⏳ THE SCORCHING ISLE: Oracle Event One ⏳

[beleos]

ARRIVAL

All Bearers have heard whispers of them - the Oracles. Mysterious and unknown entities of an abstract nature, they serve as the heart of each faction’s cause - both as a means to an end and a very real stepping stone in achieving their objectives. To claim an Oracle means growing ever closer to victory: to see your homes restored as they were, or to herald in a new one of your making.

So you go.

A Cornerstone has been set up for each faction; one for the Zenith and one for the Meridian in Yima’s manor and Heliopolis, respectively. They warn you that upon transportation, your safety cannot be guaranteed and there is no telling what waits for you beyond - to be prepared. To make sure you have whatever you deem necessary with you before you go, as there is no telling when - or how - you will be coming back. CONTINUED HERE...

NOTES

Upon your arrival, you woke up with an HOURGLASS NECKLACE. Please refer to the Time Mechanics on the OOC Summary and bottom of this post for details on its usage.

The COURTYARD is frozen in time. Player Characters and the Great Tree are the only signs of moving, free life in the courtyard. During the intro, time magic does not work.

Characters are free to investigate but cannot move beyond the courtyard if you choose a prompt during the intro. You may mingle among your fellow Bearers or speak with [MR. TIBBS] if you so choose. (Also? LOOK AT HIM HELP)

Iconoclasts and Stargazers will notice Aspect benefits/detriments now.

All characters will be weak for the 24 hours - think like mild flu - and unable to leave until Mr. Tibbs has dispersed them. This is the time in which any threads with the NPC will be carried out.

The INTRO concludes with said dispersal of PC’s once interactions concluded. They will be sent to a location around the castle of your choosing; they are free to move about freely from here. Your prompts can start with you waking alone or in the presence of others - whatever you’d like!

Your character will innately understand how to use time magic from this point forward. It will come naturally to them, like a skill they were born with.

CASTLE: OVERVIEW (p a s t)

The Scorching Isles is home to the Atirat, a people of sea-dwellers who have the ability to walk on land. (Think mermaids with the ability to shift back and forth between human and mermaid forms.) As such, much of the Scorching Isles is covered in large bodies of blue water and glistening pieces of ice to accommodate their lifestyle.

THE CASTLE, however, is what dominates the landscape and it's where the Shard-Bearers will be spending their time. The white castle with colorful glass windows is obscured by a thick layer of clouds and fog. Nearly every location on the island has a thin layer of fog that rolls through it, which gives the entire Island an inescapable chill. The castle has artfully built rooms with a CAVALCADE OF DECORATIVE ICE, lavish mirrors, and white plants accented with blue decorations. Several portions of the castle are submerged due to the aquatic nature of the native residents.

And everywhere you go, you find them - STATUESQUE BODIES FROZEN mid-movement. They are haunting reminders of the power in your Hourglass - the very real power to decide their fates.

The castle has many winding paths to explore, as castles often do. There are sleeping quarters, HALLWAYS, a wine cellar, and a few large rooms presumably for diplomatic affairs. Players can use these rooms at their own leisure for whatever purposes they see fit. (Exploration, combat, or supply gathering.)

However, many of these rooms will require some strategy to access their full potential! Atirat were much more comfortable being underwater than many Kenosians may be. Therefore, rooms of higher importance may be COMPLETELY SUBMERGED or require swimming through an underwater pathway to reach them. Very minimal supplies will be kept out in the open for all to reach. More desirable supplies - such as warm clothing, small weapons, treasure, and the like - will be located past or within one of these flooded areas.

Players may gather supplies within and preserve their Sand or use their Sand to make other rooms accessible and gather whatever lies within! The larger the asset you attempt to unfreeze, the more Sand it costs - and the more drained/vulnerable you will be as a consequence, so choose your path ahead wisely.

Currently, a pervasive fog is preventing you from wandering beyond the Castle's limits. Should you try to venture past it, your Sand will rapidly be stolen and you will find yourself suffering the same fate as the islanders if you don't move back to safety quickly... However, if you ask Mr. Tibbs what lays beyond the mist - he will tell you about the thriving farmland, the once-bustling village surrounding the castle, and the beautiful coral reefs beneath it. Sadly, they're beyond your reach - but maybe if the Bearers decide to unfreeze them when the week is up...

LIBRARY (s a f e z o n e)

The ROYAL LIBRARY - A treasure trove of knowledge, history, and glimpses of a fractured past scattered throughout. The lower floor of the Library is void of much reading material and contains several intricate-looking art pieces on decorative pedestals.

A spiral staircase dominates the center of the room, with its once delicate structure overtaken by sheets of formidable ice; it leads you toward the upper levels where a sea of books awaits. There are isles and isles of books, most perched on intricately carved shelves. Many books lay in piles or are discarded onto the floor, and scattered papers are common throughout.

Curious Kenosians may pick out books from the shelves and read on various topics, but players may also pass through this room on their way elsewhere. This area will function as a safe haven where violence and the taking of others' Sand is not allowed; do not disturb the books or Mr. Tibbs won’t be happy!

NOTES

Characters who wish to receive a book with lore specific to the island may comment [HERE]. You will be RNGed a book from a pre-written list of topics. The books may give you a deeper look into the island, its inhabitants, and its history! (Only 1 book per player! Please assume all other books they read are about commonly-available topics.)

THE EATING PARLOR (p a s t)

There are no basic amenities on the island. No hot water, no warm beds, and no salacious magazines (that you know of. heh heh). That would make the Eating Parlour a wise stop for anyone. After all, this could be the perfect chance to procure some provisions!

The EATING PARLOUR has all the equipment one would need for meal preparation. Dried plants hang from the ceiling, and the walls are lined with mason jars filled with every strange manner of presumably edible thing (Is that a head over there? Hmm… maybe you should check).

The parlour also comes with a garden under a massive windowed dome so that the inhabitants could have fresh produce at hand. Many plants have withered, but there are some salvageable plants if you know how to look for them. But beware… Some of the plants have a strange blue glow. These plants can spell potential disaster.

If someone should make contact with these glowing plants, they will crumble into glass shards - glass that will quickly burrow its way under the skin and curse that person with Blight. Blight will make all resources within that person's vicinity slowly age and eventually crumble to dust. (Which I relate to on a personal level tbh.) Iconoclasts will be immune to its effects.

NOTES

Please see the "Blight" section below for more information on its effects.

TREASURE ROOM (f u t u r e)

Faint singing can be heard coming from this room. Once you hear the song, it dulls your senses and leaves you in a haze. There is no stopping your feet from guiding you to it through the doors and into the Treasure room. The door slams shut at your back, sealed with a wall of ice and magic.

Players will find themselves lured to an icy chamber bordered by a ring of cold blue fire. There is a deep pond that surrounds the platform you’ve found yourself standing on. Beyond its glassy surface and crystal clear water, one can glimpse all manner of treasures - from crowns, jewels, ornate statues in various statues of repair, scepters, spears, and books that seem impervious to the water's cold chill.

As you come to your senses, you will find yourself frozen in place and at the mercy of a large statuesque being before you. This beautiful and horrifying figure in a perpetual song is the SIREN, the only Atirat you’ve seen in person. She measures nearly 20 feet (6 meters) from her head to the tip of her long-finned tail. She cradles an icy shard in her arms, singing to it as if it were a child.

She sits serenely in front of a large hourglass filled with white sand, which is bordered by a spear and a lance. Emblazoned in faint text at the base of where she sits reads: “The future lies in our hands.”

NOTES

Welcome to the Siren’s Chamber! Players must use their wit, charisma, or some good ol' fashioned elbow grease to escape the room or break the Siren’s magic. The Shard that the Siren holds contains dormant time magic that players may activate by using the Sand within their necklace. Players can access the future in 5-second intervals and use whatever they find in that time period to escape their predicament.

For example, if they activate the shard by using their time magic, that shard will begin to glow blue. The room around them will shift, and it could change to a point in the future where there is a sword nearby. If you can grab it, now you have a weapon! When the 5 seconds are up and time returns to the present, you will still have that weapon on your person. You may also try verbal communication if you’d like. If your character is someone who would try and talk their way out of a situation diplomatically, they may give it a try!

It is up to player discretion/creativity to think of a scenario you’d like. Each “future" does not have to be the same across player encounters! What one group experiences may be tailored to the player wants (because branching timelines exist). Let your imagination run free!

HALL OF MIRRORS (p r e s e n t)

Should you reach the rightmost wing of the massive castle Library, you will find a door hidden in the very back of one aisle against a wall; it looks as though the door used to be concealed by magicks that have since dissolved.

The stairwell leads down and into darkness. Once you reach the bottom, shimmering light cast from an unknown source beneath sheets of glistening ice will illuminate your new surroundings; you are in a maze of mirror-like ice. This labyrinth is silent save for the quiet creaking of shifting ice that may disquiet you and leave you uneasy regarding the stability of this area… but it holds beneath your feet.

Mr. Tibbs had told you that the “Kaleidoscope” - where your Sand is counted - rests through here, so eventually, you must brave the journey. Is it a trick of the light? Maybe the product of an especially active imagination…?

Did you just see one of your reflections move without you?

NOTES

Please refer to the OOC Summary for details on the Hall of Mirrors!

THE BLIGHT and TIME MECHANICS

BLIGHT

Blight is an infliction that will age supplies and infect people with a creeping disease that steals their Sand. For objects, this includes weapons, food, and items like cloth. It will take a few days to deteriorate things beyond use - so watching your supplies and acting accordingly is in your best interest. Generally, it will make it more difficult for PC's to get by given that their already scarce resources will dwindle and deteriorate - especially since it's 'contagious' through touch.

The Blight will not act quickly enough to severely hamper infected persons, but repeated exposure will cause effects to a person's body - notedly protruding VEINS in the face and extremities, a lower body temperature, and increased agitation. These effects start out mild and grow more severe with each 'dose.'

Characters must touch an object/person that is Blighted to become inflicted with Blight themselves. When that happens, it will become easily identifiable as Blighted from the faint blue, shimmering outline around the infected subject, as well as the WITHERED, FROSTBITTEN or ashy appearance it takes as it progresses.

However, there is one single perk with Blight. (Or is it a perk?) Players will feel reduced impact by the cold surroundings, making the climate around them somewhat more hospitable. Beware of falling victim to a chill you can't feel...

TIME

To use your Sand, each character is granted access to and innate knowledge of a spell they channel from their Shard that automatically manipulates their Hourglass. This allows the remote control of Sand (aka gathering and dispersing), as well as the ability to pull Fragments of time from Shards.

Fragments are literal pieces of you taken from your Shard. They manifest as memories or images displayed on little shards of broken glass (think of the memory being played out in real-time on the mirror's surface), and can be crushed to convert into Sand automatically, either voluntarily or by force. The only stipulation is that the parties must be close to one another, and the Fragment must be exchanged while both Bearers are still. This means someone has to give it to you, or you need to immobilize them before you take it - one way or another.

Once the Fragment is crushed, the memory and associated time of that person's life is lost and your character will suffer amnesia until the Oracle is claimed. How deep this goes is up to you; they could lose a large chunk of time - even all their memories surrounding a person or place for a big payload of Sand, or they could lose very little for a meager net gain.

Sand is automatically gathered or distributed by your Hourglass and added/subtracted to your running total. No need to micromanage. Convenient!

Please note that using Sand to unfreeze anything (resources, a door which can be then opened, etc) is an unpleasant experience. Each time you use Sand in this way, your character will be left feeling weakened and flu-like for an hour or two, which will leave them vulnerable. This effect stacks and scales up to outright KO-ing them for a few hours if they go crazy, so unfreezing too large of an area is off the table!

NOTES

• An OOC POST will be coming shortly explaining how Sand is going to be tallied and the Oracle claimed.
• Should your character attempt to unfreeze any NPC's, please respond [HERE]. NOTE: unfreezing NPC's may result in physical violence with CW's for severe mental instability/illness and a potential reference to self-harm.
• HAVE FUN!!!

CODING

Comments

[subsist]

[ There would have been more of an attempt at murdering the doppelganger if it hadn't gone after one of Kaeya's weaknesses. Diluc will always be a sore topic no matter how much time has passed (nevermind the thought of him basically being lost to the void—), a scar that never quite healed right. Stitched together as it is, Kaeya feels like he's about to fall apart at the seams.

This quickly turns into a looming possibility when a rush of flames (bright, burning, and alive) scares away the one on top of him, making it hiss as it reorients itself away from Kaeya and his saviour. For one, desperate, and pathetic split-second, he thinks to himself Diluc? and then quickly realizes the lack of red hair, red eyes. This is not the coming of dawn but rather smoke and ash, and Kaeya can taste the bitterness in his mouth.

His usual facade snaps back into place. He won't come undone here. ]

—my hero. [ He injects amusement into his voice, as if he didn't just come close to dying mere moments ago. ] I'll be just fine. You needn't worry about protecting me.

[ After all, this is his burden to bear.

His doppelganger takes the opportunity to dig into an opening. ]

You thought it was him, didn't you? Why would he bother saving the likes of you?

[ In order to shut it up, Kaeya sends a blast of pure Cryo energy down its way, hoping to freeze its mouth shut. All it does is send his spectre scurrying back into the shadows.

He turns to the other man. ]

Really, I can handle this.

[ Please be on your way. ]

[fishfearme]

Is that so? You were struggling before.

[Byleth's words and tone were blunt enough to bruise, but he eased out of his guard position and side-stepped a fraction, so he was standing at the man's side rather than standing protectively before him. His eyes scanned their surroundings, but the mirrors made it difficult to tell where their foe had slithered off to - no doubt scurrying about in the shadows, waiting for the time to strike like a viper in the grass.

Byleth could leave the man to it. He wasn't entirely helpless from the looks of it, but the nature of this magical trap seemed to work on psychologically torturing the individual to impair their rational thinking, and thus leave them vulnerable to attacks. Likely the man was concerned at whatever deep dark secrets the doppelganger would spill, or some other pride thing, but Byleth was unbothered by it all. If need be he will simply promise to forget all he saw and heard here after the situation was resolved.]

In any case, it's in my best interest to help you neutralise this threat, to ensure it doesn't endanger anyone else. I'll aid you, as and when you need it.

[subsist]

[ The spectre appears to have left them alone for the time being. Kaeya remains on high alert, keeping track of every mirror nearby, every reflection that might just turn on him once more. So far, nothing seems to be out of place so that allows him a moment to exhale slowly. He also takes the time to reorganize his thoughts, and think about what he wants to say. ]

I doubt it's interested in hurting anyone else. It might try to go after you, however, now that you've aggravated it.

[ He can't argue against the notion that it's probably a good idea to stick together for the time being. Not that he thinks he wouldn't be able to handle the spectre if it tried to attack him again, but if it continues to prey on things he'd rather keep close to his heart, then... ]

If you insist on sticking around, then I'd advise you to be on your guard.

[ Slowly, he finally rises to his feet, dusting himself off. There's some light bruising on his neck from the looks of it but he can only hope that will fade in time. He looks toward the path ahead of them. ]

I don't suppose you know the way out, do you? [ This maze is a nightmare. ]

[fishfearme]

[Byleth eyed the bruising around the man's neck before turning his gaze to their surroundings. He thought he would recall the path he took to get here - he had a very keen sense of direction - but the mirrors made him doubt his memory. This place was designed to disorientate. Very fiendish.]

I believe I came from this direction...

[He thinks. Anyway, it was better than standing still, waiting for the doppelganger to come at them again. However, he didn't move off immediately. He turned back to the other man and asked:]

Is your airway impaired by your near-strangulation? I can ease the swelling with my magic, if need be. It should only take a moment.

[subsist]

[ Quietly, Kaeya's hand goes to his throat, as if inspecting the damage himself. The flesh itself feels tender but nothing quite as drastic as feeling like he can foresee himself having trouble with breathing. So he shakes his head, tugs his collar upwards as if it's going to completely hide the damage done. ]

It's alright. There's no need to waste your energy on that.

[ He studies the area that this man claims to have come from, and well, that barely helps with anything when all directions essentially look the same. They need some way to differentiate where they've been or else they might end up going in circles.

He approaches one of the mirrors, placing one hand on its frame to completely freeze a part of it. ]

I'll try to mark the mirrors we've passed by. Perhaps it might help us find our way out.

[ Time to head the other way from where the man came from. ]

Is there a name I can call you by?

[ He might as well learn the name of his saviour... ]

[fishfearme]

[When the man rejected his offer for healing, Byleth dropped the topic without protest. He would know his own body's limits best, Byleth supposed. Instead, he just docilely followed the man's lead through the mirrors, his senses honed for any unwanted visitors attempting to ambush them from the shadows.]

I am Byleth. I'm a mercenary by trade.

[He deftly switched his sword from his right hand to his left, to mimic the greeting Kingdom nobles did when introducing themselves: hand over heart and a shallow bow. Shallow, since it was awkward to bow and walk at the same time. He straightened up quickly enough, but kept his blade in his left hand - he was ambidextrous, so it didn't matter to him which hand held his blade.]

What about you? What shall I call you?

[subsist]

—Kaeya Alberich. A former knight.

[ A mercenary by trade, huh. No wonder this man adapts easily according to the situation. All the better, Kaeya thinks, because at least this means he can rely on him for a bit while he tries to keep track of where they've been and where his doppelganger can attack from. So far, it's just the two of them.

Perhaps it'll stay that way. (He thinks this, and yet he makes sure to check every reflection they pass by just in case one is more sinister than the rest.) ]

I don't believe I've seen you before. Are you one of the recent arrivals?

[fishfearme]

[A knight? Byleth couldn't help but think he looked rather... flashy for the knights he knew, but he put the oddity out of mind. Different worlds likely had different aesthetics.

He had more important priorities than puzzling over Kaeya's dress code, anyways. His eyes scanned their surroundings as they walked, every sense strained for a potential ambush - if Kaeya's doppelganger attacked, he would lunge into action without hesitation]

Yes. I arrived not long before we came to this place. I come from a land called Fódlan. Yourself?

[subsist]

Fódlan? Then, you must know of Dimitri—

[ Any further attempts to learn about that are cut short when his doppelganger chooses this very moment to come back into the picture. A flurry of icicle spikes comes flying from the right side of the hall, aimed straight for Kaeya, but in no way targeting any vital spots. ] —watch out! [ It's the only warning he manages to get before he dodges out of the way too.

The spectre makes its presence known by finally revealing itself, an amused smile ghosting its lips. ]

Attempting to make a friend? That's a surprise, considering how long those connections last with you.

[ Kaeya ignores what it says before summoning a sword made out of ice, choosing to address Byleth. ]

... I believe this one came from one of the mirrors. At least, that's my hunch.

[ Why else would they be surrounded by so many of them? ]

[fishfearme]

[Byleth visibly perked at a familiar name- only to sharply snap into lethal focus when their adversary popped out of the shadows with a flurry of icicles and a mocking jibe on its tongue.

The majority of the projectiles was aimed at his companion, so Byleth only had to do a graceful sidestep to avoid becoming unfortunate collateral while Kaeya had to full on dodge out of the way. As his companion summoned a blade of ice, Byleth took his cue, sweeping a hand over his blade and letting flames - burning so bright they almost verged on white - burst into highly controlled life.

It was practically like plasma, but it was something he would have to renew frequently to maintain. Either way, the lingering heat the extinguished flames would leave would do well against any ice obstacles the creature may try to throw up. He shifted into a combative stance once he was done, primed to charge forwards the moment the doppelganger did.]

Perhaps we should try smashing the mirrors? [His tone is mild, like they're discussing which path to take in a park, rather than strategies for this strange foe of theirs.] It may worsen the situation, but it may solve it too.

[Magical traps to protect against tampering or whatnot. Also, bad luck in breaking a mirror...]