[OPENING] exploration log

[spellbindmods]

Who: Explorers and Co.
Where: Around the island and at the newly discovered house
When: Day 10
Open/Closed: Open to All
Note: Feel free to create your own logs for individual island explorations. A prompt is for house exploring, and you can list off multiple A prompts like A1, A2, etc. for more than one prompt within the house. B prompts (B1, B2, etc) are for exploring the island and may be open to all OR select friends who your character is exploring with.

[It's tough to live on an island that doesn't have many resources outside of the limited food sources and running streams. While Brie is aware of some other minor sources of food, like fish and frogs, one person exploring an island on their own means there are a lot of secret spots left to uncover. Despite adventuring for three years, her time on the hub itself has been much shorter, only staying for days or weeks at a time. Now that there are more people on this journey, covering ground is a lot easier.

Recently she's discovered another large estate -- much larger than her current shared mansion, which might also mean it has some supplies inside. On the morning of Day #, she's called together those who are hankering for more supplies in order to bring as much back as possible. Congrats, you get first dibs.

A. Upon approaching the house, the first thing that's noticeable is its size. It's all one story, but very flat and spacious. There are gardens in both the front and the rear, and upon entering (Brie might have enlisted you to help break the door down, oops) the inside is also quite vast. There are tons of rooms, multiple bedrooms and bathrooms, two kitchens and other rooms that aren't even explorable because they need keys to be entered. Unless you can find these keys, that is?

B. Alternatively, or maybe even aside from exploring the house, Brie's also suggested that you do some exploring on your own. Again, she's one woman with limited time to scout the island herself. What can you find? What resources are there to be harvested? Will you share in this bounty, or keep it to yourself?]

Comments

[teratias]

[Waver squats down to better observe the fairy ring, frowning at the mushrooms.]

Neither have I. I suspect that mushroom experiments might be something to wait on, just out of a sense of self preservation.

[windeity]

You're probably not wrong. I don't know much about wildlife, I'll admit, if only because it was never really a thing I needed to learn about. The salamanders had mushrooms they were farming for food and stuff but they didn't look like this. [What.] I guess if someone knew more about botany or plant life or whatever we could ask them, too.

[teratias]

[Salamanders and mushr....ooms.....nope. Not asking.]

Even if we saw other animals eating these, I think we'd have a good idea of safety. I haven't seen much besides the boars and crabs though.

[windeity]

We found frogs the other day. [He sounds pretty pleased about that, too. Also it is for the best not to ask about the salamanders, Waver.] So there are other creatures around but they seem to be in hiding. So far they all seem sort of, like, woodland though. So it makes you wonder where the island spawned from.

[teratias]

Or if it's from something bigger.

[A private island taken from somewhere else, maybe. It would explain why the beach falls off, and why the houses are as big as they are.]

Maybe we're just here until the aliens who actually own this island would like it back.

[windeity]

Maybe. Madoka and I were trying to figure out who might have owned the mansion since we keep finding a bunch of random stuff inside. I thought maybe it was a hotel or something. She thinks maybe it's a haunted estate. The thing is that it could be either of those because the island itself seems out of place. Especially since this is the second mansion we've found.

[teratias]

A hotel wouldn't make sense, there's no front desk or anything. Even a fancy one would have some kind of check in area. [It had been a good thought, it just didn't quite work in Waver's mind.]

Vacation mansion, maybe? I'm not sure what makes the thing seem haunted though, did she experience anything?

[windeity]

I think she was only experiencing an overactive imagination, but the place does look sort of run down. Just like the rest of the island. A vacation mansion makes some sense, too, but then that means that whoever owned it must have had a big family. We're finding stuff here that crosses all kinds of ages and stuff that may or may not be something people bring with them on vacation. And even then, if it is a vacation mansion, why leave everything behind?

[teratias]

Because it's easier than carrying it back home? [That's the only thing Waver cn think of.] Or they had to step out, and stepping out takes a little longer for these people than it does for others.

[windeity]

Or...they were forced out. Like an eviction? But then again someone found a duffelbag shoved under the couch cushions in another room so it could be a lot of possibilities. Unless we find other clues, we're just guessing about the house and these mushrooms.

[teratias]

The mushrooms are more likely to yield answers, I think.

[Waver straightens up, and taps one of the fungi with his shoe. He then yanks it off in a fairly impressive balancing act, and brings the leather up to examine.]

Doesn't look like it let out spores.

[windeity]

[John's still on the ground so yes, that is impressive. He also doesn't really know what Waver's looking for so the comment is met with a tilt of his head.]

How can you even tell? They all sort of look the same to me.

[teratias]

[Waver offers John his shoe.]

Ever poke a flower and get pollen on your finger? Same kind of deal.

[windeity]

[It's easy to get a look from this level so he observes only briefly to see that Waver's telling the truth.]

And without spores being released then the mushrooms wouldn't be able to travel and grow in other locations, so that means these were planted this way on purpose. I think. That makes it a little more likely that this was someone's personal garden.

[teratias]

[Waver nods, and then extends his hand to ask for his shoe back.]

It isn't easy to grow mushrooms, as I understand it. Either the mushrooms are easy to cultivate or someone is extremely skilled.

[windeity]

[Whoops, yeah, let's...hand that back. He's going to then lean back on his hands to eye the mushrooms again.]

With the landscape and all of the buildings we keep finding, I'm guessing it's the latter. [But.] If we pick them do you think we could try growing them ourselves to see how easy it may or may not be?

[teratias]

I don't see the harm in trying.

[Waver didn't mind mushrooms in food. They were good for pies.]

The question is where would we in the camp area?

[windeity]

Mushrooms need to grow in the ground itself, but what if we used one of the empty huts as a greenhouse or something? You can grow almost anything in those. [Or he'll have Dave draw one, whatever.]

[teratias]

Do you think we'll be allowed to use one of the huts though?

[windeity]

If no one else is using it, why not? Would that really be a problem?

[teratias]

Well, what if there's more people later?

[windeity]

Then there will be more people later? [A shrug.] We can figure something out then. Do you think there will be?

[teratias]

I mean, it's a guess? I dunno, it seems like there's more houses than people, you know? And we're definitely not the first to be part of this coven.

[windeity]

Oh. That's...actually a good point. Like maybe they could only bring a couple of us here at a time and so that's why. We were like the new test group or something. This just got a little weirder.

[teratias]

[Waver groans.]

Now we sound like lab rats.

[No. Crap. Focus on anything but that.]

We could probably just find some wood and build like, a chicken coop. But for mushrooms.