outofsticks | OOC PLOTTING: IT'S SUMMER! I'VE GOT MY HAT ON BACKWARDS AND IT'S TIME TO FUCKIN PARTY

SETTING UPDATES

Welcome to Summerrrrrr (more) (hotter)! The Grove largely continues to be “business as usual” after returning from Night Vale. It seems that those of you who were stuck there all month had a much more atypical month than those within the Grove overall.
Flowers continue to bloom, animals flood the forest, the fog wall remains unforgiving and impenetrable… while the fog wall largely prevents creatures from getting in, the occasional smart biblically-accurate deer will accidentally wander onto the true paths and stumble into the Grove. Unfortunately, they can’t figure out how to leave without assistance from those with Golden Glasses. You could also just eat them if you’re hungry, I guess.
The Sea Monkeys on the beach have realised the blessing of society and free-choice, and have begun to stir in their tidepool on the beach. Notably, they cry out to anyone with a Bone Ring that they miss “their God” and that they “wish to see the benevolent deity of blue” and similar such things. They are talking about Mizuki, because Mizuki gave them meaning last summer. Thanks little guy. Aside from that, the other beach creatures are highly active; the mobster lobsters and coconut crabs have moved their turf war down the beach a bit, the fruit sharks happily swim through the air in abundance. Careful eyes may see baby fruit sharks following after their mothers.
The mushrooms that transformed you into monsters will disappear by the end of the month, and with it your transformations will also go (and be just as painful as the first time they happened). Thank you for playing in Wolfie’s Monster Mash!
Amity is bringing us this event and post this time, everyone thank Amity for their hard work on this event! It should hopefully be more lowkey to round out summer; after summer we’re headed into Horror Times, in case you guys forgot we are a Horror Game. :)

PLOT UPDATES

This month will start you off at the Sunset Bay Hotel, a seaside resort that happens to be staffed by man-eating Sirens.
- People that get grabbed to go here will not be able to head back to the regular Grove for about a week or two. We want to mention that this is completely opt-out-able despite the event post itself being vague about it, if you’re not interested in this aspect.
- In my heart the male sirens look like the boy band from KPOP DEMON HUNTERS.
Waking up will find characters in a single room with Rattan furnishings, overlooking a beach stained by a burning red sky. The oppressive heat and burning colors will not go away.
Though the Sirens do their jobs very well, they will also try to charm and eat you. They will not stop. Killing one will send the rest into a frenzy against the perpetrator until the next day.
Amenities are still provided and available, featuring access to a pool, the beach itself, a gym and various eateries. But if you choose to go swimming you will have to deal with more sirens.
However, at some point in your forced stay, the staff will begin kidnapping a handful of guests a day- and at night the building across the hotel will become a theater where the victims must put on a play that is, in essence, a parody of their own life. This can be as cruel or as comedic as players desire, but the audience cannot interrupt (or leave their seat) until after the play begins, and the ‘actors’ cannot flee the stage until at least halfway through.
Players can choose to have them forced to perform the whole thing, if so desired.
The ‘actors’ will shuffle regularly, so that everyone will get a turn. … Yayyyy…
Süri and Zonari are also in the audience, in a box seat above everyone else- they’re very much protected from any potential attack, and will laugh at your efforts. And your plays. They’re dicks.
Eventually, Süri will get bored and drop you all off at the beach again, letting you do what you want.

OOC UPDATES

Welcome to July, and our newest TDM for the summer!
We thank you for your patience as life and the weather and also life continue to be… Existing (derogatory).
Once again we thank Kaed for his June plot, and Aspen for their Pride post!
We’re sorry for yet another secondary location event, we had to get all of them out of our systems. Again, the next handful of events up to October will be very horror-focused and take place in the Grove proper. Thanks for playing in Stickybones!

Please use the following form for plotting:

Character:
Canon:
CR: Who is your character? Any special powers or things they have going on? Any specific CR you want to kickstart?
Plans: What’s on the agenda for this month? Any interactions with the monthly event? Other things you want to do?
Not Seeking: Anything you'd like to avoid.
Anything Else: A permissions post, opt-in for a character-specific power or whatever else.
Recent Posts or Toplevels: For things you posted that you want additional tag-ins on or that might’ve gone missed.
Past Life Plotting Toplevel: From ye olde post.
Meme: Make us laugh.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Character: Verso
Canon: Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
CR:

Spoilers ahoy!

Verso is not real! Haha, yay!

The rundown is this: after Verso Dessendre met his fiery end in an arson attack on his family, his mother was stricken by grief. Because they are a family of Painters, people with the ability to enter the realities of their own paintings, Aline Dessendre turned to the only painting Verso ever made and painted her whole family into it, before deciding to live out her days. This Verso is the painted one, given all of the real Verso's memories and meant to act as the loving son of a grieving family. Roughly seven years after his creation (in the painting, time works differently outside of the painting), an event called the Fracture occurred. This was the result of the real Renoir, Aline's husband and Verso's father, entering the world and a cataclysmic fight between two god-like entities breaking out. The result was a nearly destroyed world, with both "Gods" sealed away. Aline remained on the surface, her massive avatar visible from the city of Lumiere. She became known as the Paintress.

Verso was part of the first expedition to discover what had befallen his world, at some point after which he discovered the truth of his existence. For some time, he was content with this life. However, as he grew discontent with watching the people he loved dying, exhausted with his mortal life, and terrified with the knowledge that his "mother" was dying due to her prolonged time within the painted world.

At the same time, a yearly event called the gommage would take the remaining survivors from the world, year by year. The cycle of death was preceded by the Paintress rising up and repainting the number, creating a countdown. The number on the monolith represented the age of those who would die that year (IE: if you're 33 and the number changes to 33, you die. This only happens once a year, so if you turn 33 after the number changes over, you're fine). Because of the Paintress's prominent presence, most believed she was the cause of this. The truth, however, was that the number was a warning. The Paintress used all the power she could to protect a many as possible. Anyone above the number on the monolith was a group of people she could no longer protect.

As a result of this yearly cycle of death, the initial search and rescue expeditions would later become Expeditions to stop the gommage. The name of the expedition was represented by the number on the Monolith. 67 years later, Verso would set out with Expedition 33, puppeteering their movements in the hopes of orchestrating the destruction of the world to save his mother and end his existence. However, his efforts were foiled by Maelle, who would learn of her identity as a Paintress from the real world that had been "painted over" and remade within the Painted world. For sixteen years she lived amongst the painted people, and came to see them as real, living people. Due to this, and her heavy grief as result of her involvement in the incident that claimed her brother's life, she was determined to fight like hell to save the painting, despite Verso's protests otherwise.

It's a lot. It's confusing. Let me know if you have questions!

Plans: Verso will definitely be on stage at some point, showing off his trauma. He will probably attempt to try his hand at flirting with/being eaten by the sirens. Will this teach him a lesson regarding his immortality? Probably not.

He's probably going to be somewhat rattled partway through the month depending on how stuff and things go on the TDM ;).
Not Seeking: Honestly I'm pretty open to anything and everything with him right now.
Anything Else: I strongly recommend checking out my permissions page and letting me know if you want to opt out of spoilers for Verso! He's very endgame heavy and a lot of that will be coming up this month, so protect yourselves while you can.
Recent Posts or Toplevels: Verso wants a piano, dammit.
Past Life Plotting Toplevel: Nothing yet, but that may change soon ;)
Meme:

Character: Luca Aurelius
Canon: OC
CR: Things have changed since the last time I did one of these. Luca is no longer just considered a "Blessed" individual. He's now the Phoenix itself, as a result of killing the beast and inheriting its power during a canon update. Also he found out that not only did he have relations with a fish, he has a crush on said fish. Relevant to this month.

You can find a more detailed breakdown of Luca's character and background here. I also recommend perusing the world tab there as well.
Plans: Luca is absolutely going to be on display for the performances. Like hell am I going to miss the opportunity for Zonari to laugh at him :) Other than that, he will be attempting to seduce the sirens. He will probably die at least once. Oops!

Also he's still moping about Zahliya. Pride didn't help as much as he thought it would.
Not Seeking: Not trying to go too heavy or emotional on him this month. He deserves a break.
Meme:

OOC PLOTTING: IT'S SUMMER! I'VE GOT MY HAT ON BACKWARDS AND IT'S TIME TO FUCKIN PARTY

Aspen's Assholes

Verso

Luca