crescentview | jan mid-month event.

jan mid-month event.

midsummer storms

The unrelenting summer heat has begun to let up as of late and those who make a habit of reading the news will know why: a hurricane is set to make landfall on Summer 16th. Spread the word to your neighbors and keep your loved ones and animals indoors. Expect that there may be some damage to your property, field and trees!

Fortunately, the hurricane brings with it only moderate wind and rain. Once the storm subsides and the whipping winds calm, you’ll be handed a letter by one of the Goddess’ many sprightly fairies who look quite a bit healthier and happier than they used to. Some of them look like they’ve been hitting the gym while others have a nice set of shiny new acrylic nails on their fingertips. Good for them.

Anyway, the letter details an upcoming event hosted by the Goddess: the first annual date auction. She has considerately included a form with her letter inviting islanders to volunteer as dates to be auctioned away while others have been voluntold. Oof. With the promise of a fabulous and extravagant vacation for those participating, the reward may very well be worth the price of entry.

With more news to announce, she requests that everyone meet up in the Town Plaza. The task board hasn’t seen any mid-season additions, but the upcoming date auction and the recently opened mines promise to keep islanders well occupied through the rest of the season.

This season’s crops are corn, onion, pumpkin, watermelon, and pineapple. Summer’s seasonal flowers are poppy, rose, sunflower, lily, and hydrangea. As for mushrooms, shimeji, trumpet, and common brown spores are available for the summer.

and... sold! first annual date auction

It’s time to d-d-d-date auction! Participation is highly encouraged by both the Goddess and her pushy little helpers. Every islander received a form delivered to them by said pushy fairies that contains the following application:

Describe yourself in three sentences or less:
List three of your best and worst qualities:
If you were a fruit, which fruit would you be and why?
Describe your ideal romantic partner:
Why should the auction attendees bid on you?

...You may have noticed that the form does not include a section for your name. That’s because this is a blind auction in which bidders must place their bids based only on the information provided in their application. Love is blind, as they say!

While some people may eagerly volunteer themselves to be auctioned away, those who are less bold may have been signed up to participate by a friend, neighbor, or the Goddess herself. In so many words, if you’d like to sign your character up but don’t believe they’d willingly volunteer to be auctioned, worry not! You may use the Goddess (or another character) as your convenient excuse so sign them up anyway.

Submit your applications here by the 20th at 12pm EST. The date auction will go live on the 21st at 12pm EST.

As mentioned in the overview, all auctioned off parties and their winning bidders will win an all expenses paid trip... somewhere. The Goddess’ lips are sealed as to the destination, but you get the feeling this trip will be quite a bit more than you bargained for.

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 January 1st to February 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.

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This month’s tasks are centered around getting to know your fellow neighbors on a deeper level. As such, the Goddess has put together a small human scavenger hunt to encourage people to learn more about the people they are living with — and hopefully falling in love with.

Find someone who...

1. Was born in the summer
2. Pours milk into their bowl before the cereal
3. Plays a musical instrument
4. Has more than 3 siblings
5. Works out 5 times a week or more
6. Doesn’t like animals
7. Would like to date the Harvest Goddess
8. Has traveled around the world
9. Speaks two or more languages
10. Is wearing socks that aren’t black or white

Each submission will earn you two random bags of summer seeds. Specify whether you want crop, flower, or mushroom spores in your submission. This task can be completed a total of 10 times.

---

Many ingredients used in wine production grow in the summer, but so do a variety of tea plants and grains. Grapes, tea shrubs and grains like wheat and barley can all be grown on your farm or in your greenhouse, if you have one.

Complete the following tasks to earn yourself some nice beverage-producing crops for the farm:

1. Take something from last month’s harvest and gift it to a neighbor. You can give it to them directly, cook it into a meal, etc. Alternatively, craft them a bouquet, flower crown, or another gift from the flowers you grew last season. Complete 3 times for a total of 6 grape starters.

2. Share a piece of hot gossip with a neighbor or exchange secrets with them. It doesn’t have to be your secret! Complete 3 times for a total of 6 tea starters.

3. Exercise with someone. Go on a run, swim in the ocean, help them stretch out! Complete 3 times for a total of 6 grain crops. You may choose from wheat, barley, rye, or rice.

---

Summer is the perfect time to hang out on the beach and splash around in the ocean. Participate in some summer fun at the beach and earn more animals for your barn and coop.

1. Swim in the ocean, build a sandcastle, or bury someone in the sand. Do any of the following for one of the following animals: cow, sheep, alpaca, or goat. This task can be completed once.

2. Participate in Hot or Not. It’s an annual tradition! Submit yourself or comment on someone else for a single chicken or rabbit. This task can be completed once.

to the mines!

The once abandoned mines have been reopened and are now accessible to any brave islanders who wish to explore their depths! But be warned: doing so may come at a cost. Will you take the risk and come out on top with rare and otherworldly treasures, or will you trip and sprain your ankle after stumbling over a small rock? Only one way to find out!

OOCly, the mines can be explored once per week and exploration is undertaken in a cyoa-style thread. The mines are a permanent feature and can be accessed now until the end of the game. Have fun!

mod notes

⬥ Welcome to our mid-season event for month 2! We hope you have all been having fun and enjoying yourselves. As always, if you have any feedback or concerns, feel free to reach out to us on the mod contact page.
⬥ The next event (and the season of fall!) will go live on February 1st.
⬥ Please plot over at the Event 2.5 Plotting Post.
⬥ As a reminder, please keep all plotting on the OOC post as not everyone uses Discord or Plurk.
⬥ Please submit your completed tasks at the top-level below.
⬥ Have fun!

navigation

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Stranger smells like a swamp.

Cool!! Fluffy's tail wags harder and he goes to sniff his palm. Fluffy freaking loves nature smells. Does Fluffy lick Mishka's hand? Yeah. Absolutely.

Ellis nods... well, he supposes this dog might be his friend now. If anything, he's been very useful when he isn't body slamming him on the couch. ]

You can come in. I don't care too much about the dirt.

[ Since he cleans his house every day, thanks to Fluffy's immense shedding. ]

( Dog lick! How novel. He fluffs Fluffy's head, but kind of like you'd fluff a person's hair. He's not really used to handling dogs.

With the invitation, he hoists himself up on the sill and taps the toe of his shoe on the side. With respectable dexterity, he's in with an easy movement, soles clean as promised, even if Elli doesn't care much about it. Wouldn't be much of an assassin if he couldn't get in through windows without tracking dirt everywhere, so it feels nearly uncomfortable to leave footprints about. )

Do you often let in those who take to spying on you in the nights?

( He's not gonna pretend otherwise, really. He papaps Fluffy again. )

[ Fluffy is absolutely loving the attention despite how Mishka fluffed his head. All he wants is attention. And playtime.

Though that gets Ellis to pause. He doesn't think he was doing anything... weird. All he was doing was cleaning the house.

... ]

Yup. Want some water? Or apple juice?

( JOOS )

I'll have the juice, if you don't mind.

( Sugar!!!!!!

Mishka doesn't really understand how to play with dogs, but he understands you can pet them and that it's working quite effectively on this one, so he'll keep at it. )

[ Ellis goes to get a container of apple juice in his fridge and pours it into a cup. Hopefully Mishka hasn't said anything while Ellis goes to the kitchen, because he wouldn't have known if he said anything.

Fluffy loves the petting as usual and nudges Mishka to the couch. A seat for the guest. Ellis comes back with the cup of apple juice and holds it out to him. ]

I don't do anything interesting, so sorry if it was boring.

( Mishka figures Ellis wouldn't know if he says anything else, so he just amuses himself with this funky lil (big) dog. By the time Ellis returns, he's dutifully moved to the couch. )

Oh? It was quite interesting to me. ( He takes the juice! ) Ah, thank you.

( Ah, juice... This won't betray him like whiskey or wine or (list continues)... He takes a sip. )

It's interesting precisely because it's boring. The sorts of things those from my home occupy themselves with is largely different - for one, cleaning the tables would be a luxury of time few have. But here, it's a mundane activity, yes? That's interesting.

[ Ellis will agree that they definitely have plenty of time while they're here. He likes this sort of mundane peace, but he wonders about the place Mishka comes from. ]

What is everybody busy doing? Trying to live?

[ He'd think that's pretty important. ]

Mm, more or less. If you peer into a home, it's generally empty, with everyone out working - or they're working at home - or they're drinking into a stupor.

( He sippy... )

I'll admit, I haven't known what to do with myself without work to occupy myself, either. So I thought I might like to see how the people here go about it. Here, there are people taking hours to cook meals; people reading; people lounging...

What do you do, when you aren't cleaning?

[ Ellis takes a moment to think to list all the things he does when he doesn't clean his house. ]

- exploring the island
- talking to other people or hanging out with them
- going to work (I have a business)
- reading books
- see whatever I can make

( Considers the list contemplatively... He seems to be taking mental notes, if anything. )

What is your business?

[ Ellis doesn't consider himself important to keep track of, so he doesn't pay any mind to Mishka looking at the list longer than he expected. ]

"Stable Solutions"--a small office building in town. I stabilize things for a small fee. i mostly get customers for the more mundane things, like wanting to calm down or wanting to cool down from the summer heat.

( He raises an eyebrow. Curious. )

Quite literal stabilization, then. ( Like achieving an average, he supposes. Hmmm... ) Can it revert those transformed, or is the limit of your ability simply evening tempers?

It depends.

[ Should he divulge the extent of what he recently learned about his powers to Mishka? Yeah. Clearly, this won't go wrong. ]

I can stabilize blood flow so that it keeps flowing normally inside a person regardless of whatever wound they have so that it doesn't pour out. I can also stabilize some things in the brain to knock someone out. I have to look into what else I can do, but I never tried on a transformed person.

( Interesting indeed... )

And the stabilizing effect persists for how long once you've applied it?

For as long as I want to. I can keep it on even while I sleep, but it has limited range whether I'm sleeping or not.

[ And that is what keeps customers coming back because they stop being stable and ask Ellis to be stable again. It's a cycle. No one should think of it as a clinic. ]

( And there's the catch. )

Ah, I suppose that won't work then.

( If he'd been contemplating becoming a client, that seems to be the deciding factor against it - whether because of the range or Ellis's lack of desire to maintain its effect, he imagines it would not likely work out. He hadn't gotten his hopes up much, though.

He leans back. )

Still interesting, however. I knew a woman with an adjacent ability, of sorts. She made things ordered. Objects would become geometric; terrain would grow smooth; opinions grew neutral. An unnerving ability, but useful, when most things you encounter are aspected into extremes in some way.

[ That woman truly manifested chill Minecraft streams irl. Amazing. He tilts his head. ]

Are you trying to permanently revert a transformed state?

[ He doesn't know if that's Mishka himself or someone he knows. Either way, his interest is piqued. ]

( Help you're right... In any case, Mishka pauses for a moment. )

That, or prevent the advance of a disease of sorts. The end result being a transformation. ( The subject, himself or another, remains ambiguous. ) But I cannot imagine you're keen on having a client about you at all times, nor are you endlessly altruistic without compensation.

( No offense to Ellis - he imagines most people wouldn't be, by default. He also can't be certain how Ellis's power works, and if there's a toll of energy or otherwise required when he utilizes his powers. )

[ Ellis isn't offended—after all, he mentioned that he does this for a job. Ellis thinks about it seriously for a while, tapping his notepad with his pen. ]

I can accept harvests or something else except carnal activities. I'm not that picky.

As for prevention, if it's a disease, I can forcibly stabilize the body's condition to what it was before the infection. The disease will still be present though very small, so it would spread throughout the body again if it's the type to spread on its own. If it isn't, then it will stay that way.

( Hmmm. )

And the duration and range?

( Ellis said the duration is basically whatever he wanted to be, so it's a question of what he wants it to be, in this situation. )

[ He might as well explain this in full. Let's go. ]

My stabilization powers work on my set standards of what is the "average" or "normal". I don't need contact as long as the target is within my range. The range is the size of a bedroom here if I stand in the middle of it.

[ He points to an empty bedroom (~132 sqft) on this floor that's easily visible from where Mishka is sitting, since the door is wide open. ]

Duration is still however I can will it to last. For the stabilization blood flow, I slept next to the person overnight to wait for his wound to heal as much as it could before deactivating it.

[ If that gives Mishka an idea. ]

As for effectiveness, I'll use an example:

1. I get scared of something because of A.
2. I use stabilization to calm myself down.
3a. If A went away, I can deactivate my power to retain my sense of calm without it.
3b. If A is still there after I deactivate my power, I'll just get scared again.

( Oho. Mishka watches Ellis scribble away for a bit, and he studies what he's written.

Yeah, makes sense. )

... Yes, this would be difficult, then. You would need to be around the person to keep the disease in stasis, and it would continue its progression once they leave your presence. ( He considers. ) Though, I suppose you could slow it's progression. I suppose this does have merit.

Perhaps there is some business to be done, then, if you can tolerate having someone around you for some hours a day for a period. I require a little more time.

I don't mind. They can swing by the office during my work hours or you can tell them to go to my house if I'm not there.

[ That said... ]

Who is it?

[ By "I require a little more time", Ellis thinks Mishka needs more time to decide on this instead of the subject being, well, Mishka. ]

Myself.

( He laughs. Without ceremony, he pushes up his loose shirt to expose his chest - a little scandalous a gesture at first, but it's quite readily apparent, though, his intent.

The skin is blackened where the ribs split at the sternum, the wispy, blackened impression of his ribs crisp against his pale skin. From this imprint webs outward a veinlike pattern across his chest in all directions - resembling, it seems, the veinlike pattern of a leaf.

So far, the markings appear contained largely to the general area of the ribs. He presses his finger against the sternum, to indicate this is what he's referring to - and it's not a commonplace mark. )

I was not wholly honest, but the principle is the same. It is not a disease, but a curse. It was still for a time, since my arrival, but I've sensed its slow movement as of late.

I will pay as you like, until I find some permanent solution. Is this a fair transaction?

Edited 2023-01-24 02:16 (UTC)

[ Oh, boy.

Ellis stares with wide eyes for a moment, leaning in to try and get a better look. After he's satisfied, leans back and nods. ]

Would you like for me to try now? I can do it for free, to see how it would feel for you.

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