cultor | CALCUTTA • JULY 2025 EVENT

Entry tags:

CALCUTTA • JULY 2025 EVENT

EVENT: CALCUTTA

ᛗ
I am caught, tangled in

( content warnings: body horror, surreal horror, post-apocalyptic themes )

You wake with soil under your nails, something sharp in your mouth, and the scent of damp rust in the back of your throat. The sky is not night, but it is no longer day. Around you, a city's skeleton lies tangled in ruin and overgrowth in the crisp, tail end nips of autumn— skyscrapers strangled by vine and mycelium tower around you, streets are cracked open like wounds. No sound of civilization. Only wind, soft and low like breath.

You are not where you should be, and you are not entirely who you were. Do you remember the dream you had? Perhaps barely, perhaps almost too vividly. You will likely find a mask nearby— one you find familiar. While you may not have the same urgency to wear it as you did within the dreamscape, you at the very least feel the need to carry it with you now.

Some wake in subway tunnels pulsing with bioluminescence, others in penthouse ruins swallowed by moss and red ivy. Rooftop gardens filled with brittle blossoms. Empty galleries hung with paintings that seem to shift when you’re not looking. Vessels are absolutely scattered. You can wake up anywhere that's possible within the bones of this city. Life endures here, but it is changed. In the streets, rats with slick, glowing underskin scurry between collapsed signs. Pigeons wheel overhead, blind-eyed and silent. Dogs and cats roam in feral bands, some marked by fungal growths, others with bodies too long, too many limbs, or split maws bursting with tendrils. Deer can also be found roaming the enclosure of what used to be Central Park, and will open their strange mouths when they seem to stare at you. Seem, because they no longer have eyes to do that with. From deeper shadows and thicker canopies come the zoo escapees: a moose that climb walls and have a petrifying gaze, herds of zebra stand frozen like littered statues until they hear noises, to which they will scatter like roaches. Sewer grates rattle beneath your feet, and something wet and ancient stirs in the depths— Hippos that release toxic gases when threatened lay in the waters and gnaw on anything they could get their teeth on. The most gentle of them all are the giraffes; they still attempt to nibble on the falling sunset leaves where still gathered, and will even come up to humans who offer anything green for them to eat. There's so much more left unsaid, if you're unlucky enough to come across them.

The flora is no safer. Familiar trees such as maple, ginkgo and oak still grow in parks and fracture ciment with their powerful roots. Plenty of the bark is etched with a strange set of sigils that hum when approached. Ivy pulses with low light and throbs when touched. Entire buildings are choked with fungus: spires of mushroom growths that sway despite the absence of wind, spores spilling like ash when disturbed. Moss spreads across broken windows in fractal shapes, responding to movement, to emotion with colors beyond what you could imagine. Wildflowers bloom in moonlight— roses with petal-thorns and daffodils exhale perfume that clouds your thoughts.

And still, the city seems to watch you soundlessly. Beneath your feet, the soil responds. Something old sleeps in the brickwork, the concrete, the iron bones of this place— and your presence has stirred it.

You'd better get moving. Survive.

NOTES:

• You must find shelter, water, and food. Anything that can be found in city stores is plausible, but much of the food will be expired or ransacked by the lives before yours, or animals. The Host-fauna are edible if you can stomach it, and some may talk in tongues before they die. The flora is a mixed bag, from harmless to not.
• The environment is reactive: Touch a wall and it pulses. Step into an abandoned deli and the shelves might whisper for a second.

OPTIONAL TOKEN EFFECTS

• Tokens will feel a strange resonance when near remnants of human structure, especially things tied to strong emotion (graffiti, photos, childhood toys, street art, music).
• Tokens will feel warm when close to sites where others have suffered or are remembered deeply. These sensations are disorienting but emotionally vivid, almost like deja vu.
• Tokens could experience nosebleeds or migraines near intense emotional hotspots. This is their magic wanting an outlet, but too newly formed to pour itself out.

OPTIONAL OFFERING EFFECTS

• Offerings will feel the thrum of the Murmur, like a second heartbeat in the earth, when near fungal flora or decayed nature.
• Offerings will feel oddly familiar with the world around them, as if it recognizes them and vice verse. Scents linger longer and skin responds to temperature or emotion in exaggerated ways.
• The act of hunting and consuming host fauna is euphoric, but only for a moment— followed by a haunting awareness of their own anatomy shifting from the inside in ways they should fear.

ᛗ
And I wake, say your name

( content warnings: sensory distortion )

One night— it doesn't matter which, time has loosened— your mask beckons. Something is encouraging you to put it on. It sears cold when you do. A pressure behind your eyes grows sharp, then splits. Suddenly, the silence inside your skull isn't yours anymore.

The Murmur is stirring.

A psychic thread pulls taut through your mind like a bow ready to shoot. Language might fail. Images are the easiest to come first— flickers of hands, blood, feathers, fire. Then voices, soft and reverent, speaking your name in words you don't know but understand. Some speak back. Some yell. Some sing. You sense others, Tokens humming with potential, Offerings heavy with heat and pain.

You are not alone. You never were.

NOTES:

• Your gamewide "network" is live! Try to reach someone through the Murmur. Perhaps a thought, a memory, or just a name. Players are welcomed to create prompts within this log or post to the network community proper.
• Communication may come in fragments. Images repeat, words loop, emotion surges without cause or by accident. One name in particular echoes:

Espera.
You may try to reach for her, even if your chances are slim. You might end up contacting someone or something else entirely.

OPTIONAL TOKEN EFFECTS:

• Tokens may begin having their first access to inner magic. Not enough to use consciously, but enough to glitch with use, accidental or not. A friendly reminder that characters should not be able to use their magic with ease, yet. Keep in mind they should all have a realistic adjustment period.
• Tokens may have sensory overlaps: seeing sounds, hearing memories, tasting colors.
• Tokens may be energy sensitive. Areas with high ambient emotion (graveyards, burnt apartments, memorable objects) seem to strengthen their clarity but exaggerate their magic in startling bursts.

OPTIONAL OFFERING EFFECTS:

• Offerings may have their transformation accelerate when using the Murmur's network, albeit in a way that glitches in and out. A friendly reminder that characters should not be able to use their transformations with ease, yet. Keep in mind they should all have a realistic adjustment period.
• Offerings may hear less words, more songs, breathing, scent— nonverbal communication that may be overwhelming.
• Offerings may experience intense somatic reactions while using the network: twitching limbs, sudden pain, the sense of being stroked or watched.

ᛗ
Wrapped and quartered

( content warnings: body horror )

As the days bleed together, the city begins to still. Where once the overgrowth pulsed with strange life, now it withers back into itself. The streets grow colder. The air bites. The mutated fauna, once noisy, prowling, goes silent. Ivy wilts, retreating from the moonlight. The mushroom towers collapse in on themselves with wet sighs. Even the buildings seem to hold their breath. Your own exhales frost in the air, hanging like ghosts. Above, the sky splits at the seams— crimson bleeding in from the edges, as if the moon itself were being peeled open at the arrival of winter.

And then: the masks begin to thrum.

It is subtle at first, a hum at the base of the spine. A low vibration felt rather than heard. But it grows, constant, inescapable— as if something is ticking down inside you. The masks react even when untouched, glowing faintly, twitching. You feel it in your chest. A second heartbeat. You're urged to put it on.

A voice, familiar and female, threads through the Murmur like static on a broken radio. Espera says:

Your body responds before your mind does. Magic stirs in your bloodstream— volatile and half-born. For some, flame dances along their fingertips, mirrors twitch in response to their gaze, or their pulse sings in electric rhythm. For others, bones shift beneath skin, teeth ache with growth, limbs feel wrong. Something is changing about you. Slowly. Irreversibly.

NOTES:

• Animal hosts may react reverently to tethered pairs. Lone vessels are ignored, followed, or violently met.
• Winter is here in full, but it doesn't seem natural— it is a forced shift. The city feels colder, quieter, and more hostile. Even the corrupted ecosystem seems to brace for something larger.
• Magic is awakening further. All vessels, Token and Offering alike, begin to experience supernatural phenomena more intensely. These changes are often involuntary, especially under emotional or physical duress. Powers may flicker, trigger, or distort, reflecting the vessel's inner state. They should not have control of it yet.
• The call to Tether is no longer subtle— it is urgent. Even characters who resist connection may optionally feel the biological/spiritual pressure to Tether. Those who remain untethered may begin to feel destabilized, sensitive to The Murmur, and/or experience the subtle beginnings of Succumbence.

OPTIONAL TOKEN EFFECTS

• Tokens may have unintentional magic surges in times of distress OR the awakening of "comfort zones". Small, warped spaces where reality thins into dreamscape, resembling meaningful memories (a childhood room, a stage, a battlefield). These zones offer eerie familiarity, but not safety from the weather.
• They may feel watched by something divine, but dispassionate— like being studied under a microscope.
• They may feel a need for proximity so great that the body physically aches. In worst case scenarios, you may even fall ill the longer you ignore your body's cry to dissipate your building magic. Tethering will immediately resolve this.

OPTIONAL OFFERING EFFECTS:

• An Offering's new instincts and transformations may begin to surface. Fear of fire. Yearning for music. It will all depend on what you're becoming. One thing that may be shared is a fierce protectiveness toward nearby Tokens.
• They may sense that something is weighing their souls against an invisible scale— not to punish you, but to categorize you. You have the inexplicable feeling that it is also the same thing that is shaping you.
• They may feel compelled to nest or anchor themselves near a Token's comfort zone or with a Token— circling the space like a sentinel or beast returning home. Tethering will make you whole, calm and seen.

ᛗ
Missing pieces find me

( content warnings: uncanny doppelgängers, possible visions of murder, violence, self harm. )

Winter has settled into everything with soft snowfall. Into your joints. Into the breath you share with others in the dark, or by an impromptu fire with scraps. Into the way your name sounds now when someone says it soft like a secret, or a warning. You've learned to ration warmth like a dwindling supply.

You've grown used to the rhythm of this place: the creak of half-dead buildings, the hollow crunch beneath your feet, the subtle hum that coils through the threads between you and the ones you've chosen to keep close throughout the month. The ones who understand that survival isn't just about staying alive.

But lately, something else has begun to settle in. It's not loud, and certainly not obvious. A shift, like a door left open too long. And that, Dear Vessels, starts in your reflections.

You see it in the fractured edge of glass, or in water that should have frozen weeks ago. In any surface slick enough to cast back your image, you may look, and it looks back. You move, and sometimes it moves too— but not quite right. A second too late. A second too early. Sometimes not at all.

And then it smiles, or frowns, or spits.

It is just enough to be wrong. Unnerving. Just enough to slip under your skin like splinters. You tilt your head— your reflection doesn't. You blink— it watches. And then you turn away. You tell yourself it's the frost. The tension. The light. But when you glance back, it’s still watching you.

Other vessels are seeing it, too, even if they don't say it out loud. They pause at windows. They look into still water a beat too long. They touch their own faces like they're checking for something missing. Or added. Something extra.

At least your reflection isn’t hurting you. Well. Not yet.

NOTES:

• A shimmering surface of any kind could reflect two vessels at once but their reflections are fighting. There's blood between them . . .
• At night, the moon above is bright, ice blue and full, with its edges tainted by a splowly spreading crimson. Characters may notice that in reflections, it is completely red and the tendrils from within spew out. A double take will have this reflection of the moon disappearing.
• Characters (especially those who may not be able to see the reflections) may notice and hear their comrade's reflections laughing or speaking to them— they may even respond and try to carry conversation. Note that it's the reflection that's doing this sporadically, and not the real person.

OPTIONAL TOKEN EFFECTS:

• Tokens may notice their hands glowing in thier reflection, but not outside it. After a few moments, the same magic curls up their arms. Their mirrorselves are trying to access their magic for them, so best redirect anything if you want to avoid possible friendly fire.
• They may realize their reflection is always watching their Tether, even as they sleep. It tilts its head, comes crawling with a knife raised, drives it down— then it's gone.
• They may see their mirrorselves practicing violence on nearby objects, anything they could get their hands on.

OPTIONAL OFFERING EFFECTS

• Offerings may wake to burning, superficial claw marks on their sides. Their reflections will be found licking their fingers.
• They may notice their reflection becoming violent with their nearby Tethers; pulling them by the hair, biting into them, prying at their eyes, etc.
• They may see their reflections pushing into existing wounds and feeding, wherever they are.

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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ that prompts a soft chuckle from noah. feelings from old stakeouts, missions, the wait, the crunch . . . he's familiar with all of it. the fussing over it as well is nothing new. ]

Not a fan of waiting, are you?

It's the not knowing that gets me.

[ He can be patient when there's purpose to it. When he has some idea of what he's waiting for. But this... ]

That...and I think it wouldn't bother me so much if we weren't changing. But my sorcery's been changed and I still don't have a grasp on whatever it's becoming. [ For all that he's learned to fight hand to hand, and with weapons, those are really just a fallback. They supplement his technique, but his primary weapon has always been the Ten Shadows. ]

[ it's odd.

everyone is changing. everyone is afraid of the change. everyone doesn't know what kind of change it will manifest as.

but noah . . . has been changed before. this is nothing new. is that why he's not afraid? or just . . . he's so numb to it now. what could any change do that hasn't already been done to him? ]

I don't think any of us have a good answer. All we can do is help each other out.

[ Afraid?

He's been avoiding thinking the word to himself, but...yes. If he's honest with himself, yes. The thought of dying doesn't particularly bother Megumi -- not as much as it probably should. If throwing his life down will accomplish something, that's fine.

But what are they even here for? Will any of them still be themselves, when everything's said and done?

And, a bit selfishly -- if his connection to his power is changing, what does that mean for his shikigami? ]

...maybe I just don't like the idea of losing my shikigami.

[ No maybe about it; he's just hedging his feelings by dressing them up as hypotheticals, as usual. But he's had his divine dogs since he was six years old. He can barely remember a time when he didn't have them at his side. No matter how alone he might feel among humans, he wasn't alone, really. ]

[ noah's not familiar with that word so he asks. ]

Shikigami?

Think of them as summoned spirits. My technique is focused on calling them to help me fight.

[ It still feels weird to try and use the Murmur to willingly pass things on, but he knows that's worth far more than a few words with no context to explain what he means, so he focuses on his shadows. Frogs, elephant, snake, a bird-like chimera, a seemingly endless wave of rabbits.

More than any other, though, the image of two wolves keeps rising to the front. And despite what he's said about fighting, the memory of headpats and snuffles and ear skritches sneaks in around the edges, too.

~~Look, when the world flips upside-down, sometimes a guy just really wants his dog to lick his face and wag its tail at him.~~ ]

[ huh. summoned "spirits" as animals. odd. the only spirits he's ever talked about have been people. why take the form of an animal? but then again, people here have a different relationship with nature than they do in aionios. ]

Just because we're changing doesn't mean the things we lost can't be found again.

...I hope so.

[ Or maybe the dream before they woke here isn't a foolproof glimpse of what they're becoming. Still, when he tried to reach Gama, and instead just got a faceless net of shadows doing Gama's job...

It was fine, in the heat of battle. He had bigger worries in the moment.

...ugh, one more reason he wishes whatever would happen would get on with it. The downtime is a very bad opportunity for someone prone to overthinking and getting stuck in his own head. ]

[ hm. ]

What's the first thing you want to go when you go back home?

The first thing would have to be checking on everyone. We were in the middle of a crisis. [ One that was supposed to have killed him, but maybe not? Apparently? Who knows. ] I'm not sure who's still standing.

Sure, but nothing else?

You live in one of these . . . cities, right? What about food or parks or things to do there?

Tokyo. It's one of the biggest cities in the world.

[ Although Jujutsu High is like a weird little oasis, with how few people are even allowed on the campus. A spot of quiet in the middle of endless chaos. ]

...if everyone's fine, and we had the time...I guess then I'd go to the city. Let Itadori drag me to another stupid movie. Carry Kugisaki's shopping bags. Whatever they feel like, it doesn't really matter that much to me.

[ It matters, but it matters in the sense that being with them is enough. He doesn't care too much about the specifics. After the absolute hell of that night in Shibuya, he'd be perfectly happy to let them drag him into whatever they like, just to know that they were okay. ]

Why not think about that for a while, instead?

That's your hope at the end of the road.

...yeah.

[ He was already thinking about Itadori when he went full kamikaze in Shibuya. He's way far gone for that boy. ]

[ noah doesn't quite understand those kinds of feelings, but feelings themselves are enough. ]

Worry less about power and change. Think more about the future you want to hold onto.

If I still have one. [ Schrodinger's Death is a bit of a hurdle. ]

But I get what you mean.

[ it sure is. ]

Mm. Change is change. We'll bear it as it comes.

[ Not for the first time, Megumi finds himself wondering how the nine-year-old child soldier has it so much more...together than he does. ]

Are you ready if the weather takes a turn for the worse? Shelter, supplies?

[ Noah certainly seems like he should be, but Megumi doesn't want to assume too much. ]

[ Fun Stories For Later. ]

Yeah. I'm staying with Lortel and Sunny. And I'm used to this sort of thing.

Frankly, I'm more worried about everyone else. I don't think they have . . . the training.

[ Well, Lortel and Sunny are in good hands, at least. ]

Feels like most people I've asked seem to think they can handle themselves, but...

[ He's not sure if he should believe them, if he's being blunt about it. Some of them might be fine, but he's not sure how many of them are either overestimating themselves or just don't want to be a bother. ]

That's definitely not been my impression.

But I don't know how to spread that kind of help. The murmur's no iris network. I have no surefire way of sharing.

Iris network?

[ Whatever that is, the idea that Noah's used to having access to something better than the murmur for sharing is impressive. Megumi could probably use a little time to hone the finer points of sharing memories and thoughts, but it definitely has a higher ceiling potential than sending shitty cell phone photos. ]

[ hm. can noah show it. he taps the side of his forehead and his left eye glows with a ring of yellow light. nothing. then he turns it off once more. ]

Every soldier in Aionios has an Iris. It's our network. For messages, sending information, maps, whatever you need.

Sounds like your world is way ahead of mine on that. [ Hands free, impossible to lose... ] We use handheld devices.

[ Which has proven to be very -- sometimes dangerously -- inconvenient, at times. ]

[ noah shakes his head, his voice firm. ]

It's not ahead of anything. It's just a system.

ᛗ I am caught, tangled in

ᛗ And I wake, say your name

ᛗ Wrapped and quartered

ᛗ Missing pieces find me

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cw: megumi-typical level of not giving a shit if he dies

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ᛗ
I am caught, tangled in

ᛗ
And I wake, say your name

ᛗ
Wrapped and quartered

ᛗ
Missing pieces find me