Silly Plots 3: With government backing we can make it very silly

[5a Violista]

[Mindscapes]

The two can keep on take as much time as they want discussing. After all, if they take too long, nothing bad will happen - one of them will just wake up and leave the other here alone, until that person eventually wakes up too.

Makuro will feel a sudden chill, like maybe a cold breeze went by and she had kicked her blanket off or left a window open or something before sleeping.

Rachel, on the other hand, is getting closer to waking. To her eyes, some of the doors around have started fading away. They're still there, but they're just beginning to vanish.



....
Anyway.
They go through the door with the moonlight shining through the glass.

As they could deduce, it leads to a small village. The air is stagnant, and it feels cool - but a nice kind of cool, after a hot day. The street is lit by the moonlight and the stars, but there's no other lights or people immediately around. There are signs that there were people around earlier today, however: there's things spilled from the street market earlier today that are only spoiled, not rotten. No signs of any animals, either - no raccoons, stray cats, stray dogs, bats, mosquitoes, or anything.

It's just...silence.
Like everything vanished.
Only shadows cast by the moon remain.
And it definitely feels like there's something hiding.

Unlike the previous doors, there's nobody immediately around. Guess they'll have to go searching.

The moon looks like Earth's moon, however. So that's good, I guess. The star pattern suggests....well, there's no north star visible and constellations look weird.
However, if they stray a little bit away from the doorway, lights will suddenly exist in the distance: a burning house straight ahead, outside the village boundaries, and a campfire off to the west, by a lake. (...assuming that direction is west. The stars are strange, and there's no guarantee the moon raises in the direction it normally would.) Presumably people are there, too.

[Reinholdt]

[Mindscapes]

Rachel rubs her eyes and yawns. She was... Getting sleepy? Weird. At least, that's the best she can figure with the doors blurring and fading.

"Yeah, that works. Let's go," Rachel says, opening the moonlight door and stepping through.



The thing that catches Rachel's attention the most here is definitely the lack of sound. Her ears swivel this way and that but to no avail. "It's so creepy." Rachel shivers, but takes note of the burning house. "There, let's go!"

If she stopped to think about it, the house probably caught on fire because its inhabitants suddenly and mysteriously disappeared and the campgrounds to the 'West' is a much better choice. But she doesn't.

[Gnrlshrimp]

[Dark Forest]

Krayger nods and follows after the skeleton.
”So. One of you is a mage, I’m guessing?” Everyone knows wizards love towers. And Krayger has seen enough living in them to believe the stereotype. Not that he’s the kind to judge anyone for matching any architectural stereotypes. After all, he loves a good maze.

[Dark Forest]

As they walk along, the forest gives way to a remarkably well-tended garden, with row upon row of fresh, tasty vegetables.

Somebody is clearly a very keen gardener.

Probably the skeleton.

He is holding a shovel after all.

"Oh yes, Felix is quite an accomplished mage. Why do you ask?"

[Deathkeeper]

[Dark Forest]

Krayger shrugs.
”Oh, you know. Tower in the middle of the woods. Everyone I’ve seen has been owned by a mage. And I’ve seen quite a few.”
He’s not really sure why. Wizards never seem to live in a nice ranch house with less stairs to deal with.

[Earl of Purple]

Mindscapes

Makuro's going to turn around, look at the door they just came through and the house it's hopefully attached to. But she's going to lope towards the burning house, her long limbs and a slight supernatural enhancement to her speed probably meaning she leaves Rachel behind, though not deliberately. She wants to see if she can help anyone escape from the burning house.

[5a Violista]

[Mindscapes]

As they get closer to the house, there is a sound that they can begin to hear: the burning, crackling, and popping of fire.

And the village houses move closer to them, after leaving the village boundaries. Everything's closer, and there appear to be more houses in the village than when they were in it. Like, the houses are multiplying or something.

Makuro arrives at the burning house first.
There's no signs that there's actually people currently around, but there is the smell of gasoline, and there's some flaming torches on the grass that are almost burnt out. It looks like it was arson, or something. Recent, too.

Rachel, who's farther back, might notice another person. She's coming from the west, from where the campfire was, and is running towards the burning house too.
By her stature and body type, she's probably a young teenager. Black hair, dark skin. Wearing either a skirt or dress.
It's too dark out to really see anything else about her.

[Reinholdt]

[Mindscapes]

Rachel could keep up with Makuro if she dropped to all fours and ran like a cat.
...
She doesn't do that.

But she does notice that other person and starts veering towards her slowly so as not to spook her. "Hey! Hey there!"

[Earl of Purple]

Mindscapes

Arson? That's not good. Makuro comes to a stop next to the house, listening for noises within other than the pops and crackles of the flames. She's really hoping there's nobody inside, because she's never been in a burning building before and doesn't know how fireproof she is. She'll kick one of the torches, before gathering the ones that still burn and trying to stub them out in the ground, like they were simply massive cigarettes or something. She doesn't want one to roll away and set fire to one of the other buildings; that'd be bad. So would another house catching fire from cinders landing on its roof, but there's nothing she can do about that presently.

[5a Violista]

[Mindscapes]

For reference, the burning house is two storeys tall.
Makuro can easily put out the torches, because the soil is rather moist.

And there's no other sounds other than Makuro, Rachel, the new girl, and the sounds of burning.


The teenager looks over at Rachel, but doesn't slow down her running. "Hey, did you see what happened? Did everyone get out?" Luckily, that girl saw Makuro and Rachel running up to it so she doesn't suspect them of being the cause.

She keeps on running until she reaches the burning house. Upon arriving, she immediately starts trying to climb the outside wall, so that she can reach the top floor without going inside. "Come on, call out so I know where you are!" she yells at the house.

Meanwhile, anyone who looks inside the house's windows or doors will notice a wall collapsing and the ceiling sagging from the heat.

[Reinholdt]

[Mindscapes]

"No. Everyone in the village is missing. Who are you?" Rachel asks, slowing down her running a little so she doesn't bite her tongue as she talks.

Which means she's last to arrive at the scene. "Hey wait! It's dangerous! The structure could be unstable!" Rachel says, worried for the person just climbing the building recklessly.

Rachel herself looks around for a water source of some kind. A well or a pump that might be considered nearby.

[Earl of Purple]

Mindscapes

Once the newcomer starts to climb the wall, Makuro leaps onto the wall herself to help her- and possibly persuade her to climb down and let Makuro take over. "Climb down, young miss! I'm better at climbing than you are. If anyone's in there, someone would need to climb in and get them- I'd rather that were me, I'm older." She should climb the house easily; her hands and feet are like a gecko's feet, and stick to most things, even glass. Though wet glass can prove problematic.

[Shadowcaller]

[An Epic Journey]

Ambrosia studies the two but says nothing, shrugging if Thariza turns to her for any information about "lunars". She had no information about those at all it seemed. She mostly seem preoccupied by taking notes.

[5a Violista]

[Mindscapes]

"This is my house," she calls back at Rachel, in response to the 'who are you' question.

The teenager doesn't care what these two other people think. They can't stop her from climbing up!
"Patrícia, Francisco! Don't worry, I'm coming! Dad? Mom! Where are you?" she calls out. She keeps on climbing the wall.

Makuro can climb much quicker and incredibly easily, arriving at the top before the girl even reaches halfway up. Looks like...a bedroom with a crib in it. Empty, no people, and it looks like whoever was in there left in a hurry.

Meanwhile, Rachel will remember there was a well back in the village.
When she looks back for the well, she'll notice that the village is significantly closer than it ought to be. Like, it's almost just behind her and the well isn't too far off.
Probably another one of those dream-things.
The well's got water in it. If necessary, there's also all that moisture in the dirt. Or the lake off in the distance by the campfire. She's got her pick of whatever she wants.


But then!
The wall that was sagging earlier finally collapses. Turns out it was a very important structural part of the house, too.
The center of the second floor collapses down onto the first floor. Half of the bedroom Makuro was looking at is now lying on the first floor.

[Reinholdt]

[Mindsapes]

Well that didn't answer Rachel's question at all! Ah well.

The village being that much closer kind of freaks her out too. Like maybe the village ate everyone. N-no, that would be silly. Even for a dream. Right?

Rachel's nowhere good enough to suck the moisture from the ground, nor get that lake water in the distance. But the well water might do. She does a series of beautiful maneuvers that would look good animated in order to bend the water out of the wall and throw it at the fire in a semi-continuous stream.

[Deathkeeper]

[An Epic Journey]

”Willa. And yeah, I’m just here to buy a chunk of magic wood. All there is to it.” the centaur calls, thankful she didn’t need to use magic for this one. And that Corvus has managed to look a little less terrifying for the negotiations.

[Earl of Purple]

Mindscapes

"I don't see anyone inside, and it's starting to collapse. Don't go inside unless you see them and they need help. The won't want you to risk your life needlessly." Makuro honestly doesn't know if the girl's family are inside and unresponsive, or out of the house for whatever reason. She hopes they aren't inside, and moves to check another window.

[Gnrlshrimp]

[Dark Forest]

Krayger shrugs.
”Oh, you know. Tower in the middle of the woods. Everyone I’ve seen has been owned by a mage. And I’ve seen quite a few.”
He’s not really sure why. Wizards never seem to live in a nice ranch house with less stairs to deal with.

[Dark Forest]

"Good point, it is quite a common wizardy thing to do, isn't it? Never really questioned it much, myself. Felix has a pretty good reason for doing the whole tower thing himself."

The pathway ends in a set of simple stone stairs leading up to a set of oak double-doors. The tower looms overhead, the smooth, pale stone looking so well-preserved as if the whole building was just made yesterday.

Lucas pauses with one hand on the doors. "Oh yes. How are you with animals?"

[Deathkeeper]

Dark Forest

Krayger shrugs at the question.
”Not as good as my nephew, but good enough I think. Got a pack of pets, then?” Having creatures in your tower is also not unusual for wizards. Maybe even some livestock. He can probably manage unless they never open the windows.

[Morty]

[An Epic Journey]

A shape-shifter. A Norn? He doesn't look like one. And she's never heard of a "Luna", so he's from somewhere else. Probably a follower of some god or other.

"I'm Thariza. Just Thariza, for now. I came here to learn crafting, and then suddenly we were under siege. I summoned up those ghosts to scare the invaders off, but then you showed up."

[5a Violista]

[Mindscapes]

The girl doesn't care what Makuro is saying. A house is burning.
Fortunately, she's not there yet.
Almost there, however.

Makuro, upon looking in the other window next to it, will notice a bedroom that looks a bedroom for a child. Girl, presumably, based on whatever decorations aren't on fire yet. Just like the other one, appears to have been left in a hurry with clothes strewn like the room's owner had seconds to get ready.

The house looks like it's going to start to collapse in on itself in a dozen seconds if it keeps on burning like it is, but...
...luckily! Rachel comes to the rescue.

For the first couple seconds, the fire is too hot to be put out by mere water but soon the flood puts out most of the fire, and the dampness starts to kill the remaining flames.

Shortly after the fire goes out, it starts drizzling, making "putting out the fire" much easier.

And once the fire's out, the teenager reaches the window and goes inside.

[Nova_Eclipse]

[An Epic Journey]

"I see," Corvus says with a nod. "How likely do you think it will be that they'll return soon?"

[Reinholdt]

[Mindscapes]

Rachel's pretty darn exhausted after that, never even remotely moving that much water before. So she collapses on her tail, panting heavily.

"This... this is... a lot of... work for a... dream." Are you supposed to get this sweaty? At least it's drizzling.

If Makuro holds back for her sake, Rachel will simply wave her on. Go ahead and make sure that person's ok. Or something. Rachel will just be a moment.

[Earl of Purple]

Mindscapes

Makuro's not going to wait for Rachel; she's doing water-stuff, and that's enough for her. Makuro's going to follow the girl into the burnt-out house, looking around and keeping an eye on the ceiling because if that collapses then she's going to have to try and rescue the other person. "Is there anybody here? I am here to help." She speaks loudly, but doesn't shout. She's not sure why the house was set on fire, but it seems to have been deliberate, and she doesn't want to alert whoever set it on fire of her presence.

[5a Violista]

[Mindscapes]

Rachel's pretty darn exhausted after that, never even remotely moving that much water before. So she collapses on her tail, panting heavily.

"This... this is... a lot of... work for a... dream." Are you supposed to get this sweaty? At least it's drizzling.

If Makuro holds back for her sake, Rachel will simply wave her on. Go ahead and make sure that person's ok. Or something. Rachel will just be a moment.

Mindscapes

Makuro's not going to wait for Rachel; she's doing water-stuff, and that's enough for her. Makuro's going to follow the girl into the burnt-out house, looking around and keeping an eye on the ceiling because if that collapses then she's going to have to try and rescue the other person. "Is there anybody here? I am here to help." She speaks loudly, but doesn't shout. She's not sure why the house was set on fire, but it seems to have been deliberate, and she doesn't want to alert whoever set it on fire of her presence.

[Mindscapes]

Since there doesn't appear to be any immediate danger, Rachel can have time to rest and cool down in the light rain.

She will, after a few moments, start hearing whispers coming from all directions except the direction of the house. Like, there's people whispering but they're just far enough away that it's hard to tell what they're saying. Not to mention, it's in a strange language, so...
Once that starts, if she looks behind then she'll notice that the town is almost to her, and is growing and even starting to wrap around the burned house.
It's still empty, but every so often there's the illusion of movement within the village. And disembodied glowing eyes that vanish if you look directly at them.

They seem to be getting closer and closer. This might be a good time to use that dreamstone sword.


Meanwhile, inside the burnt house, there's none of this whispering nonsense. That's probably because there's still smoldering things on the second floor, keeping it all at bay.
Nobody comes out to answer Makuro.
The teenager, who is willing to shout as loud as she can, says, "Patrícia, it's safe now, I'm here!"
Still nobody comes out.

If Makuro looks around the house and is careful to not fall to the first floor, it will soon become obvious that there's nobody here. Not like in the village, where everybody mysteriously vanished: instead it rapidly becomes obvious that everyone managed to evacuate in time. There's even evidence that multiple people jumped out of one of the second-floor windows. Looking at the ground out that window, there's imprints of...two adults who jumped and one set of smaller footprints who was presumably caught and then set down. Plus, a doll that was dropped in the ground.

[Shadowcaller]

[An Epic Journey]

Ambrosia continues taking notes. She had a few questions of her wn regarding the nature of these two beings, but those could wait until they were more familiar with one another and Thariza had finished speaking to them.
It wouldn't be much longer until Ikharos came to speak to them anyway.

[Deathkeeper]

[An Epic Journey]

Willa shakes her head.
"Hopefully never. Nothing should be coming back after the scare you two gave them." she says, not daring to be too confident about that very risky statement.

[Morty]

[An Epic Journey]

"They seem to be pretty insistent on not letting anyone touch this tower, but they won't be coming back soon after that massacre," Thariza agrees. "Now what's this about a chunk of magic wood?"

[Reinholdt]

[Mindscapes]

Rachel's fur begins to stand on end as the whispering begins and she sits up slowly. "G-guys? Makuro? That you?" Looking around, it becomes very clear, very quickly it is not. She squeals loudly in terror and jumps to her feet. But not knowing if the ghostly flickers are enemies, friends, simply trapped villagers stuck in a nightmare dimension, or even real, she feels it would be premature to turn a sword on them.

Besides, Rachel is far too busy running into the house. Man she recovered her energy with remarkable speed. What stamina! That's what makes her an adventurer.

[Earl of Purple]

Mindscapes

"I don't think they're here, I think they escaped. There's footprints outside this window, and a dolly as well. I think someone jumped out, tossed a child- probably a little girl- into the arms of the first person, then jumped out themselves. Then they all left, I can't see where to yet." She'll shout this for the girl who apparently knows the people who lived here. She may also be mistaken about her identification of the child as a girl; it's based on the image I have for a 'doll' is a baby, advertised as a girl's toy.

Rachel may also hear her and find her in the partially destroyed house.

[Gnrlshrimp]

Dark Forest

Krayger shrugs at the question.
”Not as good as my nephew, but good enough I think. Got a pack of pets, then?” Having creatures in your tower is also not unusual for wizards. Maybe even some livestock. He can probably manage unless they never open the windows.

[Dark Forest -> Felix's Tower]

"Ah, well-" By way of answering, Lucas opens the door.

Inside, Krayger can see a long spiraling staircase leads up to layer after layer of floorspace, all remarkably open for the first ten floors or so (at least on this inner ring, there's a number of doors leading off), with tons of grass and carefully cultivate plantlife, as well as dozens of cat trees, a spacious network of rodent tunnels, heck there's even a few small trees growing in here.

Oh, and lots and lots of animals. On the ground floor, for example, a chorus of excited barks signals the charge of half a dozen dogs rushing forward to say hi to their new guest, and to hopefully receive pets and be told they're good dogs.

"A little more than a pack, all in all. Welcome to the biggest and most secretive animal sanctuary in the whole of the Nexus."