Worldember Pledge Frozen Secrets II

After a few months 'off' and after winning Human of the Match for SC Which is still insane to me I'm returning to a project from 2023 that I kind of put aside for 2024 WE to play with my bestiary and some other things more. However I have just acquired Foundry, and given I have a goal to be running a PF2e game (at least one) sometime in the new year, well I'd already sort of started building out a plan for one.

I think I've abandoned the 'adventure' path idea so much. It was a fun experiment however it isn't my style and besides I might very well be recruiting from the WA community for the game when it comes time, so I wouldn't want to spoil too much in regards to the campaign. So I think my intention will be to flesh out more of the region in general, the people, creatures, interesting locations, organizations with power and sway, all that fun stuff. A localized setting box for the region that I'm intending the game to at least start in.

The overhauled homework is very cool and I don't really know much of my plan yet. I have many accountability buddies, including my ferrets and my other half of course, however I need to see about linking up with someone in the community for that purpose I like the idea of a tandem accountability/accountabully system. Otherwise I am very excited to get back into this particular folder with more vigor and refamiliarize myself with the region and get a bit more in the weeds of the world of Valerick in at least one small area, especially now that a lot of the 'umbrella' that is the large scale stuff is done!

I had found a few accountability friends, and I thank all for their willingness. However I do feel the need to update my WE plans.....because my life outside here, and within my muse itself, as well as home support system has changed in ways that irrevokably alter both my mindset and my mental health and state of mind.

On November 15th.......after a week long battle, we lost one of our ferrets. Karma had to be let go. What should have been a simple stomach bug and ideally been fought off....the little guy simply lost too much weight too fast, and unlike his brother Kaos (who was a touch over 5 lbs, where as Karma was 3 lbs 5 ounces, both healthy weights for male neutered ferrets), Karma's body did not have the fat reserves to handle losing a shade over a pound in a week. Try as we might, desperately, we could not get him to eat. He had no blockage, no nothing, just a virus is the vet's best guess. But unfortunately because of just how fast his weight dropped, though we tried with emergency fluid feeding and specialized emergency recovery formulas, he wouldn't hold weight. The vet's best guess is a simple stomach bug weakened his immune system and an infection took root. He started to go into partial kidney failure likely the 13th, by the 14th the all too familiar smell (I volunteered at many critical care shelters in my youth) that warned me of kidney failure started.....we rushed him to the vet as the smell grew.

Karma was our spicy spaghetti noodle. He'd have fought a diety for the love of the game, and I would have bet on him every time. Even at the end, despite clearly actively starving to death, being actively dehydrated, he had not, as ferrets will do, given up. He did not hide, did not try to find somewhere no one would find him to die alone (they do this to try and basically hurt their bonded friends and family less). He was out and about constantly, trying to play, trying to explore, he never gave up trying to eat and drink despite it obviously hurting him. He even tried to play chase with me despite no longer really being able to run properly, tripping over his own feet (more than ferrets normally do). He was 2 lbs, 4 ounces as of the morning of the 15th and that's when we got confirmation.....one of his kidneys was failing. Ferrets have less than 10% odds of surviving kidney removal (they can live with one kidney) once north of 5 years old. Karma was 6.5 years old. We still would have bet on him, see my previous point about fighting a diety for the love of the game....but we simply could not find or put together any way or method to cover the 5 grand it would have cost for the hospitalization and surgery and aftercare.......

The vet did note the kidney wasn't yet dead so it was hypothetically still possible, though extremely unlikely, that he could pull out of this crisis spiral.......But I knew that smell too well. It broke our hearts, shattered us like glass, in no small part because he had not yet given up so it felt like we were betraying him on some level.......but we made the call, not wanting to put him through anymore suffering. Despite his efforts to hide his pain, it was clear how much it was hurting. It was clear barring basically a legitimate miracle, he was dying. So we let him go.....

Its been nearly a week and this is the first I've touched WA in that time. Its the first I've written. I have tried, but every time I sit down to write I burst into tears because I realize I won't get the wonderful foot wrestling interruptions from my little spicy spaghetti noodle after a few sentences anymore, as he would always do. He was a muse and a distraction, and more than that he was family, and losing him hurts more than I can describe.

Eventually I have to be okay. He'd be angry if I wasn't, all he ever wanted was everyone to be excited, playful and happy. But I don't know what that looks like, or exactly what the road to that state will entail. WE went from something I was excited for and planning to have a blast doing to something I genuinely just forgot existed. So I am allowing myself grace and adding the asterisk to this pledge of only if my heart can take it.

Faerrels to end off the update, and in loving memory of my spicy spaghetti, the species he helped inspire. An article that despite overhauling layouts and formats, I likely won't alter except to maybe add more pictures or bits of home video footage, as a sort of memorial to my sweet, and spicy little noodle felon.