The Premise
You've seen ghosts all of your life. You used to think that you were crazy - maybe you've been brought to a psychiatrist, maybe you've been diagnosed with some mental disorder, maybe you've even been forced to take certain medication - but the dead, they never go away.
Now, you know better.
Through some circumstance, through some unknown gene passed into you by your parents, or maybe even through some sort of unheard of strain of virus you came in contact with at a young age, you can see ghosts, and others like you can too. Others, veterans, have found you and have mentored you to show that you've been given a gift that can help all of those ghosts trapped within the Grim.
And to purge the festering monsters they turn into when their own ties to the Earth are left unsolved for too long.
It is your job, as well as many others, to release the ghosts of their tethers so that they may pass in peace and to kill the ones whose unfinished business has remained incomplete for too long. And as Halloween approaches, the border between the dead and living grows ever more hazy. So,
Good luck out there, Reaper.
Now, you know better.
Through some circumstance, through some unknown gene passed into you by your parents, or maybe even through some sort of unheard of strain of virus you came in contact with at a young age, you can see ghosts, and others like you can too. Others, veterans, have found you and have mentored you to show that you've been given a gift that can help all of those ghosts trapped within the Grim.
And to purge the festering monsters they turn into when their own ties to the Earth are left unsolved for too long.
It is your job, as well as many others, to release the ghosts of their tethers so that they may pass in peace and to kill the ones whose unfinished business has remained incomplete for too long. And as Halloween approaches, the border between the dead and living grows ever more hazy. So,
Good luck out there, Reaper.
The DDS
Dealing with the dead all the time can get pretty depressing. Luckily, being a hired Reaper has its benefits: you can get loads of money if you're good at it, you get a ton of healthcare and a paid psychiatrist, you can work quite literally whenever you want, and you get out scott-free of any trouble you might get into while trespassing and doing some other equally illegal things (as long as you can prove it was for the sake of Reaping). I mean, what else will you do with your life? Become a tarot card reader and comfort hysteric family members for the rest of your sorry existence? Yeah, I don't think so. Welcome to the Department of Deceased Services, or the DDS for short.
The Grim and the Grim Shroud
At some point in your younger life you've might have thought that you were going temporarily color blind, a sensation where the color around you might dull or seep all color out completely. Maybe you had just been nodding off during your history class or you were just walking down the street, and you used to sum it up to the medication you might have been taking or some other strange side effect of something else. What actually was happening was that your Reaping gift was beginning to bloom, and that you were unknowingly entering what the Reaper community has dubbed the Grim.
It is the grey world of the ghosts and monsters, composed of shadow and mist, the living still present but no longer tangible. In the Grim, you can see people still walking down the streets, traffic still rumbling along, but all are completely oblivious to you now.
Ghosts, however, can see you very clearly.
Unlike everything else, you still breathe with life and pigmentation. It is imperative that you enter the Grim in your Grim Shroud. Your Grim Shroud is the impersonation of your spirit, an extension of who you are, that manifests when you slip on your mask. Your mask is something that reveals itself to you when you have fully bloomed as a Reaper, a mask that exists in the living world that calls upon you. It can be anything, from one fit for a masquerade to one as smooth and as blank as white glass. Whatever it looks like, you must wear it before slipping into the Grim. Once in the Grim the mask will transform your appearance to completely veil the fact that you are indeed a living, breathing human being, into something that would far more fit the fairy tales of death.
It is you, not the mask, that transverses yourself into Grim. The Grim Shroud is simply a disguise - but a vital one. If you were to enter Grim after your blooming as a Reaper without one in place you will be a beacon to all things dead. No longer are they the forlorn and lost souls that you deal with in the living world - at the sight of you, a Reaper without a Shroud to disguise them, a being that is alive in the Grim, they will try to literally eat you in their attempt to become living again. Most times it is simply your un-Shrouded presence that attracts them. Sometimes, it even triggers them into the monsters that live under everyone's bed. Removing your mask or having your mask knocked off in the Grim will have the same effect. A bite from a ghost or a monster will leave you with a sickness that, if not treated immediately and properly, will slowly clot and suffocate your heart. That is, if you manage to escape. To slip in and out of the Grim you must utterly empty your mind, which is a bit difficult when you're about to be eaten.
Bottom line: keep your mask on when going into the Grim.
Your Grim Shroud wouldn't leave you without a means to defend yourself, of course. How will you purge the Grim of the ghosts-turned-monsters without a weapon? This, too, is an extension of who you are. Your weapon may be a whip, some sort of fancy stake, dual axes, or the classic scythe. Whatever genius monster-fighting contraption your beautiful soul produces, it is yours for life, and should be as unique as you are. No matter if a monster knocks it out of your hand, it will return to you in the Grim just like your mask does in the living world, Grim Shroud or no Grim Shroud in place. Be extremely cautious, however. If your Grim weapon were to cut something living, including yourself and other Reapers, it will immediately stop their heart.
Bottom line: keep your Grim weapon in check.
The Monsters
As a reaper, you're paid by the case and by the monster. The bigger the case, or the bigger the monster, the bigger the reward. As cases are usually more time consuming, some reapers only hunt monsters. But as hunting can be extremely dangerous, other reapers focus on releasing ghosts from their ties to the earth. However if you don't hunt or solve ghost cases at all your paycheck will look rather bare. To avoid faking killing a monster or purging a ghost, you have to report to the DDS and have a representative from the office confirm it and give it his or her signature of approval of the case first before you actually get anything done, and again after the case is solved. So, happy reaping on that note!
The monsters (also called demons) that you will encounter in the Grim were once the confused and forlorn ghosts that you interact with on the daily, except their ties to the earth have been unresolved for so long that their ghostly selves had manifested into something rabid. These demons, when left to their own devices, grow and grow and are known for sucking upon the life force of the living, and a big part of their severity is a result of the seriousness of the ghost's ties and emotional baggage. All of them are solid black with the occasional white markings with a very wide variety of different physiques, and their weak or "killing" spot is a patch of white that roughly resembles an eye that can be anywhere on its body. For simplicity reasons, the DDS has organized them into categories.
Type 1
These are the harmless guys. They can't do much except for ruin your mood a little bit, and are mostly found scurrying about the Grim like rats, and they are about the size of a corgi. Rarely are they the kind to generate into something severe given the time and mostly they never move to another stage. These will get you a few bucks at most.
Type 2
These are the kinds that are more prone to minor possessions, usually hanging over the shoulder or trailing behind the life force they're sucking off of. They're pesky and tricky to catch mostly because they're fast and slippery and they are about the size of large dogs. They're worth a bit more, mostly because ghosts who turn into these will progress into a bigger problem later, and no one likes to be possessed. These are one of the most common types of monsters that reapers will hunt.
Type 3
These are where your reaping will be the most, as killing one will get you paid relatively well and catching them is easier than the higher types. Type 3 monsters are almost always possessing someone, and unlike a Type 2 monster they can control the body if their victim is vulnerable enough to them, which given time will happen. These types aim to kill their victims through suicide because in the moment between life and death the monster can devour the victim's life energy before it has a chance to become a ghost. Type 3 monsters are the size of a baby deer.
Type 4
These are the kinds that like to haunt specific buildings, areas, and objects that they had been connected to as a ghost. They're the typical terror, with the ability to make contact with objects in the real world and throw them, scratch them, etc. They can fully possess people but only for brief moments, and are usually as big as a bear. Kill one of these, and you could have dinner for a month.
Type 5
Type 5 monsters are very dangerous. They possess their victims subtly and integrate themselves into the person's mind so it is very difficult to remove it from its victim, and often times it is hard to see the demon as it hides in the person's shadow. This type slowly takes control of its victim's mind and compels him or her into madness, and sometimes if it hasn't been removed yet it convinces the person to kill others. It will feed off of the person and the person's own victims until he or she eventually dies from the prolonged exposure to the demon. Get one of these human sized demons killed and you can finally get that new surround sound you've been eyeing for a while.
Type 6
These are never to be attempted alone or without the DDS's approval, and are simply foolhardy to try to kill. They are composed of not one ghost, but of many who have turned into their monstrous selves and have morphed into one large, festering demon, progressing so instantly that they don't even remain in their ghostly stage for more than a minute. Most often they appear after a substantial amount of deaths in the same place in the same time frame, manifesting along with any major tragedy. The smallest ones could be about the size of a one story building, the bigger ones larger than a skyscraper.
Luckily the latter type 6 are only visible when you're high up and they mind their business unless provoked, collectively sucking upon the life force of an entire city from the clouds. The DDS, in fear of the amount of lives that will be lost and the damage caused, purposefully leave the bigger ones alone. The department has veterans monitor their movements but nothing more than that since the damage that they cause normally do not result in anything more than making everyone more depressed, since it is sucking on the life of a large population and not an individual. The smaller ones on the ground floor, however, are cause for much more immediate concern. They can pluck a human's soul out of its body and eat it like it's a tic tac.
Keep in mind that hunting is grueling, back-breaking work. Its hard to make a living off of killing demons, and constantly having to keep yourself and the oblivious pedestrians alive when in the grind of battle is even harder. Casualties happen all of the time.
The Rules
No. 1 I am the boss and what I say goes. Any managers I appoint as well.
No. 2 Swearing is allowed, but please keep any potential sex scenes at a need-to-know basis.
No. 3 Please respect your fellow purging-mates and their characters and treat them as you would like to be treated. Any interactions between characters must have both of the writers' approval. No killing off of other people's characters without permission, and please do not god-mod.
No. 4 Please keep your posts at least a page's length, and keep recap of previous posts to a minimum.
No. 5 Approach me with any and all ideas you have for this Storybook! I would love to hear them.
No. 6 All not previously stated YWS rules apply.
Did you notice how I stopped at 6? Please reply a "666" in your next DT post so I know you've read this. ;D
Character Template
- Code: Select all
(Please delete everything in parenthesis <3)
[b]Name:[/b]
[b]Age:[/b] (Teenagers would still be in the blooming stage, so preferably I'm looking for 20+.)
[b]Looks:[/b]
[b]The Grim Shroud:[/b] (This is how your character looks in the Grim. Include description of mask, outfit, and weapon. Your overall clothing should look like some variant of the classic Grim Reaper, but with your own creative twist.)
[b]Personality:[/b] (Negative and positive traits as well, please.)
[b]Purging Style:[/b] (How does your character fight? Are they quick and agile, or are they aggressive and flashy? Include weaknesses as well as strengths.)
[b]Backstory:[/b] (They've seen ghosts all of their life. How have they coped with this and how have others treated them in how they respond to seeing the dead? Include other aspects as well please.)
[b]Not Listed:[/b]
Gender:
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