Hijinks Mingle

[potentite]

Who: Everyone!
Where: Anywhere around the hub!
When: Days 103-105
Open/Closed: Open mingle!
Notes: See this post for details on the moon prompt and this one for the telepathy/dream/spirit prompts!



[A | Flower Gleam and Glow]
[The nearby moon is still passing close to the hub island, meaning the effects are still in play. Perhaps now is the time to stop and smell the large lit up sparkling moonflowers that have bloomed? Or be annoyed by the mosquito-like insects that came with them.

Alternatively, the deer seem to draw some sort of energy from the moon's light. Given their size, at least their sudden aggression and proximity to the base camp isn't the worst thing in the world but a kick would still break a rib or other bone so be careful! Possibly help each other deal with these cute but troublesome fauna.]



[B | Eavesdropping]
[For some reason, the telepathy will suddenly get rather wonky. Characters won't know why it's happening, though of course no doubt there will be ponderings, but it means characters won't be in control of their ability to broadcast — or more specifically, not broadcast — their thoughts. Time to find out secrets of an embarrassing nature. Or maybe something sadder is going on in your character's head.

If this wasn't bad enough, the area around the signet might experience burning or tingling. Just try to keep a lid on your brain for the day and distract yourself from any annoying pain.]



[C | Talking In Your Sleep]
[Or maybe your character just doesn't have the most interesting thoughts. Maybe they're busy thinking about pie instead of their upsetting childhood. That's fair. Pie is great.

But surely sometimes it haunts their dreams. With the telepathy running amuck, it's no wonder dreams and nightmares are leaking through, too. Of course, it doesn't have to be an accident. Feel free to grab a friend and share a fanciful dreamscape together on purpose! But for those nuts that are tougher to crack, accidents can and will happen.]



[D | Who You Gonna Call]
[Last but not least, as Friday rolls around, there seems to be something odd going on with the island. If your character is inclined towards the spiritual or supernatural, they'll no doubt notice the strange heavy thickness hanging around. There are whispers in the air and all of new energy just feels solemn. Might be good to give people a heads up and keep an eye on it.]

Comments

[oneandmikleonly]

[there's just the door down here, made of some dark wood. the knob is coated in frost. it seems a little warped, from stress or age or both.]

[splinten]

[Hm. He could try the door handle, or....

He's gonna try to bust it down with his shoulder. THE DOORKNOB LOOKS COLD, HE REFUSES]

[oneandmikleonly]

[dirk, calm down

he BURSTS RUDELY THROUGH THE DOOR; there's a sound of snapping metal as he breaks the latch in the process, and a wisp of something dark and hissing and ominous-feeling bursts from it, withering in on itself when it lands in the fire beyond.

what fire? well, he is now in a WRECKED, BURNING LIBRARY and, like the stairs, it is super aflame. There are rows and rows of old books and ancient texts on shelves; but most are battered and broken, beyond repair or legibility, some spilled out on the floor. There’s a scatter of QUILL PENS on the ground too, though some are damaged. Strange, eerie NOISES echo through the room, fading in and back out of hearing as you walk: laboured breathing, and an occasional dull, distant roar. It’s bitterly cold.]

[splinten]

[Well 'bitterly cold' is a bad feel for a burning library, even one that is only burning fake silver flames. Dirk doesn't need to draw his sword: in his dreams, he has the sylladex, it is his. But he keeps walking, carefully keeping to spaces that allow a quick egress and keeping his back to the wall.

The books.]

[oneandmikleonly]

[where is he headed/is he following anything in particular? the books don't attack him, they just sit there on their shelves being variously messed up.]

[splinten]

[Thanks, books. He is.... a goddamned moron who is trying to find the source of the noises so he's following that.]

[oneandmikleonly]

[it takes some listening and waiting in the middle of the library, but eventually you can work out that the breathing comes from the northeast and southwest quarters, and the roaring from northwest and southeast. the sounds are...in the walls...it's likely he can only track one set at a time, though, separated as they are]

[splinten]

[So. One option: a thing that's definitely alive.

The other option: a thing that is probably big and angry.



Yeah he's going roaring-ways. He'll try Northwestish.]

[oneandmikleonly]

[dirk,,,

the northwest is ROTTED and waterlogged, soggy pages still swimming across the floor, the ground treacherously slick underfoot, almost spongy. somehow the silver fire isn't affected, because it's blazing here as merrily as anywhere else. when you enter this area the roaring seems a little clearer, a little closer by, accompanied by heavy thumps, like a large animal thrashing.

he can trace the noise most clearly to a particular section of wall here; there's the faintest inset of lines denoting a concealed panel about the size of his hand.]

[splinten]

[Well. Spongy is weird.

>PUSH THE SECRET PANEL PUSH THE SECRET PANEL

He pushes the secret panel like he's in Myst.]

i s2g i have used the wrong account at least once per comment

[oneandmikleonly]

[the secret panel depresses into the wall and slides up out of the way.

in the small, damp alcove it reveals is a glyph of some kind; glowing blue lines denoting the shape of an open, staring eye.]

this is relatable and my life

[splinten]

[Okay. That's creepy. What to do with a creepy glowing staring eye? There is probably a puzzle here.

But Dirk is, in the end, his daughter's father. So he decides to try just destroying it with his Magic.]

[oneandmikleonly]

[so like, is he using his soul prince hijinks magic, or his 'destroy it if he can understand it' magic, because the results for the two are very different]

[splinten]

[SECOND ONE how much does he understand a glowing shape in the wall? let's find out!]

[oneandmikleonly]

[he can kind of start crumbling the wall around it if he tries, apparently that's just a wall, but the glyph defies his understanding and just kind of sits there exuding #nope]

[splinten]

[Okay he's gonna try to slash it with his sword.]

[oneandmikleonly]

[you slice the glyph in half and make a sizable cut into the wall.

...its glow fizzles out, and you find yourself teleported back to just inside the library door...]

[splinten]

Oh for fuck's sake.

[FINE HE LOOKS AROUND THE AREA FOR SOME BULLSHIT MATCHING GLYPH OR SOME SHIT??? FUCK YOU INDIANA JONES!]

[oneandmikleonly]

[HE FINDS ANOTHER HIDDEN PANEL IN THE OTHER QUARTER OF THE LIBRARY WITH ROARING IN IT

(the roaring's gotten closer and louder)

THERE'S ANOTHER EYE GLYPH BEHIND IT]

[splinten]

[if he slashes this one does he get sent back to the start of the puzzle again?]

[oneandmikleonly]

[yeah

cracks have started appearing in all the library walls, though

progress(????????????̀ͨ͠?ͬ?͂̂̄ͭ̐?̐̄̈̅ͨ͗?ͤ̂ͨ̔͡)

[splinten]

[It doesn't FEEL like progress.

Okay fine, Dirk's just going to stand in the middle of the room and,]

In the interests of being completely sensible in a dreamscape, COME THE FUCK OUT, BRO!

[oneandmikleonly]

[the walls crack and crumble, and the space...shifts, in the way dreams often do

you're

ś͉̥͓̰̥ọ̶m͓̥̝̙͞e̳̳͍͍̘͘w̢̞̪h̷̲̟̟ͅe̺̯͈ŕ̥è̮͓͍͙͎̞͔ ̬hiḑ͙͖̲͙̯͈d̬̟̙̬̞̜e̖̺̥͔̤͘n

a cave?

(you're behind the walls)

there is a dragon here, because of course there's a fucking dragon, it's that kind of day. you've seen Mikleo in the small dragon form Qri granted him, and you can see echoes of it in the dragon's blue-and-white coloration, the shape of its head and horns, the conformation of its body. but this one's much bigger, much more heavily armored, and it paints the landscape around it with a dark, visible aura of malice and malevolence, a physical thing, nauseating even to look at. there is no intelligence in its eyes.

it fills the space in front of you, hemmed in on all sides. there's a clink of chains at it shifts to regard you, a glint of some sort of restraints on its neck and forelegs, binding its wings. it snarls.

(there's a thin reedy sound somewhere beyond it...a baby wailing...? but you've got to get past it, somehow, if you want to check that out.)]

[splinten]

[He remembers something Mikleo said, then: becoming a dragon has serious associations in his world.]

Dirk walks over to the dragon, watching it snarl. He remembers that he can fly in his dreams, so tries to rise up carefully, to face it. He can feel the malevolence. He is pretty sure that if Mikleo's soul is in there, it has been broken beyond repair.

At least, that's what the nightmare is.]

Hey, dude. It's Dirk. Anywhere in there?

[oneandmikleonly]

[he's answered by the dragon lunging forward, jaws open -- that's arrested by the weird glinting chains on it, though, and it roars in frustration.]