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wildestlogs2021-11-09 09:35 pm
wildestmods) wrote in wildestlogs2021-11-09 09:35 pm
HEARTSTONE TROLLMARKET ※ CAMP
HEARTSTONE TROLLMARKET
The Nightrenders and the Sisters stop following their prey once they get some distance into the woods. The protective aura coming from the shelter up north is full of deep protective magic.
It is a strange place. It looks like a massive cavern underground was somehow thrust up through earth and stone, until the roof and one wall cracked and fell in many places, creating a sort of canyon with rounded inner walls. If they look up they'll see a starry band of the night sky through the cracked roof. The rocks clearly crushed some houses and businesses but seem to have finally settled, so it's safe to wander around.
The way the ceiling opened was a source of far more tragedy than the falling rocks, though. When day breaks, they'll see the band of sunlight that cut through this community. Scattered through this band of light are large figures wrapped in sheets and blankets, tied in place with pieces of bright cloth. Little trinkets lay scattered at their feet. If anyone takes one of the blankets off, they'll see the petrified figure of a troll, their stone face forever etched in fear and surprise. It's clear from the cloth coverings and the trinkets that this is a people that cared for their dead, and that had community and family life. Among some of the trinkets are the drawings of children and dolls left for their lost loved one.
Market stalls have been ransacked, house doors are open, with larders of whatever this people ate empty, like the people here left very suddenly. Perhaps they felt the need to leave because of their sudden exposure - their community not thrust on the surface, the walls and ceiling holding back the sun crumbling.
Or perhaps the were nervous because of what was happening to the great crystal at the center of their world: the Heartstone. This great glowing crystal that got folded into the Wilderlands, was the nexus of magical energy of a world, its lifeblood, the beating heart of all magic. It sustained and protected the trolls.
It is cracked and dying. Dimming to a deeper color, occasionally flickering in a way that shows that someday it will dim completely. But not tonight. Tonight its nourishing, protective magic will keep the monsters away and give them some light in the dark. Even without the torches of the trolls, the Heartstone's light causes gems and crystals in the cavern - now a canyon - to glimmer with its protective light.
❧ Quest magic: Players can handwave that the quest bond magic ultimately tugged the group to the Heartstone, eventually teleporting any stragglers to it. Once the group is gathered there, no one can go far without getting teleported back.
❧ Time Period: The mods will set up a top-level for the night they all arrived, and a top-level for players to post their ongoing threads set over the ensuing days. Unless the group decides to leave faster, they will likely stay there for several IC days. (And the mods will probably allow this rest stop to run 1-2 OOC weeks, but will touch base with the playerbase on their preferences.)
❧ NPCing: No npcs are left in Trollmarket - the trolls have abandoned their now unsafe home. However, gnomes can be found wandering the canyon. The gnomes seem sentient, as they clearly speak a squeaky language that just can't be translated, but they're near feral, once the pests of the trolls. They're small, extremely fast, massively strong for their tiny sizes, and love to steal the belongings of bigger people. Groups of them sometimes gang up to carry larger items. They're also aggressive: prone to biting with their pointy teeth, and taking off their pointy caps and leaping at people to stab them with the pointy horns on the tops of their heads.
❧ Supplies: There is no human food in Trollmarket and the remains of any stalls advertising food make that clear. The trollish writing on the signs is translated by translation magic to Sylvaen, the language they've all gained knowledge of. Apparently the trolls liked to eat rocks and various minerals, socks stolen from humans, and cats. Fortunately, the cages from the stalls advertising the last one are empty, and the feral cat colony around Trollmarket makes it clear they weren't taken as emergency rations. (Occasionally there is a great racket as the gnomes and cats go to war.) However, there are resources like course cloth, woolen blankets, and sewing and cobbling materials. There are also leather goods like satchels, packs, and belts. There is rope. And waxy paper that can be used to wrap food supplies.
❧ Weapons: There are weapons that can be found in places, but not many. The trolls were not a peaceful people but they settled most of their problems with simple, non-fatal brawling, rather than anything crueler, only fighting against outside attackers. The few weapons that can be found are very large and heavy, clearly meant for war. They're built for a people that averages 8-10 feet tall and only the strongest and largest among the squad will find them anything but unwieldy. However, there are a few "small" knives of crude metal that can be used as short swords, and metal shields probably used as bucklers, that would work as full shields for normal-sized people.
❧ Forest resources: The woods around Trollmarket are safe, especially if traversed during the day. They're full of potential food, for those that know what to look for. There are wild blueberries, raspberries, and huckleberries, and enough flat, dark rocks to dry fruit in the sun. At the edge of a nearby pond are cattails, with edible roots, and reeds and grasses that can be used for basket-making. Dandelions grow everywhere, with edible flowers and roots, and there are edible marigold flowers. There's ample firewood, pieces of flint (though it takes time to find them), and wild game like deer and rabbits. The trolls' cookware, cutlery, and knives can be used to cook and dress animals, but might be heavy to take along. Water can be found in the pond (though it'd need boiling), or in small, cleaner springs in the woods.
❧ Spells: Archivists will find that there are little springs in the woods that they can draw spells from. The mods will make up random spells for Archivist players that request one.
Who's Hangry - Open
Karkat is making soup.
First step? Get a big fucking scalding vessel. Check that off the to-do list: Karkat has rolled a big metal pot out of one of the buildings.
Second step? Fill it with some fucking water. This was more of a pain in the nook, but he's managed.
Third step? Boil it. That's supposed to kill all the life in water, right? He can even do it without a fire: Karkat's newfound ability to heat metal might be his best consolation prize for turning up in this awful place.
Fourth step? Put food in it.
Hmm.
Karkat gives himself a firm smack in the forehead as he has realized he forgot the critical step of "finalize your plan before you start doing it." God damn has he gotten rusty.
But it's fine. It's cool. He was a fearless plan-making leader once, he can improvise. He fishes his mirror out of his pocket.
"I have a business proposition for all the rest of you members of this..." He gets stuck on it for a moment. "....Whatever the fuck we are calling this unsightly turnout of nonstarters we have going here."
He keeps going because he knows if he leaves this door open too long, every asshole with half a sense of humor is going to try to leap on the opportunity all at once.
"I am cooking. If you have something that won't poison most of us if we eat it, meet me by the big shiny rock. I understand that it may be necessary for me to sweeten the vessel beyond the effort I am already putting into this, so here it is: I'll heal one embarrassing bruise you've managed to acquire. Two if they're small."
[cw: dead animal]
But she will, when pressed. Which is why she pounces on the first bluejay she comes across - yes, it has a face, but it also has really gross scabby feet, so that kind of balances out, right? - and hoovers the blood right out of it. As with most animal blood, shit tastes disgusting, so she hopes that getting some actual home-brewed soup will take the bitterness out of her mouth. She shows up to Karkat's space, dressed in the modest and bland oversized clothes she's found in the troll homes and accessorized in very expensive earrings and some feathers braided into her hair for fashion's sake.
"I drained the blood out of it. I hope that makes it more easy to cook, not less." She drops the rat on the rock next to Karkat. "So, uh. Does the grey skin mean you're undead?"
Because if so, Caroline's going to get way more grateful that vampirism spared her her radiant skin and silky hair.
no subject
Karkat speaks with confidence and inspects the catch as if he is a guy who actually knows jack shit about processing meat.
He can cook a bit. It's a necessary skill when your parent is a big crab monster that can't work a stove. It's the turning a raw dead animal into a useful food component bit that's a little foreign.
How hard can it be, though? He can cut stuff with the edge of the sickle, right?
"Fuck," he says with sudden vehemence when she asks him what he is. "I should've just gone on a whole fucking thing about it in front of everybody. It would've saved me so much trouble and that, naturally, means past me didn't think of it. He is, as ever, a fucking douche."
He gives the dead animal a particularly dark look meant for past-Karkat, then his expression relents a little as he looks back up at Caroline. He's grumpy, but it's not about her.
"I'll keep this short: I'm a troll," he explains. "I'm from a planet called Alternia. I'm nocturnal. Humans are fucking weird to me in a nauseating number of ways, and ongoing review of the subject indicates humans think the same thing about my species." He rolls his eyes. They're definitely alien, with the amber sclera and the iris a dark grey flecked with bright red.
no subject
"Okay, cool, you're a troll. No need to get all worked up about it. You can' walk five feet in this camp without running into an alien or a werewolf."
Which is, to Caroline, very comforting. For once in her life, she doesn't have to hide what she is. She doesn't have to compel people to forget things about her, or speed out of sight when people walk around a corner, or have a double life between school and bloodshed.
"For what it's worth, you're hardly weird enough to get on my radar." Backhanded? Yes.
no subject
"Great. I'm glad we got that over with."
It's not quite nice, but it's still several notches down from where he was. This is about as diplomatic as he gets without realizing that he should maybe apologize for taking out some of his self-directed anger on a near stranger.
"You're one of the human vampires, right?"
He says it as if he needs to distinguish from non-human vampires.
"I guess that would make sense, unless there is a big cult of human blood drinkers I haven't found out about yet."
Honestly, if it were, it would be sort of comfortingly gruesome and homelike.
no subject
She brushes off one of the rocks so she can sit down without getting more dust and dirt on her outfit, which is already tragic in her esteem and as such cannot stand to become more disheveled. She peers over at his handiwork. "You know, maybe we should try veggies instead of a bird. It's hard to mess up veggies."
no subject
He continues to awkwardly clean the little carcass as he talks.
"Do you know any from around here? Cause my understanding of plants that won't invert a person's most internal of crannynooks is about dick all on my home planet, and this isn't even there."
Karkat sighs. It's not an angry huff so much now, he's honestly just regretting that he isn't super useful here.
Which is a thought that reminds him.
"Do you actually have any bruises you need fixed, or am I taking this on charity?"
no subject
She folds her arms, looking as if she's about to start tapping her foot.
"I heal naturally." Her shrug is a little self-satisfied as she says that. "I'm just here out of the goodness of my heart."
And after a moment, another shrug, although this one's sheepish. "And I want half of whatever soup you're making."
Re: Who's Hangry - Open
"This is, uh, quite the production you've got here," she comments. "I'm willing to hunt shit and give it to you for free, if that's an option."
Is her back still a raw mess of stitches? Yes. Does she know any of these people well enough to trust them using their magic on her? Absolutely not.
no subject
Karkat squints at Elle, both because that's his natural response to people he doesn't know (and is trying so hard not to become friends with) right now, and because she's weirdly familiar. Sure, she's been on the mirrors, but also...
"Are you sure? This is a limited time de-bruising offer. I'm not taking any rain checks for this. You can't just swagger on in to your claim on my long-expired goodwill a couple months from now."
People don't just help Karkat for free unless they want something, or are trying to make it into a joke at his expense. Well, most people. The other list is very short and every entry is emotionally complicated.
no subject
"I mean, I don't want to starve as much as anybody. And putting shit in stew sounds a lot better than eating it raw."
Which isn't so bad, as long as she isn't in Homid, but she's trying to keep herself in a form that can easily communicate with others as much as possible.
"I've got my own bag of tricks if I get injured, anyway. No point in wasting your healing bullshit on little old me," she gives him an innocent smile.
There's something in the way she talks and holds herself that might remind a bit him of Vriska, but if she was a nice person (somehow). It's not super noticeable, but since Karkat is someone who's spent a lot of time with Vriska doing her best to pull the strings, he might recognize some of the calculation underneath Elle's friendly demeanor.
no subject
On the one prong, who the fuck is he to assume anything is about him? He's over that garbage. Karkat's an unlucky nobody of no significance in the multiverse, it's fine, he can deal. That means it's super unlikely that a stranger should give a shit one way or another about manipulating him or playing him for a fool.
But on the other nub, it's just weird and he doesn't like the feeling.
"Alright, well, it's your corpse party." Karkat says, shrugging. "The more non-poisonous foods we have, the better off we are in the grand scheme that is not starving to death miserably in the woods. So consider the offer accepted."
no subject
Elle is somewhat excited at the prospect of food that isn't raw meat. She could be cooking more for herself, but it's a fucking hassle and eating in feline form is easier.
"I wanted to thank you, too. You helped me out back at the faire, I probably would've been fucked without you."
no subject
She's familiar, but... He's pretty sure he didn't help a human after the faire. He'd remember that.
What he'd helped was...
"...Were you the overgrown pouncebeast?"
He doesn't actually mean to be insulting, which is clear in his tone. That's just how the words come out of Karkat's mouth by reflex.
no subject
"Yeah, that's me! I swear I'm usually able to take care of myself, but you really got me out of a bad spot. Like I said, I would've been fucked if the creepy masked ladies had managed to get me back to... wherever."
no subject
"Alright. I guess this would be fair. In addition to not expecting other people to help me for free, I don't usually go handing out favors like cheap tobacco flutes either."
This is a blatant fucking lie.
"If you know anything about plants that aren't outrageously toxic, that would also be cool. I guess."
How do you have non-antagonistic conversations? It's too weird.
no subject
"Well I do, so expect more unsolicited aid in the future, because I don't work on a quid pro quo basis."
There, that's an semi-antagonistic way to tell him that she doesn't need favors to do nice things.
"I'm familiar with plants of the won't-kill-you variety," Elle confirms.
She's enjoying Karkat's clear discomfort maybe a little too much.