Nod

Nuelle was overwhelmed once again, so many were talking around her, the centaur named Collin was growing excitable, and asked an odd question that she could not possibly answer. For all she knew he was always a centaur, and it was more a surprise to hear otherwise. Same with the Fae named Lily not originally being a Fae. In fact, if anything, it started to make her wonder what she really was all of a sudden. Who is the real Nuelle? It had only recently occurred to her that she was Nuelle, she doesn't remember anything prior to Abdown telling her that. No friends, no family... what is a family anyways?

As Collin continued to become more upset, she could feel something in the air that began to make her feel cold within. It was such a discomforting sensation, causing her to give panicked glances about for any source. Nothing... She saw the others, but nothing else than that. Were they even able to feel it? They were continuing as normal. What is normal?

She held her head for a moment, the then looked straight to Collin and leaned in. "Well, I suppose whether it is normal or not, you are here, you are you, and at least each of you know who you are," she responds in a very matter of fact manner. "All I currently know is that I'm here, and now each of you are here as well. I had to be told my name."

She looks gloomy for a moment, rocking back and looking at her feet. It bothered her to no end that she can't remember anything beyond waking up in the arms of Abdown. And she felt like a fool, trying to offer comfort while she herself felt discomfort. "Plus," she mutters. "At least in spite of it all, we are unharmed at least."

As she looked back up again, ready to say something else, the ground began to shake. The bell of the clock tower chimes with unusual and loud tune, ringing out across the vastness of Nod. Beyond them, upon the isolated island with the massive white tree who's trunk reaches high and roots dig deep, some roots coil up then roll outwards, anchoring themselves upon the edges of the various drifting islands, including the one they were upon right now. The tops of said massive roots flatten and dip inwards, forming into elaborate bridge-like constructs equip with safety rails. At the entrance of the bridge a party banner sets itself, draped across the top along with some confetti. The words inscribed upon the banner were "Natalis Dormientis."

"I guess... that answers that question." She then noticed Are, who would perhaps appear strange had Nuelle known what normal was to begin with. She didn't understand the language, unfortunately, but understood there was some confusion. "I'm Nuelle... hello. Are you a guest as well?"

Are looked around at the people. All very weird. But they seem harmless. The tattoos on her body went from black to a grey and seemed to move up to her shoulders. The lower bit of the tattoos near the hands were a bit thinner. She loosened herself. If they were to attack her she had no doubt that she would win. They seemed harmless though. But hey at least they all spoke Rikan. "You know, eh, how you get here?" Well she knew the language. Not fluent but she knew it.

"Thanks for the information Rick, although this means that someone or something dragged us to this land...or somehow we are having the same lucid dream together."

The possibility that either they were dreaming or were somehow abducted to this alien world hadn't slipped him by. They were fairly broad conclusions given the fact that logically if they didn't come here themselves they must of been brought somehow. He too had also considered the idea that it might of been a dream. He had dismissed the notion since if it were a dream it wouldn't make nearly as much sense as it did already.

"There is a third option." He proposed. "We could be dead."


It was an eerie thought but not entirely impossible. He let the proposal hang in the air for the while for consideration while he forged onward. It was not long before they reached the riverbank, walking amongst the strange ruins of what was and what might of been. With utter ease he leapt up onto the peak of one such building in a series of short hops from platform to platform. High up he could pick up the trace sounds of others, voices out in the forest carrying in what sounded like a busy conversation.

"Hey Lyn, think we aren't the only ones around these parts. Think they're like us or might they got some answers we don't have?"

He pointed in the direction he roughly believed the voices to be coming from. Much closer however was a lone voice, that of a girl. From his vantage he could see a red haired girl brandishing a blade about the same height as her. More new faces to greet.


"Ahoy there!" He waved, calling out to youthful one far out in the woods. Before he could go down and bid welcome to her the clocktower chimed, the echoing ring which carried across the island cutting right through his train of thought. As if in answer to the call of the chiming a number of roots from the shimmering tree reached out to grasp their island, connecting them to it. These roots flattened, changed and morphed, forming rails and some form of entrance complete with an arch with a banner. Upon the banner there was something written but he couldn't quite read it as it was a bit far from his location.

Needless to say his curiosity was eager like a dog towards a steak. Leaping from the top of the ruin he fell and landed neatly in the earthen floor, leaving very little indent from the impact. Not sparing a moment he broke into a long stride, powerwalking over to where he saw the bridge. He had almost completely forgotton about his previous company. He was reminded of her when he neared the red haired girl who stood between him and the bridge. Looking back he checked to see if she was still in tow.

"Hey Lyn, If that bridge isn't a clear path to something interesting I don't know what is." He spoke in case she was still listening.

The reaction to his outburst was neither what he expected or what he was accustomed to. Yes perhaps he made the situation awkward and unsettling for his new companions he was sure of that but he was expecting a violent outburst of their own telling him to get a grip perhaps a minor sort of violence upon his person. That at least was what he would have expected of the friends he had before waking up here in this odd place. Instead the reaction was much more humane. Stian simply asked if he was okay and if he had anything else to say. Lilly seemed to try and comfort him somewhat by, telling him to just take a deep breath, at least until the mention of her wings finally hit her. It was what Nuelle said that hit him the most however.

His eyes went wide at the revelation that the odd girl had no idea who she was, and suddenly Collin simultaneously felt more at peace with this whole situation and guilt for his whining. Now that he snapped somewhat out of his nervous breakdown the situation didn't seem so bad after all. He was surrounded by nature again, not trapped in the bleakness of the city, and though he never quite imagined it like this he had been wanting to go horse riding again ever since they were forced to leave their ranch. Perhaps this wasn't so bad. Still bad of course but Collin could make out what seemed to be the beginning of a silver lining in this dark storm he found himself in.

He sheepishly looked down at the ground and just as he was about to apologize a loud clock chime rang through the air, drawing attention to an elaborate party set up over a bridge. At the very least they had a goal now.

Before anyone could move towards the party another person made their presence known. This one a girl with strange tattoos and speaking an even stranger language. Soon enough however she proved herself capable of speaking English. Broken English but nonetheless at least he could understand her.

He swallowed his nerves as he prepared himself to speak. If he was going to be travelling with these strange people he might as well try to get comfortable around them. Somehow he managed to calm himself enough not to devolve into a useless stuttering mess. "Not sure how we got here. No one is but I think we are supposed to go over there. You can come with us I guess. We all probably are going to end up there eventually." He pointed towards the party as he spoke hoping that the new girl could at least understand him better that way.

As Lyn followed Rick to head to the clock tower he told her about, he made one startling and unnerving proposal about their situation. "There is a third option. We could be dead." With those words, Lyn looked at Rick surprised for a second but quickly came to her senses. "Well that is a possibility as well. Jeeze, for a guy who try's to joke around, you sure can come up with some grim conclusions. But if that is true then the afterlife certainly is strange...very strange indeed." She laughed it off and continued to walk forward until they reached the riverbank and began to walk among the ruins of past things that was once standing.

Watching as Rick began to platform hop to the peak of one of these building, Lyn followed suit by climbing the structure with ease making use of the many cracks as a foothold before pulling herself up to the peak of the building. Once she was on top on the building she also heard the sounds of voices, by the sound of it it seemed that there were more people and more specifically they were not far away although she was not sure where the voices came from. Rick soon spoke up. "Hey Lyn, think we aren't the only ones around these parts. Think they're like us or might they got some answers we don't have?" Lyn turned to face him before speaking. "No clue, for all I know they could be walking candy with all I have seen so far. But we just gotta hope they are friendly and that maybe they know what is going on here." She spoke before looking in the direction Rick was pointing in and saw a woman with red hair, and she was not made of candy. "Ok we can safely rule out candy people..."


Before Lyn could say something, Rick called out to the woman and shorty afterwards the clock tower began to ring with an unusually loud tone. What followed the ringing was the roots of the large white tree isolated on another floating island began to coil and roll outwards, anchoring themselves to other islands. What made this sight even more stranger than it needed to be, the roots began to flatten out into elaborate bridge-like constructs with guard rails to prevent people from falling off the edge. Finally to top it all off the entrance of the bridge was decorated with a party banner draped with confetti along. She could not see the words since she was too far away however she knew that that the banners were party banners making her come up with a strange proposal. "Did this place, expect us to come?" She muttered the words.

Of course there was no time to stand around confused and thinking about the bride, as soon as Lyn saw Rick leap of the building, she followed by doing a front flip off the building and landing perfectly on her feet, years in her schools cheer leading group did that for you, of course she made sure not to let her parents know she was doing something rather dangerous. She then began to slowly walk over to the group while waving. "Hello! Pleaed to meet you, names Lyn. And Rick, when one sees a bridge draped with a party banner of course it leads to something special. Maybe we can get some answers." Lyn called out to the two eventually taking her spot a few feet away from the others.

"W-we'd all like to know that," she stutters, giving the most honest response she could give to Are. She was already overwhelmed by everything, having to absorb all of it as if they were her very first memories. All she had to go on was what she felt, and what little she knew from what Abdown told her. In fact, she wishes that he didn't leave her holding the bag like this, it was kind of rude.

Nuelle turned to the newly formed bridge, and made her way over to it. Her sense of caution was at least very much intact, giving the bridge a few cautious taps with her foot. It seemed sturdy and steady, the strange white wood was in fact very strong if not a bit pliable. She walked onto it a bit making it clear that it wasn't going to give, at least not very easily. She turned to the others giving a lazy wave. As soon as she turned her back to the bridge, she felt a coldness rush over her body once more, this time more direct, more local, in fact the source felt like it was coming from behind her. So cold. Something had moved itself near her, she could hear its breath... sounding like... static. The angry sound filled her ears, or more accurately, her head. She slowly turned, the static getting louder, followed by a hollow rattle, then silence. The rattle was a sound that was not in her head, and to anyone nearby they too would have heard it.

Nothing. There was nothing there when she looked. No, there there was something there, she was convinced of it now, and could still feel it faintly. Instead of fear, she grew more and more curious. The curiosity driving her to walk forward as if in a trance across the bridge. To anyone watching, she would appear to cast two shadows briefly, the second seeming to just evaporate. She herself was oblivious to it.

Are watched as the girl crossed the bridge. Then the noise came. It wasn't much. Just annoying. But with the hangover it was like being repeatedly stabbed in the brain with a club or war hammer. She looked up and seen the second shadow. Something wasn't right. "Wait. Stop!" Are walked to the edge of the bridge. Her tattoos slowed down to a crawl and was a jet black.

Vennesa sat just out of sight cross legged in the grass. Her hoodie covered her head and helped blend with the environment. It didn't matter that the hoodie was a bit too large. System couched next to her cloaked. "Look at them system. All fools. they are starting to understand." she whispered to him. System rotated his head to scan the area. "[OBSERVATION NOTED.]" the volume was low. "You are a sarcastic douche." "[NOTED]"