lostcarnival | ⇨ THE ATHENAEUM

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⇨ THE ATHENAEUM

Who: Everyone!
When: Day 47 - Day 58 ish
Where: The Athenaeum
What: The carnival arrives at book world. First week, they'll be performing for magical manifestations of book characters. Second week, it's time to hunt (for books, in the library.) Around Day 58 some stuff will occur.
Warnings: Reading is mandatory.

FAERIE TALES↴

Though the carnival will be performing for its guests in the first week, they are welcome to search the Athenaeum while they are off duty during that time. The manifestations of story characters will be out in full force during performance week, with animals, people, objects, and even locations growing out from various tales. Most are distracting at worst, and will be curious to check out the carnival. Some, however, can be as dangerous as they were in their stories of origin. You know what to do.

► IT'S TIME TO ROLEPLAY: The best way to deal with book ghosts is to follow their narrative to its logical conclusion - turn the tables, work the story so it ends in your favour! Naturalistic and narratively satisfying plotting will have the manifestations following your lead. However, push too hard and introduce too many plot holes, inconsistencies, or illogical plot twists, and they will reject your reality utterly, becoming quite aggressive in the process. You can also use your natural abilities and powers to fight them in a traditional sense, but in the Ringmaster's experience, it's best to fight reality benders by bending reality right back at them. If you aren't careful, it's possible to be dragged fully into a story's reality, and then things get really messed up.

► IT'S ALSO TIME TO READ: The carnival came here for a purpose, and that purpose is to research. Specifically, the Ringmaster is looking for information on the Queen's Miracles - the set of ancient fae artifacts that the Blue Rose is one of. The carnival needs these artifacts to defend itself, but nobody knows where they've been for thousands of years. That's what the books are for. However, nothing is stopping you from pursuing knowledge for personal reasons. The halls are open to your perusal, and only your heart can guide you to the book you truly seek. Check the plot post to see what's allowed, and sign up to find plot info or other important game information below.

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"I'm going to continue the story," Strange remarks, as he places his hands in front of the swan. Because that's what this is, isn't it. A story. Just a story, this can't be real, and if this was real then it had already happened and Strange can't do anything about it. The Ringmaster said the best way to deal with these is to follow them to their conclusion...even if said conclusion is an unhappy ending. The more he thinks about this, the more he's convincing himself that this is the best way. After all, it's not like he can have a swan following him around for the entire stay here.

"Shed this form and become human," Strange intones, still not really sure what to do. "I, erm, command the magic to do so." The book magic and the narrative fill in the gaps for Strange's personal lack of knowledge as the magic starts up.

With a flash of light, the bird's feathers vanish. In the swan's place is a twenty something young woman, with dark black hair and an outfit that's oddly reminiscent of a ballet tutu. She looks over at Strange with an expression of relief and clings to his arm like a child clings to their parents. As she looks over at Reira, the bird-now-woman sticks her tongue out at the kid. Turns out she's a huge brat as well.

Absolutely terrible. And the fact that this dark-haired swan is being such a prat in turn is only making the little one steam. Continue the story? This is just a sad story now! And even if it is a story, she's pretty sure you can write those over!

....Right?

Beside her, her daemon fluffs their feathers out significantly, before coming up with their own idea. "...We shall command Second magic, then," they huffily declare, momentarily slipping into Reira's age-expected diction. What they probably want to say is 'a counterspell', but, whatever.

The point is, Reira's in agreement. "...then...I'll make it a happy ending anyway," she decides, frowning more at Strange than the swan. "...If you can use book magic, I can too..!"

...

There is a pause. The vulture glances at Reira, head cocked. ".......Presumably." They. They might have this. They might.

"If... If the prince dances with her...then... ...Then... I command the magic to say, he doesn't like the dance..!"

NAILED IT.

The girl looks up at Strange with a little frown. Can Reira do this? Is this a thing? Strange just gives her a confused shrug in return. Hell if he knows, he has no idea if this is the sort of thing the narrative magic can do or not.

"There's only one way to find out, you know," Strange chides the bird-now-girl. "You'll have to dance with the prince yourself." The girl huffs, as if this is a great inconvenience, before she starts to vanish, returning back into the book. Neither Strange nor the ex-swan know if Reira's magic worked, but it worked enough to fill the narrative.

"Well," Strange sighs, as soon as the girl vanishes. "That's that, I suppose."

"...Yeah." She is still frowning however, and her daemon briefly pokes at the book before clumsily pulling it open toward the end.

"We shall see, who Wins," it decides-Reira turning her frown to a more incredulous one in its direction.

"...I don't think it's a 'winning' thing, it's a 'don't die' thing..." She's trying very hard not to blame Strange, but it's sort of hard when she's so certain he's probably killed the book swan. So mean!

(Even if he has a point about it being a book, and a book that likely already had that ending...)

Reira pushes it from mind-helped when the daemon finishes prodding about the book only to close it back up and waddle to her side again, deciding to say nothing of what the answer actually was. Focusing on better things is, well, better-and so, "...did making the book magic at least feel different..?" Or did it just feel like saying words and hoping it worked? Inquiring minds must know.

Edited 2018-05-01 23:14 (UTC)

As the daemon reads the ending, Strange is decidedly not peeking and trying to see what it is. He's got his own feeling about the potential end of the story and it's not good. He doesn't even want to acknowledge the chance of 'and then the swan died,' despite the fact that he knows it might happen. It's just a story, he tells himself again. It's not real. It doesn't count.

The shift of the conversation towards magic is much more Strange's speed. At Reira's question, he shrugs. "I didn't have enough time to properly examine the spell—if you could call it that in the first place." Cobbled together bullshit is what Strange would call it if there wasn't a child in the room. "It did feel like magic, though. A different type of watered down magic, but still magic."

The chances of 'the swan and the prince died' are astronomically high, in this case. But Strange isn't wrong-it is, after all, just another story this time.

What isn't 'just a story' is magic (probably), and magic at least seems to be the conversational topic that heals all minor emotional wounds somehow. "Mnnh, it just sort of happened, when you did it," Reira acknowledges, raising a brow as he explains. "...If it's watered down, that means there's less magic, right? ...Does that mean you could probably do more with book magic than normal magic? Since it's not as strong as normal magic?"

She's got a lot of questions on the topic now actually, and it might be tricky to get the questions to Stop.

"I suppose it all depends on the book." It's said as if it's an obvious answer, though Strange knows that he's just spouting theory. "If we were drawn into a narrative of a world without magic, then I doubt I'd be able to do anything more than my usual in the first place. Hell, I might not be able to do my usual magic at all."

There are so many different stories here and so many possible worlds from the stories that can try and trap them. As much as Strange would like to give an absolute answer, he's got a feeling he won't be able to talk about anything in the library in absolutes.

"Oh-! ...Because it wouldn't make sense in the book...." That certainly makes sense then-actually, it makes her a bit worried as she picks up the one on the ground to set more properly on the shelf.

If this one book could do that, then... "...If the others do things like that, and you have to fix something without magic... ...what will happen if you don't know what to do then..?"

There is a slight waver in her tone there that might imply being more worried about if She doesn't know what to do, admittedly.

Then you bullshit. Though he doesn't exactly say it in that way... "If you don't know what to do, then guess where the story's going and follow along until you get there. The Ringmaster did say that it's best if the story makes sense."

Fake it until you make it, follow the narrative trajectory of the story, in Strange's mind, the two are one and the same.

"Oh!"

"....As our brother, then..." This is probably not a good sign, but it is at least one that has Reira back to her small-smile state enough to simply agree.

"Right..! We can probably try to make sure it's a good story too, then..." Was that a subtle jab at the idea of making a good ending, never, ~~that's not how it works either, kid~~, but...

Well, it's enough for now. "...What are you going to do now that the swan is gone though?" she questions, recalling what started the entire incident to begin with.

At Reira's question, Strange frowns. He looks up, at the bookshelves, as if he can read the names on the spines of the books on the top bookshelf from here.

"I'm going to continue looking," Strange responds. "There's so much in this library that I'm certain I'll find something to help our cause."

Whether it's finding information about the Miracles or finding information about something that can help him out, Strange is certain that the answers to his problems are in here somewhere. Because, well, they have to be. He refuses to think otherwise.

"Mnh- Right...we're supposed to find books about 'miracles'..." Or, the 'Queen's Miracles', or whatever they are... ...They don't have a lot to go on, that much is certain.

"...It's hard when there's only the two things they do, but I guess it's something to help look..."

~~Strange is going to end up So Far Ahead of you kid~~

Wait, only two things? Strange frowns a little as he looks over at Reira. Right...she didn't see the Prince get blasted to hell and back with the Blue Rose, did she.

"The Miracles can do a lot more than their name," Strange points out, with a wry little smile. "When Syrlya held the Blue Rose, he was able to turn it into a sword. I'm certain that with enough study, we could figure out how to use the magic to do other things as well."

Oh no. Oh NO-

"But if they can do more things, how are we supposed to find them first..!? It's already hard to know if it's the right 'Sun and Shade', or...or-"

"Wood-Rot"

...Yeah. "...That one."

"That's what the research is for," said in a 'well duh' sort of tone of voice. Why were they here Reira, to try and find out things about the Miracles so that they'll know what to look for later.

"This library doesn't work like normal libraries." What with the whole 'use your heart to search what you're looking for' thing. That's silly, use a proper classification system. "I'm certain if we look long enough, we'll find something of use. And then, we use that something to search and find another useful thing, and so on and so forth."

Reira, suffice to say, is pouting. Not because Strange is Wrong, but. Well. More because he's technically right.

She doesn't like this.

Her Daemon agrees with her, but is a bit more bold about it. "Then you have discovered..?"

Rather-have YOU found anything yet then, Strange?? HUH!! ~~well eventually yes, so he's still right kid-~~

"Nothing at the moment," Strange admits, with a little frown. "But we've still got around a week and a half left. I'm certain I'll find something eventually."

He's only certain because Strange has ego for days. Of course Strange is going to find something, why wouldn't he, that'd be silly.

...Okay. That's fair, she supposes, and a shared look with her daemon notes that they are going to have to Accept Defeat here.

So- "...Umh...I guess I'll keep looking then," she decides, sounding a little lost about it. Her daemon turns, already set to start doing that. "...Good luck?"

Oh. Okay then? Strange looks a little confused at Reira deciding to leave but hey, if she wants to head out, then he's not going to stop her. There's still plenty of books here that Strange wants to read and really can't while having conversation.

"Good luck to you as well. And if you don't find anything of use, I hope you at least find something fun to read."

"Mnh-! Yeah-!" Well, it certainly looks like she's leaving-the daemon only goes so far however, and Reira herself stops...about 4, 5 feet away.

Naturally, the entire idea was that they'd just be reading though so not long after, she's pulling a book down and taking a seat.

Let the better researcher ~~(Strange)~~ 'win'.

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⇨ THE ATHENAEUM

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reira im sorry but like 8/10 versions on the wiki are a Tragedy-

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Hokay-! That's a wrap then-!