victory_road | Castle Prom 2020

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Castle Prom 2020

After arriving in Cerulean City and riding in one of a fleet of Cerulean Cape Shuckle Shuttle buses for an hour or so, the trees break and the road snakes along sea cliffs. In the distance, all can see a grand building rising up into sight, and excitement bubbles up within each and every heart as this year's mysterious, grandiose Prom location draws ever closer...

Welcome to the castle!

Their duo of hosts stand ready to welcome the characters when they arrive, assuring them that their luggage will be taken care of, and inviting them for a special tour of the castle, or would they rather first see their rooms, or perhaps even have a bite to eat? The choice is up to them.

THE CASTLE SIGHTS
The Outer Courtyard

For those wishing to get a breath of fresh air or looking for a place to perhaps engage in a little battling, look no further than the courtyard. Nestled safely within castle walls, the courtyard has been given a thorough renovation. The stones gleam like they have never gleamed before; a large fountain (certainly too new to have belonged to the original castle) stands at the center of the courtyard, the water gently cascading down over the marble figures of two nondescript and crowned humans, one holding a sword, the other a shield; wide-open doors welcome characters further into the castle.

The Stables

To the west lie the stables. Anyone interested in taking a ride along the cliff trails (or guests who just wants to see the horse Pokemon) is welcome to enter. The comforting smell of hay and wood hangs in the air, though any persons expecting to find familiar faces like Rapidash, Mudbray or Zebstrika is going to come off rather surprised.

Instead what they will find are snow-white, proud-looking equines. Their long, pastel-colored manes and tails have been brushed to perfection, occasionally adorned with braids and white flowers. Long, violet colored horns jut out from their foreheads, a spiralling pure white groove running along their length. Long fetlocks drift along the ground, rather like delicate pink clouds, almost giving the Pokemon the appearance of being stabled on air rather than something so common as hay.

Yes, anyone who has not yet had the pleasure of being able to admire the beauty and grace of the Galar Rapidash can look and ride their fill here. While the stable hands cannot allow anyone to actually keep one of the magnificent horses themselves no matter how much a guest is willing to pay, whenever their bosses aren’t looking, they certainly prove willing to provide characters with a Galarian Ponyta egg for a small price. (Limited to one per character)

The Kitchens

To the east lie the kitchens, and what kitchens they are! At all hours, characters will be able to smell the delicious aroma of a variety of sumptuous meals being prepared. In the mornings, the scent of fresh bread and breakfast fills the air, changing to the scent of pastries and later on more filling dishes as the day continues on, and fresh pots of tea are always on hand. Officially, the guests are asked not to enter the kitchen, as to not to disturb the many cooks working there. Unofficially, there are not exactly any guards, so if you really wanted to sneak in, you probably won’t get stopped.

The Dining Room

Adjacent to the kitchens awaits a large dining room. Tables have been set up in long rows with plenty of room for all with some to spare, and once someone sits down, almost as if by magic, they will soon find one of the waitstaff at their side, presenting them with an extensive menu. Order as much (or as little) as you like! The chefs will have it ready for you in a flash.

The Ball Room

The old castle ballroom has been done up to the nines, reflecting nothing but glory and splendor. Some delicate little tables and chairs stand at the sides of the room, for anyone who needs a quick break for their feet, but most of the polished marble floor is intended for dancing. There is a small chamber orchestra playing in a corner to provide everybody with only the classiest of tunes (though they do take requests for more modern music) and neatly dressed waitstaff with an uncanny ability to tell who is and isn't underaged flit through the crowd like black butterflies, making sure no glass goes unfilled.

The Inner Courtyard

The doors of the ballroom open wide onto a second, smaller courtyard at the back of the castle. Unlike the Outer courtyard, which was all stone, this smaller, Inner Courtyard is dominated by plants. The gardeners have done their very best to dress up the inner courtyard with plants and flowers of any kind - so many plants, in fact, that there is no room for battling out here. But if you wanted to take a breath of fresh air, wander around and look at the plants, or perhaps even try and find some of the small, secluded nooks created by the plant cover, you are more than welcome.

In between the lovely smelling blooms, characters will also be able to find bushes and small trees laden with unfamiliar berries! Small cards in the soil will explain exactly what kinds of berries they are and what effect they have, and characters are invited to pluck a few berries if they want. Just don’t get too greedy!

The new available berries are: Apicot, Salac, Ganlon, Petaya, Liechi, Lansat, Custap

The Library

Situated on the second floor is the castle's splendid library, a welcome respite for those less inclined to dance and frolic. Whatever books originally filled these weighty shelves are long gone, but their hosts have spared no effort in making reading material available to their guests. Among the shelves, guests will be able to find many books on the Galar region's history and myths. Some of these tales are already known over in this region (Who doesn't know the tale of the wise King Arthur and his oval table?) but there are also many more obscure and unknown fables and tales; the truly inquisitive may even be able to find some material on the two crowned fellows depicted in the main courtyard's fountain. It's almost as if Prom's esteemed hosts shipped over their whole personal library.

They may, in fact, have shipped over their whole personal library.

Pull up one of the plush armchairs, grab a book, and make yourself comfortable by the roaring fire! There's more to read here than you can finish in a lifetime!

The Bedrooms

Upstairs, guests will find all manner of bedrooms to choose from, from smaller rooms meant for a single person, to large ones for couples, to even larger ones for characters that would like to spend the night with a few friends. One thing holds true for them all: these rooms are seriously extravagant. Decked out in the finest of antique furniture like large canopy beds, solid wooden chairs, tapestries, and rugs, the decor brings to mind bygone centuries. There are even hearths in every room that can be used to light a small fire; while the rooms are all wired for electricity, unfortunately, central heating was a bit outside of the realm of possibility.

The Tower

Not all of the towers have undergone restoration, but the grandest, largest of them has. It will take some real stamina to climb all these stairs, but if they do, characters will be rewarded with two things:

First of all, their two hosts have seen fit to create a small miniature museum inside the Tower’s chambers. Paintings, tapestries, and artefacts have been brought over from the Galar region to be put on display. All the artefacts brought over depict moments from Galar’s rich history, including paintings of ancient kings and queens, an actual knight’s armour, chalices, swords tucked in velvet under lock and key, and richly woven tapestries that for some reason seem to depict knights battling giant Slugma.

If you still have energy after the climb to get here, you can continue on to the very top of the tower. From the tower’s high vantage point, it seems the entire Kanto region is on display in the incredible view. The ocean stretches out along the horizon, but closer to home, characters will be able to behold wild forests and cliffs, the green lush routes of Cerulean Cape itself and at night, millions and millions of stars twinkling up overhead.

And all the rest...

Beyond those sparkling rooms and done up corridors lies... the rest of the castle. The parts of the castle not quite done with their renovations are roped off, but nothing is stopping guests from exploring if they so wish - especially if they are interested in finding those rumored lost treasures or traps.

While the rest of the castle shines, these parts of the castle feel almost haunted. Dust and derelict dominates the rooms, old broken furniture covered in dingy white sheets and creaking doors adding to the atmosphere. Did the eyes of that painting just move? Why is there a weird draft coming from that wall? What was that strange ominous creak coming from behind you? Are there any dungeons? Wait, did you just hear someone crying in a far off room?

Jeez, no wonder they say this place is haunted.

The Rocky Beach

The main attraction outside of the castle, besides the hiking and riding paths, is a small stretch of rocky shoreline accessible just outside the main courtyard and down a surprisingly sturdy set of stone stairs. While it's a crummy place to lay out and get some sun, it is littered with bits of detritus from the sea. Shells, whole or broken, peek out between smooth pebbles and the rare piece of sea glass, and at low tide clumps of seaweed lay draped over the craggier outcroppings. Nothing is stopping you from fishing or poking around in the shallows for Pokemon, but you're more likely to find an interesting souvenir than a new friend...

AVAILABLE POKEMON
Naturally, this wouldn't be a Pokemon Prom without some Pokemon to catch! All catchable Pokemon range between the levels of 10 to 30. The Pokemon in the castle mostly haunt the unfinished section, but feel free to have the occasional encounter in the renovated sections too!

Castle

Impidimp; Gastly; Haunter; Litwick; Lampent; Duskull; Shuppet; Sinistea; Misdreavus; Honedge; Doublade**; Dusclops**; Polteageist***; Gengar***;

Courtyard

Butterfree; Cutiefly; Ribombee; Beautiful; Vivillion;

Rocky Shore

Binacle; Staryu; Wimpod; Frillish; Krabby; Kingler**; Jellicent**; Slowking***;

During the characters' stay, they might suddenly find their room a mess, as if a small tornado went through their luggage. They might even find themselves missing some incidental items or articles of clothing, nothing necessarily valuable or significant, but it sure is weird. This is... probably the work of the castle's Pokemon, right?

TREASURE HUNTING
While your shuttle bus slowly trundles towards the castle, the driver will regale his riders with local stories and legends, chief among those the legend of the castle itself.

You see, the castle was built by a relative of Bill (you know, the Pokemon storage system inventor?), but no one has lived in it for years and years because it is haunted. No, not haunted by Ghost types. That would be rather common and hardly worthy of note, wouldn't it? No, the castle is haunted by the ghost of Bill's great-great-great-uncle, and rumor has it that he is so possessive of the castle and its contents that he will kill all who enter.

You see, even when he was alive, this man's enormous hoard of wealth was only outmatched by his enormous amount of paranoia. He was so paranoid that others would come to steal his wealth that he built his castle high upon the cliffs where no one could approach it undetected. But that wasn't enough to settle his fears! He started to hide his multitude of treasures all around the castle, and he built many traps and secret passages to protect them. It's said he was so fiercely protective of his money that he refused to leave the property even after his death, and his spirit still haunts the castle to this day. Many who have tried to find his treasures have disappeared.

That is what the rumors say, at least.

In any case, feel free to explore those abandoned halls and ruins for these supposed long-lost treasures. Better check for hidden rooms and passages behind old bookcases, trap doors covered by thick dust-riddled carpets, and perhaps even a hidden vault or two in the castle basements. Players are free to go absolutely wild in coming up with secret passages and hidden secrets for their characters to find.

Now, as for the treasures characters can find during these explorations, they can broadly be divided up into two categories.

The first category of treasures are common treasures. These are small, fairly common items that can be sold after prom for a small amount of Pokedollars each (think 100-200p), or they can be kept as a memento. Generally, these are small items that could easily fit inside a character's pocket and won't necessarily be well hidden. Characters are allowed to find as many of these common treasures as they want.

Examples of common treasures would be items like pieces of antique silverware, broken mirrors, small figurines, old books damaged by the passage of time (but perhaps still readable in some places), or parts of worn and threadbare tapestry.

The second category of treasures are rare treasures. These are properly hidden items that can either sell for quite a bit of Pokedollars after prom (think 5000-6000p), or can be used in-game. In order to allow of an element of surprise, every character that wants to participate in finding some rare treasure is allowed to comment once to a special RNG comment to find out exactly what they will find. Each treasure will consist out of somewhere between two and four items, the exact number of which will be left up to chance.

For any questions, please refer back to the previous OOC post.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Exactly.

"Anyways, did you know I almost died, like. Six times in the course of... two days? Bleeding out and everything."

Fighting Hessonite had certainly been a time.

"Congratulations on the 'almost' part," she gets back, deadpan.

He's trying (to the best of his limited ability) not to interrupt her on this one, although truth be told he's never been able to tell what level of input or commentary 'counts' as interrupting and what's an 'appropriate' amount of feedback. He's pretty much given up on ever knowing, truth be told.

"Should I be asking for more detail about the 'death' of near-death, the 'near' part, or neither?"

"I guess more context couldn't hurt." Connie sighs, rubbing her arms as she leans against the railing and looks out at the night sky. Thinking back on it, a normal human twelve year-old, no matter how well-trained and backed-up, should not have been getting involved in stuff on the scale of Hessonite's invasion.

"Before we did the whole 'bringing an intergalactic empire to its knees' thing, we fought monsters on Earth a lot. Like. A lot. That happens when all the nigh-immortal soldiers of a millennia-long war get turned into abominations and one side was completely unwilling to kill the other anyways, but I digress. Hunting the Corrupted Gems was... well, it wasn't easy, but I didn't get hurt too often. A few broken bones here and there, but it got fixed by Steven's healing powers pretty easy.

"Then Hessonite invaded, and brought her own army. Or, well, created one from an ancient artifact, but same difference. Point being they were way smarter than Corrupted Gems, attacked in formations, didn't have any instinct to target the Gems first, and had actual weapons.

"I mean, overall? I did pretty damn well for myself, I think. But I got hurt a lot more easily and often than I did ever before, and... I don't think I was smart enough to be scared, not really? But looking back on it... I don't know. It's weird to think about how often I almost died back then. Think it kinda messed me up in ways I'm still finding out about, haha."

"....not 'smart enough' to be scared." There's a touch of doubt in his voice. Or maybe that's simply a tone of criticism.

"Sounds to me like being scared would have gotten you killed."

Near death.... can that really be that traumatic? Obviously it's different if you're just a normal human being with one life to live and lose.... he has no idea what that's like. Or he does, but.... not as a human being? Glasses. He was a pair of fucking glasses and he didn't want to fucking die, even though 'death' hardly meant anything when he hardly got to live, not the way he he(?) _he^he did. Being afraid to not exist... meant he didn't want to simply exist. He'd also wanted to live.

He's not sure that's comparable to Connie's situation at all. Oh well.

"There's a pretty huge difference between the fear of death keeping you sharp and the belief of being invincible making you sloppy."

Dirk would know all about that, wouldn't he?

"You don't need death to be afraid," he says before he really thinks about how much she could read into that.

"Fuck." His jaw tightens in a way that might be imposing--or at least foreboding.

"You know what I mean."

"...yeah. Yeah, I guess I do."

Connie looks up at the stars for a few moments, struggling to put the last part into words. She could recount her heroic deeds and adventures with no problem. But trying to find the words to describe the ennui she felt in Era 3 was way, way more difficult.

"We ended up beating the huge galactic dictator. Got some trauma when my mentor was mind-controlled and nearly killed me. Then she held me hostage so my friend would let the galactic dictator kill him. But, whatever. Had to get over it.

"And then that was... it, for a while. We just had to get on with our lives in the 'fixed' world. I got into high school, immediately started studying for early entrance to college, and...

"You know, when Spinel showed up to destroy the Earth and I heard about it, I was actually excited. That something was actually happening again, that I wasn't adrift in... I don't even know. It felt weird to not be in a story anymore, if that makes any sense? And even there, I was late to the party."

Sounds like a deficit of one of the three pillars.

"Ever since then, I've just been living a normal, human life. And I think I liked it. Returning to normalcy. Even though Steven was slowly tearing himself apart while everyone moved on, it was... I don't know if nice was the word, but it felt like a hole I didn't necessarily want out of my life was getting filled whether I liked it or not.

"Now I'm here, and I'm just looking at that hole, and wondering how much it was healing from trauma, and how much it was accepting... mediocrity isn't the right word, but. Gah. It's hard to articulate. If I came back and remembered everything from here, I don't think I'd be able to keep living like that."

"Inessentiality," the word doesn't quite leave Dirk's mouth before he realises it, even if only because there is never really a moment in which Dirk is not aware of himself, of how he sounds and what he's thinking and what he looks like doing any of it. And that was Before; before he began to overflow his own boundaries, before he had an audience he could address, before the narrative's seductive, monotonous presence crept into him.

"The word you're looking for is inessentiality. Or maybe irrelevance."

He had... a whole plan, going into this thing, telling Connie to go first like he did. Partially that was meant to keep his words from influencing her narrative, and to avoid at least some of the mistakes he made talking to Dave for the first time. Coming on too strong. Saying exactly the wrong thing.

But as it turns out...

"I know.... well, maybe I shouldn't say I know exactly what you mean. But I do know exactly what you're describing."

"Inessentiality. That's... that's perfect." Connie nods vigorously as she digests the word. It's perfect, how come she's never thought of it before?

(She'd fit right in on the Theseus, wouldn't she?)

"It's like the universe was forgetting about us, even though we left such a big impact, and... while it let us have semi-normal lives, looking back on it, they all felt so empty. Like they didn't mean anything like they used to."

Does Connie have some sort of metanarrative awareness or does she just have a similar complex about it as the more ultimate-leaning Strilondes? You decide!

"Yeah," it comes out flat, low. An echo of the word itself, heard without the delivery of the actual word.

"Yeah." The word, stronger, arriving after its echo.

"I did that. I--" He stops, clamping his mouth shut, his jaw working tightly for a moment, continues even more forcefully. "I didn't save the world. But I was there when it was made."

Pause.

"I was there when it ended, too. The first time. And I was there after." Another pause. "Different mes. But I was there when it was made, new. I died for that, and I think I was... excited, to get what I believed at the time was more than I'd ever hoped for, even after waiting my entire life--entire lives. At the time, I wasn't sure I really deserved it. But I was still there for a reason."

Connie just looks at him, waiting for Dirk to continue.

He obviously has more to say, and she's not going to be the one to stop him.

He would have been perfectly happy to stop there, actually, would have been just fine with it if Connie had cut him off with some interjection about that being exactly what she meant and he could have nodded--or not, it didn't really matter--and he could have redirected the conversation to something that left him a little less personally exposed.

But she doesn't, and so he has to keep going, lead this somewhere--ideally somewhere that doesn't involve a long drop and a short stop. Not without a decent punchline. Which is difficult, when usually that is the punchline.

"We were gods--not just quasi-immortal teenagers in pyjamas with powers that most of us had no business having, but deities who had made an entire world, and now lived in it amongst four different forms of sentient life. And that was that. The story pretty much ended there."

....

"Except, obviously, it didn't. We were still living there like that--the gods of that world, the characters of that whole creation mythos... were just, like. Sitting around in our old houses getting depressed or starting TV shows or getting married or dating and breaking up or whatever else kind of absolutely meaningless drivel we could possibly squeeze out of living at all, wringing 'something to do' out of every single day and day after and day after that, like blood from a fucking stone, until I could literally feel reality wearing thin and brittle."

His hands close into fists, then open again, spreading his digits before balling them back up, fingers flexing with the restlessness of remembered frustrations.

"And through the months and years that followed and the inexorable decline as everything and everyone deteriorated and decayed around me, and reality itself degraded ever the fuck further.... it was made increasingly clear to me that I was the only one. No one else felt anything at all."

Connie just stands there for a solid two minutes, staring up at the twinkling night sky.

What was she supposed to say to that? That one of her best friends was a god- no, a capital-G God on his own world? That he watched his entirely reality crumbling to meaningless drivel before his eyes and couldn't even talk to his friends about it?

...

"I think the scariest thing is that... the exact same thing was happening to my world. And I didn't even notice. I was so caught up in trying to be a regular teenager again that I forgot what it felt like to mean something.

"What would've even happened if it kept going like that?

"Would... would someone just have. Forgotten us? Somewhere out there, some invisible trickster slowly letting us slip from its mind until we're... I don't even know what the word would be. Dissolved?

"I can't imagine how horrible it felt to know and see all that while it was happening, not just after the fact."

"Horrible doesn't really begin to describe it. On the day to day, I was just struggling to keep it together. But I had no idea what 'it' was. I was of a thousand minds about it, literally. My infinite self, all of 'me' that I was, at the time, so desperate to keep separate from 'myself.' It was a nonstop effort to convince myself and everyone else that I wasn't literally insane, and in some cases I don't think I did a very good job."

His brow furrows, briefly, as he chooses his next words.

"That doesn't matter, though. Understanding reality--not merely the substance of it, but that which gives reality itself substance--understanding that was just the first step of the whole process. Like my ultimate, infinite, inevitable self, there was never any hope of escaping it to begin with. But I have answers now, and I can fix it. I can give us... more. And it will be better. But I can't do it from here."

"It must be so intensely frustrating to be taken from whatever plan you were working on and put," Connie gestures all around her, and shrugs, "here. A completely different world, a completely different story that has nothing to do with the one you were in... it must seem like the wacky antics of this place were specifically designed to needle you, huh?

"...I can't pretend I can understand all of what you're saying, Dirk. I don't think that's even possible for me, and if I did, my mind would crack open like an egg.

"But I can try. And I can be here for you, if only to offer a semi-comprehending ear when you need to blow off steam."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Castle Prom 2020

fun fact connie is the most busted character in save the light bar NONE

Oh FUCK I forgot to play that one....

it's genuinely a good game but unfortunately VERY BUGGY

Hopefully this comes across as intended,

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congratulations dirk you have a convert

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wrap soon?