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LEVITATE ● JANUARY 2026 EVENT
EVENT: LEVITATE
ᛗ
Your Body is Mostly Blood — WEEK 1
For new Vessels, waking up is abrupt. The ground below you gives way. Something collapses inside you, a cord pulled taut that suddenly snaps. The world tips and you fall out of the dream, into reality. But this time, you do not rise into light. It's all terribly, terribly . . . Dark.
You come to in a slow breath. There is a weight across your face born from the mask from your dreams. Your hands grip something unfamiliar— a weapon, or a light source. Some object you didn't have before, pulled from a blessing you can't explain.
It smells of dust and mildew, rust and oil. The pressure of a thousand tons of city weighs above you. You are somewhere deep, and deeper than you should be. Concrete walls stretch out in every direction, marked by fungal grime, decay, and disuse. Pipes run overhead, weeping water and something thicker. Old signage in peeling paint warns of restricted access. But this place no longer belongs to the waking world, so . . . Can it truly be heeded?
Others are here. New faces. New Vessels, just like you. Awakened together in the deep beneath Grand Central Terminal, on the hidden level known as M42. From the looks of it, there is no escape upward—
Only the Nightmares from your dreams greet you kindly. They shimmer into form like smoke catching shape, hooves silent on stone. Some snort, pace, lean against you. All are anxious. Their gaze is turned away from blocked exits— they look instead toward the dark tunnels ahead. Something has drawn them here, and they want you to follow— You have the hunch that it has half to do with your own safety, and half . . . Something greater.
Down here, the Hosts breathe in unison, in dark, still shapes kept to the blackness. Human, almost. Grown into the walls and floors like tumors, their skin glistening with the wetness of translucent sludge and open wounds that never healed. Some twitch as if dreaming while others mouth whispered words. They are clustered around old turnstiles, half-sunken work benches, emergency panels choked in vines and tendrils. Spores drift lazily through the air like dust motes, and some are even produced by these poor, stagnant creatures. For now, they don't seen to react much. Best not test your chances in waking them up. Keep a close eye on those smaller, skittering creatures instead. Mutated rats, mice, and insects might be your only viable source of food down here for the days to come.
Above ground, veteran Vessels wake with a jolt, some from levitating meters off the ground only to snap awake and fall to their beds from the night before. There are no new faces on the surface, no stirrings on Main Street or Central Park. But you too, should you have bonded with one in Sleep's dreams, will have your Nightmare appear before you like old friends— and they are uneasy. The Murmur pulses just below hearing, static and low. Masks tingle with soft interference, beckoning you to answer their call. Something has arrived— they just don't know where.
NOTES:
TOKEN EFFECTS:
OFFERING EFFECTS:
You come to in a slow breath. There is a weight across your face born from the mask from your dreams. Your hands grip something unfamiliar— a weapon, or a light source. Some object you didn't have before, pulled from a blessing you can't explain.
It smells of dust and mildew, rust and oil. The pressure of a thousand tons of city weighs above you. You are somewhere deep, and deeper than you should be. Concrete walls stretch out in every direction, marked by fungal grime, decay, and disuse. Pipes run overhead, weeping water and something thicker. Old signage in peeling paint warns of restricted access. But this place no longer belongs to the waking world, so . . . Can it truly be heeded?
Others are here. New faces. New Vessels, just like you. Awakened together in the deep beneath Grand Central Terminal, on the hidden level known as M42. From the looks of it, there is no escape upward—
Only the Nightmares from your dreams greet you kindly. They shimmer into form like smoke catching shape, hooves silent on stone. Some snort, pace, lean against you. All are anxious. Their gaze is turned away from blocked exits— they look instead toward the dark tunnels ahead. Something has drawn them here, and they want you to follow— You have the hunch that it has half to do with your own safety, and half . . . Something greater.
Down here, the Hosts breathe in unison, in dark, still shapes kept to the blackness. Human, almost. Grown into the walls and floors like tumors, their skin glistening with the wetness of translucent sludge and open wounds that never healed. Some twitch as if dreaming while others mouth whispered words. They are clustered around old turnstiles, half-sunken work benches, emergency panels choked in vines and tendrils. Spores drift lazily through the air like dust motes, and some are even produced by these poor, stagnant creatures. For now, they don't seen to react much. Best not test your chances in waking them up. Keep a close eye on those smaller, skittering creatures instead. Mutated rats, mice, and insects might be your only viable source of food down here for the days to come.
Above ground, veteran Vessels wake with a jolt, some from levitating meters off the ground only to snap awake and fall to their beds from the night before. There are no new faces on the surface, no stirrings on Main Street or Central Park. But you too, should you have bonded with one in Sleep's dreams, will have your Nightmare appear before you like old friends— and they are uneasy. The Murmur pulses just below hearing, static and low. Masks tingle with soft interference, beckoning you to answer their call. Something has arrived— they just don't know where.
NOTES:
• M42, where new Vessels awaken, is now infested with the presence of Sleep. Hosts line the walls and floors, dormant for now. Their minds are partially open, and Succumbence is heavy in the air. Prolonged exposure to the spores, if not the overwhelming weight of Sleep's aura, may lead to symptoms.
• Veteran Vessels may experience flashes of static, unease, or brief flickers of connection when interacting with the Murmur or their masks, especially if they attempt to reach out to the new Vessels. Some may begin feeling pulled toward underground locations, but will quickly realize that of the means they've tried to brave the subways, none are safe,infested with more active host clusters.
• Characters who successfully bonded with the Nightmares from the last event now have them as summoned steeds. They may be ridden and gain personalities of their own as time goes on. They will not be able to cause damage, but they may serve as a distraction should one need it briefly. They may come and go based on the need of its Vessel.
• For those who are more attuned to music or feel a deeply rooted loneliness through grief will have their minds susceptible to hearing One play some instruments over the Murmur this week. You may try to speak to him, but be warned he has not been easy to get a word out of since his blood offering.
TOKEN EFFECTS:
• Blood magic is sharpened underground. Small wounds become radiant, releasing bursts of heat or sound. If you are harmed, the Hosts could stir nearby. You may be drawn to places where violence once occurred or still lingers, marked by miniature graveyards of mauled Hosts.
• The pressure of the Murmur manifests as arcs of electrical magic. Static jumps from your hands to metal nearby, as of late. Light and Fire magic is unstable underground— stronger than usual, but unpredictable. Sudden flashes may draw the attention of dormant Hosts.
• You will feel a pull belonging to One's yearning and the fragment of Two like a pressure behind your eyes. They call to each other yet are broken apart, out of reach, and this broken thread could be felt. Binding spells or tethered effects cast underground may double in strength but carry intense emotional weight.
OFFERING EFFECTS:
• Offerings tied to fire, light, or cleansing garner more attention than intended in the underground space. They may create temporary clearings in the spores, revealing hidden signs or eroded rune traces on the walls— but the exposed space becomes a magnet for Host attention and Murmur interference. • Offerings with strong memories of grief resonate with the fragment below. When near the walls or touching old surfaces, they may experience brief, disjointed flashes of memories that are not theirs.
• Offerings aligned with water or decay may create temporary areas of silence underground. Hosts nearby stop murmuring and The Murmur pulls back. In this space, communication with others may become garbled, and movement feels slowed, but at least you get a break from the gnawing of Succumbence.
ᛗ
Remember my cracking bones — WEEK 2
The tunnels are starting to narrow and deepen.
Old tracks curve through the dark, half-submerged in muck and rust. Spores cling to every surface and vines dangle from above like nooses. The air is heavy with slumber and your belly probably aches with upset— deeper, thicker, it now seems to be weighing much more than before. Even the Nightmares falter here. They snort. Stamp. Some even press against you as if to anchor you in place and keep going.
As the second week approaches, the new group will find a sealed chamber. The walls are stone, but pulsing with energy and thick, rippling tendrils wet with black sludge, if not covered in thick fungal crust and crawling roots. As you move closer, something beneath begins to throb in rhythm— slow, sick, but alive.
There, buried in the wall, is a fragment of Two. A faint blue light that flickers through like a flame, barely visible beneath the rot. It pulses like a heart— steady, rhythmic, but weakening. The closer you get, the louder the Murmur becomes. Not voices, this time. Music. A hum. A song.
One is mourning through the Murmur from above.
The fragment is being choked, its life covered and strangled. You can feel its tether to this world fraying— crying out and pleading to be freed. Espera's voice touches the minds of those with their masks on, like light bending through smoke. Her shape is unstable in your mind's eye, her edges unraveling. Aboveground, Veteran Vessels begin to receive the same message. She speaks with sensation: grief, urgency, pain. You understand her meaning all the same:
"Free it. And Free the runes you find scattered. Help is coming."
Then she vanishes.
Some will be called to the tunnels. Others will be urged by their mares to find runes scattered through the city itself, hidden in alleys, on top of skysccrapers, buried beneath graffiti, and carved into sewer grates or stone. Each rune matters here. Each act of uncovering brings the fragment closer to it's freedom.
As night falls during the second week's middle, the Hosts' dormancy further underground begins to break. Belowground, their bodies twitch. Eyes open. Limbs shift. The pressure of Succumbence sharpens. You can feel the pull in your spine, the weight of it at the base of your gut and dragging downward to the ground. The Nightmares begin to spook. The deeper you go, the more violent the change.
There is something down here, larger than the rest.
NOTES:
TOKEN EFFECTS:
OFFERINGS
Old tracks curve through the dark, half-submerged in muck and rust. Spores cling to every surface and vines dangle from above like nooses. The air is heavy with slumber and your belly probably aches with upset— deeper, thicker, it now seems to be weighing much more than before. Even the Nightmares falter here. They snort. Stamp. Some even press against you as if to anchor you in place and keep going.
As the second week approaches, the new group will find a sealed chamber. The walls are stone, but pulsing with energy and thick, rippling tendrils wet with black sludge, if not covered in thick fungal crust and crawling roots. As you move closer, something beneath begins to throb in rhythm— slow, sick, but alive.
There, buried in the wall, is a fragment of Two. A faint blue light that flickers through like a flame, barely visible beneath the rot. It pulses like a heart— steady, rhythmic, but weakening. The closer you get, the louder the Murmur becomes. Not voices, this time. Music. A hum. A song.
One is mourning through the Murmur from above.
The fragment is being choked, its life covered and strangled. You can feel its tether to this world fraying— crying out and pleading to be freed. Espera's voice touches the minds of those with their masks on, like light bending through smoke. Her shape is unstable in your mind's eye, her edges unraveling. Aboveground, Veteran Vessels begin to receive the same message. She speaks with sensation: grief, urgency, pain. You understand her meaning all the same:
Then she vanishes.
Some will be called to the tunnels. Others will be urged by their mares to find runes scattered through the city itself, hidden in alleys, on top of skysccrapers, buried beneath graffiti, and carved into sewer grates or stone. Each rune matters here. Each act of uncovering brings the fragment closer to it's freedom.
As night falls during the second week's middle, the Hosts' dormancy further underground begins to break. Belowground, their bodies twitch. Eyes open. Limbs shift. The pressure of Succumbence sharpens. You can feel the pull in your spine, the weight of it at the base of your gut and dragging downward to the ground. The Nightmares begin to spook. The deeper you go, the more violent the change.
There is something down here, larger than the rest.
NOTES:
• Veteran Vessels may now choose to follow their Nightmares to underground access points (Which will now be possible; they'll find that the Hosts have begun to scatter and leave their posts, allowing them to go through the subway tunnels) or remain topside and search for runes across the city (Where Three may make scattered appearances and attempt to help Vessels find the runes, though he can't keep shape for long). These will be scattered, hidden but not impossible to find. Runic discoveries above will echo underground, helping the weakened bond around the fragment strengthen.
• The Murmur grows stronger here. One's grief is felt everywhere, now, not just for the select. The pressure of their tether decaying may cause effects both emotional and magical similar to secondhand succumbence— be battle ready, and partner up with Veterans who find you— The Hosts will also begin to stir and roam more actively in the subways and topside at dusk, as well as something . . . Big.
• All Vessels will hear One's song as if it is being sung directly into their bones. The sadness is unbearable.
TOKEN EFFECTS:
• Every rune you touch strengthens the sense of connection to the fragment below. You feel Two's presence more clearly, but the bond drags on your mind. Dreams and memory begin to bleed together, One's song grows louder in your ears. Some of your spells may activate without your command, fueled by emotion.
• The fragment responds warmly to your presence. When you get close, the fungus mounds loosen. But the closer you are, the more the Hosts take interest in you. You are marked— something about you makes them highly aware, and they will react violently as to keep you away from the fragment.
• The fragment hums when you bleed near it. Your pain draws it out, helps break the growth strangling it, but the reaction also pulls nearby Hosts closer, hungry for what's being stirred. Your magic becomes a beacon, whether you like it or not.
OFFERINGS
• Offerings with Nightmares will notice they are more focused. They begin trying to guide you toward unknown corners of the underground or up above— and refuse to stop. Following may reveal hidden symbols or Host nests. Ignoring them causes your Nightmare to act erratically, sometimes blocking you from leaving until you have uncovered the runes or destroyed the Hosts.
• Offerings will begin to hear drum cracks that begin to slip into One's mourning vocals in perfect synchrony, as if it's calling back to him, reaching out . . . A duet that has not forgotten him as he thinks. He cannot hear it, but you can.
• Offerings may be granted one protective yell when near a Token. This yell will hush the Murmur around your group. For three minutes, all Hosts in range will stop moving. Any rune uncovered during this silence glows freely— but when the quiet ends, every Host that was paused now moves at once, drawn to the place the silence was broken.
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Forgetting the agony again — WEEK 2
The last of the growth sloughs away from the wall in strips, rotting on impact. Beneath the dead mass, the full body of the fragment is revealed: a glowing structure of blue and silver, greens and purples, latticed with runes, humming with a light too steady to be artificial and too wise to be new. Its pulse grows louder, and the Murmur's network coils tight from it.
Then the ground begins to scream in objection.
Something vast is moving. Not one single Host, not a dozen. Hundreds. A crawling, snarling tide of limbs and mouths and eyes, fusing together in a single, rotting organism: The Rat King.
It lurches into view like something being born backwards. Dozens of bodies melted into one another, joints twisted in the wrong directions, heads split but still shrieking. Its bones pierce its outer flesh like spikes. Its eyes are mismatched and boiling. Some limbs drag along the ground, slack and dead, while others flail with wild hunger. It leaves behind a trail of bile and black growth as it moves, and at its center— where a spine should be— a cascade of black sludge pools at its feet and stains the stone around it.
When the Rat King sees the fragment's light, it howls. Hosts from the walls begin to twitch and fall, swiftly joining the charge and answering the King's call.
You feel one thing deep in your bones: The fragment must be protected, and you all must survive.
NOTES:
TOKEN EFFECTS
OFFERING EFFECTS
Then the ground begins to scream in objection.
Something vast is moving. Not one single Host, not a dozen. Hundreds. A crawling, snarling tide of limbs and mouths and eyes, fusing together in a single, rotting organism: The Rat King.
It lurches into view like something being born backwards. Dozens of bodies melted into one another, joints twisted in the wrong directions, heads split but still shrieking. Its bones pierce its outer flesh like spikes. Its eyes are mismatched and boiling. Some limbs drag along the ground, slack and dead, while others flail with wild hunger. It leaves behind a trail of bile and black growth as it moves, and at its center— where a spine should be— a cascade of black sludge pools at its feet and stains the stone around it.
When the Rat King sees the fragment's light, it howls. Hosts from the walls begin to twitch and fall, swiftly joining the charge and answering the King's call.
You feel one thing deep in your bones: The fragment must be protected, and you all must survive.
NOTES:
• The Rat King is a cursed amalgam: dozens of Hosts bound together by the suffocating influence of Sleep. It cannot be fought with brute strength alone. Its weakness is unity. The more players coordinate, share, or suffer together, the more vulnerable it becomes to attacks. Please refer to the boss battle top level, form your groups, and post your strategy. The mod account will reply with d20 rolls to make your fight more interesting!
• Sleep's subtle influence will grow louder as the fight progresses. It will try to turn Vessels against one another, offering comfort, power, or relief.
• The Rat King's attacks are chaotic: gnashing limbs, walls of fused bone, vomited muck, spine-shattering shrieks that will cause disorientation, susceptibility to succumbence and vomiting the same sludge is "infected". It almost immediately regenerates body parts except when its main head is struck. Keep that in mind when you plan your attacks.
TOKEN EFFECTS
• Tokens can shield the fragment with their presence. The Rat King flinches at their closeness, but doing so paints a target on them. Every time they draw its attention away from another, their defenses weaken. Their Nightmare may step in to protect them once with success.
• If Tokens draw blood willingly, their strikes deal twice the damage to the Rat King. But Sleep's interference begins to retaliate by temporarily taking pieces of their memory as payment. Names. Faces. Anything important enough to startle them to stop.
• Tokens may feel the wounds their allies take. If they are Tethered to them, it deepens in the chaos, and they can draw their pain into themselves. If they take on too much, they may lose their grip on their magic entirely and backfire.
OFFERING EFFECTS
• Offerings seem to feel the Rat King before it arrives. Their muscles seize, breath shortens, vision narrows— as if their bodies are bracing for impact ahead of time. This awareness grants them a momentary edge in reacting to the creature's movements.
• The Rat King is drawn to Offerings in particular. You may use this as a means to bait it and coordinate attacks.
• An Offering's senses will sharpen to unbearable degrees. Every noise cuts deep. Every motion becomes overwhelming. This may cause erratic reactions: flinching from allies, clinging to enemies, breaking into sudden movement or collapse.
ᛗ
Will you levitate? — WEEK 3
Meanwhile, (and by now), all the Vessels topside have managed to find most of the scattered runes and left them the way Espera urges: bare to the moonlight. Hosts may have tried to make your search difficult, but not impossible. As the final rune is bared, something shifts with an incredible weight. The runes on the walls, underground, and uncovered across the city gradually ignite in full— then all at once, blinding and surging. A pattern that spans across the entire chamber and the city above as it flares to life, weaving through the metal bones of the dream.
The fragment surges, burning its confinements away.
One and Two's song swells, in full. No distortion. No static. It echoes through the Murmur like a siren. Every Vessel hears it through the space between memory and thought. The fragment releases a wave of force, a heartbeat that greets the world from a long slumber— Across the city, from subway rails to skyscraper grids, electricity explodes.
Streetlights and stoplights burst. Screens flicker wildly, all lights blink. Neon signs spit sparks and bright colors. Every power line hums like a struck tuning fork, singing in time with the runes. Even deep underground, the hum rises through the walls and stone, like the city itself is about to lift off the earth. Tokens' eyes will begin to glow like overwhelming beacons and find themselves in a brief catatonic rise, their magic surging with the runes, and Offerings will shift painlessly into their monstrous forms given the greatest of its strength.
Then gravity vanishes.
All Vessels, no matter where they are, rise into the air. Weapons drift beside their owners. Nightmares float mid-step with their misty legs curling under them or disappear all at once. Dust and shattered stone hover in place. Broken glass turns slowly in midair, catching flickers of light that weren't there before. Cars, debris, everything rises, and rises in a moment of grateful weightlessness that silently celebrates.
This moment stretches long enough to feel infinite and dreamlike. That is— until gravity returns.
The world folds back into itself. Objects fall, bodies settle. The fragment's light dims to a soft, steady pulse, and the runes return to a faint light that makes citywide electricity possible.
The Hosts fall silent and The Rat King is slew. Those still active drift away, as if called elsewhere. The fragment no longer cries. It glows quietly in its chamber, cleansed of rot— then disappears into static.
Veteran vessels will feel a shift in the Murmur— a new harmony, subtle but present. Tokens may sense a return of at least some balance. Offerings may feel a strange warmth in their chest. Espera is quiet, for a time. Then she speaks through the Murmur. Her voice is weary, but full of something like relief:
"Thank you.You've done what I couldn't. Rest now. You are not alone."
And for a while, rest is possible. Vessels may gather, recover, speak freely. The weight of violence recedes, and the city feels soft again, like it did before its fall.
NOTES:
TOKEN EFFECTS
OFFERING EFFECTS
The fragment surges, burning its confinements away.
One and Two's song swells, in full. No distortion. No static. It echoes through the Murmur like a siren. Every Vessel hears it through the space between memory and thought. The fragment releases a wave of force, a heartbeat that greets the world from a long slumber— Across the city, from subway rails to skyscraper grids, electricity explodes.
Streetlights and stoplights burst. Screens flicker wildly, all lights blink. Neon signs spit sparks and bright colors. Every power line hums like a struck tuning fork, singing in time with the runes. Even deep underground, the hum rises through the walls and stone, like the city itself is about to lift off the earth. Tokens' eyes will begin to glow like overwhelming beacons and find themselves in a brief catatonic rise, their magic surging with the runes, and Offerings will shift painlessly into their monstrous forms given the greatest of its strength.
Then gravity vanishes.
All Vessels, no matter where they are, rise into the air. Weapons drift beside their owners. Nightmares float mid-step with their misty legs curling under them or disappear all at once. Dust and shattered stone hover in place. Broken glass turns slowly in midair, catching flickers of light that weren't there before. Cars, debris, everything rises, and rises in a moment of grateful weightlessness that silently celebrates.
This moment stretches long enough to feel infinite and dreamlike. That is— until gravity returns.
The world folds back into itself. Objects fall, bodies settle. The fragment's light dims to a soft, steady pulse, and the runes return to a faint light that makes citywide electricity possible.
The Hosts fall silent and The Rat King is slew. Those still active drift away, as if called elsewhere. The fragment no longer cries. It glows quietly in its chamber, cleansed of rot— then disappears into static.
Veteran vessels will feel a shift in the Murmur— a new harmony, subtle but present. Tokens may sense a return of at least some balance. Offerings may feel a strange warmth in their chest. Espera is quiet, for a time. Then she speaks through the Murmur. Her voice is weary, but full of something like relief:
And for a while, rest is possible. Vessels may gather, recover, speak freely. The weight of violence recedes, and the city feels soft again, like it did before its fall.
NOTES:
• Electricity is back, but not in any normal way. Power is erratic, flickering, and clearly tied to magical and emotional surges. Runes now act as conduits and some technology is either burnt out or completely broken from the surge. Characters are free to use the last week of the month to repair what is blown or broken, make living easier and settle in now that they have energy!
• Freeing the fragment has returned Two, but not completely— He does not appear physically nor does he speak with words, but through pulses, flickers, and rhythm in the lights. Two is also now available for NPC interaction.
TOKEN EFFECTS
• Two's guardian presence lingers in a Token's magic for the rest of the month. Lights flicker when they cast, no matter the subtype, and objects may float or spark around them briefly.
• A Token's mask now retains a faint charge. When worn in darkness, it softly illuminates the surrounding area.
• Sometimes when you cast, you don't feel alone. A second heartbeat moves beneath yours— steady, slow and protective.
OFFERING EFFECTS
• Two's presence settles differently in Offerings. Their heartbeat aligns with a quiet rhythm that echoes faintly in the world around them. When they pass by flickering lights, those lights seem to pulse in tandem— gently, like recognition. Pain eases more quickly than it should, and lights blink softly when they grieve, or when they act without hesitation.
• The sensation of weightlessness won't fully leave until the month ends.
• When an Offering is wounded now, lights around them respond— dimming, flickering, or flaring in their defense.
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