From being an Abandoned who had rarely left the Hollowed Grounds, to embracing the call of adventure, to dying and being reborn first as an Ascended and then as an Ancient, Maea has gone through quite the amount of changes in her life. One thing remains common, though, in her attempts to find out just where she belongs; she’s always had a craving for knowledge which has brought her to so many places and to meet so many people here in Caido. We can’t wait to see what else is in store for her!
Congratulations, Maea!
Credits
Court of the Fallen was created in October of 2018 by Odd, Honey, and Crooked.
Skinning and hosting by the epically talented Kaons, and functionality fanciness by the coding magic of Neowulf. If you ever see either of them around, make sure to show them some love!
Maea too collected a crate, and chose a Hanging Snake as her test subject. Collecting a spider was nervous work, but the gloves came in handy for her as well, and soon everyone were set up with their own mini-terrarium, and a grim show ahead of them.
And so the experiment proceeded. Talyson, Thalassa and Maea were able to observe how the Voidweaver Spiders hissed and scuttled about and fell upon the only other thing within the crate that they could reach. In a strange reversal of roles it was now the snakes being bitten, and under the influence of the spider's venom they began to writhe in distressed coils while a purplish hue began to spread from the point of infection. The Sweetgrass too was damaged by a spider, and while the plant neither moved nor made a sound, an unpleasant aura slowly began to creep down the veins of the leaf. It was not instant, and each person would find that the time differed slightly from the others - but there was no mistaking the transfer of the void taint.
Somewhat conflicting information could be found with Sah, Edmund and Ellyra. For while their spiders certainly did a number on their plants and snake, nothing visible was going on that suggested an infection. Only the poor snake was afflicted, but that appeared to be due to the spider bite, and little else.
Setting her crate aside to make a tour around the others, Maea frowned thoughtfully by the time she made it back to her starting point.
"I would say this proves that the Void spreads through bites," she concluded. "But it's not enough to determine how fast the taint is spreading. Can I ask you all to try this one more time? I know it's unpleasant - but the more we know the better equipped we will be to deal with this problem."
Round 8
Experiment 2 - round 2
Maea asks that you repeat the same experiment one more time!
It's just your shadow on the floor
♦ Violence, magic, thievery is permitted with Maea at all times. DM me if you have any ideas ♦
You steal the air out of my lungs, you make me feel it
It was unpleasant, just as Maea said. She watched the void touched spider try and decimate the sweetgrass. Nothing happened to the sweetgrass other than some transfer of violent purple hues, and Ellyra couldn't quite tell if that was a transfer of void-disease (was it disease? Infiltration? She didn't really know a better word for it) or rather the spider's own life fluids coming out in its fervor. It smacked against the glass with ferocity, trying to escape now that the sweetgrass was mostly ripped from its dirt clod.
The lioness could feel her inner discomfort growing and it was plain on her face. She couldn't hide it. She never was one of those talented in masking, anyway (unless it was flirtations, or innocence, as before with the architect). Stepping next to Edmund, she asked, "What is happening in your tank?"
Ellyra examines her spider who just wants to heck stuff up, and asks Edmund how his experimenti s going.
Ellyra
Code blatantly stolen from the fantastical, wonderful Odd
Tal's glare had no effect on the Voidweaver, which ignored him thoroughly and pounced on the poor hanging snake in spite of his muttered threats and curses through the crate. His scowl deepened as the purplish hue began to spread throughout the snake as well, the gentle creature succumbing to the void's influence.
He could have ended the experiment right then and there, thank you, but his tentative timing of the event didn't quite match up with what others had found and when Maea ordered them to do it again he bit his lip and chewed it hard.
As it turned out, he just didn't have it in him to sacrifice another snake for the sake of science.
He snagged a clump of Sweetgrass and headed back to his crate. There was a spider and a snake in it now, but that just meant the whole box was going to have to be torched when they were done. Rather than add to the problem, Tal practiced good environmentalism by reducing, reusing, and recycling what he already had.
And opening the crate's top just far enough to shove the sweetgrass before slamming it closed again and crouching down to count the time it took for the one or both of the predators to make their move on the innocent vegetation.
Tal decides to continue using his crate with the Void Serpent and the Voidweaver Spider, and this time he chucks some Sweetgrass in with them! He's paying particular attention to counting the time of infection this round.
Contrary to the first experiment, this one has Thal watching with rapt attention as the Voidweaver slowly infects the sweetgrass. The purplish veins began to spread from the bite, wrinkling slightly with a necrotic essence. Its slow leaching of life was fascinating to observe, if not extremely concerning.
When preparing to repeat the same experiment, Thal decided to remove her original -now infected - sweetgrass with a curious thought. She placed a new stalk of sweetgrass into the crate with the Voidweaver, making sure to pay close attention to the timing of the bite and the associated Void spread. In addition, her hands worked quickly to lure a hanging snake into a separate crate where she placed the Void sweetgrass, curious to see what reaction may occur.
Thal puts a new stalk of sweetgrass in with her Voidweaver and places the original, infected sweetgrass in a separate crate with a hanging snake.
Sah watched the spider and his grass, brow furrowing as time passed. Nothing seemed to be happening, but his spider also didn't appear to be targeting the sweetgrass just yet. Perhaps it wasn't hungry, or maybe the specific specimen wasn't to its liking. The Wild Thunder went and retrieved another sweetgrass plant and placed it alongside the spider in the crate.
Did normal wine spiders even eat sweetgrass? He wondered if that was the issue to begin with. "Have we tried exposing the void weavers to wine? I'd be curious to see if they show any interest in it or if they affect the drink." If they still showed interest, would the touch of void make the wine poisonous?
~
Sah repeats the experiment with fresh sweetgrass! He suggests that they see if the spiders can affect wine.
The spiders proved unpredictable as Edmund carefully observed his crate. The creatures were clearly aggressive but to what end? Ellyra's question was a welcome one and he turned to her with a look of perplexed curiosity, "I'm not sure if I'm being honest. The bite seems to have an effect, but I'm unclear about the timing. What about yours?" With great reluctance, he collected a second snake and placed it into the crate too. Counting under his breath, he attempted to time any changes.
He hoped that this second round would be the end of the live uninfected experiments, however. The guilt was too much.
~
Edmund repeats the experiment by adding another snake and discusses it with Ellyra! He's taking note of how long it takes for the bite to affect the snake.
Unfortunately for everyone involved, the results remained maddeningly inconclusive. Ellyra fails to notice anything beyond the spider's intent on trying to flee its prison, and finds little help in Edmund's experiment. Talyson's sweetgrass was quickly set upon by both the serpent and the spider the moment it was dropped into the crate, but just like before it was hard to tell if it was an infection spreading or simply the result of injected Void venom. The plant did begin to shift slightly in color however, so something definitely did happen after a bite.
For Thalassa, her clever choice of switching things up unfortunately didn't result in anything noteworthy. Perhaps it was simply because the infected sweetgrass didn't do more than emit a subtly unpleasant aura, but her hanging snake kept well clear of the plant, curling itself into a corner where it flicked its tongue nervously at her. Sah's question was an interesting one, that had Maea looking up with some curiosity. "I don't know. You're welcome to try, if you wish." For the time being, he was able to spot the moment the spider in his care made a testy launch at the plant, afflicting a streak of purpling damage onto the plant.
Fortunately for Edmund's snake, though less so for them as their purpose of doing any of this was to uncover evidence of the rate of the spread, nothing much happened at all within his crate even with the new snake. It could simply be because it was smaller and faster than the spiders; it kept evading their attacks by coiling and hissing up a storm in a very brave way.
Maea passed through the group again, just like last time, but when she returned back to her own crate and realized that the results were just as confusing as last time, she looked up at the others with a grim expression. Taking in their expressions, she could see the growing conflict between discovering information and discomfort of exposing the animals to danger like they were.
"I'm going to end this early," she said quietly. "Since the result remains inconclusive, I'm not going to subject any of us to this any longer. This is my take; the Void taint spreads through bites. How fast anything is infected remains unclear.
"Are you all okay with that? Do you have any suggestions for another way to test this? If not, we can move on to the final step."
Round 9
Maea suggests halting the experiment and leaving it as inconclusive! State whether your character wishes to try something else or move on; the next task will be determined by the majority vote.
It's just your shadow on the floor
♦ Violence, magic, thievery is permitted with Maea at all times. DM me if you have any ideas ♦
"Yeah, bites spread it for sure," Tal agreed slowly, brows drawing together in the scowl he reserved for thinking. "An' these things are way more aggressive after they've been infected," he added, gesturing to his former-hanging snake that was now definitely a shadow serpent. He looked over to Sah and nodded reluctantly at the other man's recommendation for an experiment with wine, to see if the Voidweavers had any traits of their former species.
"Could be interestin'," he allowed. "Not sure how important it is, though. Person'ly, I'm more interested in learnin' if void critters can spread infection with scratches, too. But I dunno if we can test that with spiders an' snakes." He looked to Maea for confirmation on whether or not any other species were around that they could use. Maybe something that had claws?
"I'm also not sure how th'infected plants spread it. But I guess those are easier t'avoid than critters," he said, thinking aloud and glaring at the infected sweet grass in his crate. "So if we're just focusin' on beasties t'day, I'd say we can move on."
Tal asks if Maea has any corrupted critters with claws that they could use to test whether or not the infection can be spread by scratches as well as bites.
He says if they don't have any of those, they can move on.
She wasn't surprised to see the lack of interesting activity, but she would be lying if she said she wasn't disappointed. Especially since she'd been curious if eating the Void sweetgrass would spread the infection. The curiosity still pushed strongly in her mind and Thal looked to Maea with determination. "If the creatures won't even touch the Void sweetgrass, I will."
Approaching her crates, Thal prepared herself. There was no fear for what may occur, just a certainty that they needed a more measurable and applicable scenario. If she did become infected - as long as nothing drastic occurred - she could even describe the sensations and provide a plethora of other data. The benefits drastically outweighed the possible downsides.
Thal took a deep breath and found a tree to sit against. She was expecting a little bit of pushback, but the fiery look in her eyes told of her resolution. "It may be best to restrain me in case anything happens. I'd suggest taking notes." A cocky grin was plastered to her face.
Thal wants to test the spread of the Void from the sweetgrass by offering to eat it herself!
04-27-2024, 02:12 AM (This post was last modified: 04-27-2024, 02:16 AM by Sah.)
Sah
I am a being of Heaven and Earth
Sah nodded, "It wouldn't just be to test for behavioral changes. It might show us if they can infect our food supply." That was a far more concerning matter and one that they had the potential to test with the wine spiders and voidweavers present. "If we don't have wine, we can try it with another item. I just think it's worth looking into."
Direct contact via bites or other injuries had the potential to be a more obvious mode of contraction. Yet if ingesting void touched items could do the same, they needed to know. If it was the case, the possible threats of long-term exposure would also need to be investigated.
When Thalassa spoke, Sah stepped forward with narrowed eyes, "Don't. We don't know what it might do to you or if the effects will be permanent."
~
Sah asks if anyone has wine or food to use to see if the voidweavers can infect the food supply. He also tries to stop Thalassa
Edmund relaxed when Maea called the experiment off. He quickly rescued the snake that had been able to avoid the spiders and placed it safely in its own crate. As he did, he listened to the ideas being thrown around. "Testing other forms of injury sounds logical to me." He'd have to get a new snake, though. This one had earned its freedom.
Thalassa spoke up, and the younger Ancient's tail lashed, "Absolutely not. Not unless you have a possible antidote on hand." Edmund refused to sit by and let one of his kin potentially harm herself without a solid countermeasure in place.
~
Edmund saves the uninfected snake and agrees with Tal about trying other modes of injury, such as scratching. He also tries to dissuade Thalassa.
