lifeaftr | September Intro: The Fields Are Painted Gold

Entry tags:

September Intro: The Fields Are Painted Gold

INTRO LOG: SEPTEMBER

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

The Beach: And the Sun is Coming Through
When you arrive on the archipelago of LifeAftr, it is on the shores of Ensō - turquoise waves dragging through the pale sand of the beach. The breeze carries the tang of salt on the tropical sea spray. The sky overhead is a blue to rival the aquamarine surf. All told, the atmosphere is almost...pleasant. Not far from the cream-colored beach, the jungle beckons.

Above the treetops, however, something seems to be drifting overhead.

Bright spots of color drift on the wind like motes of dust. On further inspection, one might be able to discern what, exactly, is the cause of this lazily wafting, brilliantly colored confetti.

They are flower petals, being funneled up into the sky. Petals of every color and shape imaginable, thickening the air with golden currents of pollen, being lifted from one specific point. They are streaming freely from the Storyteller's Temple, as it happens, though this may not be clear to the newly arrived. The Temple has at last begun to shed the floral trappings that have ensnared it since the end of last month, and the breeze carries this out across the ocean skyline.

There's no mistaking it: it is very beautiful. Unless you have allergies.

Inland: The Trees Are Filled With Memories
This influx of flowers on the breeze, aside from being a potential source of unpleasant reminders to those who died choking on said flowers last month, have had additional consequences. The creatures rescued from Ziziphus flourish in such pollen-rich environments, which has led to a fresh budding of their young. Baby mosslings crawl like lumps of lichen over the trunks of trees, and the loud peeping of arboreali chicks can be heard in the branches above. Most of these creatures are not tameable, but some, such as flowccus, can be kept as livestock.

Just take care, when venturing into Ensō's verdant jungle. If Ziziphus's prey animals have begun to spring forth, then its predators have begun to reproduce as well. Young spindlanks and rootwyrms are not nearly as vicious as their adult counterparts, but you may have a bit of trouble getting rid of them without killing them - you did, after all, bring them here to preserve them.

Most notable, however, are the fresh litters of tigerlilies that have begun swarming all over Ensō.

Tigerlilies can be tamed and kept as pets, though despite their fearsome appearance, they not terribly vicious. They subsist in much the same way any other plant would; off of water and sunlight, primarily, though they might also graze like an herbivore from time to time.

If you're interested in keeping one for your own, bear LifeAftr's companion limit in mind - two per character, and no more. The process of trying to tame a tigerlily is not always successful, either. We recommend use of a d10, with the following guidelines:

Rolling a 10: Critical success! This tigerlily will follow you to the ends of the earth.
Rolling 6-9: Taming and training this tigerlily will be like educating a stubborn housecat, but will be nonetheless successful.
Rolling 2-5: Failure. You get sprayed with soporific pollen, which will affect you for several hours.
Rolling a 1: Critical failure. Not only do you get sprayed with soporific pollen, but the tigerlily in question decides that you're their new cat toy. Tigerlilies are not carnivorous, but their teeth and fangs are still very sharp, and not highly pleasant to contend with.

Bear in mind that these are only guidelines; you are free to predetermine successes or failures as you'd like, presuming your character can sustain the companion! Our discord channel has a room for dice-rolls, if that's your speed.

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 )

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

[ that almost makes her snap. her eyes widen, and she's visibly trembling. she wants to pummel him to the ground, make him beg for mercy and atone for all his crimes--

but there's also something about what akechi says that makes ann hear that there's someone troubled, someone who might've been lonely underneath all his bitterness and his rage. it's what holds her back from lunging at him, because maybe--just maybe there's a chance that there's someone else who'd been used by wretched adults like the rest of the phantom thieves were.

this is the most honest he's been since they met in the dreamscape. ]

...It didn't have to be this way, Akechi. [ her voice is more leveled now, but no less coated in anger than it was before. ] We've all made our choices, and you chose this path for yourself.

Good idea!

[ ann isn't going to argue against getting the hell away from whatever that was. at least with some of the other fauna around here, she can see where they are and what they look like. in the case of the mossling, it'd camouflaged so well that it just looked like sudden movement in the corner of her eye.

she follows ren south, which leads them a little further into the jungle. ]

Let's try not to get lost, while we're at it!

[ there are horses. horses. when's the last time ann saw one of those? not in a while. it's kind of exciting, actually. and the tigerlily is really adorable, too. even if it's mewing a distress signal of some sort. ]

Can I pet the horses? I mean, I'd ask about Nemea, but he doesn't really seem to be having a good time right now.

[ she grins at damen. ] Thanks for taking me in, by the way. I think being in good company while you're stuck on an island's better than being alone, you know?

[ and then to laurent, she gives him a wave. hi, new housemate! your fiancé's adopted another teen. how do you feel about that. ]

[Maribelle, being a horse that has been taught manners, swivels her ears towards the new lady and neighs hello!! She’s the stereotypical brown kind of horse, and looks like she wouldn’t mind a pet.

Meanwhile, Ann’s wave isn’t entirely lost on Laurent- even as preoccupied as he is the blonde looks up as people appear in his periphery. But all he sees is Damen with?? a blonde lady??? What, is Damen declaring his latest eye candy candidate? Laurent doesn’t know how to process this, actually.

No Stop That yells again and wiggles, and Laurent decides to let him go. The feline is more or less clean, and Laurent himself is more or less soaked. He now needs to figure out what this is supposed to be.]

.....what is this about?

Edited 2018-09-06 05:09 (UTC)

[Anthy's eyes widen a fraction when she's spoken to, but she makes an effort to try and relax her body. It's easier, strangely enough, if she's around a girl, though not because she doesn't know what they can be capeable of. Heaven forbid she underestimate any woman.]

Um...yes, we...we have.

[On her shoulder, Chuchu nods and squeaks in agreement. It's okay, he'll back you up, Anthy.]

It might be a god, I agree.

[She's not sure why she so readily agrees to that - or why it's so easy to talk to The Knight; she'll quickly find other humans to be intimidating on sight, even when they're friendly. It must be the nature of how they communicate, or their size, or just...how outright nice they are in general, to offer help so readily.]

I suppose...I have to wonder, where is it that people can stay? If there are a lot, there must be a camp of some kind, right?

[Or a shack on Islet #2 that's empty.]

[There's some visual cues that Akechi is likely to pick up on - Anthy's clothing suggest a more 1990's feel, a bit vintage-y but nice kind of traveling outfit. The tiny monkey on her shoulder notices him once he first speaks, looking at him warily. And Anthy herself...goes very still. Rigidly so, as if on instinct, and when her eyes finally flicker to him, they're...

...It's not fear, in her eyes, or hesitance, but like a sort of...shield goes up, somehow, metaphorically. They're alive enough to indicate that she is alive and aware, but they betray no emotion whatsoever until the moment passes, and she schools her face into a small, inoffensive smile.]

...Yes, I have. We have. [She nods slightly to Chuchu, who is still looking wary, clutching a lock of his mistress's purple hair.] I'm sorry, I didn't realize we weren't alone.

Hm...I wish they had taught us more of those things in school. The teachers usually focused on things that really didn't matter.

[Like math. Or various literature that was, even to Anthy, dull to read and even duller to talk about. Her brother was likely the one reason they even allowed her to continue to attend.]

Have you just arrived as well?

I'll do it again if it keeps you from dropping off.

[It's delivered with a bit more menace than is maybe necessary, but at this point he just wants to keep the idiot awake at whatever cost, because dragging him through the woods while he's utterly blitzed out on sleeping pollen does not sound like an ideal time.]

How bad did it get you?

Don't let yourself believe for a second, Washington, that you weren't willing to make good on that promise. For once he's the one with the power in this scenario, and there's absolutely no thrill in it whatsoever; there's no bite of victory, no pride, no satisfaction in witnessing the way their roles have reversed.

There's only a sour taste clinging to the roof of his mouth, bile slicking the back of his throat.

This was supposed to be over. And yet - no. He's back, the Director, and everything he represents, because they can never really be free of him.

He snaps the pistol from the Director's grip and clamps it to the mag-strip at his thigh, and no part of him breathes easier, no part of him feels better for it, and no part of him knows what to do next except:

Carolina.

It's not fair to pass this along to her, but - she'd want to know, wouldn't she?

"How long ago did you wake up here?"

"What does it matter?" he snaps. He reseals his bag and slings it back over his shoulder.There's no resignation in his stance, nor in the angle of his head as he stares Washington down. "You certainly are full of questions and demands for me, Washington."

He decides to slip the second strap over his other shoulder, carrying the bag like an eager schoolchild. Somehow it seems important to show he intends not to get the bag out again, that he means to hang on to everything the powers that be have decided he should have after losing his only means of defense.

"I feel you are also full of assumptions," he adds after this. "And I don't like your implications."

Hm.

[ It's odd for a school not to have geography lessons, or not enough of them for her to remember them, anyway, but he knows the things she had been taught were likely quite important. Too bad she hadn't enjoyed her lessons.

At her question he nods. ]

Yes, I have. Just moments ago.

[ He nods over at her knapsack. ]

I see you've been provided for in the same way I have.

[ He's not afraid of the skeleton—it just seems very odd to him. He's curious about the way this works, however. He himself had arrived in the physical form he'd been in when he died, and though Washington had insisted to him that this was not some kind of afterlife, he is interested in learning how a living skeleton has come to be here.

After Hector explains about the stone, he tilts his head. ]

Oh, indeed. I thought it worked somehow with this.

[ He digs his stone of farspeech out of his bag and holds it up. ]

I do apologize for seeming ignorant. I'm used to rather more advanced methods of communication than these.

[It's on her for not moving away. New arrivals are all over the beach and she should know better than to let herself get too distracted with her goblin tasks when distressed people are stumbling around. It's lucky that he bumped into her instead of tripping over the huge pile of sand beside her because that could've ended with a gritty faceplant. Not great.]

It's okay, it's okay! Nothing hurts.

[But he doesn't look great, with eyes plastered to the ground and holding his bag like it's his only lifeline.]

Are you okay?

They are very cute, many of the creatures we found on Ziziphus are. Though some are very dangerous. These aren't though, they are as much like plants as they are like animals. I haven't studied them that closely but if they are anything like tigerlillies they don't even have to eat really, they just photosynthesise.

[As Shion speaks Cobweb gets closer to Ann, nudging her with his nose, he is very sociable though like most cats his friendship is on his own terms.]

Hopefully. [It's what he's counting on anyways. He's already restored his world from being dead once and figuring out how to unfreeze them is going to be hard enough as it was.]

It is worrying though. [Especially with what he suspected about the strange dreams he had had after vanishing from the islands for a while.] The Story Teller says they are not responsible for us being here or for the state of our worlds. Who is responsible for it is not something we have discovered yet.

[It's sunbathing next to him as he sits, leaning against the wall with his long legs stretched out. He really needs to get a chair or two... and find out what these critters eat.]

Looks like it, yeah? He already moved himself in.

[They really aren't important things. Not when your whole world is one little academy campus. But perhaps there's still time for her to rethink her stance - there is, after all, a lot of life left to live and much left for her to do.]

Is that so? [She takes a moment to peek into her knapsack proper, only having glanced at the contents when she first found Chuchu. Oh, there's...a hammer in here? And a shaving razor? Fishing line, a small jar of dark liquid, a rock, something that's probably food...oh, that will be a cooking experience, won't it.] Oh my! How generous...though I can't imagine everything will last for too long...

I dunno. Maybe? I mean, apparently people leave, and sometimes come back, but they don't remember this place. It's weird.

[Akira was here. Sorry Ann.]

Her own arrival is not that long ago, and a part of her still feels like a new recruit, still trying to get her legs under her. It doesn't help that this place could well be written by Caboose with the amount of sense that it makes. She's not exactly overly enthused to find herself here, but she's learned a long time ago that there's no use crying over spilled milk. Rather, you just got to let it go.

Wash has been a good source to pick at, and while there is still some hesitation on Carolina's part given the past, CT is as well. How exactly are you supposed to greet someone who's dead? There is something ironic about it. She'd let them believe for the longest time that she'd fallen from that cliff and met her end. Carolina hadn't tried to reach out to anyone, although she'd been too screwed up in the beginning to even think of it. Too bend on revenge afterward. By the time it finally sank in, most of it was too late. Remnants remained, but that's all. Some tech here that Epsilon and her had gone after, reports speckled now and then. It was a chapter of her life that she wanted to finish, to close, to maybe, just maybe, put behind her.

She's not exactly a fan of flowers at the moment, in any form, even if they are just idly falling and not growing from her skin. It hasn't stopped her from walking along the beaches of Ensō, looking out for anything that might be useful. So far there's nothing that catches her attention, although it's not long after that people can be seen. Her own arrival had been much different, buried beneath the ground, which is why she does allow her eyes to roam for a few minutes across the individuals that have appeared. She might seem an odd sight, fitting in colour-wise in that aqua armor, but robotic otherwise. Recalling Wash's sentiments earlier, she does start forward, yet it is a few steps in that a voice does catch her attention, and the name that the said voice speaks.

"You won't find her here." Or at least she hadn't been here before right now. If she has arrived...

It's the same color of armor and the same face beneath it, the same voice that had spoken to him before, more or less, although the armor itself is different. She'd dreamed of him, at least she thinks so, fleetingly, just a short time ago. Had assumed it was a strange place and new rules, so to speak. Death is a strange thing here, and while Carolina still doesn't know what to make of that rabbit that had first spoken to her, she's taking it all in stride, or as much as one can.

"I don't care what you think," says Wash, bluntly. And, god, it's been a while since he's felt that ruthless invincibility. He's been too preoccupied actively attempting to be a better person than he was to sink back into the habit of out and out dismissal, cold and immediate and unconcerned.

But once again, he's in a situation where his complete lack of concern for the other party - for what they think, for what they believe, for how they perceive him, for the consequences of his utter callousness - abruptly jettisons him into a position where he can conceivably say or do anything.

(Could put a bullet in his brain - )

"I don't like the fact that you're here at all, but you don't see me complaining about it."

Uhhhh yeah, dude, worrying might be kinda an understatement. [Newt closes the knapsack back up, pushing to his feet.] Mysterious force takes you from your world--which by the way I'm still pretty super peeved and weirded out about and have no idea how to feel other than thinking maybe I died in the drift and this is the afterlife which would really really really suck because I'll never hear the end of it from Hermann--and plops you down on a weirdo island and apparently your world is frozen in stasis at the same time so you don't miss anything sounds super worrying. Like. Super duper worrying. Because I don't know about you but my world was like at the edge of the alien apocalypse basically and if this thing we did doesn't work we're all royally screwed so like that whole 'freezing time' thing is kind of important and especially knowing who is pulling that is even more important so this whole thing is just, like. Super worrying on all sides, y'know? And fucked up. Did I mention fucked up?

[boy howdy that sure did all come out in a rant oops]

Edited 2018-09-05 17:34 (UTC)

[Newt's head starts to droop again, but he jerks it upwards, trying to force himself to stay awake, swaying again] I dunno, what's th' scale for getting sprayed with sleep pollen? S' that a thing that exists?

[he'll just...lean his head...against the trunk....and just rest his eyes. it'll be fine, right. he's not sleeping. just resting his eyes--]

[Panic is something Shion understands far too well. Feeling like the floor has collapsed under you and nothing works the way it should work. That science is broken because things that should not be possible are common place.

He closes the distance between them reaching out to touch Newt's shoulders, red eyes meeting his.] I know. It is all messed up. But we will find a way out of here. This isn't the first time I've been stolen from my world. Before... my world was destroyed, I was the only surviver and we didn't even have our own bodies but we escaped. We fixed everything and we will fix things here as well. Find a way to unfreeze our worlds and get back. These worlds are not inescapable.

"I suppose you wouldn't be surprised to learn the sentiment is mutual," Leonard replies, biting the words like tin foil. "I'm at rather a disadvantage here and you're only worsening that for me."

He straightens the straps of his knapsack and squares his shoulders. He has need to return to the beach.

"Don't follow me, and don't bother me, Washington. I will steer clear of you, and you steer clear of me, from now on."

He has one thing remaining with which to defy Washington and that's his dignity. He turns to go back where he came from.

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Page 8 of 37

September Intro: The Fields Are Painted Gold

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

beach

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

THE BEACH

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject