TDM #5 - Paradesium

[pumpkinhollow]

Pumpkin Hollow Gazette March Issue

[Find our plain text version here!]

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!

Comments

[yournewsidekick]

Nimona squints at him, like she's trying to peer through any potential VEIL OF LIES Edgar might be offering up. But... nah, he actually does look okay. Ish. It's more like that time he almost died of flavor overload from a slice of pizza than any actual, y'know, dying dying.

She nods, satisfied, and headbutts him in the face. (Gently.)

"I can always bite you if you need distracting," she offers, oh-so-generous.

[maximumcake]

Max suddenly bites down on his lip. Hard. Don't crack a sex joke. Don't crack a sex joke. Keep it together, Max. Don't say something weird in front of Nimona. Focus on helping Edgar. That's what's important.

"Weird, right?" Max says tentatively, leaning close to Edgar's ear. "When something just feels so... familiar. And you can't decide if that's good or bad?"

[hate_gettin_older]

Nimona's offer makes him huff once, silently, with what might be laughter. He digs his fingers into her fur again, scritching behind her ears.

"Yeah," he says at once, with -- relief? Something like relief in his voice, at having the feeling identified. "'S like that. Like my brain's trying to be in two places at once, or something. Two times at once."

[yournewsidekick]

"Okay, but this place and time is obviously way cooler because me and Max are here," says Nimona smugly.

(It sounds a bit muffled; her purring redoubled when Edgar started scritching her ears.)

[maximumcake]

"She does have a point," Max says, nudging Edgar with his shoulder. "But... it's okay to miss some things about before. You know? Even I do sometimes."

[hate_gettin_older]

"Yeah," and the word comes out on a long, slightly shaky sigh, directed to both of them. "Just ..."

He leans into Max, holds Nimona close to his chest, blinks against the dazzle of sunlight going by outside the windows. It's so green out there; it's so warm in here. Those both feel impossible.

"Just hang on to me? For a bit?"

[yournewsidekick]

"'Course."

Outwardly, Nimona doesn't appear to change, but as she leans against Edgar's chest, she feels heavier than she did a second ago. Like a weighted blanket settling over him, or the best hug she can manage when she still doesn't want to be human.

[maximumcake]

Max swings an arm up around the back of Edgar's shoulder and tucks him in closer. "I could always offer to bite you too~" He had to. He couldn't hold it in anymore.

[hate_gettin_older]

Edgar sputters laughter, making even the heavier Nimona bob up and down a little as his chest moves. And if the laughter's a little shakier than it would ordinarily be, who's to notice?

"Not in front of the kid, you menace," he says with the utmost fondness, and bumps his head lightly against Max's.

[yournewsidekick]

Overlapping Edgar slightly, Nimona declares: "Gross."

(She's smirking, though. Ed and Maaa-aaax, sittin' in a tree~)

"Plus, I thought I was the menace around here," she adds, batting Edgar's nose lightly with her paw.

[maximumcake]

Max laughs along with him. Nimona's comment only makes him laugh more.

"You know she's older than both of us, right? Then again... she did also think I was a serial killer so maybe age isn't everything."

[hate_gettin_older]

Edgar tweaks one of Nimona's ears, gently. "No, no," he tells her, "you're the maniac. Very different."

And then, glancing up at Max, eyes widening -- "Are you fuckin serious?" (Whether that's about Nimona being older than them or thinking Max was a serial killer, he's not even sure himself."

[yournewsidekick]

"Okay, look," protests Nimona, as she slaps both paws down on Edgar's shoulders, "if you walked into a room and saw a ton of pictures on the wall with so many strings coming off one of them, wouldn't you think 'oh, yeah, obviously a murder wall,' too?! Come on!"

She gives her tail an airy flick before settling back in place.

Casual, "And yeah, no offense, but humans suck at guessing ages. Least you're not as bad as Ballister was."

Clearly this has nothing to do with Nimona spending ninety-nine percent of her human time as an apparent teenager. Clearly.

[maximumcake]

"No! I'd think that's weird and I'd ask whoever's room it is what is up with that??" Who just has a murder wall? That's not normal.

"I don't even try to guess anymore. I've lived with too many vampires to assume anything."

[hate_gettin_older]

"So wait," and Edgar's halfway back to laughter by now, "who's got a wall with pictures and strings and shite? And how old are you?"

(Somehow, without him noticing, the overwhelming feeling of being on a train again has subsided into a quiet acceptance in the back of his mind: this is how things should feel, the sway and rumble, the vibration underfoot and all around. He's home, and he's close to people who he cares about, who care about him.)

[yournewsidekick]

"You need to get cooler friends," says Nimona to Max, primly. "Good thing we're here."

And to Edgar: "It was Nepeta -- you ever meet her? Half troll, half cat? She was pretty great." Wistful. "Anyway yeah turns out the murder wall was really, uh... how'd you put it, Max? A looooove wall?"

Her grin's turned downright devilish.

"Oh yeah and I'm like a thousand-something," she finishes in the most offhand voice possible.

[maximumcake]

"Yeah, I said it was a love wall because I didn't know how old you were yet. Your friend was literally keeping track of all the people I slept with. I'm not sure that's cool. That's kind of creepy, actually." Yeah. Now that he really thinks about it, what the fuck?? It's not like any of it was a secret but who does that?

[hate_gettin_older]

"A thousand something, huh?" He's grinning. "Wouldn't have guessed you for a day over seven hundred."

He glances up at Max on that last, caught by his tone as much as his words.

[yournewsidekick]

"Aw, thank you," chirps Nimona, pressing a paw to her chest as she bats her eyelashes at Edgar.

She drops the act pretty quick, though, as she turns a circle in Edgar's lap so she can give Max her full attention. "Okay, in Nepeta's defense, I bet wasn't just sex. It was probably all sorts of romance stuff. Trolls have, like, a bajillion different things that count as romance." A pause. "Ooooor just four things, whatever, anyway -- she was probably also tracking really tight friendships, mortal enemies, this three-party relationship where one person's gotta stop the other two from killing each other..." She shrugs. "I'd need a gigantic love wall too if I was into that stuff. And it wasn't just you! It was everybody on the ship!"

That... probably does not make it better, Nimona.

[maximumcake]

"...I mean... I guess that's a little less weird. But, still, kind of weird to make an entire wall out of it for everyone? Was she... I don't know... did she like someone and was trying to figure out if it was safe to tell them?" That's the only motivation he can think of that makes any sense.

[hate_gettin_older]

"Maybe she just thought it was fun?"

He pauses, and looks down at the Nimona-cat. "So wait, did she have me on that wall?"

[yournewsidekick]

"Yup. You were one of the strings coming off Max."

Which explains why she started screaming WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME YOU HAD A BOYFRIEND during the potluck!

She starts grooming a paw, flexing her claws to get between the toe pads.

[maximumcake]

Oh, wow, look, it's time for a topic change screams Max inside his own skull. They do not need to get into those dynamics here and now. He's not about to be the first person to explain friends with benefits to her if she doesn't know.

"Hey, Nimona, did you know I can actually turn into a wolf?"

[hate_gettin_older]

Unfortunately Max's attempt to change the subject may get lost under Edgar's voice, rising in disbelieving indignation.

"Wait, hold up -- you mean you thought he murdered me?"

[yournewsidekick]

Nimona pauses, claws still flexed, and says completely straight-faced:

"Well, you obviously got better."