westwhere | the clock tower

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

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

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Me? Five takes another look at the man he's wrestling with, and the others that took on the appearance of John's older self. He tries not to let that bother him as much as it does. It's bizarrely familiar and raises questions he doesn't have time for right now.

Learning too much about a man he only spoke to once isn't going to distract him from the others descending on them. Fortunately, for as small as he is, Five is the trained killer of the group. He shifts his focus when the next three run at him, and he doesn't hesitate to blink behind them, between them, axe swinging. He keeps an eye on the man as he moves to another, but they're a grabby bunch who don't have the decency to attack one at a time.

As soon as John gives him an opening, he teleports behind both of them in a flash and holds the axe back. He realizes it'd be strange to watch someone kill his doppelgängers, so he hesitates to do the natural thing and chop its head off. Instead, he offers the weapon in case it's something he needs to do himself.

"You should have run when I told you to."

John watches the little tyke blip around like some sort of wanky superhero, and, fuck, why not? John's strengths aren't in this sort of conflict, and when he gets shoved up against a wall, he stays down. The kid becomes a much more pressing problem for John's aged shadows.

It should be upsetting, to see his own head caved in. But as their flatcaps get covered in blood, it only calms him. That fucking part of him is dead, right? He cut it out. The deal isn't done. He escaped the bastard.

So what if he's a coward? He's alive.

And then the little sprog teleports them, and John wants to hurl. He dry heaves into darkness, and the sound of a teenager giving him lip. "It occurred to you," he says, voice thin with disdain, "I ain't the sort to follow orders?"

Going into the tower, Five had a vague idea that they might come up against some of what they saw in the Unwinding. Especially after what he ran into as he made his way up to the third floor. It wasn't as whimsical as a tea party and sadistic jackalopes, but just as insane. Which makes him confident that coming here is his best chance of finding the boy and the man in white.

It also means that there's no way of knowing what they'll run into. There's no point in trying to find meaning in something born out of a child's imagination, but he's still bothered by what he saw. He waits until the man finishes dry heaving to respond.

"That's not all that occurred to me." He's not expecting any thanks for helping him out, so he doesn't wait for one. "You turned back for me after throwing me to the wolves. Were you that eager to kill yourself?"

Panting, white as a sheet, John is all crooked angles, a scarecrow on shaky legs. Dripping wet, maybe, but his glare is hot and dry.

"You ain't never changed your mind, lad?"

It's avoiding the question, maybe, but they've got to get some things straight, first.

One look at him and Five can tell that he's barely holding it together, so that mind trick that they played on him was an effective one. It's also a weird thing to have in common. Five knows exactly what it's like to try and kill another version of himself. He'd say he handled it better, but he was under the effects of paradox psychosis at the time.

"First of all, don't call me that." He's nobody's 'lad' or any other nickname he wants to saddle him with. An no, generally he isn't given the luxury of changing his mind when he's made a mistake. "I don't need any other surprises. You want to tell me what that was about?"

John is a bad fighter, but a good bullshitter. The quintessential rule of gab, of saying the right thing at the right time, isn't coming up with convincing lies. It's about knowing when and where to sprinkle in the truth, and how.

He looks the kid in the eyes with an expression of pure stubborn loathing, but he does tell the truth, in his own way. "You think," he pants out, "all these endless bloody universes, there ain't more'n one version of me? You? 'Kinell, you little sprog, get some sodding imagination."

Five bristles at every single nickname, but manages to let it slide. Screaming that he's not a kid tends to have the opposite of the desired effect, and this isn't the time to get into it. The scarecrows seem to be able to read their thoughts and pull out visions that they know will distract them. That much is obvious, but it's still an odd choice.

"Have you met that one before?" John sounds like he's a little too familiar with other universes. It's worth asking, in case he dies here in a few minutes when those scarecrow doppelgängers come back.

John hums a grumbling affirmation. "Likes showing up in me dreams. Oneiromancy."

Which isn't quite the truth, but, again, isn't quite a lie, either.

"You always this curious?"

Oneiromancy. Is that something he does? Not really a useful ability if it only shows him future versions of himself, but it would explain part of the reaction. Then he calls him curious and from his expression it really seems like that was a bigger insult.

"Just wondering if it was him or me that changed your mind." He shakes his head. There's more he wants to know, and specifically needs to talk to John about after his conversation with Lila, but he needs to stay focused on his priorities here.

"After I clear the way, you should take the elevator back out." Then he adds, with a tight smile. "Not an order, just a friendly suggestion."

"Half of one, six dozen of the other. You know how bloody boring it gets, watching kids die? Excruciating."

John is starting to form a theory, here. Every time he says anything to this lad, he twitches, but it's specific things he's saying. He's caught his breath enough to poke and prod with purpose.

"Sod off. I'm going forward, same as you. We're both stubborn bastards, I can tell you that for free."

If he's keeping score, Five has the same twitch at the word 'kids', as much as he already suspected that to factor in. A lesser person might take advantage of the way people react when they see a child, but it's never sat right with him. He'd rather go out of his way to cut them down just to wipe that away any thought that he's someone who needs to be protected.

"Good news then, they'll get you long before they can lay a hand on me." The way he phrased it, like he's seen scores of kids die, is nothing more than a notable aside. Part of what made Five a good assassin is his ability to put his emotions aside. It helps that he's almost always done worse than whoever they're facing.

"You're that committed to burning a talisman?"

the clock tower

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