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westwhere2023-06-08 06:47 pm
groundrules) wrote in westwhere2023-06-08 06:47 pm
Entry tags:
- arcane: caitlyn,
- asoiaf: daenerys targaryen,
- doctor who: the doctor,
- final fantasy xiv: stephanivien,
- game of thrones: jon snow,
- horizon: aloy,
- kingdom of the wicked: emilia,
- kingdom of the wicked: wrath,
- legend of fei: xie yun,
- lockwood & co: anthony lockwood,
- mcu: america chavez,
- mcu: kamala khan,
- mcu: natasha romanova,
- oh! my emperor: beitang moran,
- owl house: eda clawthorne,
- star wars: cal kestis,
- tian guan ci fu: xie lian,
- touken ranbu: kanesada,
- umbrella academy: five,
- untamed: lan xichen,
- untamed: wen ning,
- warcraft: wrathion
the sunken | part ii
Get your toes wet in Part II of The Sunken, stretching until 28 June.
THE MORNING AFTER
Waking from Yancai’s undead attack, you find the village has gone three years back in time.
- ■ Yancai remains flooded, but there are fewer waterways and some dry grounds. You can safely transit by raft, alongside row boat, though the waters run more turbulent.
■ Houses are sturdier, less drenched, their paints and furniture less eroded. There are fewer piers and minimal mould. The dual moons appear less… bloodthirsty.
■ Most locals don’t recall the future. The elder council, including leader Quanze Tsaymien and Kuthuba, remember, but feel compelled to re-enact the past, like an itch they must scratch. Those dead in the undead attack are alive, feeling as if they never perished.
■ Telepaths can hear echoing screams from the undead attack over the two days that follow the time travel.
■ The House of Commerce is less sunken, its beacon offline and musical boobytrap unarmed. The Master of Commerce yet lives and may be contacted.
■ Some struggle with partial or full amnesia, or might undertake their assumed identities. These effects wane within 24 hours — but vertigo, nausea and a sense of displacement may persist.
LIVING FIRE (NEWCOMERS, OPT-IN)
Spooked by the memory meddling, party witch Karsa rallies newcomers, who have least experienced Yancai’s magic, to assemble ingredients for an elixir that will help settle clouded minds. ( ”Minds? What minds? You learn to use them now? You’re too old. You only take your little drink to stop staring like fools.” )
- ■ You must locate red-eye root on the outskirts of the forests that border Yancai. The plant lives in ancient, immense trees that have been burning from the inside for decades.
■ The red-eye root grows within these endless fires.
■ Briefly stop, divert or enter the fire wall to collect the root — but beware that flames stoke, if you loiter nearby. You can also find the resident fire gnome, who’ll surrender a handful of roots — if you amuse them by fulfilling requests ranging from playful (songs, dances) to humiliating (pretending to be animals, sharing uncomfortable secrets) to cruel (asks for blood, punching a comrade… )
■ Dilute the red-eye root into a painfully bitter elixir, then distribute it and coax the reluctant to drink.
■ You can enlist anyone’s help with the quest!
HOME AT SEA
Slowly, surely, Yancai sinks — a fresher reality for villagers who reward help to raise piers, wade through waterways to reach their families, or design new boats, infrastructure and safety mechanisms. Cash in on your good deeds here.
You overhear veteran fisherman Temiu mutter that mould dregs have knotted his nets — while newly arrived Captain Alia of the New Brigade wonders how Yancai can be so flooded, amid quiet seas. The population seems tender, weary.
FARE THEE WELL
Once more, the village observes a funerary rite — this time, setting dead bodies at sea. Hostile, sullen and silent embalmers contracted by the elder council prepare corpses for final farewells before laying them to rest in one-man casket-vessels. The ships are bound with thick, weighty chains, closed and set on water — destined to return empty after the dead are claimed.
Drifting distantly at sea, the Man in Black of hauntings awaits them on a ragged boat.
- ■ Some villagers murmur that many casket-ships have gone missing, leaving those dead without rest. They argue the wisdom of burying their dead at home — but superstitious family aggressively object.
■ Stay among the grieving to collect information on the dead. You can also inspect the bodies by… borrowing coarse, greyed robes, and painting your eyes and lips with wood ashes to mimic the embalmers.
■ You recognise a small minority of the bodies sent to sea as the undead who attacked in the future.
■ There are unused casket-ships, built for lovers who perished together. Partner up, descend into a casket and fake… perfect… stiffness, to experience the disappearance firsthand.
THE MOON, HOWLING
A sight to be seen are the twin moons that steward Yancai, one true and one diffuse. In the future, they gleamed cold and waiting — here, those with a lunar or astral connection become increasingly and inexplicably convinced that these moons are… not real. No distraction, no reason, no proof convinces you. The true moon is captive.
In your moon-hunt, you are drawn to the dam-fenced, heavily flooded south-western district of Yancai — into the now deserted former seat of the elder’s council, the drowned but majestic palace-mansion of the Storm’s Stage.
- ■ Can’t hurt to tell other party members your suspicions and enlist help. Alternatively, they might follow you because of your strange behaviour.
■ Scale the great wooden dam, mindful of guards.
■ You find the district overwhelmingly submerged, with waters thick, unnaturally cool and darkened (but not black). Refugees have removed row boats, and remaining rafts are threadbare, forcing you to swim, leap or scale rooftops and balconies to advance. Beware deep rotting and crumbling architecture.
■ The Storm’s Stage is a flat, one-level building, where waters run 1.5-2m high. Its large, wide and labyrinthine corridors have made it a favourite hunting ground for Weepers: carnivorous 1m-long sea creatures with cruel teeth and human intelligence. They produce a sobbing, hiccupping sound — their cackle of enthusiasm, before they attack.
■ These obscene creatures spear the decaying bodies of their former human or animal prey in their teeth, propping them up and mimicking voices to lure you closer.
■ Make it far enough into the twisting building, and you may encounter a magically locked room, behind which, the sensitive are certain, lies the moon. Elders’ leader Quanze Tsaymien might have the key you require — or find a way to open the door yourself. Are you in yet?
THE LADIES & THEIR LAKE
You hear that beautiful maid Miang-Si has come of age, and her rich merchant family now accepts marriage offers. Jubilant, modestly attired, kind and in good health — this Miang-Si is a far cry from the spiteful, sly creature you met before.
Yet, in a small village, murmurs abound: some of Miang-Si’s friends hint that her reputation won’t survive more sneaking out at night. Others say that Miang-Si appears… distracted, her appetite lessened. Others, still, say the girl has returned to her obsessive fixation with a beautiful woman glimpsed in the forest years prior.
Miang-Si could have information on her future accomplices — the allegedly ladies of the lake.
FOR RICHER OR FOR POORER
Miang-Si’s parents have exacting marital standards: you must be rich and publicly righteous, all genders welcome. An exotic gift might go far to gain you a private audience with Miang-Si.
- ■ Choose and present a potential suitor: dress them in the village finest, polish their manners, hire an entourage and commandeer a suitable courtship gift. Swat if they complain.
■ Raise the suitor’s odds along with their public profile by flaunting their feats and virtues in the marketplace.
■ Woo your would-be parents-in-law by capturing golden scales from a rare Mura-sirri lake fish. It spits slime on its pursuers, who instantly flee, irrationally startled.
■ To the seeming ignorance of Miang-Si’s parents, their dark, dusty, mausoleum-like house appears haunted: strange women appear in reflective surfaces, or run down corridors. Joining your hosts for tea, you feel inexplicably covetous of your ‘intended,’ certain that you must have Miang-Si at all costs and that jealous rivals oppose you. Invisible to others, a beautiful woman clings to you from behind and whispers you need only verbally or physically eviscerate everyone at this table to claim your bride. Hopefully, your wingwo/man can prevent bloodshed.
■ Sign up here for one of three RNG-drawn audiences to speak to Miang-Si or investigate her quarters.
AT NIGHT, WE DALLY
You can also trail after Miang-Si on one of the nights when she slips out of her dead silent house. She leaves when the main moon is full — while the twin moon feels disapproving. Follow Miang-Si to the outskirts of Yancai, to the Silver Lakes. Here, she tosses in a silver coin and wishes for safe passage, then takes a small boat.
- ■ If she discovers you following her, Miang-Si firmly tells you to go home. The twin moon seems at ease as you heed, however unwillingly.
■ If you also drop a silver coin in the Silver Lakes and wish for safe passage, your ship turns invisible for two hours.
■ Miang-Si stops her boat in the middle of the Silver Lake and touches the waters with her hand. She is answered by several skeletons, who swim to surface and gather by her boat or climbing in. The parts of their bodies that exit the water gain flesh, then skin and the likeness of beautiful women — the rest stay skeletal in the depths.
■ One such woman greets Miang-Si as queen of the night and kisses her on the mouth, about to drag her in. If you only follow, you notice she disappears for hours, then re-emerges with a look of dark conviction, before returning home.
■ If you seek to intervene, the skeletal women capsize your both then look to embrace and kiss you, also dragging you into water. The kiss allows you to breathe underwater, while your lips are locked — but steadily steals stamina. Your captor progressively decays back to bones, losing sentience, as you reach the bottom of the lake.
■ Here, you find dozens of skeletons and mismatched bones, webbed in wisps of familiar black water, along with rags of clothing — including shreds of a white shroud.
■ The waters hold no bodies, once Miang-Si leaves.
A-HUNTING WE WILL GO
Village elder Kuthuba urges the crafty and the brave to a forest incursion after several lumberjacks are a week late returning. He fears the men lost. The village’s numerous piers, pillars and boats depend on timber, and Kuthuba seeks to retrieve both wood and any prospective casualties.
- ■ Two dozen people leave at dawns with daggers, bows, arrows. Some say they previously entered the forests before being driven out by vicious animals, but are not keen to speak further. The grounds are inhabited by woodland creatures, but eerily silent. Predators are scarce, thin and terrorised.
■ A thick mist drenches the forest, deepening until you struggle to see past 3 metres ahead, or to spot the waning sun in a grey sky. Network devices do not work, and torches are essential. You feel increasingly paranoid and hunted, distrusting your companions.
■ If lost in the woods, villagers say to set your dagger on hard ground and spin it. If the blade lands on you or your companion, wet it with your/their blood, until it no longer does so. If it points in a proper direction, head there. If it starts to cackle, bury it in dirt or flee — it has caught a taste for blood and will now seek out your throat.
■ The forests brim with diffuse whispers, women’s laughter, shrill growling and heavy steps — until amorphous many-bladed beasts descend from trees or burrow in soft ground. Aim between their carapace plates and run. Happily, rivulets abound and the creatures fear running water.
■ Deep in the forest, you find the resplendent vegetation thins into a small barren clearing where nothing grows. Here, even the earth has cracked, showing signs of black mould spores, while animals and birds avoid the region. You discover the belonging of the lumberjacks, but no bodies, along with a few scattered diary pages.
■ Take the belongings back to the lumberjacks’ families. The hunting party returns with sundown — only to realise three days have passed in Yancai.
NOTES
- ■ Feel free to investigate other regions of Yancai!
■ NPCs for this event!
■ QUESTIONS.
THE CASKETS
In a dark, cramped space, set at sea with only your partner’s breathing to break the stillness, you feel an increasing constriction. Panicked, you bloody your fingers as you scratch ruinously to remove the chain-bound lid of your casket and flee — only to fail.
Your ship turns, rattles and quakes on violent waves. You suspect that the wood of your vessel, so strained when you touch, will splinter and give. Within fifteen minutes, the stench of damp, mould and plaster suppurates your lungs, and you no longer hear birds or waves crashing outside, but the gentle lulling of water everywhere.
Then, all at once, your casket-vessel turns and tumbles, you hear waters roaring, your ship repeatedly hits stone —
And you are suddenly on hard, rock ground, dust and debris wafting around you. You have been stranded — together with your companion — at the lip of a shallow cave. You look out behind you, only to see... pitch darkness. Here, you breathe perfectly — but step outside of the cave's confines, and you find yourself drowning in the depths, underwater.
Corpses have come ashore beside you, also bereft of their caskets. A string of hooded women kneels by the bodies, inflicting sorcery that reduces them to bones. Distantly, the Man in Black speaks to one such witch — perhaps, one of the fabled ladies of the lake — in soft whispers.
The death-touch feel revulsed in this space, an invasive magic settling on their skin like an unwanted touch, without ever quite latching.
Before you can collect your bearings, a woman comes close to inspect your body, before gasping —
"These ones are alive."
NOTES:
■ Tag here, kicking off a three-way IC thread that must finish by 20 June. This scenario is only available to paired characters. You don't have to have signed up for it to play it out.
■ You should aim to share findings with the group after.
■ You can still sign up until the end of 9 June for a RNG draw to meet the Man in Black. Otherwise, your characters will be interacting with the ladies of the lake.
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The smells don't really register, but the shaking and whirling is uncomfortable for a moment, until the whole thing crashes and they're outside the coffin once again.]
... Are we still underwater?
[Ah but of course, they're not alone, and as soon as someone discovers them and starts talking about them being alive, Xie Lian gives a glance to Hua Cheng. Will they be able to tell.]
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two things occur to him at once, though: the first, that there's something very, very wrong here, and it crawls over his skin like rot, like unwanted hands. it reminds him of being held in jun wu's grip when he'd been a simple, weak little ghost fire. he'd hated that, hated him, hated, hated, hated. and the second thing, perhaps more importantly, that impertinent ghost. the one who'd dared to try to haunt him.
there's a noise in his throat, barely audible, very close to a growl. he has to swallow it down to keep his husband from hearing, instead rising to shield him, possessive and protective. he dusts his scarlet clothing off as he does so, then offers a hand down to the other man to help him up. ]
Sorry for showing up unannounced, auntie.. You didn't give us much choice.
congrats, you are Man in Black'd
( The auntie seems sufficiently ill at ease with the revelation that they have netted in living beings to gasp, one hand instinctively rushing over her mouth, then to gather the root of her hood in hand and stretch it to shield her face. She fumbles back, ill at ease, while the other women spook and startle, a riotous stirring sparking off, as some of the hooded silhouettes look to flee —
Before the Man in Black steps forward, voice thunderous enough to resonate dark and long across the cavern's hollows. )
Sit down. Yer barking up a cut-down tree. ( This, for all no one seems to understand why at a first glance, he addresses to the man in red. The young'un, the frailer. The one who reeks.
The Man in Black waves the nearest woman close, calling, without ever peeling his gaze off the unlikely pair: )
Get'em water. ( And before the duo can object: ) You'll need it. Is the salt. ( Sea water, infiltrating wood, air. Their surroundings whole. )
You're underwater, yet. And not from these parts, are you, uncle's nephews?
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But then he is strangely hospitable and... Xie Lian is wary. He's never been one to shun ghosts or mistrust them on sight, but accepting anything from an unknown ghost in his own lair seems... unwise.]
We'll be fine, I'm sure. The ride was only a little bumpy, and we're not even that wet, are we?
We're ... from far away. Just passing by. Are you the ones emptying the coffins and sending them back afterwards?
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Are we going to dry out? Like a preserved corpse. [ the salt. the water.
he's silent after, though, content to let his highness take the lead. only his eyes, dark and focused, remain fixed on the ghost. ]
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...eh?
( But he's laughing from the corner of his mouth, with or at them, or merely in that quiet, liminal state that tolerates both possibilities. Up close, the Man in Black seems broad, strong, a manifestation of proper physicality — lacking the cold wisps of smoke that so often accompany him during his hauntings.
A man, proper. No lich king. )
You'll be fine. Maybe thirsty. ( The next grin's a deep thing, callous. Brimming sharp teeth. ) Don't think I'd hurt you, do you?
( Let that question linger, as he turns his eye on Xie Lian, nodding aside — ) What are we emptying the coffins of? You see anything here?
( Why, take a gander: the hooded women seem to be operating near perfectly emptied coffins already, as if the dead never were. What shocking display of efficiency. )
Nothing to see here, nephews. You'll remember that?
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Xie Lian smiles, very sweetly.]
Well, your friends here turned them to bones, but they were still there before. So yes, I would say I have seen some things that I would very much like an explanation to, Uncle.
You were at the burials at sea, too. Surveying the work to come, I assume?
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A man's got to keep an eye out, hasn't he? For all that's wretched, coming right his way.
( More of the same: amusement, tame, reined in. His unnatural, ghastly interest. How he preens and seems to stare, measuring the men before him in an even, weighted glance.
Wanting to eat them alive. )
Little nephew... what am I doing with you? Can't be letting you walk as you are. And you... ( A nod, to the other, in red. ) You're one of mine. And you're for the red bitch, aren't you, second nephew. Come to us, have you? Pay your respects?
( Here, finally, a thorough grin: ) What'd you bring your uncle?
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The more things go on, the more he is taken with the desire to just punch this smug ghost square in the face, but they're here for answers, first.]
We didn't know we'd be coming here, so shamefully, we are empty-handed.
And you still haven't told us what you're doing with the bodies, Uncle. Or what happens to the coffins that don't make it back.
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They're safely kept away, little nephew. So there's no troubling them with rising later, when the waters surge. Just a nice, long sleep.
( This, somehow still smiling, an age and darkness to him, as if he rots despite his clean and untarnished aspect. As if he is withered and strange and close, so very close to ripping heads off.
His hands stay light and ungripping. )
Now, you get on, boy. Back to your little world without problems. And you thank me for it, aye?
no subject
Wait... You're saying... What you're doing here will prevent them from being called by the undead? They won't rise even if called?
Then... when the coffins don't come back, that means... that means they got taken.
[It does make sense, in a horrifying sort of way.]
... Uncle, how long have you all been doing this?
[Does this question even matter at all, given the way time seems to like jumping back and forth here? But this 'man', for lack of a better word, definitely doesn't feel like a normal human anymore, but also different from just a ghost.]
no subject
Smart little nephew, aren't you? Like a pretty little bird.
( But there's no more humour to the elder man, and his magic seems turbulent now, his shape transiting in and out of translucence — as if some part of him has been agitated or startled, and he can no longer control his magic as closely.
As if he's nearly prone to disappear. )
Still got some song in you. Must have been... couple of years now. Three? Five? Time passes differently when you're... ( Click of his tongue shrill, then he passes two fingers by his own throat to signal, ah yes. Dead. )
But we look after'em. Keep them safe and sleeping. And none of that other nonsense. Now... how about you go back up, before I have to make sure you join them?
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There was no out to the cramped space they're in and he can hear waves crashing, at first. They were definitely still on the water. Of course, the crashing waves die out.
Crashing upon the shore was not something that he'd expected but he hears the woman who comes to inspect their bodies stating they were alive. Just as she says it he looks over at Wen Qing beside him, wanting to be sure that she was alright. ]
Are you alright?
[ They'd have to find out where they were in a moment. ]
no subject
So this is a new experience entirely, one that isn't entirely pleasant, more tossing and turning than she preferred, especially with a constitution poorly given to the harshness of water. She's grateful that they crash on the land eventually, even if the pervasive feeling of wrong surrounds them.
She sits up carefully, breathing shallowly, but nods in response to Xie Yun's question. It takes her a few moments to find her voice, and then she speaks slowly, deliberately. ]
Do you know where we are?
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You're under the sea.
( Hisses the woman, somehow ignored, for all she would presume to point out, they are in her territory, hers and that of her sisters. She pulls back, careful not to intrude in their space, not to touch them — as if some part of their presence is infectious, disgusting, resoundingly unwanted.
Both of them, here. Alive. She seems, at least to have the dregs left of her senses to not draw attention to her qualms, holding out wretched silence. The Man in Black and her sisters do not yet take notice. )
You need to go back. Now.
( Before they make you of the dead seems entirely superfluous, after a point. )
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He gives the woman a soft smile when she mentions that they needed to go back and now. ]
We'll go once we find out what is going on here.
[ He pauses briefly to look at the woman before him, keeping himself close to Wen Qing. If anyone tries to make them dead then he will fight. ]
Are you the ones making the casket ships go missing? Keeping the dead from going to their rightful rest.
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Good mistress, these people. Why are their bodies disturbed? Do they not cross the bridge to the afterlife? [ What need is there to break their cycle, to keep their bodies? She looks back to the man in black, and remembers the funerals, the hauntings in years future. ]
You have sensed us, but the others haven’t yet.
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You quiet. ( She hisses at the boy, startled by his audacity, the seeming foolishness that prioritizes his wants and whimsy over the danger at hand. A sea of her sister, and a greater one of waters beyond, and he talks as if he has nothing to fear. ) Or they kill you.
( They have done it before stays unspoken between them. She seems, for a moment, to think of how to manage the matter, distress contorting her face. In the end, she settles on a loud proclamation: )
These ones! They have pox sickness. The limbs are falling off. I take them in the back.
( She's greeted with a groan of disgust and a call from the back that, yes, keeping the sick and decayed corpses from the fresh ones is wise. Turning to the pair, she waves them to enter the casket-ship again and pretend death, while she drags the vessel's chains like a leash to lead with. At least in the back of the caverns, they won't be seen. )
Quickly.
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Those eyes narrow slightly before he looks at Wen Qing before giving a bit of a nod. They could play the part, pretend death. But they would not leave without their answers.
Once they're toward the back of the caverns, unseen, he helps Wen Qing back up before looking toward the woman that had gotten them away from the others. After all, they'd had questions that needed answers. ]
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She studies the woman, gaze cautious. ] Why are you helping us?
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( Alone, still a woman and bereft assistance, she takes her time dragging the casket once the pair plays pretend and they may pass by her sisters without minding.
Once they're delivered in the back, she allows them both to exit, keeping a watchful eye on the other hooded women, who seem distracted by their work.
Then comes the question: )
I do not kill. ( This, not without an element of disgust, as if the very proposition horrifies her. ) You must leave. He does not like intruders. He's skinned some. Calls them rats.
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He does, however, give her a slight bow before raising and looking toward her. ]
We will leave. Though can you answer Lady Wen's question? Why the ones that come in the casket are not heading to the afterlife. Why they are disappearing and not being laid to rest.
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[ She thinks of her brother, of her own death, of the others who followed her to death. None of them will rest peacefully. ]
You are kind. Can you explain to us why he skins them? Who is he to the village?
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( This much seems to anger her, a light hiss breaking her mouth, as she turns towards Wen Qing. ) What do you mean? They rest peacefully. That is the point. What nonsense! They do not rest peacefully? You show me how. Where do they not rest? Who is not resting? You show me now, one. At least one! Come, show me!
( Here, she taps her foot once, seemingly impatient — before noise far too close draws her eyes, and she tempers her voice. No, these idiots can't be found. It will be worse, then — for them, and now for her, who safely kept them. )
Why do you mean why he skins intruders? Isn't it plain? He doesn't like to be found. Or the work found. It makes sense.
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it's okay!
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