lifeaftr | January Intro: It Grips Me

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January Intro: It Grips Me

INTRO LOG: JANUARY

Who: New arrivals, and you!
What: New souls arrive to the archipelago of LifeAftr
When: January 5th and onward
Where: All over Ensō
Warnings: Mark as needed!

Shores of Ensō: The Sun's a Harsh Reminder Why
As dawn arrives - and with it, new adventurers to Ensō's shores. It appears the Storyteller is not about to allow a repeat of last month. The ever watchful pages that have guarded the shorelines the month prior now begin to move closer inland, circling the landscape in closing, careful arcs. To the particularly astute, their purpose may quickly become clear. Anything foreign to Ensō's natural ecosystem will be met initially with wary hovering, ruffled pages flocking to nearby trees and wheeling overhead. Now and again, a particularly brave little page will swoop down to tap against the top of an unsuspecting entity.

Foreign entities, in this instance, just so happen to include...well, all of you. These partially sentient notes can be found flitting across the entirety of Ensō and the neighboring housing islets, intent on surveying every little nook and cranny of the tropical landscape. While they may little more than a vague irritant, their attitude towards a person they’re surveying can absolutely get worse, depending on the response they receive.

Though responses may vary (and creativity, encouraged), the pages are looking for indications of anything that is not only out of the ordinary, but also that which is acting suspicious. Unfortunately, they're not quite experienced in determining what does and does not count as a genuine threat, and thus they might very well interpret even the smallest signs of surprise, anxiety, and (justified) irritation as signs of hostility.

Unfortunately, their response to this is likely to be just as unpleasant as it is abrupt. Those of you who protest a little too vigorously may find yourselves abruptly doused with a viscous black ink - a marker to return and inspect you again in future. Where more aggressive behavior is…noted, you may very well find yourself swept up in a tornado of angry paperwork, only to be abruptly (and not at all comfortably) deposited at the Storyteller's temple. A very weary Storyteller will do their best to apologize as they slowly smooth out the kinks in this new security system.

But surely you agree, dear adventurer, that this sort of security system is indeed necessary.

Ensō, Inland: Who Knows Where Our Limits Lie
Unsuspecting adventurers aren't the only creatures the pages seem intent on harassing, it seems. Across Ensō, the activity of the native fauna will become much more apparent as creatures are driven from their usual haunts by invading paper. From the smallest of snaplings to herds of cariborn, it will take some time for the wildlife to settle down as many disturbed creatures will find themselves displaced miles away from their natural homes, seemingly at random. Unfortunately, this also includes the creatures most would prefer not to have on the move.

For the unappraised, Ensō happens to play host to a particularly horrifying brand of wildlife known only as the fustercluck: a large swath of appropriated limbs with katamari-like qualities, if katamaris were more well known for digesting the majority of their victims and using what little remained (usually the hands and feet) to propel themselves towards their next meal.

Despite Ensō being home to two such creatures, very little has been discovered about them, aside from how unfortunately indestructible they seem to be. Magic, guns, bombs - name your poison, and a fustercluck will most certainly be impervious to it, including poison itself. Should you be unlucky enough to wander into the path of a fustercluck, your best option is to run - or lend the fustercluck a hand.

And another hand. And your entire body, since you offered so nicely.

The fusterclucks have a more directed path than most creatures - they can be found moving up and down the rows of G and H until January 10th, when they appear to settle down...unless they're diverted elsewhere first.

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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Well, we've come this far and I...have nothing but time...

[how badly is this gonna dock his faith in humanity, asgore

how badly]

Well...gosh, where to begin...

[Trustfell: As Asgore Understood It!]

I do not know who started it, exactly. There was another session before ours, but that was not being run by the originators either. One of the people drawn into it was a young girl named Alex. The people in charge did not realize that she was sharing her body with a conglomerate of ghosts called the Risen. At least, if they did, they did not realize how easily the Risen could kill them, too. They killed everyone there.

After, the Risen decided that they would run their own session. They thought that once people died, they could inhabit their bodies instead, and be living individuals again. [.....] Oh, it all happened inside a computer, I should have said that. So the victims were not truly dead yet. We all ended up escaping with our lives, even though there were...quite a few murders.

[He doesn't even understand what the Matrix is, please have mercy]

[...]

Computer...?

[He's. He's from bullshit medieval fantasy land, Asgore, he doesn't...understand...

Anyway- ]

...Are the dead truly revived so casually? Aren't there repercussions - I'm under the understanding that such a thing is an abomination, there's no way that it doesn't come with at least some sort of internal trauma and crisis following? Once one dies, that's not something that can just be taken back or undone with no consequences.

[...okay look he may have done some weird shit with corpses in his time he knows these things]

[He can't see you, for all he knows you've got a computer on your head right now.]

None of our people had truly died yet. It was all...like a dream we had been forced into! All they had to do was wake up.

[Also, Asgore himself has died a few too many times to even clock it as weird that you have such well-formed opinions about necromancy!]

The Risen, though. What you say is very true for them. I am not sure they will ever again be the people they once were.

[Rest assured that whenever you can actually see this man and run across him again, he looks like he got lost on the way to Ren Faire. He hasn't quite gotten the memo that it's okay for him to not be in full regalia at all times.]

I suppose if their desire to return was so strong, perhaps they would handle it better than most, but I can't imagine it to be easy either way. Even those that were in the...dream, I suppose - the memories of dying surely would leave some sort of mark...

[He has not yet raised someone from the dead that hasn't been Extremely Mad At Him for doing so?]

...My apologies, it's just a bit surreal to me is all.

No, I understand. It was a strange situation all around.

[...should he bring this up? He probably shouldn't bring this up.]

There were some of us who had died before being brought there at all. Something in the process of being transported from one world to the next allows for that, I suppose. I hear it is the same way here.

[...That's.]

Might I ask if you were among those that are unfortunate like that?

[It's carefully-asked - not hesitant, but there's no force behind it, either. If it's not for him to know, it's not for him to know.]

[For a moment, Asgore isn't sure what to say. Washington had a good point. Why would he tell people, if he doesn't want it to get back to Muffet and Chara? Far better to just never say anything at all.

But there is a lot he would prefer they not hear. Is he to just keep everything to himself, for another year or more? It may be the right thing to do, but he misses the familiarity of Beacon. There was comfort in everybody knowing the worst about him, and still being there. He knows he cannot have that back so easily; there was far more to it than sitting in a circle and trading secrets one afternoon. Those bonds were hard-forged.

Still. He misses it.

...his hesitation has probably already answered for him.]

I was.

I see.

[Alexei is usually composed, and now isn't much of an exception; his voice remains even, at least, though some small, horrid part of him thinks that it's good that Asgore can't see anything - it keeps him from noticing how his fists have clenched at his sides, how his eyes have slid closed because he doesn't know what to look at and that seems as good an alternative as any.

He hasn't told anyone. Asgore is still a stranger to him; even if he weren't, he would ultimately have no reason to care, Alexei is fairly sure.

Perhaps that's why, then.]

Before I was brought here, I...

[His words trail off a bit; the thought doesn't seem to want to finish itself in any reasonable capacity. It frustrates him, momentarily, but not as much as the break in his voice before he cut off does.

Disgraceful, really.

He shakes his head a bit, more to clear it than anything else.]

...Likewise.

[There's benefits to telling strangers things like this, perhaps. Alexei isn't bothered by Asgore dying. Alexei certainly has no reason to go gossiping about it. He couldn't even possibly know that Chara is any relation to Asgore at all.

Maybe they both just needed to talk.]

Oh. I see. [Asgore bows his head. He doesn't know Alexei well enough to be deeply moved, true. But the man has been decent enough thus far, and any death is a loss.] I am very sorry to hear that.

...Don't be. I made a rather grave error; I won't be remembered fondly by history. It was deserved.

[He shifts a bit, however; this is awkward and he's fully aware of it.]

What a thing for me to be telling someone I hardly know - I do hope you can forgive me for it.

[Asgore snorts.]

Oh, no, it is quite alright. I can understand that much.

[Whether it's the deserving death or the impulse to overshare, he sure does! But since we've both recognized that it is oversharing, perhaps they shouldn't dwell.]

Have you...settled down well here, at least?

[He's content not to dwell; he doesn't usually give in to the desire to overshare unless he's talking to Schwann, and that's specifically because he knows Schwann will listen while ultimately not caring, since Schwann isn't really capable of caring about very much these days. But that is neither here nor there; he's already said it either way, and it's a weird sort of relief to have said it, but moving on seems...prudent, yes.]

I have. It's quite different from the Empire, but it's in a way that's more interesting than completely troublesome. And there's someone from my world here as well, someone I know and am reasonably acquainted with, so at least there's some familiarity.

Oh, that is nice! Muffet is from my world, of course, but we had only met very briefly before. She owned a bakery near my home.

[And there's Chara. But the less said about that, the better. They do not wish to be publicly associated with him, and the topic is painful.]

Are you living on the islets around here?

Ah, that's charming.

[HE'S NOT EXACTLY CERTAIN IT IS, but okay, the...large bipedal spider...ran a bakery...]

As for the islets, I'm...considering. I've been hesitant to stake a claim anywhere proper, but I suppose one can only wander this area so much before getting tired of it.

[He and Yeager have been pretty nomadic for the past month, which is fine by him? It's something that's commonly done in Terca Lumireis, so it hasn't struck him as too weird. But really, within the next week or so he's going to settle down somewhere anyway, so it's fine.]

There are certainly other places you could live if you liked. I know there are several people who live on Enso proper, in their own campsite or in some treehouses.

[luckily, he was not present during the war surrounding those treehouses]

Personally, I enjoy having neighbors. Besides - [He smiles] - it is difficult to get a tent that I will fit inside.

[That gets a soft, vaguely amused noise out of him.]

I'll admit I'm used to having other people around - I had quarters in the castle back in Zaphias, so there was always someone close by. For now I've been enjoying getting accustomed to the wilderness again; it's been a long time.

Oh, yes, this was the first time I was able to spend much time outside in a long while! My people were imprisoned underground centuries ago - part of our history with humans, I'm afraid. You lived in a castle?

[Asgore you can't just gloss over being imprisoned underground like that]

[There is a Pause at that, although... If his assumptions are correct, that's a much fairer solution than what his people did to the Entelexeia? And what he personally did to one of them in particular, at that.]

Yes... I was Commandant of the Imperial Knights, back in Terca Lumireis; I stayed there whenever I was in the capital.

[...]

...Imprisoned underground, you said?

[Oh, yes, we've probably got to talk about that. Asgore nods.]

In a system of caves beneath a mountain. There was a war, and those were the terms of our surrender. Human mages were more common in those days...they created a barrier which we have not been able to break.

In my time, at least. Muffet says that monsters are free, in the time and place she is from.

[Yeah, that's sort of what he thought...]

...I see. I'll admit that we've been to war with monsters ourselves; in our case, humanity wasn't - and continues to not be - half so forgiving. Although the war I refer to only ended ten years ago; it's still incredibly fresh in the minds and the hearts of the people, and casualties were heavy for us.

[As he said: if he lost eleven years, he'd be a different person.

That said, however.]

Regardless, I'm aware of how devastating such things are - the wounds inflicted by the brutality of war are difficult to heal, regardless of the time that passes, and terms such as those serve as a constant reminder of both what one had and what one has lost. You have my sympathies, both for your losses and for your people's situation; while I understand that it isn't nearly the same as being in one's own world, I am glad that you've gotten to experience worlds well beyond a barrier of that sort, and likewise that your people will get to experience such a thing in future.

[It sounds...formal, but not unsympathetic or insincere; Alexei is someone who's used to diplomacy and expressing himself on those terms and it shows. Something to fall back on, because what the hell is doing this naturally and like a normal person.]

[Forgiving? It isn't a word Asgore would use at all; is it really kinder to let monsterkind die a slow and lingering death, trapped in the dark? But he's not going to argue the point.]

I appreciate that. It is my hope that our two peoples will be able to start anew, when we do reach the surface. It has been many generations for both our kinds.

[He seems to have raised his own register a little in response to the formality. While things in the Underground are pretty much egalitarian, he certainly has diplomatic experience.]

[It's not just possible, but it's incredibly likely that Alexei is not the best gauge of what should be considered merciful. Not when he has Dein Nomos, with Astal's soul sealed in it.

It is what it is, as far as he's concerned.]

May the passage of time have been kind, then.

From what knowledge we have, I am not certain most humans even remember us as more than a myth anymore. I cannot say if that will be for the better or the worse, but at least the old grudges will not cause us trouble.

Are there no such grudges against humankind among your own people, or does the chance at freedom mitigate the desire for revenge to some extent?

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journalname - 2019-01-23 14:52 (UTC) - Expand

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