♥ December (Ranir) Event Log

[hugtopiamods]

December (Ranir) Event Log
The end of the year is here and winter has arrived. The chilly fall weather quickly gives way to cold days and colder nights, perfect for snuggling and watching the first dusting of snow fall. It doesn't seem to stick for long, but it's certainly a beautiful sight to watch out of your windows. Ranir is the beginning of Rawna's time to shine, but the god of apathy breeds apathetic followers and priests - or he usually does. Maybe it's due to the influence of all the offworlders for the past year, but this year? Ranir is strangely familiar in its festivities...

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❥ PROMPT I: Bring Out Your Pens

No one is quite sure how, but over the past year, the natives have come to learn about a very particular figure in many of the offworlders' legends. He appears one time a year, shrouded in mystery, visiting in the dead of night, only to vanish until the next year. This godlike figure has piqued their interest to say the least and once Ranir is in full swing, offworlders who are aware of the legend of Santa Claus will start seeing some robots, especially Rawna's temple priests, wearing that familiar red and white outfit around town. They're carrying sacks on their backs and going door to door, electronics buzzing with excitement as they find anyone they can to shove an actual pen and paper into their hands.

"All hail the Santa of Clause!" they exclaim with glee. "Hail to your winter god! Nail your socks to the wall!"

Anyone who receives a letter set in person will then be told to write a letter to the Santa of Clause (and the robots ARE checking spelling. Who's ever heard of Santa Claus? Clearly you're mistaken and need a spelling software update) asking for a present, to a friend in town, or to someone back home. They won't leave until you write your letter, either. Whether it means they have to follow you all day, all week, or straight into your homes, they will complete their duty to the Santa of Clause and appease his great and terrible appetite for grammatically correct letters. For those who are lucky enough to avoid the robots in person, they may find a letter set in their mailbox one more with similar instructions about to whom they should be writing and a cheery announcement that someone will be by later to pick the letter up.

The sheer volume of letters being passed around town, however, is more than the robots alone can deliver. Soon enough, they start reaching out to the offworlders to help deliver the letters to their intended recipients, whether it's other offworlders, natives, or to temples to be placed upon the gods' altars. Anyone who is willing to help out will be given a small token of appreciation in the form of Dora, but more importantly, a larger gift of the Santa of Clause approved uniform. That's right: a Santa costume. If you're delivering letters, you must be wearing a Santa costume or you'll anger the Winter God, Santa of Clause! Or so the natives believe. So get into the holiday spirit and dress on up!

Those who wish to write letters to someone who is no longer among the city population or those who have never been here are more than encouraged to do so. In fact, Rawna's temple priests seem particularly interested in having people come by to read those letters directly at their temples to tie this offworld holiday into Rawna's typical purview. Read your letters to your loved ones or just read a letter detailing what you want for the holidays at Rawna's temple to unburden your soul as the year ends. Maybe you'll walk away feeling lighter than before.

❥ PROMPT II: This Isn't What I Ordered

At the end of the month, characters will wake up to light scratching at their doors. The sound is enough to get anyone's attention, especially if the scratching is at their bedroom doors, rather than their front doors. When people go to investigate, they'll find a little rainbow dragonling at their feet looking up at them expectantly. By the dragonling's side is a box of varying sizes, decorated and topped with a holographic bow. Once the dragonling has determined that you recognize the package is yours, it slithers off back to where it came from, escaping your house with surprising ease.

Opening the package will reveal one item from your character's life. That's right, it's a regain event! The item inside the box is familiar to your character and it might bring a smile to their face - or it would if it wasn't just....slightly? Wrong? For whatever reason, it seems this year the gift giving went a bit awry and all the items delivered by the dragonlings are off in some manner or another. For example, you might have gotten a box set of your favorite books from home! But they're all in a language you can't read. Or you may have gotten your favorite sweater back! But it's fourteen sizes too big and looks like it was sized for a T-Rex instead. Or your favorite gun from home is now bright neon bubblegum pink instead of that sleek and cool gunmetal gray. Oh and the bullets shoot flowers instead of, y'know, bullets. Whoops.

Whatever the problem, every gift received seems to have something wrong with it. As the complaints start rolling in, the temple priests will try their best to fix it by having all willing characters come with their malfunctioning gifts. A few trials and errors reveal that the best way to get things right again is? You guessed it: positive contact. Any temple will do for this, but Rawna's temple is naturally the busiest seeing as it's sort of his holiday and thus, sort of(?) his fault. Come with a friend or a frenemy or just a straight enemy if that's your flavour, place both of your gifts on the temple's altar, and just hold on tight. Once contact is initiated, the gifts will start to glow with a soft light; and the longer the contact is held, the brighter the light gets. It can take up to an hour depending on the level of wrongness your gift went to in order for the light to grow bright enough to flash and set the gifts back to their original forms. But there are rumours that talking about the gift you received and why it is significant to you makes the process far faster, resulting in a light that might flash as soon as you finish your story. Just be sure to hurry to correct this mistake. Some of the temple priests hypothesize that the corrections can only be made so long as Rawna's power holds sway.

OOC: These items from home must be approved by a mod. They cannot exceed the Medium Item regain limit. It cannot be a power or other ability. It cannot be something your character did not own or have knowledge of in their canon or their CRAU. Please post your regain request in the Regain Request thread before threading out the receipt or restoration of the item.

❥ PROMPT III: Ghostly Consequences

Toward the end of the month, people begin having dreams of Havenwell. That's nothing truly unusual, certainly, as it's quite normal for dreams to mimic one's daily life. What is unusual is that these dreams feel...real. Too real. And the people in the dreams are ones that may or may not be familiar to you. The faces of the dream people resemble those of the ghosts that took over Havenwell a month or two prior, and they seem to be going about their business as if they lived in Havenwell. In fact, they seem to be living your lives instead of you, living in your house, sleeping in your beds, working your jobs, talking with your friends. No one in the dream seems to notice the switcheroo and try as you might to interact with people in the dream, it looks like you've taken on the role of ghost. Thankfully, these dreams are innocuous and short, snapshots of your life rather than full length dreams and are over quickly.

However, before each dream ends, the ghost living your life turns to you and puts their hands together in a pleading gesture. What do they say? That differs for each person.

For most offworlders, the message is the same. The ghost puts their hands together and says:

"Balance must always be kept. Nothing shall die here that He does not allow. Your sacrifice is balance, and balance must always be kept. Some must die or all shall perish. These were their promises and their demise."

But, if your character touched a ghost in the previous event, you will receive a PM from the mod account soon with your specific message. Keep an eye out for your message.

The dream ends once the message is delivered and you'll find yourselves not where you remember - your bed, your sofa, wherever you went to sleep - but someplace new. Apparently the dreams have caused some minor sleepwalking and you may just find yourself waking up in someone else's bed or up a tree or about to buy that super expensive plastic model of Havenwell's latest holomovie starlet. Whoops.

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This event will run from 15 December to 31 December. Click on each prompt's title to see the text. If you have any questions, feel free to direct them to the FAQ or to the Mod Question thread. You can also use the Havenwell Status page or the General Plotting Comment to give you other ideas for original prompts!

Comments

[ii; various ]

[kingkingcxiii]

[It's evening in the Lucis Caelum Sr house, and one would think the kitchen would be a comforting and safe space, but Regis has been standing in the door watching Ardyn seem to be everything but that. The dark wisps are worrying, but even more so is the tonberry who apparently is so concerned for the redhead that it can't even spare a moment to glare at Regis as it usually does.

Regis...really isn't sure what to do next. Should he call out? The atmosphere is so dark, though, he is half afraid of what kind of behavior such a startle would trigger in Ardyn.

Just what is going on?]

[scourgingstars]

[It took a little time and a fair few nervously insistent noises from Viridi before Ardyn started to seem just a little more awake, one hand pressed to his face with the other bracing himself on the counter rather than his own unsteady legs.]

[Whatever it was, he was clearly trying to shake it off and get that ominous darkness to lessen even a little at a time, not fully noticing Regis' presence just yet.]

[kingkingcxiii]

[It is a reaction, at least. Something to prove that Ardyn isn't completely in another place. Still, Regis is careful, quiet, not wanting to startle the redhead anymore than necessary.]

Ardyn? Can you hear me?

[scourgingstars]

Ah--what?

[He looked up a little too quickly, still with one foot somewhere several thousand miles away.]

You-...you can see me right now?

[kingkingcxiii]

Yes, of course. Viridi can too.

[Regis takes a step closer, his expression worried.]

What is going on?

[scourgingstars]

I...I don't know. I think I...must have had a terrible nightmare. I don't know how I even got here.

[kingkingcxiii]

[Regis nods. Somehow, the answer is exactly what he expected. He takes one more step forward and then rests a hand lightly on Ardyn's shoulder.]

Let's not worry about that now, then. Come, why don't you sit down? Just be mindful of the tonberry attached to your leg.

[Please don't trip on top of everything else, Ardyn.]

[scourgingstars]

R...right. Of course.

[Still tense and shaken, he glanced down to Viridi before letting himself be led over to sit down.]

Forgive me, this seems...painfully foolish of me, now.

[kingkingcxiii]

How so? You were asleep. It's not like you chose to wander down here.

[Once Ardyn is seated, Regis gives his shoulder a squeeze and then moves over toward a cabinet so he can grab a pan.]

Would you like some hot chocolate while you sort yourself out? I promise. This, I won't burn.

[scourgingstars]

That...yes, that might help.

[Viridi jumped up into his lap, Ardyn petting its head without any real thought to the motion.]

...I had a terrible dream of...someone else, living my life here. As though I'd been replaced so utterly that none thought to question the absence. None of you could see or hear me, all I could do was watch him live in my place.

[kingkingcxiii]

[Regis sets the pan on the counter and then finds himself returning to Ardyn's side, his expression pained. How often will Ardyn have to see his life torn away from him?

He reaches out to give Ardyn's shoulder a comforting squeeze.]

That is your nightmare; one that has come to life before. No wonder you were so restless that you could not stay in bed.

[scourgingstars]

Of course, you're right. I only...feel a little foolish having been rendered so uneasy by just a dream. Frustrated, perhaps, that it should still bother me so much.

[kingkingcxiii]

In dreams we are, perhaps, at our most vulnerable.

[Regis gives Ardyn's shoulder another squeeze before returning to gathering his ingredients and tools.]

While I appreciate the previous warnings, I have to admit I am not all that thrilled about how these strange dreams keep coming.

[scourgingstars]

Warnings...right, he did--he did say something, didn't he?

[Ardyn muttered that to himself, struggling for a moment to remember the whole thing despite the wave of resentment it brought with it.]

'Balance must always be kept. Nothing shall die here that He does not allow. Your...your sacrifice is balance, and balance must always be kept.' [A pause, then, Ardyn pressing a hand to his face while Viridi's tail swayed like a purring housecat's.] 'Some must die or all shall perish. These were their promises...and their demise.'

I...can't honestly tell if that's a warning or not. It rather sounds like something he might have said regardless.

[kingkingcxiii]

[A frown crosses Regis' face as he starts to stir together the hot chocolate ingredients. The words do sound a lot like what Somnus would have said. Cryptically vague, but a warning nonetheless.

Regis doesn't respond for a few moments, thinking over the words and their possible meanings. The only sound comes from his actions at the stove. Finally, he breaks the silence with a question.]

Do you think the warning is tied to the natives escaping death by creating their new bodies?

[It seems a likely angle. Perhaps even too likely, but talking about a likely angle is better than letting Ardyn linger on how similar the dream is to the life he lived and how it was stolen from him.]

[scourgingstars]

I...I don't know.

[To his credit, he was trying very hard to pull himself out of his own unfortunate spiral.] But that...mm, possibly? If one is to preside over death somehow, then-...perhaps it would make sense. I can't be sure.

[kingkingcxiii]

That's all right. It's late.

[The sounds of him working at the store turn to the sounds of him pouring something into a cup which he then brings to Ardyn. It smells wonderful. Not a trace of burned smell to be found!]

Here. Think about enjoying this instead.

[Hot chocolate fixes everything. At least for a little bit.]

[scourgingstars]

[Ardyn hurriedly swiped a hand over his eyes just to be safe, then looked up with a weak smile as he took the mug.]

...thank you.

[kingkingcxiii]

You're welcome.

[It's the least he can do.

He returns to the stove for a moment to get his own cup and turn off the stove, then joins Ardyn at the table.]

If I only ever learn to cook one thing, at least I have picked a useful thing.

[scourgingstars]

Oh, it's fine...I could try to show you a couple of things sometime, if you like. I think I've gotten quite passable in a kitchen.

[kingkingcxiii]

[Regis raises an eyebrow at him.]

Are you sure you want to torture yourself like that?

[You do remember the flour hurricane, right?]

[scourgingstars]

I think I've seen worse. It would be worth a try, if you're willing.

[kingkingcxiii]

Well then, how can I turn down such a gracious offer? Do you have any idea what you would like to start with?

[scourgingstars]

I fear it would have to be something straightforward, lest we destroy the poor house. Maybe a basic rice and vegetable dish or something like that.

[kingkingcxiii]

[Regis can't help but chuckle softly.]

If we are starting with basic, we may want to start with the rice alone.

[How many ways can rice go wrong? Who knows, but Regis is pretty sure he could find all of them even without the vegetables involved.]