INTRO LOG #1

[collectedmods]

INTRO LOG #1

Welcome to Collected’s first Intro Log! The information we’ve provided about the setting is not exhaustive - feel free to interact with the setting as you see fit. Rather than have specific prompts, our event posts throughout the game will generally have information listed out like this and players may come up with their own prompts.

If you have questions about the setting or the intro log, please ask them HERE in the comment thread! And most of all, have fun, shoppers.

PROMPTS

The first thing anyone does is gasp for air.

It’ll feel like the first breath you’ve taken in years. That’s right; before you can even become aware of your surroundings, the most immediate thing they’ll process is that you’re in water. Foul smelling water - like rotten eggs and decay. It’s pitch black, and you’re swimming in it with only your head above the surface. If the smell doesn’t deter you, the longer you stay in will; the water stings to have on your skin, chemical in nature.

So - you need to get out. This water can’t be okay to stay in. Once you’ve gathered enough about your surroundings, you’ll see that you’re inside a mall, of sorts. There’s a large (non-functioning) escalator in front of you that will lead you to the semi-safe havens of the second floor - but be careful, because everyone’s going to be gunning for that only exit.

» Once on the second floor, exploring will lead you to a few notes of interest: Long windows and tall glass doors show the conditions outside. The sky is a burnt orange, and there is a thick sort of fog on the horizon. Nothing for miles in every direction - just an empty parking lot, completely devoid of life or any sign that anyone has come across this place in many years. Even so, you’ll find the windows and doors unlocked, so getting outside is easy… the problem is what’s out there.

A trip outside will make it instantly clear why you see no life outside the mall’s walls: exposure to the radioactive sun outside causes your skin to bubble with welts, and the thick, toxic air of the outside is impossible to inhale without keeling over. It’s blistering hot, too. Even non-organic creatures would melt or be eroded by the sun’s radioactive qualities. One thing is abundantly obvious: you cannot survive outside. Not now, at least. Those who receive a burn or other damage from the conditions outside will discover that strangely enough, upon returning inside the mall, the wound begins to heal up on its own. Slowly, and extremely painfully, but it’s healing. That’s strange…

» Another thing of note is that there’s a food court on the second floor. There, you’ll find a variety of abandoned restaurants that have varying amounts of non-perishables inside - canned vegetables and preserved meats, as well as dusty old jars of sauces and the like. There are a few walk-in freezers with hefty locks on them, but if the locks are broken or picked, there’s actually some frozen rations, as well! Many of them are not labelled, so the dining experience will be pretty hit or miss. None of the stoves or cooking appliances in the food court work anymore, either, so you’ll have to get creative when it comes to cooking up these ingredients. (Or just, you know, eat them cold.)

» Throughout the mall’s bathrooms, water fountains, and gym showers, you’ll find that all the water in the mall is suspiciously clean. Like, way too clean to be normal in a place as run-down and clearly abandoned as this. You’ll find that toilets flush completely fine, and shower water heats up (eventually). Should you be grateful, or concerned?

» There’s an electronics store on the second floor, as well, along with a internet cafe. Should you try to turn on the computers in the internet cafe, you’ll find that it only opens to the same forum page: a site called Mall Watch. It’ll prompt you to make an account and password if you try posting to it. In the electronics store, you’ll also find that any phone you forage for and try to boot up will also only open up to this forum page. Weird!

» If you’re looking for a place to sleep, the department stores of the mall still have a variety of furniture sets collecting a lot of dust. Then again, no one’s around to tell you where to sleep - and maybe you don’t trust all these new faces you arrived with. If you’re okay sleeping on the floor of a random store, more power to you.

» You’ll probably want to do something about your clothes that were stained by the black water on the first floor.. try foraging for some clothes! Looking around, you’ll find that some clothes stores have some stock left over, though everything’s generally a mess in clothing stores - it’ll take you some time to find anything that’ll fit you. Looking around enough on this second floor, you might end up stumbling across some of your own belongings or clothing, or those of your peers.

More than anything, the longer you explore and scavenge the mall, you’ll recognize how eerily silent it is. If not for you and your peers here, this place would be totally desolate. Clearly, there’s no one around for miles, and as far as you can tell, you’ll only be able to survive here for as long as the supplies here last. No one’s coming to save you - no one even knows you’re here. In every sense of the word, you are alone.

For now.



NAVIGATION

Comments

i

[regnum]

[ Down, up, down again… but not up. When Harrowhark’s bobbing head doesn’t resurface, something dormant in Historia awakens. Save them, it cries. They’re drowning; save them. She looks up to the second floor, then back down to Harrowhark—or what’s left of her. What should she do? Common sense tells her to leave, to make it up to safety, but her heart tells her to take the plunge.

The latter wins out. She dives down into the deep for a fistful of Harrowhark’s anything—her hair, maybe, or some tulle from the elaborate mess of rags she has the gall to consider clothing—and heaves. Her arms are slight, but the inky muck takes on the majority of Harrowhark’s weight, so the task of hauling her back onto land becomes a trivial one.

They eventually break the surface, Historia before Harrowhark, and shortly after, make it to the foot of the escalator. Step by painstaking step, she eases them both up from out of the water until the only thing the shore has left to lap at are the soles of her shoes. If she never has to swim again, it’ll be too soon.

She hacks up a helping of black gunk off to the side, then props herself up onto her elbows, where she can get a better look at her rescuee. Harrowhark’s hair, dark, wet, and clinging to her face, is in the way. Historia smooths it back, smearing her face paint in the process. ]

Are you okay?!

[ Or, well, as okay as they can be, given the circumstances. Historia’s clothes are ruined, riding up, and clinging to her in places she didn’t know they could. She’s not okay, but she’s okay. She’ll manage. Whether she can say the same for her beached friend, though… ]

Can you hear me?!

[skeletonize]

( fortunately for both of them, historia grabs a fistful of the Ninth adept's robes (rather than finding a handhold of hair or bone jewelry, which would have been very unpleasant for one or both of them) — it might almost seem that the vestments themselves weigh more than the girl tangled up in them, like some sort of tiny crustacean ensconced deep within a thick entrapment of netting. she becomes dully cognizant of someone pulling her through the water and she can't help but wonder a bleary, gideon? but no, the silhouette is all wrong, unfamiliar. paranoia crawls up her spine in a sickening wave, but she subdues it for the moment, contributing as much as she is able (which is just about nothing except a vague movement of her arms and legs) to get the both of them out of this foul-smelling drowned catacomb.

once they actually reach what stands for dry land in this situation (a half-submerged metal staircase leading up to a stone landing, it seems), it's all harrow can do to pull herself up onto the incline. then she begins hacking up a lungful of acidic-tasting black water, her entire body shuddering with the effort. but gradually air replaces liquid in her lungs, and she begins to make sense of the space around her — and her apparent rescuer.

even as out-of-it as she is, harrow shies blindly away from the hand pushing a sodden fringe of hair back from her face — avoidant of touch nearly as much as she is avoidant of anyone seeing her without a proper presentation of Ninth face paint, which she knows in her gut had mostly washed away roughly twenty yards behind them. is she okay? well, absolutely not; she's soaked through to the skin, which is one of the worst feelings a person can possibly feel, and she has no idea where she is or what's going on. but she blinks and focuses on the other person, and for a moment she is transfixed — her pale hair reminds her of the vision of another, but that was one several years past walking with her in waking hours (and even then, the face is wrong). she abandons the thought with some self-admonishment, brow drawing together. she leverages herself weakly up onto on elbow. )

Yes, ( she says in a small voice, rough-washed as if with battery acid (which is roughly what had just happened). ) —Yes. ( a little stronger this time, and here she half-turns away to meekly cough up another lingering trace of water. ) You are shouting.

[regnum]

[ The “sorry” she owes Harrowhark is somewhere in the sagging slope of her shoulders, but Historia, wrung out and exhausted as she is, doesn’t have it in her to put even a single word to voice. Instead, she sinks back against the escalator, each metal jut digging awkwardly into her back.

When she musters up the will to speak again, she does so quietly, like anything more’ll hurt too much to bear. Her throat already feels like it’s on fire, whether from overuse, abuse, or both; she doesn’t need to make it worse. ]

… I don’t know why I did it.

[ Why she yelled? Why she touched her? Or why she risked her life trying to save her? Historia doesn’t think there’s rhyme or reason to anything here—not to what she does, and certainly not to what brought them here to begin with. ]

[skeletonize]

( historia certainly didn't owe harrowhark any apologies — it's highly likely she isn't even raising her voice at all, but the strength and verve behind it was simply rendering an already waterlogged and discombobulated necromancer fully malfunctioned. the Reverend Daughter of the Ninth House is not a creature predisposed towards feelings of regret, remorse, guilt, or even undue empathy, but she finds the ghosts of such things tugging at the sodden hem of her dark vestments as she hears the reply from her rescuer. she slows her breathing, appreciating for a moment the sensation of air within her lungs, and then she pulls herself up into a sitting position: a pale face in a pool of soaked, pitch-black cloth. )

...To see that you didn't just lifeguard a drowned corpse and waste your effort, perhaps. ( harrow is also not the type to offer the olive branch, but this is just about as close as she will get. she shifts again, turning so she can rest with her back propped up against one of the metal rails of the escalator. the line of her mouth is drawn with discomfort and frustration, but none of this was aimed at her present companion.

she is silent another long moment, then: ) You didn't need to help me. ( a beat . . . ) ...Thank you.

( like pulling teeth with her, but - a sign of gratitude from harrowhark nonagesimus? might as well frame it and put it on a wall now. )