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Post by icon on Nov 22, 2018 0:07:09 GMT -5
This thread is a play-through of The Sundered Land: A Doomed Pilgrim in the Ruins of the Future, a role-playing game created by D. Vincent Baker. The Rules- Try to limit your answers to the questions asked.
- If you don't already know the answer, make something up.
- Keep your answers reasonably short.
- Anybody is allowed to respond, even if an answer has already been given.
- If multiple people respond, I'm allowed to merge the answers as long as nothing is contradictory.
- If your answer's disruptive, I'm allowed to override or ignore it.
- I'll go with the first answer, or the first few answers, that people give.
- I may flag specific people to answer a question or give a clarifying detail, but I usually won't.
— I'm a wanderer seeking peace and an end to bloodshed. I'm on pilgrimage across the Sundered Land to the Temple to No Gods in the distant City of Gulls. My pilgrimage has brought me to the Shallow Sea, inhabited by the spirits of beasts who once lived in these waters. My goal is to pass safely through and continue my pilgrimage.
You all play the world. Your goal is to see me to my doom, instead of safely on my way. You're allowed only to directly answer my direct questions, though, so you might not be able to do it.I have been crossing the Shallow Sea for days, now; the sun rises and sets on this body of water, which stretches endlessly to the horizon. True to its name, the seawater laps at my calves—it has not at any point during this journey risen higher than my waist. The sky is clear, with only a few clouds overhead. A slight breeze plays with my hair. I have a bundle of sharpened stilt-spears balanced across my back and an unwavering patience honed from a hard youth. Something in the distance breaks up the horizon, catching my eye. What is it? Anyone should answer.
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Post by Gelquie on Nov 22, 2018 0:20:01 GMT -5
You see jagged cliffs looming ahead of you on the horizon.
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Post by icon on Nov 22, 2018 0:32:56 GMT -5
The Gold Cliffs ahead define the boundary of the Shallow Sea. They are still a long way off, but they signal the end of this leg of my pilgrimage.
I press forward with renewed vigor, wading as quickly as I can. The water tugs against me as the seabed begins a soft decline; the waves brush first against my calves, then my knees, and soon against my thighs. I pause for a moment to catch my breath.
Something warns me of approaching danger. What warns me? Anyone should answer.
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Post by Gelquie on Nov 22, 2018 0:40:03 GMT -5
Several crabs on the sea floor.
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Post by icon on Nov 22, 2018 1:00:36 GMT -5
I glance down as I feel a crab brush against my ankle, scuttling past. Then another. Then a third. Then more, several more, all in front of me, all traveling in my direction—all traveling away from the direction of the Gold Cliffs ahead.
I pull a pair of stilt-spears from across my back, one in each hand, jabbing them stake-down into the sea floor to pull myself forward. They dig in handily, but come out without too much effort.
As I continue my travels, the environment changes. What about it becomes different? Is this change gradual or sudden? Anyone should answer.
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Post by Gelquie on Nov 22, 2018 1:25:43 GMT -5
The sea floor becomes more smooth and hard. This happens gradually.
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Post by icon on Nov 22, 2018 1:46:57 GMT -5
What else about the environment changes, either suddenly or gradually? Anyone else can also answer! (in the future i might consider suggesting a soft limit/unofficial cap on the number of replies that one person should submit in sequence; I know that this particular circumstance is because of timezones/nobody else is around but it's something to keep in mind)
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Post by Thorn on Nov 22, 2018 4:04:35 GMT -5
A storm breaks overhead.
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Post by Fraze on Nov 22, 2018 5:59:57 GMT -5
The water quickly becomes frigid.
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Post by icon on Nov 22, 2018 13:49:54 GMT -5
As I make my way forward, the ground beneath me becomes tougher. I have to use more force to pull myself across the sea floor. The sea level reaches my chest, and then my shoulders—the deepest I have found in my time here.
I hear a clap of thunder overhead, and the water around instantly turns cold. My muscles tense as I look up, watching the sky turn overcast with a supernatural quickness. Magical storms are common in the Shallow Sea, but they can be deadly; if the waves get too high, they will dash travelers on the floor below.
The water nearly at my neck, I thrust a spear down once more, and I suddenly hear a violent, shattering sound: shards of the ground have split apart from the sea floor and float to the surface. Most of them are no longer than my arm, but one is long and broad. If I reach it, I can cling to it as a raft, propelling myself forward rather than swimming—but to move toward it would mean inching closer to the eye of the storm.
What's the best position that I could take here? Anyone should answer.
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Post by Fraze on Nov 22, 2018 17:18:07 GMT -5
Climb onto the large chunk and use spears to push yourself forward.
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Post by icon on Nov 23, 2018 0:07:36 GMT -5
I continue to kick myself forward, clambering toward the large fragment. The water is almost above my ears now; I am fully and truly swimming in order to stay above water. I lose one spear in my attempts to reach the shard.
I make a clumsy lunge, throwing my weight over the fragment. If I climb fully on top of it I will sink, but by clinging to it from the side I have a roughshod floatation device, and can use my other spear as a rough pole to propel myself toward the Gold Cliffs.
The clouds continue to gather overhead, and the waves are rougher, the sea churning more intensely. I kick with my legs as well as my spear, fighting as best I can against the waves. At times my feet touch the seabed, but only for a moment—the slippery ground provides poor traction, and I must proceed by swimming more than by wading. My muscles scream against the icy water but I continue on.
Pulses of strange magic course and crackle through the clouds above. I hear a deafening crack and I look up from my efforts as a blinding, blue-white bolt of energy screams down from the sky. It lands in front of my makeshift raft, several lengths ahead. What happens as the magic touches the surface of the water? Anyone may answer.
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Post by Fraze on Nov 23, 2018 5:18:47 GMT -5
The water becomes thick like tar.
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Post by icon on Nov 23, 2018 13:40:24 GMT -5
I see the waves in front of me begin to soften before I feel them. They appear to move as if time itself has slowed down, rendered thick and viscous by the magical energy.
Another bolt of powerful magic hurtles down from the cloud cover, landing to my left—then another far behind me, then another. Countless bolts of blue-white lightning begin to rain down overhead.
Thinking quickly, I climb entirely onto my large shard, its weight now more supported by the viscous tar. I pull from the bundle across my back the longest stilt-spear I possess and jab it into the tar, clambering onto the roughshod footholds lashed to its sides. If I can wait out the weather, I will be able to reach the cliffside safely after it dies down.
I stay clinging to the upright pole for some time, watching as magic falls from the sky across the rest of the sea, moving out and away from this eye of the storm.
Does anything else change about the environment as I wait out the storm? Anyone may answer.
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Post by Lizica on Nov 23, 2018 16:29:09 GMT -5
From beneath the viscous water and the shattered shards, the sea floor begins to quake and shiver irregularly.
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