outofsticks | January Plotting: Bitter Winds Howling

OOC UPDATES

Regular AC will be resuming in January!
January is also a TDM month, so it’s the best time to think about who you may want to bring in or to enable the people you love who aren’t us.
New characters of preexisting players are welcome on this post, for the record!
A new past life plotting meme will be going up January 1st to ring in the new year as well, and hopefully the new format will make it more engaging.
We are going to set 2024 on fire and I am personally holding 2025 at gunpoint on all our behalf. Otherwise, we have a lot of really fun things planned for the year and we are greatly looking forward to playing things out with everyone together this year!
Also there is an end of year love meme for the game. This winter’s been hard. This year’s been hard. Let’s end it with a bit of love and joy.

SETTING UPDATES

Mayoi has built a shrine to Ourania, which doubles as a new home. It is placed in the formerly burnt town!
The weather is going to reach sub-zero temperatures, with raging snowstorms threatening one’s health if they stray too far from the indoors… though with how bitter cold it is, that may not help as much as you might want it to.
The river and lake are both completely frozen over, and not even Terho’s cabin has any light or presence to it. State of the seaborne and fish and Sinann? Frozen.
By nature of their magic, the fruit trees and blackberry bushes are still perfectly fine. It’s just a matter of getting to them at this point.
As the winter progresses, the cold encroaches further and further into where it should not be. Cups from the cabinets are frigid as ice, and any fires you try to keep burning flicker even as you stoke them and feel as if they could go out at any moment- Irene’s fireplace in the inn seems to be the only one that isn’t affected.

PLOT UPDATES

Characters will experience strange dreams of water and something trying to reach out. What could it mean? Great question!
New arrivals will find themselves struggling to get through the storm to safety, and will find themselves drawn to various buildings within the settlement. Hanging from their necks will be a pendant with a heavy snowflake amulet. While they wear these, the wraiths may use their voice to call for their sacrifice, and the new characters will feel incredibly cold even within the hottest places in town until they melt the amulet in a fire.
On top of the awful cold, the Grove and surrounding forest are once again under siege- though this time it doesn’t actually seem to be the Fallen Sun’s fault. The winter comes beckoned by the call of wraiths of frost and ice, and their presence only makes things worse.
They can be fought off with a partner or more- they’re much too strong to face alone- and for a time their defeat will abate the winds, but the howling blizzards return not long after. Working alone may cause a curse similar to last January to befall characters as well, where they slowly turn to ice unless saved by an act of true love (platonic or otherwise). The buddy system is the way to go!
(Mods will not be handling these fights, NPC the wraiths in battle as desired.)
All the while the wraiths call for a sacrifice. They do not elaborate on what they could possibly want, but “to stop this awful winter, sacrifices must be made”. Player characters must decide on their sacrifices and how they make them. The results will impact the end of the month with a small mini-event.

Please use the following form for plotting.

Character:
Canon:
CR:
Plans:
Not Seeking:
Anything Else:
Recent Posts or Toplevels:
Past Life Plotting Toplevel:
Meme:

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

This is legal they're all himbos (or very close to it) Wolfie's tier list said so

Character: Sesa

Canon: Arknights

CR: Sesa's the Grove's local Chuuni and weapon's smith, who has his own workshop that he both lives and works out of with his fiance, Passenger. Sesa kindof got hit with a bat a the month prior because said fiance fucking died and he was angy about it, and while he's still not Fully Over It, he's doing a lot better. Sesa is a puppydog of a person but he holds one hell of a grudge when it comes to people he cares about, even if he doesn't necessarily fully realize it. So, yaknow, something to bring up during therapy. He's really happy about all the new "Vouivre" in the Grove, which is being balanced out by how fucking cold it is. He HATES the cold and this cold is going to make him want to just live under his kotatsu forever thanks.

He has also been thinking ahead about ~marriage plans~, especially since Passenger died since he's afraid that if he keeps waiting he'll die for real and then he'll be a WIDOW-

Plans: Sesa was here for when the true-love-kiss thing happened last time and he was not a fan! Like he already hates the cold weather but like, cmon. Granted it was what kindof kickstarted him into realizing "oh shit I have feelings for this motherfucker", so it's a double edged sword, truly. He's not really had much of a chance to get to play with his grenade launcher so he'll definitely be out and about helping to cull the wraiths, so if anybody wants to team up and blow up shit he's your guy. Otherwise he will be curled up in a thousand blankets and whining about how cold it is (and also playing videogames).

Not Seeking: Nothing super heavy for Sesa this month, no death, etc etc also not seeking romance he's engaged!

Anything Else: I'm sorry Ive been so slow I've been on break but I've been busy with family stuff and also somehow gave myself a case of tennis elbow so I've been trying to not exacerbate that too much, I fall over and die

Recent Posts or Toplevels: N/A I didn't make one for December Im sorgy

Past Life Plotting Toplevel: Bwap

Meme:

Character: Nicholas D. Wolfwood

Canon: Trigun Stampede

CR: Wolfwood is a faux Priest/assassin for hire who likes to try to make everyone think he's just some big asshole when, in reality, he cares way too much and honestly the fact he cares as much as he does is the reason for 99% of the problems in his life. He owns the dilapidated Church that's sometimes mentioned where many, many pigeons live, including the God King Pigeon who likes to visit from time to time. Zahliya also lives there too, he's the Church Gargoyle Who Perches. He's a prickly guy who's often hard to get close to if you don't know him well, but anyone who does know Wolfwood knows he's a good guy deep down. He's also got a massive cross-shaped gun he carries around called the Punisher, though most often it's wrapped up in belts and tarp until he actually needs to use it.

Plans: Wolfwood, surprise-not-surprise, got himself corrupted in an altercation with Vash lateee October I believe was when that happened? He didn't realize it at the time, nor did he realize it until the day he was tasked to give out presents, but he was slowly showing signs mainly in the way his hair was just growing at an uncontrollable rate until he finally sprouted ears and a tail and was like "okay fuck something's wrong". Ain brought Zahliya over the same day to burn the corruption out (Wolfwood was unconscious when this happened, otherwise he would have just fuckin' left), so he at this moment is no longer corrupted. However, he would have told his close CR about this regardless, so if you'd like to thread this out please let me know! I'm happy to handwave it but otherwise anyone close would absolutely be aware so you're welcome to assume you just Know about it. Anyway it wasn't a fun time and kindof soured things, but he's going to go apologize to the dragons for being an idiot and get dragon boons yaaay! I'm probably going to give him horns and a tail so look forward to that.

As for the event proper, Wolfwood has ~trauma~ in regards to this level of sheer cold and people freezing to death since Vash died in his arms last year, so he's going to be more than a little testy and absolutely wanting to go shooting wraiths (can you shoot a wraith with a gun). While I wish I could say he'd be smart enough not to make the same mistake twice, he is going to be wanting to burn off some steam and might not be considering that he needs to be working with someone to avoid the chill, so I'm down to play with that if anybody wants!

Not Seeking: Nothing severe, no death or nothin' like that, if Wolfwood starts to freeze we can thread him recovering instead of blowing up etc etc. He also has I think 4 vials left on him currently which can be popped in an emergency if needed.

Anything Else: Does a jig

Recent Posts or Toplevels: Wolfwood's Saint Nick log if anybody wants to tag in belatedly! It's still open I don't mind backtags.

Past Life Plotting Toplevel: I NEVER MADE ONE FOR HIM but I have it in my brain, I'll try to actually type it up for the new version when it goes out.

Meme:

Character: Sparkling Cookie

Canon: Cookie Run Kingdom

CR: Sparkling is a side-character in Cookie Run Kingdom and I am one of his five biggest fans. He's a CRAU from the game formerly known as Ryslig, in which he's a Vampire/Honduran White Bat! Info on what he looks like/his general abilities are on his profile, but here in the Grove he works at Luca's bar and tends to just kindof vibe and try to do the best he can for everyone. He's currently dating Clotted Cream who he was dating in his past life, it's all very gay, etc.

Plans: I NEED TO DO MORE WITH SPARKLING I just don't have any super solid plans for him rn...he's not combat oriented at all re: the event, but given that he IS a healer and his healing drinks work here, I would like to play with that if anybody finds themselves getting hurt and needs help in a pinch/can't get to the clinic in a reasonable amount of time! He also makes a mean hot chocolate so, yaknow, it'll keep you warm.

Not Seeking: I will kill Sparkling someday but today is not that day

Anything Else: Does another jig

Recent Posts or Toplevels: I didn't make one for December rip

Past Life Plotting Toplevel: I ALSO DIDN'T WRITE PAST LIFE PLOTTING FOR SPARKLING I will at some point I swear

Meme:

January Plotting: Bitter Winds Howling

Chi's Himbos

Sesa

Nicholas D. Wolfwood

Sparkling Cookie