August Intro: You Think...You Wink...You Do A Double Blink...

[lifeaftr_mods]

INTRO LOG: AUGUST

Who: Everyone!
What: New souls arrive to the archipelago of LifeAftr.
When: August 3rd
Where: Ensō
Warnings: Mark as needed!

Part I: Get Wrekt
You rouse to a splash of sea salt drying on your skin. A haze of glass-white sand glitters in your vision, dappled by lush palms and thick, curling foliage that disappears into a jungle of deep jade. From behind, crackling wood and sawing rope groan from a mangled life raft ran ashore. A petering wash of tide over pebbled sand fills your ears as you struggle to gain your bearings in a vast portrait of tropical color…

No...no, no, that’s not precisely how this story starts.

Why don't we start over?

You rouse to a splash of sea salt, spraying across yourself and the wooden floor beneath you as it breaks across the edge of the platform. The light as it dances across the sea is blinding, dappling white spots across your vision as you slowly come back to consciousness and realize that - this is not where you last remember being.

The middle of the ocean is likely not a place most recall being at all. As you struggle to fully comprehend the new scenario in which you have found yourself, three things become quickly apparent. The raft you find yourself upon barely constitutes as something that should float, never mind a boat. In the distance, perhaps a few hours away at most, a large island beckons to you, a wide strip of beach surrounded by cliffs making it very clear where the most fortuitous of directions shall be.

Lastly, of course, you’re not alone. Hopefully your new companion(s) are just as keen to get ashore before nightfall as you, or voyaging together will not be the most positive experience. At your side you will find a knapsack, one to every member of your raft party, and upon inspecting its contents, you will discover any rewards you may have accrued - as well as a few other items to give you a fighting chance.

A note to those who participated in the Test Drive Meme: those threads, if all parties involved would like, can be game canon in the form of dream-like memories involving a place very much like this one, though the layout is considerably different.

Part II: Choose Your Own Adventure

By fortune (or misfortune, as it were), you eventually find your feet meeting sand, blessed shore to stagger upon as you shake off your newly found sea-legs. There are those that may find this place familiar, as though it appeared in a dream, though the expanse of shore certainly seems larger. The beach stretches off into the distance on both sides, curving around sharp ridges and cliffs, mist obscuring the view the farther along it goes.

So here you are. You’ve found land. Company. Supplies. The sun is now beginning to trek rather low upon the horizon…spending the night outside in such an unfamiliar land is unappealing at best and outright dangerous at the worst.

There is one silver lining in the midst of this mess. Directly ahead, the beach curves up a gentle slope until it meets forest, some manner of building visible through the trees. Further exploration of this area will reveal a dilapidated building of sorts; the architecture is indiscernible to even the most skilled eye. Despite looking as if it has seen better days, there are areas that offer some form of shelter...and who knows what else. Just because it appears uninhabited doesn’t mean you won’t wind up pleasantly, or unpleasantly, surprised.



So what shall you do from here, traveller? There is land to be explored, strangers to meet, friends to reunite with. Supplies to inspect and plenty of questions in need of being said aloud. Choose your path, make haste, and above all else: survive. And whatever you will, take heart.

Your story is about to begin anew.

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Feeling a tad adrift? Make sure to check the Locations Page, which has details regarding the starting areas and a handy map for those who feel better with a bird's eye view!

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LOGS ● OOC ● STORIES ● MAIN NAVIGATION

( CODED BY BOOTYCALL )

Comments

[unpurify]

[Not much, but at least they were granted a few things to begin with. Interesting that some received another weapon - or the Drifter did, going by their 'additional' comment - while others didn't. Someone or something had to have prepared those.

More questions for later. He was coming up with a laundry list of things to ask when possible.]

Have you encountered any impure beings in this place?

[hyperlit]

[Their head goes to one side in apparent confusion. Impure can mean a great deal of things - and, in a small bout of abrupt self-consciousness, the Drifter tugs their mantle a bit more securely about the lower half of their face.]

[Impure may mean...anything.]

impure
?

[unpurify]

[If it matters to the Batter that the Drifter adjusts the mantle hiding their face, he doesn't comment on it. Their appearance thus far has not shown the signs of the impurity he knows of. Blue skin is not a problem.]

Specters or other such beings. Unholy beasts that seek to harm the innocent.

[Monsters, in other words.]

[hyperlit]

[Hm. That isn't the term they would use to describe any of the hostiles they've encountered in their world, but there are deviations - that much they've already registered.]

no.
no one hostile.

[unpurify]

[There are many deviations but when it came to the impure, it all was the same and would end the same way it did back home, by his own hands.]

I see. If you see any, let me know.

[The Batter can take care of it, despite appearances.]

[hyperlit]

description?

[If anything looks as though it's bent on harming anyone, then it will have to be destroyed out of necessity. particularly if anyone here plans on living here in the long-term. Which, given the state of things, is looking likely.]

[unpurify]

The ones I fight are ectoplasmic entities that come in various shapes and sizes. They are always hostile. As for this land, I am unaware but they will have to be purified.

[And if the land itself is infected...

Well. The Batter is here.]

[hyperlit]

[Ectoplasmic.]

[Hallucinations? Visions? The Drifter's head cocks at that, sharp and attentive. Can shadowy entities such as those be killed?]

visions?

[unpurify]

No. They are real. I am capable of purifying them.

[It's what he was made for. So if they really were here along with him, the Batter could easily take care of it.]

[hyperlit]

[There is an almost imperceptible shift in their demeanor. They are real, and things that are real can be destroyed - but not that which lurks in the head, pink and glistening, circling like an ever-present thread.]

[Those things in their head - those are not real.]

how

[unpurify]

[The shift is noted although it is not an aggressive one. Curious. Was this a subject that interested the Drifter?]

It is an ability imbued within me. Through battle I am able to purge their impure souls.

[Or basically he has a baseball bat and good aim.]

[hyperlit]

[Ah. Not something they can simply learn, then. But they'll ask - just one final time. Just to be sure.]

cannot be learned?

[unpurify]

No. I am not capable of it.

[It was something he was made to do, not teach.]

Why do you ask?

[The Drifter isn't the first person to ask about the Batter's power of purification but they are the first to ask if it can be taught.]

[hyperlit]

[There is no kind or normal way to admit that you experience hallucinatory instances of your own death on repeat as a result of the illness sitting astride your chest and polluting your lungs with your own blood.]

[So they say nothing of it at all.]

in case it is needed

[unpurify]

If it is necessary I will do it.

[The Batter purified the world once before and if that was why he had been brought to this place, then that is what God wills and he will follow.

With or without his Puppeteer, this time.]

[hyperlit]

[That will...have to suffice, it would seem.]

[Unfortunately.]

but there are none
?

[unpurify]

Then I am not yet needed.

[It feels....very strange to say. "I am not yet needed."

Does that mean he will have to do something else until that time?]

[hyperlit]

[The same thought had crossed the Drifter's mind, it turns out.]

then what will you do

[unpurify]

[Sleep. Sleep until seconds turn into minutes, into hours, days, weeks, months, years, forever. Sleep until the time you are needed. Until I need you.

Stay in your coma.]

I will do what tasks I am given.

[Even if it means interacting with others when he normally would not.]

[hyperlit]

[A short, formal nod of their head. That would follow logically, wouldn't it? Yes. They should think so. Leading them to their next point - highly pertinent, that which they have been dwelling upon since their arrival.]

mapping?

[unpurify]

You wish to map this place?

[It would make sense to have a map of the island and ruins on had for everyone's convenience. Normally that was something the Batter left up to the Puppeteer, as they could see what he could not. But it would be incredibly valuable to learn.]

I have not done it before. But I will help if you need it

[hyperlit]

map went blank.

[A secondary HUD springs to life from their companion sprite, a wider expanse that remains disconsolately dark. There should be peaks and valleys here, rivers and buildings, but there is no deviation from the uniform blank that signifies an unexplored region.]

start anew.

[unpurify]

[It seems this device of the Drifter was capable of quite a few things. The Batter observes it for a moment before responding.]

What do I do?

[hyperlit]

[Oh, but that's the easy part.]

note what you find.
study landscape.
i will record it.

[unpurify]

[Simple yet effective.]

Okay. Where do we begin?