buscador-niko

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Lorekeeper Household 1, Prologue

Since this household has seen A LOT of drama that I didn’t catch on camera or post about, I think we need a recap of what’s gone on before.

Previously on Kulo Seeri: in the middle of winter, Melchol zan-Ku revealed with his dying breath that there was a spy for the Beguiler in the camp, and head lorekeeper Yoshan zan-Li began investigating his own theory about who it might be. After talking with a few of the tribe’s most likely suspects, he came to the conclusion that it was none other than... Yoshan himself.

Yoshan had suffered from memory lapses recently, even forgetting his family for a while - so he concluded that he must be the Beguiler’s sleeper agent, and pulled a disappearing act in the middle of the night in hopes of protecting his people... not knowing that he was reenacting his lover’s most painful experience by vanishing with no warning. (Dominick, Yoshan’s boyfriend, is one of @esotheria-sims​ Wyvern’s Bay cast originally, and the backstory of how he and his father parted in a similar way can be found on Esotheria’s blog.)

A full starband later, Kulo Seeri received a message from the nearby town of Credence saying that Yoshan had been staying there and would return after the spring thaws. Apparently he’d been planning to travel to Zati, a city high in the Earthshammer Mountains - which are notoriously dangerous to travel in winter. What was he thinking?

It’s now early spring, and Yoshan is newly back in Kulo Seeri. Dominick has felt betrayed, worried and confused for most of the bands he’s been away... and this couple has seen more than a bit of relationship drama. Will the two lovers reconcile, or will this be the final straw that makes them fall apart?

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The herbalist and her apprentice had barely arrived when Melchol gave birth to two beautiful, healthy daughters. According to Nuidya tradition, they would not be named until they were a full starband old, hopefully preventing demons from sensing the girls’ presence while they were still infants.

(In other words, I hate naming sims I don’t know yet and prefer to have a few toddler traits to work with first. For now, the babies are 1 and 2, so I won’t be tagging them by name until they’re toddlers.)

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Previously on Kulo Seeri, Melchol gave birth to twin voidlings, revealed that the vengeful Beguiler had a mole in the village and died. His grave will be moved to the burial grounds next rotation - in KS, you don’t anger a spirit by turfing it out of its home straight away!

The rest of the rotation passed uneventfully, but here are some highlights of the last couple of days:

Immediately after Melchol’s death, ACR kicked back in with a first kiss between Zyulo and Wild Kiss. Is Sophos crying for his brother, or is it because his love interest has just got romantic with someone else?

The twins had to be adopted out, since there are only three nursing mothers in KS. Since one is Melchol’s ex and another is a Vedraloga, Lark zan-Ace was the only choice. She came by with her brother Caleb to take the babies back to her tents.

A litter of skuncoons are on the way...

...and Melchol is not taking kindly to the fact that the kitchen has become a mess in his absence.

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And then it gets really dramatic

Two starbands had passed since the Beguiler escaped the Void, disrupting the Nuidya festival of cats in the process. After the initial panic, though, nothing had been heard of the vengeful deity, and life in Kulo Seeri was slowly returning to the usual task of preparing the winter stores. Most of the tribe didn’t even speak of the cosmic jailbreak. Would they still ignore the fact that the Beguiler was out there, no doubt growing stronger by the day, if they knew what Melchol zan-Ku knew?

The older man had mostly kept to himself since leaving Etan. On the rare occasions that he’d left his clan’s tents, he'd just fetch whatever supplies the family needed and not speak to anyone - Etan’s recent interest in rekindling their relationship was her idea, she’d made all the moves. Granted, Melchol didn’t mind the attention. But even Etan might be... well...

Not long before the Cat Festival, according to his brother, Melchol had simply vanished while preparing a morning meal. He’d reappeared a while later with no memory of having vanished, and carried on cooking like nothing had happened. That night, he’d been watching the sky for omens and been taken into the Spirit World; he didn’t remember much of that either, but he knew - knew without knowing how he did - that he’d received a warning from whatever spirit had abducted him.

Someone in the tribe was a spy for the Beguiler. Someone had aided vir escape.

Every day, the knowledge gnawed at him, making him suspicious of everyone else. He couldn’t work out who was the mole. It could be anyone. His only comfort was that soon, any time now, he would have the voidling baby that was his other souvenir from the Spirit World. He’d be able to trust the child, he was sure of it. The Beguiler feared voidbeasts; they’d kept vir prisoner in the Void for aeons, kept vir too weak to escape. Until recently...

“Well, don’t just stand there, Zyulo - fetch the herbalist!” Melchol yelled through gritted teeth, as his voidling prepared to enter the world.

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I don’t have many pictures from this outing, but here are a couple more from before Kira decides to get home and snooze.

It’s hard to tell through the chandelier thingy, but Melchol and Kira are talking about crowns here - probably relating to Etan and her recent actions. Which also involve troublesome arkal, so Kira can’t really criticise. Meanwhile, Sophos and Zera both seem to have ACR on their minds.

Nita’s not interested in Sophos though... something tells me Shazia is enjoying her break from serving in the Vedraloga!

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During London’s daily trip to the Heart of the Village to fetch wood and water, he catches sight of Etan heading for the as-yet-unnamed tavern. London and Etan still have a very strong attraction to each other, so he follows her in.

Etan acknowledges his greeting, but that’s about all she does before turning her attention back to a discussion with Tegan of the Vedraloga. To add to the awkwardness, Etan’s other ex-husband Melchol walks in... the one who broke a law he actually helped Etan write by divorcing her, but - unlike London - didn’t become arkal for it.

The two men exchange pleasantries and discuss the quality of the beers they’ve been trading for. It’s still an extremely awkward atmosphere in there, so London uses the excuse of having to get back to make the morning meal and heads home.

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This was meant to be Alana’s first time attending a birth as an apprentice herbalist, and so far it seemed to be going well even without her and Arafa... or so it seemed. By the time she made her way to the tent, the buzz surrounding the birth of the twins had given way to fear, as Melchol slumped to the ground in pain. Alana couldn’t reach him before the kora did; she knew better than to interfere with the work of these spirits, tasked with carrying souls to and from the Spirit World.

Melchol knew in that last moment that he had to warn his people. He still didn’t know who in the tent he could trust, but he managed to get the words out: “A spy... Beguiler has... a spy in the village...”

Nobody knew how to react. Some cried over the loss of Melchol, who had often been described as “the only zan-Ku with more sense than hunting trophies;” others stood in shock, eyes wide and mouths open. Suddenly Melchol’s recent reclusive behaviour made perfect sense. Most of the tribe had put it down to the after-effects of the spirit journey.

And then, out of the corner of her eye, Alana thought she saw a strange figure slip into the tent and head towards the departing kora. She couldn’t quite make out the features of the newcomer, beyond the fact that it appeared to be a dark-haired, red-furred zisky in a purple robe. Had the settlers from Credence also sent a healer? But the catlike ziskies weren’t a flying species, and she could have sworn the stranger had a pair of shimmering wings...

The newcomer was not impressed. So much brilliant planning, derailed in a brief moment. Time to break out the first of many backup plans.

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The first day in Zera’s household started the way it started last time: with way too much ACR for my tastes. Wild Kiss certainly lives up to her name, sharing a first kiss of the iteration with Sophos before heading over to flirt with walkby Caleb (who has, up to this point, only been interested in guys). I actually told her to, because she wanted to, but I wasn’t expecting him to accept the flirt!

Etan was also walking by (coincidence?) and Melchol greeted her, which again was followed by a lot of ACR.

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Back to posting Kulo Seeri gameplay! And after Kira’s done swooning over troublesome arkal, she makes her way to the tavern for the closest equivalent to a night on the town that Kulo Seeri can manage. Most of the night is spent hanging around with her northkin, the zan-Ku clan. (”Northkin” in KS means “related on the father’s side” - only matrilineal ancestry counts for family ties in Nuidya culture. The implication is that paternal relatives are a quirky custom of the northern cities.)

She discusses her recent transformation to and from a werewolf state with her cousin Zera, who double checks that Kira has in fact turned back while trying to act casual and joke about it. Kira has inherited the zan-Ku temper, and no one wants to get on her bad side when she doesn’t have fangs.

Kira’s uncle Sophos, a hunter who’s nearly sixty moons old and stubbornly refusing to hang up his spear, also comes over to talk with her. I think he might be trying to mooch something off her, going by the thought bubble. His brother Melchol, Kira’s father, is waiting in the background...

...and when he gets a chance to speak to Kira, their shared experiences of being pulled into the Spirit World and returning pregnant are the main focus of the conversation.

Melchol’s pregnancy is further along than Kira’s, and he remembers nothing about the experience except a vague warning that someone in the village was an agent of the Beguiler, which popped into his head midway through preparing a meal. He still doesn’t know who the warning referred to, and it’s making him feel anxious most of the time. (Kira, who’s done this before, reckons that’s just a pregnancy thing.)

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This marriage will self-destruct in 10 seconds...

Very very late to the party, but @retromaisie​ tagged me (over a month ago!) in the Improbable Couple Tag meme thingy thing.

This one was pretty easy, although I couldn’t take screenshots until I’d finished cutting downloads for new Kulo Seeri. If there’s one pair of Sims that scream “improbable couple” more than current pairing Kenda mi-Avira and Sophos zan-Ku... it’s got to be Kenda’s cousin, the late, great Vedrafe zan-Ave, and... Sophos zan-Ku. :P

Below the cut is a summary of what I imagine their life together would be like:

To start, I should mention that Vedrafe clearly had a thing for the zan-Ku brothers. She was very close to Melchol, and had a brief fling with Pollux, but her chemistry with Sophos was a massive three bolt attraction.

Sophos and Kenda have been semi-happily married for nearly ten moons in the canon timeline - a relationship that is built on fighting and making up, since both of them are extremely stubborn and take no nonsense. But Vedrafe wasn’t like Kenda... she was even more assertive. Like, the only Sim who ever talked back to the great ancestors kind of assertive. And that would have meant serious trouble.

Before I gave up on the idea of moving Kulo Seeri into an empty premade, I just had to see what their kids would have looked like. I rolled a d4 for the number of times I created offspring for them... here’s the result:

So, in this highly unlikely scenario, Vedrafe and Sophos would be parents of four - one daughter and three sons. (I forget what I named them.) I imagine that Sophos, who was not born and raised in traditionally-matriarchal Kulo Seeri, would spend most of his time with the boys - probably to prove some obscure point - while Vedrafe, equally stubbornly, would devote most of her attention to her daughter, the only heir to the zan-Ave name, just to annoy Sophos.

They’d keep going like that for as long as they could stand to - Sophos would not be allowed to instigate a divorce anyway, while Vedrafe could but it would mean admitting defeat as far as keeping her man in line went. (This is also the reason Kenda won’t divorce him... and the reason she was a rather unpopular headwoman.)

Eventually, things would come to a head - probably with Vedrafe accusing Sophos of tampering with her birth control. (A very likely possibility, and possibly achieved with the aid of Asken zan-Ace, who managed to do that with his wife... nothing else could reasonably explain Sophos knocking Vedrafe up at least three times, even with triple bolts.) He would face trial by something or other, and probably be punished somehow - I’m still working out the Nuidya justice system. However, Vedrafe would still refuse to divorce him, on the grounds that if she did, there’d be nothing to stop him getting together with someone else and starting the whole mess again. I imagine that she’d keep him on a tight leash from there on out.

[sarcasm] And, of course, they would live happily ever after. [/sarcasm]

I’m thanking you for the tag, Maisie... and the rest of Kulo Seeri is thanking the spirits that this never happened. :)