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tom-failure · 5 months

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Okay, so I've come up with a mystic messenger horror AU that I'm tentatively calling the Meatverse (ugly name, I'll think of something better later), and I don't have the energy to actually write multichapters, what with juggling making games and getting fired, and drawing gore is not really my strong suit, but I'm DYING to share it. So you'll have my bullet points for it, unedited.

The worldbuilding:

In this au, the world exists on more than just physical level, or plane. In fact, it is divided into two: the cortex and the Red matter, or Meat. All the world as we know it is the cortex, and the discovery and study of the Meat are top secret and virtually unknown. The Meat is a nether layer of the world, inner and hidden, formed by subconscious desire and trauma, where intangible and psychological things are made manifest. It looks literally like the world made of meat and viscera, all pulsing and alive.

Inherently, The Meat is neutral, but it is way more malleable than the cortex, and thus more easily corrupted, and the corruption of the Meat is extremely dangerous to the cortex, which is part of why the existence of the Meat is the secret so heavily guarded

Cortex is the layer that, on the one hand, protects the Meat, and on the other informs it and changes it.

The Meat carries the historical memory, integrates experience, and shapes the future of the cortex. The Meat is responsible for group mentalities and generational trauma

Although formal study of the Meat is secret to the public, there are people who stumble into it by accident, or secretly search and study it on their own. Such individuals are secretly hunted

Sometimes, as a result of experiences, humans become vulnerable points, where the membrane of the cortex wears thin. Such persons become able to greatly affect The Meat, and thus shape the fates of the world. The danger is, they can use it for good or for evil, and their actions are often informed by their experience

The background:

As a result of her upbringing, Rika becomes a vulnerable point, and starts profoundly feeling the effects of The Meat. As a traumatised person, the signals that she is able to accept from Meat are mostly downward trends and experiences of suffering that echo her own on a greater scale. As she begins contemplating suicide, she starts to secretly hang out with the people on the margins of society, on the lowest, bonding with them over their shared experiences. There, she befriends a drug dealer who experiments with less known substances. Once, he tells her about a very dangerous, potentially deadly mixture, which Rika persuades him to let her try.

When she tries it, the mixture alters her vulnerable point state, and Rika witnesses The Meat. For a brief moment, she is scared, but then she immediately becomes fascinated by it. She quickly understands the workings of The Meat and how it is connected to cortex. She spends some time studying it.

After a while, with her studies and drug usage, she furthers her vulnerable point state up to where she could see The Meat at will, without having to rely on either substance or state of mind. She was her own guinea pig, and then later she also recruited the dealer. She searched for ways to bring him to Meat with her, and found that torture and pain were a quick way to create a vulnerable point.

She also wanted to bring V with her, which is where all of their weird conversations about hurting each other came from. But she hated hurting him for a while, and she tried other ways which ultimately did little to create in him a point of vulnerability.

She discovered that Saeran was another Point, and saw in him a prodigy. She used him, however, to try and find a way to make V a Point. Ultimately, when she hurt V and left, that was her way of creating a point of vulnerability, but she didn't want to see it made.

She had Magenta built and created Mint Eye as a twisted way to create a big cluster of vulnerable points, which she would then basically lovebomb, using that as means to bring profound good to the world via Meat. However, for her plan to succeed, she had to create a space of suffering first, which is why she confined her cult to the mansion, to make sure the evil didn't leak. Only the cleansed vulnerable points were allowed out for recruitment, those that did not ooze pain any longer. Those, however, were mostly very broken people, absolutely incapable of any meaningful action at all.

The elixir is used in Mint Eye as a gateway to Meat

Basically a lot of what Rika did there was not just for the 'greater good', but also to bring V at her side. She wanted him to be the change for good, and herself she saw as the harbinger

Eventually, fearing the great pain escaping the mansion, she started fusing the cultists to the house via Meat. For their cortex beings, that meant that they developed a physical dependence on being within, and spending time outside a while drew them back or killed them. She fused herself with the house to nurture them and give them care and love, partly as compensation, and partly to encourage them to stay.

Zen has potential to become a vulnerable point made by suffering if he accepts his pain. He is very close to it, and his prophetic dreams are a symptom.

Yoosung is another type of vulnerable point in the making, built up by love and kindness and acceptance in response to the harsh world, however, his development is hindered by Rika's disappearance. Accepting kindness and love of others and finding the courage to bring forth his own kindness actively can make him a fully realised vulnerable point

Seven is also a vulnerable point, which Rika knows, but she leaves him out of the cult as a way to further Saeran's connection to Meat. Seven is hired by an org studying Meat, and is tasked with searching out potential vulnerable points who will be closely supervised by the org to be supported and killed if they threaten Meat. Which is why he behaves the way he does and tries to stop Yoosung and Zen from becoming vulnerable points by encouraging Zen to be more lighthearted and overconfident, and bullying Yoosung. He has to take meds to take plunges in Meat, and does not have Meat-sight at will.

Saeran develops Meatsight without Rika knowing

The plot:

Joori Nam (MC) is scouted by Saeran as an extremely valuable vulnerable point in the making, with great potential and little effort required to fully realise her. She was supposed to be bait for Seven as Rika realised he is on the hunt for them, but she fell for Jumin, and then was rescued by Jaehee, disrupting the development of her vulnerable point as she, for the first time in her life, was actually cared for like this.

Saeran starts getting impatient and acting out, disrupting the Meat and making the house unstable. By then, he is half-split into several conjoined entities on the Meat level, partly separate but still acting as one. Rika forcefully binds all but one of the entities on Meat level, and partially separates the most docile one

Around then, V's vulnerable point becomes fully realised, and Rika meets with him, telling him it was all a test and that she is ready to accept him with open arms. V is dependent on her, so he gladly agrees, and then Rika puts him in the lowest, secret level of the house, and forms a sort of a chrysalis around him, so that he would sleep and see kind dreams until her cluster is ready and she would have him make the Great Good. His entire cortex-level being falls into a sort of a coma, and Rika tends to him herself.

The mansion grows from the body of Rika on the top, and the body of V on the bottom, but everyone thinks it's just Rika

V disappears and Seven tracks Mint Eye via Saeran. Joori, on her part, actually finds documents on Mint Eye, too. Basically, Jaehee, Jumin, Zen, Yoosung, and Joori at that point have no idea that Meat even exists. Joori finds some notes, but she can't place them and dismissed them

Seven decides to go to Mint Eye with Vanderwood, who is his org partner, also a vulnerable point who has meatsight at-will. Yoosung is not willing to let Seven go alone, and wants to help save his friends, as he doesn't understand the severity of the situation. Yoosung insists Seven allows him to take him with, but Seven flat-out refuses, and Zen secretly volunteers to take Yoosung there and come with him as backup. Zen has a lot of confidence in his abilities and he fancies himself a saviour of all

Separately from them, Joori (who is let in on a little bit as the person who has found the blueprints and notes of Rika's) wants to go with Seven, too, but is dissuaded by Jaehee

Seven gets into Mint Eye secretly (as he thinks, not knowing that Rika's feelers are probing the house). Rika orchestrates the meeting between him and Saeran, aiming to push both their vulnerable points to greater power, but Yoosung and Zen appear suddenly, disrupting the 'reunion'. The dormant entities of Saeran's awaken, he wants to attack Seven, but Zen saves him, and Saeran attacks Yoosung instead, which both Zen and Seven witness. Saeran essentially further disrupts Yoosung's vulnerable point development. And then Rika takes control and all four of them are imprisoned.

When connection with them is lost, Joori persuades Jaehee that they must go and check, and they are unexpectedly joined by Jumin, who pleads with them to go with. He has information that V was last seen around the mansion. Jumin by then is a mess, and Jaehee tries very carefully to keep Joori sane, so that she doesn't jump into his clutches again.

In three, they go to Mint Eye and are also eventually captured because of Rika's total control of the house

They must find a way to reunite and stop her. The Meat exposes everyone's trauma in a visceral way, so to work together they need to admit it and they need to be able to look at each other. But for a lot of them the first reaction is to hide or to make it seem like nothing is wrong with them

Basically I'm thinking that in the process of them working together Yoozens reveal their feelings, because they're kissing in every universe

I imagine Yoosung tries to reason with Rika, but she simply tells him that he must accept her love to fully realise his potential as a vulnerable point. She sees him as a person who will take the gospel of her and V's success and be her successor elsewhere, starting another ripple of good deed through Meat. She basically explains to him about Meat and has him drink her Elixir, and Yoosung actually sees the Meat and understands what she is talking about. She explains the workings of Meat to him, but Yoosung is too concerned with the present state of the house as an enormous heap of pain that is already oozing outwards. Rika keeps him away from his friends a while, treating his eye (yes, he loses sight there in this version as well, this is something that will happen in every universe I have any say in). She gives him elixir, and Yoosung keeps it and hides it. Rika knows Yoosung little, and she can't really understand him well, cortex or Meat. And she relies little on cortex, operating more often on Meat level, so Yoosung can hide stuff from her.

I think all of them will have to drink elixir and face each other in The Meat, and they will have a lot of explaining to do, and a lot of rifts put between them. I imagine the main conflict would be that the only way they see to stop Rika is to destroy her. But she has hold of all the people in the house, and severed from her, they would all likely die. Someone must replace her and ease them out of it, but none of them are strong enough, so whoever stays will not leave alive. Yoosung will immediately volunteer, and Zen will immediately try to stop him.

But somewhere around there Jaehee and Joori will find V and V will actually be the one strong enough and willing enough to fix this.

I imagine Joori will develop some power of her own, which will help them find V

Seven and Saeran will meet in the Meat, too, and there will be some profound connection, maybe Seven will physically connect with Meat-Saeran to give him strength to at least be restored to the previous state, where he was semi-detached from himself, and not almost-detached, but in the process they will become fused. And in helping Saeran Seven will not save him, and will hurt himself

Yeah, it has a happy ending

#mystic messenger #meatverse au #to rename #mysmes #maybe I'll actually draw something for it #but like in a month when I'm finally fired #прівєт пострижися

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