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ph_memes2024-04-02 06:46 pm
TDM #5 - Paradesium [REPRINT]
[Find our plain text version here!] MOD NOTE: April's event for members will take place between April 12-25 and will impact the whole island. As such, any tags taking place here over that time will need to be back- or future-dated unless an alternative is discussed with a mod. Don't worry over the details of this too much--- time is soup, after all. Just something to be aware of. Thanks!
Pumpkin Hollow Gazette
4/2/24 | TDM #5 - Paradesium [REPRINT]
Content Warnings: individual CWs found per prompt in "Further Details"
Forecast: Very rainy! Chance of severe storms.
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 past March is 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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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?"
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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!
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Ruby snaps back to reality like an elastic band against its anchor-point, abrupt and startling. She scrunches her eyes shut, and shakes her head, and then looks at the guy talking to her with a gaze that's still not completely with it, but is, at least, actually seeing him.
"Oh, uh— no, no I don't mind. Go ahead."
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It takes effort, not letting herself drift back outside her own skin, but she holds the pieces of herself together and starts picking at her food again. It's lukewarm at best, now, and that means it's going to be a sensory nightmare, but... now money is a concern again, she can almost hear Yang's voice in her head reminding her not to waste food.
So she eats it anyway, even if she cringes a little.
She's quiet at first, too. But even though small talk and introductions in general are something she considers herself horrible at, she eventually offers up, "Uh. I'm— Ruby."
Usually she manages to get through entire conversations before even introducing herself, so this is an outlier.
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"Leon," he says, nodding in greeting. "Good to meet you. You a local, or did you get here on the ferry like I did?"
It's intentional, the way he offers up that information first. Maybe it'll make her feel like they've got something in common, if she's a new arrival like he assumes - or at least like this is a conversation and not an interrogation, like he knows can sometimes happen when people are just trying to make sure you're okay.
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"I came in on the ferry too, yeah. It's been... a few weeks, I guess?" Her sense of time is a little off, thanks to everything, but it must be thereabouts. "If you've heard about a bunch of people who were on a cruise ship before ending up here, well, I'm one of them, heh."
If he hasn't heard about that... well, she guesses she'll have to explain what is otherwise a pretty weird statement when you've not gotten used to all this universe hopping. This is technically her third time.
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"Yeah. Six and Ava told me a little about it. Condolences," he says. "You doing alright, after all that? I mean - feels weird to asking that to anyone that got here like we did, but..."
He trails off, shrugging. It's weird, but it's important, because the answer is almost definitely at least a 'not really'.
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"It was definitely rough, but... I made some good friends there that have made it here, so it's not all bad?"
Not all of them made it, of course. Maeve's gone. Eleanor's gone. Okie's gone. Maybe in the blurry mess of unclear memories that is the end of her time on the ship there was an outcome where some of them survived, but Ruby doesn't really have it in her to hope. Not after those few horrible days at home that ripped the tattered remains of her optimism from her body and set them alight for good measure.
"My last four years have all kind of been a lot, but that's..." she breathes out, "common enough in the kinds of people who end up in places like this, I-I've found."
Four years. For a girl who can't be more than 19.
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He considers offering to buy her a drink, as has become almost traditional for him with the rest of
Mortanne's angelsthe ferry arrivals at this point, but looking at her she can't be old enough for that, despite how tired she seems - and despite that comment about the past four years, holy shit."Places like this?" he asks, unsure of what exactly she means. He gets the feeling he's not gonna like the answer.
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"Places where people from different universes get pulled together. I don't think I've ever met anyone who came from a life that wasn't..." she struggles for a moment to find the right word, before settling on, "intense? We all had lives full of trouble and risk. Here probably more than even the ship, with the whole... dying thing."
Not that she died thanks to any kind of danger. Just... the ripple effects of a life that had been full of it.
"And— heh. Hearing about my world tends to worry even people from other dangerous worlds." She says it like it's just a funny little fact, but well...
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"The ship you and the others were on - that was one too?"
That would explain Six and Ava's willingness to settle here instead of striving to make it back 'home'. Would going back where they came from separate them? He hadn't even thought of the possibility. And none of this is even touching on what Ruby just said about where she came from, but Leon figures he can have one crisis at a time. They're not in a rush.
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Ruby nods, chewing a bite of lukewarm potatoes for a moment before she swallows and can talk again. "Yeah, it was. I don't know how many there are? But I know a couple people came to the ship from other similar places. I-It's pretty weird. Back on the ship we were told we were just... copies of ourselves, but that turned out to be wrong."
From Ruby's perspective, at least. Going home as a copy of yourself was meant to be impossible and yet home she went.
"This place is... very different."
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He's still trying too hard to get past 'a whole bunch of weird universal crossroads exist out there' to think to provide some reassurance that being a clone wouldn't be the end of the world, but thankfully it doesn't seem to be the most pressing issue right now.
"Different for the better, I hope. Marrow Isle's dangerous, but it's better than a lot of places I've had to deal with, at least. And the people are really nice here, in my experience, so. If you need anything, don't hesitate to ask for help."
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"It definitely seems better so far. There's more to do, places to go..." On the ship, there was only the ship. The same enclosed space for two years. Except for the occasional trip to pocket dimensions that were often deadly. "And yeah, everyone seems... nice. Everyone's been very helpful so far."
Even if she hasn't done very good at asking for help, just trying to go about her business as best as she can. The problem is it's impossible for people not to notice that something's wrong with her.
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Which aren't things Leon's personally ever had to worry about long-term, but it's still noticeable enough here how much the town and the people in it plan around making sure no one's missing anything vital that even he's picked up on it.
"And I can imagine. Island's closed off from the rest of the world, but it's still gotta be a hell of a lot bigger than any boat. You find anything fun to do since you got here? Or anything you're interested in doing?"
He's hoping to get a sense of whether Ruby's been up to anything recently, because for all he knows the times he's caught her staring into space here have just been off days. It'd be good to have an idea of how concerned he needs to be, without having to out and out ask 'hey, are you struggling with depression and post-traumatic symptoms'.
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Ruby nods in agreement. Those worries have been very real for her at scattered points of her life, for scattered reasons, though she'd always toughed through it with a smile. It had seemed better, that way. Not causing her family more trouble than they already had.
Answering the question is... more difficult than it should be. Like getting out of bed most days has been more difficult than it should be. "Uh. Mostly I've been getting adjusted? And working. Blacksmith work."
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And he imagines it's worse for her, since the boat situation sounds like there were a lot of people there that didn't make it here. No guarantee, he guesses, that they didn't just get snapped up by some other wayward god and put on an entirely different island somewhere, so to speak, but he has to imagine the survivor's guilt is very much in play regardless.
"But anyway. Wouldn't have guessed you were a blacksmith. Have you been doing that kind of thing for long?"
cw: reference to suicide
In some ways the worst thing is that it wasn't fight or flight that was still ringing in the back of her mind, when she stepped out onto the island and another new life. Everyone else seems to have come from moments where their life was at risk from outside forces, and then there's her. Two choices brought here here. One, a choice to end everything. The other, a choice to keep going in spite of it all.
"Heh, yeah, it's not most people's first guess. I've not done this kind of old school blacksmith work before getting here, but I-I was one of the best weaponsmiths in my year, back in combat school. So I've done a lot of metalwork and weapons design."
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"Combat school," he repeats, brows furrowing as he drums his fingers on the table in thought. "Like a military academy?"
He doesn't think weaponsmithing was a part of any program he'd ever heard of, but it's not like he was particularly close with anyone whose parents shipped them off to boarding school to shape up. There might've been a couple in his class back in middle and high school? But he didn't exactly spend a lot of time asking them about the curriculum once they transferred out. And all of that's sort of a moot point anyway, given how different some of the worlds people came from are.
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"Sort... of? But not really. Only one kingdom has a standing military, though Atlesian graduates sometimes join their special operations unit—" right, she's doing that thing where she talks as if she doesn't need to give more context, again. "—but no, our combat schools aren't really about the military. They're for training Huntsmen. Which are sort of... elite freelance warriors, that help keep the Kingdoms and other smaller settlements safe from the Grimm."
She pokes at her food with her fork like she's going to eat some more, but never makes it as far as actually doing so.
"Grimm are soulless monsters that attack for pure destruction's sake. They occupy more of the planet than humans and faunus do. Before Huntsmen, people just had to learn to defend themselves. But nowadays it's mostly up to Huntsmen to deal with the worst of it."
And so they start training young.
This, believe it or not, is only the tip of the iceberg of what's wrong with her universe.
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All this to say, he looks appropriately horrified, though he's trying to be polite about it.
"I think I'm starting to see why hearing about your world worries some people," he says, slowly, so as to buy himself a second or two to think about how to follow that up. If she'd had time before getting whisked off in the multiverse to establish herself as best in class with regards to blacksmithing, then how young must she have been when she enrolled? Freaking out about it isn't gonna make her feel anything but awkward though, he's pretty sure, so he switches gears. "On the bright side, it's... good to be prepared. And to know how to help other people in dangerous situations."
He nods, approvingly, even if he still looks a little concerned.
"What kind of weaponry are you used to making, if the stuff here is old school to you?"
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The horrified expression doesn't surprise her, at least. It's not the first time she's seen it and it probably won't be the last. Remnant is a dangerous world even by the standards of many people from dangerous worlds. At this point she'd be worried about anyone who thought it sounded normal.
"Heh, yeah. I was surprised by how many worlds... aren't, like mine. Guess it goes to show we're all a product of our experiences?" It's a little strained, as 'isn't this interesting'-flavoured statements go, but it is of course true. Ruby couldn't imagine a world less dangerous than Remnant outside of fiction books until she left it.
A little light comes back to Ruby's expression, as the conversation circles directly around to the weapons themselves. Not as bright as it was once upon a time, and it... flickers, in and out, but despite it all at her core Ruby is still Ruby. And weapons are still her.
"My signature weapon was, heh— a high-calibre, bolt-action sniper rifle that transformed into a scythe. It could fire in both folded down rifle form and when unfolded into the scythe itself, which was both the simplest and hardest part of designing her. The scythe form was um... considered unconventional? There's not a lot of Huntsmen that can use one for combat, but— it was all I'd ever wanted to use. And then uh— I designed a sword that could transform into a spear, more recently. Or, well— it could be two types of sword and two types of spear. Which was simpler to design, it only took me a month or so from start to finish, but... yeah."
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"A combined scythe and sniper rifle?" he asks, tapping his fingers on the table as he tries to think of what that'd look like. "Sounds unconventional to me, too. Bayonets started falling out of popular use where I come from something like fifty years ago, except in very specialized cases, and those were the only real cases of combined guns and blades you'd see around barring antique novelties. Sounds like what you've got is much more complicated than any of that, though, if it's got two modes to swap between."
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"Various styles of bayonets are actually a very common addition to ranged weapons back home! Having both a ranged and a close-quarters combat option is pretty important when fighting Grimm, so most modern weapons used by Huntsmen have at least two modes. Sometimes you get people who only have one or the other, but they're exceptions. Rifles that turn into an axe or sword are a more conventional take on what I did with my scythe. But you get things like gauntlets with shotguns built in, war hammers with grenade launchers, guns that also function as nunchaku, whips that turn into blades or staffs... I've even seen weapons that daylight as musical instruments."
The trumpet being the most insane example, probably. A guitar with a retractable hardlight blade is almost normal comparative to a trumpet that is simply a trumpet with some magic Dust.
"Most huntsmen design their own, so we get can get pretty creative, heh."
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Despite this, he doesn't sound like he disapproves - just like he's talking through the pros and cons out loud as he considers. If anything, he seems more curious than anything else.
"Some of those definitely sound like better ideas than others, but my question is how you account for the fact that most melee weapons see a lot of jarring impacts if they're in use, when that's the last thing you want for a gun. Sounds like there'd be a lot of issues with misfiring or jamming, but if it's so common to combine the two I figure there's gotta be a solution to that, right?"
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"Right. Every design has to compensate for the competing needs of the weapons and for all possible failure points during the transformations. I had to properly reinforce and cushion Crescent Rose's firing mechanisms and make sure that the telescoping barrel didn't have any internal ridges. I went through a lot of trial and error in the transformation mechanisms early on, too."
If asked, Ruby would claim maths is her least favourite subject and that she's terrible at it, but you put it in an engineering and design context and her tune changes completely.
"But most people don't go quite as complex as I did, heh, so it's an easier problem to solve in some weapons comparatively. We do have to make sure we use the best materials, though."
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