hum ]

Though, my best guess is that the Honmachi Sakura Park will have some sort of key to getting rid of them.

[crossmyheartandhope]

What, like push em all back into the place where...?

[maidenheaven]

There's no harm in trying, is there?

[crossmyheartandhope]

Naw.... guess not.

[A beat, and then another]

...wanna give it a shot?

[maidenheaven]

. . . Absolutely, if you have the time!

[crossmyheartandhope]

Let's do it, dude. I got all day.