trainmasters: (Default)
Aurora Express Mods ([personal profile] trainmasters) wrote in [community profile] auroraexpress2019-02-15 09:27 pm

Unlock! (1)

Who: Everyone
When: Day 12, evening into night
Where: the Aurora

[As evening approaches, you hear the jingle associated with an official message from your Chain. It's the same balloons and confetti animation as the last time newbies arrived, and the same message as well:]
WELCOME NEW HEROES

[As anticipated, some newbies are waking up in their rooms, in the usual nondescript undies or team pyjamas.

Just after this, however, something much more startling happens...

Outisde, the bell tone gets all the louder, a beautiful resonating sound that fills the air. Then, suddenly, a flood of strange square-shaped sparkles appear, floating around like magical fireflies, bringing with them a pleasant warmth. They increase in size and volume until the air itself whites out with a bright but pleasant light. While you can't see, you can hear the bell, and the distant rumbling of stone.

Abruptly, the sound stops, and the bright light fades to reveal a sky painted in sunset hues. Where there was once a dark and hostile jungle with cracks in the ground, there's now a colourful rainforest environment and a floor thick with bright moss. The sounds of birds and insects and regular wildlife rise over the previous silence, and the aggressive plantlife is replaced by large flowers and succulent fruits. In one direction, a dirt path winds through the trees, and in the opposite, the brush gives way to a stone formation with a flat top and an opening flanked in carvings of water and plants.

If one were to enter the new cave entrance, they'd find the previous moon crystals replaced by rainbow ones that reflect sparkling light onto the floor, and feel soothingly warm to the touch. Further into the caves, there's a carved stone path that leads to the beach you initially arrived on. There stands the Prism: a large floating cube in the center of gyproscope-like concentric rings. Where it had been glowing black, it's now a royal purple, and the light and energy from it are significantly less malicious than before -- though still far from pure. The beach itself is now covered in fine white sand, and the sea no longer tries to pull you in -- provided you don't go out too far.

Because not all is well on this Star just yet. While the nearby water contains a reef of colourful fish, 100 meters or so out to sea the water turns black again. While under water in the safe area, you can occasionally see the shadows of great and terrible monsters deep in the dark.

Likewise, should you choose to follow the first path, after ~1km you'll find the forest fades back into the previous dense, dark jungle. At the edge of the darkness, there's something new -- the remains of what looks like a modern town. It's all overgrown, cottages twisted into ruins and streets covered in vines and prowled by tiger monsters and a new threat: towering reptilian creatures that climb the crumbling shells of apartment buildings and the empty City Hall, like geckos increased to dinosaur size. They're fast, and if they catch you they'll swallow you whole. On the one side, that makes it easier for someone to save you -- they could cut you out. On the other, those unable to be rescued will find their skin and muscles becoming slowly more transparent and stiff, the colour and feeling leaving them until their minds are trapped in a useless shell. Those found in that condition later must be saved via the healing pods -- but they'll remember their stay in their glass bodies, with their blood running and heart pumping like a living anatomical model of their organs.

On the Aurora, however, you're welcome to enjoy the first sight of the sun in 12 days. As the brilliant sunset moves into a night reigned over by a gentle moon, the Heartbeat Festival remains in full swing. So celebrate your victory with a glass of shimmery alcohol and a kiss, because you've done it -- your love has purified a part of this Star!]

[[OOC NOTES: CONGRATULATIONS on your first Prism purification, guys! There is a toplevel for ICly suggesting train upgrades here, so check it out! Next week we'll post a poll, and the week after the upgrade will be implemented.

The updates to the Setting page to reflect this post will be made soon, so keep an eye out!]]
crimeboy: (2u08)

[personal profile] crimeboy 2019-02-17 01:05 am (UTC)(link)
Monster school!

I'm like an imp, you're a zombie... Is there a ghost or a mummy? Maybe a vampire!
ewestmarch: (wait wait)

[personal profile] ewestmarch 2019-02-17 01:09 am (UTC)(link)
[Thinking about this.]

Someone here could be a ghost or a vampire. I don't know, I didn't check.

[She's not an amazingly social person, and ghosts can be pretty realistic if they're lucid enough to disguise themselves.]

But most of the other people that live in this car are the living. ...And human.

[Which is really weird, she hasn't gone this long without seeing an orc or elf since she was growing up in an itty bitty village that none of the other countries bothered visiting.]
crimeboy: (035)

[personal profile] crimeboy 2019-02-17 01:14 am (UTC)(link)
[Oh, ok. So this wasn't some weird spoof of an old Scooby Doo episode. Which kind of suck cuz he knows nothing at all, then.]

That seems really weird... Then what IS going on here?
ewestmarch: (sly)

[personal profile] ewestmarch 2019-02-17 01:17 am (UTC)(link)
With your head? I don't know what that is. But here in this car, you've been kidnapped.
crimeboy: (067)

[personal profile] crimeboy 2019-02-17 01:19 am (UTC)(link)
Kidnapped, and I forgot everything too! That's awfully suspicious. How come we get such a nice kidnapped bedroom and cute kidnapped clothes?
ewestmarch: (stare)

[personal profile] ewestmarch 2019-02-17 01:24 am (UTC)(link)
The story is that they saved us from the destruction of our worlds, and they want us to be grateful for it.

[A muscle in her jaw twitches. Nope.]
crimeboy: (78)

[personal profile] crimeboy 2019-02-17 01:30 am (UTC)(link)
Hm.

I wouldn't really want to be saved without my world though, I think. And it's hard to be grateful for something I can't remember!
ewestmarch: (darkness)

[personal profile] ewestmarch 2019-02-17 01:32 am (UTC)(link)
Exactly. He should have just left me in there if he wasn't going to bring anyone else.

[Flips what she's been cooking.]
crimeboy: (005)

[personal profile] crimeboy 2019-02-17 03:33 pm (UTC)(link)
...

I wonder what my world was like.

[Oh now he's a little sad. How can he be sad if he doesn't remember, though??? Confusing.]

Are there people like me on your world?
ewestmarch: (Default)

[personal profile] ewestmarch 2019-02-17 08:04 pm (UTC)(link)
With horns? ...None that look otherwise like a human. We have succubi, but they have, um-

[Gesturing to her legs - succubi are kind of lizard-goaty from the thigh down?]

- hooves and scales, they're purple.
crimeboy: (016)

[personal profile] crimeboy 2019-02-17 08:43 pm (UTC)(link)
Hm! That's a lot to unpack, I'm not going to lie!

Guess it makes sense though. For us to just be stragglers...
ewestmarch: (Default)

[personal profile] ewestmarch 2019-02-17 09:00 pm (UTC)(link)
Mm. Unless none of it is true, which is possible, because I haven't seen proof.
crimeboy: (003)

[personal profile] crimeboy 2019-02-17 09:38 pm (UTC)(link)
[Shrugs!!! He's got no clue, honestly.]

That's fair. Guess we'll just have to play by ear, eh?
ewestmarch: (stare)

[personal profile] ewestmarch 2019-02-18 09:07 pm (UTC)(link)
That's what I've been doing. At least it seems like we're provided for.
crimeboy: (024)

[personal profile] crimeboy 2019-02-19 11:34 pm (UTC)(link)
[Nods.]

What're you makin', by the way?
ewestmarch: (Default)

[personal profile] ewestmarch 2019-02-20 12:21 am (UTC)(link)
Looked like pork, but for all I know it's some alien animal.

Or person.

[she doesn't mean to be ominous it just happens sometimes.]
crimeboy: (045)

[personal profile] crimeboy 2019-02-20 12:29 am (UTC)(link)
That's really spooky!

Are you just okay with that????