westwhere | the sunken

the sunken | part i

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.

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Tea has been had, poor quality though it was. He didn't mind. Xichen does, after a nod, get straight to the point, however.

"Wangji wished me to congratulate him."

Letting that stew for a moment as his mild smile watches Wei Wuxian, he remains of calm mind and sturdy body where he sits up on his knees. He takes the time to fold his sleeves over his lap, breaking the wait between his speaking and a possible answer.

"He has a way of speaking around that which he wishes to say. I find it is what he will not utter that presents the biggest case as to what occupies his thoughts."

Wei Wuxian blinks, slowly. Much like a cat observing the people before it, mildly surprised at their presence, but accepting they're there, regardless. It's funnier to him now to find he's in a position of knowing more than Lan Xichen, but he'll admit to himself which congratulations is due is one he's... not entirely certain of. Lan Zhan having married Wei Wuxian several times in his clan's ways without telling anyone, including Wei Wuxian? Or the ones that follow? Was that said over tea?

His brow quirks up in small increments, and then he smiles, slow and amused.

"There's a number of things worth congratulating," he says, voice warm with an undertone of his tiredness. "Which he intends I hesitate to say."

The truth behind it rings genuine: congratulate him on having survived, on adapting, on making friends, on finding people he wants to protect, in having reached beyond himself, in having laid parts of his trauma with their mother to rest, in admitting his wants and intentions, in having to face and return and stumble and succeed and fail again in what relationships are. Wei Wuxian has done the same, and he doesn't have the ease of speaking on love that Lan Zhan has managed.

Or congratulations, more important than a social bond acknowledged between soulmates that goes parallel to their existing one, for Lan Zhan finding himself and his way step by step, becoming the man he wants to be, even as he's new to learning who that man is.

"He's found a path for himself. One he sees and acknowledges, here, where the merit of any clan is meaningless, and personal action and decision is all that carries weight. He could mean that."

"He has not abandoned his clan." This much, Xichen knows for sure. As much as Wangji can advance other priorities, he longs for home and Xichen intends to somehow return him there. All of them, working as a team. "He knows how to weigh the merits of people according to their actions, not their heritage or methods, that is true. However, I do not think that is what he was alluding to."

He doesn't quite sigh, though he does exhale slowly.

"I wish you would not hesitate to say."

Glancing down at his hands, when his gaze flits back up it is steadier.

"Wangji speaks nothing of you."

A faster blink, and a snort, shaking of his head.

"When did anyone say he had?"

But he stands after that, heading to the alcove with the small banked embers and the pot for water to make tea, looking for grasses to feed into it, coaxing along the small flame. He adds water to the small pot, looking for the cups.

"Do you still have the cups from earlier out?"

In this case, it's one conversation that the brothers need to have for each other. This isn't the insight to a life lived that the other party simply can't know without someone speaking. Lan Zhan struggles communicating what he assumes people will intuit or understand, and sometimes they do. The times they don't, those are the ones where... a little clarity is useful.

Yet he'll make his brother-in-law tea. Even if he's already had tea. Because that's what you do.

Xichen rises to fetch the washed cups from the ledge that provides a shelf for such items.

"He speaks nothing of you," he elaborates patiently, "and avoids conversation of you, which leads me to believe he still holds you in high esteem. More so than what I understood back home, given your ... two years together.

"It is your business, of course, and I don't wish to pry."

Turning the cups over, he offers them once having checked they have dried. His tone is calm and measured, polite but with an earnest edge controlled from years spent exuding decorum.

"But I hope, in the case of there being something either of you need to say, you will at least consider me a confidant."

"If your worried we've discovered springtime, let me lay that to rest," he says, more a grumble than anything else as he picks up the tea leaves and measures them into the teapot, checking that it's been cleaned.

He does not add, not for lack of trying. Their timing has continued to be miserable, but Lan Xichen doesn't really need to know that. If anything, the mumble is meant jestingly, which he matches with a smile that says, don't take me seriously when he accepts the cups.

"Two years is a long time to find ourselves. Lan Zhan hasn't been the only one determining his own way, or how we choose to walk the world in step." It'll be some time for the water to heat, so he shifts to one side, holding the cups in hand and leaning back against the wall. "What you want to ask, Zewu-jun. Ask him directly. He's somewhat better at speaking when you bring his attention to what you want to hear, ah?"

Two years of struggling with communication, and he can say that much confidently now. It had hardly been a one sided struggle, and no one sided improvement. They learn together.

"I've said what I wanted to."

He waves off the suggestion of asking Wangji anything directly, he wouldn't want to put his brother on the spot for an interrogation. Even the remarks about springtime don't pull more than an amused muscle in the corner of his lips; he was assuredly not asking about that sort of thing, no. Very funny.

Watching him, his smile softens.

"Besides, Wangji has considered you a part of our clan for a long time. I would be remiss in not doing the same and letting you know that you can come to me, if needs be."

It deserves saying out loud at least once.

He coughs a little, hand up to his mouth.

"Yeah, that was a surprise to me." Decades later getting the information that clued him in to Lan Zhan having married him in custom of the clan if not exchanges more traditionally realised.

"Not so much now, but for a long time. Hardly the only thing to take me by surprise."

The water heats, and he sets down the cups to see to pouring from the boiling pot into the smaller tea pot.

"Have you had a chance to see Sizhui yet? He ended up in another residence, but these pendants let us see and speak with each other easily."

"Good surprises, I hope."

Said as unobtrusively as possible, before the subject of Sizhui is brought up.

"I used the little device to speak with him, yes. I hear he's interested in a girl."

Dropping a soft bomb, inquisitively phrased. Wangji is a gossip.

A non-committal hum and a grin; they weren't all good surprises, but that's life. He expects no different, and he's thankful for those which are.

"Ah? We must be speaking about Miss Hermione," he says, tapping a finger to his chin, "Not that he's said anything directly, and she's learning people can be attracted to both men and women." Wei Wixian muses, allowing his amusement to show fully. "With you here, he could ask clan and parental permission, ah? For the heartbreak of it all."

A more solemn expression for all that.

"There's been no indication so far that we return to times or places other than our own. Nor that we recall this place, for the kindness or cruelty that offers."

He pours tea into both cups, setting the pot back down and offering Lan Xichen one with his fingertips maintaining contact. He should be pouring tea at least once for his relative by marriage. Jiang Cheng mostly endured it the one time Wei Wuxian convinced him to sit down long enough with Lan Zhan at the same table without storming away.

There's a flicker of something like amusement that veils behind his pleased smile when he hears Hermione's name: he thought so.

"She knows you all quite well, it seems. I've met her, she's a clever girl." As for the heartbreak of leaving Sizhui behind, should anyone happen to vanish before another, he hums as he gratefully sips his tea, "Should you find your heart's song in a cloud, it would be best to at least try your luck flying toward it. If the connection is sincere, the joy of its warmth will outlast any initial fear of falling."

If not, then they will become Xichen.

"When we return," because they will, he brooks no argument on that score, "I would prefer Sizhui felt fond echoes of memories from his time away from home, especially any lost ones."

Or if they take after Wei Wuxian, they wouldn't allow themselves to fly, to reach. Fear and lack of awareness aren't unique conditions. He wishes for Sizhui less heartbreak than what both his fathers have faced.

Yet with memory a question of might, he has little enough to say. In the end, each person lives their life according to their own decisions. Making them for anyone else is a poor move, no matter how well intentioned.

"We all wish for happiness when it comes to those we care for." Holding his own cup between his hands, Wei Wuxian appreciates the heat that seeps through, easing an aching he hadn't acknowledged earlier. "The youngest ones have always been most free here. I can say that much leans in his favour."

Lily and Eleven, long returned home, and in Eleven's case, twice-over, come to mind. Youth has always been more bold, and for many, that lay also with boldness in the heart. He fixes his gaze on the sect leader, a man who has tangled with such loss and betrayal so recently.

"Do you grant yourself the same leave?"

"Myself?"

He can't say he thinks of himself and his own needs much at all, anymore. Beyond eating enough to stay alive and useful, training occasionally to keep his skills in check, Xichen prefers the silence of the hanshi to almost everything and everyone else. Besides, he could not fly toward any cloud that sang his heart's song; his is buried in a constant rainstorm, nothing could be heard inside that brittle organ.

"I am not a young man like Sizhui."

That's not untrue, as excuses go.

"Are we?"

He sips from his tea, lifts his brows and cants his head to the side, studying his brother by law, albeit only in this world for the moment. A path to navigate back home when they arrive once more, but that isn't today's trouble, borrowed or otherwise. Nor is it tonight's joy.

"For the sake of those who love you, don't discount the affections you may gain in the future. Or feel you need to find them anytime soon." He smiles, lopsided, tiredly sincere. "Heavens knows it took me years to feel I deserved anything good, after the lives we've lived."

Not only the life he's lived, but the ones collectively endured by their generation, by the decisions of their parents and elders, by the crafted world delivered to the orphans of the generation below them. War and death and sixteen years of darkness, to find it hadn't ended there, hadn't stopped with him. That the world is never so simple, and justice is never absolute, never fair, always a fight.

Yet not alone. Not without understanding, companionship, compromise. Wei Wuxian takes another sip of tea. Who of them has not been betrayed? Who of them has not been the betrayer? Even unintentionally, they all become both sides of that coin at some time or another.

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the sunken | part i

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