Chronicles of The Omniverse Archived Losenji Island

[Script]

as written by Script

The clouds first began to gather over the heart of Naséni Forest. Those few observers who had seen their moment of conception would later note that they had followed no normal weather patterns. They had flowed from nothingness, fully formed and black as coal, rumbling ominously as lightning danced in flashes in their depths. Where they came, rain followed - not a gradually building drizzle, but an instant downpour. Torrents of icy water fell in a sheet that matched the rapid expansion of the storm.

It spread outwards in a vortex, bringing with it a bitter, chilling wind that carried whispered promises of destruction. It moved with a singular, unnatural purpose, like a blanket being drawn across the island by an unseen hand. Within minutes, it had reached Lake Yōsái at the island's centre, churning the water of the basin like a stormy sea as worse threats than thunder began to rise from its depths.

Alarms wailed and maydays were called on airships across the island's skies as they found themselves all too suddenly pulled into the heart of a malicious tempest. Even skilled crews struggled to retain control of their vessels as the winds and lightning ripped into them as though it were seeking them out. All would land in short order - some guided down by careful hands, and some in smoking wrecks.

It was not long at all before the great storm reached Tiānshì City, on the island's southern coast. It surged over the city like a crashing wave, pushing out into the harbor and beyond, before clasping down to reach the waves.

And there it halted. The entire island was wreathed in a colossal bank of thick black clouds - it had been swallowed whole. The sea for miles around churned and rolled with the intensity of a hurricane, and the skies became death traps for even the most capable of aircraft. Signals of all kinds, be they technological or magical, ceased to reach beyond the storm.

For all intents and purposes, Lósénji Island had been cut off from the world.

 

[Tiko]

as written by Script

As people across the island were panicking with the sudden onset of the great storm, rushing for shelter or scrambling to save merchandise from being blown clean away - stall and all - more was yet to come.

Those sensitive to the spirits would notice it first. A wrongness to the storm, as though beneath the clouds and the rain there was another layer. Something far more terrible.

Spirits were an integral part of life in Lósénji. They were revered, respected and held close to the hearts of its citizens. Though few people encountered one in their lifetimes, evidence of their existence was abundant in the form of those mortals who found themselves spirit-touched. The Spirit Festival, the very event that tonight celebrated the beginning of, was a time when the people of the island considered themselves the closest to their spiritual guardians. And indeed, those that could see spirits knew that they gathered in their hundreds at the time of the festival, drawn to the energy and the life that the rituals and celebrations created like moths to a flame.

Most of these spirits were diminutive, sparks of life and concepts without true consciousness, but even spirits with a greater sense of self such as kitsune, yokai or lesser zodiacs often walked alongside their mortal neighbours at the time of the festival.

And it was they who would feel the twisted darkness of the storm most keenly. Like a knife being plunged into their innermost beings, driving in and bringing corruption in its wake. The lesser spirits would fall without resistance, their luminous hearts turned dark in an instant. Those in possession of their own minds would find themselves in a battle of will - fighting to retain themselves in the face of overwhelming pressure. Many would fail, but so too would many prevail. Those most likely to succeed were those that walked often with mortals, and seldom slipped back across to the spirit world to flow as one with its currents.

For those that could see the spirits, the change would be immediately apparent. Their forms became twisted, warped into monstrous aberrations of varying sizes, and their light became shadow: an ominous blackness that radiated from them in a cruel mirror of luminosity.

And then, like a tide, hordes of them began to surge towards the storm's heart. But not all. Some were pushed even beyond this purpose by the corruption and anger that had twisted their hearts. They felt only one urge - the urge to destroy.

These spirits turned their eyes on the mortals below, and struck. In their hundreds, dark spirits began to manifest in the streets of towns, in fields, in villages. Mindless, they lashed out like animals at the people of the island. They would fight until they were destroyed.