[EVENT|4TH WALL] MYSTERIOUS INTERLOPERS - THE DREAMING DISCONNECTS | APRIL 22-30

[ironwood]

Characters: ALL and plus ones.
Date: April 23-30 2015 (2016 in-game)
Location: In the city of Keeliai
Situation: Infiltration - fourth wall event, week two!
Warnings/Rating: Add warnings as needed.

The festival initially ends on a vindicated note. The kedan at large are happy, chatting, even being unnecessarily gracious toward the Foreigners -- those they can tell are Foreigners, at least. Even the Woodsmen are pleased, on the whole, though it may occasionally be difficult to tell. It's also the Woodsmen who first get the news, trickled down from Heojin.

By the end of the first day, the rest of the festival-goers will have heard enough from the Woodsmen to be going on: that Lin, Heojin's bodyguard, ran across someone making trouble in a field on the day he was apparently absent. The exact details of what happened are blurred; some say he was kidnapped, some say he fled into the mountains to draw the interlopers off, some say he was just in hiding, watching their movements.

Regardless, it causes curious kedan to go investigate the fields themselves on their way back to the city -- never by encroaching on the Woodsmen's land, thanks to the strings of Woodsmen guarding the fence-lines, but enough to see the evidence for themselves.

Whatever the truth of the rumours, by then it becomes clear: there was more than one group of infiltrators in the festival.

The raiders are back. They've come for their own.

---

LINKS
Festival Grounds & Crop Circles | City Tensions | Outside Yunxu's Mansion | Palace Lands | Water Sector Memorial | OOC Post - Event Week #1 | OOC Post - Event Week #2 | 4th Wall Character Check In

OOC
Some starters have been provided in the comments below to cover the main areas of the event! Anything that doesn't fit into these can be added to the bottom of the post. Please direct any questions to the OOC post, thank you!

Comments

[bugger_quantum]

I AM, said Death patiently. Certainly a wizardish type, no matter what the man called himself. Then again, he hardly minded the company. Indeed, wizards were so much more cooperative these days than they used to be. AT THE END OF THE UNIVERSE, I WILL BE. BUT I COULD TALK LESS, IF YOU PREFER. I'M AFRAID WALKING LESS MUST WAIT UNTIL I HAVE LOCATED MY HORSE.

[peacefullywreathed]

Solomon laughed and it was unexpected, especially since he wasn't sure whether the apparition was deliberately being witty or honestly didn't realise his words were funny. "You are and will be," he repeated, and nodded. "I've heard that description before, in a manner of speaking."

That was essentially how Bakura had taught him to summon part of his soul; as something that just was. Close your eyes. Open them. There, you've done it.

Some things had to be taken on faith. Wouldn't that just rankle Skulduggery?

"No," Solomon said, his mouth quirking. "You're not the only walking, talking skeleton I've met, anyway, and he's got quite a bit of presence himself. Not as much as you, of course, and to be perfectly frank I'm glad for the comparison." It would be a nice reminder, if Skulduggery's magic ever went haywire again, that there was something even greater ready to reap him. "Why is the situation off-putting for you?"

[bugger_quantum]

THERE ARE RULES, Death repeated, as grave-faced as ever. IT'S TERRIBLY DISRUPTIVE. AT THE VERY LEAST, I SHOULD HAVE BEEN INFORMED.

He shook his cowled head. Up ahead, the crowd was on the move again - not dispersing, but pressing forward in a wave against the mansion gates, leaving this area somewhat quieter.

I DON'T SUPPOSE YOU'VE SEEN MY HORSE EITHER, HAVE YOU? he said presently, as a hopeful afterthought.

[peacefullywreathed]

Which ... explained absolutely nothing about the rules, what part of the situation was a problem, and why exactly it was so disruptive. "No," said Solomon absently. "I can't see anything but death, currently." He motioned at his eyes, wondering if the apparition would be able to feel the necromancy which had destroyed his sight. "Assuming your horse is flesh-and-blood, at least; if it isn't, I haven't seen it. Why should you have been informed?"

It wasn't a confused question, or even a curious one, but almost amused. "If you don't know whether I ought to have seen you, in my world, why expect that you'll be informed, in your current incarnation, about dimensional manipulations?"

That was the only thing Solomon could think would come under the heading it being 'terribly disruptive' and against these 'rules'. Was it possible for something who seemed so deadpan to be arrogant, or out of depth? Maybe that's what 'off-putting' meant, that the apparition didn't really know what was going on or why, and was miffed at that fact.

... Quite a bit like Skulduggery, really.

[bugger_quantum]

Death's eye sockets flickered again. He was not, as such, a creature of magic - arguably, on the Disc, nothing could be more mundane - but blindness was such a relative term anyway.

I AM DEATH, he said, mildly nonplussed. What other explanation was there? I DON'T TAKE HOLIDAYS.

[peacefullywreathed]

So probably not aware of its witticisms, if the apparition had that much trouble with anything occurring out of its sphere of experience. It was comforting, actually. Comforting and ... interesting. The Temple saw death as the ultimate chaos they sought to turn to order, but this apparition's inability to comprehend anything but its duty implied the opposite.

A breeze passed over the crowd, carrying the sound of their shouts and making Solomon shiver. He hadn't noticed he was getting so cold. His heartbeat had slowed, too. Not dangerously so, but ... significantly. It was the pressure of Death's presence beside him, too stable to be dangerous unless Death actually wanted to kill him, but too powerful not to leave its mark against the being of someone currently as magically and soulfully open as Solomon was.

"You could have been kidnapped," Solomon pointed out, putting his freezing hands in his pockets. "Or you could be here by accident. Neither option has anything to do with taking a holiday." Though if Death felt the need to explain it wasn't there on business, that implied it frequently went to places for reasons other than business. What were they, if not holidays?