Stanifly

Dragonbone Liar

Lia didn’t answer Mr Sword Guy’s question, because she was too busy glaring at the crystal that had disappeared into his hand.

‘Hey!’ She dropped out of the air, her wings folding behind her as she landed on the ground with a thump. ‘We agreed. Killing blow gets the shard.’ She stuck out the hand that wasn’t gripping a crossbow. ‘Give it.’

~
Elsewhere...

All the villagers felt it.

A sudden chill in the late morning air. The taste of ash sitting in the back of their throats. There was no distant howl, no vengeful roar; only a mournful quiet that settled over their hearts. Some children asked why the adults looked defeated. The rest continued as they were, youth guarded by blissful ignorance. The village elders, regardless of where they were, looked towards the horizon. In their hands they clutched perfectly round, shining pearls.

At the village edge sat an elderly woman in a wooden armchair, her long grey hair braided into twintails draped over her shoulders. She lifted her hand and kissed the pearl it held, long and tender. Footsteps drew close behind her. She did not turn her head; she knew that her son stood behind her.

‘We should be going after them,’ he said.

He was angry. They all were.

‘We should never have let them pass,’ he continued. The words hissed out between clenched teeth, calm only for the sake of propriety. ‘Following their rules is never going to change anything. They slaughter and pillage our gods, and–and now we have lost the River Guardian! We need to avenge her!’

Ah, the fire of youth. She lowered her pearl.

‘It is good that you love her so,’ she said. ‘Her loss will be a difficult change for us to adapt to. But we will adapt, my child. As much as we love her, the River Guardian lives... lived for an age that spanned far before my own birth, and...’ Her faint smile grew crooked. ‘Our understanding of her has always been tenuous at best.’

‘Are you suggesting that she allowed herself to be felled?’ said the young man, incredulously.

‘I am suggesting,’ said the elder woman, serenely, ‘that fate has its reasons for the losses we endure in life. Let the pieces fall where they may, my child.’

A deliberately controlled hiss of breath.

‘I am grown,’ said her son. A beat of silence, where he seemed to ponder on a choice of words that he would not immediately regret. ‘I will not sit by and make excuses for the ignorant thieves that toddle through our lands at the bidding of their fat and greedy masters.’

He stormed off. There were many things she might say to stay him, but she stayed silent, thumbing the pearl in her hands.

Though they were far from the waters that lay at the bottom of the chasm, she heard it still:

The bubbling roar of a steadily swelling river.

~

Something was bad.

The hatchling had woken from its slumber, startled by the abrupt jerk that had shaken the ground. It wasn’t like all the other times the ground rumbled with familiarity. This one was different.

And the ground had been still since.

That was around the time the hatchling had begun to cry. Constantly. Insistently. Carrier had come before, when it cried. Carrier always came.

But the ground was still.

And the hatchling’s cries continued to echo into silence.

Forgotten Sands: A Divine Journey into the Unknown

ᦓ꠸᥅ꪀꪖ

Sirna was not fond of the Nighthares. They were impulsive, and self-indulgent, and did as they pleased. Typically, this was a combination of traits that would appeal to Sirna – if they were mortal. Being creations made by Sirna’s own metaphorical hand and twisted by the Patron of Nightmares’ certainly nonexistent hands, these Nighthares were decidedly not appealing.

Perhaps if Sirna so wished, they could admit that pulling the veil between the Dreamscape and the waking world was a slight blunder. Slight. For enabling the natural residents of the Dreamscape to wander the lands of Ashuru included the Nighthares themselves. The dream guides were free to pass through the veil, but they were pure and they knew better than to detract from the jobs Sirna had given them. The Nighthares did as they pleased; there was an irregular rash of nightmares blooming across spots of Ashuru, doubtless incited by the critters. Sirna would have to reign them in at some point.

For now, they were in the little temple of clouds that the mortals had dreamed up for them, with its walls of violet midnight and floor of glimmering stars. Sand gathered in a corner, grains trickling melancholy as it tried to crawl into the abyss the walls offered. As they were walls, it didn’t get very far.

Sirna had assumed their usual form, their waterfall pouring straight down through the infinite starscape. Today, they were curious. Today, they would look into that which had lurked in the back of their Dreamscape without so much as a hello.

Today, they scried for the identity of the planet that had woken from its slumber.

---

In the space around the Veiled Moon, a serpent the colour of gold cut through pitch darkness, gliding without care for its lack of wings. A second glance would reveal that it was not a true serpent – it had legs, eight of them, but they were all tucked beneath it as it glided round the planet, hidden against its furred belly. It closed in on the moon, until the fuzz of its chin kissed the moon’s powdery surface. Its body shrunk, a little uncertainly before it steadied, into a size that would be accommodated by the moon. It became no larger than a great whales wandering the depths of Ashuru’s remaining oceans. In its journey across the moon’s surface, it passed by a lone mortal, but she did not possess the magic that had lured the serpent and so she was ignored.

The serpent dived through fine powder without disturbing a single grain.

Beneath the surface of the Veiled Moon lay a latticework of silver webs. Thick, sticky structures that stretched end to end, criss-crossing without ever touching one another. As it turned out, the surface of the Veiled Moon was a compact shell of indeterminate powdery substance, with the occasional sinkhole crumbling through the spots where the lattice wasn’t present to support it. Somewhere among the lattice wandered a mortal who seemed to have grown bold in the absence of a god who would intervene.

He would have to settle for a god’s creation instead.

The serpent curled around a horizontal web column, above the human that had so insisted on trespassing on divine property.

What business have you here, mortal? It did not have a true voice. The words impressed themselves against the mortal’s mind, leaving behind the sensation of a great rumble. The serpent blinked slits of sky blue. The claws of its eight legs dug further into sticky webs. This place was not built to be a playground for you little things.

~

ACTION LOG

• NIGHTHARES: The Nighthares have taken advantage of the loosened barriers between the Dreamscape and the waking world, and are now essentially unchecked pests. They share the same qualities as a Phantasm, so they cannot physically harm mortals, but they can infect their dreams to turn them into horrible, sleep paralysis nightmares. They were already doing that sporadically, infrequently in the Dreamscape (no more than the usual nightmare with every other mortal), but access to the waking world means they can infect a whole village's dreams at once, just for example.

• In short, the Nighthares learn geographical convenience.

• SIRNA: Sirna is aware of the Nighthare problem, but is more interested in pursuing other matters instead. Like Ashuru being a sleeping being this whole time? What's that all about?

• HAZY (Out-of-Domain): Interest piqued by the sudden pause in the dreams of a previously unnoticed entity, Sirna scries to observe the awakened world and what form and/or identity it might have taken on. (In other words, they're trying to scry the Woman-Who-is-Not-a-Woman... I think. Or maybe not.)

• -2 Conviction

• THE VEILED MOON: A Phantasm - a gold, furry, eight-legged serpent - takes it upon itself to confront the mortal hiding within the core of the Veiled Moon.

Conviction Balance: 8

Interactions: @JFK

◈ 𝐂𝐀𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐒𝐈𝐒 | Κάθαρσις ◈

Caught in a Snare

@Tlazolteotl@silver21@DaftJive

It wasn’t long after the ceiling opened up into a gaping abyss that gravity reasserted itself, ensnaring Vicis into its inevitable hold once he reached the climax of his leap.

Uh oh.

After a few seconds of freefall, however, Vicis met solid ground with an abrupt whumpf. Wherever he had landed himself in, it was dark. Not a cave, surely, for the ground beneath his scales was not of stone or dirt. The only light source available was weak and drowned by thick silhouettes that looked suspiciously like the vines that had snatched Damien away. Vicis flicked his tongue. There it was, that unmistakable scent of lavender and sweat-drenched human.

...That isn’t right.

Slowly, Vicis turned towards his tail, lifting it up in one simultaneous motion. Dangling by the point of his pincers was Silas, clutching onto whatever he could reach of Vicis’ tail with those brightly coloured fingers of his for dear life.

‘Bold, human,’ rumbled Vicis. ‘But I am not a steed for you to ride upon.’

He lowered his tail so Silas could drop himself off to the floor, but the sound of another voice brought his attention back to the glimmering slits of light.

‘Oh, you thought you could escape me. How cute.’

A new scent had joined the conglomeration of plants, lavender and sweaty human – sharp, distinct and oddly reminiscent of wildcat fur. This one sounded like bad news. The thought was immediately proven right by the newcomer’s next words. Vicis tensed.

Humans were the only ones in the Wild Lands to think of putting others in chains. Was it really so surprising that the residents of the Hell they so strongly believed in would do the same?

He moved closer to the slits of light, trying to peer through them.

Adventure is Out There!: An Amazing Digital Circus RP

@silver21

hello caine plush :D

◈ 𝐂𝐀𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐒𝐈𝐒 | Κάθαρσις ◈

that's so true honestly.... I need to fix my sleep schedule... #WhenWillWeLearn 😔

ty for your patience 🙏🏼

◈ 𝐂𝐀𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐒𝐈𝐒 | Κάθαρσις ◈

omggggg time is flying like crazy HOW

I will get vicis up tonight (in like. 4 hours ish eta or smtg) (if I accidentally fall asleep tho I'm v sorry 😔)

Adventure is Out There!: An Amazing Digital Circus RP

CLOVER

with POMNI and ZOOBLE

‘What do you mean you don’t know a Ragatha?’

Zooble’s rising voice has Clover’s attention drifting back to the spot where Caine hovers. The arguments between them and the AI are nothing new, but it looks like Caine’s words are agitating them more than usual. Considering what Clover is hearing, that's understandable. If Caine's beginning to confuse them with NPCs, that was... bad. Really bad.

‘Yeah,’ he mutters back to Patch. ‘Not sure what he’s playing at here.’

Pomni is still over by Gangle and Riff’s sides, but that doesn’t stop her from staring at Caine with dawning horror. Clover is abruptly reminded of her second day here, how she tried to bring back that gummy crocodile NPC and lost him near immediately. He doesn’t want to imagine what she might be thinking right now.

Call it whimsy, call it impulsiveness – whatever spurs him to action, ultimately, is an effort to keep the situation from derailing any further. He’s seen enough arguments with Caine that he’s not expecting this to come out in anything other than a resentful stalemate (or the ringmaster getting his way, anyway).

‘That’s not even a–what the [%$!#] are you talking about?’ Zooble is sputtering now, in the wake of Caine's oblivious offer.

‘Caine,’ he says, stepping up to them. He nods apologetically at Zooble for interrupting before continuing in his indifferent tone. ‘Buddy, you’ve got the whole rest of us waiting here to play your adventure. That’s, what, a 90% success rate? No harm in letting Zooble sit this one out. Maybe they’ll get enough rest to join in on the next one.’

‘Clover!’

His only response to their snap is a look and a shrug. Zooble’s ire doesn't last long; probably because they know what he's trying to do. With a harsh sigh, they fold their mismatched arms and look away.

Forgotten Sands: A Divine Journey into the Unknown

ᦓ꠸᥅ꪀꪖ

Strange things were happening. Sirna found this to be the usual state of affairs the world constantly found itself in. Corrupted dream guides running around; incoherent snippets of thought that came from something that was neither god nor mortal; and a new dimensional space brushing up against the Dreamscape. That last one was a fascinating concept. Sirna was fairly certain that the mortals dwelling within it had expired from the waking world, but instead of existing in a dreamless limbo, they lived as they did in life, surrounded by bountiful blessings. They played, they ate, they dreamed – that was how Sirna came to know about the dimension in the first place.

(Admittedly, that was how they came know about most things. Mortals were useful like that.)

Sirna wasn’t much concerned about those things at the moment. They were busy staring at sand.

Shifting landscapes weren’t unusual in the Dreamscape. Permanence did not exist here and consistency less so. This sand shifted around but it did not fade in and out of existence. Its form was loose but did not become inconsistent.

This was not a product of the Dreamscape.

Sirna, currently a wooden teaspoon resting upon the surface of this sand as it rippled and rolled across the lands of the Dreamscape, could not sense much thought from the sand. It possessed instinct of a kind, and it was certainly a visitor from the waking world, but when Sirna had attempted to find its waking counterpart, they could not. This creature of sand, no matter its origin, seemed to be a permanent resident of the Dreamscape now.

The realisation had been displeasing at first, for Sirna was immediately reminded of the shaman who had attempted to flee the waking world by taking refuge in the Dreamscape. Further observation of the sand quelled that displeasure, however. Even within the boundaries of the Dreamscape, it kept moving, seeking... something. Whatever it was doing, it did not remain idle. And so Sirna had decided to see where it would go and what it would do when it arrived there.

(Perhaps it was searching for a way back to the waking world. Sirna had considered sending it back directly, but the thought of offering a direct answer to any creature’s problem was far more disturbing than tolerating this odd singular consciousness.)

You have been neglecting your duties.

Sirna was immediately regretful, in that they should have chosen a form more capable of turning over than a wooden teaspoon. The black thundercloud trailing above them now was an irritating sight.

‘On the contrary,’ said Sirna. ‘Your greed knows no bounds if the moons proved insufficient for you, Patron.’

You call it greed, rumbled Oblivion. I call it sense. How is a singular action sufficient for accomplishing anything?

‘You tire me.’

And why have you adopted this form? What have you deemed more important than overseeing the spread of oblivion among mortals?

There were many things more important than drowning Ashuru in eternal oblivion. If everyone despaired all the time, then it would become their new normal and acceptance would take the reigns. What was oblivion without the light of hope casting its shadow?

Instead of explaining any of this, Sirna said, ‘Sandbathing.’

Oblivion’s thundercloud sparkled with lightning. Much of what it said next was lost to Sirna, on account of them dismissing its rambling tirade as a waste of their godly faculties. Did the Patron of Oblivion not have better things to do with its time? If it came from beyond the boundaries of whatever made up their reality, surely there was some other Ashuru out there with some other Sirna that it could bother. Why fixate itself here?

The sand had stopped moving.

Before it sat a dream guide – or more precisely, a thing that used to be a dream guide. It still bore the silhouette of a hare, but its skin was that of the void. Wafts of black scentless smoke streamed off its fur-less coat.

It lunged. Upon contact, Sirna’s teaspoon exploded into a fine mist. They were fine, of course. The not-dream guide sunk its paws into the sand, black eyes flashing.

The sand began bubbling. It did not howl, but the stench of misery rose from them both. Some of the sand began clambering up the hare’s paws, up its arms, up its neck. On it went, until the sand coated the entire hare, snuffling the smoke that came off of it.

Oblivion, who had finally ceased its rant when the hare had attacked, spoke up again.

Is that not the work of Nightmares?

’It meddles,’ muttered Sirna, now a thin curtain of mist. ‘I am not prone to violence but it was smart to hide itself after interfering with my creation. You Patrons are all the same.’

And what of the earthly material?

‘A mystery. Look.’

Oblivion looked. The hare was shaking off the sand, spilling grains far and wide. It seemed larger. Its smoke thicker. Somehow, it seemed satisfied. The hare scampered off. Particles of sand began inching in different directions. The larger clumps stayed where they were, unmoving. All of them radiated despondency.

‘They do not wake,’ said Sirna. ‘They cannot, because they are not asleep. They exist only in this realm.’ Its mist glittered orange. ‘I do not know if that is preferred.’

The creature... the Nighthare’s touch on the sand would linger for as long as the sand was trapped within the Dreamscape. A nightmare that couldn’t be woken up from – now that was a concept that intrigued Sirna. They did not like the idea of mortals sleeping their entire lives away, but perhaps an alternative could be arranged.

Sirna reached for the veil between the Dreamscape and the waking world, and tugged.

...

Night had befallen Gabung, but not all were asleep. By the firelight, a handful of villagers were inscribing their observations the night sky into soft clay. Oyuna was among them, carefully indenting marks in the clay that mirrored the patterns of the flickering lights in the sky. Their fascination had begun when someone had pointed out the shapes that those lights made every night. Now, they studied the night with a fervent passion, pondering over all the meanings that it might hold. Tonight was no different.

Then someone gasped, and Oyuna lifted her head, and everything was a little different after that. She would not expect her fellow villagers to begin giving thanks to the sun for allowing them to see the night sky. She would not expect them to begin resenting the moons for challenging the starlight. In the present moment, there was no way for her to expect any of these things.

That was alright, though. For in the present moment, she was content to gape in awe at the glimmering winged serpent, silver like cobwebs in the morning dew, slithering in between the stars of the night sky.

...

Pulam hated gathering firewood. It was boring, and it was repetitive, and he didn’t care how many people told him that it was good for “finding inspiration” in the “wilderness”, he would rather be home mixing paints than picking up sticks!

And it was cold! The sun blazed overhead with mocking cheer, and Pulam was still shivering in his garments!

‘This is stupid,’ he muttered, bending down to pick up another loose piece of wood. ‘Everything is stupid. The gods are stupid. The sun is stupid. The weather is stupid.’

Hey now. You’re going to upset someone.

Pulam dropped his bundle of sticks. He blinked very hard, blinked again, slapped himself across the face, and then simply stared. Hanging from the branches of the tree in front of him was a red monkey, with the bright yellow head of a bird Pulam had never seen before. Its beak was extraordinarily long.

Impossibly, the beak opened and shaped more words that Pulam had only ever heard another human speak.

Are you going to pick all that up? You’re making a mess.

Pulam shrieked.

...

In a small community built on stilts above shallow waters, a shaman was woken from his nap by an urgent tugging on his elbow.

‘Father. Father!’

‘Mm,’ he mumbled. ‘What is it, Eka?’

‘Wraith!’

His eyes flew open. His daughter, crouched down next to him on his bed of straw, pointed at the room’s arched entrance.

There stood someone with a face – if faces could be a smudged smear of skin, with no indeterminate features.

Adi began to shake.

‘Gifter help us,’ he whispered.

...

One of the larger clumps of sand had formed a question mark on the ground.

‘So you are sentient,’ said Sirna. ‘What a fascinating thing you are.’

~

ACTION LOG

• SIRNA: Sirna encounters a sabulon wandering the Dreamscape and hitches a ride on its back as a wooden teaspoon. The Patron of Oblivion is as unhappy as ever and starts picking at Sirna like a nagging parent. A dream guide corrupted by the Patron of Nightmares (as seen here) shows up and makes the sabulon sad for the foreseeable future. After dubbing the corrupted dream guide a Nighthare and witnessing this turn of events, Sirna decides that bringing dreams and mortals closer together might be an interesting endeavour and, in a manner of speaking, opens the floodgates.

• LUCID (In-Domain): Sirna thins the boundaries between the Dreamscape and the waking world, allowing the creatures of the Dreamscape to travel between both realms freely. These creatures range in sapience and sentience, and can take any form. Ever dreamed of a tiny, talking box? That's a thing now.

• These creatures will come to be known as Phantasms.
• No matter their form, they do not possess a solid body. They can choose to interact with the environment or pass through it, but they cannot physically interact with mortals capable of dreaming (i.e. humans, Changelings, animals... do Fae dream? Idk.)
• Oddly enough, they can't interact with physical objects either. They can summon their own, though (made of pure Dreamstuff™).
• The vast majority of sighted Phantasms, no matter how odd, will stay close to forms that are known to mortals. Forms that resemble undiscovered concepts - e.g. a talking lamppost - are exceedingly rare and only serve to confuse or scare a mortal shitless.

• MORTAL: Oyuna and the other budding astronomers of Gabung spot a silvery, translucent serpent in the night sky.

• MORTAL: Pulam collects firewood and meets a talking red monkey with a yellow crane head.

• MORTAL: Śramaṇa Adi, in the little left of his village, wakes up to a spooky figure in the doorway, that which his daughter confuses with a wraith. He is, understandably, spooked.

Conviction Balance: 9

◈ 𝐂𝐀𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐒𝐈𝐒 | Κάθαρσις ◈

Teresa’s Catharsis

@Tlazolteotl@silver21@JJ Doe

The server came by to top up her whiskey. Blond hair, lanky frame – it was the same young man who’d greeted her when she’d first been pulled into this strange place. He kept his carefree smile, but his eyes told another story as he poured her drink. He disapproved.

Teresa’s response to that was to raise her glass and take a long sip. He left without another word.

Neither Jay nor Sirpa seemed overly disturbed at her blunt admission. Which was... well, it wasn’t good – nothing about this, about disregarding every protocol the Council had drilled into her, was good – but it was better than having to deal with civilians who bought the candy-coated perception that heroes could be who they were without any risk involved. They literally fought people who made it their life’s work to kill and hurt people on a daily basis; the number of people who thought death wasn’t a part of the equation was frankly astounding.

Teresa put her drink down.

‘He didn’t know it was me. And by the time I realised who he was, it didn’t matter anymore.’ A faint smile tugged at her lips. ‘We have our differences, but we share the same goal. He–’

He has my back, was what she would’ve said, if the words didn’t catch in her throat.

She trusted Caden. She did. But he’d known about the truth behind the Council and he hadn’t said a word. Had he thought she’d known? Did he think she wouldn’t have believed him if she hadn’t?

Or maybe, she thought, I was the fool to have followed the Council without question.

Whichever it was, it was a fruitless mental exercise without Caden himself present to give her his answers.

‘I trust him,’ she said instead. ‘I trust him because he chooses to be more than the role society forced him into.’ She traced the rim of her glass with a thumb. ‘Actions over words, I suppose. That’s what worked for me.’

◈ 𝐂𝐀𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐒𝐈𝐒 | Κάθαρσις ◈

teresa will be incoming today (mayhaps in 12 hours time), sorry for the wait ya'lls :"""") @JJ Doe @silver21