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TDM #5 - Paradesium

Pumpkin Hollow Gazette March Issue

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Pumpkin Hollow Gazette

3/8/24 | TDM #5 - Paradesium
Content Warnings: individual CWs found per prompt in "Further Details"
Forecast: Partly cloudy with a chance of rain

WELCOME TO PUMPKIN HOLLOW!

By Yorick Aberdeen

Apparently the ferryman needed a bigger boat!

ACROSS TOWN - Since June of 16:53, a steady stream of new arrivals to our sleepy little town has flowed in by ferry, emerging from the fog. And it seems this trend is due to continue, as this March is due to be on record the highest number of new residents in a single month!

We are incredibly grateful for all of you coming to our home and filling it with life once more, even though the dangers of our local curse have significantly increased since all of you began arriving. This reporter isn’t complaining--- additional harm to my own person notwithstanding!

If you are a new arrival, please report to Town Hall at your leisure so that we can help you find work and permanent lodging. Or don’t! The Oak & Iron is happy to rent you a room for as long as you need. Best of luck to all of you, and as we say in Pumpkin Hollow, may your lanterns always be lit!

CHARITY DRIVE ENCOURAGES CULTURAL EXCHANGE

By Cecil Gershwin Palmer

One of the charming toys created during last year's Doll Picnic.

FESTIVAL GREEN - Preparations are underway for the upcoming annual Doll Picnic. A charity event sponsored by the Artisan’s Guild, this picnic is an Anwyllic tradition that was brought to the island and continued with love. The first Doll Picnic was organized by Dame Meredith Idlewild of the town of Glyn Rhuthun on Kora’s Haven, with the toys being donated to the local children’s hospital after a massive landslide engulfed a local school.

The Artisan’s Guild has baskets of material available for making dolls, including fabric, yarn, stuffing, buttons, and the like. However, tradition states that sourcing materials from the natural world (for example, acorn husks to use as buttons or deadwood to carve for doll arms and legs) results in the toys being blessed by Serrenai, who will watch over the children who play with them. The toys will be donated to local children after the picnic, including those who are ill or whose families can only afford necessities.

Newcomers are explicitly invited to join in the making of toys, and the resulting picnic. As a personal note: the locals have never heard of a teddy bear before. This reporter expects to see several, as we introduce our traditions to their traditions.

PLANTING SEASON BEGINS!

By Yorick Aberdeen

After a difficult winter, the appearance of spring's sprouts lifts our spirits.

NORTHWEST HOLLOW - The spring thaw is in full swing! That means it’s time for our local farmers to begin planting. Town Hall is offering a small reward to any of our newest arrivals who would be interested in assisting with planting season for farms less than a year old.

Anyone fresh off the boat interested in making 100 Brass should seek out Eddie and Angel Kasbrak, Arthur Morgan, Cèsar Salazar, Mairi Miann, Ylva Wolfsdottir, or Muriel and offer assistance with tilling and planting. We look forward to rewarding you for your contributions!

HOT SPRINGS OPEN FOR RELAXATION

By Yorick Aberdeen

Photograph provided by the Safety Board!

CRANE'S RIDGE - After a recent earthquake opened up a hot spring on the lower portion of Crane’s Ridge, a small portion of the Pumpkin Hollow Damage Claims Assessment Corps has been working to get the area cleaned up and safe for use by the general public.

Following its recent approval for compliance by the Safety Board, we are pleased to announce that Porter’s Spring is now available for public enjoyment! It can be accessed by taking the train to the North Station or by following the central trail out of Northwest Hollow, though the Safety Board does not recommend making this journey on foot due to its proximity to Lake Sal-Co-Penn. Enjoy!

STRANGE CAVERNS DISCOVERED BENEATH CRANE’S RIDGE

By Yorick Aberdeen

A small glimpse into this world beneath our own.

CRANE RIDGE - In addition to the hot springs, the earthquake can also be credited for a major cave-in in our Crane’s Ridge mines. A large tunnel was completely buried in rubble by the inexplicable natural occurrence. For the past several months, our mining team has been chipping away at the cave-in to try and regain access to the blocked tunnels in the lower area of the mountain.

In one of these tunnels, however, the team discovered a shocking surprise as the rubble was removed! Apparently, just beyond the mine walls, there has been an entrance to Hepogaia--- a subterranean nation running below our own fair country and many others. It seems that this particular portion of Hepogaian territory is also trapped within the barrier. Brief attempts at scouting by the Safety Board have noted a plethora of subterranean wildlife, both familiar and unfamiliar. This incredible new environment, hiding just out of sight beneath our island, is so full of wonder and splendor that it has earned a fitting name--- “Paradesium.”

A recent ecology study and expedition run by Pumpkin Hollow’s own Dr. Elias Coldwood has redirected their efforts to this new location, but those interested in exploring and scouting out this fantastical new discovery independently are encouraged to pack thoughtfully and travel in groups of two or more! Any information obtained during excursions into Paradesium would be appreciated by the Pumpkin Hollow Board of Safety.

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Further Details...

Charity Drive

The Doll Picnic Charity Drive will run throughout the next two months during our TDM, and there will be an event later on involving posing the dolls for a picnic. Once a photo is taken, the children will be allowed to come picnic with their new toys and take them home after!

There is absolutely no way this could possibly go wrong. Absolutely no dollmakers will be jumpscared or attacked by possessed dolls. None at all. (Okay, maybe some of them. But it’s fine. It’s for a good cause.)

[Mod Note: you can just make a doll without it coming to life and trying to kick your ass, that part is optional. Also the dolls will be blessed at the picnic and rendered unable to attack children.]

Planting Season

Any brand-new characters will get 100B extra on their stipend if they submit an AC-length thread with one of the existing farmers on their first Activity Check! This will be available regardless of whether the character qualifies for normal bonuses, but can only be redeemed by those who app in.

For reference for new players, threads are considered AC-length if they are ten tags in length (meaning 5 of your own tags and 5 from your partner.)

Hot Springs

Porter’s Spring is a perfectly normal and safe hot spring! However, you can encounter any number of perils on your way there if you decide to travel on foot, allowing new players to revisit some of our earlier events.

Check out our bestiary (pending update to new format) for more information on creatures such as Brutoks, the River Walker, and the Pine Devil, or stumble on Lake Sal-Co-Penn for a nasty surprise! Brutoks may also steal personal items from spring-goers on occasion. Don’t chase after them alone unless you want to be turned into a tree!

The Tristitia

In addition to the creatures in the wild, in town after dark characters may also encounter the Tristitia, Pumpkin Hollow’s newest cryptid.

She is a wraith-like spirit which haunts the island. Wearing tattered black clothes and colored all in shades of gray, she appears as a woman who walks around weeping with a caved-in chest, covering her face with her hands. Harmless if given a wide berth, but if she is set off, she will take out her desire for empathy for her grief on her target. She does this by embracing them and drawing out their own grief and trauma, leaving the target catatonic before she fades away, temporarily assuaged.

Into Paradesium

Crystals, golden with light and raw magical energy, cast what looks like sunlight down into the cascading cave. For every foot lower that the ground curls down from the entrance, the trees stretch ever-higher, carrying the raucous cries of animals unlike the surface of Marrow Isle had ever heard.

A jungle, so lush with life, sprawls ahead of any brave enough to venture into it. But what is there to see?

For Paradesium specifically, the bestiary has received a significant update. Creatures featured in prompts have their links to the accounts by Dr. Coldwood and his team marked with stars for easy location.

Below are multiple prompts for some encounters to be had in the jungle, but feel free to create any of your own encounters with any of the creatures listed! If the descriptions are short, feel free to write the creatures' behaviors however makes sense.

Welcome to the Jungle

Swallowed by dense canopies and noise, the jungle is quick to swallow any who travel within it whole.

Eyes are quick to find you, however. Perching in the treetops are a variety of small wyverns in vibrant colors, heads tilting as they try to comprehend what you could be. They squawk, chatter, and some of the bolder ones draw closer - if you sit anything aside and leave it unattended for too long, some even bolder than that will pilfer it, taking the object into the trees to admire with its companions.

Reptilian hunters with bright, keen eyes, the Plommon, consider you with much of the same interest. This interest increases tenfold if you happen to feed them.

If the prying eyes are no bother, then the forest's bounty is ripe for tending and taking. Bananas hang off trees, colorful citrus fruits catch light on their waxy peels, and bulky cocoa beans are jostled by movement in the branches above them. Even the broad leaves of the plants prove extraordinarily useful, whether you're looking to come in and quickly leave, or intend to push further within.

Wherever you go, those curious eyes follow you. Perhaps even out of the cave, should your attempts to shoo an adventurous creature away. What an odd way to gain a new team member.

Down a Few Notches on the Food Chain

(CWs: Potential for death, gore, or animal death)

Unfortunately, not all can be pure bounty and new friends in a place like this.

With the cavern sprawling widely and massively, there are many significantly larger creatures in this space, and some seem to be keen to take up opportunity for new prey. As you explore, there's a new feeling of eyes upon you, and the silence that overtakes the surrounding trees spells nothing good to come.

Any one of the massive predators in the wood has you in it's sights.

Escape is difficult, but manageable, as is fighting back. Creatures can be challenged, and hides, bones, and other spoils can be claimed from them, should there be success! If not, this is a good opportunity for familiarization with the Death page.

The silkhide chimera specializes in persistence. The longer and further you go, the more exhausted you'll get. A break is an opportunity that it will be keen to take.

The greenstalker excels at ambushing and high-speed pursuit. At top speeds of 30MPH, your party will need strategy and skill on their side to keep this beast at bay. (Or, alternatively, a source of fire.)

The elephant raptor does neither of these - the beast's sheer length of reach does all it needs to. Water and mud soften the sounds of the gargantuan creature's approach. Stay alert, and be sure that you hear it before it's upon you.

Safe travels become more difficult to manage, the further in you go. Deep, rumbling snores tell you that there's a chance you're just getting to the greater threats this paradise has to offer...

Fragments of the Past

Through great distances traveled, this "uninhabited" cavern begins to show signs that may speak to that not having always been the case.

Ruins of homes, crumbled bricks and tiles, can be found at the deepest reaches of the cavern. These dilapidated buildings, though worn with time, tell a story: the people who left his place, one that could be identified as a stenholm to any familiar with dwarvish culture, did not leave it on good terms.

Essentials were clearly taken with them, as the ruins of this place lack tools or clothing. Valuables are still scattered throughout, however. Large objects with too much history to have been left behind by indifference dot the collapsing homes. Ritual circles still waft radiant energy from them.

In the remains of a temple, an altar stands, cracking with age and covered in plants as the cavern reclaims it. Old candle-stands have rusted with age, but still stand, undisturbed.

Just before the altar, folded onto its side (as best as one can be, when only pieces remain), lies a skeleton. The clothes are tattered remains of stained whites and dulled blues, and the wildlife have cleaned flesh from bones, but it's remained undisturbed by time.

There's a quiet sadness to this place that lingers, even with the people who inhabited it so long since lost.

Should you linger too long, however, there comes the distinct feeling of not being alone.

Clair de Lune

(CWs: Long-term isolation, extinction)

Golden eyes of a human face follow your every moment, and the moment you lock your gaze onto them, the face emerges from the darkness, partially covered by spilling dark hair.

What follows this face, however, is not a human face - but, rather, a feline body with sprawling, grey-flecked wings.

There's a long, tense silence, as it emerges fully. Standing easily at eight feet tall while on all fours, the size of this creature becomes more and more apparent as it emerges from the dark of the collapsed wind.

Unlike the other animals of the cavern, though, there seems to be an anxiousness to its look. The lion's chest rises and falls with short, nervous breaths.

And then, in a hushed, woman's voice, hoarse from disuse, it speaks.

"Who are you? Why have you come here?"

-------------------

The Sphinx is a new NPC available for characters to interact with, should they delve deep enough into the caverns to find the stenholm. She's wary of all the new faces, and tends to be somewhat flighty, but seems cautiously interested in what new humans being in Hepogaia have to offer. For the sort looking to understand this place, it's people, or intend to trade, she can be communed with.

To interact with her, comment on the TL provided from beastsofthehollow with her icon, and if the initial introduction isn't your speed, feel free to encounter her however you like!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Erik contemplates keeping his silence, but it only grows more awkward as he tries and fails to mask his anxiety. Since when has he been so expressive? He's annoyed with himself for not being able to hide it better. Maybe talking would help. Any distraction.

He turns to Edgar. "Have you taken this journey to the spring before?"

"Uh -- yeah, couple times. You?"

Is there something vaguely familiar about that voice, that face? Distantly so, vanishing when he tries to bring it into focus.

"This will be my first visit." His fingers dance in front of him again until he decides to stuff them in his trouser pockets.

"I don't much care for trains, but I'm told it's the simplest route."

Edited 2024-03-17 15:37 (UTC)

The anxious fidgeting somehow makes the sense of familiarity recede even further, as though whatever he's being reminded of doesn't fit with what he's seeing in front of him, like mismatched puzzle pieces. Edgar shrugs, and returns his attention to watching the tracks where the train should appear soon, with a little divided for the unraveling string in his fingers.

After a moment, he offers a bit awkwardly: "'S not so bad, the ride. And the spring's worth it."

Erik's expression warms. "I'd forgotten what a luxury hot pools of water truly are."

He turns to regard Edgar fully, and then the string he's unraveling. "What is that for?"

"Right? Nothing like it."

He follows the stranger's glance down to the string, and looks back up. "This? Nothing really, just -- found a scrap and thought I'd see if I can make anything out of it. String's easiest, never know when you might need some."

He nods, making a noise of agreement. He'll never take modern conveniences for granted again. If he lives here long enough, surely they will be reinvented. Surely.

"String. That's clever of you. You inspire me to be more mindful of resources." Another thing he's taken for granted.

His attention shifts suddenly to the tracks. The train is still too far away for Edgar to hear it yet, but Erik can. "Our train will arrive soon. You wouldn't mind talking with me a little on the ride up, would you? The last journey I took on this train was terribly unpleasant."

Front, he thinks, for once with more amusement than bitterness and with only a little cheerful contempt. Nobody from the Tail would ever need inspiring to be more mindful of resources.

The request takes him a little by surprise -- both that the man would make it of a stranger, and that someone Front would ask rather than assuming he was there for their convenience. It's the combination that makes him say "Sure, guess that'd be all right," without hesitating.

"That's very kind of you."

Just as foretold, the train is now rumbling into human earshot, and then into view. It comes to a hissing stop at the station and the whistle toots once to signal that they should board. Erik keeps up the conversation as he steps over the threshold, so he won't hesitate.

"I suppose if we may both be soaking in the same pool, it does make sense to get a little friendlier. Oh, but that's not a proposition unless you'd like it to be. I'm the town whore, you see, but I'm not working at the moment."

Edgar chokes slightly, stumbling over the threshold in his startlement. By the time he's recovered enough to start talking again and find a seat, the train's started up again.

"The town whore," he repeats, "like ... professionally?"

And he blinks, as a secondary thought occurs to him. "Just you?"

"Yes." His eyes sparkle with amusement. "Professionally. And, yes, for the time being I am doing the majority of the work. A sad state of affairs for women who do not enjoy men and for men who do not enjoy men, but there is no helping that."

"Oh, course," he says innocently, and if there's amusement glinting in his own eyes too, who's to say why. "But, you know, just seems like a lot of work for just one person to handle."

"I would be too busy for trips to the spring if every single person in this town availed themselves of my services, but my clientele list is not quite that impressive yet." But a man can dream, can't he?

"That said, it does work to my benefit that I have vastly superior stamina compared to my human counterparts. I can keep it up for a very long time."

"Definitely sounds like an advantage, yeah."

Edgar is not snickering, but it's a near thing. And despite the mannered phrasing and slightly stuffy accent, he's finding himself kind of liking this man; something about him -- maybe it's the cheerful shamelessness about sex, even -- is reminding Edgar of Max.

He's about to ask about that human mention, but the train rocks slightly on a turn and he glances out the window -- just in time to see the bright warm daylight vanish into blackness.

Erik enjoys when his playful banter gets a rise out of someone, so he's already grinning to himself noticing Edgar trying so hard to stifle that snicker.

But all the mirth drains from him the minute they enter the tunnel and everything goes dark. He's suddenly on his feet, back ramrod straight as he looks out the darkened window. For him, it's just as easy to see as in daylight, and so far all there is to see are the walls of a rough stone-hewn tunnel. But he's tense, waiting for it to change at any moment into another nightmare.

"Hey," says Edgar a touch hoarsely, and somehow he's on his feet too, balancing without thought or effort against the sway of the train. "'S just a tunnel."

(A fuckin long one, says Yona in his memory, bizarrely cheerful, and he shakes her voice away. She's not here, Curtis isn't here, the axe-wielding guards aren't here.)

He takes in a long breath just for the comfort of feeling his chest inflate. "Yes. Just a tunnel. Nothing to fear."

And yet they both seem to be having similar reactions here.

Suddenly, light floods through the windows, causing him to wince and turn his gaze away. Harsh transitions like these are always uncomfortable until he manages to adjust. He uses this as an excuse to take his seat again.

"I apologize for being so jumpy. I'm not usually so..." vulnerable "easily affected."

"Nothing to be sorry for," says Edgar, and means it.

And he's not going to ask what made going into the tunnel so alarming. Could be anything.

"Missed that my first trip up this way. Might've had my eyes closed."

"I take it that first trip was a difficult one?"

Erik wishes closing his eyes could be enough. He can still feel the air pressure shift, smell the subtle difference in the air. Yet none of it smells like rot or blood the way it had in the nightmare. That's enough to help calm him. It's just an ordinary train in an ordinary tunnel. That's all.

"Nah, not really," he says, and then without any change in tone, "kind of."

"Kind of?" The question is implied and yet... "Care to elaborate?"

"Wasn't really the first trip that was, uh, difficult." He doesn't exactly mime air quotes, but his pronunciation is close enough to Erik's to make it clear he's using his word.

"It's that ... I grew up on a train. Cause it was the only place on our world anything could live. Everything else froze over when I was a baby."

He's looking out the window rather than at his fellow passenger, like he doesn't want to take his eyes off the green world outside.

"First trip on this train was the first time I've been on one since."

"Really?" Erik is now giving Edgar his undivided attention, much of the fear gone from his expression to be replaced with curiosity. His reflection appears like a ghostly visage in the glass of the window. "An ice age? How horrible. It's hard to imagine all of life existing in so narrow a space." A pause. "Oh, excuse me, I don't mean to disparage your home when it was all you knew."

"Nah, it was shite," he says candidly, glancing at the man's reflection against the moving landscape. "Don't know what it was like up Front, but back in the Tail? We din't even have fuckin windows to see out. Couple thousand people in a big metal box. Headcounts and protein blocks twice a day, and whatever pieces of junk nobody from the Front wanted, that's what we got."

The bitterness, the rage; they're muted by distance and time, but not gone, never gone.

He inhales deeply and somehow manages to make that sound like disappointment. "I don't know why I'm surprised to learn that even at the end of all things there still manages to be a class system. I'm sorry. Believe it or not, I do understand the rage you feel. I wasn't always so"--he looks down at the fancy suit he's wearing--"well appointed."

Pumpkin Hollow Gazette

3/8/24 | TDM #5 - Paradesium Content Warnings: individual CWs found per prompt in "Further Details" Forecast: Partly cloudy with a chance of rain

WELCOME TO PUMPKIN HOLLOW!

CHARITY DRIVE ENCOURAGES CULTURAL EXCHANGE

PLANTING SEASON BEGINS!

HOT SPRINGS OPEN FOR RELAXATION

STRANGE CAVERNS DISCOVERED BENEATH CRANE’S RIDGE

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3/8/24 | TDM #5 - Paradesium
Content Warnings: individual CWs found per prompt in "Further Details"
Forecast: Partly cloudy with a chance of rain