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NOVEMBER EVENT LOG

NOVEMBER LOG

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In the aftermath of the rampage, the city of Mango starts to put itself back together, mourning losses of its citizens and Pokemon which would have been much heavier if the calamity hadn't suddenly and mysteriously stopped. The static in the air, which the citizens had gotten so used to to the point of no longer noticing it, is now gone and the silence is almost palpable, so obvious in comparison. Even the sandstorm to the west has started to die down, so that every crunch of heel on gravel can be heard as relief pours from Toran to Mango City, volunteers empathetic and eager to return the favor, however unfortunate that the opportunity had to be this soon.

The ghost Pokemon linger for a while, helping to guide the souls of the dead to the afterlife before they disperse back into the forest, while the cemetery stands still and silent save for those working on restoring the graves and fixing structural damages. Both towers remain closed to the public, the cemetery out of respect and the radio tower due to police investigation, with the staff called in for questioning but each denying knowledge of the radio signals having an adverse effect on the Pokemon. If there is anybody with that knowledge, it would be the company president, who is currently on leave elsewhere in the region and cannot be reached due to the storms and a conspicuously missing radio antenna preventing physical and electronic communication respectively. Maybe you guys will come across him later, maybe not. Maybe he got caught up in that volcano explosion you let happen. Who knows? haha!

Either way... people are welcome to remain in Mango as long as they want, and Toran seems to be fully up and running as well. Those who make the trip back to check up on how things are going will find the island to be warm and sunny, townspeople hard at work sowing the berry gardens and expanding the daycare center, where extra Pokemon will be sent to once the maximum limit of six Pokemon in a team has been met. Several missing children posters remain hung up around the daycare, but the island feels fuller, happier, with sounds of children laughing and yelling as they rush to the game corner to pool their tokens to win the new month's prize Pokemon: Swinub which know the move Rock Smash.

But for those who have decided to push forward, the only way forward is to the west, into the sandstorm towards Melona.

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Even without raging sandstorms, the desert is rough travel and there is no reliable map to get from one place to another, especially with the way the wind naturally and occasionally picks up to start sandstorms, and it's so easy to get turned around by the wind and the cliffs and the way everything is sand for miles and miles and miles around. Little Gale King is eager to go home, looking around for somebody who will act as her guardian so they can travel with a guide straight to Melona. While taking a guide can be a bit expensive, groups up to six people can travel together for the same group price and they are guaranteed safe passage, provided with thick capes to keep the sand from buffeting them, goggles to help them see, and rental Numel to ride upon so they don't have to make the trek on foot.

The trip from Mango to Melona takes several hours, with occasional pit stops during which the guide pitches a large tent for everybody to rest in or to wait out a particularly heavy sandstorm before continuing on, but if they leave early enough in the day, they will eventually come across a huge stone dome in the middle of the desert, spanning several miles in diameter. Around the perimeter of the dome are several gates that can be opened from either side via hand cranks that require two people to operate, the thick stone walls of the dome protecting the desert town from the sun and the sand. At the apex of the dome is an open oculus that allows sunlight to shine down upon the town, and during the day, a constant beam of light illuminates the boba shop located at the very center of Melona. This shop's specialty flavor is Cacnea flower tea and its collectible stamp is a yellow Sandshrew! The boba shop is where the guides make a beeline to once everybody has been dropped off, the employees at the shop glad to hear the news that the sandstorm isn't as bad as it was in the recent month or two, but they also don't seem all that concerned about the outside world, nor were they aware of how bad things really were, with how isolated they are within this dome in the middle of the desert. Tsunamis? Volcanoes? Rampaging Pokemon? The citizens are pretty horrified, actually, and promise to send help to both Mango and Toran when the guides have rested up and are able to make the return journey.

In the meanwhile, Melona is a pretty quiet town, with everything quite scattered and far apart, less streets and more individual buildings with packed dirt paths connecting them. Next to the boba shop near the center of town is the Pokemon center which features a clinic space for people in lieu of an actual hospital, and flanking the Pokemon center on either side is the contest hall and psychic-type Pokemon gym, although the gym leader is currently absent and thus the gym is closed. Apparently it's not uncommon for him to wander off sometimes, but he has never been gone for weeks at a time and the people are getting worried. Is he lost? The last anybody heard, he had set out to find a mythical Pokemon rumored to be in the area, investigating a possible link to the abnormally long and harsh sandstorms that picked up recently, but for as competent a trainer as he is the storm was no joke and the town has never seen anything like it before. The same worry is echoed at the Pokemon school, which takes students of all ages to teach them more about Pokemon, their relationships with humans, and everybody's place in the world; several field trip groups had departed weeks ago but must have gotten caught in the sandstorms as well because they haven't yet returned. Gale is immediately concerned, and, asking around, learns that her little brother Jordan had gone on one of those field trips, and both their parents had gone with him as chaperones.

Hopefully good news will come in time, and the townspeople are patient, going about their daily business with a certain calm. For those who wish to earn some money, there is an abundance of odd jobs hiring both people and Pokemon, especially asking for Pokemon suited to specific tasks such as fire Pokemon to help cook and keep fires going at night for warmth and light, water Pokemon to water the fields and ground Pokemon to help till, flying Pokemon to check the dome for cracks to repair, fast Pokemon to make mail deliveries around town, hardy Pokemon to weather the sandstorms and keep a lookout for anybody approaching, for example. For those who looked at October and went "That was not a break month, what the heck," other places of interest include the museum containing many specimens of ancient Pokemon preserved in fossils and amber found right in the surrounding desert, offering rare items in exchange for more specimens, and... that's it, really. It's a quiet, sleepy town.

The days are hot and the nights are long, but when the sun goes down and the electricity is shut off overnight, the view above is spectacular. Thousands upon thousands of stars can be seen overhead, sparkling like diamonds in the pitch black of the oculus, while candle lit rock salt lamps line the street sides to provide a soft, temptingly lickable, warm glow below.

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But perhaps you're not the sort to just sit around and wait for things to happen. Perhaps you're the sort to dive headfirst into trouble despite the multiple danger warnings. Perhaps you were just foolhardy enough to have ventured into the desert from Mango without a guide, thinking that you could save a few bucks and make an adventure out of finding Melona all on your own. Those leaving Melona may be stopped by townspeople on the outskirts offering to sell them escape ropes, which will allow them to escape the ruins and appear right in front of them again if they're ever caught in a sticky situation, along with other food, water, and camping supplies. One man in particular suggests catching an Abra to teleport you right back to Melona— or if you prefer, he is also offering to trade one of his own.

Those leaving Mango are out of luck.

Either way, even if it takes days (and if you're wandering blindly, it's going to take days), you will eventually come across one of the ruins scattered throughout the desert. Hopefully you came prepared, not only for the travel, but for whatever awaits inside the ruins! The ruins look like this, aka the first thing that pops up in Google Images, but while some of the pillars still stand, most have collapsed and lay buried in the sand, presumably due to the massive sandstorm that raged the entire month prior. The sand is soft and hard to walk on, constantly shifting over uneven ground and quite a bit of digging might be required to locate hidden underground entrances or other secrets. The ancient ruins seem to be a bit unstable, with evidence of cave-ins here and there, the potential for further cave-ins the deeper inside the ruins one ventures, and with the lack of light and constantly branching halls, one could be stuck down here forever exploring the labyrinths underneath the ruins. Maybe you'll never escape. Maybe you'll live and die here, and get to do just that (:

No wild Pokemon can be found without thirty feet of any of the surface ruins. Every few hours, a slight tremor can briefly be felt underfoot, barely noticeable at the start of the month and becoming somewhat concerning as the month progresses. Everything is fine.

→ MOD NOTES

⬥ It's November!! Somehow! When I'm at work and am writing dates, sometimes I autopilot 2010 and sometimes it's 2021 and ig I just want everything to be over.
⬥ Ruins investigations are currently capped at two investigations per player to allow your mods space to breathe, but is likely to be lifted as the month progresses and investigations wrap up. As a hint, it would be highly worthwhile to investigate the area and question npcs first, and in particular find the gym leader, before heading into the ruins! If you do decide to run blindly into the ruins, though, we'll have a good time (:
⬥ As a reminder, the gym leader must be located and brought back to the gym before any challenges can take place. The contest hall, on the other hand, is open from the start of the month. For both, please comment on the appropriate toplevel for submissions!
⬥ Please comment to the new Pokemon toplevel for trading with the NPC, making a note of which Pokemon you would like to trade for his Abra. As a reminder, traded Pokemon are able to gain +15 levels a month through bonus activity, and traded Abras are able to evolve into its final evolution, Alakazam.
⬥ As an alternative to the daycare in Toran, Pokemon can also be given jobs around Melona if they aren't in your main party. OOCly, players are allowed to give each of their Pokemon +5 levels (not counting towards the bonus activity level cap) one time only for this month, regardless of the number of jobs the Pokemon takes. ICly, the Pokemon will be unavailable for one week while they're at work, so please be mindful of which Pokemon are available in your threads at what time of month! Please also be aware of the badge/ribbon requirements for higher level Pokemon to continue obeying, applicable to the total number of unique badges/ribbons in the travelling group.

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[Joss would probably be able to hold Sagi under normal circumstances... but these are not normal by any definition of the word, and the sudden change in shape and weight nearly makes him topple.

His grip fails. Sagi does indeed plummet to the floor.

Joss, absolutely flabbergasted, remains completely immobile as he stares at the teen.]

Um.

[If Sagi tries to rise to his feet he'll suddenly remember he can move and try to help him up, but in the meantime he's just frozen in that awkward "just dropped something" pose, his face completely blank.]

[Getting unexpectedly dropped from a tree like this, it's only a natural reflex action for Sagi to spread his wings. They don't help him, though one of them might thwap against Joss's waist or leg on the way down. He crash-lands onto his elbows and knees in that order, momentarily stunned. The Unbearable Sadness card isn't far from his hand when he falls down, he's just going to need a second or two before he remembers it's there - he'd react sooner, but his whole body still feels strangely heavy, and it's not his stupid clothes for once.]

Urrghh... what just...?

[To anyone inside the Pokemon Centre or its clinic area, it sure does look like an extremely tall, menacingly expressionless man just stepped through the doorway and tried to throw some kid (along with a headless bird?) onto the floor. Joss is getting stared at. Sagi is also getting stared at, despite being too crumpled in a pile to notice right away. Nobody seems daring enough to approach either of them just yet.]

[Joss does get whacked on the leg by Sagi's wing, but it barely registers next to what just happened.]

... Shapeshifter?

[He "knows" Sagi is a dragon, and can also summon bird wings, but... a cat too?

Unfortunately, this is when he notices he's getting stared at, and so he's quickly distracted from his wrong assumptions about Sagi. He's uh. Going to try helping him up. See? He wouldn't do that if he'd tossed him to the ground. Please stop staring at him he's already been banned from the pokémart but he really needs someplace to heal his Pokémon if needed.

He picks up Sagi's magnus as he tries to slip a hand under his armpit. Wouldn't want to lose it. But why does the figure on it seem so hauntingly familiar...?]

[With the magnus out of his reach for the time being, Sagi finds the energy to at least lift his head off the ground. He blinks a couple times and rubs his eyes with the back of his hand, as if it's his vision having trouble coming into focus rather than his sense of self.]

I... turned back? Like Toki in the ruins...

[Yes, the human voice he's now using to talk to himself and the fact that he has arms for Joss to hoist him up by would indeed suggest that he's human again, science crimes notwithstanding. Good job, everyone.

Even more belatedly, he notices that most of him is still on the Pokemon Centre floor, and that people are goggling down at him as he finally stirs. This is less than ideal. How embarrassing. The thought does not make him unbearably sad, but maybe a semi tolerable level of sad.]

S-Sorry. I'm fine now.

[Using his wings to spring upright all at once and then gently land on his bare feet is probably unnecessary. He does it anyway. Sproing.]

[To his credit, Joss barely startles when Sagi decides to just sproing to his feet. Also to his credit, Sagi's comment is enough to make him realize the transformation was likely not intentional. Are such curses common in this land?]

What a strange world we've wandered into...

[He shakes his head, before realizing he's still holding Sagi's card. He simply has too much unbearable sadness in him to notice much of a difference.

He hands Sagi the magnus.]

[Oh. Right. He'd thought that thing was still on the floor, but now it makes sense that the effect lessened just enough for him to pick himself up.]

Um, thank... you.

[He does not sound terribly enthusiastic. His head and shoulders droop a little as he takes the magnus back and regards it sadly; the picture hasn't faded yet. His posture isn't an exact match for this slouching stick figure, but it may be somewhat recognisable to anyone better at making connections than Sagi, who already knows why this card feels so much heavier than its negligible physical weight.]

...I can't believe you just live like this. I'm never drawing this one again.

[Joss blinks.]

Um.

[What in the Fury's name did Sagi even store in that card? Does its contents affect him somehow? That seems like a rather inconvenient mean of storage if so, but then again his dark knight soul crystal can be a little volatile as well...

He's just going to... gently, hesitantly try tugging the card from Sagi's hand, both to take a better look and to see if his theory is true.]

Huh?

[Sagi is too unbearably sad to hold onto the card when Joss pulls it away from him again, and just lets go. Exactly like before, the sensation lessens within moments, clearing his head a little.]

Oh... yeah, that's from you. Sorry. I couldn't think of another way to get your attention.

[This probably explains less than he thinks it does. As ever, he's trying.]

[He looks at the picture on the magnus, which looks nothing like anything he's ever owned. So Sagi stored... some of his aether, maybe? And it's making him sad every time he touches it? How peculiar.]

... How do I empty it?

[He knows these can be emptied because he saw Sagi do it with his bag, but he has a feeling if the teen tried to empty it himself he'd suddenly be too sad to go through with it. Sagi already tried, of course, but he doesn't know that.]

You just hold it, and -

[He reaches over - but before he can touch the card, the picture on it changes, overlaid with a new illustration as the slouching stick figure fades from sight. Now the stick figure is sitting in a stick chair, arms folded, no longer weighed down by the dark lines of angst that make up the background. With time, Unbearable Sadness evolves into Grudging Acceptance.]

It degraded already? [Instead of taking the card back, Sagi ends up leaning over to look at it. It's hard to tell what essence it turned into just from the picture... All he can say for sure is that the heaviness in the air seems to be gone.] Well, that works too.

[To be honest, if it's that quick to degrade, Joss's endless supplies of it are all the more impressive. Now he really doesn't know how Joss lives like this.

As a possibly welcome distraction, a trainer with an Alcremie in her arms clears her throat from somewhere behind them. Between Sagi's wings and Joss's general tree-ness, they are completely blocking the doorway.]

Uh, yes, sorry. We were just leaving.

[He walks outside, figuring he can ask Joss to give the card back once they're out. After that, he's going to want to retrieve the rest of his things from the alley Pawniard hid them in...]

[Joss was about to grudgingly accept that the picture on a card can change when the trainer clears her throat. He apologizes to her before quickly following in Sagi's wake; hopefully, people outside won't be staring at the two of them like they just turned into large betentacled monsters.

Though he doesn't speak as soon as they're out, Joss does eventually ask:]

... Do these normally degrade?

[From Sagi's reaction he can infer it's a common occurrence but... does it happen to everything? Would he store a weapon only to end up with a rusted, broken sword or something?]

[Sagi has further regrets the moment they step outside and his feet meet the sunbaked pavement. His wincing is decidedly unsubtle. Oh well, he couldn't have predicted things were going to go quite like this; that would have involved trying to think ahead, ever. It does seem like a decent reason to keep his wings out for now, though.

It takes him long enough to mentally put together a more polite version of "please give the card back so I can run the hell away" while sucking down the pain that Joss speaks up first - with what seems to Sagi like a typically bizarre, Joss-brand question.]

Uh, yeah, magnus do that. It's like storing anything else. Right?

[...Right?]

But I have to admit, not usually that fast.

[Well... this would make sense for normal means of storage, but he supposes he expected a little more from magic cards. He can't help but feel a little disappointed]

Crystal I showed you stored a cuirass for a thousand years. Admittedly dragon-forged. Could have preserved it.

[He can't help but notice that wince, though... and how it seems related to them stepping outside. Ouch. It's true that Sagi is barefoot, and it's sweltering right now.]

Um. Dran Fah could give you a ride. If you want.

[Armour that lasts for a thousand years... The idea makes Sagi wonder what kind of magnus would last that long, and from there his train of thought derails into unpleasant memories of pushing rocks, which at least distracts him from the blisters he's probably going to get later.

Joss's offer, however, reminds him of them again. Ouch. He wouldn't normally want to impose any longer after causing Joss this much trouble, but... ouch.]

Is it okay if I take you up on that? Pawniard was looking after my things - we just need to meet up. She shouldn't be far.

[Joss nods. He wouldn't offer if it were a big inconvenience, not these days.

He summons Drampa, lightly petting her neck as she flies low enough for Sagi to climb on her back.]

Where to?

[She may be low enough for Sagi to climb on normally, but he's still going to just propel himself straight up and flutter down onto her back before letting his wings fade out again. Sproing.

...It occurs to him, once his feet feel slightly less like they're on fire, that he's now riding a dragon. Despite the ignominious circumstances, that's pretty cool. He feels briefly cool.]

It's an alley kind of around the corner from the inn. [He points.] That-a-way.

[Then he hesitates. He really doesn't want to sound ungrateful, and it's not as if he thinks Joss would do anything untoward with a blank magnus compared to that one Toran kid he found waving his katana around... and, technically, the magna essence inside does belong to Joss...]

Also, um. The magnus... Do you really want it?

[Perhaps having some Grudging Acceptance to look at would help remind Joss that there are less Unbearably Sad ways to live life. He didn't exactly ask for it, but if he had, it would not be the dumbest thing Sagi has ever delivered to a relative stranger.]

Oh.

[He looks at the magnus. It's not his, but somehow looking at it makes him feel like he could Grudgingly Accept it, if Sagi willingly gave it to him. He can tell this isn't really the case here, though.

He shakes his head as he hands the card back.]

It belongs to you.

[With that said, he starts walking towards where Sagi was pointing, Drampa following at his side.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

NOVEMBER EVENT LOG

premise ⬥ taken ⬥ faq ⬥ navigation

→ THIS IS A HEADER!

→ ICHI WE MISS YOU AND LOVE YOU

→ ICHI WRITES ALL THESE HEADERS

→ MOD NOTES

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