EVENT ✨ Wolf's Moon

[avalonmods]

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The Fairy Queen sends out an invitation for all otherworlders to an eccentric party with ulterior motives that aren't necessarily bad.. after all, they're protecting players from a ritualistic curse cast by escaped convicts from the Elphame prison. But that doesn't mean it's the party's entirely safe either.

CONTENT WARNINGS:

• 1st Prompt: Mild elements of body horror in the fairy queen's description (paragraph starting with "Opening the message"); this paragraph is description only and may be skipped without loss of content.
• 2nd Prompt: Ball prompts include reference to drugs, alcohol, smooching, and fake murder.
  
• 3rd Prompt: May have potential for mild body horror depending on player preference, as it features cynanthropy/lycanthropy.

The night before the full moon, a message is sent out to all the otherworlders in the land. In each person's inbox, the message sender reads simply "ELPHAME" and appears to have a verified account, despite that looking into it doesn't seem to reveal much content. The profile pic is simply a picture of a mushroom. Opening the message will reveal a video recording. For the first full minute, a woman simply stares into the video through one pure white eye and one wholly black eye. Her hair is white and fair and longer than can be seen in the video of her torso. Her skin is sallow, gray more than any other color, and her décolleté is peppered with what seems to be shells of mushrooms growing out of her flesh like they would on a tree, patches of bleeding tooth mushroom creeping down the side of her neck.
Atop her head, a headpiece made of platinum formed into the tiniest branches, filled with leaves of precious stones- diamonds, rubies, emeralds, sapphires, and moldavite trailing down in long chains that keep her hair out of her face. Her lips are just slightly parted, painted in what seems to be an enchanted design that shifts patterns as she moves, as if they were a green screened galaxy in real life. There is a stud in the bow of her lips, and the top of her clothing appears to be colorful, but is only visible toward the top of her frame, as her top is low-cut to account for the fungi. A number of small stitched scars are visible, but largely healed. She tilts her head slightly. Even though it's only a video recording, it feels as though she is looking directly at your character. "You are busy bees..." A soft voice speaks, almost as if the wind itself is whispering in your ear and not from a recorded video. "Busy bees could barely bother, but bother is basically all you do. I bequeath you busy bees a bidding. Bother blithely, busy bees, in Elphame as bristling beauties are bound to do. A ball before you, beneath the Wolf's Moon big and bright, betwixt burgeoning fae blooms. Do not baa, do not bray, bruin nor boar will keep big bad wolf at bay. Bop and bounce, ballet you may, or brawl your basest behaviors in my ballroom before break of day. Broadcast not your boorish bumf, though, or busy bees will be broken brisker than bats banished from Beelzebub's borders and bound. Bless my bestowal and with bated breath I shall bade you betokened truth, if truth be told." Whether or not your character understood what was actually said or their brain shut down in the middle of those barely benign instructions, they may additionally notice fairy circles made of tiny mushrooms start to crop up regardless of where they are in Avalon.
	Once night falls, if a character dances in them they will be transported to a costume party within the ballroom of the fairy queen in Nicnevin. Costumes will be magically applied upon arrival, based on a favorite childhood fantasy. (Did they want to be an astronaut? A dinosaur? A cowboy? A cat? That's what they'll appear as.) You can choose from any age of childhood for your character, depending on whether you want to go funny or more serious about their later childhood dreams. Whatever your character chooses to do as part of the party, the following party happenings should be noted:
1. If your character or anyone they know uses your character's name or reveals enough information about themself, they will become unable to disobey the fairy queen in future events. They've technically been warned about this in the fairy queen's message, even if it wasn't easy to understand. B. Alternately, you can have your character's name be captured by a more mischievous party guest fae and play with that as you will. You can be released either by someone else killing your captured fae for you, or the fae saying your name backward. So if your character's name is Stevie, they would have to trick the fairy into saying Eivets. This option to NPC your own fae captor is endable on your own terms, but 1a will be on the fae queen's terms down the line. 2. The party itself is a protected area; refusal to attend or leaving the party before sunset will subject characters to the Wolf's Moon, which has been put under a ritual by a prisoner group released from the fae prison during the previous dark web quest, Banyanished. This ball is being held as a gift to otherworlders to protect them from the second part of this event. (See below for details.) Characters will be told that they are in a protective area if they try to leave and to trust the fairy queen, but will not be forced to stay against their will by the fae. The only people who may try to stop your character from leaving beyond telling them this information are other player characters. 3. Dancing, food (fairy food*), psychedelics and drink will be provided to those of age who want them throughout the night. If the partygoers don't seem to be having a good time or the party grows dull, the fairy queen (dressed in the award-winning submission to the Elphame Trader's contest some time ago) will make a demand participation in a party game. If your character is standing around and not participating in the general activities, they may be coerced to participate. Anyone may join willingly as well, of course. The following party games will be played throughout the night:

Spin the Bottle, Elphame Rules: Fairies are quite randy creatures at times, and the first game played is none other than spin the bottle. The rules are as such: when it is your turn, you are blinded by fairy magic and must spin the bottle. Once the bottle stops spinning, the person the bottle lands on will kiss them. The person who is kissed must guess who from the circle kissed them; a correct guess will mean they stay in and the blindness spell will be lifted. An incorrect guess will eject them from the circle and they will wander around blind for the duration of the game until a winner is declared. Feel free to play out gameplay or your character needing assistance after being ejected from the game circle.

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Truth or Dare: The standard game of truth or dare. Don't forget to be very careful, as certain truths may have dire consequences. (See point 1, be very careful.) You can play issuing and completing dares or asking and answering truths with other player characters or receive dares from NPC'd fairies, which may escalate to dangerous and magical lengths. The only solid rule is that no dares are permitted to require exiting the party to complete, and lying during a truth gives permission to fairies to steal your tongue from you if they discover your lie at any point, even after the party is over.

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Balloon Game: Everyone loves a good murder game! Everyone is outfitted with a single balloon. You may secure the balloon to yourself for 2 minutes before the start of the game. In the center of the game circle is a pile of close-range weapons varying in usefulness from binoculars and pots to knives, slingshots, axes and more. Magic is also permitted. If your balloon "pops" you are "dead" and will float to the ceiling to fly around until the end of the game, out of harm's way. Do not commit any actual murder or the balloon of the deceased will immediately wrap around you in a full rubber bodysuit and imprison you until the fairy queen can deal judgment. (If this happens, notify a mod so we can discuss Queen Elphame's judgment with you OOC.)

Helping to empower otherworlders to improve their chances of saving the world is the kind of task that can be a little.. subjective. A little questionable when it comes to consent, at times. After all, no one is here with their consent and no one was bonded with their familiar or given magic with their consent. What's a little more empowerment? Certainly, a group of imprisoned lycanthrope wizards seem to think they have something of a solution to increasing other worlders' potentials: a ritual using the Wolf Moon of January's full moon cycle to transform unprotected otherworlders into fellow cynanthropes or, in layman's terms, werewolves and other types of weredogs. Anyone not protected (at the party) will be affected by the curse ritual.
Cynanthropes in Avalon have the following characteristics: Character is now able to transform into a humanoid dog or wolf form to the extent the player chooses (go ears/tail or full-furry) Experiences enhanced strength, enhanced sense of smell, night vision, blood lust, and characteristics similar to the character's dog or wolf breed. These effects are only applicable the day before, the day of, and the day after the full moon from sundown to sunrise on each day. Note that new weredogs/wolves do not have control over their instincts for the first few months of transformations and will behave aggressively. If in an emotional state, they can lose control of their transformed form regardless of how long they have been cursed. Though characters can be killed by normal means throughout the month, they can only be killed by silver bullets during the 3-day full moon cycle Full-time side effects include cravings for meat, animal mages having mild influence over them, being able to eat food from Elphame without being bound to the land, and the occasional hair ball. It is up to players how painful they want the transformation to be/not to be; you can play this how you want and chalk it up to ritual reaction variation. Cynanthrope ritual curses are particularly strong and require at least two siphoners working together to break the curse, a counter-curse potion (only available through events), or a deal with a powerful being such as the fairy queen or Morganna. If your character did not attend the party, left the fairy queen's party, or wasn't at the Red Springs (protected by the mysterious crystals that turn it red during the full moon-- conveniently for your excuse not to participate in either prompt if you want to opt out!) they will become a werewolf or weredog.

Comments

[hitokiri]

Huh. Guess he actually knew what he was talkin' 'bout.

[ that, and she had the sense to listen to what was potentially drunk ramblings. izō supposes that's one reason he likes her (and her counterpart where he's from, of course, because they're the same where it matters). not where she doesn't dismiss the drunks but just being that attentive at all, especially considering the personalities floating around chaldea. it sounds exhausting. you notice that sort of thing when people usually blow you off.

but enough about stupid human feelings. animal instincts are a double-edged sword kind of deal, but there's not much to complain about when it comes to being a dog. she's happy and he's getting pet — which is great — and?? now?? she's mentioned the other Best Thing!! treat!! the offer of free food! anyone would wag their tail at that and he does. ]

No? Starvin', now that ya mention it. I'll pay ya back! ... Soon as I get m' stuff back, 'course...

[ that would be fair, especially since he'd have to borrow a little extra to grab something cheap to wear. ]

[fujimaru]

Don't worry about it. I'm pretty covered, now.

[ She's come a long way from camping out in the woods out of half-necessity, half-stubborn desire to be kindly out of the way. Mostly because-- ]

Beowulf dumped a whole bunch of loot on me a couple of months ago. What am I supposed to do with it? Just sitting on it isn't gonna do me any good, and I've got a place to stay now, so... call it my way of taking care of you guys here, okay? It's the best I can do.

[ She can't provide any sort of backup in a fight, she can't provide mana--not that they even need it--so, what? She can at least be as much of a background support as she possibly can, with the resources available to her. ]

[hitokiri]

Yeah? There's all sorts a' things if ya got money. 'Course I'd jus' spend it on real expensive dinners an' shit. Or y' know, like when they got that one bottle an' when someone orders from that bottle everybody goes real quiet 'cause they know somebody's either real stupid or really rich.

[ he will realise later that no, she possibly does not know. ]

Or gamblin'. Hehe, but that's why it's good somebody more responsible's handlin' that...

[ again, reasons why ryouma deals with things like finances which is probably also bad in its own way but it could be worse. most importantly, he seems convinced enough to take her up on the offer without more fuss. rambling is also a good way to attempt to diffuse a little awkwardness. or try not to leave room for questions he doesn't want to think about like what really happened. ]

Anyway, the magic everybody has now sorta evens things out all around. 'M sure there's plenty t' do. Some people're jus' better at standin' back an' makin' decisions anyway. Nothin' wrong with it.

[fujimaru]

I'm only gambling again if I absolutely can't avoid it.

[ Okay, okay, so the summer running around in Las Vegas had been fun, but it had also been kind of really terrifying, seeing the sheer amounts of money and QP that got bandied around. Maybe most of Chaldea's population had been kings or otherwise rich in their lives, but Ritsuka has no idea how people live like that constantly. In that, at least, her experience is closer to Izou's.

She tugs very gently on one little pointy ear, not quite scolding. ]

I'm best at standing back and making decisions. But you guys don't even need that from me, here. It's not like your skills are dependent on what I can provide.

[ When you no longer need a Master's mana to manifest, it's probably a lot easier to use your own inherent technical skills. She can acknowledge that! ]

So I might as well do what I can with what I have.

[hitokiri]

Oh, that happened too, huh?

[ that summer had been messy for him, what with the incredible amount of debt he'd acquired and the fight that had broke out... ]

That ain't true! I'm bad at makin' decisions. Can't even decide what I want for lunch most'a the time.

[ which is funny, since they're going to eat. ]

But I guess ya gotta point. 'Course that jus' means ya know who's hangin' 'round jus' 'cause they like ya.

[ he's not saying he's in this category, just indirectly pointing this out as a fact that might potentially apply to him. ]

[fujimaru]

[ Maybe he doesn't say it, but she still lights up t the comment. He might not be her Izou, specifically, but that doesn't mean she can't read between the lines. Her arms even tighten a little, not quite a hug. ]

I guess that's true, huh? Somehow, everyone's still putting up with me. I'm pretty lucky.

[ She doesn't really think it's putting up with, precisely--she's not so modest that she doesn't think her (former?) Servants don't like her! But there's still a difference between them spending time with her through obligation on both sides, and also just because... well, apparently they like her. It's nice to hear! ]