Newbies + Monthly Prompts!

[trainmasters]

Who: Everyone
When: Day 47, morning
Where: the Aurora

[It's that time again: this morning, you're awoken by the jingle associated with an official message from your Chain -- the usual "newbie time" balloon animation and text:]

WELCOME NEW HEROES

[This round's newbies are waking up in their rooms, in the usual nondescript undies or team pyjamas.

Outside, the cold snap has broken. It's back to jungle warmth, though the sudden change in temperature appears to have caused a thick fog. So thick, in fact, that you can't see more than a few feet in front of you -- and it doesn't burn off with the daylight.

For the next few days, Origin Star will be lost in the mist, and should you venture too far, you may be too. Because out there in the humid dim are willow-the-wisps, faint lights in the fog that will lead you to perilous terrain or into the jaws of beasts.

Sometimes, you may also hear a voice -- a distant song from across the sea, in the direction of the corrupted island. If you get too close, long and spindly arms will reach out of the water and pull you down, for a kiss from a scaly human-like being that sucks all the emotion out of you and leaves you feeling hollow and lacking empathy for others. The cure is time -- you'll be better in a day or so, but you can speed it up by basking in the warm feelings of others.]

[[OOC NOTES: As the monthly prompts, the fog and mermaids will continue until next month's placements. If you have any questions, please ping the mods via the q&a. Thank you!]]

Comments

[daydreamshimmer]

Very. Makes fine tune work much easier.

I do! Though what it means....

[Sun yin-yang symbol is decidedly very vague.]

[bowtiedbones]

It's very pretty, whatever it means.

[daydreamshimmer]

Yeah. jury's pretty much out on it. Like sun could range from emotional to magical to spiritual to I'm meant to assist Celestia, but the whole balance thing is like....what am I even balancing.

But it is nice. I can see why I accessorize it.

[bowtiedbones]

If it's balance it could be a pair of those options together, like balancing emotional against spiritual, but oh my gosh what I love is that it still matches with the name Solar Flare, too!

[daydreamshimmer]

Emotional versus spiritual makes me sound like a cult leader.

....though maybe it's balancing myself versus what my special gift does. That's an idea.

And of course it does. I mean, that's just how names are. Look at a pony, say the name that comes to you, and a Cutie Mark is usually gonna be connected to some part of the name. My real name probably has something to do with the sun or fire too. Maybe balance, but eh, not really feeling like it is.

Like I'm sure Eliza is some kind of magic term? [Because pony names Just Be Like That.]

[bowtiedbones]

Oh! That's neat! So do little kid ponies have a hint about what their Cutie Mark will be by what their parents named them? That must be fun to make guesses with.

My name doesn't mean anything, though. Eliza is derived from Elizabeth, which has been a popular name for ages. My family likes to give all the girls names that are variations on Elizabeth, like my cousin is named Lisa, but there's been Eliza's and Elizabeth's in a bunch of other families and across countries for centuries.

[daydreamshimmer]

Kinda, yeah. I mean, sometimes people get a name that's hard to picture? Like....rumble. Someone named rumble isn't gonna have the most straight forward connection. But someone who has a name that's not even the most distantly of distance relation to their Cutie Mark is really rare. It's why you can kind of end up with Family Cutie Marks. Like an Earth pony has a family legacy of working on a carrot farm, but her talent is making toys, she might end up with a partially dissembled puzzle that'd make a carrot.

What?

So your world just....made up words for names?

[bowtiedbones]

Sort of? Some cultures will try to pick names that are desciptive or that are earned, but for most places it's a name that sounds nice or has connections that you appreciate. Like a kid might be named Daisy, and that's a name that's also a thing, but they don't have anything to do with flowers. He parents might have just thought Daisy sounded cute, or she had a grandmother named Daisy and they wanted to honor her. Daisy might have been a name of a character in a show they liked, and then there's five other Daisies in her school whose parents liked the same show.

[daydreamshimmer]

Well, I mean, ponies can be named that way too. Because they liked it or named after someone, just also has to feel right. Just...the meaning is always clear. What it means.

So Elizabeth doesn't mean anything? Just...sounds nice to last that long?

[bowtiedbones]

Right. It's just a name people like. Even with my middle name, May— That's a name that could have meanings, but I was born in November, not in spring. The meanings are irrelevant. It just sounds nice together with Eliza.

[daydreamshimmer]

That's....really weird.