Alara had heard the trembling and vibrations in the ground as she slept during the daylight hours. They got stronger the closer she got to the mountains and home.
She had seen machinery on a large scale sometimes pass nearby as she traveled at night. What were the surface-dwellers doing?
Rather than taking the cave entrance into the centuries old subterranean city her people called home, she decided to investigate what was going on. She climbed the slope in darkness, to a position where she could look down on the surface settlement and froze with shock.
They had always mined the rock miles above her home, but never had she seen a drill of that size! She looked down into the crater trying to visualize the layout of the city below. If they dug much further they would start to uncover old entrance tunnels!
The giant drill that threatens her subterranean home.
She descended the slope away from the settlement towards the nearest entrance, she must warn her people. No doubt some would already be scared by the inevitable increased noise, but she suspected the Elders would be dismissing it as just more mining if they had no idea what was above them. Stopped for now, but inevitably that drill will start again.
At the Faire last year I wandered rather aimlessly, I followed the Bubbo Owls storyline and one day I went to a NeoVictoria meet & greet, apart from that I didn’t explore much. It was that meet that would change my perspective, I just didn’t know it at the time.
This year I was at the planning meetings and discussions of what NeoVictoria may do at their meets and discussed what items they would be offering for sale and as gifts. It was this last part that was most relevant, I volunteered to make a freebie gift.
On the evening of the Wednesday before the Faire began I was invited to the “Backstage” group so I could Rez the item for visitors to purchase.
The NeoVictoria stand in Fantasy FaireWith a stage for RoleplaysThe drinks barrel I made as a gift
On the Thursday morning I logged back in to have an explore.
It was surreal being in the Faire before it opened. My previous experiences had always been of bustling regions full of people. As usual I didn’t really have much of a plan of what I wanted to see, I just knew I had about 3 hours before the Faire opened and there would be people everywhere. I just wanted to see as much as I could before the masses arrived.
Since the NeoVictoria store is located in Auxenio’s Pass steampunk region, that’s where I started. When I stepped outside I was blown away by the surroundings. I started walking the paths to see what I found.
A glance down the street
And I see several of these beautiful creations
With the regions being mostly empty except for store owners making final tweaks to their displays and other creators taking the time to wander, it was blissfully quiet.
Blissfully empty streetsThe centre of the Region features a massive drill
I stuck mostly to the paths, with occasional detours, wanting to try and see as much as I could in the time I had. Traveling mostly clockwise around the Faire, I took in the sights of the created locations. Each one mind blowing or boggling in their design. I got about half way around before I ran out of time, but I had a large collection of snapshots taken as I went around. Here are some of my favourites.
The leafy pathways of Autumnia
Cassiopeia
Cassiopeia
Cassiopeia
Lamented Fens – An eerie myst is everywhere
Lamented Fens – Not somewhere you’d want to swim!
A light in the distance? Who would live here?
Isle of Shadows – The sight of this creation is breathtaking
Isle of Shadows – Such detail on a massive scale
Isle of Shadows – Departing the harbour
Isle of Shadows – Off the brige into some welcome woodland
Isle of Shadows – A lovely small place just off the path
Now I look forward to exploring the rest of the Faire!
So it’s this time of year again Fantasy Faire is upon us. Another week and more of exploring beautiful location, roleplay and shopping in aid of Relay for Life in Second Life.
Last year I visited the Faire and for the first time was able to follow their week-long roleplay storyline. That was great fun and I wrote about it in my Bubbo Owls post. This year it appears the RP is called the Grizzly Cubs and I look forward to following this years adventure.
As I’ve mentioned previously, last year I attended a Meet & Greet with the lovely folks from the NeoVictoria Project. I submitted a character and became an official member of the community. They’re holding similar Meet & Greet sessions this year, so I shall be present for at least one of them to help out. I’m also possibly providing a freebie to be given out at the NeoVictoria location at the Faire.
What else is new this year is that I applied to be one of the Official FF Bloggers. However the applications are now closed and my names not on the list. I suspect this is probably due to the quality of my regular images, admittedly lower quality, but it’s usually because they’re un-staged and my focus is the RP or story. (I’ll be remedying that for the Faire) So instead I’m going to try and complete some of their Blogger Challenges which I’ve copied below:
Faire Folk – create a character from the Fairelands
Ava arrived at the venue for the Glitter & Gore festival she planned to attend, to find that the only accommodation left in the area was a very rundown hotel. Having checked in with the rather creepy desk clerk she follows the directions to deadliesther room, deciding it was best she not find out what was making the odd noises in the rooms she passed on the way. She notices the somewhat dubious condition of the fireplace but it’s too cold in the room without it lit, so she sleeps.
She is woken all too soon by the fire having apparently been in worse condition than she thought and was surrounded by flames, she opens the room door and exits the building via a window.
Ava stands looking at the burning hotel
Cranky at having had too few hours daylight sleep and the nature of her waking, she looks up at the burning building. She notices her car has also caught light, but simply shrugs now she won’t have to torch the rust bucket herself for the insurance. Seeing a green light around the corner of the building she heads for it muttering “that is Not normal”.
She follows the light uphill into the woods behind the building
The edge of the forest
and follows the path and the light till she sees a graveyard.
Something large and furry lunges out of the dark towards her and into her path.
Ava’s furry attacker
She raises a hand planting it on it’s chest and pushing it away, thinking it best not to harm the local denizens when not on her own territory. She flashes her fangs in it’s direction and continues on into the graveyard.
Ava is well aware that she is in fact the deadliest thing on the prowl tonight.
Entering the crypt in the graveyard she finds herself in a maze of tunnels,seeing again the green light Ava follows it to a room full of hanging cages.
Hanging cages surround Ava
Here the tunnels divide and she must explore them all to fin the way out, where she comes across several specters haunting the tunnels.
She also encounters one very large living inhabitant of the cave, a large spider
The only apparent living inhabitant of the tunnels
Ava retraces her steps and in the process finds what must have evidently been the former residence of the spider, clearly some had tried to keep it locked up.
Had someone tried to keep the spider in here?
Having found nothing but dead ends, Ava surmises that perhaps the spider is hiding or guarding something, which may include a way out. She returns to it’s cavern looking for a way past it and finds one, passing through a a very gory room, but the lack of cobwebs makes her think it’s not the spiders work.
She proceeds though to the next chamber finding a ritual space with a glowing pentagram on the floor
Beyond it she notices another phenomenon, presumably what the spell was used to create, a glowing portal.
Since she has run out of options for where else to go, she takes a breath and steps in.
After what feels like an eternity of falling, Ava lands in the middle of a cornfield, an unexpected place for such a means of transport would deliver someone,but at least she was out of the tunnels.
She wanders the different paths, finding various sights on the way
Finally one of the paths does not end with a confrontation with something un-dead or un-human and she finds a familiar face and a way out. (I’m not going to spoil it all!)
For more information about the Haunted Motel, read the blog by my dear friend Sheree Honeyflower HERE.
After my last visit to the Eternal Conflict regions and taking a glimpse of the Angel Archadia, I was looking forward to returning. The arrival area that I took a single pic of at the end of my last post is very impressive.
As I mentioned before, I always check behind me, the massive statues were impressive and the doorway seemed inviting so went and had a look. Which leads through to a very impressive build, similar to that in my very first visit.
I then came back and explored the buildings around the landing area.
For a sense of scale, the little white dot under the wing to the left, is my avatar.
The buildings around the area contain various different tasks to be completed by Angel players in the game. This is where I re-evaluate my original description of Eternal Conflict. I referred to it as “an invite-only Angels & Demons roleplay game”, which is quite an understatement. The roleplay is an optional component, the majority of game appears to be completing these tasks to level-up and strengthen your characters abilities for combat in as the name says, eternal conflict. The series of tasks to reach these ends can be quite time-consuming and complex. For example to make a spell scroll several tasks have to be completed:
Chopping lumber from trees for logs
Using the logs to make parchment
Inscribing the spell onto the parchment
Sounds simple, right? Except that the task of collecting logs requires spending an awful lot of time practicing your Lumberjack skill, before you successfully managed to collect a single log. Then a similar processes for turning the logs into parchment and inscribing the spell. That’s assuming you have gone through the processes to make Ink..
Second Life is just the environment framework used to facilitate the game. The combat can take place anywhere on the SL grid, invisible to non-registered residents. Yesterday I became a registered player of the game, today I was attacked while dancing at a club, no-one around me was any the wiser. However this practice of attacking a new player is very frowned upon, but is as I found out, very possible. I’m sure once I have mastered the skills required it will be a lot of fun.
So back in July I was looking for a nice pair of Angel wings, I found some lovely ones on Markerplace. The description of the wings talked about a roleplay system called Eternal Conflict, which is an invite-only Angels & Demons roleplay game. Correspondingly they have two location themes, Heaven & Hell.
The first collection of images were taken in the Heaven part and I found the place totally enchanting.
I returned recently to revisit the region and explore the Hell part.
From the arrival point you can see a number of round towers, marked Laboratory,Marketplace,Temple, Hall of Death and another away from the others marked “Throne of the Prime God” there is also the visible chasm into a pit of lava.
The Laboratory
Marketplace
Temple
Hall of Death
These all contain objects clearly pertaining to the various aspects of the game, which I am as yet unfamiliar, so could only guess at their respective purposes.
Throne of the Prince God
This tower set away from the others had no apparent pedestrian access, being suspended above the ground on the cave wall.
Looking down into the tower from above
The statue is the main feature in here
I took a few other snaps of this upper level, where are seating and props before heading down into the pit..
I took the rather impressive teleporter down to the lower level:
Fiery teleporter
Down in the lower level as you’d imagine, lots of rivers of lava among impressive statues
After checking a notecard I’d received, I discovered there was more to be found. Another two areas Hell: The Ruins and Heaven’s Archadia
which are located in a different region.
So off to The Ruins I went.
As usual I took snaps around the welcome area..
Arrival view
But wait, what’s this behind me..?
Quite often arrival points just expect you to go forward, which is why I always check behind me, in case the builder has been imaginative. Here there’s a throne up on a raised platform hidden behind some rocks.
I then headed out following where they expect you to go, towards a large statue:
Here you can go either down into a mine
Or in the other direction to a castle type building:
After a little wander, I thought it was time to go briefly visit the second Heaven location:
Heaven’s Archadia arrival point
I’ll write up about Archadia in a follow up post, since if it’s half as detailed as Hell, it’ll take me a while to explore it!
I saw this place on a destinations guide and thought “oh that’s pretty” and thought I’d go have a look. However when it’s come to writing something about the place, I got a little stuck. It does look lovely, it’s well built and laid out and the music stream is appropriately relaxed. However it just feels like just another high fantasy beauty spot from the many linked off the same guide.
So I asked a fellow visitor for their opinion and their response was:
“ohh it is very magic and peaceful here” and that it was “like a few, but not Lots.”(of other places)
So maybe I was being overly harsh. Stop by and have a look, maybe leave a comment if you think I’m right or wrong. Seeing it for yourself will no doubt be much better than my humble snapshots.
So there’s this place that once existed, by the name of Goatswood. It was formerly a roleplay sim created in 2013. Recently it has been revived by the original creators on a homestead region. So I went and had a wander.
It’s a lovely sim and I wish I could have seen the original, although the owner claims they prefer this newer version. I love to roleplay and this looks like the kind of place I’d like to. According to the welcome notecard there is a detailed backstory, but how much you choose to involve yourself is up to you. It explains the setting and scenario and there are story notecards you can collect if you choose to follow it.
After reading Strawberry Singh’s blog post featuring Alpha Moon I just had to go and explore the sim. When I arrived there was a greeter waiting who gave me a brief tour around the island. I took a few snaps as I went around, it really is quite beautiful. My regular graphics settings don’t do it justice here, so best come check it out for yourself. I also managed to find the same boat Berry did, very relaxing!
I love Fantasy Faire in SL but rarely get to attend or take part in things. This year I decided to try and follow the rp instead of just visiting the empty scenes afterwards. This year one of the RP stories is the Bubo Owls, I kept up on what was going on through the updates page, so I had an idea what was going on when I eventually made it inworld on time.
It was great fun watching the story unfold as the kids explored, questioned and solved their way through the evolving story. There will be a few more twists and turns in the story I am sure!
I took a collection of photos in their base below the flying market and at various places we went to as I followed them around to different plot locations.
