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westwhere2022-06-03 07:06 pm
groundrules) wrote in westwhere2022-06-03 07:06 pm
Entry tags:
- 2ha: chu wanning,
- arcane: viktor,
- asoiaf: daenerys targaryen,
- game of thrones: jon snow,
- idolish7: tenn kujo,
- kingdom of the wicked: emilia,
- kingdom of the wicked: wrath,
- mo dao zu shi: xue yang,
- oh! my emperor: beitang moran,
- star trek: jim kirk (aos),
- storm at sea,
- test drive,
- tian guan ci fu: xie lian,
- travel arc,
- umbrella academy: diego,
- umbrella academy: five,
- vampire diaries: damon salvatore,
- warcraft: anduin wrynn,
- warcraft: wrathion
no man's sea
Avast ye — sprawling til 18 June is part I of the Storm at Sea travel arc, which doubles as a test drive. Participants don’t need an invite to reserve or apply over 10-17 June.
Try to label if you’re a test drive tourist or an old timer — and don’t hesitate to leave an OOC note to opt out of random NPC piraaaaaaaargh interaction. Test drivers can post both log and network prompts. Have fun!
AHOY! SCALLYWAGS
Departing Ke-Waihu, the existing party joins paranoid pirate king, turned stalwart saint Samuel Vane — the feared Quicksilver Sam — aboard the Pariah.
Test drivers awaken anguishing at sea, floating on rafts, or on minuscule patches of deserted land. They are collected by two pirates and the recalcitrant sorceress Karsa — who supplies translation and communication devices. She explains the newcomers were summoned into the land of Akhuras by warring undead factions. Karsa’s master, the elusive Merchant, ferries newcomers east to beacons hoped to return them home. He has secured them passage on the pirate vessel Queen Zanyra of ’Wet Rope’ Caladan Kreil, an associate of Quicksilver Sam.
The Pariah and Zanyra meet at sea, a day’s travel away from Ke-Waihu:
- ■ Characters overhear that Quicksilver Sam seeks to reach the haunted Crossing Seas and ‘settle an old score.’ Long-term ally Caladan Kreil supports his cause.
■ The two vessels make daily supply and crew exchanges by rowboat. The Pariah’s passengers must give the passcode: flaunted like gold to board the Queen Zanyra. Staff of the Queen Zanyra must speak the words before the blind man to access the Pariah. Forget your passcode and fall at the mercy of whoever patrols the decks!
■ Tasks await all passengers: diligently clean and polish decks, climb tall masts to sew torn sails, banish a preposterous number of seagulls, fish, read post or… dubious novels to sailors, count loot, guard the decks, clean cannons or serve as boat lure for shark fishing. Medics and cooks can practise their natural trades, while musicians and entertainers should amuse the crew.
■ By all means, grab thematic garments from crew coffers. Also available: daggers, swords and rare pistols.
■ Characters may notice both ship crews are spirited, but grow weary when Quicksilver Sam fitfully orders his five on-call priests to carry out protection rites, or to ‘exorcise’ evil from random staff — through ineffective bitter potions, shrill chants and requests to sit in unusual luck-incurring poses, or to commit some mundane, repetitive task. Let’s bore the devil away.
■ Treat senior crew with respect: some pirates are equally drunk on rum and fleetingly authority and reward perceived slights with a 24h-stay in the brig. These fine accommodations fit two and annul powers while there. No dinner.
■ Sleep where you can: hammocks and rotting mattresses can be found in great common halls beneath decks. The sick and women (naturally, ill omens at sea) can share the four private cabins of each ship. Sumeragi Subaru has his own cabin aboard the Pariah.
■ Each night, expect drinking beneath the halls and a pirate’s greatest hobby: gambling. Conmen might lure you into an ‘innocent game’ that sinks you deep into debt, winning your valuables, favours, or kidney!
■ Ladies are afforded a wide, begrudging berth and some authority over the crew.
■ Accommodations: fresh potions are readily available to ward off sea sickness, and magically resilient oranges are on hand to counter scurvy. As woe would have it, the long-serving Mr. Ishmael has passed, and his earthly remains have been retained aboard the Pariah for Kaneki Ken. Viktor receives a leashed emotional support albatross — a large, loud but docile bird that flies above him counter-current to balance him, whenever the ship’s sway threatens his footing.
OBJECTIVES
- ■ Discover why good Quicksilver Sam is intent on his haunted travels. The captain declines audiences, but try to get information from the two crews.
■ Please share the information gained via network…!
THAT SON OF A BISCUIT EATER
Trouble starts to brew, within days at sea:
- ■ Be on the lookout while on watch duty: on a handful of occasions, new faces appear aboard. They fail to offer the passcode — and attempt to injure characters, throw them overboard, or to enter the captains’ lodgings. Sound the alarm or seize intruders!
■ After interrogating an infiltrator, Caladan Kreil sends word that the assailants hail from the Concord, a war vessel of the Dawns’ Reach Trade Company that is pursuing the pirate ships at distance under the command of Maximilian Hawk. A credit to his name, Wet Rope Caladan has the spy hanged.
■ Prepare to get drafted for double watch duty, as both Caladan Kreil and Quicksilver Sam bolster defences. Tensions escalate, with pirate crew questioning the loyalties of newer recruits.
■ A few days later, at dawns, the silent, swift and massive Concord approaches close enough to fire its cannons at both ships and send vicious militia to climb aboard. Defend your ship!
■ The Concord withdraws by midday, after lightly damaging its opponents. Help with repairs and enjoy some rum — you’ve survived your first sea scuffle!
MOLLYWICK
Just short of entering the Crossing, where the seas are dark and highly opaque, the Queen Zanyra and Pariah encounter a stretch of vibrant, lushly forested land.
- ■ Both vessels send crew over for a few hours, with captains urging quick incursions. Pair up to collect berries, scant mushrooms and sweet water. Curiously, no animals are found.
■ Veteran sailors say this is the Neverflight isle of myth, where sea kings have buried their treasures. Pirates share legendary coordinates of long lost loot, archived as riddles or poems. Grab a shovel and a-digging you go!
■ …ah, but don’t linger too long. What pranksters your sailor friends are. Within hours of the island’s appearance, the earth beneath your feet crumbles and quakes, and the land starts to sink. Evacuate or call for help to get out of here — as the great white whale Mollywick submerges in the waters with the Neverflight island it carries on its back. Hopefully, you don’t go under with them.
■ If you’ve threaded out a treasure dig, drop a line to receive some especially deplorable loot. You deserve it.
THE CROSSING
The Pariah and Queen Zanyra — frequently chained together to avoid separation — creep into the Crossing : a stretch of eerily silent waters, dark and volatile.
■
- ■ Slowly, a thick, nearly impregnable fog dawns during the day, covering the sun and leaving the skies a desolate slate. Dreadful storms spark at night.
■ Strange, talking carps jump on board, offering to tell you your future. Caution: they only make bad luck readings (request yours) that turn true. They appear wherever their target flees and are exceptionally annoying, until either the moon rises, or you apply the superstitious cure of throwing salt on them.
■ Nightmares haunt you — your own, or glimpsed memories of ships crashing, sinking, falling to storm. Note: only your character suffers these memories/nightmares, but everyone else can experience their exhausted grumpiness, come morning.
■ Be wary, when pairing to cross over to the other pirate ship: you may find another rowboat beside yours, its sailor begging for an oar or ladle. If you give him one, he shovels water into your boat with inhuman speed — desert your vessel and swim quickly to a pirate ship, before undead hands pull you into the sea.
■ While alone on deck, characters might hear sweet, coaxing voices that urge them to walk the plank into the water. Break your brethren from this spell, or watch them fall into the arms of man-eating mermaids.
■ Now and then, the ships are shaken by long, whips of something lashing from the depths.
■ Pirates become increasingly skittish and on edge. Priests perform countless protection rites and exorcisms on both ships.
■ At night, a handful of undead men climb aboard. They lack awareness and are in a clear state of discomposure, looking to catch the living and drown them. With toothless, rotting mouths, some rasp, This is kinder.
■ As you officially enter the Crossing, beams of light erupt in the horizon, showing the distant silhouettes of several ghost ships.
NOTES
— closed to ensanguines
Subaru is tenured in his favor, and so dispatched to investigate.
He walks the Pariah, notes her crew. He follows the trail, slipping between fact and rumor like water does over stone. Eventually, he comes to one of the cabins for the ill and stops short outside the door. There is... a presence inside. Someone. But the fog around them is dense and uneasy. Not in the way that threatens to crush, but in the way that threatens to rend. There are times when Samuel Vane's superstitions align well with Subaru's gifts. From outside the door, he ventures: ]
There's someone in there, isn't there?
[ Why pretend not to know when he does? He hesitates briefly before reaching for the door latch, only to find that it's stuck. Or being obstructed. ]
no subject
Chizuru is on the other side of that door. What door? His vision blurs and he can no longer see it. There was light there, seeping in through the cracks, broken by the worried shuffling of her feet. Now it's gone and the ship rocks, and Toshi thinks of the last ship he boarded, alone, to the north.
He thinks of the time before that, and before that. Thinks of the man, the boy, the child that died with the bloody gurgle of his name beneath the decks. Toshi's face is wet. With sweat? With tears?
There is someone here and there isn't, half here and half gone, half human and half corruption, half present and half past.
The haphazard barricade he pushed against the door groans, and briefly, briefly, Toshi's vision clears. His teeth grind together hard enough to crack, and a low snarl rips from the hollow of his chest. ]
Stay out—
[ Stay away. It's not safe with him. He tries to leave them behind, but they won't let him. Their loyalty once made him proud, almost arrogant.
Now there are nothing but ghosts around him. ]
no subject
He knows well that this room won't long contain whatever is within. ]
I can't...
[ A refusal and a fortification both, quiet enough to be to himself. There is a pulse of energy that occupies two realms, a violent fury and a profound loss wrought over bone like iron. He tastes it. A haunting. Subaru's fingers grip the latch once again, opposite hand delving into his coat for a round of ofuda.
It's no longer the Captain's orders that motivate him. His temperament cleaves to such furious desperation in an instant — the same instant that he heaves his weight at the door.
It screeches, cracks, and the ugly clattering of the barricade gains Subaru entrance. Once in, the presence bears down on him with such force that he slams the door shut behind him. It won't seal in whatever this is, but he's positioned himself as the bulwark against this sinking, suffocating wrath.
And still he is only human, eyes darting through the room as they pin and adjust to the dark. ]
Where — ?!
no subject
It is so warm and rich that it makes his mouth dry, his very joints aching with want for the source of that overwhelming reprieve. There is an ocean before him of something healing, a shield, a sanctity, a salvation. It is divine and it is empty, hollowed out, a temple enshrining only memories.
Shuddering, he sways, nails clawing shallow grooves into the floor planks. He tries to speak, to order the interloper to leave, but the air leaves his lungs as nothing more than hoarse gasp.
The air itself is sickly sweet, Toshi drowning in honey and rot. He fumbles for his sword on instinct alone, but his hand closes on empty air. He doesn't have them. Why doesn't he have them. There is a distant, vanishing memory of pressing them into awaiting hands, the fading knowledge that they are too dangerous to keep on his person.
That understanding, that knowing disappears in an instant, like the whip of a broken cord. A rasping roar tears from his throat as he lurches forward, pushing off the wall with every ounce of strength in him. The board cracks under the force, and he is upon Subaru in a single breath. There is no thought, no lingering sanity. It has been too long, and Toshi's very sense of self vanishes into his overwhelming thirst. ]