The Dark Realm [IC]

[100 % Snek]

Welcome, to the Dark Realm of Darelta
Your mind has been dragged here in your sleep, for unknown purposes, by whatever forces lie in the darkness. But that is not what matters, you are here now, and you will have to make do if you want to survive. Here in the Dark Realm, fantastical creatures are about. Snake people, skeletons, ghosts of all forms and many other creatures make this world their home. Now, you are here, but you are not the first. Others have come here before you, and who knows how many. Now, the people of this world are already accustomed to humans and other "living" species, and have accepted them into their community hold for a few rules.
1. Living may not kill creatures of this realm, intelligent or not. [Punishable by torture, imprisonment, or death]
2. Living must work like any other dark creature.
3. Living must report to The Reaper and be accounted for before they may live among us.
These rules apply to any and all Living, but the children of living and dark creatures do not need to follow these save for Rule 2 which applies to all intelligent beings.
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The World

Legend:
Four-Point Star: Capital and arrival point of most newcoming living.
Circle: Port City
Square: City
Triangle: Unsearched/discovered land.
Fun Fact: The Town of Ardel is far from being a "Town" It is a bustling city that sprung up from a town started by a ghost named Ardel, he is still there.
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Info:
Looking for the signups? Want more info about this world? Here they are: https://www.iwakuroleplay.com/threads/the-dark-realm-signups.70690/

This rp is paired with another, The Kingdom of Astaeron. Go check it out!
Sign Up for KOA: https://www.iwakuroleplay.com/threa...eron-sign-ups-always-open.58642/#post-1352985
IC For KOA: https://www.iwakuroleplay.com/threads/the-kingdom-of-astaeron.58643/
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[PrincessLala95]

A pair of dim blue-grey eyes fluttered into view from beneath dark, thick lashes as young Isabella Goldgard awoke, blinking in surprise and confusion. The ground beneath her was cold and hard, and she was lying in a small room. She slowly pulled herself into an upright position, gazing around at her surroundings. The room was plain, with a cobbled floor of dark stone and walls of plain grey bricks that looked rough to the touch. Set in one wall was a large, imposing door of dark wood with small pyramid-shaped spikes that looked like they could only harm someone if they hit you. The door had a curved handle and she was unsure where it would take her. Isabella lifted a hand and subconsciously brought it to her loose black curls, twisting one thick lock of hair around her finger. Where was she? What had happened?

The last thing Isabella remembered was confronting the man who had been eavesdropping outside of Arianna's bedchambers - he had apologized, but she didn't know what for, and she had a faint memory of his voice saying something about taking a little nap. Had he knocked her out? Was she asleep? Her mind immediately darted to the Reaper's riddle - sleep. He had told her to wear the beautiful necklace whilst sleeping and she would see the extent of the gift he had given her. Was this it? She fell asleep only to awaken in a cold stone room?

She began to look around, her hand dropping from her hair to feel for the necklace. It was still there, it seemed. She saw a small window by the low ceiling of the room, but it was barred and she would never fit. No light seemed to be seeping in through the window, nor from under the large door. Perhaps it was nighttime here? After all, it seemed dark and gloomy just in this little room. Isabella took a deep breath before pulling herself to her feet. She felt a slightly pained pang in the small of her back, probably from lying on that hard floor. She could even feel the coldness of the stone through her simple brown leather shoes, and she moved slowly towards the door. She was hesitant as she grasped the handle, its cold iron chilling her fingers, but she needed to know where she was.

She opened the door only to find that it opened into another room, slightly larger than the one she had just been in but still cold and made of stone and brick. This one had another door and a spiralling black iron staircase that led upwards. Beside the door was a large window, and out the window, Isabella could see a town - the town was engulfed in darkness, with only a few torches lighting the walkways and doorways of the buildings. Despite the darkness, however, the town was bustling - and Isabella couldn't see one human like herself among the crowds. There were skeleton figures strolling casually along, one even carrying a tiny sleeping skeletal child. There were ghosts, transparent and translucent figures of people floating or walking along on their merry way. More unsettling yet were the snakelike beings that made their way around. It all seemed so normal, save for the cloaking of darkness that hung over the city and the strangeness of the people.

There was a terrified knot in Isabella's stomach. Was this the land of the dead? Some world of beings gone from the real world? She looked down at herself - but she was neither skeletal nor ghostly and pale. She was very much human. So surely she wasn't dead...was she? She turned from the window, not wanting to gaze upon the terrifying sight before her any longer. She looked at the house before her. It seemed to be just a simple house like one that people would live in, but it was empty entirely. She couldn't decide what to do - should she wander outside and see if one of the strange beings would be kind enough to tell her where she was? Should she make her way up the spiral staircase to see if she could find out anything else? Part of her wanted to simply curl up on the floor and cry.

She finally decided to make her way upstairs first. She grasped the cold railing of the staircase as she circled upwards, finding herself in a short hallway with three doors. Again, everything was empty and made of cold, rough stone bricks. She sighed to herself and went to open the first of the doors on the right - this room was not empty, much to her surprise, as it contained a small chamber pot and nothing more. So it was a home, and this was the washroom. She shut the door and went to the one beside it, opening it up to reveal yet another empty room. The last of the three doors, this one on the left side of the hallway, opened into another large and empty room, this one with another door leading to another empty room that could probably serve as a walk-in closet. A thought suddenly darted across Isabella's mind - was this hers? Perhaps the Reaper's gift, Isabella thought as she gently touched the lovely necklace he had given to her, was that he was giving her a home of her very own in his world.

 

[100 % Snek]

There was a knock at the door downstairs from Isabella. The knock seemed long and drawn out, followed by a voice. It was feminine, but not just regularly feminine, this voice seemed almost seductive. "Hello? Isss anyone in there? The Reaper told me to check on thisss house if I heard anything." Outside was a snake woman, brilliantly colored in reds,oranges, and yellows. He hair tied at the back, but flowed out from that point. Her eyes were a striking yellow, her pupils reptilian and narrow. Her features were fair and beautiful, her teeth sharp and pointed. She wore a circlet with an onyx gem sitting in it's center around her forehead, and a necklace with a spider hanging on her chest. On her body was a long, velvet coat that went to her tail. On her hands she wore two rings with metal claws extending from them, one on each index finger. She carried with her a large black book with the reapers symbol, a skull with two scythes crossing behind it, on it's cover.

 

[King_Dalmasca]

"Gah!" Maven yelled as he awoke in the middle of a forest. His eyes met an entirely different scene from just a few moments ago, the very world around him seemed to have changed dramatically. Maven got to his feet slowly, his body feeling a bit heavy and weak at the same time. As he scanned his surroundings as well as himself, he noticed that the Queen and the Reaper are no where to be found. Furthermore, all of his equipment from before is gone; only his clothing remained with him.

"What happened, where the hell am I?" he asked himself literally looking for answers. As he gazed up towards the dark, disorted sky he finds it somewhat familiar. He takes a few wild guess but nothing seems to come clear until it hits him. He remembers all of this for just a breif moment.

"This world... it's the Reapers! He tried to banish me here and then..." Maven stopped there, trying to remember what happened next. As it seems, he can't recall what transpired afterwards but he knew the last thing he saw was with the Reaper, the Queen, and some sort of ripple in space. Maven came to the conclusion that the Reaper may be his only way to escape this realm and plans to call him out, defeat him, and get the answers he was desperately looking for.

"Alright, so which way to do I go?" Maven looks around and notices an extremely dark and large castle. Most likely, that was where he should have been heading. He believed that the castle before him may be the Reaper's home. When Maven began to walk, the sudden sound of dreaded growling entered his ears, and Maven was surrounded by a group of undead beasts.

"What the..? I don't have time for this!" Maven tried to attack the undead beasts with his bare hands but it had no effect on them. This only pushed them back but they kept attacking Maven. He backed against one of the dead trees in the forest realm and found himself cornered. When he thought this may be it, a truly pathetic death by a bunch of undead beasts, this strange feeling from deep within him started to spark. As an undead beast's jaws widened for an attack, Maven held his hand up to block it and then a burst of some sort of crimson energy came from his palms and launched the undead beast flying. This blast was so powerful that it, in one shot, defeated the undead beast.

"What? There's no way! I can't use magic... unless..." then he figured it out. Maybe this place has affected him or something deeper like his soul soul somehow, even to the point where latent abilities like his demon magic may be reached. Maven focused and covered his body in a dark crimson glow for the first time, as he smirked at the many undead beasts surrounding him.

"I'm pushed for time right now, but I hate to admit that I should probably get a little practice in. Don't you think?" he asked the undead beasts rhetorically before destroying them all in a large scale hack and slash brawl. After that time wasting stunt of blasts and explosions, Maven makes his way to the Reaper's castle. He traveled towards the base of the castle and after a while, found himself in a strange looking town. There were floating balls of blue fire, what seem to look like ghosts, and even skeletons.

"Woah... this is a bit... consuming." he said feeling that this experience is way before his actual time. Still, he didn't let it distract him. Trotting onward, the base of the Reaper's castle, formally known as Tower of Death, was before him. He prepared himself for the battle of a lifetime, or after -lifetime so to speak.

"Well... here goes. I'm coming father!!" he said pressing against the massive doors with his new magic powers and entering a portal on his way in. A bright light covered his sight and he found himself blinded by it. It was heavy, warm, and felt very familiar. Maven walked through and the doors behind him shut, locking him inside wherever he traveled to.

 

[PrincessLala95]

Isabella jumped at hearing a knock, followed by the faint sound of a voice from outside the door downstairs. She moved back towards the spiral staircase, making her way downwards as quickly as she could without falling. She was a bit hesitant as she approached the door - the voice had sounded strange, and the people outside when last she checked the window had all been strange. However, the voice had mentioned the Reaper, whom Isabella trusted - and if the Reaper had entrusted this person to check in on her, she ought to trust them as well.

She grasped the doorknob and twisted it open, opening her mouth to speak but then freezing up somewhat when she saw the brightly-coloured snake woman outside. Isabella had never expected to consider a snake woman beautiful, but this one certainly was, with bright yellow eyes, beautiful flowing hair that was tied back, and facial features - the shape of her eyes, her nose, her lips - that were beautiful no matter what species wore them. Isabella froze for a moment, taking in the appearance of the snake woman before her. She suddenly felt underdressed, clad only in her servant uniform - a simple brown dress with a cream-coloured apron - and the necklace given to her by the Reaper. She wasn't sure what it was that kept her from talking - fear, timidity, shyness, astonishment - but she stood there awkwardly and wordlessly for several long moments, simply staring at the woman in front of her.

 

[100 % Snek]

The sanke woman looked at Isabella a moment, she seemed to bein shock for a moment, but then regained her standing. "So, you must be the first person the Reaper has chosen...My name is Vera. I am the Reaper's personal assistant, a servant, you might say." Vera looked up and around at the house "I see the Reaper spared no expense for you, this is one of the nicer houses around here, and it's already been paid in full.Not only that..." She opened the large black book "But he has also given you a large sum of money to furnish as you wish. Not to mention assigning me as guide to tel you about this world. You must be special to the Reaper to be the first he gave his necklace to."

 

[PrincessLala95]

Isabella felt a slight blush come to her cheeks at the mere thought of being special to the Reaper, but quickly shook it away. She reminded herself mentally that the Reaper was a being who reaped souls and carried the dead to this world, not some guy who could develop feelings for some girl. She did like this Vera girl, especially when she mentioned that she was, in essence, a servant. Isabella immediately felt something of a connection there, perhaps because she was also a servant. The mere idea of decorating the way she wanted excited her - after all, she lived in the servants' quarters back home, and the closest she got to decorating the way she wanted was occasionally putting a vase with flowers on her dresser, or the hanging picture of herself with her family on the wall above her bed.

"My name is Isabella," she said, lifting one hand and gently running it through her thick, dark curls. "I'm a servant to the Queen of Astaeron. I was the first person to meet the Reaper when he arrived. He came in through a portal that had formed in the Queen's bedchamber and I went in to tidy it..." She smiled a bit, gazing curiously at Vera. "So this is the land of the dead...?"

 

[100 % Snek]

Vera looked at Isabella a moment before continuing. "Well, in a way, yes, and in a way...no. But I won't get too deep into that. You see, not ALL dead come here. Some do, so far, we know that War heros, Priests, the most evil of souls, and those who die in the ocean do not end up here. We have come to beleive this is the gods influence, but we cannot be sure. Now, may I welcome you to our little community! There is a variety of races that live here, though there are some general categories. We have Skeletons, Ghosts, and my race, the Naga. But anyway, I am at your disposal for now milady. Where would you like to go? We could go to the store to get your furnishings, or perhaps the clothing department, or perhaps the Reaper's home?" Vera awaited Isabella's response with a smile...a sharp-toothed smile.

 

[PrincessLala95]

Isabella was quiet as she listened to Vera's explanation. It was an odd one - this was certainly not where she had imagined herself going in the future when she died. It seemed like any other place, but dark, and filled with strange creatures. She gave Vera a nod, and as the snake woman - Naga, she seemed to recall Vera's word being - smiled and asked her a question, Isabella got excited. A smile came to her own lips and she paused thoughtfully.

"I think our first order of business should be the house," she said, glancing over her shoulder at the emptiness of the stone building. "I've never had a place to myself...I have so many ideas," she added with a soft giggle.

 

[100 % Snek]

Vera smiled as Isabella contemplated ideas. "Well, I guess we are off to the store! The carpenter should hqve plenty in terms of furniture. As for the more niceity side of furnishings, our local merchant has large selection of housing goods. I could also hire some laborers to carry in the heavier objects if you wish." She pulled open the black book and simply spoke the words "Ana Kel Vere Tomus" Suddenly upon the currently blank page was a map of the entire town with points showing the shops and other such points of interest. "This should help us get there and back without a problem." The map itself showed the entire city. It was built in a circular shape with the Reaper's Tower sitting in the center.