lostcarnival | ⇨ HEARTSTONE MANOR

Who: Everyone!
When: Day 170 - Day ???
Where: Heartstone Manor
What: The carnival arrives at the Heartstone Manor. Do your best to play along, and try not to get too far ahead of the schedule with threading if you can avoid it, in case something that would affect your character happens early on.
Warnings: Individually marked! Could be a lot of things.

BEAUTIES AND THE BEAST↴

When the carnival arrives at the Manor, everyone will be taken into the Throne Room to greet the Prince for the first time. He will be lounging on his throne, and will take a look at the guests that the Ringmaster has brought before eventually dismissing everyone so that he can talk to her alone. After that, they will be given a brief tour of the Manor by some of the servants, and then brought to their rooms to start picking out clothes for tomorrow. On the first night they will be permitted to wear regular clothes, but starting the next morning the dress code will be enforced.

There will be a number of servants helping guests with clothing, and making alterations to suit the non-humanoid features they may have. The tailors work with fabric by hand, but their stitching is impossibly quick and accurate, with changes being made to complex clothing at unbelievable speed. Some guests may note while working with them that one of the seamstresses has wooden mannequin-esque hands instead of human ones, and another has two sets of arms. The arms are one of the most obviously inhuman traits that they'll see while first touring the building.

Come the morning of Day 171, the daily routine will begin.

⇨ THE DAILY SCHEDULE ⇦

► FIVE MEALS A DAY: Between breakfast, lunch, tea, supper, and evening drinks, the meals you are required to attend are frequent and long. Each meal (except drinks and tea) will have multiple rounds, and use all of the fancy cutlery. It will be difficult to keep up for those that are untrained. The food will vary greatly, but will generally to be palatable to those that are into whatever kind of food it might be. Some of them are odd delicacies that are very much an acquired taste, however. People who cannot eat will be given a pass once the Ringmaster explains it, but will be looked down on for it.

► DAILY ACTIVITIES: There are scheduled activities for every morning and afternoon,
and everyone is required to attend. Descriptions of each activity are provided on the "Event Descriptions" tab of the spreadsheet linked up above. There is only one hour of free time scheduled per day, after supper, and beyond that the servants will almost constantly have you on the go. The Prince and Ringmaster will not be present for most of the activities, but they will be there for every meal. If you character refuses to follow the schedule or makes a huge mess out of proceedings, make sure to report it here.

► AFTER CURFEW: At 11PM, everyone is expected to return to their quarters and spend the rest of the night there. Wandering after curfew is unacceptable by the Prince's rules, and if you do it there will be the chance of discover. Based on your character's stealth abilities, there will be dice rolling to determine if they are discovered or not, and by whom. Make sure you report any after curfew activity to the mod post here. This can also take place as an investigation if they are actually looking for something instead of just farting around.

► ROOM AND BOARD: The servants will remain upbeat for most of the time the guests are here, unless something is done to provoke them. They will be present at every activity, and there will be a variety of different individuals. One frequently spotted character will be the butler, a man with dark hair and small, sharp horns. He seems to be the main organizer of things.

► ODDITIES: Even beyond the obvious, there is something off about the Manor. Doors, windows, and other household objects will sometimes move seemingly without cause, and other times there will be banging sounds in the walls, or mysterious voices heard at a distance. It feels like you're being haunted. If you have a moment to wander the corridors, then you'll sometimes see open doors abruptly slam shut the moment you lay eyes on them, and wall sconces turn off or on. It's weird, man.

► THE HUNT: The Hunt activity will have its own event post, and some sign ups for those that will participate meaningfully. There will be some dice rolling to determine who hunts the most impressive game, and rewards handed out accordingly. Before that post goes up, however, you can do some investigations for the start of the event, if your character is interested in looking into the specifics of the contest and overall context.

MAKE SURE THAT ALL DECORUM VIOLATIONS ARE REPORTED HERE.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"...Maybe the plants one." It still isn't super interesting, but... At least he knows about plants. He might be able to make himself read it long enough to pass some time.

He frowns, that was the one he wanted to read, but he passes it to Susan anyway.

They'll probably end up switching again at some point or something anyway, so it doesn't really matter. Right now what matters is Susan taking it from Lauren, looking over the title with a look of distaste before going back to sit and try and read this stupid thing.

Lauren grabs a few more things off the shelf, hoping one will at least be understandable, before moving to sit with his brother again.

"Is it any good?" he asks, voice quiet.

He's already trying, but already frowning at it, too.

"It's still too hard." He's trying, but... It seems none of the ones they're finding are really meant for kids to be reading.

He frowns, looking at their books again. He really doesn't feel like anything here will be appealing to Susan.

"I wish they had more books that were just stories."

"A story would be a lot more interesting." Because apparently all of these books are super boring, even if they're about things that could be interesting.

He scratches his chin, thinking things over for a moment.

"I could... Tell you a story?"

He thinks about it as he glances around the room. Everyone else is just reading (or attempting to, at least), but...

"Do you think it's allowed?"

He shrugs, looking around as well.

"I'm not sure."

Well... Maybe if they're quiet, and Lauren is technically reading or something...

"We just have to be really quiet."

The only problem is that now he has to think up a story.

"Uh... Well. Once in the kngdom of Nar there was a wicked king who did... Something wrong."

He raises an eyebrow at Lauren's "story".

"Maybe I should be the one telling a story."

He isn't offended, more curious than anything.

"Can you?"

"I can try! It might be hard to stay quiet though..."

"I can tell you if you get too loud."

He grins as he looks around the library again, and then he opens his book to a random page so it at least looks like he's reading from it.

And then he launches into what is probably a completely ridiculous tale about some sort of evil villain who sent his armies out to kidnap people or something, with some kind of brave and really cool knight who saved the day with magic and being strong. It's very silly and very stupid, but it keeps him entertained and (mostly) quiet.

Honestly, as long as Susan is having a good time, Lauren is happy too. He didn't mind the non-fiction books, but he doesn't mind hearing Susan's ridiculous story about heroic deeds either. He laughs as they come to the climactic final battle scene.

"You're made all this up in your head?"

"I'm just making it up right now!" You think he'd actually plan something like this? This is all completely made up on the spot, completely randomly. And mostly quietly, even.

"How?" Lauren asks, amused but bewildered.

He shrugs a little.

"I don't know, I'm just... Saying things, and seeing what happens."

"That's amazing."

"No it isn't, it's just telling a story!"

He shrugs, "Well I couldn't do it."

"Well... You're good at other things that I couldn't do"

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mylastchance - 2017-11-19 20:38 (UTC) - Expand

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