hugtopia_logs | ♥ November Event Log

♥ November Event Log

a gloved hand places a brick in place on a wall

November (Malom) Event Log
The chaos of Lasohm's invasion is still fresh in the mind, but it's over. The ugly scar of the hole in Havenwell's wall is a jarring reminder that this world is dying and nothing goes quietly into that dark night. The phantom is gone as Malom overtakes Lasohm, the weather turning colder and chillier with each passing day. Still, the city of Havenwell has all of you offworlders to thank for its survival, and the fearful citizens make sure you know just how much they appreciate you by stopping you on the street to say their thanks. Your new home still needs your help to recover from their ordeal though, so will you lend them your strength once more?

❥ PROMPT I: Rebuilding Effort

a stone wall with a large collapsed hole in the center

The magic barrier over the hole that unknown monster punched through Havenwell's wall is repaired, stopping the onslaught and encouraging any other nightmares that lurk outside to move on and away, but the hole itself remains. Throughout the month of Malom, robot natives are working tirelessly to gather bricks and stone and patch the breach, but they could use some help. Work together with other offworlders and natives alike to repair the wall and be rewarded with a handsome bump to the Dora in your bank account. They need all sorts of help, from clearing away the dead bodies of the spider-like creatures for cremation, to retrieving and hauling stone for the wall, to actually slotting the heavy blocks into place to cement them back together.

Outside the barrier, now clearly visible through the hole, a storm rages on, obscuring the view of the world beyond it. Gray and black clouds whip against the invisible barrier, and occasional debris slams into it, causing the impact site to light up with silver, pink, blue, or white hues before it fades away again. It seems even without monsters, the world outside is as inhospitable as was rumored.

Work together or take a break along the base of the wall and get to know your fellow offworlders a little better. It's going to take a while before this mess is cleaned up.

❥ PROMPT II: Air Sickness

Those who worked at or were near the breach in the wall for any extended period of time will notice that, over time, it gets harder to breathe. Then they begin to feel feverish, even if they don't have flesh bodies or are immune to disease. Their bodies ache and groan and it gets harder to move about without help. Once the natives notice, they set up a recovery area away from where the breach occurred: a giant tent with cots and pillows, thick rugs and blankets to keep the chill away. Unfortunately, they don't have medicines available to treat flesh bodied people, so they're at a loss of what to do otherwise. The priests gather anyone who is ill and brings them here...which is when a curious thing occurs.

While conventional medicines and healing spells seem to have no effect on the illness, staying in contact with another person alleviates the symptoms. After a period of contact with another person or persons, the fever breaks and it's like you were never sick at all.

Return to the wall, however, and you'll notice your symptoms coming back with a vengeance after a few days. It seems that making regular trips between the wall and this recovery tent is the only way to keep working. At least it's an easy fix so long as you're not a germaphobe.

❥ PROMPT III: A Tasty(?) Reward

a collage of different foods on display: salads, meats, and pasta

Toward the end of the month as the hole in the wall is completely repaired and the risk of illness declines, a message is sent to all the offworlders' communication devices. Those who choose to open it will find a very official looking message from The Havenwell Council that reads:

Greetings, Saviours of Havenwell!
We of the Havenwell Council greet you and wish to express our eternal gratitude for your valiant efforts to keep our wonderful home safe. Without you, we would not have survived this terrible onslaught. As such, we wish to express our gratitude in a more concrete form. Your emissary, Magolor, has been in contact with this venerable Council and has brought to our attention that your greatest concern is for the food available. We apologize that due to our inability to taste we have been unable to supply you with satisfactory meals.

To that end, we invite you to work with our scientists to improve upon the taste of currently available offerings from our replicators. Please come to the Northern Research Tower (map included) at any time this month to sample what our replicators can produce and give us feedback on their flavour and textures. We ask that you be as specific as possible in your criticisms so we may improve upon your general quality of life. Please feel free to bring as many friends as you wish.
May the Gods Protect You,
Havenwell Council, Community Liaisons

Those who take the invitation will arrive at the Northern Research Tower and be taken directly to the 40th floor, where a large banquet hall has been laid out. Five rectangular tables, over 5 meters long each, stretch down the room, creating aisles for people to walk down. At the far end are several high round tables, covered in white cloth, and high round stools for those who wish them. The tables are overflowing with food, much like the welcome dinner, but at each table and scattered throughout the room are scientist robots with arm bands that read "Experiment 73" in that peculiar Aellyn script you saw during your time at the Archives. They invite you to taste the foods - both raw and cooked - and to give your very honest opinions.

Enjoy the food, help them improve the flavours, and walk the room to talk with the others who have come. Those who participate will receive a small synthetic fruit basket to take home with them on their first visit. Feel free to come back as often as you like, however! Each time, they'll be changing and adjusting the food available so your first and last visit may be very different. Perhaps that strawberry actually even tastes sweet, finally.

❥ PROMPT IV: A Virtual Spa

a spa/water park with large open pools, an enclosed building, a bridge, and a water slide in the background

The VR cafes are uncharacteristically quiet while the rebuilding effort goes on, but there are still those who come to plug in to unwind after a day of intensive labor. And what better way to unwind than with a hot bath, right? Since the people of Havenwell can't actually submerge themselves in water, they're doing the next best thing: going to a virtual hot spring. There are several types to choose from and despite being digital, their calming and soothing effects on the body seem very real. Choose from:

The Classic Outdoors: a rock lined hot spring with natural rock floors and steamy mineral infused waters nestled in the mountains. All around you is beautiful greenery like a sweeping pine and low fragrant bushes. The serene air and the calm forest is only occasionally broken by the sound of a wooden pipe thudding hollowly against a rock at a steady interval or the sound of birdsong off in the trees. The relaxing atmosphere is enough to set even the tightest wound nerves at ease.
The Marbled Columns: white and painted marble columns lead to a series of different shaped baths with statues of the gods pouring water into them. Each bath has a different healing property, which is clearly marked with a plaque at the rim of each: good for your circulation, your bones, your aches and pains, even acne and metabolic rate. The columns support a beautiful open ceiling that shows the perfectly blue sky overhead dotted with the occasional cloud.
The Steamy Sauna: though seemingly austere in their white tile and deep blue bath basins, the air here is thick and steamy and the baths are deep with hand-rails leading down steps to help you enter. All around the basins are stone or wooden benches with towels laid down for those who wish to simply sit and let the warm air open their lungs. If you get too hot? Grab a bucketful of cold water from one of the freestanding tubs and douse yourself to get a shock and cool off.
The Milk-and-Honey: a beautifully tiled bath with a large shallow rectangular basin. The surrounding walls and ceilings have blue, white, and gold geometric designs laid out with loving care in pleasant designs that ease the mind. The bath water here is filled with a concoction of milk and honey to soothe and smooth the skin, filling the air with a pleasing sweet scent. The effects of these baths on a person's skin is said to make them glow from the inside out for at least a day after bathing.
The Theme Park: the first thing to greet you is the comically oversized bottle of red wine tipped to pour a continuous stream of red liquid into the large crystalline bath basin. The smell of wine is heavy but pleasant in the air and the crystalline basin is round and shaped like a wine glass. Climb up the glass steps and give yourself a good old soak in the red water. You might even find that taking a dip here gives you a heady happiness that lasts all day. And if it feels like you're a little drunk while there? That has to be your imagination! ...Maybe.

Hot springs are great to experience with friends to deepen that feeling of skinship you have with each other, and several Havenwell natives are doing just that. But what about those who don't have a friend to log in with? Don't worry! The game will randomly select another player from this or another facility and match you together. Isn't that nice? We're sure it is! Who doesn't want to talk to someone else while naked, right?

This event will run from November 14th to the 31st. 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 here.

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[Having been wrangled into one of the cots, despite his complete and total reluctance to it, Shinji is hoping that just some quiet rest will be as effective as the incredibly predictable other cure. If he has to stay in bed longer to kick this on his own, that's fine, but barring a very short list of exceptions, getting cozy with someone while he's feeling this sick sounds really unpleasant.

So, does Magolor make the cut? Shinji gives him a brief, bleary look-over as he approaches, before wordlessly lifting up the blanket to let him crawl in under it.

There's probably no real chance of resisting this company either way.]

[Not this time, Shinji. A healthy person could resist a sick Magolor, but a fellow sick stands no chance. Magolor drags himself in and cuddles up against Shinji's chest with a shivery sigh, sounding miserable. . . . Though he sounds a little less miserable than he would if he were feeling better. If he were only feeling a little under the weather, he'd make sure to play it up for all it was worth. But now that he's really feeling like garbage? He's more subtle.]

They should've given us waivers . . . if you ask me, we've got a real case . . .

[Even his complaining sounds weak.]

[Who, exactly, would they be pressing charges against?

Ah, but who is ultimately responsible for this is not really the kind of thing his hazy mind really wants to think about right now. He'd rather pull that blanket back around the both of them and focus on coaxing himself into some place of relaxation once more now that there's an extra body on the cot.]

Sounds like a lot of work.

[Even if it is just for the sake of complaining, what kind of bureaucratic nightmare would bringing up a case like this against a bunch of robots even look like?]

Some things are worth the effort . . . buuuut not this.

[That playful tone of his is almost there under his stuffy fevered lethargy. The very edge of it peeks through. And his body shakes against Shinji's in the tiniest laugh. Is it the way of this planet that being with someone does make it feel a little better, or just misery loving company? Or is it he himself loving company, despite his best efforts?]

You were helping?

[Leave it to Havenwell to force hands-off individuals into enjoying close-quarters coziness. Maybe it has something to do with this company in particular (Magolor's incredibly perfect size and shape for cuddling), maybe it's just having another warm body to hold on to (gotta fend off those fever chills!), or it could just be that... not being alone is actually kind of nice (familiar company is always going to be welcome over a stranger)? Maybe it's a combination of things, but even if trying to wait this illness off on his own isn't an option, this is a very nice alternative.

Once they're nice and settled, Shinji lightly lets his arm come to rest around Magolor.]

Hmm. [He nods a little at the question.] As much as possible, anyway.

Edited (comes back hours later and sees how badly my phone betrayed me) 2019-11-17 04:14 (UTC)

[It really is nice. Having the weight of an arm around him is unexpectedly pleasant; he's slept with Taranza, but Taranza is his size and doesn't have arms, and he's slept with Will, but he was curled up against his head like a cat at the time, not within arm's reach. This is new. He can blame his illness for it not being stifling, maybe. Who cares? He doesn't have the wherewithal to give a shit right now. All he cares about is that it's nice, and so he snuggles in. Living teddy bear!]

Hmmmmm . . . give yourself some more credit.

[Ah? That nets a faintly confused hum from Shinji. He didn't think that was a terribly self-deprecating reply, even if hes pretty sure his own contributions to the cause were... less impressive than some other's.]

Just doing what I could. [That's all he had meant.] You were out there too, right?

[Magolor can be obscure at the best of times, and this is not the best of his times. There's something else itching in the back of his mind about this that he doesn't outright bring up yet, but it's there, along with his fever. About as pleasant from his point of view, too. For now, he just blinks vaguely, but good-naturedly, up at Shinji.]

Mmhmmm. At least I'm not sick for nothing. That'd just be insulting. Well, now you can help me out . . . again.

[There's beginning to get at it.]

[For a moment, through his fever-fog, Shinji can only think to nod a bit in agreement. At least they have something to show for getting sick, and at least there's this way to help each other feel better.

But, 'again'? There's something about that 'again' that strikes him. After all, this is markedly different than the kind of 'help' done through ribbons or dancing, something a little more consequential...]

What do you mean by that?

[He thinks he might see where this is going, but he'd rather not assume.]

[He's quiet for a bit before answering. Maybe he fell asleep? He kind of wishes he had; it'd be great to just summon fever sleep right now and totally avoid this conversation, that he is solely responsible for anyway. That's how it be sometimes. But no, he's awake, and he started it, so to hell with it. It does need to be said.]

You definitely know already . . . the dream. Thanks for that. It's embarrassing, but . . .

[So his hunch was right. He had been planning on doing the Polite Thing and Not Bringing It Up Ever, and he honestly isn't entirely sure what to say about it now that it has come up. He's definitely lost on how to deal with this gratitude coming from what was essentially him trespassing into Magolor's subconscious, sick brain or otherwise, so takes a beat or two from his end to untangle that mess of feelings a little before he can figure out how to reply.]

Hm, [Soft and contemplative,] I'm sorry, you probably didn't want anyone seeing that.

Of course I didn't.

[He grumbles, entirely honest, burrowing against Shinji in his shame. It isn't even the reality of that dream, that callback to an incident in his life, that he doesn't want anyone to see; he doesn't love people knowing anything about what he's done or what happened, but he can deal with it. It's more his own reaction to it, the weakness after it was all over, that he's ashamed of. Of course he didn't want it seen.

But at the same time, the alternative—

What would have happened if no one had come? The pain of the nightmare, and the loneliness, was worse than the shame now. He's self-aware enough to have a grasp on that. So he sighs, his whole body expanding and relaxing with the sound.]

But, I'm still grateful to you.

[There, there, Magolor. That little bit of honesty nets him a couple of soft pats on the back from Shinji, even if he's still fairly puzzled on what he might have done to warrant that kind of gratitude. Was it really so much for him to have stuck around through the whole thing...? Or is there something else here he's not quite getting?

Either way, his attempt to gently side-step accepting those thanks fails when Magolor throws that second round of gratefulness at him. Give him another moment, here.]

I'm... glad I could help. [Even if it's clear that he's not sure what aspect he really helped with. From his perspective, he had just been an unsuspecting passerby drawn in for the ride that hadn't taken the chance to run when it was given to him.]

[Sometimes that's all that needs to be.

Magolor reaches up to pat Shinji's head in return, sighing. And then, like that, he sets it aside, refusing to draw out the awkwardness of his emotions any longer. He'll remain grateful, probably forever, for things he isn't about to explain and doesn't need to hammer in any more. The transaction is complete. . . . No, he knows that isn't how friendship works, and maybe this is friendship. But at least talking about it can be over!]

So, let me pay you back with the warmth of my hugs now. Hehehe.

[He wouldn't be able to say there isn't anything about that dream he isn't curious about, but if that's as far as Magolor's going to take the incident, then that's where Shinji will leave it. No reason to open up any more avenues for making this situation uncomfortable.

Those head pats bring up a totally new kind of awkwardness, though! Shinji can't help but pause for a moment at the contact, but, ah, perhaps that's something else to not call attention to.]

Hmm, you are awfully warm. [Is he actually finding himself appreciating this company? Wao!] You aren't uncomfortable or anything, are you?

Of course I am. I feel terrible. But that's not on you, unless there's something really major you're not telling me . . . like that you're a beast from beyond the barrier? Is that your secret?

[Another weak giggle. For all that he does feel terrible, he could feel so much worse. Even the contact healing issue aside, being in bed sick alone is boring and painful, and he's happy not to be anymore.]

My secret?

[There's a gentle, amused sort of upswing in his tone at the question, however dampened by his own affliction.]

I don't know if I'd be able to keep something like that hidden for this long. [Especially not after that whole break-in debacle!] Don't worry, I'm just a regular human trying to help out.

[Nothing to fret over here.]

Edited (w o r d s) 2019-12-01 06:20 (UTC)

That's almost a shame . . . but I'll believe you.

[He winks up at Shinji. Just a normal human! He'd assumed that anyway, but it's still amusing to prod at and be amused by. And, for a normal human, he's a good guy, with more steel in him than he gives himself credit for.]

You do what you can even though you don't like it. I respect that.

[Almost! He probably wouldn't have fared too well in his own world if that wasn't the case!!

He does have to pause for a few seconds at the way Magolor worded that second comment, though. 'Even though he doesn't like it', is that the kind of impression he's been giving off? Come to think of it, haven't pretty much all of his encounters with Magolor involved not being entirely thrilled about whatever situation they were in? Oh. That's... Oh.]

I promise there's plenty that I do like doing.

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♥ November Event Log

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