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

[skeletonkeay]

"I dunno who Celia is, but I know what the Magnus Institute is, and I know what it was like when I was there. You're probably playing with a whole different set of rules, but I can't imagine it's any less of a hall of monsters anywhere else," Gerry prattles, angry and pacing like a caged tiger now. Agnes, his Lampent, dutifully follows him back and forth.

"I can think of three theories. None of which consist of me living a normal fucking life and Gertrude bloody Robinson being my actual grandma. Either I've been brainwashed and Gertrude is supervising me, I've been brainwashed and Gertrude is trying to protect me, or I'm in on it and lying through my teeth."

[huntingtruths]

"You remember?" Sorry Gerry that's kinda what he's latching on to at the moment. "What can you remember? When I was there they just had us do a bunch of tests and put me in a room with a bunch of other kids...I can't say I remember any monsters there."

He is sort of watching as Gerry paces, confused as to why he's angry until the taller man continues. No possibility huh? Brainwashed? Well it had felt a bit...odd...but Sam had just chalked it up to Gerry being a peppy sort of person and his grandmother not being keen on strangers. This put everything in a much darker light however, maybe even more sinister.

"I mean...unless you're a really good actor...I don't think you were lying. You were...completely different."

[skeletonkeay]

"It was a research institute, attempting to put a more scholarly spin on paranormal research. My version was, anyway. They'd take statements from people who claimed to have paranormal experiences, follow up on them, and attempt to prove or disprove them. Of course all of this was a cover-up. They knew exactly which incidents were real, because they were in on it." That's the best way Gerry knows to keep it brief for now. No sense imploding this guy's brain with excessive info all at once.

At the mention of being different, Gerry pauses and looks at Sam as if... almost like he's dreading the answer to his next question. "Different how?"

[huntingtruths]

"It was a research institute in my world too, well before the fire I mean. Now it's just a ruined building full of mul...ch..." Wait. It had been full of mulch. Hadn't he had a case that the person said there wasn't anything there? Huh, something he'd have to think about later. Shaking his head he instead tried to file away the fact that they dealt with creepy shit just like his work did does not go unnoticed. Something to mention to Alice later.

She's going to really get after him for bringing up the Institute after everything.

Oh well.

"Uh..." Sam sort of looks Gerry up and down a moment before half shrugging. "I mean you were a lot...peppier? Still looked the same from what I can tell, just a lot more jovial? I guess....?" Sorry Gerry.

[skeletonkeay]

Gerry pulls a face. "Peppy?" Ew. "That's even more suspicious. I've never been peppy a day in my goddamn shitstorm of a life. Happiest I've been is here."

[huntingtruths]

"Yeah....I'm kinda getting that." No offence. "So it was really that bad in your world...like...horrors and stuff? They were actually real?"

Shit. Did that mean all those cases that they categorized were real too? The needles guy...ink5oul? All of it?

[skeletonkeay]

"Oh yeah. Absolutely. May well be real for you, too. Hard to say unless you got context?" Spin your old pal Gerry an incident story, Sam.

[huntingtruths]

"Context? I mean...I can think of a couple cases off the top of my head." For all Alice was always telling him not to think about them, not to dwell on them, how could he not? He can't just push that stuff away like she does.

"Well, I mean there was one, it was an emergency call...some guy was...hugging someone....with needles? It was weird. He was so calm for the most part and he'd get really upset when the operator said something about not being afraid of needles. It was like...like he needed to be feared. Then there was the tattoo artist who gave a lady an insane tattoo...and then she started to...reshape herself. Literally...like used a palette knife to..." He motioned towards one of his own eyes, as if using the tool to dig into the eye socket or something.

"It was intense to listen to."

[skeletonkeay]

Listening to this, Gerry makes a series of strange faces. "I mean, a lot of that sounds familiar, yeah, but like... a little to the left, if you catch my drift. The palette knife definitely sounds like the Flesh, but needles doesn't line up with any of the Fears I know, even if you include the Extinction... I guess even then the Flesh is close enough, but needles seems like too niche a phobia..." Now he's just muttering to himself.

[huntingtruths]

"Fears? Sorry, don't think I follow." Because he knows of the idea as...you know...an idea not as a real thing like Gerry seems to be mentioning. Flesh? Extinction?

Honestly, Gerry is just getting a confused look right now because, yeah. He has no idea what's going on.

"There was one case where....pretty sure the guy just like....became a plant? He talked about roots growing into him and finding a good spot to plant himself? It was...unsettling."

[skeletonkeay]

"Mmm. That's--- also weird." Gerry rubs a hand over his face. "In my... version of the world, I guess, there were metaphysical manifestations of primal, universal fears. Like--- the Buried, that was claustrophobia and being trapped. The Dark, that's darkness and the unknown. Shit like that. But those don't--- they sound--- weird."

[huntingtruths]

"That sounds...limited." Frowning with a thoughtful look Sam can't help but try and think over all the cases he had heard. Compared to what Gerry said they were definitely more varied and not nearly as simple to categorize, even by their own standards at work.

"So same world but...different. Like just to the left. Alice is gonna have a field day hearing about this." And she'd probably give him a look if he ever thought about trying to look more into it.