January Event: Setting Fire to the Sky

[lifeaftr_mods]

JANUARY EVENT: SETTING FIRE TO THE SKY

Who: Everyone!
What: The sun dies, and the creatures of the night emerge from the depths
When: January 21st - January 28th
Where: Everywhere! Ensō, Monsun, Chol, and the Islets
Warnings: Character death, possible body horror and violence. Please mark any additional warnings as needed!

So We Can Take the World Back From the Heart-Attacked

The night of the 21st, the sun begins to dim. It dips in the horizon, sinks to nestle itself in the center of Chol like a star falling in slow motion, where it begins to smolder quietly - massive, smoking, and hot, like a massive egg. The night grows colder, the sky reduced to an inky black. The surface of the surrounding water is still but for the occasional ripple, the odd, strangely subdued wave, with not even the hollow lights of distant stars to glint off its reflective waves.

The Jormun gather around the sunken, dying sun with their scaled hands on their weapons, their expressions grim. They fan out across the island of Chol with arms in hand. Their fortifications have settled around the island's center in a dense ball of bristling weapons. They have been preparing for this. They are ready to fight.

Are you? No island is safe. From the well-trodden mainland of Ensō and its islets to the stark dichotomy of Monsun to the craggy shores of Chol, all manner of strange things have begun to haul themselves, dripping, from the watery dark.

No more preparation. No more running.

From here on out, it is fight or die.

One Maniac At a Time, We Will Take It Back

As the Storyteller has promised, there is sanctuary in their temple on Ensō, which will keep out the worst of the creatures. It will not, however, protect characters from the cold and dark, and so they will have to keep themselves warm some other way.

The Jormun fight fiercely, but they do not fight alone. Aside from the help that the willing of your number have offered, you may glimpse the Storyteller battling alongside the rest in a flurry of strange, shifting animal shapes: a heavy-antlered reindeer, a shrieking owl with outstretched talons, a slavering grizzly bear with the Storyteller's signature tome strapped across a broad, furry back, to name but a few. Those creatures that the Storyteller defeats will burst into a flurry of paper and dark, spattering ink, rather than being felled in the conventional manner. How odd.

As this is an event with a high risk of death, the Storyteller will impose death penalties for one week only. However, deaths succumbed during the event will count towards the character's total.

Then I'll Raise You Like a Phoenix

Come the sunrise on the 28th, the sun will launch itself into the air with a victorious shriek, its wings trailing plumes of fire behind it. The phoenix takes flight, reborn from the ashes. The shores of Chol are littered with corpses, both shadowy and scaled, along with an even smattering of crumpled paper and splotched inkstains. Despite the triumph of the fight, it did not come without its costs. The Jormun gather their dead and prepare to mourn them quietly. Those who perished in the fight will not see the sunrise from this unique perspective, watching the murk of the night tint to soft, milky yellow and pink, and then to a glorious new day.

Munin will greet the survivors with a mixture of solemnity and relief, thanking them profusely for their help. There is not much more that her people can offer you, at this point - they must grieve their dead, and she must return to the sea to prove that she has cemented her worth as a leader in the eyes of the other Jormun - but that does not mean that your stories will part forever.

Event Timeline

[ ♆ ] January 20th: Monthly Storytelling occurs as usual
[ ♆ ] January 21st: The dark arrives, the temperature drops further, and the first hostile creatures begin their assault
[ ♆ ] January 28th: The dark ends and the sun rises
[ ♆ ] January 30th: Those who perished are revived, suffering from a reduced death penalty

Event Specifics

[ ♆ ] If you have any questions, feel free to look over our OOC Info Post.
[ ♆ ] Feel free to make your own logs if necessary!
[ ♆ ] If your character perishes in this event, please let us know!
[ ♆ ] Item trades with the Jormun can be found on the OOC plotting post here! Even if you were only recently accepted, you are free to participate!

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( CODED BY BOOTYCALL )

Comments

[prettypurpleparlor]

Yes. I thought... the scarf and the hat would keep your head relatively warm between them, but you're wearing short sleeves and don't have anything for your hands.

[She'd have made him a jacket if she could, but she only had so much time and silk to work with.]

It can be hard to do things with your hands with thick gloves, it muffles things too much, so I made fingerless ones. Just in case.

[ungrieved]

[He called her something wrong, in a moment of weakness. The association pulled at his brain and worked out that open-mouthed mistake, and no matter how he might try to rub it away, it is an error he has already made. Set in stone. No hope of being forgotten.]

[But it is a thing a Mom would do, isn’t it?]

[The thought swirls in snowflake-ash spirals, drawing his shoulders taut against his ears.]

Just...’cause you could?

[prettypurpleparlor]

Just because I wanted to.

[A small distinction, but one she feels worth making.]

[ungrieved]

[He doesn’t seem to have an answer to that. Not an immediate one, away. Chalk it up to the fear, to the fact that he’s just had to come to terms with his fluxing mortality, with how shaken he was from the start, but it works something out of him. A quiet, almost inaudible little mumble:]

...thanks.

[prettypurpleparlor]

You're welcome.

[Her response is gentle, not trying to push at him too much lest she break something about his slow and fragile progress back towards calm, or at least towards being calmer than before.]

Do you want me to toss them over to you? That way I don't have to get closer if you'd rather I not.

[ungrieved]

[A pause, before he nods, almost reluctantly. As if he regrets needing to ask - regrets that she needs to ask.]

Y...yeah. Okay.

[prettypurpleparlor]

[She picks up the gloves and hat, folding them neatly together so she can toss them in one bundle and not have them land all over the place.]

[Movements clear and steady, so as not to startle him, she throws the bundle over to him with a gentle underhand pitch. It's not terribly difficult- monsters tend to have good aim, thanks to practicing with bullet patterns, and for all that she hasn't moved closer they're not sitting that far apart.]

[Even if he fumbles the catch, it'll probably land in his lap anyway.]

[ungrieved]

[He doesn't quite make the catch. He'll blame it on his spent nerves, on the general chill clinging to his bones. If he had the wherewithal to do so, maybe he'd even pitch a fuss about precisely that.]

[He pulls on the gloves almost at once. It feels a bit stupid, given that he's in short sleeves, but they're soft and warm, and too much to resist.]

Thanks. I guess.

We can probably wrap this unless you want to do more with it.

[prettypurpleparlor]

[She doesn't point out that he's thanked her once already.]

You're welcome, Gabe.

[Instead, she hopes that it can be a little bit of a reference, point, something to help him ground himself while he puts himself back together. There'll be work to do, quite a bit more, before the week is out... but not just yet. Just for a little while longer, they can both sit quietly, giving themselves some time to find more stable ground.]