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a little dream of her | travel arc
Mar. 31st, 2023 06:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
groundrules
Ain't no bird like a Super train — especially one crossing Dream county. The log of the Dream county travel arc goes live on 3 April, covering three weeks from that time and including more details on the optional wedding mystery plot. Boarding scenarios for existing and new characters are covered under the Old Timers and New Arrivals header, respectively. Please click on the tabs for details!
OLD TIMERS
Shout out to Alem for being metaphorical and literal Hell. Absorbing Wrath, Licyn and Yelena’s sympathy and wisdom, King Deimar decides against joining his brother Haiva in ‘noble sacrifice’ to hell. Good news for the party, who depends on royal savvy to reach Alem’s otherworld transport beacon, buried in the labyrinthine tunnels beneath crumbling Alem.
- ■ Deimar and his paladins guide small groups back to the beacon — but the keypoint’s energies are particularly depleted following the war with Rathakku, allowing a handful of party members to make their way out.
■ Characters who have dropped or been swept by AC during Arc VI will go home. Shout to update your character’s canon point — they’ll briefly head into their world, recalling no in-game memories while there. They’re dragged back to Akhuras when the beacon fails.
The party must now head onwards east, boarding a dreamy steampunk train at a station near Hassir. Here, you can find exotic stalls featuring wares once intended for Alem &mdrash; from the latest travel fashions, to unlucky artefacts, heavy alcohol and narcotics. You can even purchase a domestic ghost.
Whether the Merchant supplies a ticket or false staff uniforms for you to proactively sneak aboard, don’t dally — this train runs like clockwork.
NEW ARRIVALS
You wake up to claustrophobia, ash and gravel in your mouth — and a sense of urgency: run. Midway through a slovenly, rattling underground corridor, you meet an irritable woman, who leads you out, at the foot of a serene, smoke-topped mountain.
The woman passes you a pendant that allows you to understand her and to communicate with others like you. You are one of many otherworlders brought into Akhuras by undead lords who seek to weaponise you, as they battle humans and each other for dominion. Don’t believe her? Look up. The holy citadel Alem yet burns before the dead armies of Rahakku.
The woman is Karsa, an associate of the elusive Merchant, who collects and leads otherworlders east, where ancient beacons can transport them home.
Regrettably, you’re late — you arrived with the unexpected last gasps of Alem’s dying beacon and must now catch up with the others, who’ve departed on the Sandman train express.
WHY THE LONG FACE?
Karsa barters for a carriage led by two nightmare horses, along with several such steeds for confident riders. These are mercurial mounts and dizzyingly fast — your only shot to reach a train travelling through Dream county.
- ■ Karsa warns you must not fall asleep during travel. The horses will invade your nightmares, consuming your vital energy while you suffer asleep.
■ Talk at all times or sound the shrill silver bells Karsa provides to wake up any sleepers.
You reach the seaside village of Kyari, where you must board the incoming Sandman express. Regrettably, the horses have left Karsa with just enough coin for one ticket for the wounded Dean Winchester. Everyone else: make do.
You must also help Karsa sneak in fist-sized, forbidden dream boxes. Try to avoid the Sandman’s guards and their canine sentries, who scent newly boarding passengers for such contraband. Return the boxes to Karsa once on the train.
You’ve got 45 minutes to board, once the Sandman reaches its rustic station. Some options?
- ■ Play stowaway and break the rustier locks of the economy class cars.
■ Sweet talk the depressed Conductor. You bought, but just… forgot your ticket.
■ Distract the guards while your group boards, so they can sneak you on after.
■ Plant dream contraband on another would-be passenger, when the dogs draw close.
■ Ride one of those god-forsaken horses and jump on top of the train once it starts moving, then make your way in through ceiling hatches. God help.
A fully veiled young woman might lend you a hand.
THE SANDMAN
All aboard… the Sandman, a majestic 100-car train that gallops on an emaciated railway across Dream county. Ghosts and dream residents wave as it passes by.
The Sandman stops once after leaving Alem, at seaside village Kyari, before crossing the abyss of the Cradle — the turbulent, storm-prone birthplace of dreams, where it is constantly night-time.
Some say the Cradle is only a cauldron for those who steal dreams or make them into living things. Others say the Cradle has its own mind.
To avoid igniting dream storms, passengers are strictly prohibited from carrying dream tokens and performing dream magic. Characters find powers are reduced while travelling on the Sandman.
New arrivals join the Sandman at Kyari with group caretaker Karsa, who introduces them to the old party.
- ■ The Sandman offers exquisite single-person cabins for First Class passengers, while Second Class travellers share generous cabins in pairs, and up to four voyagers can bunk up in… cozy Third Class cabins.
■ You can hide in the staff, luggage or coal stock rooms.
■ You can decide your character’s First/Second/Third Class, staff or stowaway status. (Please come up with a job, if staff!)
■ Amenities range from dining & bar carts to game, exercise and cinema halls where the (PG-13!) pleasant dreams you’ve gambled away can be viewed freely, or passengers can hold recitals or seminars.
■ Travellers are polite and social. You learn early on that you share a voyage with renown heroine and First Class passenger Firo, who, alongside her wedding party, picks up her bride Prassenze from Kyari.
■ Within two hours of leaving Kyari, the sky begins to darken, becoming pitch black and occasionally loudly stormed. It stays night time throughout your journey over the Cradle.
■ Whether you’re an insomniac or don’t typically need sleep, you find you fall instantly asleep at midnight and awaken refreshed by 8 a.m.
THE SMUGGLING
The new arrivals helped Karsa bring contraband aboard, but they’ve steps to go to their final destination. The sorceress doles out fist-sized boxes containing precious dream fragments of happiness, sadness, fear, surprise, anger, guilt or disgust — explicitly prohibited cargo that regains its magical properties once aboard the Sandman.
Each box comes with instructions for drop off under a dining hall table at midday, under a roulette table by 6 p.m. or in the coal room by 8 p.m. Karsa says the deliveries are an explicit favour from the Merchant to an old (dream thief) friend aboard the Sandman.
- ■ Pair up for your run! Those who hold dream boxes feel their emotions to a player-chosen degree of intensity, throughout their adventure.
■ Beware the vigilant guards of the Sandman, who run frequent searches for illicit dream artefacts. Some bring dream-catching dogs who catch the scent of the dreamed things.
■ You may feel unusually sleepy while holding dream boxes. Doze, and you wake up to find your dreams have summoned a wo/man, child or animal whose temperament embodies the box’s emotion. They can’t help drawing attention, but slowly disappear within 30-60 minutes — wait, are those the guards?
■ Caught smugglers are locked into ‘jail’ cabins, while their contraband is placed in the depressed Conductor’s office. First-time captives can be bailed out at ludicrous expense or in exchange for maid service, but repeat offenders are jailed
for the rest of the voyage. Liberate your dream box back from the Conductor’s cabin, if it’s taken!
■ Successfully delivered boxes feed into the mystery of the missing bride. You mysteriously fall asleep to a sweet dream if you wait to meet the collector.
THE GROUNDHOG WEDDING: A MYSTERY
Great heroine Firo’s bride Prassenze boards the Sandman from Kyari. She comes alone, veiled head to toe, and only brings a modest case. A shy thing, she is prone to silence and retires to her cabin at the earliest opportunity — a far cry from boisterous Firo.
So much so that members of Firo’s wedding party can’t help telling anyone who’ll listen that their friend is marrying this girl after courting her for six months through correspondence. This is the first time the two have met.
- ■ Firo’s friends plead or offer coin for you to coerce the loving pair to delay their marriage — or to sabotage the wedding, due to take place in two days.
■ An enthusiastic Firo meanwhile asks if you can help with celebratory clothing or wedding ornaments.
HERE COMES THE BRIDE...
No one forgets their wedding night — least of all brave Firo, who, vows performed, feasts and makes merry with her friends and timid bride over a magnificent feast in the dining halls. Everyone is invited.
The blushing bride excuses herself to freshen up in her cabin. Nearly an hour’s absence later, a worried Firo checks up on her — finding the bride’s cabin locked from the inside. Once the door is forced open, the partygoers — and you? — discover the cabin stormed, bridal veils discarded on the floors, and windows widely open as the Cradle’s nightmare tempests rage.
The bride has vanished.
Terrified, Firo questions everyone in earnest, accepting your assistance to find Prassenze.
...REDUX
You wake up next morning to find everyone reliving the same wedding day, which only fellow party members recall. Squinting outside, you see new landscape — suggesting the Sandman has covered a day’s journey.
The bride Prassenze is present again, but sharply different in appearance and manner. You can intercede over the day, but Prassenze somehow disappears again by the end of the second wedding day.
You wake up to a third wedding day, with only party members recalling the past two days. Prassenze looks and acts differently from the first and second wedding day — but once again vanishes in the locked bridal cabin, leaving the same clues behind.
- ■ There are three iterations of the wedding day (the first wedding day and two repetitions) in total.
■ Player characters can change events and investigate during the second and thirdgroundhogwedding days. Regrettably, Prassenze still disappears.
■ Non-PC characters and the Sandman’s crew only recall the third wedding day.
■ Evidence suggests the number of passengers aboard the Sandman has not changed — meaning the bride is alive and on board. Help a distraught Firo find her missing wife!
NOTES:
- ■ This is just a brief summary of the mystery, to give you a sense of whether you want to participate. More clues forthcoming on the log!
■ The wedding largely takes place in a small part of the train and can be neglected if you’d rather skip the mystery!
■ To confirm, for those who want to avoid trauma after Arc V, this is not a murder mystery.
■ Sign up a character in a RNG draw for one of three mystery-relevant NPC threads.
■ QUESTIONS.
PLOTTING & CR MEME
To plot, plan, scheme and make new CR, why not fill out the below and comment around savagely? Please list in the header if you play an old timer or a newcomer!