aather_ooc | PLOT SUMMARY, AKA WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED

SHORT HAND
➥Day 84, Unlock
[It's a very warm night tonight! Luckily, since some of you might not make it home after that, gosh.]

[The moon seems brighter tonight, and if you strain to hear it, you can almost hear a strange, soft melody overtop of the usual humming birds—sometimes, it seems as though they're just providing counterpoint.]

[Deep in the misty marsh woods, things are moving. But it's dark—unless you've gone looking, you're not likely to find anything.]
➥Day 86, Unlock
[Today's unlock is KITTENS!!]

[No, I'm lying, that's a lie. There are no kittens. There are only soft giggling sounds, the occasional whispered name, and increasingly persistent shadowy figures in your peripheral vision when you pass by reflective surfaces.]

(murmurmurmur m u r m u r)

[Nothing really to make you paranoid or anything though.]
➥Day 87, Unlock
[There is a noise as abrupt as a gunshot, a sudden creaking shudder that makes leaves tremble and fall from the trees, a wrenching tinkle of glass cracking—very loud, and coming from every direction.]

[That's all.]
➥Day 89, Mingle
[The weather today is a balmy indeterminate temperature, the sky is an inoffensive shade of blue, and there are just a very few yellowish-tinged leaves on the trees.]
➥Day 90, Fog + Voice + Riddles
[ Oh dear. Oh goodness. Oh heavens. A thick, wet fog is rolling in, with snakey tendrils that will curl around your feet and up your arms and into your eyes until you can’t see anything more than a few feet in front of you, not even the sun. But in one direction, there’s a smell like whatever you love best, and a quiet voice that whispers: ]

Little heroes…

[ Oh my. ]
⤷ A voice in the fog called to heroes and knights.
⤷ The voice also asked you riddles!
⤷ Success yielded weird gray cubes that were entirely unremarkable at the time
➥Day 91, Unlock
[Well, that was a fabulously tiring few days! Hope you're up bright and early in the morning to enjoy how kind of fucking cold it is, goddamn. The skies are gray and it's just sort of overall Not Nice. A number of leaves have started to turn a bit yellower around the edges, and in your gardens and around the edges of your cabins, there are some strange, fuzzy vines starting to grow.]

[Luckily, on each bed, there appears to be a pair of appropriately team-colored gloves and scarf—or . . . whatever might suit, if you're handless, as it were. Neither are wooly, but still warm enough!]

[The woods all seem very hushed this morning. There are no humming birds humming, and the animals are scarce.]
➥Day 91, Beauty Post
[ Beauty is contemplatively sitting next to the stream. Contemplating. ]
⤷ Beauty gives some really ambiguous statements about the future and stuff
⤷ Stuff like "But it may also be the storm before the sunrise. To be honest . . . we haven't won this much against the Darkness before . . ."
⤷ And "To fight the darkness . . . it will take strength and wisdom. Courage and fear. . . but I'm not sure what it will take in the end. We've never . . . it has always been a loss, never a victory for us. But you have all changed that . . ."
⤷ And ". . . prepare as though you would for a storm. Gather your supplies and your strengths."
➥Mau, Josh and Ven brought your team some food supplies
This is to say that although I didn't make an IC post (because I'm lazy), Mau and I suspect Josh and Ven and possibly others brought a barrel full of smoked, rosemary salted meat and dried corn around to each cabin, with the explanation that the food is meant as an emergency ration in the event that people can't leave their cabins, while the barrel is meant to hold water.
➥Day 93, Onyx's Clinic
[There is a lot of activity behind Onyx this morning, and not just because Guy came a-courting. There are giant logs being moved, saws doing . . . saw things, nails being hammered, etc.]

[Maleficent is supervising, occasionally giving directions and referring to what could only be building plans drawn in her book.]
➥Day 93, Night
[The humming birds are quite loud tonight, almost-but-not-quite-familiar songs possibly keeping you up at night—or making your sleep fitful, if you do manage to fall asleep. Even if you're generally a sound sleeper, you may find yourself waking up in the middle of the night with an urge to wander. Luckily, between the floating orbs and the glowing bellflowers, the night is quite bright. As well—]

[The sky has cleared off, and the moon is quite clearly visible—brighter than it has been for a while, but with a vague outstretched shadow of a hand on the surface.]
⤷ Notably, this connecting ooc post.
➥Day 93, Night, Attacks
[ Night continues ever forward. In some places of Aather the barest beams of 'sunlight' might be showing, but that could also be your mind playing tricks on you -- because the darkness doesn't seem to be lifting.

If you find yourself far from home you may find that you're not alone.

If you're the heroic type, you also might find someone in need of saving . . . and it might not be who you were expecting. ]
⤷ Beasts of Darkness attack Personae and Heroes and Knights
⤷ The monsters were made of shadow and could change form, also whatever they touched got hella cold and possibly numb/bleeding/whatever
⤷ Some of the monsters were ~made of mist~ and intangible but pretty much the same effect
⤷ The monsters showed up as blackholes or energy nulls to the sensitive
⤷ The moon was also shining
➥Day 93, Night, Beauty's Game
[ The Call is gentle, quiet and hesitant. In fact, it is almost not a Call, but if you heed it and follow it you'll find yourself walking through the woods and through the forest. The Call brings you to the Castle gate -- the one previously wreathed in mist and mystery. Beauty stands in front of the Castle, so transparent she is barely visible. ]

Hello my heroes, hello my knights. Today . . . today I will ask you to do this world a great favor. You may decline, you may go back to your cabin now. It . . . it . . . [ she trails off, briefly ] It may not be pleasant and your choices will be heavy.

If you choose to stand and fight for us . . . I thank you from the bottom of my heart. If you feel it may be too heavy for you to bear or you just don't want to . . . that's fine as well. I'm sorry for putting you in such a position.
⤷ Beauty's thread in the mingle
⤷ Castle exterior & The Gate/What the Gray Cubes Did
⤷ Part 1 & Part 2
⤷ Endgame
⤷ Every team and knight received memories
⤷ Beauty's game ended the long night on Day 94, morning
➥Day 93, Night, voices and puzzles
[For one reason or another—you don't hear the call, or you don't follow it to its destination—or simply because, on the way there, you heard voices . . . you find yourself wandering into the marsh woods, following the sound of voices, beckoning. The path ahead of you is unusually clear, and you find yourself in a clearing with a massive willow tree and a small pond that is so clear and placid that it might actually be a hole in the ground that looks into the sky, instead of a watery reflection.]

[I mean, you never know.]
➥Day 94, morning, castle exploration . . .?
[Regardless of whether or not you were around for Beauty's game, you may find yourself drawn towards the castle afterwards, now—the forest itself seems to be making it easy for you, with the paths much less full of mist and bramble than usual. In fact, there's hardly any mist at all, and the morning seems incredibly bright.]

[As well, the castle doors themselves are open slightly. You could probably go inside, if you felt inclined—there's a delicious smell coming from just inside, and you find a long table piled high with . . . basically every type of food you could want. If you desire it, it's there.]

[You could also go deeper into the castle if you felt adventurous, but maybe you should wait...]

OH JEEZUS WHAT

THE WEIRD UNLOCKS
TBH I am not going to say much on them. They were Unlocks that were weird noises meant to add to atmosphere but also THE WORLD IS GETTING UNLACED A BIT. THINGS ARE MOVING AGAIN. Currently they are as they seem. (This is not to say that later we won't have a Weird Unlock IC Explanation but currently it just isn't that important).

THE GRAY CUBES
Were needed to unlock the Castle door. Under the moonlight they showed A PATTERN THAT FORMED A KEY SHAPE WHEN FITTED TOGETHER.

SHADOWBEASTS
These were mostly player-run! And there is no real secret or anything behind them. They are pretty much what you see what you get.

BEAUTY'S GAME
Which was pretty much set up in a 'traditional game format' and there was the option for complete AatherDeath but it didn't happen so that doesn't seem to be terribly relevant.

In the Mingle Beauty answered some questions. There is some about rules and powers and Darkness. If you're interested in that!

The game itself just took place in the foyer of the castle. Part 1 was with doors on one side of the room and Part 2 was with doors on the other side.

FOYER:
[ It is clear that no one has been in the castle for a long time. The floor is covered in gray leaves and debris. There is a decided chill in the air and you can see your breath.

The foyer is shaped like a half circle with a high arched ceiling. Waaaay up above you there may be chandeliers, or just points of light. The room looks almost as if someone has cut it in half. To your left are four doors. To your right is what looks like a black wall, but on closer inspection is actually layers and layers of black thorned vines. Be careful when touching it, if you prick your finger you may feel very . . . very . . . tired. ]

Part 1

And basically people chose which of the four rooms to go into.
The Map Room
Stuff done here will come into play laaattterrrrrr, so there will be another write up about that later too. NEEDLESS TO SAY it was a pretty straight forward room. Not so much metaphor as related figures.
The Room of Figurines
This room was also related figures but the puzzle was a bit harder to figure out. Or a lot harder. The walls could be bent or pinched or moved and figures could be made. Some of the figurines could also be changed. There is very little impact that came out of this room.
The Room of Lanterns
GOSH YOU GUYS WERE SO CLOSE TO DOING SUPERWELL. If you did everything right the room would turn ntself into a boat on the scalding hot water :B Anyway, lanterns did not only need to be lit but the candles needed to go into the appropriate lanterns and then the floor needed to be unlocked.
The Room of Blood
The group actually performed the best option here! The other options would be just to smash the glass to begin with and let stuff out or cut all the wires and I guess drown in blood or something idk whatever.

Overall probably a middle score :|bbb Which impacted the doors for part 2.

Part 2
[ After everyone has made their choices and done stuff in their room and is standing in the foyer again something happens.

The vines that were wrapped so tightly against the wall start to grow. In doing so they 'release' their hold a little and reveal six doors -- all exactly the same in appearance (dark wood with scratches with heavy door knockers shaped like feet and simple dark red doorknobs). However the vines also somewhat obscure your path now. It will be a chore to get through. ]

And then there were six rooms. Though each room was identical and the choices given were identical as well.

The choice was basically 'die' or 'sacrifice others'. If Part 1 had been done SUPER WELL there may have been a third choice but there wasn't. So. Most teams picked die! There were some definite squabbles and attempted weaseling out of the price and so forth and so on. Also some discussion went down in the different posts about what can be done and such!

Endgame mingle/revivals which I haven't read but I assume is full of bitterness and sads. The world became BRIGHT and more VIVID and very clearly SAVED and the dark and weird desaturated forest-y bits and everything are gone! . . . as well as the people in the forest.

Also everyone received a memory.

During the game, some people who never made it to the game found themselves lost in the woods, where touching the glassy pond there swapped you to the other side of the pond. There were voices that were desperately trying to tell a story—or several stories. It's hard to tell; they were all jumbled up and out of order. But perhaps what they were trying to say was still relevant—?

HELP A MOD OUT
If you had a thread that you think your peers might be interested in, re: Plot or development (Anything you think other people who are :o plot!11?) would be interested in!) Pllleeeassseee link it here.

THIS WAS THE PLOT UP UNTIL NOW. We are doing a bit more wrap up today which maaayyy spill into tomorrow depending on what happens and how fast we get through this. If you want to exploradora the castle more we can backdate that but we want to get this wrapped up timely so! (And well, we can always backdate <3333)

If you have ANY QUESTIONS on what has happened you can ask them now. Or you can wait a bit and it may get answer. TBH I have no idea because I have no idea what your questions are :D;;; We will continue to spam the OOC comm with summaries and wrap-ups until we are done s-so PLEASE HANG IN THERE WITH US. GANBARE, AATHER!

PLOT SUMMARY, AKA WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED

WHAT DID YOU DO/FIND OF INTEREST/OTHER STUFFFF