lifeaftr | August Intro: All Will Fade and Petrify

August Intro: All Will Fade and Petrify

INTRO LOG: AUGUST

Who: New arrivals, and you!
What: New souls arrive to the archipelago of LifeAftr
When: August 4th and onward
Where: Primarily Umui, though Ensō is also likely
Warnings: Mark as needed!

New Arrivals: Bury Me Alive
When you wake, it's initially to darkness: musty, stuffy, and dense. Your eyes may take some time to adjust, but when they do, something will rapidly become apparent - namely, the fact that you're underground.

Exploring your surroundings will reveal a few more unnerving discoveries. Take, for example, the fact that you're currently trapped in what appears to be a number of buried houses, walls and ceilings compressed against one another thanks to time and pressure. The walls may have held up the weight of the soil above your head for a time, but it'd likely be best not to hold out hope that they'll continue to last. Your supply of air down here is rather limited, after all.

Unfortunately for you, it's not merely earth that separates you from the surface. It's also flowers in rich abundance - an untold, innumerable weight of dead and decaying plant matter, twined around the ancient bones strewn underground along with your sweet self, pressing down from above, peeking through the cracks in the metallic folds of whatever material once comprised these buildings' ceilings, walls, and floors.

Whether it's a mass tomb or something more sinister, you'd better figure a way out, and quickly. If you didn't show up with a shovel or some means of teleporting yourself out, you may very well need to resign yourself to digging your way out or making a lot of noise to attract someone who can, before this becomes a more dedicated grave.

Everyone Else: All Will Change and Calcify
As for the rest of you, well...if you're anywhere near the regions of G5, you might hear the sounds of a not-insignificant number of people finding themselves displaced underground, and requiring your imminent assistance in getting out. Perhaps you'll recognize the place. It is, after all, very well marked. They'll probably be properly grateful if you mind offering the help, and hey - it's a welcome break from the eerie, ever-present silence that clouds almost the entirety of Umui. As long as you don't mind digging around that old cenotaph half-buried in the flowers and scraping through sheets of metal, a lot of flowers, and...oh, yes. The first bones you'd be finding since arriving here.

If you've been hanging around the laboratory near the island mana pool, on the other hand, you'll definitely be getting a break from the silence - namely in the form of ARUM-25, whom a number of you have been devoted to repairing since their discovery, learning that a great deal of their systems have come back online, right around the time that the newest arrivals are properly unearthed.

Including their diagnostic systems.

The warning, repeated shrills will undoubtedly be heard by anyone who passes:

ALERT: STAGE ONE DETECTED
ALERT: STAGE ONE DETECTED
ALERT: STAGE ONE DETECTED
ALERT: STAGE ONE DETECTED
ALERT: STAGE ONE DETECTED

And that's probably fine. Right?

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 )

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Once the flowers are gone, which takes a fair few minutes because there's just so many of them, it's just dirt and (bizarrely) metal. It's the metal that's the problem, really. His sword doesn't do much against it and he doesn't just want to punch it down aimlessly and risk hurting whoever's underneath.

This is a situation where Laurent's magic might be useful, Damen thinks, but that would take too long.]

Can you hear me? [He hopes whoever is down there can.] Stand back, I'm going to try and pierce the metal.

[It's probably not great for his sword to slam it point down into metal repeatedly, but that's what we're doing now.]

[ the metal is very strange. she's not sure what it could be--not at this very moment, anyway--but as the noises get closer, she starts to get the idea that someone is actually coming to get her. she stops her yelling as soon as the stranger from the other side speaks to her. ]

Yes! I can hear you.

[ what a relief. but...advising her to stand back is a great idea, thanks damen. she takes a few steps back, standing several feet away from where she once was. ]

Alright, please go ahead. [ she sure hopes that this'll work. ]

[His sword isn't actually very pointed, which makes this take more effort than expected. The good news is nothing shatters. The bad news is that when it does pierce the metal, there's a somewhat concerning creak. Turns out that smacking an unstable roof? Maybe not the best plan.

Unfortunately, he can't tell where this building might end and another might begin so time suddenly becomes of the essence. He wedges his sword into the hole he's made and presses down, which causes a chunk of the roof to give way. There's light now, but uh.]

Quick, take my hand!

[The rest of the roof is making extremely concerning noises, so you know. There's that]

[ that creak puts her on edge, and hifumi gasps to herself, terribly afraid that whatever's up there will collapse on the poor man trying to help her. she opens her mouth, ready to tell him to stop--

and then he breaks through. she flinches when part of the roof collapses, but it's an opening, and with the concerning noises happening, she knows there isn't much time. ]

Okay!

[ she runs up to him and latches on to his hand as quickly as she can. hifumi is light; hopefully he won't have too much trouble pulling her up? ]

[He's ~~strong like bear~~ more than capable of pulling her up. It probably would have been easier if he lifted her out, but uh. He's not that tall. As it is, though, he pulls her out and the roof immediately gives up the ghost and collapses inward. That'll be fun to shift through to find Hifumi's knapsack.]

Are you alright?

[ that's fine. as long as she gets out, that's fine. screw the knapsack--well okay they'll probably want to look for that--but they're both alive. hifumi looks up at the man, grateful for his help. ]

Yes... I'm fine. More than fine. [ she has a few scratches, but she pays no mind to them. ] Thank you... You saved my life.

It's nothing more than what anyone would do.

[The way he says it implies that he truly does think anyone would go to this effort. nevermind Chara sitting over there being an asshole about this. Nevermind that Laurent is probably going to be like "what the FUCK is wrong with you" later.]

Can you stand, or should I carry you to somewhere you can rest?

[ honestly? she knows that not just anyone would. she's encountered some pretty rotten people--well, she can't blame them for being that way--and people who'd most certainly leave her be if they heard her crying for help. ]

I can stand, don't worry. I'm just...overwhelmed. Nevertheless, you have my gratitude.

[ a nod, then: ] My name is Hifumi Togo.

Damianos.

[He doesn't give a last name because he, uh. Doesn't have one? The closest thing he has is "of Akielos" and that's meaningless here. Laurent is the only person that carries any weight for, and they'd both rather forget what kind of weight it carried.]

I'm glad to make your acquaintance, although the circumstances could have been better.

Damianos...I'll remember that.

[ the man who saved her life. ]

I'm in your debt, Damianos-san. Please let me know if there's anything I can do to repay you.

I don't keep track of that sort of thing. [It's a very Veretian thing to do, keep track of the ways people owe you.] If I did, my husband and I would spend all our time trying to cancel out our debts to each other.

[They're technically not married yet, but at the same time? They were basically married in Damen's mind even before he proposed and he'll call Laurent his husband if he wants to. He gave up a kindgom for Laurent, once. He's earned the right to call Laurent whatever he wants.]

I see...

[ how kind of him. hifumi thinks he has a kind heart, and she smiles earnestly at him. ]

Still, I'd like to do something for you regardless. Perhaps it'll just need to be a surprise... [ a pause, then: ] Um... I would like to ask, though, if you know what's going on? Where are we, and why have I woken up here?

Do you remember a dream you had near a fire where a rabbit spoke to you? [It's always easiest to start there and work backwards to fill in the gaps, he's found.] That's the basic shape of the situation: we've been brought here by some force unknown, and are now under the care of the Storyteller. Currently, we are on an island called Umui to gather resources to take back to the island of Ensō, which is the Storyteller's domain.

[Damen pauses, to let all of that sink in and let Hifumi ask any questions she might already have because, y'know. He's had like eight months to adjust here and he remembers how shitty those first few days were.]

[ a storyteller? islands she's never heard of before? and yet, the dream about the rabbit is the only thing that feels familiar to her. hifumi suddenly frowns, eyes wide.

they certainly aren't in japan anymore. ]

I...I don't understand. I don't recall ever signing up for such a thing...

It's not a thing one signs up for. It's a thing one is chosen for.

[Jury's still out on whether that's a good thing or a bad thing, honestly. Damen's opinion of the Storyteller trends towards positive, unlike some people. He knows that gods can be fickle, but he believes that the Storyteller isn't to blame for them arriving here.]

Whether we like it or not, we are all stuck here and it's in our best interests to help each other wherever possible. Everyone has something they can contribute.

[Even his useless royal ass.]

Chosen? But...why? Why me?

[ she frowns deeply, brow knitting as she tries to process this. hifumi doesn't think she's very special at all, especially considering recent events that have happened back at home. ]

I...I'm not even sure what I can contribute to a situation like this.

I can't answer that. I don't pretend to know how the gods think or how they use us in their games.

[He's pretty comfortable with the idea of gods just casually fucking around with human lives. Perks of being from fake Ancient Greece.]

But I know you can find a place here, even if you can't see it yet. There are plenty of people who will help you find it, myself included.

I see.

[ that's. slightly frightening, but okay. ]

I'm...glad to hear it, and I'm grateful. I... Right now, I'm just at a loss of where to start. Should I find somewhere to stay?

You can stay with us, if you'd like.

[Laurent will agree if Damen looks enough like a kicked puppy. Of that much, Damen is certain.]

First, however, I should retrieve your pack from down there.

O-Oh, that's--

[ improper?? probably. definitely. but if there's really nowhere else, she'll consider it. ]

Ah, yes...is there a way that I can help?

[Damen sees like zero problems with this because it's not like he's Veretian? Besides, she's jailbait and he's (going to be) married. No big.]

Well, if you see it while I'm down there, don't be afraid to point it out.

[He's literally just going to jump down and start moving stuff around. It's fine. Nothing about this is ultra-dangerous or anything.]

Alright...please be careful. Should you get injured, I have a first aid kit with me.

[ please don't get injured, damen. she watches him jump down effortlessly, and she's pretty nervous about everything like. collapsing on him or something, so she keeps her eyes peeled.

as he's digging, something akin to a bag starts to pop up to his left. ]

Ah! Check to your left--that might be it!

[The good news is that the walls are probably not in danger of collapsing too. The bad news is I rolled a 7 so like. The metal is definitely sharp and in the process of trying to get her bag he cuts himself. It's fine, in that he's definitely suffered worse, but he does definitely have some trouble getting back up to where Hifumi is.]

Laurent is going to be so annoyed with me. [He doesn't seem particularly concerned about, y'know. Being injured.] It's nothing a bandage won't fix, though.

D-Damianos-san!

[ she tries to go down a little to help him out, extending a hand to pull him out of the wreckage. he has her bag, sure, but at what cost. she frowns deeply. ]

Once you're out, we can bandage you up. I'm so sorry...

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

August Intro: All Will Fade and Petrify

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject