This is a short story about crew of the Odysseus, traveling from Sabakumara, representing the Mercantile Guild to Kiro - to trade with Arashi merchants. This is meant to be purely fictional!
In the Age of Air , survivors are those who can endure the chaos,
Embrace the cruel environment, and thrive in its harsh realities,
In the lands of the Vastness,
A member of the Mercantile Guild must cherish every moment, and seize every opportunity,
For they come few and far between for the families in the Vastness after the Blight,
Merchants often look to the dunes of the Arashi to find their profits,
Yet, their charted skyroads have a reputation of being treacherous and deadly,
Filled with marauders lurking along all these routes for vulnerable merchants.
To reach the rumored treasures of those unforgiving deserts,
Merchants must brave these skyroads and transverse these unforgiving routes to reach the Arashi stronghold, Kiro.
Venturing out of Sabakumara, the crew of the Odysseus found themselves braving through the night,
Racing to Kiro, the Odysseus had entered the most dangerous section of the skyroad,
And on the cusp of a harsh dawn, in the distance the crew heard the resounding drums of war,
They rallied forth, gathering their tools, checking all the components and guns aboard their vessel,
Knowing full well that today they would be entering the fray.
Everything they do on this fateful day shall determine whether this vessel will be their home for another day,
Or their rusty crypt forever,
The pilot strides to his helm aboard the Odysseus and hollers,
“Alright crew, take your positions! We’re in for a scrap today.”
He knows should any misstep, miscalculation, or miscommunication happens today,
It could be the difference of life and death on this burnt Earth,
The gunner anxiously stands next to his gun, his chosen ammo loaded,
And spyglass in hand, waiting for the chance to spot the harbinger of war,
He knows that his aim has to be true today,
What and when he uses that ammo can be just the simple thing that can beckon him and his crew to the barren waste,
The engineers that his aim has to be true today,
The engineers hold steady to their posts, ready to maintain the vitality of the airship,
And prepared for the worst of scenarios,
They know that their timing is integral to their survival, they know their priorities are essential;
They know the fine balance of when to shoot, and when to repair – all their training and experience has come to this,
Together this crew must fly as one entity,
These survivors must move forward in unison this day if they want to return home to their families in Sabakumara,
Suddenly, a cry comes forth from the gunner,
“Through the clouds sir! East to Southeast! I believe, wait - yes, it’s a Marauder sir, lancing straight at us!”
Instantly, all the shanties stopped; and drums sounded aboard the Odysseus,
The pilot hastily shouts to rouse his crew,
“It’s either us or them today! Into the fray we shall go! In the spirit of Gabriel and his Icarus!”
As tensions rise, the gunner waits with his trigger finger in suspense,
For he knows he must wait just a little longer to engage before his foe arrives,
Through the haze of the clouds the crew of the Odysseus mark the name plastered on the starboard side of the enemy, the Apollo,
Seconds seem like years, and time seems to have stopped for both crews as they anxiously await their fate,
Both pilots try to position their airships before the engagement,
However, the Apollo is quicker to the mark, and their pilot shouts,
“All forward guns fire! Let’s claim some of those Guild coffers!”
Aboard the Odysseus, a tremendous thunder is heard as the enemy starts landing their marks!
“Quick! To the hull!” the pilot shouts,
As he begins to maneuver the Odysseus into a better position,
Then the Apollo strikes forward and cripples the armor of the Odysseus
Seizing the perceived opportunity for victory,
The Apollo tries to tenaciously propel itself into the Odysseus’s bow,
Time again grinds to a halt, as everything breaks down, and all systems begin to fail,
Somehow the engineers aboard the Odysseus have managed to miraculously keep the ship alive,
The pilot of the Odysseus knows his actions over the next few seconds will either mean life,
Or death for his crew,
But then it hits him instantaneously,
He needs to rise above his foe to evade this ram,
So, he calls out to the top deck engineer,
“I’m using Hydrogen, get to the balloon!”
Springing up in milliseconds and evading the ram,
The Apollo just glances under the keel of the Odysseus,
It buys the Odysseus the precious few seconds to lick its wounds,
The pilot of the Odysseus swaps the Hydrogen for his Phoenix Claw and cries out,
“Using the claw! Grab the engines and forward guns fire upon the Apollo!”
As the Apollo lurks forward, its Pilot recognizes his folly,
With what engines the Apollo had left, he ordered his crew,
“Grab the port guns! I’m using claw to turn on the Odysseus!”
As the Odysseus starts landing fatal hits,
The Apollo desperately starts returning it’s own firepower upon its foe,
However, the Odysseus focuses the Apollos balloon,
An explosion happened upstairs on the balloon,
The top deck engineer has to run back upstairs and try to resurrect the balloon,
However, the Apollo starts to rapidly sink to the sand-torn landscape,
The main deck engineer hollers to his captain,
“Sir the armor is gone! The hull is breaking apart! I’m trying to repair it!”
With the top deck engineer frantically trying to repair the balloon,
The Pilot of the Apollo was losing opportunities to rectify his situation,
“Sir, the gatling gun on the Odysseus is down!”
Shouted the gunner as he quickly reloaded his ammo into his port gun,
So, the Pilot attempts to turn and go under the Odysseus,
However, his turning engines have been crippled beyond repair,
As all this is taking place, the Odysseus repairs its fore gatling gun and refocuses fire upon the Apollo,
And its pilot shouts to the main deck engineer,
“I’m engaging moonshine, run to the engines!”
As the pilot throws on moonshine, the Odysseus races forward towards it disabled attacker,
Those few seconds felt like an eternity,
The Apollos crew ran to revive all the critical components,
It’s pilot waiting for the slim opportunity to punch Hydrogen and evade the oncoming ram,
Yet, the Odysseus’s guns kept the Apollo’s balloon and armor down,
In that moment a final cry was heard from the crew of the Apollo,
As the Odysseus crashed headlong into the Apollo,
And dispatched its hellish crew to barren waste,
With debris scattered everywhere, and chunks of metal falling to the ground,
The Odysseus braced itself and burned engines out of the debris field,
The engineers and gunner laboriously restored the Odysseus’s components and health,
After the battle the crew were sat amidships; with pipe and smokes in hand,
When the pilot bellowed; “To me lads!”
To their joint shock after scurrying to the pilot,
The Capt' had cracked open a rare bottle of,
"Seppuku Pochin Special Reserve 1896" - to toast their success,
“The Guild will be happy that the we’ve kept their coffers stuffed,
And so, onwards to Kiro we must press on!
Be wary lads, for these roads are filled with more of these marauders!”
And with that, the pilot and crew thanked their respective Gods,
And they took a brief moment to think and dwell on the nostalgic memories,
Of their families and loved ones at home in Sabakumara,
With that, the crew of the Odysseus knew that they’d done it again,
Defied the odds in the Age of Air,
Where man and machine can return to dust in a fleeting heartbeat,
Towards Kiro the shanties sound,
The Odysseus ceaselessly beats on,
Into the horizons of the Age of Air it endures.
Hopefully you all like this story! Muse has created a rich, vibrant, and engaging lore. Setting the backdrop for the game, and they established the world of GoIO beautifully! With all the factions, stories, and legends. The lore is something so that is to accessible to the community to engage in, and actively toss around creative ideas about the lore. Talking about things like the maps, diplomacy, government structure and also fun things like Shanties! They are all apart of the fantastic GoIO experience!
A huge thank you to haytheghost for contributing this piece of artwork! This is concept art for the pilot of the Odysseus!
I'd like to take this opportunity to link the
GoIO VN Project Reboot!
Guns of Icarus: Online Visual Novel Project Studio:
TTR StudiosProject Managers:
Qwerty Kun,
B'Elanna &
Gilder UnfetteredBelow is an excerpt from the
What is it? part of the post, describing just about how the project got started and its goals.
Please take a look and if your interested please look through the post or go to their website:
All is Fair in Dust and AirThe GOIO VN started about mid 2013. It spawned from anime discussions and teasing Qwerty 2 Jam, a former GOIO caster, about discussing anime during long battles. One thing led to another and Qwerty presented the idea,”Lets create a GOIO VN.” After talking with Muse and getting their blessing, the process of gathering writers, artists, and developing the game started to take place. As the project sits now, there are 5 out of 6 story arcs done, plus the intro neutral story arc. Most of the story arcs hit in around the 70k word mark with at least one hitting over 85k. This is a big project, I will not sugar coat that. During the development process, members have come and gone. In fact, currently I am sad and happy to say that Qwerty has moved on in life. While it has been a setback not having him working on the project, he has had a good reason and we all wish him the very best in his new endeavors. Currently project development is working on getting an alpha version of the neutral arc up and able to be played before starting on the individual story arcs. The game has no set due date right now, but many of the members want to see it completed before we get old and grey, hehe
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