lifeaftr | April Intro: The Flower Ripens in its Place

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April Intro: The Flower Ripens in its Place

INTRO LOG: APRIL

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

A9: Sow the Seed
Unbeknownst to new arrivals, the archipelago of LifeAftr has recently seen the appearance of a new island, as chosen via voting - and they have been unceremoniously placed there instead of upon Ensō, where most newcomers would typically appear. It's probably for the best that the island of Ziziphus is so outwardly peaceful.

There are worse places to find yourself, all things considered. The mana pool glimmers with a greenish light, the stone ring containing that peculiar fluid set firmly into the earth. The surrounding land fits neatly into that general aesthetic: rippling fields stirred by the occasional crisp breeze alternate between amber-golden and rich, verdant green in coloration, and irregular patches of color signify the presence of a great deal of flowers of all sorts.

It's a peaceful scene.

We're sure you're all about to make it go horribly wrong.

B9: Reap the Harvest
For the unluckier, or the more adventurous, something far less tranquil awaits. Perhaps you woke up on this particular map square instead, or you saw fit to journey a little farther, just to see what might happen. In any case, you'll quickly discover that this may not have been the best idea, when an ordinary grassy mound abruptly detaches itself from the ground, hauls itself upright on bristling legs, and starts scuttling near.

SPINDLANKS have now been unlocked in the bestiary.
What might initially appear to be a leafy hillock will very quickly prove to be something far more...mobile, if you get close enough. That clump of grass and red ferns will abruptly hoist itself up on six vine-like tendrils, crawling for its prey like a very large, mossy spider. While it's fully capable of swiping at its foes with its massive, leafy arms, the spindlank's favored method of dispatching its prey is simply to scuttle forth until it's positioned directly above you and drop down. If its weight does not crush you and choking on the clods of earth doesn't smother you, don't worry; the spindlank intends to eat you alive with a set of fleshy jaws set deep in its center, buried somewhere in its underbelly.

For despite their appearance, spindlanks are very much carnivorous. Their size can vary from anywhere between six and ten feet tall when their appendages unfurl entirely. They are, in essence, very large plants, and thus can be easily dealt with, if you can burn them.

Just try not to get overwhelmed.

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

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 )

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[He’s right on the money, to be fair, but Kravitz wouldn’t admit to it in exactly those words if pressed, mostly because he doesn’t want this strange man to be right in any capacity. He huffs, tucking his scythe under his arm.]

Alright, then, enlighten me. Why, exactly, would this not work?

[He’s going to keep being stubborn about it, but he does need the info.]

Did you not get the memo from the Storyteller? We're stuck here. [jazz hands] The best you'll get if you're trying to open a portal to hell or whatever is you might get to the other island but honestly if you want to do that? Use the mana pool, it's faster.

[Connor points to the mana pool and doesn't explain how it works, because anybody with a scythe also probably knows how magic works. Plus the Storyteller should have explained it. He's pretty sure the Storyteller explained it to him.]

[They did. The Storyteller totally did. Kravitz is just bad at obeying rules he thinks are utterly stupid.]

So what, your solution to this is to sit down and have a picnic, just like that?

[Better than what he’s doing. But more than that, now that he’s getting the chance to focus, he’s realizing there’s something… off, about this person. Something more his domain.]

… Stay right there.

[And without skipping a beat, a large heavy looking book appears in his hands, though he doesn’t seem encumbered by the weight- as if it didn’t have any at all.]

What is your name?

Why not?

[Connor's about to say something about how he's been here for four months and it's not like he even wants to go home anyway when the conversation takes a different turn. Normally, Connor has zero qualms about telling people what his name is but also? Also that's some magic shit and he's enough of a fantasy reader that he's not about to give it out to creepy people holding scythes that have massive, magical-looking books.]

Uh, full offense? But I'm not inclined to tell you my name when you've got that. [Connor points at the book.] Names have power and shit and I'm not about to tell you mine when you could be out here trying to learn my true name for evil purposes.

[He's smart, honestly, but it's not going to stop him, just slow him down. Kravitz flips some pages, barely registering what's being said to him as he scans the pages.]

I'm not going to hex you or something.

[But he does find what he wants, and Connor can see his eyes narrow, and then flick from the pages up to him.]

You're undead.

[He says it so plainly, like one might be exasperated because their cat knocked over a glass of water. It's not cruel or angry so much as it is unfathomably tired.]

And twice over. Really? You can't just do that and come back here.

You say that like it's my fault I'm still here. Newsflash: death is fake and not being able to die is worse than dying.

[Why anybody ever let Connor know there's no permadeath is beyond me, but. Here we are: Connor knows death is fake in LifeAftr and is dedicated to telling other people in the literal worst ways possible. He was mad about it, but now it's just an unfortunate fact of life. Kind of like how he keeps accumulating people to be responsible for and his dormant big brother insticts kicked in so now he's got like three water bottles he's responsible for.]

But if you can fix that, be my fucking guest.

Death is not fake.

[Or well, it shouldn't be. There are laws to the universe and this is damn well one of them.]

But we can agree on one point- living things should be able to die, and in peace. And as soon as I can find a way off this island, I can ensure you are brought to the proper place as well. What is it that brought you back, exactly?

[Because uhh they CERTAINLY shouldn't be doing that, either.]

Death is super fake here. If you die, the Storyteller just rezzes you with a handicap after a few days.

[He even tested it out for himself to make sure.]

So that's the answer: being here brought me back because we're all stuck here. It's like the afterlife, but it sucks.

[He immediately makes a face like he's just been slapped.]

Wh-- it-- they should not-- that's completely against the natural order of things. What the hell is going on.

[This better not be the afterlife wherever he is because this is not even CLOSE to the right plane.]

Y-- You're trapped. The people here are trapped by a cocked up necromancer who thinks they can just play with death.

[... Well. That sure sounds like a job.]

Okay, before you get all self-righteous and shit? Not everyone here was dead before they arrived and I'm like 80% sure the Storyteller wasn't lying when they said they didn't bring us here.

[It's not 100%, but Connor would bet good money that it was true. Too many things didn't lie up if the Storyteller actively brought them here and it really did seem like maybe there was somebody higher up than the Storyteller. Call it a hunch - or the sure knowledge that there were other Gods and therefore someone had to have created them.]

Anyway, not being able to die is actually doing wonders for keeping me from doing that thing where I kill myself so it's not actually as bad as you would think.

[He still craves the sweet release of death, but it's weirdly freeing to know the matter is literally out of his hands. Not being able to die is so much fucking worse that it activated self-preservation instincts he didn't even know he still had.]

[Hhhh, alright, alright, we're going to have to back up here. Kravitz sighs, running a hand back over his hair as he tries to center himself before letting his hand drop, clapping them together in front of his chest.]

Okay, okay, we are going to start over here, because this is only getting more confusing by the second. I'm Kravitz. I'm a bounty hunter for the Raven Queen, also known as the goddess of death. It comes with a variety of job titles, but most societies seem to refer to me as the grim reaper. It's my job to make sure people who die go to the right place, and that people aren't just out here sending the laws of the universe directly into the toilet.

[He takes a deep breath, closing his eyes for a second and raising his hands to his mouth, before tilting them forward, still together, towards Connor.]

You should not be here and living. Frankly, I should not be here and living, because I've been quite undead for the last thousand or so years. And the coming back to life thing? Way out. Very off the table. Now, I don't blame you for this, necessarily, as long as you weren't part of the scheme to do this. But as soon as I figure out a way off this island, you and everyone else who has died is coming with me to the proper plane.

Does that make things a little more clear?

No, I got that. You're a Grim Reaper and you're upset because this isn't how things "should be." [The air quotes are heavily implied.] I'm trying to tell you that just because that's how your shit works doesn't mean that's how all shit works.

[If there's anything his super normal ass from super normal Pennsylvania has learned? It's that the only rules that matter are the ones of where you are. The fact that magic doesn't exist where he's from doesn't mean shit when it comes to the fact that people literally have magic here.

He hasn't met an actual vampire yet here, but he's pretty sure they probably exist too - to say nothing of zombies. Conciousnesses uploaded into robot bodies. Whatever other shit he can't even imagine that exists and is, somewhere, the natural order of things.]

You can take me, whatever. I don't give a fuck, but don't fucking come in here acting like there's only one natural order to things when there's no such thing as a "Raven Queen" or magic books that tell you whether or not people have died where I'm from.

It's how things should be for the good of the world. I didn't just-- just make this up for the sake of antagonizing you. I truly would have loved for this exact thing not to be happening, actually.

[He's trying not to bristle further at the idea of a whole world without the Raven Queen, but-- perhaps there are other agents of death. Perhaps without necromancy his job is simply not needed. There is circumstance. But not here, when things simply come back to life. It makes him think of souls ripped apart between planes, people spiraling past their sanity and killing the very people that tried to save them. Revival is a bandaid for death, not an escape.]

You're awfully. Calm, for this whole endeavor.

It takes effort to feel strong emotions, my guy, and I don't have enough spoons to be wasting them on stupid shit like freaking out whenever weird stuff happens.

[Every day is a day where Connor is like "This might as well happen." He could freak out when weird stuff happens, but after the sun literally died? He 1) realized that freaking out about normal-ass shit is not really, like. Productive? And 2) pretty much everything paled in comparison to spending a week in eternal night because apparently, you know. Suns can just stop goddamn doing their job in the sky.]

I got over magic being real and shit about when the sun fucking died and turned into a phoenix.

The sun died and... no, you know what, we're not doing that today.

[Now that, that's an emotion he understands. Sometimes, you hit the tip top end of your "fucking hell" meter and you just lose the ability to give a flying fuck. It just. Happens.]

Whatever, you don't have to be-- scared, or anything, I just. It's so odd, to find so many people blasé about death. Or at least bored by the actual grim reaper showing up, I mean-- I'm not as intimidating as usual, certainly, but that shouldn't matter.

[Okay, he should not be getting into this with a mortal (even if it is grinding his gears), and he shakes his head.]

Regardless. When this is all over, I'll make sure you can go where you're supposed to and rest.

I'm sure there's someone on this island who isn't casual fuckbuddies with death. [A beat.] The metaphorical concept of death, I mean. Not you. Anyway, that person isn't me.

[Connor's voice gets more strained as he speaks because this conversation was kinda fun? But nothing brings the party to a stop like accidentally implying you'd sleep with the person you're talking to. Let him - ok no. No, dying would be worse, in this specific situation. Nevermind.]

[He just sort of gives him this look, lips pressed tight into a line. Well that's. Nnngh.]

Well that was... one way to put it, certainly.

[He knows he isn't Death incarnate, just an agent of the force, but also... thats some phrasing right there. He clears his throat, trying to get past it.]

Anyway. Ah. Yes, hopefully everyone on this island isn't so... casual about what should be a serious topic. Though I suppose I'll have to have some words with this Storyteller about what they have in place to prevent the typical consequences of a lack of a structured death system.

You can't spell funeral without "fun." Anyway, there's still consequences to dying here if you're worried about that shit.

[He'd say they're worse than actually dying, but he knows that's just his own fucked up perspective.]

I lost the color blue for a while - which I realize sounds like nothing but. [Connor gestures around to everything.] We're surrounded by water and the sky is blue. It sucked.

[Nevermind the symbolism of losing the color blue - Evan's color. He doesn't think about that one a lot.]

[Well, consequences are a start, at least.]

I imagine that would be plenty disorienting, yes. Any kind of deterrent to dying all the time is, on the whole, preferable.

[But he sounds like he's going to need to get in depth with the Storyteller for that one.]

Well. Thank you for all this information. I will need to have an audience with that god, but... I will find a way to sort this out, with you. I'm sorry you haven't been allowed to rest.

[That promise, he will do his best to keep.]

In the meantime, I have matters to attend to.

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April Intro: The Flower Ripens in its Place

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cw: suicidal ideation

this is going So well

it's Fine

so fine

cw: attempted suicide

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