the clock tower

[groundrules]

Happy Hallow-elevator! The clock tower event lasts between 22 October and 8 November. ICly, the tower incursion stretches around a week, and you’re welcome to have your character investigate something else, if they finish early!

THE CLOCK TOWER

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ALL IS AS ALL WAS| TRIAL & NO ERRORS | THE TOWER

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ALL IS AS ALL WAS

Play it cool, as Serthica’s customs officers pore over your passport papers, before grudgingly allowing you overground. Minaras, you hear, is hunting a delinquent.

Both it and Eidris fare well, with no sign of the damage that preceded the Unwinding. Locals no longer behave eerily, dragons and clockwork droids roam freely, and everyone hates taxes.

Yet perfect strangers insist they know you. Your assigned address leads to a different house. The roads, buildings and architecture look ‘lived in,’ but changed.

No one remembers the Unwinding.

■ Burlap mannequins sometimes watch from mirrors, windows and reflecting surfaces.

■ You might hear shifting and scratching in Eidris walls.

■ Minaras has doubled its bounty for a man not unlike Leonard McCoy.

■ Black fungal spores are found on the increasingly voluminous experiment vials, specimens and supplies thrown out by Minaras medical facilities.

■ Frail and confused, Ellethia survivor Zenobius finally awakens. A short thread is up for RNG grabs.

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TRIALS & NO ERRORS

The guard troops that Eidris and Minaras assign to the Neutral Zone now protect King Thivar and High Councillor Arabella during the annual Sanctuary Reckoning trials. Both adjudicate cases that violate the ceasefire.

Prolonging the trials buys time for your companions in the clock tower.

■ Create a distraction — flood the judgement hall rooms? Fire? Illusions?

■ Pose as trial participants: perhaps you are of Eidris, and you caught this wicked Minaraian raiding your home? Mayhap this wretched man of Eidris stole your girlfriend? Wait, you’re a Minaraian who wants to kill King Thivar?

■ …organise breakouts, if Thivar or Arabella have your jailed. You are first imprisoned in makeshift Sanctuary cells — all but poorly locked, glorified closets. Get a trial sentence!

■ Thivar and Arabella treat the trials as a box-ticking exercise.

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THE TOWER

As Eidris and Minaras play court, you can infiltrate the Neutral Zone clock tower of Vassarizhia.

■ Only token security remains. The door is unlocked.

■ Karsa supplies paper talismans that must be burned in the watch fire at the tower’s top level.

■ Each burned talisman amplifies the reveal spell that Karsa activates. Link a finished burning thread by 8 November to help the cause.

■ A November mod post will describe how much of Serthica’s ‘undeath’ characters can see.

■ Placing Magnus’ dragon eye before the tower’s telescope will allow characters to always see Serthica’s undeath, moving forward.

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✘ ELEVATOR ETIQUETTE

Imperfect stillness dominates Vassarizhia: your footsteps do not click, words die in your mouth. The tower’s rickety gear slither silently. Your heartbeat aligns with the clock’s tick… tock.
You have the growing, gnarly certainty that you have invaded something ancient and alive.

The tower’s entryway level is large, deserted, stacked with gears. At its core is a dilapidated open elevator shaft.

A large sign says to find and pull the floor lever, if elevators stop.

■ There are two elevators. Each narrow lift can hold up to four people, crammed. The upper half of the carriage is chain-link fence, while the floors contain hatches that sometimes open mid-travel for 30 seconds. Hold on to ceiling-bound leather straps.

■ The ropes holding the elevators are thick, but tattered.

■ The elevator’s creaking squeals can awaken swarms of 1m-tall bats and bat wyverns. They rattle the lift, but ultimately withdraw.

■ The elevator can stop at as many levels as you want (or none!).

■ Beyond the second level, you feel intensely paranoid and see your companions as the persons you most hate/fear for five to 10 minutes. Reaching the top, you are tempted to cut the lift ropes of those who follow. (The ropes and elevators recover, after crashing to the bottom. )

■ On each floor, as you exit the elevator, a nearby wall shows a different scratched instruction, signed by DAVID.

LEVEL I: THE LABYRINTH| LEVEL II: THE ANCESTOR | LEVEL III: TAG! YOU’RE IT
LEVEL IV: THE ROOM WHERE NOTHING HAPPENS | LEVEL V: IT’S RAINING (AGAIN)

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LEVEL I: THE LABYRINTH
CONTENT WARNING: MINOTAUR, BODY HORROR

Step into a jail maze, flooded to knee level. Confusing corridors narrow, widen and contort, while wall torches dim.

Intermittent howling reveals you’re not alone. Hiding, you see child-like chalk drawings of forest animals on walls — and a great minotaur. Keep silent.

■ David S P’s wall scrawl says, IT RUNS IN THE FAMILY.

■ Collect some of the many discarded daggers or axes. Rope bundles float in water — use them to paralyse your captive or briefly force them under your control.

■ Don’t linger in one place: rotting, bodiless hands surface to restrain you.

■ Bad news, if you swallow water when the minotaur or dead hands try to drown you: your skin stretches and bursts, while your bones pop and extend. You mutate into a half human, half woodland creature, all bloodlust. ( Inspiration, anyone? ) Your companions should still recognise you; between hazy memories and constant pain, you might struggle to remember them and even attack.

■ Morphed characters can (painfully) return to normal within minutes of re-entering the elevator.

■ A smaller and distressed three-headed minotaur also roams the labyrinth. Two of its heads sob, while the third urges you to hide with it when brother approaches. It tries to throttle you with a noose to make brother happy, if you follow. David did say.

■ The minotaur and its sibling have poor sight. They cannot enter a corridor where you’ve drawn or laid down a line.

■ Pull the lever, and a straight corridor leads you to the elevator.

TOP | LEVEL II | LEVEL III | LEVEL IV | LEVEL V

LEVEL II: THE ANCESTOR
CONTENT WARNING: GIANT SKELETON, BLOOD DRINKING

Here, only barren stone and thin rivulets of fresh water pouring from wall fountains with sharp-tipped ornaments — your spilled blood quickly infects the basins. Knives, pins and bowls have been abandoned nearby.

High pressure and vertigo overwhelm you. Follow a rhythmic heaving to where the upper half of an enormous skeleton — the Ancestor — has broken through a wall. White, silk thread fetters it. Dried blood rims its cracked mouth. Before it, the stone floor has been tarnished, up to a 5m radius.

The Ancestor appears dormant, a crown of iron thorns on its head. It clutches the lever tightly in its right hand. Above it, an engraving urges, SPILL WINE FOR YOUR ANCESTOR.

■ David S P’s elevator scrawl says, WATER TO WINE.

■ Dally staring and you feel dizzy, nauseous, depressed and compelled to share your close-death encounters. Before you know it, you are stepping into the Ancestor’s radius…

■ …where it plunges for you, if you don’t bear a filled cup. The silk ropes keep the Ancestor from reaching beyond 5m.

■ Two carvings under his fists read HONOUR THY FATHER and DISHONOUR THY MOTHER.

■ Quickly distract the Ancestor from crumbling his captives, tearing their arms or attempting to eat them.

■ The Ancestor is instinct-driven, consumed by thirst. It cannot see or smell, and only remembers taste. Sounds divert it.

■ Improvise: there is no actual wine here. Infuse water, spill blood, or vocally pretend you are delivering wine, and the Ancestor might spare you.

■ If sated, the Ancestor releases the lever.

TOP | LEVEL I | LEVEL III | LEVEL IV | LEVEL V

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LEVEL III: TAG! YOU’RE IT
CONTENT WARNING: SCARECROW, SKINNED CREATURES

Enjoy pitch dark, dread and bile spreading in your gut. Take a candle from near the elevator and roam through small, unlocked rooms that feature tattered beds, strips of tanning leather and blood or wax spilled on the floor.

■ David S P’s wall scrawl says, O CATCHES IT.

■ Ahead, you see candle-bearing mannequins that dance a hora to the same song played by Jim Kirk’s music box: “Up the mountain, in the grove, hand in hand to Ke-Waihu, fresh harvest’s a treasure trove, each fall we feast anew.”

■ The creatures are patched abominations of wax, skinned flesh and burlap. In the middle of the hora is a wiry scarecrow, eyes blazing with candle fire as it points a large cleaver. In certain lights, the scarecrow’s face briefly contorts into that of your mother. It wears priestly robes that Arc III survivors may recognise from the House of Ravens.

■ As the dance finishes, you notice the lever in the middle of the circle, where flame spells out TAKE THEM, NOT ME. The game begins.

■ The abominations run, gleefully manic and screaming TAAAA~AAAAAG. YOU’RE IT! The scarecrow unflinchingly cuts them down while pursuing you. Hide in the abandoned rooms, or risk snuffing your candle to avoid detection.

■ Some abominations slap you, hold you, or alert the scarecrow. Others offer shelter. A few peel off wax skins from their limbs — showing black fungi beneath. They murmur, IT NEVER GOES AWAY.

■ Parchment strips fall from the scarecrow’s sleeves, reading, HAPPY NAME DAY, MOTHER KNOWS BEST, THE SIN RAN DEEPER THAN SKIN, IF YOU CAN BEAR IT, IT’S A GAME.

■ Bless David: draw the scarecrow into a drawn or makeshift circle to trap it.

■ Intense, paralysing fear arrests you, if the scarecrow catches you. The wax abominations chant, TAKE THEM, NOT ME. One might even take pity and move your numbed mouth to utter the words. Say them — and the scarecrow lands deep cuts on your arms, then pursues your companion.

■ If you betray someone, the abominations take the appearance of your worst version: whether physically mutated, with a temper that amplifies your worst features, or both.

TOP | LEVEL I | LEVEL II | LEVEL IV | LEVEL V

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LEVEL IV: THE ROOM WHERE NOTHING HAPPENS
CONTENT WARNING: MANIPULATION, MENTAL COERCION

You enter a quiet room. The lever sits on a table, beside rope and a dagger. As you approach, your surroundings transform: perhaps your dearest dead appear to warmly welcome you. Crowds of your doubters celebrate your success. Or you are in a calm oasis, where nothing hurts.

■ David S P’s wall scrawl says, THIS DREAM IS A NIGHTMARE.

■ Whatever your deepest wishes, the room’s vivid illusions provide. With time, your beautiful dreams deteriorate into horror. Sometimes, you hear whispers of, Make a wish.

■ The room increasingly drains your life force. Within half an hour, you have gaunt flesh, brittle bones and a hunched back. Or you might feel compelled to harm yourself, clawing your arms and face, or pulling your hair out.

■ The damage comes undone minutes after reaching the elevator.

■ The room focuses on one person: if someone joins you, they see fainter echoes of what the room shows you, but they are not enthralled. They must coax or drag you away.

■ If you are under the room’s influence, it forces you to make any later intruders stay.

TOP | LEVEL I | LEVEL II | LEVEL III | LEVEL V

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LEVEL V: IT’S RAINING (AGAIN)
CONTENT WARNING: PLAGUE, THE CHILD

At the tower’s open-sky top, fire crackles from a small stone pit, shielded by a familiar, immovable blood-spattered white umbrella. Nearby, discover an immense rusted telescope and other discarded astronomy tools.

You trip on rain-battered yellowed bones at every step. One skeletal hand holds a watch piece, engraved for Mr. David Sebastian Pumpkins.

■ David S P’s has only scrawled his signature.

■ You might reach the flame easily, or be overwhelmed by sickness, black fungal spores blooming on your fingers, while you cough blood and experience intense fever. The symptoms wane once you reach the fire.

■ Burn paper talismans and link finished threads to help Karsa’s spell.

■ The child with a fox mask from the Unwinding could appear. Sign up for one of three short threads, which must finalise by 3 November.

NOTES

■ Some of the bigger plot clues have been emphasised, to help navigate through the horror details.

■ You can hit up some NPCs during the trials.

■ Check out plotting posts for last-minute team-ups.

■ Back to the top.

QUESTIONS

Comments

[vdovy]

[ Yelena has stopped to get a closer look at the timepiece clutched in a skeletal hand, and perhaps her nerves are frayed from the horrors below, or maybe it's the howling wind and rain drowning out the sound of approaching footsteps, but she actually jumps when she hears another voice. Bones shift and roll beneath her and she loses her footing momentarily, kicking a leg wildly to balance out. A few one-legged hops in place as she re-calibrates and finally she gets both feet under her. ]

Watch your step up here, [ she warns. Then she gets a better look and realizes there may not be much stepping happening on the girl's part. Carefully, Yelena makes her way back, kicking bones aside with each step to clear the path as she goes. She squats down when she reaches the girl and taps her shoulder. ] Put your arm around my neck.

[growlies]

( Every soul is unique, but still even in the midst of exhaustion, she is distracted by this one: the conflict of it, the warm wind which says freedom but the feeling of being restrained, blood and then - something else? She doesn't recognize the rest. Cheese maybe?

She blinks and allows her attention to be drawn back to the tap against her shoulder, and then- ) Oh. ( She wraps her arm around her neck then, sinking into her helplessly as soon as she lets go of some of that effort to remain standing. ) Uh, thank you for the- Would have seriously sucked going through all that shit and then getting stuck at the elevator at the top, staring at the fire. I see the decor up here is just as full of Halloween horrors.

[vdovy]

Tell me about it. I usually love American Halloween. The scary movies, the candy, the costumes... So much fun. But now I'll never look at haunted houses the same. [ As Yelena laments another ruined facet of her fake childhood, she shifts her feet to a more stable position to compensate for the girl's limp weight. Then she starts stepping slowly, careful to stick to the path she cleared. ] Be careful where you step. These remains are very slippery.

[growlies]

Yeah, can't say haunted houses will ever have the same pizzaz after giant scarecrows and minotaurs. ( Red winces, staring down at the remains, avoiding stepping on an arm thanks to the other woman's warning, and now then scanning the area for signs of any danger. It seems... quiet though. ) What's up with all the bodies up here? This seems like the safest level.

[vdovy]

Whatever got to them is long gone, I hope. [ She kicks at a stray, skeletal foot. ] They have certainly been up here long enough. That one over there— [ Yelena nudges her chin toward the hand still clutching a timepiece. ] —used to be David Pumpkins, the man from the mysterious notes.

[growlies]

Wait, really? His name is David Pumpkins? Shit, feel sorry for the guy. ( Her expression twists up into a wince.. The poor soul likely was teased like hell when they were a child, but also- ) Everyone's been so in the weeds with this David Pumpkins guy and his notes.

You think they meant anything? I mean, he died up here so if he knew anything, it didn't save him.

[vdovy]

No, it sure didn't, [ Yelena says dryly, wrinkling her nose at Mr. Pumpkins' remains. She takes another step forward, careful to balance their combined weights. Tumbling down onto a pile of old bones would be the cherry on top of this tower adventure. ] Perhaps he knew his fate was sealed and left clues to give us a fighting chance. Really shitty clues, but I guess he tried.

[growlies]

Yeah. 'He tried' is probably a better thing to put on his tombstone instead of 'He didn't try at all'. ( Red makes a face though, grateful they're getting nearer to the fire that she can now reach out to. Once she gets this thing in there, she can seriously consider if she wants to dive into creepy towers in the future because the Merchant says they have to. Maybe she's just creeped out by all the dead and burlap dolls masquerading as people around. She holds the talisman over the flames and then drops it in, relieved when it burns. )

...shit, expected there to be fireworks or something. Thank you again. Seriously. ( Note to self for the future: turning into giant three headed dog version of self is now exhausting as hell. ) You're new?

[vdovy]

I am. [ Yelena confirms with a nod. She drops her own talisman into the pit and watches the fire consume it. ] You're right, this is anticlimactic. It better have been worth it.

[ She glances behind them, eyeing the elevator suspiciously. ] How's your strength? Because I am seriously considering climbing down the elevator shaft if it stops one more time.

[growlies]

( Red is just gonna sit here by the fire for a little while even as she lifts her eyebrows, staring up at her, as if this entire idea does not compute, has not ever computed in all her time existing on the Tower. ) ...what?

You can just climb elevator shafts? Shit. I'm pretty sure at my best I'd just fall or get squished by an elevator. That's pretty badass.

[vdovy]

Nah, you just slide down the cables, it's pretty easy. [ As much as Yelena wants accept the badass mantle, there are many cooler ways to earn it. Going down an elevator shaft is basically rock climbing with more improvisation.

Yelena kneels down to join the girl by the fire, realizing that she had the right idea. Better to take advantage of this first moment of peace than jump right into the next thing. She looks into the fire and sighs. ] Too bad the witch didn't give us any marshmallows.

[growlies]

Okay, well, I'd be down to try. You make it sound really simple. ( Then again, this is her first ever elevator, and it's been straight out of a horror film. So. She can't say she knows anything about how easy it would be to slide down its cables either. )

God, yeah, that would be good. Lightly toasted over the amulet, magic fire. Probably give us super powers or make us sick, but worth it. I'm Red by the way. Welcome to... the shithole.

[vdovy]

So worth it. [ Yelena nods her agreement. Getting superpowers from eating toasted marshmallow would be among the cooler origin stories she has heard, too. ] Nice to meet you. I'm Yelena.

How long have you been in this shithole?

[growlies]

A few months. I was part of the newbie group that secured the passports to get the old group into this city.

Not really sure why we wanted to come - Oh right. The beacon. ( She wrinkles her nose. She's heard it's not even that effective - can't get everyone through before it powers down again. Not that she wants to return to her own world. ) How've you been enjoying your stay? ( She smirks, because yeah, shithole. )

[vdovy]

Honestly, I don't hate it that much. Being stuck underground with little to do was worse. [ Sure, she could have done without the room that made her see Natasha— that was painful— but the rest was not that bad. ] Definitely my most Halloween experience, though, I can say that.