lifeaftr | December Intro: Don't Come Home for Christmas

INTRO LOG: DECEMBER

Who: Everyone!
What: New souls arrive to the archipelago of LifeAftr
When: December 3rd and onward
Where: Monsun
Warnings: Mark as needed!

The Overview: Uncharted Waters
Stay alert, new adventurers; instead of the white-sand beaches of Enso, you will instead be coming to on one of two sides of the relatively uncharted lands of Monsun. Most of the information regarding this peculiar land can be found in the informational post linked, but as a quick-and-dirty rundown: Monsun's western side is a hot wasteland of a desert prone of disasters and mishaps, but will affect your character's emotional and psychological state in a positive sense, while its eastern side is a verdant forest filled with endless resources...as well as a tendency to bring out the absolute worst of your character.

To start with, all new arrivals will be showing up in one of two squares that characters uncovered last month! We are leaving it up to player discretion as to which side of the island your character arrives on, but bear in mind the psychological repercussions!

All new arrivals will additionally awake with knapsacks, their names stitched to the front. The contents of said knapsacks can all be found in your acceptance notices!

Monsun, C4: These Are Your Good Years
You wake to the hot sun steaming overhead, rapidly drying your clothes and belongings, waterlogged from washing upon this desolate shore. The heatwaves shimmer at your vision, distorting your view of the horizon. But if you really squint, it looks like there might be something dark green fringing that pipecleaner skyline, like a lush woodland awaits you on the other side of this desert nightmare. A mirage, maybe?

Whatever it is, you don't get very long to contemplate it. Beneath your feet, the ground has begun to shake as a many-headed horror erupts from the earth. Great streams of pale sand slough from its dry, scaly hide as multiple horned heads unfurl in a hissing inflorescence. The creature's eyes are all pale as grubs; it is quite blind. But that does not mean it cannot smell you.

Boasting both a thick hide and a chitinous coat of sandy-colored scales that blends them perfectly with their surroundings, Sand Hydras sleep several feet under the sand until they sense the vibrations of potential prey aboveground. While they are significantly smaller than their mythological counterparts - they can only span eight to twelve feet in length - Sand Hydras are cunning creatures nonetheless with a number of heads that can vary from one to as high as ten. Their weakness, on the other hand, is simple: water burns them like acid. It seems they may flourish only in any moisture-poor environment.

Assuming your character lasts that long, remember: as physically destructive as Monsun's west may be, your character's most admirable traits will be amplified to their fullest potential by the twenty-four hour mark.

Monsun, D3: Before You Bury Yourself Alive
Those waking on the eastern side of the island, on the other hand, will face a far more pleasing tableau. The temperature is perfect, the sun shines modestly through the canopy of deciduous greenery above your head, and the air is thick and sweet with the smell of fresh fruit.

That's right - within minutes of their arrival, your character will discover several plants laden with fresh wild blackberries.

Should that temptation arrest their attention, should they be vulnerable to the foibles of greed or hoarding or paranoia, your character may very well wish to keep this treat to themself. Or...perhaps not. Perhaps they'd much rather search out a fight, or try to steal someone else's supplies, or embark on a poorly-advised mission to swim out into Monsun's surrounding waters.

For that is, after all, the catch: as physically soothing as Monsun's east may be, your character's most hateful traits will be amplified to their fullest potential by the twenty-four hour mark.

As a final note to those who participated in the Test Drive Meme, bear in mind that 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.

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!

LOGS ● OOC ● STORIES ● MAIN NAVIGATION

( CODED BY BOOTYCALL )

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Makes sense. We need to find out more about what's going on, and it'll help to hear from someone in charge who isn't the Storyteller.

[Because right now they only have the Storyteller's perspective and their own. Each could be incredibly limiting in their own ways. That being said, they still had to consider that whatever god might be here might not be any more helpful or straightforward than the Storyteller, but...

Well, they'd cross that bridge when they came to it.]

I think that would be nice, if possible. [How long she's been here, he doesn't know -- but her immediate suspicion of the Storyteller both exhausts and amuses him. Amuses, because she's right; exhausts, because she has no way of knowing she's right.] We're also compiling resources and information, to the best of our ability.

It's an honest slog and I won't describe anything that's happened as pleasant, and I'm sorry you got dragged into this. [She seems sensible and reasonable, adapting to these new circumstances quickly. Maybe worryingly quickly. But Roy thinks that it is important, when possible, to offer sympathy and understanding. Forgetting other people here are people, out of anger or frustration, is easy to do.]

It's okay.

[Now that she's getting a more... straightforward explanation of their situation, it's helping her settle into things, she thinks. Or maybe it's just getting food and water.]

I'll just have to do what I can to help.

[Roy starts to respond. Pauses, then folds his arms with a frown directed at the ground.]

That's true. Something about how you say that just seems to ram home how frustrating and futile this all is, but then again, I have massively conflicted but resolutely negative feelings about all this. Understandably so, I should hope. [All he can do is shrug. She's handling this so well it's alarming, honestly. Even accounting for the fact that she had a good cry earlier, what has she been through that makes her so matter-of-fact about it?]

[Or failing that, why is she a good enough actor to come off like she is?]

[Funnily enough, her reaction mirrors his, arms folding, looking at the ground.]

Yeah, I think so. It's... my second time doing this, after all.

[Well. Just answer all his mental questions there.]

[Roy glances up at her, one eyebrow practically off his head.]

I would appreciate some more details. If you're willing to share, of course -- I would totally understand if not.

[Considering his opinions on this current adventure and everything he's been through, well. He doesn't expect he'll be exactly thrilled to relive it if he's ever asked in the future.]

[She's silent for a few seconds, eyes still on the sand. Trying to decide what she's comfortable telling.]

There are other places like this. Nexuses, I think they were called? Where people from different universes and worlds end up. This is the second I've been to, though I've met people who've been to others.

The place I was at last was called the Tower of Animus.

[No idea about the rest of the world, honestly. The Tower was the only thing that mattered by that point.]

[Interesting. That doesn't explain to Roy how these nexuses could just not be demiplanes when nothing else fit into the planar cosmology, but it did explain some of the Storyteller's insistence that the term was incorrect.]

I'm going to go out on a limb and make a completely irrational guess that 'animus' was meant in the hostile and negative sense, not the psychological one.

It stood for "Tower of Souls," I think. Because... the people who'd originally lived there were doing experiments with them.

[Not exactly a pleasant prospect in the least, and whatever else may have happened afterwards, all of that was messed up.]

I see. Excuse me for one second, please.

[Roy has to turn away for a moment, because for a moment he can't stop his anger from leaking out. One hand clenches into a fist, and his entire body trembles as all that fury rages in him without an outlet.]

[Only through force of will does he swallow it all back down, and though the tension doesn't leave his muscles, it at least relaxes just enough that he's no longer straining against himself. Another moment, and he has enough control to turn back to Xion.]

I'm sorry you had to go through that, let alone that you got brought here. As much as I want to reassure you that there are no experiments being done on souls here, I can't guarantee that absolutely. I can tell you that thus far, we have observed no direct influence on our souls except to resurrect those who have died here. I don't expect that to be much comfort, but...

[What... does she even say to all this? To the fact that he's obviously angry on her behalf, even though the experiments that she was referring to hadn't happened to her (mostly - psychoradiation and Jason aside).]

It's okay. It's really okay. [Light, she's saying this and she's a mess. She wipes at her face.] I... know I don't look it right now. But I appreciate it.

[Besides, some of the best things happened to her in the Tower, not that she thinks she could ever fully explain it.]

[Roy frowns, shaking his head slightly.] It's the sort of okay that you can't do anything about so you accept, not the sort of okay that's actually okay. But I didn't learn how to fight to accept things I thought were wrong.

[He waves both his hands, trying to put it all aside with a physical gesture.] But it is pretty much all besides the point here and now, I know. Sorry.

December Intro: Don't Come Home for Christmas

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