Café de Nuit

Its been a while since I have been here (kinda vanished when the ravenloft reanimated project kinda died, what ever did happen to that?)


Anyway been rewritting grand central alot, and been tying it into a fantasy book I have been writting. Which cements more the act which damned my world. Also another reason I am doign this is because I read Perdido Street Station, and relised that alot of my ideas.....are similar to his (this was unintentional as I never had read his book -.-)

Anyway I am using mist allready as a power source. Saying in my world that more mist is made from the generation of negative stagnation. Though I want to expand more on how grand central is powered. One idea is using pyre elementals. Though instead of having them in some sort of engine beneath the city, have them created by the city.

I always liked the theory, that ravenloft elementals are not just corrupted eles, but the damned taking on an elemental form. So the idea is having one of the punishments in grand central to be burnt in the cities furnaces (and have even their soul incinerated.) Though once in a while (maybe 1/10000,) the fire doesnt burn their soul. Instead the fire is absorbed by them, turning them into their own funeral pyre.

Whether its because they were to evil, or they were innocent. Or maybe their is no reason and its random I dont know. Instead of destroying these artifical elementals. They are put to work, trapped in the workings of the city. Powering it even more.

Is this an interesting thought train? Or maybe having elementals created is going to far?

If the elementals are damned by the Dark Powers, there could be a Terror Track that ends in becoming one, and it's a matter of letting nature take it''s course. However, if the station is simply condemning people like a court sentance, then the darklord judge could easily be falsely condemning innocents for it's neeeds of a power source.

I am definatley thinking that the pyre elementals should be born from innocent souls. So once in a while the judge will damn an innocent to keep new pyres being created. I am thinking of really expanding the punishment system in grand central. To the point that the whole system is a well oiled punishment machine.

One punishment which is kept in secret, is the punishment for those who dont operate within the systems requirements (they are many ways to recieve this punishment, though one could say its worse then being incinerated.) They are those who become faceless. They are first purged of emotions (bottled and sold as drugs,) then purged of memories (turned into thread, and made into clothes,) then robbed of time (syphoned and sold to those who can afford it,) and then when everything has been taken from them. They lose their face.

Identical figures, who are those forced to obey the system. They lose evenything that makes them individual and are forever damned to be a nobody.

Becoming one of the faceless masses would only be punishment in our self-centered society.

However, I can only wonder what goes through the souls of the people who actually perform this procedure...

Well the ones in charge of the city, are the cities greatest prisoners.

Also you noticed one of the key themes of this city.

Its about centre points, self centered people living in the centre of a cancer like network of trains.

The darklord in charge is the Trainmaster Foamec (who more or less IS the city.) People are drawn into the city and become "cogs." The more higher you are in that chain, the less likely you are to ever escape the city. Eventually merging with it, and becoming merely a part of the darklord.

One of the most obvious examples, is the central clock tower. There always is a Chronomancer, a clock smith who manages the cities time. Syphoning it and redistributing it to get higher efficency from the city. Though all the previous chronomancers had the same flaw, a fear of the flesh that devoured them and a fear of time. They would always take time for themselves, extending their life more and more.

They say when an apprentice becomes the next chronomancer, he puts a statue of amazing skill into the clocktower. The previous master always vanishes. They take so much time, they drown in it. Till their body is frozen in time, and their flesh becomes china and metal, and their blood oil.