Chapter 2: Corran, the stilled town

The town line

• Where: Corran (corran), the south gate (Spawn_south, Event_town_line).
• When: act3.stage = 3. Sets act3.stage to 4.
• Who: Aske.
• What happens: (Idea) Corran is clear glass to the grass line: houses, a market cart, a man leading a goat, two children running, all mid-step and clear as window glass. Nothing moves and nothing makes a sound. Behind the town the warp stands in the air, much larger than the Sallow warp, and it is quiet in a way the Sallow warp was not. Aske stops at the line where the grass turns to glass and does not cross it. The player goes on alone; she follows a minute later.
• Player does: move; talk.
• Content to make: Yarn: Act3_Corran_Line. Flags: act3.stage = 4. Location trigger on Event_town_line.
• Art and audio: (Idea) Corran (concepts: Art/Concepts/world/corran-a.png, corran-girl-a.png, corran-overworld-a.png; Art/Concepts/buildings/corran-street-a.png). The glass is a shader over ordinary Facet-town models (dark slate, shard windows), so the town can be un-glassed in chapter 5. Audio: every ambient sound cut at the town line; one sustained high note from the warp. The silence is the music.
• Screens used: dialogue panel, overworld HUD.

The Stilled

• Where: Corran's streets: the gate, the market lane and the square (Event_stilled_goat, Event_stilled_basket, Event_stilled_children, Event_stilled_cart, Event_stilled_teacher_door).
• When: act3.stage = 4. Optional; each look sets one flag.
• Who: the Stilled of Corran (about 200 glass figures, a dozen of them interactable).
• What happens: (Idea) Each interactable figure has a "Look" that gives one line about them from what can be seen: a man halfway through a word, a woman whose basket has eggs still falling out of it, two children racing, one a step ahead. The player can read the Facet sigils painted on their doors and sleeves; each figure's sigil is on a house nearby, so the player can work out who lives where. Every figure looked at becomes a side quest once Corran wakes (section 15).
• Player does: move; look.
• Content to make: Yarn: Act3_Stilled_<Name> per interactable figure (12 nodes). Flags: corran.looked.<name> per figure. Names: section 13.
• Art and audio: (Idea) A small kit of glass townsfolk poses (walking, carrying, running, talking) built from two or three Facet-villager models with the glass shader; painted sigils on doors that match sleeves.
• Screens used: overworld HUD (look prompt), dialogue panel.

The glass remembers: Aske's story

• Where: three places in Corran: the south gate (Event_reflection_gate), the square (Event_reflection_square), the well (Event_reflection_well).

• When: act3.stage = 4. All three seen sets act3.stage to 5. The well reflection can only be seen last.

• Who: Aske; in the reflections, Ondine Ash and four menders, Aske twenty years younger, the girl at the well.

• What happens: (Idea) The glass of Corran is still Glass: it holds the reflection of the moment it closed. Where the player's shadow falls across a glass figure, the reflection inside it plays that moment back for a few seconds. This is the reflected kind of glyph lore (Story Bible section 3) turned into storytelling. The player sees Aske's story in three pieces, and Aske, standing behind the player, has to watch them too.

  1. The gate: five Warden menders arriving at a run, Ondine at their head. Ondine's order, without sound; Aske lip-reads it aloud: "Seal it. Town and all."
  2. The square: the five in a ring around the well. The young Aske argues with Ondine, is overruled, and lifts her hands. The player sees her cast her part.
  3. The well: a Corran girl running to the menders' ring and pressing a shard into the young Aske's hand as the glass closes over her.

  After each one Aske says a little. After the third she says all of it, in the fewest words she can.

• Player does: move; look; talk.

• Content to make:

  • Yarn: Act3_Reflection_Gate, Act3_Reflection_Square, Act3_Reflection_Well, Act3_Aske_Tells.
  • Cutscenes: three short reflection playbacks (reflection_gate, reflection_square, reflection_well), each 5–8 seconds, played inside the glass figure.
  • Flags: corran.reflection.gate, corran.reflection.square, corran.reflection.well; act3.stage = 5.
  • Optional (spell roadmap): Recall, a reflected glyph that shows in Corran's clear glass only at dawn (spell.learned.recall).

• Art and audio: (Idea) Reflection playback VFX: the figure's glass clouds, then shows a moving image like a reflection in a window at night, desaturated with a pale blue cast. Young Aske (her model with darker hair, Warden coat with bands worn right way out) and four generic Warden menders (Art/Concepts/creatures-items/enemies/warden-menders-a.png). Ondine Ash model. Music: Aske's theme, broken into fragments.

• Screens used: dialogue panel, cutscene (letterbox).

(Idea) Lines to keep:

Aske (after the gate): That's Ondine. She was my commander then.

Aske (after the square): I said it would hold the town with the warp. She said that was the point. Then I cast.

Aske (after the well, all of it): Five of us. Mirrored seal. It held the warp. It held everyone in it. Two hundred people. Twenty years. I keep the ferry because it's the nearest crossing. That's the whole story. Don't make it a better one.

The girl at the well

• Where: Corran square, the well (Event_well).
• When: act3.stage = 5. Sets act3.stage to 6 and item.corran_half_hourglass to 1.
• Who: Aske; the stilled girl.
• What happens: The girl who gave Aske the shard still stands in the glass beside the well, one hand held out (concept: Art/Concepts/characters/stilled-girl-concept-a.png). (Idea) Aske has never learned her name. She takes the shard out of her coat, where it has been for twenty years, and gives it to the player. The player's Act 2 half pulses when the two are close: the wave shard from the Shardfield is the other half. Aske knows what a split glyph is, and knows that tracing it here, next to a live warp, could break the glass instead of thawing it. Nobody living knows how a five-person Warden seal ties a town to a warp. The Keepers might: they keep the record of every seal.
• Player does: talk; look at the two halves (the item screen shows both).
• Content to make:
  • Yarn: Act3_Well_Girl, Act3_Well_Halves.
  • Items: corran_half_hourglass (Aske's shard). It joins corran_half_wave from Act 2.
  • Flags: act3.stage = 6, item.corran_half_hourglass = 1.
• Art and audio: (Idea) The stilled girl as a single glass statue (no rig; concept above); the stilled well prop (Art/Concepts/world/prop-corran-well-a.png, Art/Concepts/buildings/corran-well-ref-a.png); both shard items as inventory icons; a resonance VFX between the two halves (a thin amber thread of light). Music: a solo instrument, very quiet: the girl's motif, which plays in full in chapter 5.
• Screens used: dialogue panel, items (inventory).

The Girdle house (optional)

• Where: Corran, the glyph teacher's house on the market lane (Event_teacher_door, interior Event_teacher_slate, Event_teacher_shelf).
• When: act3.stage ≥ 5.
• Who: (Idea) the stilled Hollis, the girl's mother, a glyph teacher, mid-lesson with three stilled pupils.
• What happens: (Idea) The door carries the sigil of a cut called the Girdle, named for the edge where a gem's top and bottom halves meet. Hollis's slate shows both halves of the Corran glyph chalked side by side: an hourglass and a wave. This confirms what the player and Aske guessed, and gives the glyph its proper name, Pavilion Wake. On a shelf is a box of practice shards, among them the square half of Prism Snare.
• Player does: move; look; learn (the Prism Snare square half is a fragment; the spell needs both halves, see 3.4).
• Content to make: Yarn: Act3_Teacher_Door, Act3_Teacher_Slate, Act3_Teacher_Shelf. Items: prism_snare_half_square. Flags: corran.slate_seen, item.prism_snare_half_square.
• Art and audio: (Idea) A Facet teacher's room (asymmetric, chalk slates, a shard rack); Hollis and pupils as glass statues; the chalked slate as a readable close-up prop.
• Screens used: dialogue panel, items.

The colossus at the warp

• Where: Corran, the north edge facing the warp (Event_warp_edge).
• When: act3.stage = 6. Sets corran.colossus_seen.
• Who: Aske; the glint colossus (not fought yet).
• What happens: (Idea) At the warp's foot hundreds of glints have fused into one shape, a giant of quicksilver and cracked mirror plate, sitting with its back to the town like something keeping warm. It is why the warp has not spread into Corran: it is drinking the warp's leak. It is also the reason no one can reach the warp. Aske says the Hour Stair is a week's walk east. The player can't fight the colossus yet; walking closer makes it turn its head, and Aske pulls the player back.
• Player does: move; talk.
• Content to make: Yarn: Act3_Warp_Colossus. Flags: corran.colossus_seen. A blocking trigger at Event_warp_edge until act3.stage ≥ 10.
• Art and audio: (Idea) Glint colossus in overworld scale (concept: Art/Concepts/creatures-items/enemies/glint-colossus-a.png, model ref glint-colossus-ref-a.png), with an idle "drinking" animation; the warp (concept: Art/Concepts/world/arena-corran-warp-a.png).
• Screens used: dialogue panel.

From Walkthrough: Act 3 › Chapter 2: Corran, the stilled town