lifeaftr | August Intro: These Days Are Feeling Dark

INTRO LOG: AUGUST

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

Our lucky new adventurers join the archipelago on a new chapter of our journey, with the new island of Nastrandir playing host to their arrival. With the events of last month leaving many questions in those more settled in LifeAftr, all will find they soon have…other things to think about.

New arrivals may awake at either of the locations listed below. Or they may wander!

A4: Show Me Distraction
In comparison to the warm welcome characters experienced on Io, the land of Nastrindir is not at all promising. The strip of coast hosting the mana pool is a scoop of rock and cliff, and rather unforgiving. To the east, however, it looks as though nearby wetlands leave the horizon lost in a foggy haze. The mana pool is generally a comforting, reliable constant on any island...generally. There looks to be something wrong with this one. The rocks surrounding it are blackened, various spots across their surface almost glass-like under the summer sun. After a brief inspection, most will probably gather that the pool has been set on fire in times past.

More annoying still is the tampering that's occured within the pool. The pool is partially obstructed, due to a blockage of tumbled rocks and boulders that seem to have fallen from the surrounding rocky landscape and toppled into the raised plinth. The choking of the mana water will make return trips to Ensō…inconvenient, to say the least. The rocks are an annoyance that will need to be removed before anyone will be travelling anywhere.

Also of note are the old statues that stand at opposing sides of the mana pool. In their prime, they may have towered a good fifteen or twenty feet tall. Now, however, one has been tipped onto its side, and there are large, crumbled chunks taken out of the other. Both look blackened, much like the mana pool, as though they were also set on fire at some point in their history. Whatever they may have meant to depict has been lost to time...but the parts of them that have survived look to represent smooth, rounded coils of something or another.

It might feel, to the particularly wary or those prone to paranoia, like these statues are watching you. Like they're representative of something else that might have its eye on you, even now.

Or they might not! It could be all in your head. What's way more important is the local flora in the vicinity. The parts of the land that have soil are currently host to some delightful plants that are known, colloquially, as candyplants. And, yes - they're exactly what they sound like.

Candyplants are odd plants that are not unlike a melon vine, except that their fruits take the form of giant candies. The candyfruit is quite edible, though much higher in sugar content than your more bog standard varieties of fruits and vegetables. The variation in the shapes and sizes and flavors is tremendous - some are shaped like fruit, and will have a very similar taste to the fruit they represent. The only exceptions are the ones that look rather like overgrown candy corn, which taste like...marshmallows, for some reason. But they still taste sweet, and they're still full of some of the nutrients you'd expect to find in ordinary fruit!

While candyplants are somewhat less sugary than their real candy equivalents, it's still not recommended that you gorge on them overmuch. They're probably pretty bad for your teeth, if you have any. Candyplants do keep for quite some time, though - particularly if dried, packed in jars, or otherwise preserved.

Candyplants grow in temperate areas near quantities of fresh water - which Nastrandir has in abundance. Most of them grow in shaded, open areas along the ground, like melons; plants that bear smaller candyfruits may instead behave like grapes and other climbing vines, especially when they would be otherwise crowded out by other ground plants. The plants and fruits are quite harmless, though the sweet, sugary smell that tends to linger around areas of rampant growth during hot weather can cause one hell of migraine.

B4: Snakes Are Biting at My Heels
Those who arrive a little ways away from the mana pool or find themselves daring enough to start exploring will end up on the B4 square, which is closer to the swampy environment more characteristic of Nastrandir's inland. The further east one progresses, the wetter and softer the ground underfoot will get, until you're slogging thigh-deep in freshwater algae and muck. It's pretty dirty work, but it's probably more advisable that you go roaming into the wetlands rather than sticking around in the rockier regions. - especially because those regions happen to be occupied.

That feeling of paranoia that may or may not have settled on the back of your neck on A4 will turn out to be justified. Flickers of motion in the corner of your eye, the sensation of something watching you, the clattering of pebbles and rocks sliding down the sloping inclines on Nastrandir's craggy landscape - all signs indicative that something else frequents this region.

And something does. Something large, scaly, and very hungry.

Rocobra have now been unlocked in the bestiary!

The spiny protrusions on this creature's long, sinuous body will make it quite difficult to distinguish from its surroundings; these beasts tend to disguise themselves as the surrounding mountain rock where they live. Mild chameleonic properties allow this predator to blend almost seamlessly in with a rocky environment of almost any texture and color. And, given the size of them, it's very possible you won't realize that you're stuck in one's coils until it's too late.

With thick, scaly hides, large jaws, and venomous teeth, the rocobra is deadly fast despite its significant bulk. Even at their smallest, the rocobra is often as thick as a tree trunk in girth, and can range from thirty to sixty feet in length. Rocobra specialize in draping themselves in a circle, concealing themselves among their surroundings, and waiting for unsuspecting prey to wander somewhere in their coils before drawing tight around them to constrict them into a slow and painful death, so they might be devoured.

The good news is that rocobra only ever hunt and live in solitude; it is highly unlikely you'll find more than one in any one area. Most cannot spit venom, but can deal a paralyzing strike with massive fangs that are just as likely to impale you as they are to poison you. The good news is that they do have a weakness, and that weakness is numbers - when there is more than one target for the rocobra to focus on, it can get hopelessly confused over who it should be striking first, and can be easily distracted and led along by a well-coordinated team or pair. It's advised that you strike it at the mouth, if possible, as those scales can be awfully hard to penetrate.

While the danger rocobra present is very real, that doesn't mean they're completely useless. Rocobra can potentially be harvested for venom, meat, or their tough, scaly hides.

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

[Okay so clearly the answer to that was "yes" but... she doesn't. Which bothers her because she is not one to forget faces. Every meeting and parting meant something to her, even the small ones, so for this woman to know her name and yet be completely unrecognizable startles her further.

She knows her brother too, apparently, so perhaps... she was a friend of his? Is that where she knows her from?]

I'm sorry, I don't... [She frowns, brow furrowing, as if she's trying to think about it... but ultimately she shakes her head.]

I don't think I've ever met you, let alone forgotten. Are you a friend of Alphinaud's?

Ye've never...what?!

[ Now she's just confused ]

Alisaie, we've hardly parted company for a bell since Thancred brought you into Ishgard moons ago. Hells, your brother may as well be a second shadow te me, and one who's presence I keenly miss.

A-And even before that we...[ She stumbles here a moment, for once in her life choosing her next words carefully. ] There was the business with the Dreadwyrm. Surely ye haven't forgotton that

[Her words make her blood run cold. Quickly she goes from confused to uncomfortable. That is way too much information for a stranger to have.] How could you know that? Who are you?!

[Logically she knows the answer. Based on what she just said there is no way she could be anyone else but... that can't be. Because she isn't. Alisaie knows who the Warrior of Light is and they are most certainly not this woman. There has to be... some other reason? But that just makes this worse. How is any of this possible?

True to her usual form Alisaie, unsure of how to handle this and the emotions Castor has provoked, lashes out angrily. She looks livid.]

And you had better answer carefully or you will be made to regret it.

[Surely this is some kind of sick joke being played on her...]

[ Castor's head tilts as confusion starts to bleed into annoyance. The cant of her head might seem passing familiar to Alisaie as a gesture shared by the individual her thoughts are currently orbiting around. ]

Do ye know someone else who'd know all that? Lass, it's me! Castor! Warrior of Light! Savior of Eorzea or whatever else titles they've flung at me in the meantime. Are ye sure ye didn't crack your head ere I found ye?

[Alisaie lifts her hand to her head, frowning.] ... Aye. I do know someone else who would.

[The Warrior of Light, of course... which Castor is not as far as she knows. They don't look the same or talk the same. Nothing about them is the same, in fact, yet when she tries to recall why--what the person she knows as the Warrior of Light is like--she cannot seem to recall.

She lifts her gaze to give Castor a hard look.] I've no doubt you believe what you say but I do not know you. The person with that title is... someone else. I cannot explain why or how but I assure you that is the truth.

[After all the other worlds and time nonsense she experienced it maybe isn't so hard to explain. Perhaps some sort of... other timeline or universe exists? But then the people across worlds aren't suppose to be exact reflections so that doesn't explain how Castor recognized her.]

Someone...else? What, like those Warriors of Darkness? [ And hoo boy has it been a while since she's thought about them. ]

I don't disbelieve ye, lass. You've not lied te me before and I can't see ye startin' on a lark but...'S more than passin' strange that you know someone' who's me-but-not-me, and that I know a you that ain't the you that's here'n now.

All that aside, there're better places for this conversation; I'm not keen on the local beasties. 'S a mana pool not far from here that'll get us back te the big island where we ain't like to be ambushed.

August Intro: These Days Are Feeling Dark

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