AUDIENCE: IZUMO & ALEX

[retellers]

Comments

[chanteuser]

There's the rule about you losing powers, as you lose team members. And... rumours about it being tougher at the bottom of the rankings.

[ THE RUMOURS...? ]

[retellers]

... There's the occasional conjecture that participants come up with and spread around, but not all of it is necessarily fact.

[ stop listening to rumours!! they smile, sheepishly if a tad exasperated. ]

Let's start over from the beginning.

First, when I say that rankings aren't important aside from what was previously established--the wish at the very end of this--I really mean it! I promise this isn't an "oh, except for that one important detail" deal.

This was originally meant to be a friendly competition, before Viridian... escalated things. However, nothing about the competition aspect itself has changed. The only effect of note is that first place may receive things like random stickers and candy for a job well done, I suppose. That was always intended.

Apart from those weekly trivial prizes, none of the other ranks matter whatsoever.

[sacredchants]

[ RUMORS ARE BAD...but oh. this...is good? they can relax about this much, at least. though this also clicks a little for her. ]

That explains the items that I've noticed that don't seem to fit in.

[chanteuser]

[ she sighs, but it's one tinged with relief. ]

That's good to know though.

-- [ but she glances at Izumo ] Items that don't fit in?

[retellers]

[ fox will wait to her what izumo says! ]

[sacredchants]

During trial, I saw a few items that didn't fit in what we were awarded or could have found just around the place.

[ just because i over sleep doesn't mean i don't see things. ...i'm just on my laptop and do a poor job actively keeping up. ]

I mean maybe one of them, but I can't think of a time where we could have found a glow bracelet in the last week or two. Are those the rewards you are referring to, then?

[chanteuser]

[ she blinks

and then lifts her wrist, with a silver bracelet on. ]

You mean like this? ... This was from one of those adventures. Where I came back burned. I'm assuming that's common across the board?

[retellers]

[ fox holds up a hand to their mouth, as if thinking. ]

I couldn't say. As in honestly--I don't know what exactly Wolf's team is getting as rewards, just that they wouldn't be anything horribly important.

[sacredchants]

[ she won't clarify any further since fox pretty much clarifies before she even needs to ask. small brain thinks about that though. ]

...hey, I know a week or so ago, Elsa brought up something about a monster out there but I haven't heard much else about that.

[chanteuser]

[ she just tilts her head. alex is also curious about the monster elsa mentioned. ]

[retellers]

We don't know too much about it either... It's what originally disturbed the nova, before everyone was brought here. From what we can tell, it isn't doing much other than try to eat nova--and what nova we can gather back is then safe from being eaten by it again.

[sacredchants]

So, is it making out net gain effectively zero? If that keeps up with how things are, there won't be much of us left to even gather nova.

[ SORRY BUT SHE HAD TO SAY IT. ]

[chanteuser]

[ she has nothing to say to this, really. other than wow, get it izumo? ]

[retellers]

Regarding the first part--well, yes. The idea that you're creating new nova is another misconception that's popular among the participants, but we did say at the very beginning that you were meant to restore what was siphoned away.

As for the next bit... I can't speak for other teams, since I don't know exactly how nova they're collecting, but I've found that the number of people on one's team hasn't drastically affected how much nova is gathered each week. Numbers may be going down, but it hasn't slowed down nova accumulation.

[sacredchants]

[ cries in fox. why are all of our RUMORS and FACTS so poorly checked. what do you mean we're not creating nova? izumo is sobbing somewhere on the inside. what if people talked to their leaders more and spread that information?

SURE DOUBT IS ACCEPTABLE...but izumo would die for fox (probably). ]

It's not?

[chanteuser]

... [ so hugging people ain't gonna bring lots of nova to the table? damn. ]

So even though there's less of us, we're just gathering more nova automatically to compensate...?

[retellers]

[ hey, never said that hugging still won't help!! this is why you should all smooch. ]

I wouldn't say automatically. I suppose strictly speaking, if everyone did the exact same things each week, more of you would mean more nova gathered... but there are different things you all do that causes your collected amount to fluctuate each week.

[ fox smiles, a tad wry. ]

And the removed aren't exactly on break either.

[sacredchants]

[ izumo has put in a lot of time on this front....

but also squints at that final statement. she recalls someone mentioning something about them being ~elsewhere~ but?? ]

Yeah, about that, I thought they were lost to us somehow but now we're able to communicate with them?

[ HER KAMIDANA. ]

[chanteuser]

[ looks away very quickly ]

... They did say that removal didn't have to be seen as an execution. It was us that made it that way. If you remove something you just take it out of where it was before, right?

[retellers]

Gathering nova has helped to stabilize the pathway so that messages can get through. Maybe even an item or two, if you have anything you want delivered. No guarantees it'll remain intact, though.

[sacredchants]

So something like a cake would be fine, but not a plate of cookies?

[ yes, there's a point to why she's asking about baked goods. ]

[chanteuser]

Better luck with something that's one individual thing, rather than lots of things then.

[ send kano and shima and shiro cake, izumo. wow so many people you know are dead! ]

[retellers]

Well, I wouldn't say there's any particular rhyme or reason. You can try anything--just don't ask us to deliver something you'd be sad to know didn't make it.

[ just, you know. conveniently anything that would count as a message will get wrecked along the way by mod decree. ]

[sacredchants]

I see.

[ hmmm. ]

Well, I guess this means they're gonna get a lot of junk from some of us until we can figure out what works.

[chanteuser]

Try sending some snacks and see how they are after the journey. That’s a pretty simple thing to do... and it won’t be the end of the world if it ends up a bit mangled.

[retellers]

Well, if you do want to try, feel free to pass it onto me or any other Leader. There's no guarantee when we'll cross over to check on the removed, but we can pass it onto whoever's likely to be there soon.