01: Outside Barrier Report!

[iustaegis]

Good morning, everyone!

A few weeks ago, Somnus, Noctis, and I were granted permission to explore northward beyond the walls and barrier.  Please see the attached files as to what we've discovered:

[ 1. A video of the outside, recorded on their communicator. Beyond the barrier, as most may have already seen from previous recordings, is a wasteland with a thick, caustic atmosphere. Visibility is low, but not terrible. The video is mostly the three of them traveling along with their NPC guide, Calda. The video cuts to various segments of their travels, some of which show either Noctis or Somnus warping ahead or above to keep surveillance, although it might be difficult to determine which one is which from far away in their exosuits and helmets. Another clip appears to be taken some distance from the barrier, zooming outward towards the wastes. Northward, it a eroded road extends out; in the distance, a shadow of what appears to be mountains loom.

2. An aerial map of the northern region just beyond the wall, composited from a series of photos taken at the same altitude. It shows a few decrepit, eroded buildings and roads, as if the city had extended well beyond where the barrier stands today.  No craters mark the terrain, although some buildings might appear to be as if something knocked or crashed into them. The grooves surrounding the norther portion of the wall can also be spotted from this view.

3. A video of a skeletal behemoth with a flower growing outside of its skull...being totally demolished by a joint attack from Somnus and Noctis, fighting together in tandem. The monster ends up crumpling to the ground, spilling out an oily black substance between its cracking, dismanteling ribcage. Go them!  

To find out more about these discoveries, continue reading below: ]

While visibility was low, we were able to travel out as far as our guide would permit us.

Some of us might recall the virtual reality "Memories of the Sun" program, in which participants were allowed to ascend a sacred mountain called Fractured Hill. This landmark was said to be north of the city. The VR did not have any indication of the city when looking soutward upon the summit for Havenwell; however, looking out northward beyond the barrier in reality, there appears to be a mountain range in the distance.

We've discovered that deep grooves track inward towards the walls, and these grooves apparently surround the entirety of the city's wall. Together with the evidence of buildings and roads beyond the current barrier, we suspect that these markings might indicate that the wall was originally at a greater radius from the citycenter, encompassing more area than what it does today. For whatever reason, it's been scaled back from its original position.

We entered some of the more stable-appearing towers and buildings, looking for artifacts and anything that appeared to be electronics, or metalwares. Unfortunately, most of what we've discovered was too fragile to return with us. Almost everything disintegrated whenever we attempted to hold them.

The skeletal creature we encountered was dead; however, the flower atop of its skull, the poinsettia, was, and still is, alive. The roots shrivel when the flower is severed from the skeleton, which breaks apart without the network that integrates it. This creature also produced a caustic, concentrated dark substance. This substance may contain toxin which produces the same illness-like symptoms many of us may have experienced near the breach of the barrier.

 On a similarly related note, Besithia was able to lend me a few samples of the gigarachnids' black fluid found within their bodies, which I was able to analyze. This fluid is mostly their blood, which seems to be a darker color to begin with, but under further scrutiny, it appears to contain a toxin. This toxin appears to have mutated the arachnids. Similarly, when exposed to this toxin, it produces symptoms that mimic an inflammatory response: malaise, cough, chills, and fever.

I believe that the sickness that one feels when being exposed to the outside environment is not produced by an infectious, living organism, but by the very same toxin found in these creatures. This toxin is carried in the atmosphere, which explains that mere exposure to the outside atmosphere is enough to inflict an adverse reaction that mimics an illness. This "illness" cannot be fully cured by medicine or magic, or at least not by any I'm yet aware of. For those of you who are new to this world, the current treatment we have for these symptoms is through physical touch, and this works to alleviate the illness in as little as a few minutes of contact.

Noctis and I will be available to answer any questions regarding the expedition, the samples gathered, or the process for petitioning an expedition beyond the barrier and what preparations to take.

Comments

1/3

[scourgingstars]

[how does he save this video, he's so proud of his dumbass family]

[scourgingstars]

[Just give him a second to actually read through this...]

done

[scourgingstars]

['Not an infectious living organism' was of absolutely no comfort, because the rest was so alarmingly familiar that he couldn't actually think straight for a moment. Did the distinction even matter at all, whether it was a living plague or a toxic component of blood itself? And even if something that straightforward could alleviate the symptoms, did contact alone truly cure it? What if it was merely lying dormant in those that had briefly fallen ill, himself included?]

[What if things worsened, and what if his power did nothing for it this time?]

thank you all for your efforts. [His hands were shaking as he tried to compose a calm answer, and it took longer than he might have liked.] the two of you, and my brother as well.

[iustaegis]

[ As it were, testing to see if it is dormant in people's blood is another part of the process. Unfortunately, they haven't gotten there yet. Pyra does not have blood to spare for conventional testing, being what she is... ]

You are welcome. They've done a great deal of the work, taking that monster down in little more than a minute!

Do you have any questions?

[scourgingstars]

[which posed another problem, because it would be a cold day in hell when Ardyn let Verstael get anywhere near his blood or what he had instead of it.]

just one

are all of you feeling well after returning?

[iustaegis]

We returned [ Weeks ago. ] with no injuries, I am happy to report!

The exosuits given to us by the locals are only a one-time use, and they could not sustain us for too long. Thankfully, we made it back in time.

[audio]

[flawed_immortality]

[y'know what he's going to go throw himself over the wall so you fools stop endangering yourselves.]

I see you were busy while I slept.

[If his dumbass Prince did this before Cor fell unconscious, please don't tell him.]

One would think that it would be noted somewhere that the wall needed to be pulled back. Likely at the same time the gods' powers began to fail.

[Private]
Did you see any evidence of a building that may have once been an additional temple?

audio in return

[iustaegis]

[ The Founder King and the Chosen King certainly did do this. Together. Weeks ago! Because she asked them. Oops. ]

That's a reasonable theory. The energy in the barrier is directly tied to the gods... So if it happened, it happened a very long time ago.

Private
We saw old towers that were on the verge of collapse and buildings of the same condition. No temples, but... [ A pause. ] What sort of temple? One for the Crawling One or one the Flying One? [ The two unnamed gods, as it were, assuming the titles given in the new archives belong to the unnamed gods. Unless he has additional information? ]

[flawed_immortality]

Something similar was necessary in our home, as I'm sure Noctis told you. His grandfather scaled the wall back a great deal.

[Don't mind him if there's the faintest hint of strain in his voice at `his grandfather`. Not a sore spot in his history with Mors at all, nope.]

Private
Precisely that. I suspect temples for them would not necessarily be at the cardinal points so it would be difficult to determine where exactly to search. Hopefully any who go beyond the Wall keep a watchful eye out for any such evidence.

[iustaegis]

[ While she catches the inflection in his tone, she's not sure what it signifies; does he sound strained because they had to pull back the wall at all, in his world...? ]

Was it a strategic move, scaling the wall back? The scenario could have been same, for Havenwell. Either there was a decrease in power that led to the barrier unable to support a wider area, or tightening the integrity of the barrier under a smaller area made it stronger.

[ She's inclined to believe that it's more the former than the latter. ]

Private
...I would think their temples to be in the sky or atop a mountain. For the other, perhaps... beneath the ground.

[ --Are her guesses, anyway. The passage states the Crawling one and burrowing beneath the ground. The Winged One, however, could literally be up in the sky, or atop a mountain. Given the impressive technology she sees here, she wouldn't doubt that building a temple underground or somehow in the sky atop a platform would be beyond them.

Then again, she could be thinking of the passage too literally. It's difficult for her to say at this point. Those of her world would write a number of myths dedicated to their god and what he did, but very little, if anything of it, was the truth. What of the passages here?

It's all they have to go by, unfortunately. Their best leads. ]

[carbungle]

[DON'T @ HIM, COR]

We told Dad we were going, take it up with him.

[Or at least Somnus told Regis that he was going. That's enough, right?]

[flawed_immortality]

Mmhmmm

What exactly did you tell him?

[Iggy has taught you too well, brat child.]

[carbungle]

Me? Nothing. Somnus said he was going to pass the info along.

[It's called delegating, Cor.]

I did tell Ignis and Prompto.

[And Luna, but if he avoids saying her name out loud maybe the depression will go away...!]

video

[begguiling]

So this is what you've been up to . . . well, how are you feeling after all that? I hope you've been getting all kinds of healing hugs! Seriously, for this kind of effort, we should be lining up to hug you anyway!

permavid just for magolor

[iustaegis]

[ Flattery? She will answer in kind. Had this been a conversation in person, her replay would have come smoothly, without missing a beat: ] I will always take more hugs from our very handsome Emissary.

[ U know where she and Somnus live.

But also, network sucks because you can't engage in contact! Why! ]

FOR NOW!

[begguiling]

[For his first several months here he avoided the network entirely, and this is exactly why. It's such a pain getting all your casual touching in when you're talking to a screen! Stupid millennials!

That aside:]

Welllll, if you insist.

[she didn't, but]

I'm on my way! Where are you right now? Don't tell me you really are laid low with the toxin?

[iustaegis]

If I am, you know just the thing that might cure it. [ Touch!

Anyway, insert her and Somnus' address to their brand new house! The scaled up, and it even has a garage (unfortunately, without any current vehicles or spaceships).

When he arrives, she'll greet him at the door with open arms to lead him inside, which is barebones in terms of furniture. A few flowers sit upon a vase on the kitchen counter-top: an arrangement of pearl, blood-red, and indigo sylleblossoms of Eos. ]

It's better, to talk like this. [ She says, settled with him, however she's carrying or holding him this fine morning. If he has any outstanding questions, she'll allow him to voice them. ]

text.

[astralera]

Thank you for the information.

The hidden passage that Magolor shared from the archives does match with what we've seen of the outside thus far, particularly with the additional knowledge you've acquired.

`Through the soil, through the plants, through the creatures that walked the land unknowing. Like a parasite it was passed through life's endless circle. Like dust it moved into the air. And like that which birthed it, death followed.`

The flower — was there any sign it was sustaining itself with the substance the creature produced, or that it may have been a parasitic vector for the spread of the toxin?

[iustaegis]

Both the air and the soil contain traces of the toxin, much like how the passage notes the poison to do so in the passage. [ Well, it was safe to assume that the air at least did already, for those who worked close to the breach tended to become ill fairly quickly. ]

The flower is able to sustain itself even when severed from the head. This leads me to believe that the flower was a separate entity from the skeletal creature, for we saw more of them without the flower upon them.

As for the ooze the creatures produced, it was extremely caustic as an attack against us, capable of eroding the ground wherever it landed. I've no doubt it could consume through metal itself. I gathered it after it was more inert, and after some analysis, it doesn't appear to be a toxin similar to that which is found in the air or soil. Additionally, it doesn't produce the same sort of malaise, but more of an allergic response: rash and hives, for instance. Unlike the sickness as is felt by coming in contact with the air, these symptoms of the creature's ooze do not appear to be remedied by touch.

[Audio]

[original_is_best]

An impressive feat...

Have you been able to analyze the toxin from the flower and compare it to the toxin in the spider blood as of yet? It would seem they both likely come from the same source.

still text

[iustaegis]

As it turns out, the flower is not the culprit of the ooze, but perhaps the creatures themselves? [ Unless the creatures got the ooze from somewhere else. ] While the spiders' blood contains the toxin, the ooze seems to contain a toxin, too, but it's different from that found in the air. The ooze produces an allergic-type response in its milder forms: hives and a rash. It's unpleasant, and while it does not seem to be remedied by touch, [ No matter how much she's been cuddling Somnus. ] it does fade after some time. I would also like to warn that the ooze while within the skeletal creature was highly caustic.

The air sample and the soil sample both contain the what we believe to be the same malaise-inducing toxin found in the spiders' blood.

Speaking of the spiders' blood, Besithia, I was unable to analyze the extent of its mutations in the sample of it you had given me. Its flesh appears to be too worn, and any genetic material was too degraded to yield any results.

[original_is_best]

A shame. I shall have to acquire new bodies. At the time there was no way to properly store them, but I am in the process of building a space for it. At the very least we were able to extract some information first.

From your analysis, it would seem there is more than one kind of toxin outside.

It would seem as if the fauna and floral perhaps mutated in order to survive the toxic environment, rather than being that way originally. Just a hypothesis. And, as I suspected, we are finding things that touch does not cure now. We will have to learn to protect ourselves.

You have done good work.

[iustaegis]

It could be that this toxin is derived solely from the creature, not the environment, but I confess that more time and testing will be needed to be completed beforehand.

It seems that way, yes. Even if I am unable to analyze the rest of the giant arachnids, I would guess that the mutations come secondary to being exposed by a copious amount of toxin, in their case. [ She has more to say on this front, but she's going to stop there, instead saying: ]

Are you able to meet in person?

text

[scentsitivity]

pyra-san,

thank you for you and your companion's efforts in looking into the outsider world. please send my regards to both somnus-san and noctis-san!

i don't quite understand everything, but this illness affects all living creatures? what happened to the infected spiders, can you please tell me more about them?

[iustaegis]

Tanjiro! You are welcome. I will pass on the message to the both of them. They were incredibly brave to come with me on this exploration.

In regard to the gigarachnids, they originally entered this city during the breach about a half-year ago in Lasohm. Samples of them were collected, and I was able to analyze their blood. Their blood contains the toxin found in the air and soil. The spiders' genetic code was mutated by it.

The toxin seems to indiscriminately effect us otherworlders, regardless of whether we are completely human or not. As for other living creatures as the passage Magolor discovered suggested, I am not sure.