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Finally we arrive at Nary's Palace in the top left corner of this little island. She is the ruler of Borei and a typical young royal brat. Her innocent appearance may fool you, but Nary is actually the mastermind behind the cult of villagers who would do anything for perfect peaches... even murder!!
This post will be very text and picture heavy! If I make any changes or improvements to the town and story I will edit this post with the latest version. To check out what it looks like during a rainbow, click here!
Background
Borei is the remnants of an ancient city that is now tucked away across the river and surrounded by thick natural forests, guarding it from the outside world. While the town looks like a peaceful community of birds, there is a more sinister story behind their rise to prosperity. Deep in the haunted woods lies a terrible secret of gluttony and obsession! Only a few unsuspecting visitors make it out of Borei alive. However, there is a trick to surviving in Borei. It is simply to blend in.
The name Borei comes from a Khmer word meaning "ancient civilisation", although nowadays it is more loosely used to describe an enclosed or gated community ("borey"). There are 3 sections to Borei: The Haunted Woods, The Blue Springs Forest, and the "borey" itself. It is predominately a bird-themed town with 3 human residents who are also seemingly birds, as well as a peaceful benevolent ghost! For the most part, I wanted to create a town that was a regular peaceful community where everyone can enjoy the lush forests and a cup of coffee at the local cafe. However, I also wanted to finally complete my dreams of making a horror themed town. I attempted this once before when I tried a 1-year town challenge that was horror themed, although I couldn't keep up with it or dedicate a whole game to being purely horror-based. So my compromise was to make a "regular town" but add an element of horror in it by dividing the town into sections. If the Haunted Woods is not visited, this town is basically your average happy village! But you can explore deeper into the woods if you want to uncover Borei's secret :-)
This dream was uploaded on the date 7/01/2019 at 4:40am. It's a bright and clear starry sky! I'm really happy with the way this turned out and I hope you enjoy your visit!
The Haunted Woods
When you first awake in Borei, the most immediate "road" leading towards anywhere is a small dirt path through the haunted woods (for lack of better name). This area is thick with cedar trees and wild black flowers. The plaza does have a road towards the back that lead to the "nicer" part of town, but this area is the first thing you see and may likely be the first area you are compelled to explore.
The winding path to the right and up leads to the campsite and the path leading down goes to a dilapidated house. It was important for me to have the campsite and plaza in the haunted woods because I wanted dream visitors to see this area first and I also wanted the campsite to tie into the mystery of what is found inside dilapidated house further down the road.
Here's my brave mayor of Tinytree on her way to find out what is down the road! The small dirt path that leads down has torches lighting the way. As you walk further down the forest is now speckled with dandelion puffs and even some booby traps.
Along the path is a single rotten peach. This is Borei's native fruit and rotten counterpart, however walking through the forest there doesn't seem to be a single perfect peach tree in sight. If you walk further down, you will fall victim to the first booby trap! A pitfall seed :'-) I actually had the intention of making this area far more "dangerous" to traverse through but I feel like falling into sneaky holes too often would get annoying (because it definitely was for me).
The end of the road is the shanty house that seems to be occupied by a grey haired ghost.
Venturing inside the house is no safe shelter. The first room you see looks to be the result of some kind of bloody ritual. There are shoes and humanly possessions on top of blood stained pillows, displayed proudly in front of photographs of villagers. At first, it could seem like some crazy bird killer has massacred the town, but in reality it's the humans that are in danger. The clothing items are the trophies of unsuspecting campers and visitors that visit this quiet town.
Although the story of this town can be interpreted in any way you want, my idea behind the town is that the villagers (and one resident in particular) have an unhealthy obsession with perfect peaches that drives them to cause harm to others. This room is meant to look like a graveyard of victims that met ill fates because of the cultish villagers and their obsession. They were lead to believe by Queen Nary that murdering the human visitors will reward them with what they want most: perfect peaches! They could also be blindly following Nary's orders in order to live in the town. So if Nary believes that visitors are a threat to taking the last tree's peaches and tells them to kill, they would do it! Maybe she convinced them to form a cult to offer victims to a Peach God. Whatever the reason is, the villagers seem to be blindly loyal to her. Later on as you get to the other side of town, the character Nary that you will meet will exhibit her obsession of peaches as well.
While the dilapidated house itself which is occupied by a ghost named Bora could lead people to believe that he is a deity that the villagers are offering sacrifices to in some kind of cultish behaviour, in reality he is actually meant to protect the forest from Nary and the villagers. His "greeting message" says "I must protect the tree" and his personal room downstairs has a different atmosphere of peace and life compared to the other rooms above. Bora is simply borrowing a room in the house while he watches over the woods! Bora's name meaning in Khmer means "ancient" which directly ties into Borei's name meaning "ancient civilisation" or used more loosely nowadays as "enclosed/gated community". He is an ancestor of the human residents in town during a time before the villagers turned evil. Now he's back to look over his hometown!
To view pictures of Bora's house click here!
Here is Bora wandering around outside with his mission on his mind!
At the very edge of the cliff stands Borei's last remaining perfect fruit tree! Whatever you do, don't shake it.
If you do plan on taking the perfect peaches that Bora is trying so hard to protect (he's trying his best ok ;_; ), you must suffer through a few more pitfalls and bare the burden of being responsible for Borei's perfect peach extinction.
If you backtrack to the plaza where you first started your journey, there is a section of overgrown forest that basically separates these two areas. When you first start at the plaza, the bushes blocking the way as well as the direction of the dirt path may lead you away from this section at first, but you could still creep through and make a short cut into the "Blue Springs Forest". Here you'll start to see the combinations of blue, pink, and purple flowers that are the colour theme of the rest of the town.
Here's Jules sitting on a stump by the stonehenge! I wanted this PWP to make it feel like it is a stone structure that was once part of the ancient Borei but remained standing in ruins. The town was eventually pushed out by the growing woods and all that is left are the remnants of the old town.
Blue Springs Forest
If you successfully make it through the haunted woods you will find yourself in the Blue Springs Forest! This is actually directly to the right side of the plaza (instead of going down) although it is initially blocked off by bushes and trees so it might not be your first thought to venture through it.
If you walk directly above the plaza towards the train station instead of the haunted woods, there is actually a very straight forward path that loops right around into the safe haven of the Blue Springs Forest!
From down from the train station (and seen in the first two pictures), this is the main path that leads you around the blue forest. As the name suggests, this area is primarily blue with hints of purple. It is lush with bamboo shoots, blue hydrangeas, and natural rock pools. It could be seen as what the "haunted woods" might have once looked like if it wasn't... haunted.
The next house you will come across is most likely Mayor Malis' little cabin. Malis is the khmer word for Jasmine. No real meaning behind her name, I just thought it sounds pretty and I was reminded of the jasmine trees near my house.
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| Log bench and rock pools by Malis' house |
Malis just wants to live and survive in the town she grew up in and loves. She knows of the horrors that goes on in the woods, but she also cares for her villagers and wants to protect them to an extent. Malis also takes on a "protector" type role like Bora. She warns visitors who stumble in without knowing and tells them how to survive or looks out for them so she can help them escape unharmed. She has a responsibility to her people but also needs to protect outsiders from them.
To view pictures of Malis' house, click here!
Here's a back view of Malis' house and her cryptic advice for dream visitors! "The beak is our disguise" is basically the way the residents in Borei survive: the villagers are too stupid to know that they are humans if they are wearing a beak... so they wont be attacked! The beak is pretty much my favourite accessory so even from the beginning I was totally ready to make a story town solely based on this item! :'-D One of the reasons why I wanted Bora to be the only human resident without a beak is to show the difference between the danger that follows humans over the animal/bird residents.
Here's a close up of the water pump and a dirt path that leads to one of the main stone tiled paths that takes you to the "borey" as well. The path leads you to an area has a similar look to what I described with the stone henge pwp. Although the blue forest is primarily "forest" there are areas where it looks like the remnants of civilised bustling town.
One of the main reasons I designed my town like this was actually because of the way I play ACNL. I love doing trades and having visitors over for quick visits/signatures, so I needed a path way that was easily accessible for "trader needs" and not have them navigate through thick forests where my flowers are planted randomly. The path seen above goes directly from my train station to Retail. It then leads you down to the campgrounds and finally towards the "borey". Actually, people who I WiFi with will probably never even see the haunted forest because there is no direct path to there unless we are hanging out at the plaza.
Here's a few pictures of the area near Retail that has some park-like PWPs to go with my ancient/ruins town look. The park has some of my floor patterns creeping in but for the most part it is overgrown with flowers.
This is the first villager house you may come across in the blue forest! This is Blanche's house that is in front of the little park area.
There are many natural-type PWPs in this area as well to give it that foresty springs look.
The next area, as seen from the preview image of this post, is the "abandoned plaza" area. You can enter this area by following the dirt path or by taking the "Retail route" along the edge of the map. The abrupt cut off from the forest is another hint that this was once a larger civilisation but was overtaken by forest and nature. This plaza area is also the entrance way into the actual villager community. Blanche is the only villager who lives in the "forest".
Below is Sann hanging out by the statue fountain! I was considering trying to squeeze the regular "fountain" PWP in this area as well but I found it harder to work with the 3x3 size because most of my pathways are 2squares. This one also looked more worn out by weather and age.
Sann's house is directly to the back. The path that leads to the right goes right up to the campgrounds!
Here's a better view of Sann's house! Sann's house is the only "facility" building in Borei. He is the owner of the town's cafe, salon, bird spa, fruit market, and egg day care centre! As mentioned before, rather than making a full blown horror town I did want have the semblance of a normal peaceful community as well. There is nothing really "horror" themed about this house (Malis' house as well) although Sann's greeting does reveal more about the town's secret. Another hint is that Sann's fruit market holds almost all types of fruit except Perfect Peaches, implying that he does not participate in the rituals like the others.
Here's Sann's cryptic warning as well as a glimpse of the cafe room.
Now we move into the "borey" section of the town! If you take the road down from the statue fountain plaza, we start to enter the area where the majority of villagers live in their enclosed community. There are 3 villagers who technically still live in the Blue Springs Forest and they are Wade, Ken, and Butch. I was luckily able to plot all their houses next to each other and they look so good with similar exterior styles!
Borey
There are 3 bridges that connect to the borey or "villager cluster" part of town. One is to the left of Wade's house, another right below Wade/Ken/Butch's house, and the last one to the left by Mallory's house. Here are Bea, Mallory, and Phoebe's houses in the right corner of this little island and next to the town hall! There are no bridges connecting this villager area to the haunted woods. The closest way to reach the woods would be to cut across the forest from Malis' side of the forest. Because of this, I rarely ever see any villagers going into the haunted woods unless they somehow ended up near the plaza because of a hide and seek game or a plaza event.
Here's Mallory's house that leads right up back into the Blue Springs Forest and Malis' house. I've debated whether I should remove this bridge to make the borey even less accessible but I haven't thought of what I wanted to put there in its place, plus the bridge lines up so perfectly.
If you take the bridge down from Wade's house it connects straight to Sparro and Piper's house, the police station, and the cafe. Like Wade/Ken/Butch, I tried to purposely plot Sparro and Piper near each other and next to the police station because their boxy exteriors worked well together. You'll also notice that this section of town is now pink/purple with pink hydrangeas to separate it from the look of the blue forest.
Next to the police station and in front of the waterfall is a log bench seating area! The cliffside where you can jump off is here too. I've placed a wetsuit by the cliff so visitors can use them if they want.
A 2square pathway loops around the boxy houses. Here's Piper's house with a view of the bridge and Wade's house in the background! I wish Mallary was also in this area (perhaps even replacing the police station) but she was already settled in town long before I moved Piper in to complete this cluster.
The cafe is next to Sparro's house and overlooking part of the beach.
Keeping with the Zen/Asian style houses of my characters, the town's PWPs and decorations also have a zen theme. In this one pathway next to the cafe you can see three of them together: the zen garden, zen bell, and zen clock (and a water pump).
Here's a view of the town hall with Mallary lurking in a rose :'-D I got extremely lucky when I did my initial map search for this town because of the location the town hall was placed. It's right in the centre of the plot of land surrounded by river. In fact, I got the idea for Borei when I first saw this map option because I imagined that a "villager cluster" around the town hall in its own designated island would be an easy way to plan out my villager plots while also having a lot of open space elsewhere.
Here's a park bench near the town hall and in front of Avery's house. The park bench is the only exception to not using the zen type PWPs. I thought it worked even with clashing themes because of my use of topiaries here and there. There's also a tulip topiary directly behind this spot.
To the left of the town hall is Avery's house and Nary's Palace in the back left corner. His house kind of looks like he's a royal guard for Nary's Palace.
There's also another pathway towards Nary's house that's not on the main road. There's a small dirt path to the left of Phoebe's house that has a beautiful view of the giant lake. From a certain angle you can see the stonehenge as well. This is a simple area in town but it's also one of my favourites, especially during special sky conditions.
Finally we arrive at Nary's Palace in the top left corner of this little island. She is the ruler of Borei and a typical young royal brat. Her innocent appearance may fool you, but Nary is actually the mastermind behind the cult of villagers who would do anything for perfect peaches... even murder!!
Unlike the other residents and their greetings, Nary's greeting has a different more evil tone. While Bora wants to protect the last tree, Nary wants to cut it down and take the peaches for herself. Even in a town that is supposed to be known for their native perfect peaches, there isn't a single house that has any baskets of peaches despite all the trees withered away from over-harvesting. That's because all the peaches are kept locked away in Nary's house where she hoards them for herself.
Nary's secret library in the basement truly gives away her evil personality. If the peach hoarding isn't enough, Nary had kept a secret pet project in her downstairs library. She had captured the poor Peaches (the horse) and kept her hostage just for fun. Nary knows very well that no amount of death will bring back the perfect peach trees. This is just something to keep her villagers busy and loyal to her. Her ultimate goal was to chop the last tree down herself! There's a golden axe on the table for the golden tree!
The picture of Peaches in her room could also imply that Bora's upstairs picture room with my past villagers were actually Nary's doing and not the villagers. Now that I think about it, I wish I could have put an item belonging to Nary's in that upstairs room to make that tiny connection! Perhaps in the next update :'-D
So that's the end of the tour! Please do visit the DA yourself if you can. I had a lot of fun coming up with a backstory and "lore" for this town. It's something I've never done before in past towns and I'm really proud of the result! Most of the "story" for this town kind of developed naturally. For example, the idea of Peaches being a hostage was because I actually had Peaches in my town at one point because of a void move in and I suffered so much trying to get her out. I then decided that I wanted to remember those past villagers in some way, so I gave them a room in the haunted house. The whole residents wearing beaks thing was also not planned. I just really liked the item and found a way to incorporate it into the story.
There are a few spots I didn't cover in this tour, mainly the beaches, although I have posted a few other WiFi adventures covering these areas in past blog posts. If you can look in some villager houses, some of them also have skeletons hanging out with them. I know a lot of the references might not be exactly obvious to my real vision, but I hope that visitors can interpret it in their own way and have fun regardless! Thank you for visiting Borei!
There are a few spots I didn't cover in this tour, mainly the beaches, although I have posted a few other WiFi adventures covering these areas in past blog posts. If you can look in some villager houses, some of them also have skeletons hanging out with them. I know a lot of the references might not be exactly obvious to my real vision, but I hope that visitors can interpret it in their own way and have fun regardless! Thank you for visiting Borei!
