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Writing Discussion Thread

Zark2099 said:
Inception is a prime example of Payoff > whatever it took to get there. The entire movie is an overly long buildup to the dream sequences with exposition over exposition and planning (I still love that part tho), but the payoff of those sequences and the ending are what make it a modern classic.
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I was talking specifically about oppressive regimes. If you're talking about anything, then there are plenty of good ones. Also, it's Ôëñ, examples of = do exist (I think).
 
The God Of Procrastination said:
I was talking specifically about oppressive regimes.
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Days of Future Past, 1984, Red Ribbon Army (Technically), Star Wars etc., etc.

You may not personally like them, but it is a legit trope that works
 
Anyways I whipped the first draft of the first chapter I was writing. Still working on ending it I guess, but eh, I kinda wanna see if this is any good in any way

Alotta oof

These walls have heard a lot of things. Screams, bangings, fights, many many things. Today is a little different. Today the only sound to hear are scribbles, with a touch of sobbing. Years and years of life culminating in a single letter to a man, thinking that he would care even the very least. It would be funny, if it wasn't her writing...

She was unique in my eyes. 20 years of living her miserable life and never once getting what she deserved. Her upper lip was split apart by a cut, but yet that didn't detract from the fire in her eyes, her innocence unparalleled by the depths of this wretched world. Her skin had a shade of crimson and darkness, her hair fell across her forehead, through which her perfect visage peaked through. Others may have called her plain. They hadn't seen her the way I did.

Even when writing to a man she despises, a man she knows won't care what happens to her, yet when she holds that pen in her hand, she has so much to tell. How he ruined her, how he broke her, how he hurt her.

Then the scribbles stop, the letter writer pens her name, Rebecca Ellis, and pushes herself back to the chair to catch her breath. Such a innocent face hidden between a cover of hair, one that would've lit up when she smiled, but now it was full of tear stains.

She pulls herself away from the chair, and tries to stand up. Her eyes turn to her more sinister friend. A makeshift noose in the corner of the room. Looks like strangling was her way out.

She puts her neck in and pulls it, as if to check for its sturdyness. Stable as always. Now there wasn't any going back for her. She mutters a silent prayer as she prepares to meet her maker. There was no one to stop her, and she'd be long gone before anyone reached there. She didn't deserve this.

"How do you know someone will listen?"

Rebecca halts her words, and looks around.

I repeat myself.

"How do you know that there is someone else there to help you?"

She replies while trying to continue her chant.

"Doesn't matter. All that matters is to run away" "What do you have to run away from?"

She shows a reluctance in her words, as if not expecting further inquiries but her confidence returned and she replied.

"Pain."

"Isn't that pain?"

"That's freedom" "How can you free yourself by tying yourself up?"

Rebecca doesn't answer back, she finishes her poem, and walks across the room. I walk along too. Her letter is on the table

"You have a nice handwriting."

That touched a nerve for her. She turn around and bolts towards the table grabs away the letter and hides it in her jeans pocket. Her face looks considerably angry.

"None of your ******* business." "Who is John?" "**** off!" As she pushes me aside to the best of her efforts.

She walks towards the ropes, but trips midway on the floor, breaking down.

"Are you okay, Rebecca?" "Shut up! You know nothing about me!"

She tries to get up, but her will is too weak and she falls back on the floor. She turns to where she heard my voice, broken down to tears that hid behind her confident facade.

"You all pretend to care but you do nothing! I don't need you!"

Her voice breaks up as she lets out a wail and attemots to breathe in

"You weren't there when I was beaten into the ground, were you? No, you are only here to **** with me! You just want a ******* story!"

I kept silent. I didn't know what to say, but she kept on going.

"It's all because of that bastard. I never wanted to be this! I can't even look at myself anymore..."
 
The idea is kinda ridiculous but it basically is the story of how Krampus redeems himself. He starts off as an hedonistic and alcoholic demon. He's at his worst in the beginning of the story. He even has his own reign of terror. Santa Claus defeats him and seals him away, although he later offers him the chance to redeem himself. The main conflict of the story is a bit internal and external.
 
Days of Future Past

Meh.

1984

Gurren Lagann-nonono
Gurren Lagann-nonono

And no, these guys aren't an example either. For most of the series it's Lordgenome, and it's all talk. That's the good part


Red Ribbon Army (Technically)

Unfamiliar with this one.

Star Wars

That was a thing, wasn't it?
 
I had a literary question.

One of my ideas for my story was to make Death itself act socially akward since due to it's function of taking life it doesn't have much friends and so it doesn't know how to talk to others, my question is if it can be pulled off?
 
Creaturemaster971 said:
@Unknown I think that would absolutely work. Would you be trying that in a comedic sense?
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Sort of, I want to make Death more nonchalant and less serious then most versions of it in fiction but still have a sense of doing it's job properly
 
I love this and I could go to go into a long tangent about Potents, the series I've been working on for at least 5 years at this point. I could talk about Delia, the paragon refugee princess with powerful plant manipulation, Seth, the enigmatic swordsman who doesn't take shit and wants to find out more about his past, Ian, the fun magician secretly from another world, Ava, the witty and sassy thief with powers over mirrors, Band, the cocky Irish mercenary with super strength, and Elliot, the laid back nomad with powers over wind, speed, and a terrifying weapon. This is the most barebones description I can give of these people. I tried my best to flesh out every single one of them over these past years. While I need to work more on villains, I love every single one of my heroes. Band used to be the character I cared about the least, and now he's one of my favorites.
 
One of my favorite characters as of recent is Wilhelmina Edelweiss Schmidt, or Mina for short. Originally, she was created as a secondary character, just a love interest for Elliot, as a normal human government agent without superpowers but a ton of weapons but I expanded her sooooo much since then.

She's an android. Completely removed the human element from her. She was made in the 40s as a Nazi weapon, her model designed after a niche propaganda of the time (not a real one, obviously). She's made of a secret fictional metal that bonds well with machinery and creates great AI, but the Nazis were incapable of getting it right, so she was scrapped, and her body was taken by the allied powers during the victory of WWII, and passed to an even higher military power afterwards, where they eventually succeeded to bring her life. Unfortunately, the fictional metal to make her was so slim that there wasn't enough to give her a full body, so they left off a bronze arm and gave her a bionic one to replace it. Upon activation, because of the bronze arm, she was given the codename Talos after the giant Cretan automation from Greek myth. She exists as their best agent for the better part of a decade.

To the majority of the secret agency she works for, she's a bot doing her job, with amazing AI but only somewhat human functions. She can walk and talk and learn but not good with emotions. Only a few people are aware that this is a play, and that she's 100% sentient as a fully feeling being, but only comes off as the emotionless robot because after her time in service, she's seen enough people die that getting attached can bring sadness. She deals with this by going to a tavern bi-weekly and enjoying herself, going in casual clothes as opposed to her normal weaponized getup.

Everything changes when she recruits the titular Potents, the group of six mentioned in my previous post. After strenuous training for two weeks, the guys of the group sneak off the agency to enjoy themselves after Talos leaves to do what they could only imagine. Band convinces them to go to a bar and out of sheer coincidence, it's the one Mina is taking a break in. Staring them down for insubordination, Band, being the genius he is, misinterprets this as her ogling them, and convinces Seth to go talk to her. Thing is, both of them are incredibly blunt and socially inept, but somehow manage to establish a rapport with each other, offering to see each other again. Later, back on base, Talos punishes them for leaving the base, but Talos also offers to be a personal trainer to Seth. So Mina and Seth wind up seeing each other while Talos and Seth are training (like I said, I changed her up a lot. She's not even Elliot's romantic interest anymore).

I could go into even more detail about that, but it'd be wayyyy too many spoilers, and I already gave enough as it is. I'll just summarize it. Seth eventually figures out Talos and Mina are one in the same (he doesn't care tho), and Mina reveals herself to the rest of the group as a feeling, thinking being, and she's taken in as an honorary member of the Potents. Her status as a robot still plays into the plot. For example, immunity to mind screwery comes into play due to her having an unconventional mind, her not liking EMPs despite being immune to EMPs that make normal EMPs look like a couple seconds under UV lights, the how society looks upon a sentient machine, let alone one that's in love with a human, the fact that she's only an A cup because her creators thought large breasts would get in the way of combat despite being able to lift countries, and with souls being confirmed to exist in the series, she secretly has a crippling fear of death as she has no idea if she has a soul and doesn't know what'll happen to her if she ever perishes.
 
I really wush I could gush about the villain for my series but I can't because his name and motives are a spoiler for the first book. (This is unrelated to the Sci-Fi story above. That'll come way later).
 
Thanks Zark

Powerless Hero First Draft

Act 1

Chapter 1

A single rat can wipe out half of Europe, a single leak could sink the Titanic, and one single, Powerless Hero can make a King bleed.

~

The alarm gave a shrill, crimson blare in the brief few seconds it sounded before it was silenced and ripped off the wall by a large, rubber-like hand. The hand retracted back to its owner standing on the bank floor, his smug proud-of-himself grin still visible despite the mask he wore. At least, it was visible enough to annoy his more serious accomplices. He was about to speak before the leader gave an icy glare and growled out a single word. "Quiet." Backlash, the supervillain and professional bank robbery with a rubbery, stretchable physiology sank back like a kicked puppy. "But boss. Didn't 'a see what I did back there?" Icebreaker rolled his glowing blue eyes, the only thing distinguishing him from the others in the dead of the night, and put his hand to the vault door. "We get it. You have cool powers. That might've impressed the thugs that you ran with back in Yorksville, but we're in Tokyo Town now. The Supers who hang around this part of town can likely tear right through you like a cheap rubber band." As he was speaking, the building sized vault door froze over. One swift punch smashed the door to shards and large chunks of ice rained down around them. "Yeah, speaking of which. You guys sure that none of the big-name heroes'll show?" Toxin asked, his glowing red eyes piercing the darkness, clearly panicked by how much noise they were making. "I don't feel like getting my fangs punched in by Kinetic Man or Paragon. And there's no way in hell I'm sticking around if that freak from the Gothic District shows up." Icebreaker waved the vampire off. "I've studied their patrol routes. There's no known Hero in the city who operates around this street at this time of night." The three men walked into the vault, but Toxin still looked unsure. "No known Heroes. That still bothers me." Backlash gave a short laugh. "Oh, please. I think we can handle any small-timer that comes through here." Tempting fate, we all know how well that tends to end for these kinds of people don't we? 9 minutes. Starting now.

It was a large bank, the biggest bank in Tokyo Town. Enough to take up its own city block. The large, empty lobby was lined with three large marble pillars on each side, with their size and sturdiness being enough to put the White House's pillars to shame, although the lobby was nothing compared to the positively huge bank vault that lied beyond it. "Now you two need to cut that chatter. This is the biggest bank in the city outside of Atlas Square, we knock this over and we'll be set for life." Icebreaker said in a harsh growl. That's not really something that needed to be said, as the mountain of dollar bills, gold bars, and gold coins tended to speak for itself in the brightly lit vault, the occasional steel safe spotted the large pile. "How are we gonna get this out of here, boss?" Backlash asked as soon as finished balking at the giant stacks of cash. "Trust me, boys. I have a plan. I've been doing dis for 19 years and I ain't screwing up now." As soon as Icebreaker finished his gloating, green bubble of energy appeared around some of the safes littered in the pile. "Heh, nice thinking boss. Telekinetic Supers work pretty well for jobs like this." Backlash commented. "That's not one of ours." Icebreaker corrected before one of the safes ended up getting flung at him at supersonic speeds.

The corner of the safe ripped a hole in his winter coat as he dodged out of the way. The safe lodged into the floor but another one came flying after him like a homing missile. Backlash extended his arm and caught the several ton safe with ease before blindly throwing it, hoping it'd hit something.

"Screw this. I'm out of here."

Toxin began to book it for the entrance, but a green bubble of energy appeared around him and he was sent flying into an open safe before it slammed shut. "What the hell, man!" Backlash yelled out, as more safes and stacks of gold came raining down on them from seemingly everywhere. "Back to back! Circle up!" Icebreaker yelled, before the back of his blue winter attire met the back of Backlash's sleeveless leather jacket. Icebreaker slammed his hands to the ground an icy ball formed around the two criminals, defensive spike jutting in every direction.

The safes and mounds of gold slammed into every side of the shield, but to no avail, some even got stuck and impaled on the outward spikes. Another green bubble appeared around the shield and the two found themselves hurling up towards the ceiling.

The ice smashed against the hard stone, reducing the shield to pieces. Icebreaker felt his spine scream in protest against the force while Backlash shrugged it off, the force defusing across his rubbery body. Backlash's arms extended, one towards the ceiling and one towards his boss.

His right hand dug into the steel of the vault ceiling, but without anything on the ceiling to grab and hold, Backlash was forced to make something. His fingers dug through the fine steel while an enlarged hand wrapped around his boss.

Backlash swung forward like Tarzan, complete with a yell coming from Icebreaker as he regained consciousness (He'd later insist that his voice did not, in fact, crack as he gave a girly screech, despite the fact that it did.) Regardless, Backlash swung through the barrage of flying projectiles and green bubbles before the two escaped the vault. As soon as the two touched down on the cool bank lobby floor, Icebreaker threw up his hand and froze over the exit to the vault.

Seven minutes.

The two took a deep breath, panting and gasping. "What Hero was that, anyways?" Backlash asked. "No idea. They don't have a power I recognize." A resounding boom started coming from the other end of the wall of ice and Icebreaker quickly threw his hands to the wall, adding more and more layers to the wall as the booming sound became more and more frequent. The ice began to creep onto the walls and floor, threatening to ice over the entire bank. Outside, some ice even managed to slip onto the roads. Eventually, the booming stopped and Icebreaker gave a sigh of relief. "That's a bit overkill, man. No amount of telekinesis is gonna break that ice." Backlash stated. They began to hear a charging sound from the other side of the wall. "You just had to say something, didn't you?" Icebreaker said before a giant, bright green explosion completely vaporized the protective barrier, a resounding KABOOM sounded out for miles across the entire neighborhood.

Icebreaker could feel his bones rattle from the shockwave as he was pushed back, while Backlash shook like a puddle of water that someone just cannonballed into. As the smoke began to clear, a small humanoid figure stepped through, her form occasionally highlighted by the flash of green plasma across her dark green armor. Her visor reflected any light that came close to it, and it gave the expression of an eyeless stare of tranquil fury.

"What're you waiting for? Get 'em!" Icebreaker yelled as he materialized a mace of pure ice.

The unidentified Hero simply pointed forward and an armada of flying safes began to rain down on the yet again. "Oh yeah, let's see how you like it!" Backlash shouted as he caught one of the safes and tossed it back at the green clad Hero.

The Hero simply jumped up and began to fly overhead.

Backlash stretched his legs up to pursue the Hero, not wanting her to take the airborne advantage. The Hero began rapid firing energy blasts from her knuckles, the green bolts of plasma ricocheting of the villain's rubbery body. "Nice try, kid. Blunt force tends to just bounce right off me! You can't break bones when I don't have any."

The Hero seemed to grind her teeth a bit more, before flying closer to the floor and beginning to take potshots at Icebreaker. "Hey, get back here!" The Hero seemed to ignore the overconfident thug while she focused on the ice wielding goon, who growled and fired a ray of ice from his hands to get her off his back. "Hold still!"

The Hero ignored his advice, leading the ray of ice around like a toreador does a bull until it collided with Backlash, slowly freezing him solid.

"What? No! You son of a-."

Icebreaker was cut off by a sudden drop kick which rattled his jaw, with his stretchy partner incapacitated, he was the only goon standing. The kick sent him sprawling onto the floor, the fall to the floor would've dislocated his hip if he was any normal man. He growled and forced himself to his feet, charging the Hero directly.

Five minutes

Now that the two were up-close, Icebreaker could see the unknown hero in more detail. In spite of the green metal armor she wore, she was actually quite skinny and short, something that proved useful to her as she ducked and weaved around the swinging of his mace. As she ducked one of his overhead swings, Icebreaker spotted a ponytail on the back of her head. As the Hero lunged forward to tackle him, the ice based villain grabbed the back of the ponytail, tugging and yanking her back. "You're good, kid. But I can tell you're a rookie. Only an amateur wears a ponytail in a fight, next time go for a buzzcut."

As he finished his taunt, he yanked the Hero's head back and ripped the chunk of hair right off.

The Hero screamed in pain and feel back just in time to get smacked in the face by Icebreaker's mace, the blow leaving a crack in her visor and would likely later form a bruise on her cheek. Icebreaker leaned in to swing again, only to get hit in the face by a blast of green energy. As his facial hair singed and burned, a green bubble of energy appeared around him. Icebreaker screamed in pain as he was brutally shoved through one of the nearby pillars, his bones and ribs aching and screaming in protest. "Ugh, my back is gonna hate me after this." Icebreaker grumbled as he forced himself to his feet. He looked up just in time to get hit in the face by a flying boulder. His vision began to blur and split as he staggered forward, randomly swinging his mace hoping to hit something. He managed to get one last look at the Hero "Screw, ugh, you." He spat out before falling face first into unconsciousness.

~

The Hero let out a tired sigh of relief as Icebreaker fell unconscious. Finally, that was harder than it should've been. It took a lot longer than it should've too. The Hero checked her watch. Roughly four minutes left. Crap. The Hero took to the skies, soaring into the air and through a nearby window. As the Hero began to fly over the rooftops, she looked down on Tokyo Town from the skyline. Tokyo Town may have been the size of a city in its own right, but even it was only a single small district in the outer parts of Central City. Good old Central City, the biggest city in the world. An enormous island off the coast of New York, being thrice the size of Seoul and with nearly 4x the population. It was a popular tourist spot thanks to its wide variety of cultures between districts, it's large amount of tourist attractions thanks to places like the City of Iron, Clockwork Block, and Tourist Town, not to mention it's wide assortment of Superheroes. Tokyo Town, true to its name, proudly flaunted its Japanese culture, inherited from the huge boom in Japanese American immigrants the city received during the 1940s, thanks to many Japanese American workers hoping to avoid getting sent to internment camps. Beautiful Japanese style architecture covered practically every block of Tokyo Town, while it wasn't the only district that felt the influence of the Jap Boom of the 40s, it was the one effected the strongest, hence the name. The Hero would love to spend more time to take it all in, but she was almost out of time as it was. The distinct color and light of Tokyo Town soon began to wane, quickly being replaced by the loud, city-style hustle and bustle of Yorksville. The district closest to New York City, being the district where the bridge between the two cities can be found, Yorksville was practically defined by being essentially a smaller New York. And that meant that it was always busy, everyone was a jerk, and there were probably hundreds of people ready to snap pictures of her as soon as she tried to change. Great. The Hero began to lower her altitude, no longer flying side by side with the clouds and instead began approaching the first empty alley that she saw. The Hero touched down next to a large dumpster, pushing a button on the side of her cracked visor. Her suit turned off, but not before it began to retract off her body, the plates disappearing into a 'shell' hidden under her shirt on her back. The girl took off her visor, and the magnetic field the kept her normally long hair into a ponytail deactivated, causing her black locks to haphazardly fall into a mess over her face and down her back. Loose fitting clothes covered her body, keeping the 'shell' on her back well hidden. A nice baggy jacket and baggy pants, made her look even smaller and nerdier than she already did. Most people don't even believe she's 18. Just regular girl, Pearl "Perry" Jones, as far as the world needed to know.

Perry checked her watch again, 3 minutes to spare, good. Perry dashed out of the alleyway, quickly scanning the nearby buildings. There it was, the Technical Education building. Unfortunately, a certain Jet-Black limousine was already waiting outside. Oh, this was going to be fun. Perry braced herself with a tired sigh before dashing over to the limousine, the opening door giving off a brief aura of foreboding. Sharp, electric eyes glanced out of the car, a golden aura glaring off of them. The telltale sign of a Super with energy based powers. "You're early this time." Perry's grandmother noted, although, she looked young enough to just be her mother. Super's age much slower than Powerless people, causing the old lady to look barely even thirty when she was actually just reaching her nineties. "Yeah, my shift ended early today." Perry explained. It didn't, but Catherine didn't need to know that she'd called in sick today. It was supposed to be a slow day today anyways; the shop could manage. "And what on earth happened to your hair?" Oh, crap right. That creep managed to rip off her pony tail, earlier didn't he? At least the bruise hadn't formed yet, she'd have a hard time explaining that. "It, uh, got caught in the door on my way out, you know how sensitive those can be." Catherine West gave her granddaughter a suspicious glare before letting it go with a sigh. "Just get in." As Perry got in the back and started to get buckled up, Catherine started talking again. "You know it worries me, you working at a blood market at night. Vampires aren't especially well liked around here and being Powerless certainly doesn't do you any favors." Perry worked at a shop that sold blood to vampires during their waking hours. That kind of job always came with certain risks, Powerless may have been treated as trash, but vampires tended to be actively hated and feared. Granted, certain historical figures such as Vlad the Impaler did little to help that image, but even still. "I'll be fine, you worry too much. The shop's so obscure that no one would ever target it."

"That won't matter to some people." Catherine commented, before a breaking news jingle played over the radio. "Hey, turn that up." She said to the limo driver. "This just in, an attempted bank robbery over in the Tokyo Town district has been thwarted by an unknown, presumably freelance Hero. The perpetrators have been confirmed as the ice villain Icebreaker, the rubber villain Backlash, and a vampire villain calling himself Toxin. The identity of this new Hero remains unknown, but current reports place him or her as having some form of telekinesis and energy projection. Whether this is the same Hero as the heroine spotted during the Yorksville shoot out remains unknown. We'll keep you updated with further updates. With Central City News Radio, I'm Canon Fox." Huh, well that was surprising. Perry knew that the news traveled fast in this city, especially where Heroes were concerned, but even then, that was fast. Must've been a slow news day. Catherine rolled her eyes. "Every day is another mess to deal with." Catherine turned back to Perry, golden eyes looking her over critically. "Have you heard back from any of those colleges? You have quite a few letters of recommendation, so you're bound to get into at least one." Perry shook her head. "No, not yet. I just don't see why you're so insistent on me going to one anyways." Catherine's glare sharpened. "Don't give me that. No child or grandchild of mine is going to grow up without a proper education. You're capable of anything you put your mind to, more so than most Supers out there. You'll get into a good college even if a have to found one from the ground up for you to attend." Perry knew she was exaggerating that last part, even if it would be well within her Grandmother's finances and influence to do so. She practically owned the city after all. "You won't have to. I promise." Catherine leaned back, seemingly satisfied. "Good. Now it's almost ten-thirty, so you should get to bed. You have a long day of work tomorrow." The limo pulled up to the curb outside Perry's apartment complex. A rather expensive complex the Catherine had insisted she buy, stating that she should have the best living space possible. The door to the limousine opened and Catherine began to call out as Perry walked away. "And remember, I love you and I know you'll meet my expectations."

"Yeah, I love you too." Perry responded before the limo drove off. Perry gave a suffering yawn as she marched towards her apartment. Talk about overbearing. At least she was home now. The door opened to her larger than strictly necessary room, with a pile of letters on the kitchen island, right next to a rent notice. All the letters she sent to colleges. All unopened. All marked with a rejection stamp stating that they didn't think she was right for them as someone who was Powerless. Perry crumpled the letters in frustration before simply choosing to rip them up in a brief fit of fury. Well, that's Princeton, Harvard, Columbia, and Massachusetts all out. I'll have to apply to somewhere else, University of Texas maybe? Doesn't matter, I'll think of something. Perry walked upstairs to her bedroom, grumbling in frustration. Her bedroom door opened to reveal a mess of Star Wars, Warhammer, and various Hero posters on the walls, a half complete metal suit, similar to the one that was in a shell on her back, was lying on her dresser surrounded by hundreds of charts and graphs, mapping out the power levels of various Heroes in the city. The powers, strengths, weaknesses, and potential applications and evolutions of hundreds if not thousands of different powers from all kinds of different Supers were all listed. There was a mechanical device on her night stand, a signal tracker that was connected to the police radio, as well as the radio networks and chatrooms of various Hero groups and networks across the city. Some of which were harder to hack into than others. Perry disconnected the robotic shell from her back after taking off her hoodie and throwing it into a heap on a nearby chair, covering the various newspaper clippings that had piled up onto it.

Perry sat down at her desk in the corner of the room, plugging her visor into her laptop and uploading the footage captured on them. She began brainstorming as the computer began processing data. Walter Tarentine, aka Icebreaker. Common thug, leg breaker, bank robber, D class villain. That wall he made was a pretty high level showing for him, it likely took somewhere from 190 to 200 tons of force to break if I managed to eyeball it correctly, but I'll let the computer take care of that. Toxin, real name unknown, vampire, rather young one too. Couldn't be any older than a thousand. Pickpocket and occasional accomplice to Icebreaker. Barely even qualified as a supervillain. Then there was Backlash aka Jerry Philips. He was young, smug, and inexperienced. But that power of his has a lot of potential. She made a mental note to add something to her arsenal to counter rubber physiology. Ice rays have potential, as seen tonight, but that would require some hard to obtain materials. Some form of petrification maybe? Like a concrete ray? Some form of sulfur gas might forcefully vulcanizate his body and leave him briefly powerless, or alternatively, some form of ozone attack could cause his body to crack, albeit that runs the risk of killing him. Worst comes to worst, turpentine and naphtha will dissolve right through him. Granted, you can't just go to a store and buy those materials either. Perry rubbed her eyes. She was tired, she'd work on more feasible solutions to deal with him in the morning. Perry got up, through herself into bed, and spent the rest of the night restlessly shifting until she could fall asleep.

End of Chapter 1.
 
Zark2099 said:
@Schnee No, what's it like?
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The Ace Combat Series is a Flight Combat series based around dogfighting and aerial dueling in Fighter Jets.

Okay, there's three paths to the game, Mercenary, soldier and Knight, I'll assume the former because that's assumed to be the canon one.

The Story of Ace Combat Zero starts in an alternate version of the Earth, titled Strangereal by the Fandom. Continents are switched around, and they have different names, but obviously taken inspiration by the countries of today

In this particular case, we have Osea (North America), Belka (Germany), and the very small country of Ustio

In the year is 1995, due to a sudden discovery of resources in Ustio, Belka, wanting said resources, starts to invade, due to the other countries wanting said resources themselves as well as wanting to stop Belka from conquering the small land, end up also declaring war. Thus, the Aptly named "Belkan War" Began.

10 Years after the War, a Reporter is tasked with writing a documentary regarding the Belkan War, and is starting research into a project that's already been touched upon dozens of times, but as he's researching, he comes across something incredible.

Hidden in the war reports was the name of a Pilot, called "The Demon Lord of the Round Table" a legendary pilot who the the entire Belkan army feared, yet also respected, who supposedly saved Ustio and turned the War Around.

This reporter practically forgot his job due to how invested he was, trying to find as many official records as he can, thus, he finds Belkan pilots who have fought the Demon Lord, and who he was to them.

The story follows the reporter and the pilots stories 10 years after the war, and you, the player, play as the Demon Lord during the war itself, an Ustio Mercenary and leader of the Two Pilot "Galm" team, 66th Tactical Fighter Squadron Alongside your wingman, Larry 'Pixy' Foulke, as you save Ustio from the brink of defeat, and drive back the Belkan army.

At the beginning of the first mission Ustio is in a pretty sorry state, Belka, far superior in both personal and technology, are pushing them back with relative ease.

Cipher and Pixy are two mercenaries working for a PMC unit called Axe and Hammer, who are hired to hold the last line of defense for Ustio, an airfield in the middle of nowhere around constant snowstorms.....Riveting.

Belka sends in a small bomber squadron to destroy this last airfield, and Cipher and Pixy are tasked with defending it.

Speaking of the two Larry "Pixy" Foulke is your wingman throughout most of the game, he's calm, collected and generally incredibly relaxed even in some of the most dangerous situations, but has no problem with making a sarcastic remark or enjoying a onesided fight. (He's also voiced by Yuri Lowenthal and that's badass) more on him comes as the story goes on, while he is concerned about money as he's a mercenary not a soldier, he still genuinely cares about the war effort and helping Ustio, that is his reason for fighting.

Cipher is the main character of the game, his voice is never heard, face is never seen, how he acts is ultimately dependent on the decisions of the player and who he is can be inferred by the interviews of those who fought him. The Mystery of Cipher and who he was is able to drive the game outside of just the war itself.

The reason why Cipher works decently well is that his actions speak for him, and the actions are determined by the player, and they're the driving force behind the secondary plot of the game, the reporter trying to find who he is, through the interviews and discussions given by the pilots of those you have fought in battle, you can pick up the pieces of who he was, there's still quite a bit of discussion that goes on today about Cipher, despite the game being 13 years old. Not the most interesting main character but Regardless of whether or not silent protags can be good or not, I definitely think Cipher is easily one of the better ones.

Regardless, Cipher and Pixy are very quick to make names for themselves, they down all bombers before damage is done to the base, and they are quickly respected amongst the other pilots.

However, The Top Brass are still heavily suspicious of Mercenaries, given that Mercenaries are typically associated with people who just want to fight and end lives not for honor or duty, but for money. As such, Cipher and Pixy are often sent on borderline suicide missions that are ultimately very minor in terms of the ground they win during the war.

On their third mission, they're sent to Area B7R, also known as the Round Table, a Barren Desert Sky where pilots all over the world face eachother and prove their skill, with no real rules to follow except for one. Survive

Cipher and Pixy were sent here for incredibly barren reasoning, they're there to basically distract the Belkan Air Force for a bit until the Ustio-Osean Fleet can regroup together and prepare a counterattack. But this was much better then expected

Despite being outnumbered and outgunned due to their inferior aircraft, Cipher and Pixy clawed through dozens of planes, at one point, a Belkan Ace Squadron shows up to finally shut you down, these men are the best of the best in Belka, and they know it, and typically mock you for being a mercenary.

Cipher and Pixy knock them out if the sky, their ego with it. Depending on your path you can fight different squads on different missions, the squadron leaders of the missions are the ones that end up being interviewed after the war.

As the War goes on, Cipher is far more respected as a pilot then he was as a Mercenary, Pixy is jealous, but is ultimately glad his friend is getting the respect he deserves. At least for now...

As more fights over the war and over B7R take place, Cipher fights more and more Ace Squadrons, outnumbered and outgunned, but never outsmarted. Due to his incredible prowess in combat, Cipher is nicknamed "The Demon Lord of the Round Table"

Near the end of the War, Ustio takes back their land, and goes on the offensive, but clearly not happy over the losses they suffered by Belkan hands. Cipher and Pixy are tasked with Escorting a Bomber group, this group was supposed to destroy enemy Belkan Weapons factories, while trying to avoid Civilian Casualties

This order ends up getting twisted, and the Ustio Bomber pilots, furious at Belka for originally stealing their homeland, drops bombs on both the weapons factories, and civilian oil facilities

Again it depends on your choices, but you can either focus on your mission and defend the bombers, or actively participate in the bombing, and destroy the oil factory and kill Civilians in it.

Pixy is FURIOUS at this revelation, that people have lost their reasoning to fight and resorted from trying to protect their homeland to simply torturing the enemy. And he flies with a shattered ideal.

The next mission, Pixy is clearly dragged down by his lacking of reason for fighting as his goal of just trying to assist Ustio is saving their land has now been changed to affectively being their puppet for destruction.

But just then, in a fit if desperation, Belka sends a Bomber group loaded with nuclear Weapons.

Cipher, Pixy, and other mercenary groups, such as the Crow Team, destroy the bombers before they get to Ustio.

Or so they thought

Suddenly, a massive set of seven nuclear explosions goes off in front of them, with zero idea where those bombs landed. Belka set seven nuclear bombs on their own soil, killing 10,000 of their own people, to fully stop the allied advance into their country, with no more options, they have committed the biggest scorched Earth act ever. Pixy, already having his ideals shattered last mission, has them trampled in the worst possible way, and has a borderline Mental Breakdown, and defects, and goes AWOL. Just after this, the war ends.

With no whereabouts of his close friend around, Cipher goes out hunting remnant Belkan forces, and a peace treaty is finally signed, with said Peace treaty being incredibly one sided in favor of Osea, gaining an incredible anoint of land and resources, especially from Ustio, despite Ustio just getting themselves back on their feet from the War and them assisting Osea. Effectively, Osea got way too good of a deal, and left Belka bone dry, and Ustio being taken up by Osea.

This angers a massive group of military officials who, Disgusted not only by the arbitrary political discussions that are based far more on personal gain/Greed, as opposed to peace, Create an organization known as "A World with No Boundaries" an organization set on nuking the borders dividing the countries, to stop a war from happening again. Effectively starting the war anew.

Cipher is sent after this remnant group, whether for personal gain, because it was his job, because he wanted to protect people, is ultimately up to interpretation and path There, at the final end of a fight to destroy the Nuclear Missle Silo's he finally destroys all of them but one, and all forces around it. But then Pixy shows up again. '

Pixy ultimately is one of the driving forces of A World with No Boundaries, having lost his reason to fight, and wanting war to finally end, he challenges Cipher in a One on One Duel, whoever to win will decide the fate of the world.

Pixy launches the last Nuclear Missile. And Cipher and Pixy have one last exchange between eachother, with the best boss music around to help with the mood. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=80XAJKqRU9k The song lyrics themselves talk about the fictional tale of the "Razgriz". When history witnesses a great change, Razgriz reveals itself, first, as a Dark Demon, as a Demon, it uses its power to rain death upon the land, before it dies, after a period of Slumber, Razgriz returns, this it returns as a great hero though this is more of an Ace Combat 5 thing then a Zero thing.

Ultimately, Cipher defeats Pixy, and the Nuke explodes in Mid Air. At the end of the Battle, Pixy ejected and was stuck in the middle of a cold Winter land, where he happened to eventually stumble upon ground zero of the nuclear detonations, seeing for himself the destruction the original nukes caused, at ground Zero of the Seven Bombs.

He realizes just how much destruction his "World with No Boundaries" ideal would have caused, the amount of tragedy that would have happened had he not lost and understands this is not the way to stop war from happening. He is still a Mercenary, wondering what borders really mean.

After this battle where Cipher saved the world from the nuke, he disappeared without a trace, to this day his whereabouts are unknown The last interview the reporter does with the squadrons, in his documentary in trying to find out who Cipher was, ends with Pixy.

"It's true the world may have no need of borders, but will getting rid of them really change anything? The world will never change unless we trust people, trust is vital in a peaceful world, but that will never happen" "Will he see this video? If so, give him a message from me"

"Yo buddy, still alive? And thanks friend, see you again." Pixy being glad Cipher stopped him from committing the ultimate tragedy, and finally giving him a reason to keep going.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7QWyUDicb8
 
I also had an idea where Death is an aspect of the darkness which existed before creation and said darkness is in a constant state of war with light/life itself to regain what it lost but IDK if Death having an antagonist would make sense given what it does
 
Schnee One said:
What are some of the best evil protagonists?
Click to expand...
Light Yagami (and depending how you look at them both, also L), Lelouch vi Britannia (Yes, he is evil. Don't be blinded by his amazingly good qualities and sacrifice. That's what makes him one of the best.), The Joker from the movie, Joker.

Can't think of anymore at the moment.
 
Lelouch was more of an Anti Villan really who got twisted by his power.

Evil would be like committing genocide and enjoying it.
 
Schnee One said:
Evil would be like committing genocide and enjoying it.
Click to expand...
I think that is narrow mind view of evil. Take Dr. Wily, who is evil but is against murder. Robotic people don't follow his view of what makes life and to be fair, Mega Man isn't considered truly alive like X is.
 
Schnee One said:
Dr Wily actively enjoys causing suffering and pain, a single example doesn't restrict Evil to that specific view
Click to expand...
Lelouch has enjoyed the suffering and pain of his enemies and causing them. Or what he has viewed as his enemies. Even if his enemies are evil, that isn't by extension automatically make him a good person.
 
Lelouch vi Britannia's story does mirror some story beats of Walter White's story. Definitely not close to each other but there are some noticeable parallels.

Lelouch felt consequences of his evil actions during the course of the story while Walter White didn't feel any of the consequences really till the end of the story.
 
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