lostcarnival | ⇨ A DIPLOMATIC MISSION

Who: Greg, Sora, Childermass, Jonathan Strange, Ashleigh, Papyrus, Susan, the Ringmaster, King Triton, and King Triton's hundreds of daughters.
When: Late D44
Where: Triton's palace.
What: The Ringmaster handpicks an entourage of carnival randos to show off to the king. Threading here isn't obligatory, the top level is primarily here for informational purposes, but you can use this post to thread with Triton or with each other if you like! Please do use the top level below to let us know what your character does, though.
Warnings: Nothing.

TRITON'S PALACE↴

After each candidate is chosen, the Ringmaster will escort them to the palace on her back like a serpent-shaped train. The palace is deep within the city, and the speed is probably appreciated - it would take a smaller mer a much longer time to swim there on their own. They are expected, and so there are mer soldiers already waiting to escort them when they arrive. The halls are big enough for a creature the Ringmaster's size, likely due to the fact that King Triton is enormous himself.

The Ringmaster will instruct everyone to follow along and be endearing, which is about as much guidance as they'll get. The palace is filled with upper-class merfolk of various types - a large number of which are beautiful mer women who have characteristics reminiscent of the king. The Ringmaster will quickly note that they are the King's daughters, of which he has many, and that people need to be especially affable to them.

The throne room is exceptionally large, and centered around Triton's throne, a vast structure made of giant seashells and gold. The king is waiting with an expression of general skepticism when the Ringmaster arrives and makes her introductions - she's about as attuned to decorum as one would expect. Her peculiar charisma and confidence make up for it to some degree, but the introductions of herself and her crew are pointedly self aggrandizing.

There is an ultimately boring exchange where Triton delivers his terms, making note of the fact that the Ringmaster has been difficult and not extraordinarily trustworthy in the past. She brushes it off by talking up the supposed quality of the carnival and the entourage she's brought with her today, encouraging them to go mingle with the royal merfolk while she and Triton finish talking business. She'll shoo all of her workers away to entertain, and for a while the conversation between her and Triton will become more hushed, with the Ringmaster curling her serpentine body up next to his throne.

The merfolk here are not quite as easily excited as the common classes, and will initially regard the visitors dubiously. If you can get them excited about the carnival and your presence, however, the Ringmaster will be exceptionally grateful. The workers will be left to their own devices until the meeting between Triton and the Ringmaster ends a few hours later, though he has some final words for her as she begins gathering her entourage to leave.

"Be cautious, Ringmaster," he calls after her in a booming voice. "You are here to entertain. Your welcome will wear out quickly if you attempt to meddle with Atlantean affairs - particularly with those we call enemies."

The Ringmaster mostly seems to brush him off, but you'll notice that she winks at you on the way out.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Reply to this top level if you'd like to ask either the royal merfolk or King Triton any questions. There will be a brief time to speak to the king before the Ringmaster leaves with you. You can also reply here to gauge how NPCs will react to certain behaviour, or any other inquiry you might have.

Strange will attempt to subtly ask some of the royal merfolk some basic questions about the Sea Witch and Tamatoa because he is nosy and kind of wants to go bother things. How big is the crab? Does the sea witch have any particular magic? Just basic sort of questions like that.

he's not gonna ask the king that cause he's not a COMPLETE idiot, but hey there daughters, you might have answers.

The mers will have a lot of different answers regarding what the Sea Witch can supposedly do. Some will say that she supposedly has a connection to "devils", and that she steals people's souls to feed them. Others will say that she can control anyone and anything who so much as enters her lair. One of them sheepishly admits that she could probably go as far as to outclass even her father, if he wasn't the one with control of the realm.

Of course, her taking it over would change all that, and would be a nightmare in general. Triton has taught all his children from a young age that any wish the Sea Witch offers would be inherently corrupted and inclined to backfire on its target. So, over all, not a glowing review.

The royal class seems less concerned about Tamatoa in general, seeing him as an arbitrary obstacle that the lower classes go after for sport. Mostly he just gathers objects so he can horde them. This is of less interest to people who are already quite magical and wealthy, it would seem.

We would ask that all involved characters reply to this comment to give an idea of how well your character will handle this diplomatic operation. Briefly describe how your character will interact with the merfolk, and whether or not they are successful in being "endearing." You don't have to go on a great length - this is mostly so that the Ringmaster can judge your proficiency.

Though Greg is initially fairly anxious and uncertain upon introduction, it doesn't take him too long to warm up once he starts interacting with the royals. He does his best to be polite to make up for his general lack of decorum.

He avoids actually talking about the carnival much because this is supposed to make it look good and he's a bad liar. Instead he prefers to ask after the individual mers, or discuss his home.

In the end, Greg hardly comes across as a professional or an especially apt individual, but he likely left an impression of someone pleasant and friendly.

Ash thrives in front of a crowd. Cheerful, energetic, harmlessly flirtatious, and conveniently looking mermaid-ish enough not to be weird, she probably ends up conducting one giant musical number by the end of it, fueled by her magic.

To the surprise of everybody, Strange doesn't mess things up. He's actually got experience with this sort of hobnobbing and attending parties and making idle chit-chat. He's fairly polite if a little too talkative and a little too nosy with regards to asking some of the merfolk about their lives--he'll back off when asked, though.

Strange avoids talking about specifics about his personal life--the most specific he'll get is mentioning his wife. However, he'll gladly answer any sort of questions about land animals or London society or his world's magic or the carnival all day. Somebody probably has to gently tell him to shut the hell up about faeries at one point. He generally comes off as someone who's friendly and good with conversation, if a little bit odd.

At some point he'll show off via magic by like, doing something fun with plants or something like that. Who wants to see him trap a seashell in a mirror and replace it with it's reflection, stupid party tricks all around.

Unlike Strange, Childermass is more used to existing in the background of these kinds of things, but he's thankfully also an amazingly good bullshitter when he needs to be and is familiar with the general etiquette for it. So, he's pretty chill at dealing with these merfolk, even if they are royal. He'll be particularly friendly towards a few of Triton's daughters because when's the next time he'll get a chance to chat up royal mermaids? Really? Probably never. It will fall short of being too friendly, though, since he actually does know better.

When not listening in on someone else, he'll mostly stick to telling stories ranging from the mundane (which may not seem mundane at all to merfolk) to the fantastic and, depending on who's listening at the time, even some not-quite-for-young-ears ones. If there's any interest in hearing about sailing or stuff about the ships that get dumped into Atlantis from time to time, he'll indulge that as well. Thanks to coming from a drastically different background than Strange, there isn't too much overlap, either, and he's sure to include stories about places like the realm of dreams and anything interesting about the carnival itself.

Overall, he still ends up coming off as a serious sort, even when playing nice, but he's got that tall, dark, and mysterious thing going for him. It evens out, right? That along with his seemingly endless supply of tales of magic, adventure, and mishap, he's at least going to be interesting.

Sora is, thankfully, naturally pretty endearing. In addition to being considered 'cute', he's friendly, personable, and will strike up a conversation with anyone who'll give him the time of day. There's a reason he has so many friends back home, and it's likely he'll have a few friends in the palace by the time this is over as well.

He has lots of stories about other worlds to tell, and answer just about anything anyone asks him about his home life; he has very little to hide, and is pretty open about sharing most things. He'll also listen patiently to anything anyone has to say to him, and even try to help out with anything he thinks he can.

"Endearing" is a word for it. He's loud and energetic, quick to laugh and quick to boast, and not shy about talking about himself and the things he does. If folks want to hear about the Carnival, he can describe it... in bite-sized chunks of information that might not be the parts they were curious about. If they get curious hearing about his time as king, he'll be more than happy to tell them about his expertise as the head of encouragement for an entire realm.

All in all, Papyrus is a character, and probably stands out in the crowd of more solemn folk. As long as they can tolerate his physical and verbal pushiness, they'll be entertained.

Susan is more than a bit distracted by the sights of the palace at first, but once the introductions are done and he's set out to mingle with the merfolk, he mingles with the best of them as his usual charming self. Of course that's in his own Susan way - which means that it's full of stories about things he's done before that sound exciting to share, tangents about random ideas or other connections he comes up with, and questions and intent listening to whatever even slightly interesting things he sees or hears from the assembled group. He may even show off a spell or two if it comes up (an illusion spell or dancing lights or something of the sort), but he wouldn't without prompting as he doesn't immediately jump to magic when conversation can be easily had. Basically he's just a cute kid but easily holds his own in conversation with adults and yeah.

⇨ A DIPLOMATIC MISSION

⇨ QUESTIONS FOR THE COURT

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⇨ YOUR PERFORMANCE

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late, sorry