ph_logs | June Event - Cukey-Scary [The Cucumber Festival]

June Event - Cukey-Scary [The Cucumber Festival]

**Plain text version here.

CUKEY-SCARY

Come one, come all!

The long-awaited festival to enjoy vegetables and welcome in the summer months has finally arrived - and this time, completely uninhibited by curses!

Pumpkin Hollow's streets are bright and bustling, adorned with green ribbons, baskets of flowers, and freshly arranged shop stalls to market their goods to the festival-goers as they mill about the streets surrounding the Festival Green. Cheering crowds watch performers perched upon stages, jaunty music played by thoroughly energized bands fills the air, and the smell of freshly-cut cucumbers is carried on the breeze.

Welcome to the Cucumber Festival, a sorely-missed holiday held exclusively on Marrow Isle. It is a festival begun at the town's inception to encourage the newly-established farming community, which was rapidly embraced from then on. Many smaller-scale gardeners dedicate vast amounts of energy in joining farmers to make the festival possible, and this year is more abundant than ever, thanks to the efforts of the new arrivals taking up the farming mantles. The merriment sprawls all over the Festival Green, and even further into the town.

One question yet remains: where to begin?

Cucumber Celebrations Commence!

Copious Cucumber Cuisine

With the cucumber harvest more bountiful this year than it'd ever been, the booths have a wide assortment of offerings - cucumber chips, fried pickles, bowls of salad, breads with chunks of vegetable in them, fritters, among the wide tide of other culinary delights. If you can make it with a cucumber, these people have!

Almost as abundant as the attendees are, the stalls and booths set up with cucumber-centric meals are easily found. much of it is cheap, even free in many cases, and scattered with them are other booths peddling artisan goods.

Challenges of Chance and Cheer

As much as Hollowites enjoy their food, there's rarely an opportunity that they pass up to incorporate games or rides into festivities, and the Cucumber Festival has an extremely wide variety to offer!

The Whirling Wyvern is a ride that stands shortly behind a neat arrangement of picnic tables. Rope fences wind around the ride, giving it a safe distance from any bystanders, and the surrounding area is littered with flour bags, densely stuffed to offer padding.

Watching it even briefly makes it very clear why the padding is needed: the platform, raised about two feet off the ground in the middle, begins to spin its seated riders, rotating faster and faster until they topple, roll, and fall off the sides, into the padding below. People can often be heard nearby making bets with friends to see who can stay on the longest. (It's not a recommended ride for anyone who's been drinking!)

Bumpermobiles is another ride, operating on enchantment instead of electricity and a switch, that may look familiar to some of Pumpkin Hollow's residents from more modern times! Though they lack the distinctive roofed building in favor of a section of paved road closed off with wooden beams, the small carts of the bumpermobiles resemble automobiles of the current time, outfitted with wide-edges to brace the impact they'll inevitably have on one-another! Each one seats two, but are able to be driven on their own, if you'd prefer to focus your conversations on heckling your fellow driver.

Hot Air Balloons are set up not on the Green, but just outside of it, taking a spot just off to the side that's unoccupied by booths or frequent foot-traffic. Each ride carries a maximum of three, not counting the operator, and gives any rider an impressive view of marrow isle for thirty minutes.

The Carousel stands in the center of the Festival Green, chiming cheerful music from the pillar in the center. Horses are joined by the addition of shimmering unicorns, beaked pegasi, and colorfully painted pony-drawn carts (which are crafted to be seats, for those who cannot climb on one of the other mounts).

The Wheel of Chance is a vertical wheel, perched between artisan's booths, offering low-stake prizes for a small payment! 5 Brass allows you to spin the wheel, offering one of ten available prizes:

a cucumber, covered in batter and fried, on a stick.
a goldfish in a decorative bowl.
a pair of pants, with several varieties to choose from.
a deck of playing cards.
a fine leather-bound notebook.
a set of six shot glasses.
a bottle of wine.
a basket of assorted fruits.
a glass-blown animal native to Marrow Isle, palm-sized, in assorted species and colors.
10 Brass. Double your money!

(For any concerned about the wellbeing of the fish: the person operating the wheel assures the health of these goldfish, and that the bowls are simply for festival distribution. They do note, however, that you'll be on the hook, no pun intended, to provide the new home for the fish.)

The Cucumber Festival's Raffle is one of the most coveted opportunities to spend a small sum of brass and win one of the many prizes donated by the community, with all contributions going into community services and upkeep.

Each ticket costs 20 Brass, and each person may purchase up to 5 tickets. There will be three drawings total, granting a small prize, a medium prize, and a grand prize to each winner. One person cannot win more than one prize; if the same person draws a second prize after their first, it will be re-rolled.

To purchase a raffle ticket, please reply to the Pumpkin Hollow mod account comment with RAFFLE TICKETS as the title, also linked here, stating how many tickets your character will be buying. On JUNE 14TH, ticket purchasing will be closed, and the prizes will be rolled!

The prizes are as follows:

1st (small): a telescope, with elegant engravings in the metal, donated by Elias Coldwood.
2nd (medium): a set of two enchanted tea puppies, one glass and one metal, donated by Neil West.
3rd (grand prize): a basket-hilt sword, well-weighted, masterfully crafted, and delightfully ornate, donated by Dahlia Leeds.

Contestants Convene for Competition

Of course, what's a festival without a little bit of friendly competition! Over the week of celebrations, the Cucumber Festival hosts the following activities for any and all participants interested in joining in the fun.

The Cucumber Growing Competition is a celebration of the farmers who made all this possible, as well as a flexing of gardening prowess. Each cucumber is measured in weight, length, and color! The prize for the best cucumber in show is simply a ribbon, but among the Pumpkin Hollow farmers, it's quite a statement to have. Career farmers, hobby gardeners, and onlookers alike gather to see the town's farmers' handiwork!

The Cooking Competition follows directly after the Cucumber Growing Competition. While the larger of the vegetables don't make for very good foods, sacrificing flavor for size, the rest of the entries are cut up and used for a variety of dishes. Chefs of all varieties are encouraged to participate to show their culinary prowess!

The Great Turnip Smash-Off is a cheeky jab at the prior year's failed festival. Wielding any tools they like, including but not limited to one's hands themselves, each contestant is allotted three minutes to destroy as many turnips as they possibly can. The prize for the cucumber festival's first annual turnip slayer is a small trophy for bragging rights!

The Water Walk is a fun sport for all ages! Lined up in rows with metal spoons full of water, the participants must walk carefully to the end of the "racetrack" to a small glass of water, with a line denoted on the side at the middle. The first person to fill their glass to or above that mark wins!

The Variety Show occurs throughout the week, offering the stage to many people of assorted talents. The first day is booked up for magicians (sleight of hand, specifically - mages are politely requested to refrain from participation), and on the following Monday, a "feat of strength" competition will showcase the might of those strongest in Pumpkin Hollow! The other days are yet to be filled, and several festival attendants are waiting with clipboards to accept submissions. Many newcomers have talents they've never seen before, so new submissions of the musical, magical, or other remarkable talent alike are not only welcome, but strongly encouraged!

Carnival Complications

Of course, not all things can go entirely peacefully in Pumpkin Hollow's festivities, and the Cucumber Festival has never been exempt from this. Though the prior years' incident was far more disruptive to the festival's celebrations, several things begin to crop up over the span of the week.

Capricious Crashers

As the festival goes on, it seems that some poltergeists have seen fit to invite themselves to the party. Two games are affected, with varying results.

The Whack-a-Mole Game, during the first night, becomes the first item to start experiencing a mild haunting. Though the specters only make themselves known when the participant is alone, there's a distinct feeling of guilt that comes with each smack, not unlike stepping on a cat's tail without realizing it. Instead of the triumphant jingle that the machine lets out when the game is complete, a stark silence settles in, as though the entire festival has frozen in time. Only then does a whisper, no louder than a breeze, brush past your ear.

Rolling a D3, the spirits haunting the whack-a-mole machine will tell you the following:

a secret that isn't yours to have about someone in town.
a piece of gossip, a shocking recent happening that may or may not be getting around in whispers.
a lie, carefully crafted to impact the way you see one of your fellow townsfolk.

(Mod Note: the information given is always going to be about someone nearby. When tagging into someone's top-level with the Whack-a-Mole Game who's got secrets or gossip, provide a piece of information about your character that the spirits might've said! Additionally, feel free to request a piece of information about an NPC, major or minor. For a lie, anything goes. Have fun with it!)

The Candle-Shooting Game is the next to become haunted, though the haunting is significantly more straightforward. In an act of simple mischief, the flame will occasionally withstand blasts from the water gun that should have surely snuffed it, or the flame will go out just as you line your shot up. These spirits are aiming to ruin this particular game, but not your night.

Cards and Consequences

On the outskirts of the festival, there is a strange building set up. Just a small shack, decorated with celestial trappings and a mysterious air. Above the door, a sign painted black with gold lettering says "HOUSE OF CARDS". Is it a funhouse? A fortune teller? No one's sure who set it up. Perhaps another effort of Captain Tuttle or something.

There is a sign on the double doors that make up the entrance, which reads, "Admission is free, but you must enter in pairs." And true to its word, the doors will not open unless two different people take each door's handle. Otherwise it is definitively locked.

So, choose a companion and go explore! What's the worst that could happen? All you have to do is open the door.

| CONTENT WARNINGS: mild manipulation, unreality, snakes, possible character death. |

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

water blurs into sky [food]

[ The thing first and foremost for him is, of course, the food.

He pays his fair share of course, but it's the stalls of free things that face the brunt of his edible wrath; his metabolism has always been high, not helped by the physicality of his day-to-day or the fact that he loves good food and will still eat bad food. Throughout the entire week his plate is piled high and his cup is full, and it seems he's on a mission to try out every single thing that's been put out for the festival.

Not to necessarily say that he's greedy. In fact, anyone passing by who stares for too long is getting something plucked from somewhere in the pile and offered eagerly towards them. ]

both gem-green [turnip smashing]

[ Oh, a combat minigame. Now this is something he can do.

Have you ever played Fruit Ninja? You know how fruit would be thrown into the air and you were encouraged to combo by chopping up as many fruit as possible in a single stroke? It's like that, and with just as much swiftness and dexterity in wielding an entire actual sword instead of just swiping a finger across a mobile phone screen. The more thrown at him at once, the better.

There are multiple instances where he will leap out of the way of one on a direct collision path and suddenly he gets very swift, or--or it's more like time bends around him?--and in a flurry of lethal strokes, the ground around him is scattered with turnip gore.

Has he beaten the high score yet? (Was anyone keeping track...?) ]

blossoms hide the trees [house of cards] [locked to zelda]

[ Now this. This is something he can't turn away from. He's stuck his nose into and tread his boots on every single corner of Hyrule, and he's certainly not about to stop his habits now.

The House asks for people in pairs. Easy.

Zelda and Link stand side by side at the foot of the entrance. He's as prepared as he can manage with his state of affairs; he's got a few weapons on him, he's got cucumber food, he's got a few rocks to throw in a pinch.

Link glances aside to Zelda. Ready? his expression asks. ]

all garish-red and crimson [wildcard]

(( ooc: hit me! ))

Edited 2024-06-14 23:21 (UTC)

[ Zelda takes the other doorknob, and nods. ]

Let's go!

[ She turns the knob, steps into the bright light, and--- Oh shit it's a cliff. With a light shriek, she stumbles back a step. ]

Be careful, Link, it's narrow!

[ Link is, thankfully, used to twitch reactions--they both are. He stops just short enough to send grit and dirt sailing over the edge into the sea far, far, far below.

His hand itches for the spot his paraglider should be, but there's nowhere to fly. If he jumped down there, he'd live, but he'd run out of energy and drown. He's got no devices to help, nothing to work with but a smattering of food and items in his bags and the weapons he carried in.

He looks around, and turning, spots the doors.

He makes a noise for Zelda's attention, then gestures to the choices ahead. Sword, wand, pentacle, cup; he'll go wherever she leads. ]

[ Zelda heeds the sound, turning back to where the door they came through once stood to find four new ones. Salvation!

Four symbols. A sword, a magic wand, a coin, and a chalice. Immediately, Zelda feels drawn to the sword. She is here with Link, how can she not think of swords? The sword that kept her safe, the sword that gave Link the strength to save Hyrule, the sword she fought to protect and that released her from her prison in her beloved's hands--- it feels right. She pulls open the door.

Safely off the cliffside, they step into a marble tiled hall. Their shoes echo loudly off the wall. ]

Such strange magic. This place reminds me of the castle...

[ A strange place for a sword to lead to, he thinks. His ears swivel and flick as the sounds reverberate; at least if something tries to sneak up on them, he’ll likely hear it. Of course, it’ll mean it hears them, too. But it’s no Test of Strength; they’d have been met by something by now.

And at the end is a gap. A gap that would mean nothing if only, once again, he had his devices. Or even anything around to use—but nothing can be pulled off of the walls. Link frowns.

A scepter or an orb? They’d just chosen a sword, and a scepter seems similar to him. Maybe they’d benefit from the variety. Besides, this place sort of feels like a strange Shrine, and those always rewarded him with those Spirit Orbs or Lights of Blessing.

After sharing a confirming glance with Zelda, he pulls down the door with the orb. ]

[ As soon as Link lifts the orb from its place, the door drops down in front of them and slots into place in the floor. ]

Huh. This is such a strange place... I wonder where we'll go next.

[ She opens the door, and they're now in a grungy, modern-looking space with eerie lighting. Zelda looks around with a sort of... unpleasant awe. ]

What--- what is this place? Some kind of cave? Are those--- train tracks?

|Train tracks,| [ he signs. They're absolutely tracks. Hylian tracks don't have so many ties, but the idea is the same, and the one in town looks... something similar.

But what's strange to him is how sunken they are, lowered into its own pit. Are passengers meant to climb on top? Is the train body itself meant for... for something else? Or are these tracks not carrying a train at all? Link finds himself peering over the edge; finding nothing, he looks around at the long corridor. There's benches. Posters in a language he doesn't understand, with images that are difficult to interpret. Are those... advertisements? ]

|This is a station,| [ he remarks. It has to be. It looks like if a platform was underground. But what kind of train station is completely covered like this? The darkness before them--is it merely covered, or are they underground? ] |A train for miners...?|

[ There's a noise. A dull roar. Link turns to the tunnel. ]

[ If the rumbling didn't indicate the train coming, Zelda might have asked Link to try Ascending, but the train is clearly where they're meant to go, despite the strangeness. ]

|Maybe,| [ she signs back. It makes sense. ] |I've also heard there are subterranean people on the main continent Marrow Isle is technically a part of. Paradesium used to be inhabited by one such group.|

[ The train rolls to a stop before them, and the doors open by themselves. Zelda casts Link a glance, then shrugs slightly and makes for the doors. ]

[ Huh. He's no stranger to strange technology, at least.

In they go. Never let it be said that Link doesn't go boldly forth.

Once they are, though, the train starts moving, the thunder-drum of metal on metal rolling and rocking beneath them; and they could wait and see, but there's a door behind them, and the rest of the train to go, too. The motions of this have felt like so many mysterious structures he's traversed; temples, arks, labyrinths, mines, shrines. Whatever this House of Cards is, it's more of the same.

Which means the door immediately behind them is either another large branching path, or a short path with some enemy or trinket; his habits incline him to check it out immediately in the name of thoroughness, but if they can only pick one way to go forward and cannot go back, then it's ignorable. Waiting for the stop, versus seeking the door at the front...

The train is moving. They're side paths. ] |Let's wait,| [ he signs. ] |I want to see where this train is going.|

[ Zelda's gaze is instead drawn to the front of the train, seeing the door at the rear as more likely to be a trap or setback and the longer journey as the goal. That seems logical, doesn't it? But when she sees Link's hands move again, she considers the suggestion, and nods. Perhaps there's something interesting awaiting those with patience. ]

| Alright. Shall we sit? |

[ He nods. When Zelda sits, he draws up beside her as the train thunders its way down the tunnel. The stillness feels almost unnatural to him, though; his fingers fidget where they rest on his knees. It's rare that he's ever had to simply wait inside of a puzzle like this.

Eventually the train comes to a stop. The room they're let off in is even more decadent than many of the places in Hyrule Castle had been, shimmering with stars and a sense of a magic foreign to him. And in the middle is a wheel.

Whatever Zelda turns to, Link finds himself peeking every artifact and knickknack littering the space, all its countless stones and symbols. All beautiful, all strange. He wonders if it's worth trying to take anything with him. ]

[ It's clear by the look on Zelda's face that she's thinking much the same things, picking things up and turning them over in her hands. ]

This is amazing. What do these symbols mean, I wonder? Are they letters? Sigils? ...Do they belong to someone?

[ Link is holding a crystal that vaguely resembles a rupee, and by the look on his face, he's clearly thinking about pocketing it. It's kind of amazing he hasn't already.

Turning to Zelda, he signs, ] |I wish I knew. This place is a puzzle. Maybe it would have helped us decide where to go.|

[ He pads up to the wheel. ] |I don't think we get a choice this time, though. Which one of us should spin?|

Someone was, in fact, keeping track.

The second Link pauses long enough to seem like he's taking a break, Laios stands up in a great hurry, absolutely beaming. He'd only started counting after the first few turnips went in a flurry, but he was deeply invested. Maybe he's embellished Link's numbers by one or two from that first round, but he's quick to snatch one off the picnic table he'd been sitting at to watch, lifting it triumphantly.

"Hey! One more, and you'll be at fifty!" He calls, waving the turnip in his hand for emphasis. "Do you think you can handle one last one? I'll give it a good throw for you!"

Link is wiping his arm across his forehead when someone is calling over in his direction. The stranger raises another turnip in opportuntiy—and, well, who is he to back down?

Link gives him an enthusiastic thumbs-up. Then he mimes a skyward throw, following it with his gaze. If Laios could toss this last one as high as he could…?

Laios follows his gaze attentively, processes for only a fleeting second to gauge angle, and gives Link a grin and a thumbs-up as well. He could manage that!

Carefully, he reels his arm back, leans to and fro for a mere moment to try to make sure he has a good shot, before he throws it. The turnip careens upwards, spinning and flailing it's leaf in the air, before it begins its descent.

As soon as it does, Laios stands back, watching with restrained excitement as he waits for Link to take his shot.

"Oh, hey Link! It's been a while!" She's got blond hair and green eyes, but the woman getting a plate handed to her most certainly isn't Zelda. She's dressed in the clothes of a newcomer and is more than just a little bit muddy.

Blink. Blink blink. He doesn't recognize this person. He usually recognizes the people he meets.

Too caught up in confusion to muster up more social graces, he says out loud, "Who're you?"

She sighs.

"I guess you don't remember me, either. Makes sense." She holds out a hand.

"Cadence Bravura. Former holder of some power that might or might not have been a piece of the Triforce. Some version of me helped some version of you stop Ganon from taking over Hyrule."

Link takes and returns the handshake with as much enthusiasm as he'd greet any friend. Hey, that's a pretty weird arm he's got.

"Cadence Bravura," he repeats, just to get a feel for it in his mouth. Then, switching to sign language, since she's apparently very familiar with him if she helped him save Hyrule somewhen: |Nice to meet you. What do you mean?|

Version? What version? Someone explain split timelines and parallel worlds to this guy. He's got the multiverse thing down, just not that.

It takes her a minute of thinking, since she’s out of practice with Hylian sign. But after a moment of thinking, she answers,

“Which part? The Triforce part? I had some sort of glowing triangle spell that I used to break you and Zelda out of a sleep spell. If you mean the ‘version of me, version of you’ bit… one of the court composers broke time. He actually, physically ripped a hole in it. And I know there were at least two separate histories where a me did something to save Hyrule.”

... Right, both of those things, honestly. He isn't overly familiar with the "Triforce;" he mostly knows it as part of the symbol of the Hylian royal family, though he also knows it's appeared in Zelda's magic. Is there more to it...? And also, an evil court composer??

Sorry, Cadence, like a good RPG character he's going to pick through every inquisitive dialogue option.

"What's the Triforce...?"

Her eyes widen in confusion.

"I thought that was a big important part of your kingdom?" Just how far-flung in the tangle of timelines is this version of Link?!

"It's this golden triangle made of three smaller golden triangles, and it has the power to grant wishes. The pieces represent courage, wisdom, and power. Princess Zelda told me whatever I had was something like the Triforce, but it seemed to be the power of 'heart.' Which makes sense, I guess, but I'm not sure how it actually connects to the Triforce, if at all."

... Oh! Oh, he thinks he's starting to understand what she's talking about. The thing is that he doesn't know it as specific magic or anything; he knows it as part of the royal family's Crest and ideals, but Cadence speaks like it's more. More than just part of magic in the royal bloodline. Some kind of power.

|I think I understand now. I thought it was just part of the royal family's Crest and a symbol in Zelda's magic...|

Well, good to know there's more.

|We have the Springs of Courage, Wisdom, and Power, and the divine Dragons that oversee them. I never thought that they'd be so connected to the Triforce. Or that the Triforce was something that powerful. But I've seen the symbol of it before.|

He takes the fishing harpoon off of his back, using the point to scrape the shape of it into the dirt, accompanied by the bird-like figure that always accompanied it on the royal crest.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

June Event - Cukey-Scary [The Cucumber Festival]

link | ota, but be gentle

Blossoms hide the trees

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Both Gem-Green

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Cadence | Crypt of the Necrodancer/Cadence of Hyrule (post-game) | Sky

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