April Intro: Better Get to Digging

[lifeaftr_mods]

INTRO LOG: APRIL

Who: New arrivals, and you!
What: New souls arrive to the archipelago of LifeAftr
When: April 4th and onward
Where: Cahypdo
Warnings: Mark as needed!

Waking up to the gentle proddings of what appears to be very curious, sentient trees isn't the worst wake up call LifeAftr has to offer. For our newest arrivals, however, it may be a tad…odd.

Situated in the valley between two mountains, Elower is a scenic village filled with the friendly Roaka, tree-like beings that are rather peaceable and happy to assist those who have just arrived. I'’s a peaceful location for one to start their adventures - though, unfortunately, it doesn't stay peaceful for long.

Cahypdo: You'll Bury Me Low
Those who have explored the new island of Cahypdo in the last month will undoubtedly recall the series of quakes that shook the island throughout March. With the arrival of LifeAftr's newest adventurers comes Cahypdo's largest tremor to date, striking without warning and more than enough force to throw even the steadiest and sturdiest of your number to the ground. With a low rumble, the mountains heaped on either side of the island will start to shed an abundance of slag and debris, pouring down their slopes. Anyone who's scaling those peaks risks being flung bodily off them when the outpouring of shale comes roaring down those mountains, and anyone at the mountain bases risks being crushed beneath.

As one might expect, unsuspecting newcomers aren't all that have been shaken up. Though protected by netting and retaining walls, the cliffs around and above the village of Elower can only take so much pressure before giving way - a threshold that has been crossed entirely. With a sound like thunder, rocks fall.

Everyone dies? Only if you don't act quickly. Roaka housing is sturdy in build, enough to protect a decidedly less sturdy body from all but the heaviest of boulders. Hiding inside any of their village constructs built into the sides of the mountains will certainly save you from taking a new weight onto your shoulders. They will not, however, save you from being buried alive.

For those who become trapped inside any of those abodes, your options appear limited. Work to free yourself, or wait for help to arrive. Though, speaking of help, those outside may think to offer the Roaka a helping hand in getting their trapped people - and yours, at that - a few breaths of fresh air.

Before you suffocate.

Cahypdo: Stay Acting Brave
Such seismic activity will also stir up the local wildlife, of course. Those unfortunate enough to come across them will recognize the restless shark-dragon hybrids, hydrac, now prowling across the shorelines, while the wickedly fanged wabbits will also be far more frequent, traveling in larger numbers in the jungle and at the bases of the mountains. Taking care to avoid them would be wise - though another creature may make that venture much more difficult.

Lorbies have been unlocked in the bestiary! A strange mix between owl and serpent, the recent quake has clearly startled these usually reclusive creatures into the open. Alone, a lorby is a rather skittish animal, prone to hiding from most perceived threats. Useless for food due to the toxicity of their flesh, lorbies do have the potential to be tamed...but this comes with its own risks.

A lorby may be prone to flight rather than fight when encountered solo, but in groups, these feathery critters are far more hostile. A defensive lorby emits a piercing cry alone, but a group is an almost ear-piercing experience, capable of rendering the unfortunate unstable on their feet at best, and unconscious at worst. For the days that follow the severe earthquake that so rocked everyone's foundations, any hope for silence is lost in the infrequent bursts of almighty screeching by colonies of lorbies who have so rudely had their homes overturned and disturbed.

While the lorby is omnivorous, it may not think to take a bite at anything so much larger than them. That doesn't mean that conflict with these fluffy creatures won't attract something much more willing to take advantage of the fact that you may or may not have been reduced to a prone sack of meat. If something else does arrive, you best hope that it's a friendly face.

If you're interested in keeping a lorby for your own, bear LifeAftr's companion limit in mind - two per character, and no more. The lorby is omnivorous and can survive off of most odds and ends: insects, fruits, berries, critters it can dig up in the sand, and more. However, the process of trying to tame a lorby is not always successful. We recommend use of a d10, with the following guidelines:

Rolling a 10: Critical success! This lorby will love and adore you, and may even feel comfortable enough to drape itself along your neck like a beautiful, furry scarf, churring softly all the way.
Rolling 7-9: This lorby will prove high-strung and timid, even if safely befriended, and will take several weeks to warm up to you. But once it does, it's yours!
Rolling 2-6: Failure. The lorby enters a state of distress and starts screaming. Hope you brought earplugs, or you'll be snoozing for several long hours for your efforts.
Rolling a 1: Critical failure. Not only does the lorby start screaming, but its panic attracts a colony of its friends, and they all start screaming too.

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 you prefer.

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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.

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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!

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LOGS ● OOC ● STORIES ● MAIN NAVIGATION

( CODED BY BOOTYCALL )

Comments

[postictal]

Yeah, yeah. [He waves that off. Tim's never considered himself noble, or much of a good person at all, really, but that's also not something he sees worth picking an argument over.]

Well, we've got some pretty basic food. Eggs, meat, milk, that kind of thing. Coconut cookies. [He gestures at a basket that seems to have a liberal amount of them, and placed in easy reach of just about everyone.]

Booze, too, but if you start wrecking the place you're gonna need to leave.

[reflash]

I'm not interested in alcohol. [Not that he doesn't ever drink, but he's absolutely only a social drinker and only if he gets pressured into it.

Meat and eggs are useful, or would be if Yukio could cook like, at all. He's going to have to learn here, which he's really not looking forward to.

But there's an opening for him to actually get to the point and see if he can get what he came here for.]

Do you have coffee?

[postictal]

[Tim's brows crunch down as he considers that, sucking in the wall of his cheek.]

I think we've got coffee plants somewhere, but I couldn't tell you where. If you actually want something that passes for coffee, you're gonna wanna talk to a guy called Ignis.

[And then, wryly:]

Got nicotine, though. Plenty of that.

[reflash]

There are only so many bad habits I'll let myself have. [Yukio says, with a polite laugh.

But more importantly, he's absolutely screwed. Cool.]

I'll have to go talk to Ignis-san then, I don't even know what a coffee plant looks like.

Has it been difficult to survive here?

[postictal]

Not difficult, usually. We've got enough stuff to not die. It's just when shit goes wrong that you've got to keep an eye out.

[And, to be clear, shit going wrong is a pretty frequent occurrence.]

Places like these tend to mess with you.

[reflash]

["When shit goes wrong". And of course it will. There might not be any fae pulling the strings here, no Courts or Ringmaster, but there's no way these gods are any better.]

They really do. [His tongue flicks out, more instinctive than intentional, but it gets the point across.]

What kind of things have happened recently?

[postictal]

[As far as bodily transformations go, that's on the tamer end of the spectrum, though the tail seems to make up for it. Still, he doesn't comment on it.]

Well, islands pop up here and there and it's generally our job to explore them. Or - not our job, maybe, but it's in our best interest to. Sometimes you end up locked underground and forced to go through some kind of trial to prove your...worth or something.

[That particular case was at least worth his while for the takeaway. That doesn't mean it felt great.]

[reflash]

That seems frustrating.

What happens if we don't explore the islands? Is there some kind of punishment?

[postictal]

You don't get whatever's on them, probably.

[He shrugs. You win some, you lose some, mostly.]

No risk, no reward. Something like that.

[reflash]

[That's not too bad. It's safer here, at least in terms of a lack of a bigger opponent, of things out to get them.]

That seems reasonable. How many islands have you all discovered so far?

[postictal]

Not counting Ensō or Mu?

[He takes a minute to count through them, one by one.]

I think...we're at eight, now.

[reflash]

How often on average does a new island appear?

[postictal]

Every couple months, maybe? Storyteller gives us a choice of four or so and we pretty much vote to see which one comes our way first.

Their way of giving us a "choice" I guess.

[reflash]

It could be worse. [A choice of one out of four isn't bad.] The Ringmaster rarely gave us a choice when she moved us to a new location.

[Yukio is assuming that it's obvious he was Somewhere Else before here.]

[postictal]

You were somewhere like this before?

[That makes...well, he's not clear on how many people that makes, but more people seem new to this than people who aren't.]

[And Tim's learned not to make assumptions.]

[reflash]

I signed a year-and-a-day contract to work for a dimension-hopping fae carnival in exchange for a wish granted. It was... more of a hassle than I anticipated.

[postictal]

...

Did you get your wish?

[If you lead with that, you should expect that to be the first question you get.]

[reflash]

I think so. [But he doesn't know, and that... that stings. There's no way for him to know until circumstances are right.]

My contract ended early due to unforeseen circumstances, but the Ringmaster said she was going to make sure I received full payment. She wasn't exactly reliable, but fae tend to be bound by their word.

[postictal]

You think so.

[Well, that sucks. Investing a year and a half of your time and energy in exchange for something you're not one hundred percent sure is even going to happen?]

You sure you don't want a drink?

[reflash]

... I wouldn't turn it down. [He says, because he has to respond or it would look suspicious, and it isn't like he could say no.]

[postictal]

[A loose shrug of his shoulders.]

Hey, I just know that when people are stressed they prefer to take their minds off things. You don't have to if you don't want to.

[reflash]

Food would probably be a better idea. [He's not saying no, because it isn't true. He does want a drink, sort of. But not enough to ask for one.

Plus he hasn't eaten in... he's actually not sure how many hours. He might be on his second day without any food.]

[postictal]

Well, we've got that too. The cookies are monster food, so they won't ever go bad.

[That's an open invitation to take as many as he likes with him, because Muffet has made it very clear that she would like as many of these things to be gone as possible.]

[reflash]

Monster food? [Yukio's met Sans and Papyrus, but he didn't ever learn much about them.]

[postictal]

Made by monsters. Means they're made of magic.

[No Sans or Papyrus here. Just one very capable spider lady who's very tired of coconut.]