the sunken | part i

[groundrules]

THE SUNKEN

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Welcome to the first log of Arc VI: the Sunken, which covers 15 May – 2 June and doubles as a test drive meme.

Back/forward date as needed! The calendar date suggestions are indicative.

The TDM is open to everyone! If you decide to apply to the game, you can get an invite from current players or the upcoming enabling meme — or participate in the test drive meme and get in touch @ groundrules to chat things over. We currently have 13 slots available for new players.

Test drivers can use this post for logs and network posts — old timers, please make your network posts at eastbound.

LOST AT SEA | TEST DRIVE TOURISTS

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You wake, gasping, in a stormy sea, your thoughts slowed to a confused trickle. Skill, floating wood or a kindly stranger — who you can’t understand — help you to reach shore.

Villagers discover you collapsed on sand and provide critical (if rickety) communication and translation devices. They say you are in Sunken Yancai, a fishing village progressively overtaken by waters and cursed by the secretive ‘ladies of the lake’ to transit through time.

■ Rescuers group newcomers and supply questionable village couture, warm meals and accommodations in abandoned, half-flooded homes or spare small boats anchored in Yancai’s waterways. Huddle up, recover your strength and don’t think too hard on why your memories are hazy over the next three days.

■ Come morning, you visit village leader Quanze Tsaymien, then the sorceress Karsa — who explains you are otherworlders summoned into Akhuras by undead lords who wish to weaponise you in their battle against humans and one another. Karsa is an associate of the Merchant, who leads otherworlders towards ancient transport beacons east.

■ One such beacon rests dormant in Yancai. The group must infiltrate the village and wait a few weeks until it shifts to a point back in time when the beacon was active.

■ Newcomers are handed passport papers with their new identities in Yancai, where they may be known as a bankrupt merchant, perpetually drunk sailor, whale hunter, raft surveyor, mermaid who has just gained their legs, crab collector... feel free to invent a dutifully hilarious apt role for their seaside sojourn.

OLD TIMERS | THE DRIFTING

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You dragged yourself here in a haze. You arrived long ago, as if in a dream. You were born and bred in this village. In truth, your memories of reaching lively Yancai feel nebulous and alarmingly inconsequential.

Characters are facilitated new identities and dwellings by the Merchant, or believe they have had them all along.

■ A weary Karsa warns to say nothing to party members with altered memories, until the sorcery that affects them runs its course.

■ Memory-altered characters progressively regain their memories within three to five days (by 20 May). They have their memories partially or fully back at night ( midnight to 5 a.m.). Throughout the day, memory regains can trigger migraines, eerie confusion and paranoia.

■ Hauntings begin once characters have fully regained their memories.

■ Once everyone is ‘back to normal,’ Karsa explains that Yancai periodically transits through time. The memory alterations are a magical solution endorsed by the village council, which ensures locals mentally weather these shifts. Villagers continue to blithely accept you as part of the community.

(DON'T) HOLD YOUR BREATH

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Karsa reunites the existing party and newcomers, issuing first assignments. The Merchants’s information suggests the beacon of Yancai will be online once the village travels in time within weeks. A dubious Karsa asks the party to check on the beacon, located in the former House of Commerce of the largely inundated merchants’ district. Reach it by rowing boat.

■ Villagers say the Master of Commerce, a famous musician, took precautions against intruders.

■ All ground and lower floor entryways of the palatial House were boarded to restrict flooding. To enter, pick locks or climb the putrid stairwell towards upper balconies.

■ Inside, the hissing of running water — and, in the lower levels, of thin, slippery leeches whose bite numbs your limbs, while they attempt to feed. You seem to experience pronounced vertigo when entering any decaying rooms covered in black mould.

■ The beacon is located on a dais in the basement vault room, where water rises near 1 meter. Only a few scattered scrolls and golden decorations remain among decorations, while a large ceiling carving writes, greed deafens man to the cries of his conscience; music sets him free.

■ Some tiles of the marbled floor stand out as you wade — step on one, and all doors abruptly slam shut, while dozens of obscured holes in the wall start to rapidly spill water, threatening to fill the room to the ceiling within the hour. You hear the tinny, waning sound of a village song played from a hidden source.

■ To stop the pouring water and open the doors, sing the song you hear, or find the music box that produces it amid debris on the water-covered floors. Wind it, and it plays its song in reverse, revealing the voice of a laughing elderly man who says, Depressingly, Anurr was right to worry.

■ Don’t forget to check the beacon — and report back to Karsa that it looks structurally untarnished.

THEY SLEEP

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After surprising revelations at previous citadels, Karsa tasks you to investigate just how… permanent death is in Yancai. Villagers share that their dead are buried in a strange rite at sea — part of which will take place within days.

■ The dead are ‘entombed’ in one-man sarcophagi ships with carved and chained lids that depict their likeness. These burial boats are set at sea on the first day of each season and return three months later.

■ Join the harbours around 22 May, when mourners gather to receive the burial boats. Characters must pretend to be greatly anguished relatives, acquaintances or debt collectors to join the grieving.

■ The boats float towards you, seemingly of their own volition. Gaze afar and spot a boat carrying a man in black — the same who haunts some characters — who observes until the last burial ship has reached the piers, before he disappears.

■ Sailors draw up the boats and unpeel the untouched chains and lids, to reveal… no corpses. Peer closer and find neither biological signs (stench, liquids) of discomposure, nor the magical chillness of spaces where cadavers have lingered long. Scratch marks litter the inside of some boat lids.

■ Mourners seem grateful that the waters have ‘accepted’ the bodies. Some say that their relatives whose boats have yet to return must have been stolen by the ‘ladies of the lake,’ a villainous witch coven. Speak to mourners or sailors for clues.

■ Linger long near opened burial boats, and you feel tempted to throw yourself into the sea, slowly losing consciousness — until someone rescues you.

AMONG US

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On 25 May, village leader Quanze Tsaymien drags the chained and half feral mistress Miang-si to households and Yancai’s largest market square.

The young woman, he says, was seduced by the ladies of the lake — the furtive witch coven that condemned Yancai to time travel. Luckily, the village elders have… coaxed Miang-si back onto the righteous path.

■ Miang-si is brought door-to-door to point out her 'accomplices.' Ill at ease, villagers whisper of similar witch hunts leading to false accusations and blood-curdling repercussions.

■ Both men and women are suspected and brought before Miang-si. Perhaps she takes an eerie interest in you, getting especially close to catch your scent, touch or remark on (in)visible hurts, or even dotingly kiss you. If you whisper quickly while she’s near, you might be able to ask one question.

■ If you are patient and kind to Miang-si, she briefly squeezes your hand as she withdraws. Within the hour, you find blood writ on your palm that warns, Our fat moon rises red.

■ If you are agitated, or if Quanze rushes her during your visit, Miang-si erupts into sudden, side-splitting cackling — while you find yourself croaking like a toad, or transforming into one and retaining human speech. The spell dissolves after eight hours.

■ Quanze’s long-suffering men say this sorcery breaks faster if you kiss one of the curmudgeonly emerald toads that hide in some of Yancai’s lakes. Catch one such delightful, slime-spitting creature or barter it from merchants at a costly premium.

ILL MET BY MOONLIGHT

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A full moon is set to rise within days of Miang-si’s visit, on 27 May — just as Yancai shows signs of time shifting. Villagers are prone to stilling and staring askance, seeming lost or adrift.

The village itself evolves: one moment, the same house appears freshly new, then drowned, while waterways overfill with water, then seem barren. Overall, the village deteriorates.

■ That day, the sun suffers a midday eclipse, while droves of black birds circle the woods and village outskirts, attacking those who come close.

■ The waters increasingly thicken and darken, preventing boats from entering certain waterways.

■ An exceedingly bright moon and a diffuse lunar replica rise with nightfall. Come midnight, the village is alive with the sounds of ripping, structural collapse and shrieks. Tar-covered corpses emerge from the waters, clawing on and climbing up piers. They swarm, drawing passers-by into waters to drown them. Help them — and foremost, yourself.

■ Light and fire keep the dead at bay. On some waterways, wildfire now spells, WHAT IS WET WAS WRONGED

■ Weaker alone, fresh corpses climb into your rowing boat, pretending they are innocents who seek shelter. They betray themselves by speaking very slowly, struggling to keep track of the conversation or obliviously peppering it with details of their death. They stubbornly ask questions about you, repeating your answers, and become violent if you say they are dead. Push them into the water at first opportunity.

■ Quanze Tsaymien and other men of the village take arms, urging villagers to barricade in the nearest home, harbour or warehouse and weather the night. They advise to be silent and beware the dead who imitate living voices, warning not to touch any black mould or water that suddenly appear in your home — which alert the dead of your presence within.

■ Some dead try to tear you apart, while others seek to feed you a disgusting, tar-like black mould. A small taste of it makes you sluggish and feeble for two-three hours, while an entire fistful can kill.

■ If the undead infiltrate your house, hold your breath, do not move and keep from screaming. The dead have weak sight and olfactory senses and might pass you by, as long as you stay silent. It can be more efficient to fool than kill the dead.

■ By 5 a.m., houses start to replenish themselves, gaining a new appearance, while water and mould retreat. The dead withdraw into waterways. Outside doors have been marked with blood: vertical lines tell how many living people remain inside; horizontal ones count how many within died overnight.

■ You step to seize a brave new day — while Yancai enters a new time period (further details due in the next plot update).

NOTES

■ The game enabling meme goes up on 25 May.

■ Hit up available NPCs here or in their new inbox!

■ QUESTIONS.

Comments

they sleep | keep doing your prose, buddy, I'm just weird about #Looks

[downswing]

( He is a trickled silhouette, a smear of white mourning — barely a bruise against a pale, watery horizon. Unobtrusive, for how grievers permit him among them, and is it a lie, then, to omit his purpose? Men conjure their truths and live their appearances. If Lan Wangji must make mantle of a sixteen-year-long wound and flaunt his inertia, the tight rope of his bitter mouth, so be it.

At least, they allow him near the piers, knelt like a courtesan paying obeisance, while spittle of spumes rises and spreads when fresh-current waves batter the pier posts. Beside him, sailors cleave open a ship's carcass, wood groaning, then split — to unveil the absence of cadavers, only the stench of staleness, air trapped months-long. The pulse of Lan Wangji's temple quickens to storm; he has done well to find the lone ship neglected, perhaps through the spite of a grudging family, or their reckless abandon.

Beneath his fingertips, the wood's lacquer has withered from unctuous to stark, beady granules. Careful, so very careful and kindly, he sweeps the ship's lid down with a worn thud — nearly striking the feet of the woman that eases beside him, come close. Another of the infamous fresh arrivals. He should make apologies — stays his gaze like a long winter over the emptied boat, instead. No shroud in the ship's petty hull, none of the moistures that accompany flesh deteriorating. Not even the dust of bones. )

Flesh was retrieved or never placed therein.

( Late, when he finishes her speculation. Rasped. Perhaps this is the trick of it, the sleight of hand: they assume these are the same boats that made their death journey. They could yet be welcoming duplicates on return. )

but i need to Match....!!

[datapoint]

[Aloy breathes out. She didn't want to voice the rest of her thought, as if that would make it more real—as if keeping it unspoken would change what she knows to be the truth.]

Who prepares the bodies? Family?

[downswing]

( He looks at them, each man, each face: stormed, wretched, reduced. Tight like linen stiff, like rope holding. These are not people cut from the stone of practicality, not men accustomed to minding their dead. The astringent pinch of sea salt in their wounds is the most they'll tolerate for discomfort.

They cannot have practised, he thinks, the plumping and readying of flesh, the application of cosmetics, the delicate exercise of sitting dead men and women in final repose that respects the wounds of their passing and represents them with honour. )

They must be served by an embalmer. ( No. Too primitive. Too — spartan. He hesitates: ) A... rite master.

[datapoint]

[A rite master. Someone of high regard, probably. Someone with wisdom; someone of importance to this tribe. It'll be difficult to find anyone to humor suspicion of such a person.

Aloy exhales again, frustrated this time, and dusts her hands off. Time to get to work.]

Someone like that should probably be here to receive the dead.

[downswing]

( He sees her point, her angling — that a master would wish to see the fruit of his labour at work, that no such man of craft or clergy shows face in these parts freely. Pauses, nod tentative and as he scans the horizon, landing with inevitability —

...on the spectre who waits, dark like a night's span, abyssal. He seems affixed in the distance, at once critical to the proceedings and entirely separate. )

They have a keeper. ( There, where the man in black sets and whirls his oar, and waters crash, more caskets floating. ) Unreachable.

[datapoint]

[She follows his gaze across the horizon, expression pinching when she makes the same observation. In a sea of mourners, the dark-clothed figure sticks out painfully—the way he stands apart, the way he's watching the goings-on with an authoritative eye.

Setting her jaw, Aloy taps the silver triangle at her temple once more, then starts off along the pier with purpose.]

We'll see just how unreachable.

[Storming toward the black-clad figure, she calls fiercely across the expanse of sea that separates him from the pier. The mourners all look up at her because, you know, it's not subtle.]

Hey! I want to talk to you!

[downswing]

( Best, at all times, to let five things exhaust themselves sooner than set yourself a losing quarrel, seeking to contain them: fire, wailing winds, dead-winter's snow and the rattlings of the earth — and women seeking answer.

No, he does not intercede — only drifts along, an echo of her shadow and a quiet note of dissonance in billow silks, on a pier where men keep their leathers, their belts and their thoughts bound.

And she screams at the protector, or watcher, or curse-caster, who does not turn away Screams, as if courtesy and greetings might seduce him to politesse. Screams, and — He will not answer. — Lan Wangji whispers in the man's stead: )

Deadened things oft cannot hear. ( A pause, drawn thin. ) He likely eludes this world.

[datapoint]

[That's not the answer Aloy wants to hear—it's not an answer at all, really, seeing as it's coming from this man and not the figure in black—and she turns her head halfway back, keeping her eyes locked on the impassive figure past the waves.]

Yeah, right. [Aloy is logical. Analytical. The metaphysical isn't something she has a great deal of experience with.

Through grit teeth, she continues:] So, what. He's beyond all this? The people he's done away with—

[downswing]

— may be the same he has lent aid.

( Look at this man, the strange, floating weightlessness of his disposition. How he appears equally adrift and fixed, the only constant in a sea of literal, solitary death.

And Lan Wangji thinks, He does not hear us. And it strikes him after, he does not see, he does not speak. A man dark like the depths, the curse of his omnipresence like sour ginseng in Wangji's mouth. He swallows. )

Malice unproven. ( The only certainty is the man's presence. But then, what else to be done but stare? ) The living. Let us attempt them first.

( Those with mouths and appetites to speak might prove easier targets. He hesitates, shivered, silvered mouldings foam dispersing on waters. ) Delicately.

( None of... the woman's... impetuous impulsiveness, please. Thank you. )

[datapoint]

[Delicately. Right. Okay.

Aloy sighs in barely-smothered exasperation. These people are convinced some 'evil witches' are responsible for the disappearance of corpses—or that they vanished wholesale from locked, chained coffins at the pleasure of the sea itself. Superstitious nonsense that doesn't give her great confidence that she'll get answers that aren't more superstitious nonsense.

But still, they are in mourning. Perhaps a more gentle touch is warranted. She sighs again, acquiescing.] Alright.

[She motions for him to come with her, and then they go ask questions, I assume, which we can handwave because I just asked you lmao.]