lostcarnival | ⇨ THE LUNAR SOLSTICE

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⇨ THE LUNAR SOLSTICE

Who: Everyone!
When: Winter Breaks: Day 6 - Day 25
Where: THE MOON
What: The carnival journeys to one of its moons to celebrate the Lunar Solstice. More information here.
Warnings: Winter fun.

MOON WALKING↴

The journey to the moon only takes a blink of an eye, but it leaves the carnival far away beneath you. The second moon can be seen on the peripheral, massive compared to its usual view. At least when the holidays start out, there will be no notable wildlife on the moon, though this is something you can talk to the Ringmaster about if you think it needs a change. It sounds like this is the first time she's used it in quite a while - it probably needs some dusting off!

Claim your cabins, and proceed to... well, do whatever you want! There is no rush and little obligation, besides to enjoy yourself. For real, this time. She promises there will be no vampires. Or, at least, none that don't already work for the carnival.

► CABINS: Living arrangements are character choice for this event, and there are a variety of cabins of various sizes, mostly built to house 2-6 people, though you can fit more in if you squish. They are all made of wood and of a rustic design - no fancy modern furniture, here! Each building is housed with a fireplace and the needed amenities. You can pick up materials to cook with the private kitchens if you like. Theoretically, you could spend the whole holiday sequestered away, watching the snow fall. Some of them also have outdoor hot tubs available!

► ACTIVITIES: Activities are mostly going to be character driven, though there will be some large group games like bingo and maybe a poker tournament happening at some point in one of the festival halls. Otherwise, there is a lot to offer: skiing, snowboarding, hiking, ice sculpting, snowball fights - it goes on! If you'd like to run a winter activity, just let the mods know, and we will get the word out there for you.

► FEASTING: Every day isn't a full-out feast because that would get a bit unhealthy, but there will be a number of specific feast events over the holidays where everyone is encouraged to let out their inner hedonist and stuff themselves. There will be one big feast per week, with smaller but also delicious meals offered in between. The feast dates will be B12, B18, and B24. There's also plenty of alcohol available for anyone who wants it.

► SHOPPING: As mentioned in the planning post, there is a massive market being run by the World Walker Caravan! The Ringmaster has given everyone 1250 credits to spend on items, but there is a caveat - must spend at least 500 of those credits on gifts for other people. And it better be a good one, if you only buy one! (She will ask that you do not buy her presents, however. She appreciates the sentiment, but it seems sort of silly buying her things with her own money! If you'd like to gift her, please have it be something more personal or handmade, but you are not obligated to get her anything at all.)

► TREATMENTS: The beginning of the holidays will also be about the time that the emergency Medical Team will have finalized their treatments for the Prince's poisoning. Watch out for further information on that - and make sure to get treated if you are suffering from petrification or poison induced illness! The holidays will be a lot more fun that way.

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"Maybe... it's alive?"

Papyrus, nearby, is studying a snow dragon like that's what Cole's talking about. It's detailed, impressive, and if anybody made this one, they weren't doing it in the daytime.

He goes on to explain his reasoning, "I know a snowman lived in the forest, back in Snowdin!"

Edited 2017-11-24 04:35 (UTC)

Cole just brightens up as he hears Papyrus, demeanor shifting from his more closed off sort of quiet normal Cole self to something a bit more bright and open. He hadn't been paying attention to who he was talking to but good! It's him! He likes Papyrus, most people don't think as bright as he does.

Papyrus thinks that Cole's talking about the dragon, Cole's perfectly happy to roll with that, even though he doesn't think he was talking about the dragon in the first place.

"I've seen dragons before. This doesn't feel like them," Cole explains, as if it's perfectly possible for a snow dragon to be alive and breathing and growing. Though hang on a minute, "What was the snowman like?"

Maybe not breathing or significantly growing, but alive? Sure. Monsters are really varied that way. Even Papyrus doesn't need to breathe, though he does plenty of moving and growing and living. One of the livelier monsters around. Maybe he puts all that energy from breathing into other things.

"Hmm." How would he describe the Snowman? It wasn't like they met up and talked very much, since being made of snow made moving around a dangerous impossibility. But, knowing of their difficulties, Papyrus had made sure to stop by for chats from time to time. "Friendly...? With a limited view of life."

"Because they melt?" It's a morbid answer, but one that makes sense. Limited things would have limited views. The Snowman couldn't know summer, heat, the beach, a fire, things like that because then he wouldn't be.

And honestly, Cole doesn't really know how Snowmen work but he's got a pretty good idea that if one melted, it wouldn't be the same. It'd either be a Waterman or nothing at all.

"They melt?? What???" Papyrus flinches at the question, wide-eyed and unsettled. It's not something he can truly, knowingly refute, but his mouth rushes ahead to do so. "No, no, they just live in one place! I think they might grow out of the snow...?"

The snowman was, astonishingly, more rooted to the ground than the literal flower he knew. Sure, they didn't have legs or muscles or anything, but all of the Snowdin area was always snowy, and cold, year round. There were other places they could just as easily have lived in... but he'd never thought to ask, was it possible to move them? To, to get a wheelbarrow, or ask a particularly strong monster to lift them?

"But they're still made of snow," Cole continues, a bit confused. So wouldn't they melt to begin with? His point still stands!

Still, he can see Papyrus's point as well. They're stuck in one place, attached to the ground they grew from. It makes sense that they wouldn't know as much as others who could move around. But on the other hand, they would know that one place very well.

Cole thinks he'd rather know a little about a lot than a lot about a little.

It's true; they are made of snow, and snow does melt. If it's exposed to heat, or friction, or probably some other mysterious things that scientists would know. Everything's got something they're weak against. But... maybe snow has a lot of weaknesses.

"I suppose... they could melt," he finally admits. "But! I've never heard of one melting."

"Really?" Now that's odd. Cole can't help but blink back his confusion before he continues talking.

"That's all they do back home. The snow blankets everything, the cold freezes, then melts to reveal green grass and spring shoots."

Or more likely, it melts to reveal mud. Still, Cole's a bit of a romantic.

"Really?" Papyrus echoes back, momentarily confused by the notion of plants growing where it's snowy.

"Is that... weather stuff?" He means seasons, but it's close enough for his purposes. Stuff that makes the environment change from day to day, or in cycles through the year. Instead of... being so consistent that areas are named for their predominant conditions.

"It's the sun," Cole simply answers. That's what Papyrus means by weather stuff, right? Maybe? He's not entirely sure.

"Some areas are more snowy than others, some more sunny, but they all change and grow."

Somehow that's still a novel concept, that places might change without people making the changes happen. And the Carnival... if she can make mountains and lakes just start existing, then stuff like sun and cloud and temperature are surely under her control too.

"So the sun eats snow... But, it's snowy here," Papyrus looks up to the bright sky, staring at the light like it's a trick. Is that just because it's a fake sun?

"The sun eats snow but the cold keeps it firm." At least, that's how Cole interprets it. Why do frozen things not melt in the sun? Because they're just too dang frozen. And, at least right now, the reactions of others and the yearnings for warm weather gear tell Cole that for most people, this is too dang frozen.

He hasn't yet figured out that one of the main reasons why the moon remains snowy and cold despite the sun is 'magic.'

'Because it's magic' sounds like a perfectly sensible description of what the sky and weather is all about. Not quite an explanation, because even magic has some amount of explanation... But a good summary!

"The cold is stronger than the sun, but the sun is stronger than the snow..." Sounds like a regular hierarchy of powers, here. "And... the snow is stronger than the plants?? This gets complicated, huh?"

"But the sun helps the plants. Snow melting gives water, sun shining gives light, the two together make the plants grow."

Well, the two and other things. Some plants grow better in one place than others. But Cole's got a feeling that Papyrus doesn't want to hear a complete and in-depth recitation of Cole's scattershot account of how plants work.

"It's a circle."

"A circle... Now that you say that, haven't I heard of a water cycle?" Scattered memories of human education and monster education overlap on the phrase, and he nods a slow understanding.

"The water recycles... how efficient." The surface couldn't count on rivers from higher worlds dribbling water and trash down into them, after all.

"That's a thing?" Cole doesn't have any memories of human education or monster education. As such, he's never heard of the term 'water cycle' before. Still...it does sound like a very efficient way of doing something and a good term that could be used to describe all of this.

"It sounds right," he admits, with a little shrug.

"But," Papyrus says with another frown, moving on from the subject of science neither particularly knows or loves. "What about the shape of the snow. Could a snow dragon... become a water dragon?"

A water dragon sounds very cool. Like a river, but wiggling around through the sky instead of through the ground. Or like a large, oddly-shaped floating puddle.

"Dragons aren't snow," Cole replies, as if it's the most obvious thing in the history of creation. "They're just dragons."

Cole, at least, is from a world with dragons. And those dragons that he's seen were the giant, fire-breathing lizard sorts of dragons: big and scaley and reptiles and not snow. Were Papyrus's dragons different?

In fairness, Papyrus considers, the snow dragon they're standing near is just a snow sculpture. Not a living creature of snow. It doesn't prove anything... besides the mystery artist's skills. But 'snowdragon' sounds familiar, and it takes him a minute to place.

"Are snowdrakes dragons? They're dragonish." It's hard to put hard lines on the sorts of monsters out there.

This is just going to be two people ask each other for clarifications for who knows how long. Because snowdrake? Cole's never heard that term before.

"What's a snowdrake?" Cole asks, with a frown.

He continues stroking at his chin thoughtfully, and offers, "Comedians, mostly...?"

That's an exaggeration by a good measure; while there was a slightly broken family who made or sought a living based around joking, there's plenty of the snowflake-looking dragonish monsters around Snowdin who don't spend their time making jokes of... varying quality. Teenagers especially, roaming around and doing whatever teens in the snowy forest do. But while they were all much smaller than that sculpture, and had beaks rather than whatever mouths dragons have... drake and dragon sound so much alike, there must be a connection.

As expected, Cole has no idea what's going on. So, snowdrakes are comedians who also look kind of like dragons. That...well, that doesn't make any sense! Even Cole thinks that doesn't make sense! But Papyrus feels it makes sense so Cole is going to try and find a way to piece out what the heck a snowdrake is so this can all make sense.

"Do they speak like you do? I can't really talk to the dragons I know. Just feel."

Unsurprisingly, most of the pain Cole feels from dragons is something along the lines of what the hell, please stop trying to murder me. But if it's between killing the dragon and letting his friends die then sorry dragon, Cole knows what he's going to choose.

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⇨ THE LUNAR SOLSTICE

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