lostcarnival | ⇨ THE PRINCE IS DEAD

Who: Everyone!
When: Day 178 - B1: Day 6
Where: The Carnival and sometimes on top of the Heart of Stone.
What: Now that the Prince is dead and gone, there's a lot left to sort out. As the remaining servants are liberated and those captured by the Prince are tended to, it's time for recovery and goodbyes.
Warnings: Nothing in particular.

HOME GROUND↴

At long last, it is over. The Prince is dead, and all of his stolen Names have been restored - all that's left to do is treat the wounds and move on. For the first day or two, the Ringmaster will be arranging passage for the servants that are left, all of which have remembered their names for the first time in years. The earth elemental that had been trapped and forced to serve as the Prince's manor, the Heart of Stone, is happy to help for the moment. It appreciates the Ringmaster's mercy, and is free after untold eons of imprisonment.

Yet, there are plenty of aspects that are far from simple. There are still servants left mad and transformed into beasts, with no easy way to change them back. The Prince's spells outlive him, and those bearing his poison and his curses will have a difficult road ahead of them. Though most of the bestial servants have been rounded up, and a large number that had been reduced to unmoving statues returned, even the Ringmaster can't return them to normal so simply.

The next week is for rest and for settling remaining affairs. If you want to bid farewell to any particular NPCs, or assure care is given where it's needed, now is the time to do it.

► A CURE: The Ringmaster will tell everyone simply - there is no simple way to undo another fae's magic. The Prince's powers were essentially on par with hers, which means that those who have been transformed to stone and those that were cursed into beasts and driven insane are not something she can trivially fix. It will take the work of the carnival and a couple weeks of treatment to shed the curse of stone, and the maddened servants are an entirely separate matter. She will do what she can, but for the most part she is arranging for the Prince's servants to be cared for elsewhere. At least for now, the Ringmaster will be animating the stone portions of people's bodies with magic, though those portions will still be a bit clumsy and numb feeling.

► THE NEW HEARTSTONE: In the absence of the prince, the Heart of Stone will be taking over the remains of the Prince's realm and preventing it from collapsing into void. As it turns out, the manor had been an earth elemental all along - a form of Wyld Fae almost on par to the Prince and Ringmaster themselves. How the Heart of Stone was enslaved is a long story presumably, but the Ringmaster considers it to be a sign of the Prince's own depravity. The Heart will be allowing visitors for the first couple days of this period through the portal, but keep in mind you are essentially just walking around on its body. At least the realm has a floor, now, instead an endless abyss surrounding it.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Well, it seems like just... being in the carnival is dangerous..." she retorted.

"And maybe I don't seem like a hardened soldier but..." her hand naturally glides to the grip of her sword, ready to draw. "...but I can handle this! I'm sure of it!"

She's not remotely sure of it, btw.

Well, she is casually carrying a sword around, so that's gotta be a few points in her favour.

"Yup," he says, not trying to downplay that instinct at all. It's been hella dangerous lately, and he's not going to pretend it isn't. She's seen enough already to know it'd be a lie.

"But as a member of the Patrol, you don't just have to survive, you've also gotta protect everyone else in the carnival. It's a pretty big deal."

Deep breath. Think about what you want to say. Say it.

"I agree. And... I promise, that I'll do my very best!"

She can't promise more than that.

Nobody can, really. Sans is silent for a few moments after, looking her over. Eventually, he shrugs a shoulder.

"Sure," he agrees. He's certainly not going to kick her out on day one. More than that, though: "So... know how to use that thing?"

He's pointing at the sword.

"Y-yeah," Connie says, still uncomfortable with confidence. She was afraid that being too unflinching would make her look arrogant or immature.

"I'm being trained by my mentor, Pearl. She's an expert duelist, and she fought in the Gem Wars."

"Oh yeah?" he asks, all seven eyes looking her over again. He leans back in his chair. "Well, from what I know of gems, being trained by one sounds pretty legit."

So that's pretty good, anyway. Looks like her placement wasn't random after all.

"So you're from the same world as the Universes, huh? The one with the gems and humans?"

"Yeah! Steven is my best friend, I just moved in with him." She tries not to blush, but she totally starts to blush.

"And I know Lapis is here, although she doesn't remember me. Well-" She winces, almost from physical pain. "She doesn't remember... recent me."

Sans's grin widens a little because, hey, he knows Steven, he's a good kid. It's both nice and also sort of a worry that one of his human friends is here, and under Sans's care none the less. Yikes.

"Ah. Yeah," he says, understanding without prompting. "Timeline stuff gets pretty screwy sometimes. I wouldn't take it personally. But I know how much that can mess with you, anyway."

He leans his cheek on one of his hands.

"My world's having this whole... timeline problem, thing, where it keeps resetting? So people I know from home have been coming in with totally different experiences. Kind of messed up."

"Resetting?" She didn't really know how to conceptualize that.

"Yeah," he says, like it's pretty well tread material by now. "You know time travel, right? Or at least the gist of it? Basically what would happen if someone reversed time repeatedly... going back to the start of the same series of events, and did it a bit differently every time."

He scratches his stone cheek, a bit uncomfortable.

"Cause that's literally what they were doing. Trouble is, they were the only one with any control over it, so the rest of us schmucks just got dragged along."

Oh, okay, sure. Not even kidding, framing it that way makes everything become extremely clear to Connie, she's a sci-fi buff.

"So 'reset' would mean that it's always a fixed point in time where the deviations start, then. It has something to do with the 'they' you're mentioning?"

"Yeah, uh." Shit. Speaking of which. "There were two different people doing it. One started it, and the other... Kinda took the time travel torch later on, I guess. But the first one..."

He trails off. Okay, well no reason to keep it a secret is there. His casual tone is a bit forced.

"Well, he's actually kind of one of your coworkers."

Connie is a little confused by Sans' tone. There's something off about it, but she can't put her finger on exactly what.

"Yeah? What's their name? Maybe I've met them already."

She didn't know what to think- certainly they weren't doing these time resets on purpose.

"Either Flowey or Asriel. Not sure what he's going by these days," he says. "He's pretty impossible to miss, 'cause he's a talking flower."

He hesitates to add this, but he ends up going ahead with it:

"He did some pretty bad stuff on my world. He took the ability to escape consequences and used them to their limits. He's apparently turnin' over a new leaf, now, but... heh." He glances away.

"Don't get too cozy."

Talking flower. No big.

"And he still has that power? The 'resetting' power?"

"Dunno," Sans admits. "Probably not. I doubt the Ringmaster would put up with something like that, even if it was possible. It's a real pain, dealing with someone constantly resetting your life, whenever it suits them."

⇨ THE PRINCE IS DEAD

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