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crescentview2022-12-09 08:26 pm
crescentviewmods) wrote in crescentview2022-12-09 08:26 pm
dec event overflow.
prologue
You awake to find yourself in a bed that creaks with your every movement, motes of dust flitting about the sparsely lit room. Whether you wake alone or with another by your side, you exit the worn-down building to find yourself on an old, abandoned farm. It isn’t long before a familiar voice lilts in your ears, carried to you on the breeze—
“Hurry over to the town square. Chop chop!”
Whether you go willingly or find your feet inexplicably compelled to trudge into town makes no difference. Once you arrive, you find yourself surrounded by a small ocean of new faces— some confused, some angered, and others quite chipper. At the center of the crowd is a bright-eyed woman with an otherworldly allure, her white hair tied up neatly in a bun, pamphlets and assorted papers tucked in her grasp.
“Welcome to Crescentview, farmers!”
Spreading her arms out wide — as much as she can without her papers blowing away — she eagerly regales the crowd with some fun facts about the island and the town while also reminding everyone of one very important fact:
“Remember, you’ve been brought here to tend the earth, fall in love, and begin your new lives together. You’re not leaving until you do. It will be quite the experience for you, I’m sure.”
Complain, grouse, or rejoice if you like, but don’t expect the Goddess to budge. Oh, right, there’s that too: she, the Harvest Goddess, is the one presiding over this land. Don’t get on my bad side, she gently warns as she stuffs pamphlets into the hands of Crescentview’s aspiring farmers.
spring breeze
While you’re here, you may as well check out the pamphlet the Goddess insistently pressed into your hands. Within it, you’ll find a handy infographic on each of your neighbors detailing their likes, dislikes, and... ideal dates? Even the Goddess’ profile is there. How invasive! Each farmer’s picture is hand-drawn by crayon into simple stick figures with the only difference being how the hair looks on top of their heads… if it can be called hair with the mess of crayons, that is. Every single stick figure is smiling. In front of each personalized pamphlet, there’s a stick figure on the cover with the same style as the photo. It’s definitely yours with how the hair color seamlessly matches yours. For the ones who have multicolor hair, you might notice the goddess seems a little more huffy with you.
The pamphlet also includes a map of Crescentview and lists the services available in town. There aren’t many on this small, remote island. Learning how to fend for yourself seems like the best course of action. Finally, a hand-printed bingo card has been made up for each new island resident. The Goddess must have spent quite a bit of time making these...
The Goddess gives her new questionably loyal followers a chance to mingle and mix before speaking up with another announcement. A small group of haggard-looking fairies appear at her feet, and clapping her hands, a notice board springs into existence. When the fairies fail to react, she gives one a nudge with her foot, prompting them all to burst into the world’s smallest round of applause. It’s a little... pathetic.
“Ta-da! Behold: the task board. Every season, I’ll give you new tasks to complete, and in exchange, you’ll be richly blessed by me, the Harvest Goddess. Spring is the season of new beginnings, so let’s take a look at what we’ve got cooking, hm?”
task board
The task board is located in Town Square and changes from season to season. In real time, a season is one month long. The following tasks are available from December 1st to January 1st and more tasks may be added mid-month.
Certain rewards are only available through event participation, so please keep this in mind when planning your threads. Multiple tasks may be completed within a single thread, but when turning in, please link to the individual tags in which each task was completed.
Finally, rewards are per character, not per farm, so those with housemates may want to coordinate with one another with regard to what animals you’re bringing home to your farm.
1. Greet your neighbors. For every person you meet, you will be given a random bag of spring seeds. Potato, cabbage, turnip, strawberry, and cucumber seeds are available at this time. Alternatively, random mushroom spores are also available. These include morel, matsutake, and common white mushroom spores. This task can be completed a total of 10 times for rewards. Please specify how much of each you would like when submitting your threads, i.e. “I’d like 5 random spring seed bags and 5 random mushroom bags, please!”
2. Exchange names. Start learning some names and faces: you’ll be seeing a lot of these folks! For each name you learn, you’ll earn a random bag of spring flower seeds. Daffodil, tulip, forget-me-not, primrose, and hyacinth are available this season. This task can be completed a total of 10 times for rewards, and yes, you can cheat the system and introduce yourself to someone you already know, but the Goddess won’t like it.
3. Check out your new farm. Take a look around and settle in! After a bit of wandering, you’ll notice a small cat or dog following you around and looking up at you with them big ol’ eyes. Looks like it wants to stay with you, but will you adopt it? This task can be completed once.
4. Till your field and begin planting. Find the beat up farming tools in your beat up house and begin beating your farmland into submission. Plant some seeds and be rewarded by the Goddess with a single chicken or rabbit to keep in your coop. This task can be completed once.
5. Visit another farm. Pay one of your neighbors a visit to receive a stationary set blessed by the Goddess herself. There are no cell phones or Internet on the island, so get used to sending all your “LOL”s and “XDDDD”s by hand. This task can be completed once.
6. Make a new friend. Isn’t friendship wonderful? For each person you proclaim to be your friend, you will receive two random gacha items. This task can be completed 3 times.
7. Pray to the Goddess. Whether you do so grudgingly or willingly doesn’t matter much to her so long as you’re doing it! Clasp your hands together and bow your head or throw an offering into her pond— she’ll hear you either way. Praying to the Goddess will net you a barn animal of your choosing: a cow, sheep, alpaca, or goat. This task may be completed once.
Caution: throwing certain items into her pond may have consequences. Choose your offerings wisely.
mod notes
⬥ Welcome to the game's opening and our first event!
⬥ A second event post will go up in mid-Dec.
⬥ Please plot over at the Dec Plotting Post.
⬥ As a reminder, please keep all plotting on the OOC post as not everyone has Discord or Plurk.
⬥ Please submit your completed tasks at the top-level below.
⬥ Have fun!
no subject
Do we? Fascinating. I'd be interested in seeing how your paintings turn out when you've got a bit of a buzz in you.
[ Laurent hums thoughtfully at the next suggestion, yanking up another half-successful clump of weeds. Cooking? When was the last time he really cooked? ]
We could. Might as well. I have a feeling we should get used to cooking for ourselves, right?
It is, but I guess we wouldn't be very useful if she let us starve to death.
no subject
[ Makoto is already slipping back into being short with him. But it's once again because of an annoying weed. Yet if Laurent saw him around town earlier he knew how he'd been all friendly smiles then. They'd been genuine, but not like this. The work is tiring and he'd walked everywhere today. He just doesn't have the energy for more than bluntness anymore. He wants a nap.
The weed comes free and Makoto tosses it with a sigh as he passes Laurent to skip to the other side. It puts them face to face across a row of weeds, shirt only a little oversized. Just enough when he leans over if Laurent is sitting tall enough. But Makoto looks at him after pulling the weed in front of him. He removes one glove, to shove his hair back with a clean hand before resting his chin on that palm.
He's hungry. But also too tired to cook more than one meal or give up half his crops because Laurent ate out too much.
So, with only a little bit of a grumble, he asks-- ]
What do you want to eat, then? Pick something that doesn't take forever.
no subject
[ And bumming food off of Cynthia. But who can blame him? She cooks SO well.
Laurent watches Makoto move around him to continue weeding. He's much more serious about this hand Laurent is. He's aware he'll need to participate... but now that he's doing it, he realizes how impressively boring it already is to weed a garden. Tending to a terrace herb garden was much less drab than... this.
He sighs about it, but keeps yanking up weeds to keep from getting punched while he's in such a close proximity to Makoto. ]
Why not some pasta? I would hope we have some in there, don't we? Doesn't take long to sauté some veggies and boil some noodles.
no subject
Yeah. Not long at all.
[ Last time he cooked around anyone but himself, he'd been Yakuza. And he still missed her sometimes, if he's honest. Makoto keeps his gaze down on the weeds. ]
You know, I expected you to give me way more of a hard time about all of this.
[ And on to the next one, it's sort of impressive sometimes, to see how fast Makoto can pick up a new skill after seeing it, reading about it.
There's still no real heat in his voice. ]
So if you've got any ulterior motives, forget it, okay?
no subject
He remembers being that wore down. Maybe it's what's lightened the hand of his careless words. He raises his brows, stopping his hands so he can turn his head to look at Makoto.
Oh, he noticed. ]
Now, how could I have ulterior motives when I'm just as in the dark here as you are. You should take advantage of that, you know. Our playing field is pretty even, don't you think?
no subject
[ It's a low blow, or it would be if it wasn't lightened suddenly to a flat joking tone. Maybe Laurent is the only person that can rise this type of humor from him now, at least without Abbie around. But with him, it is a messy outcropping on the dark monument to their intertwined lives. Also, because he's noticed just how good of a job he's done already compared to Laurent's side. Visibly, it buoys his ego, though there was no reaching the level of the young man Laurent initially met playing at being a badass. That takes more work now.
More casually, tossing a glance to Laurent himself-- ]
Aren't you worried about the second part of this thing? How're we supposed to get to know anyone if we're stuck here doing all of this work? And why...
[ But he stops himself without trying to let on. They've never talked about it, he'd never really planned on it to be honest. Laurent had heard him, and it was done.
But the question bubbles up unwarranted. Why him? And not... her? With the power the goddess clearly has, he can't help but wonder what the point is of ringing him here with Laurent. It makes no sense to Makoto, really. ]
no subject
[ A low blow, but it hits him soft. One of his many frustrating qualities will always be how difficult it is to rattle him. Besides, in his mind, it is good - very good - that Makoto is not him. In some way, he will say, Makoto is painfully familiar but otherwise, he is very much himself. Very much someone better, he's certain.
Laurent feels where that question is going in his guts. He averts his eyes from Makoto again and gets his hands down in the weeds. His smile is tighter than before. ]
I assure you, I have no intention in playing that part of her game in earnest. No one falls in love because they're aiming to... that's not how it works, no matter how much she meddles.
no subject
If Makoto presses too hard, and too bluntly, he just knows Laurent will bring up Oz. Asshole. Right now, or ever in Makoto's mind, it isn't worth the headache. ]
Well, yeah. I know that's not how it works. [ Does he?? It isn't as though he was getting up to much romance lately before the yacht, as Laurent might be aware. Or ever, as he might be less aware. His flush is faint and short-lived.
After a pause, only mildly a huff. ]
And I'm not playing her game either. There are just people here from all kinds of different worlds in the same position as us, so it'd be stupid not to at least get to know some of them and see. Maybe that's why we're both here?
no subject
Maybe! It's always useful to get connections in the community. That much is true. We're at square one and I don't have my usual network, so we'll have to build something up - to keep our heads above water, of course.
no subject
[ Makoto says it scornfully to his current weed victim. And by the time he's finishing his side and moving on to clearing other debris and getting tools involved, he's back closer again. He'll leave the rest of the weeds to Laurent.
He pauses to look down at him if he's still down there. ]
This isn't a big place, Laurent. You can't just pull crap and hop on a plane this time. Try to find some meaning now or you'll just wind up feeling trapped.
[ Like how they'd left Makoto trapped and in the dark. He says the words flippantly, without an edge. He's gotten good at that since the last job, biting without breaking breaking skin. But it's advice he knows from personal experience. Meaning in more than a figurine or a job. ]
no subject
[ He hadn't stayed in one place longer than a week or so since Dorothy. The idea of being stuck still makes him... antsy, not that it will show on his face. Not as long as he has a say in it.
He notices Makoto has given up on the weeds. He decides to keep his hands busy, continuing to yank up plants and slowly getting better at plucking out the roots. ]
That's awful philosophical of you to say, Edamame, but what meaning are you hoping to find here?
[ Laurent had not found meaning anywhere in a very long time. He almost can't imagine what Makoto means. ]
no subject
It is this moment he realizes that he'll need to keep Laurent busy if they want to make it through this together. Because that is the instinct he doesn't fight for once. They work well together. Makoto isn't an idiot, so even if he won't admit it out loud, he knows it. This isn't a con, but it is a job of sorts.
He sighs at the question anyway. Because he doesn't feel like admitting he doesn't know yet and it feels like Laurent is poking on purpose. ]
Well... this farm is ours. We're responsible for it now, so it deserves the best we can give it at least.
And who knows, [ Makoto starts working again, as if this part is clearly secondary and the less comfortable point he has to make--- ] we might both find love here, right?
no subject
I haven't been responsible for anything before. It might be interesting if it bears fruit.
[ Then his mouth tightens and he pauses, staring at Makoto silently for a moment. Oh, he is aiming low, isn't he? He can't help but see it as a rib. Like Makoto continued to see his pain as a target after all he'd done. Maybe he deserved it, but it still jerks something under his ribs.
But he smiles easily before long and looks down at the weeds he's continuing to unearth. ]
I think you know very well that I'm done with that sort of thing, but have at it if you plan to go into things heart open.
no subject
[ Makoto sounds so sure of himself as he works, voice impacted by his physical exertions; a huff here or mumbled Japanese there. He does, however, give Laurent a serious look for his eventual response to the last part. He even pauses his work. ]
And I think you know very well that your heart decides that, not you.
[ As if Makoto has any experience with love. He does a good job sounding like it, as if anyone had been able to navigate his trust issues and keep his interest, or trust him enough in turn. Love. It's a complicated thing, something he's idealized yet never experienced romantically, wahile his life was altered radically by the love of those around him. His mom loved his dad, Laurent loved Dorothy, and who did Makoto have at the end? In the wake of love? No one.
And the look in his suddenly serious, tired eyes are too expressive, briefly, about his illusions of that ever changing. Optimism, a small match in the darkness, seems eternal, but unlikely to grow without kindling. And Makoto isn't getting his hopes up any time soon. He fans the match himself, stubbornly, when it takes over his expression and lifts his chin-- ]
Maybe I will. [ Makoto turns back to work, mumbling the rest in Japanese: ] At least I still can.
no subject
[ Maybe his work isn't always... actively apparent, but he puts a lot of effort in when no one's looking, ok! Surely, he thinks, Makoto sees that. He almost sulks about it.
He snorts at that, pausing for a moment and touching his collar bone when he feels Makoto isn't working. It is gone, after years and years, but he doesn't feel like his heart has been opened by its absence. He can't imagine what would happen to someone he did let in. Nothing good had come to anyone who loved him before... why risk it now? ]
Knock yourself out. You haven't lost your sense of adventure, I'm sure. What's love but an adventure? It should make every day exciting.
no subject
[ Makoto counters, not confirming or denying he knows how much efffort Laurent put into anything. But the attitude says he remembers learning that lesson and isn't about to thank him for the privilege. ]
Yeah, yeah, I don't need any advice from you. There aren't many girls around here anyway.
[ Give him a second, because it's a thing the gender disparity on the island made him consider only recently. ]
Well, I guess two guys can get married here too.
no subject
[ 'Grew Up', he supposes, being a loose use of the word given he was gone from there by 8 or 9, but all the same.
Laurent shrugs. Perhaps the goddess just liked watching guys struggle with their feelings. He knows a few women who would get some joy out of that. ]
I suppose our host is more forward thinking than we might have guessed.
no subject
Of course it wasn't, not really. Laurent had made sure he didn't get to live out his soul searching. Then again, he knows Laurent isn't wrong.
Makoto's stomach speaks up before he can, declaring his hunger for the field that is already starting to take shape. Pointedly, he keeps working as he changes the subject-- ]
Want to get started on that pasta? I'll finish up here.