lifeaftr | November Undercurrent: And We Give Thanks

November Undercurrent: And We Give Thanks

NOVEMBER UNDERCURRENT

Who: Everyone!
What: Have you told someone you loved them yet?
When: November 3rd to November 20th
Where: Everywhere!
Warnings: Nothing of note; please mark if anything comes up!

Take Me Back to the Reasons Why
The Water wishes to demonstrate their power to you, as well as just what they mean, when they suggest that they require your cooperation. They are going to bring back the harvest island of Nuidan, a generally fondly remembered island that explorers have encountered in the past. What's more, they're going to require your help to do it.

Starting November 3rd, characters will discover a simple strip of dark leather among their belongings, meant to be worn around the neck or wrist. They can disregard it, of course, but if they attempt to discard or destroy it, it will always find its way back to them, no matter how improbable this might seem. How strange...

Perhaps even stranger is the sudden appearance of a smooth slab of stone, half-submerged in the waters just off of Ensō's coast. It's an altar, and around its edges are a series of deep notches, as though something is meant to be inserted into them. In its center is a pool of water, though it curiously doesn't seem to reflect anything.

The purpose of this will only really become obvious once the month goes on. Characters will find themselves to compelled to be honest with the people around them as to why they care, why they appreciate them as people, or what they like most about them. This compulsion can vary wildly and at the player's discretion, from a gentle mental pressure to an unstoppable force, and anything in between!

The bottom line is that every time one admits to some feeling of gratitude, no matter how small or big, their little plait of leather will receive a crystal from the interaction. All crystals will be roughly the same shape, but they may vary in color, pattern, and texture. Some might be simple sticks of quartz, while others might be comprised of myriad, ever-changing swirls of color. Again, the only limit here is your imagination.

Now the presence of that strange, altar-shaped stone in the water might make a bit more sense. Those notches in its sides are the perfect size and shape to fit a crystal smoothly into any one of them. The more grateful interactions one has with others, the more crystals they will gather, and the more they can fit into the altar. As more crystals are fed to the altar, it will start to glow. The pool of water at the altar's top will start to reflect the likeness island of Nuidan in increasing clarity, as though one is peering at its likeness in a snowglobe. What's more is that the number of crystals in the altar will very obviously affect Nuidan's state: very few crystals will make the island look as though it is mostly wilderness only a handful of structures in dire need of repair, while a great deal of crystals will cause the island to look as though it is thriving, in full bloom, and in more need of harvest than maintenance.

But, ultimately, the state in which Nuidan returns to you is up to you...and how far you're willing to go to express a little gratitude. Don't worry if you don't know anyone, either - this marks a great opportunity to start doing nice things for people, even if you don't know them! You've got most of the month to get to know each other, after all.

Don't think you can get away with heaping compliments on your closest friends and companions, however; variety is the name of the game here. While you can collect all sorts of crystals for personal use from repeat interactions, you can only feed one crystal to the altar per person. That is to say, Character A can be as grateful to Character B as they like, but only one crystal from each character can be delivered to the altar. If they want to procure more for the altar's purposes, Character A will have to have a positive interaction with Character C, and so on.

Take Me Back to That Big Sky

Of course, there's a lot going on in the background as well. You're free to use this log as a catch-all for the duration of November's Undercurrent Event, as well as the other minor events listed on our Monthly Rundown post. You are very, very free to let your dreams about creepers and baby lorbies become reality, and you are always free to create your own individual logs and posts as needed.

If you have any questions, please feel free to ask them over on our Monthly Rundown post!

November Timeline

[ ♆ ] November 3rd: "And We Give Thanks" begins and lasts until November 20th
[ ♆ ] November 4th: "Aw, Man" begins and lasts until November 12th
[ ♆ ] November 11th: "The Lorblings" begins and lasts until November 25th
[ ♆ ] November 20th: Nuidan returns to the archipelago
[ ♆ ] November 21st: "Return to Your Roots" begins and lasts until November 30th

LOGS ● OOC ● STORIES ● MAIN NAVIGATION

( CODED BY BOOTYCALL )

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I...

[Well, now he's gotta concentrate on it, and while he's always generally appreciative of people, and generally willing enough to express that gratitude, it seems more forthright now. It's not really a compulsion he's actively thinking about. But he does feel...more inclined to voice it?]

I guess. I dunno. I don't feel all that different, but I guess I wouldn't.

Why wouldn't you? You don't seem like the type to hand out compliments.

[Not as a slight to him, he's just... not that guy. It's one of the things Beau likes, that he isn't totally headass about people in the Denny. It's chill. At least she's aware enough not to say that, though.]

I mean...not really.

[Not that he hasn't, but. He frowns.]

I just mean I don't feel - I mean, there's not really a lotta people I hate. I don't think there's anyone here I hate, really. [Save for himself, of course.] Just people I kinda avoid, you know?

Uh. No?

[Hate is one of the easier emotions for Beau, but that's just because her trauma became anger and really never stopped doing that.]

You can hate people. I mean, there aren't a lot here right now. But some people are fuckin' bastards and they should choke on a spike, y'know? Real end the world for their own gain dicks, the kidnapping and mind control type that do it cuz they love it.

[Haha she doesn't have such a ready example for any reason, of COURSE not,,,,]

[Tim shrugs, tiredly.]

It takes too much work.

[He only really has the energy to hate one thing in pretty much all of existence, and It's not even here. He thinks. He thinks, because he can't know, though It could always be here through him. He doesn't know. He's not thinking about that right now.]

[It's easier to not think about it than it usually is.]

Do I look like someone who has that kinda energy?

[Huh. Well, that's one way to think about it. She squints at him, the confusion mostly pointing towards her figuring it out over judging him for it.]

Guess not. Just doesn't feel like energy. Maybe it's just easier to be pissed off.

[But that required knowing her life was unfair, knowing there was something out there having the will to keep going. She recognizes that now, in every time Caleb goes silent when he's hurt, in a gentle hand on her shoulder when a battle is not worth fighting.

Maybe he's the same way.]

Kinda weird to hear you don't hate me at least a little though.

...should I?

[He frowns at her, genuinely confused. Trying to...piece together any reasonable impetus behind why he would hate her. She hasn't been disagreeable to an extent that he would. Sure, she's rough, but so are a lotta people here.]

[Then again, his standards are low. People have tried to kill him, and he's waved it off. That's just the kind of person he is.]

[She just shrugs.]

Didn't think I'd have to explain why. I'm a rancorous asshole? I spend most of my time starting fights in your bar and yelling at people, sometimes you, when they gotta shape up. Dunno what about that's friendly to anyone.

[Which is... overstating it, frankly. Mostly she drinks and talks, and only starts fights when she really wants to. It just feels like failure if she's seen as too nice, too approachable. It's too much to try and think people might actually like her.]

Yeah, and?

[He continues to look at her as though this wouldn't be an issue to him. She's an asshole? He knows plenty of assholes. He is an asshole. She yells at people? So do a lot of others here. Tim himself has been one of them.]

A lotta people here act shitty sometimes. That doesn't make 'em bad people.

Kinda thought I'd crossed the sometimes mark when it's my always.

[Or that's what she goes for, anyway. She can always make people mad at her. Making them love her, well-- that's hard. Harder. Impossible.]

Guess I'll have to try harder to start shit around you. So I stand out.

[Tim snorts quietly and glances away.]

Look, it's...fine. Whatever you think you did. People've tried to kill me before, have actually killed me, and that's really not even the worst thing that a lot of them have done, and that hasn't stopped me from giving a damn.

[Just accept it, Beau. Tim has no standards. Acting like an asshole just kind of makes you the sort of person he historically gets along best with. Birds of a feather. Etcetera.]

[Well god damn. She can get behind that, too. Beau snorts her own grunt of amusement, face pulling into a little grin.]

Huh. Good to know. You take a lotta shit, but it's better than having nothing. Never trust the goody goody ones with no skeletons in the closet.

[Shit, is this where she should be apologizing or something? Fjord is always harping on her for that, showing gratitude, but she has no clue. So after a few seconds of silence, she makes a bit of a face, and then--]

Uh. Thanks, though. Appreciate it.

[She doesn't even notice the little stone appear on the leather, too engrossed in this conversation.]

If I had standards, I wouldn't have any friends left.

["Friends."]

[This is the first time in a long while that he's used that word willingly. It settles a little uncomfortably in his gut, so rather than face it or examine it in any way, he blinks and looks at her with a confused tilt to his head.]

For what?

[Well, that she gets, absolutely. The Nein are all outcasts in some way; from being a shunned race, to a disgraced existence, to people running on borrowed time. It's... something, all right. Something she doesn't really know or want to ruminate on now.

Instead, his question jerks her from deeper thoughts, leaving her blinking at him like she just got let go from being possessed.]

Y'know, like-- thanks for... saying it? Instead of not? Look, I don't know, my friends just remind me to... do that sometimes. Say it when I mean it. So. Yeah.

Well, uh...you're welcome. I guess.

[He rubs the back of his neck with one hand with a shrug of his shoulders that suggests he's not entirely comfortable with the notion, but he can't exactly think of a way to refuse a thing like that. Not when Beau is being so...weirdly sincere?]

I don't actually think you're that bad a person, though.

[Okay, now this is getting really personal. She has literally no good response to this, so she just shrugs.]

Uhhh, yeah, sure, whatever. Bad idea probably.

[She's long stopped paying attention to the straps of leather, but maybe she'll put it together later. Either or, she's standing to go.]

Well uh. Good luck with your... wood stuff.

[cool great okay she's leaving the planet now]

[And that was a step too far, apparently. A part of him almost wants to laugh at that, that the only thing that makes Beau balk is genuine if sappy sincerity. He doesn't, though. He's not that low.]

...thanks. [But he doesn't take it back, and he does mean it.]

[Don't bring a feeling near her mister! Especially when she's being vulnerable! She's handily hit her quota of what she can process today in terms of feelings, so she's gonna go recover by the ocean until the concept of existing stops bouncing around her head.]

Cool.

[She turns, takes about two steps, and then looks back at him like she knows she should say something to let him know yes she heard him and yes she appreciates it, but every word she's ever had has been tossed out the window.]

Tell me what it ends up being. The wood. I'm curious.

[Nailed it. Off she goes!]

All right, [says Tim, more than a little bemused, but he lets it happen. He's not about to force her to stick around if she doesn't want to.]

[It's not until after the conversation has long since ended that he realizes there's a crystal on the leather thong whose purpose has, up until now, been pretty unclear to him.]

[Isn't that something.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

November Undercurrent: And We Give Thanks

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probs wrapped!

o7