[Artifact] A Bone to Pick (Rojo)

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gaia_crown [ Day 1 - The Tulgey Woods: ]

Finding the location of Wonderland is something which happens by accident.

The forest itself is seemingly unending, perpetually dark but with the grass and trees lit from within by strange ethereal light. The sky overhead where glimpsed through the branches is an impossible black and there is no moon.

Everything in the forest itself is not quite right. The flora and fauna are not like anything Rojo has seen before...

gaia_crown [ The Mushroom Patch ]

You come to a grove of strange mushrooms interspersed with signs which state EAT ME. There seems to be no way forward until you do just that.

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1. A small green mushroom, it tastes like a favourite food. It makes the eater relive a childhood meal, including the location it happened and the people present. Minimum of 800 words.

Rojo didn't actually sleep. He went through the motions every night because pajamas were fun. Lying on clean new sheets was fun. Pulling a sleeping mask over his eyes? Fun. The silence and the darkness gave him time to think... to dream. But not like that. It made any deviation from the carefully crafted stories he spun in the dead of night fairly easy to recognize. The dream he found himself visiting that night was quite pretty, all midnight stars and quiet trees. But it wasn't one of his.

He awoke next to a little pond, sitting upright on a carpet of mushrooms, each one just a little different from the last. There was a tiny sign nestled amidst the fungus. It said EAT ME in handsome, spindly letters. So he did.

It was always Día de Muertos in Muerto, just like it was always Halloween in Halloween Town. It was a wonder the two of them hadn't separated eons ago, but they fell so close to each other on the calendar and the humans who didn't know any better thought that made them one in the same, so together they remained. No one in Muerto, or any of the Day of the Dead cities that he knew of, seemed to mind very much at all.

Tonight, on the eve of the start of the humans' observance of their time, Rojo's village was truly celebrating. Papi Reggie was in the kitchen making tamales. Every family cooked their own, then they brought them down to town square so everyone could share. There was plenty of bragging too, but it was all in good fun. Reggie had always had a thing for cooking, and in Rojo's not so humble opinion, their family's tamales were the best.

Papi Martin was in charge of the sugar skulls and decorations. Creeple didn't normally think that chupacabras were dexterous enough for fine detail work, but Martin pulled it off every year, crafting such beautiful miniature calaca that everyone wanted to take one home. He insisted he based them all off of Mami, but Rojo had seen a fair few with tiny hats and magically shifting decorations on their sugar faces. Out of all of his dads, sometimes Rojo thought Papi Martin loved him most.

And then there was Papi Miguel. Rojo's third father had been born and raised in the forest, far from civilization, and outwardly balked at the idea of celebrating and representing some mundane human holiday when he was anything but. Inwardly, he tolerated it well enough, obviously, he even enjoyed helping as long as his part involved staying outside a lot and gathering butterflies. Miguel's contribution had grown to be an important part of the meal, even though the insects were rarely eaten, and then only by accident, but Rojo couldn't picture Día de Muertos without them. Out of all of his dads, he felt slightly guilty to admit the Alux held just a little more of his figurative heart.

The one who held the most by far was Mami. She and Rojo were conspirators through and through, inseparable since the day he'd broke free of his pumpkin, but against all odds, not in a dependent sort of way. She showed her scareling how to stand on his own two feet from the moment he could, encouraging him to think of himself as the best at all things. There was only one above him, and that was her. It was why when she had asked him to come home and help her with her mayoral campaign he had done so at the drop of his hat, even though he loved Amityville more than a lot of things. The election was a week away now, and they'd been working tirelessly for months. She had won, but tonight they didn't know that. Tonight, they would feast.

The table stretched nearly the entire length of Main Street, covered with an intricate layer of black lace over a rich, cream tablecloth. Food was piled high atop everyone's best china, not only tamales, but rice, pork, pozole, molotes, and more desserts than he could count. It was really a shame that he rarely ate.

Rojo took a seat between Mami and Papi Martin, a single candy flower at the center of the plate in front of him. Subtly sparkling butterflies danced from citizen to citizen, drawing their attention between bites. It was beautiful. He was truly homesick even less often than he was hungry, but...

Had Rojo possessed eyelids, he would have blinked them in confusion. The EAT ME sign was gone, and there was half a green mushroom cradled in his palm. His teeth tasted of sugar. What was going on?

Off to his left there was a wide open path through the trees that definitely hadn't been there before. Beyond this copse there were more trees, though from where he sat the area around them looked a little lighter than where he sat now. (It wasn't.)

Rojo pushed to his feet, dropped the mushroom, and took a step forward.  

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gaia_crown [ Day 2 – The Winding Forest ]

After a lot more wandering through the forest, following endless winding paths, they end up in a darker, more sinister part of the woods, the path once again blocked by gnarled trees and thorns making progression difficult. In the forest, it is impossible to see the sky and any glimpse of it is pitch black. Already claustrophobic it only becomes more so.

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3. Tea Party - Through a broad and leafy path you come across an enormous table laid for a tea party with three figures at at it, the march hare, the hatter and the dormouse. They welcome everyone to join them but no one is permitted to leave until they furnish the others with either a riddle or a story. Minimum 500 words.

The farther Rojo walked, the darker the forest became, until the sky was just as dim as it had been when he'd shown up here. The trees loomed, the air grew heavy, and every step the skeleton took expended greater and greater effort until he could step no more. The brambles held him back. He could swear they were moving. It was only when he retreated, his booted feet silent in the moss, that a path to his right opened up while he watched, a very large, very ornate table stretching before him. Three small creatures sat around it, a fourth spot vacant at its head.

"Come," the rabbit said, nibbling on a crumb of shortbread.

"Join us." This squeaky missive came from a mouse, one Rojo wouldn't have even noticed had it not spoken. Had animals like this been spying on him the whole time he'd been here? He was going to have to keep a closer watch on the trees.

"Join you in what?" Rojo asked innocently, feeling anything but. These two... no, three... wanted him to sit with them for some reason, and he wished to know why before he did so. He stared at the person he hadn't noticed at first, a knee high man with a broad-brimmed hat and a manic look in his eyes.

"A tea party," he said, a giggle slipping out before he could close his mouth.

"I don't drink tea."

"Well, that hardly matters, now does it?" The rabbit had abandoned its shortbread and was now crunching a bright carrot in dainty bites. Nom nom nom. "Even if you do not drink, you cannot leave."

"You must pay us before we will show you the way."

"Pay you with what?" He knew deep down that they couldn't possibly want money, so even though the question was pointless, he asked it anyway just to assuage his curiosity. It would be helpful to know what he was up against.

"A riddle."

"Or a story." The mouse seemed particularly fond of this second option, which was good because riddles and Rojo didn't mix. He lifted the tails of his coat away from his rump as he sat straight and tall, trying to come off as though he did this all the time when he was just making it up as he went along.

"A story." He nodded.

"There once was an old reaper named Auntie Marmalade. She was everyone's favorite potion maker and when she came to town with her wares, all the people of Halloween would come out to buy them. One day she decided that she didn't want to live in a world full of jerks and whiny creeple. So she laced her love potions with an ingredient that unmade FEAR, and every time someone took one thinking they were going to find love, they died.

The end."

The glen was silent as he finished his story, but eventually there came a series of tiny claps, too quiet to be coming from the hatter and too clear for the hare. The mouse smiled a tiny smile on its upturned face (which looked kind of weird on its little mousy features) and held out its paws in the direction of the trees on the far side of the clearing. They began to slowly clear away, and it didn't take long for another path through the brambles to open up.

"There you go," the mouse said. "Be on your way."  

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gaia_crown [ Day 3 – The Red Queen’s Castle ]
Routes are player choice - Anyone wanting to reach the final throne room must pass at least one of these prompts

Route 1 - Painting the roses red
You come across a group of people sized playing cards frantically trying to paint white roses red. They enlist you to help.

Roll 1d20, if you roll above 7 then you are successful in helping them and they approvingly let you pass into the castle out of gratitude, if you roll below this then you must choose one of the below two tasks to complete to proceed.

This time he exited the dark canopy of trees into a bright expanse, a castle blocking the way forward. A small army of paintbrush-wielding cards didn't look very happy to see him. Rojo took a wide detour around them, heading for a tall hedge maze instead.  

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Route 2 - The castle maze -
Another way into the castle is via the castle’s enormous hedge maze, this way is perilous and difficult but can have hidden rewards. You need to roll twice successfully to pass.

5 - Fail - A dangerous pit opens up at your feet, so close you almost fall in, realising your way is now blocked.

 

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3 - Success - Runic household item - Small runiced appliance

 

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4 - Fail - You encounter nothing but dead ends and lose your sense of direction.

 

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6 - Success - You hear arguing around a corner which leads you in the right direction.

 

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(( hur what are dice ))  

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5 - Fail - A dangerous pit opens up at your feet, so close you almost fall in, realising your way is now blocked.

 

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3 - Success - Runic household item - Small runiced appliance

 

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3 - Success - Runic household item - Small runiced appliance

After about an hour inside, Rojo began to wonder if maybe he should have braved the cards after all. He had faced bottomless pits, dead ends at every turn, arguing humanoid swans, and when he finally caught sight of the front gates, he was carrying three glowing blue toasters for some reason.

He dropped them as he crossed the drawbridge and ducked inside, fairly certain that no one had seen him even amid the metallic clatter he left behind.  

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gaia_crown [ Final Day - The Queen’s Throne Room. ]
gaia_angelright If you fail at any point here you must wait another day before you can roll again (unless specifically stated otherwise)

The red queen’s throne room is enormous and is linked to a vast network of guarded rooms and corridors, at the end of these rooms is the treasure room where the valuable and often stolen treasures are stowed away by the selfish queen.

gaia_angelright Success means you can move onto rolling an artifact, Safe means if you fill in an rp post you can roll again, a free re-roll can simply be immediately re-rolled if you wish. Fail means you must wait 24 hours to roll again.

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4 - Success

He might have made it inside without incident, but as soon as he hit the halls, Rojo was confronted by a labyrinthine layout with surprise guards around every corner. He wasn't exactly built for stealth, but he soon found the spare rooms here were filled with fabrics and trinkets he might use to disguise himself, and he loved few things more than dressing up. He had no idea what his end goal was, but he kept an open mind for opportunities to make some sort of progress at every turn.  

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The door that finally sent him home looked just like all the rest: wide, tall, and gold. Rojo was prepared for it to squeak, since a couple of them had, but it slid open without a sound, moving as easily as if it hadn't been there at all.

The room sparkled so intensely that he almost didn't notice its contents, but once he'd hurried inside and closed the door behind him, he couldn't help but see the bounty that lay before him.

There were little silver cases, big golden bells, bracelets, spoons, pipes, but what held his attention the longest was a single cufflink resting on a midnight blue pillow. Where was its match? Why was it shaped like a dustbunny? He reached for it very slowly, closed his bony fingers around it, and...

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6. The Hare’s Cufflink: An elaborate cufflink in the shape of a hare's head.
Status Effect: Can be used to turn the owner or someone else into a hare for a short period of time, maximum 5 minutes per day. Cannot be used on someone higher stage than the user. Does not work in battle.