avalaughs | TEST DRIVE MEME ⚔️️ I

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TEST DRIVE MEME ⚔️️ I

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A ⦿ Soaking in Your Arrival

KERPLUNK, SPLASH!

Regardless of what you were in the middle of, you and your familiar have been magically pulled into the world of Avalon just above the Bay's waters. After a brief plunge into the Bay, the rush of water filling your ears and soaking up into every creak and crevice of your body, you may need to cough to clear your airways when you rise above the surface. You'll definitely see other new arrivals plopping in. If you can't swim, a red-headed woman known only as the Lady of the Lake will drag you to the shore if she doesn't spot someone else near you helping so no one ends up drowning. She's a little busy casting directive magic to make sure everyone lands safely and playing lifeguard, so if anyone attempts to talk to her, she'll tell them to head up to the Rent-a-Ride. The shores themselves are littered with new arrivals complaining their way up a staircase carved into the walls of the White Cliffs. There is no railing, so be careful, but if you do fall, be prepared for a mysterious sand hand to reach out of the side of the cliffs to catch you. The hand will pat you atop the head twice before retreating back into the wall. This is the Cliff Beast; despite the name, he is quite friendly.

B ⦿ The Caravan to Camelot

Once everyone is wrangled up to the top of the White Cliffs, the handsome owner of the Rent-a-Ride, Archimedes, will distribute smart phones and a pair of earbuds to everyone before getting them settled in groups into modernized carriages pulled by horses and give them a basic explanation of why and how they've been brought to Avalon: The universe is frozen in time and your character has been brought here by a familiar that was able to bond with them. They'll have to learn magic to help save their own world from destruction, but first they've got to get them to Camelot. It is here that you have the first opportunity to decide who they will be in their new home. You'll have about an hour to wander around here, meet and greet, and pet the horses before it's time to go.

These carriages use fae technology that combats weight, so your character will be able to get in regardless of whether they're light as a feather or weigh two tons. The carts have air conditioning when it's hot, heating when it's cold, and a mystical shield to protect from bugs. There is also a mini-bar that pops out of the console with nip bottles. Characters can use their smartphones to connect to Camelot's internet service,

avalononline (AOL), to chat with other characters, watch dumb videos, learn about the world, contact Camelot Support (they'll answer any questions they can for you, from how to use a smart phone to where to find quests and resources to learn more about your magic). Be careful if you decide to use your phones while in the caravan-- if you don't use those earbuds and start forcing everyone to listen to your nonsense, Archimedes may make you walk.

C ⦿ The Red Spring

The journey from the White Cliffs to the City of Camelot is a long one, and the first evening you arrive you'll end up spending at the Red Spring, a booming resort town. Because of the volume of new arrivals and vacationers, inn rooms are assigned two-to-a-room. The rooms have two twin beds, a bathroom, a mini-fridge and microwave, and a TV equipped with a couple of entertaining video games and a few free movies.

If you don't want to relax in the room, try taking a dip in the spring for another chance to meet your fellow travelers. The waters have restorative properties that help horses and travelers recover quickly when drunk. It is known to relieve stress, improve energy levels, and mildly accelerate healing.

The springs are also home to a large training grounds just outside town limits, where there are teachers who will teach basic magic safety and help you discover what kind of magic you have together with other new arrivals. Try target practice, obstacle courses, meditation circles, and other ways to try to figure out just what you can do.. if you didn't already have an accidental discovery on the ride there.

A ⦿ Get Fresh

Upon arrival in Camelot travelers are ushered to a large set of wash rooms where they can clean up and make themselves presentable for the Welcome Feast. They are informed that once the feast concludes there will be an announcement on where they can seek lodging and how to begin their magic studies.

B ⦿ Be Merry

After they freshen up, travelers are led into the main dining hall. The decorations range from simplistic to a little more grandiose, it is likely everyone will find something familiar. A modern mash up with a medieval flair. The jester makes his rounds, perhaps he has a joke or two to tell, go ahead, give him a listen or perhaps volunteer to participate in one of the jester's shows, like knife-throwing or hypnotism. Within the crowd of staff there are mummers, a juggler, here and there dabbled through small troupes perform mini skits, perhaps they’ll perform a well known verse from a traveler’s world or tell a tale of fancy from this realm.

C ⦿ Eat Well

A banquet is prepared with food that while all “rustic” in appearance are usually a version of modern dishes ranging from basic roast chicken and veggies to Korean-Mexican fusion and French patisserie. The drinks are much the same; while served in old fashioned goblets, they are drinks modern travelers will be familiar with.

Have a seat, meet a new neighbor, find a roommate, maybe a new or old friend? Talk to the person to your left, your right, across from you. Mingle, enjoy the food, the music, it shouldn’t be long before the information promised is provided. Till then take your fill and get to know your fellow travelers.

You've been here a few days now and have gotten a chance to settle in, find a place to stay, and Camelot's citizens have decided that you've been here long enough to start living your life again. Well, your new life.

A group of citizens have decided to give everyone their first quest.

"Hear ye, hear ye!" a man in chain mail with a tablet with his statement typed up on it declares to a crowd from atop a pedestal. There are two other citizens around him with phones to post the video to AOL later to make sure the word gets heard ye all around.

"Those with magic, we beseech thee! Findeth us a grail most holy hidden in the depths of the Brocéliande! This holy grail is known to grant thine wishes three, a most noble quest for noble souls! Great reward will come to those who find it and proclaim at least one of their wishes to find the great Excalibur for King Arthur!"

This is the first you've heard about King Arthur, and it seems curious that he hasn't yet shown his face around town. It also seems strange that this guy is speaking like he's stepped out of a bad period piece, and probably should be the clue that this is more or less an attempt to haze some of the newcomers by sending them into the forest... but no one is telling newcomers this. It's better to get them out there and start praciticing, after all.

A ⦿ Lost, and Lost, and Lost Again

The Brocéliande is well-known around Camelot for being a forest that's both bountiful and mysterious. Oddities are known to happen that may never happen again to the point that even if something weird happens and you can't prove it, most citizens will assume you're telling the truth.

Which is what makes it peculiar when you keep passing the exact same locations over and over again, as if you've been traveling in circles or reaching the end of the map in a video game and coming out the other end. You're stuck in a space loop. The only way out is to successfully find the one difference in each loop five times in a row and collect it. Maybe it's a strange frog, a crystal that wasn't there before, a small wooden step that doesn't lead anywhere, or some other singular item, you've got to find what stands out... pick the wrong item, and you'll have to start your five count over again, and again, and again...

B ⦿ Grail, and Grail, and Grail Again!?

If you either missed the space loop or managed to get out of it, eventually you'll come to find one of... quite a few copies of a grail with holes in the side placed throughout the forest. They look like they might be good for draining noodles, but that's about it. Though they're spread out, it's entirely possible you'll find more than one, but each of them are placed in situations where it's impossible to get to by normal means. You'll have to use magic! It may be hidden in a bird's nest at the top of the tallest tree, inside of a hole in a rock with bars that prevent you from reaching in (perhaps an animal friend could reach it), inside a boiling pond, or inside the body of a bear fir... there are a load of possibilities, and now's a chance for you to try out your brand new magics! Use one of those samples, find something from the bestiary, or come up with your own adventure to get your hands on that less-than-holy grail.

C ⦿ A Quest Completeish

Or it would be, if you could ever find the guy who announced it... The AOL posts have since been deleted. You may end up spending a lot of time trying to find the guy. At this point, citizens will start telling you that you shouldn't take quests unless they're on the quest board or else you're going to get scammed... that's definitely an olden times themed noodle strainer. If that doesn't make you give up, or perhaps motivates you to find the guy to kick his ass, you'll have to head out to the farmland and chase them through a cornfield. (Be careful not to get lost, it's a maize in there.) If one of the boys are caught, they'll explain they were just testing you-- and hey, you got a free addition to your kitchen! If pressed, they'll apologize and give you a bit of money for your trouble. It's not much, but it'll get you at least a meal.

MOD NOTES:
• All test drive prompts are open to anyone in the game at any time to create your own logs with, but this post should have top-levels by potential new characters only. Current characters may reply to any threads, but should not top-level comment on this post. This is the first one, ignore this note today!
• If your application is accepted, you may accept TDM threads as game canon as long as both players consent. Characters may begin threading as soon as their journal is accepted to the communities.
• For the first month only, there will not be a quest board. Starting in December, quests will be posted on the 1st of each month for current players. After that point, quests may be used as TDM prompts in addition to the presented TDM prompts. A link will be provided as a bonus prompt option at the end of the post.
• The first "Arrival" prompts are present on every TDM. All other prompts will change monthly.
• Questions about this TDM's content? Comment here! If you have a question about the game at-large, please head over to the FAQ.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Soaking in your arrival

"Oi! Bastard, just who do you think you're flingin' around in the water." Yeah, he's turning around and yelling at the water once he lands on the beach. The small collection of skulls that land next to him clacks around until they form into what do you know a skull shape, a deep blue light emitting from a pair of eyes as it seems to speak to him. A mekurabe as his familiar, something seems appropriate in that.

Your loud.

"And you're a pile of talking Skulls trying to be my sidekick, what about it? Huh?"

He needs a smoke, Samatoki goes to his pockets, and two things hit him as he pulls out a soaking wet pack of cigarettes. His cigarettes are wet, and his mic is gone. This is the moment he goes down nose to nose, well as nose to nose as one can with a pile of skulls and glares into a set of glowing blue eyes.

"You got magic fucker, then fix this shit!" He dangles the smokes in front of the familiar's face. The familiar does what it does and is fabled to do, stares at the yakuza. Excuse these two as they sit at the shoreline, having a silent staring contest with a pack of wet cigarettes dangling between them.

The Red Spring:

Okay, one way or another, he got his smoke situation taken care of; his familiar, however, has long stayed silent on him. Clearly, they will have some minor relationship issues to work out. Either way, the smaller skulls, forming a bigger skull, do at least seem content to stay beside the Yakuza.

He seems content to lean there on the front of the inn and blow smoke up into the sky. This is probably his third cigarette since they got out of the caravan. That was not a pleasant ride, and he is definitely not a favorite of the man who guided them here.

What does he care, from a world where words were weapons to this place that wants to make him into some fucking wizard. Sorry, that plot does not work for him, and ash drops lazily from the smoke between his lips, landing on his boot-top. He finally looks at the familiar.

"You gonna give me the damn silent treatment all day, bastard?"

Banquet:

Yeah, check, please! He is done already; it's like walking into a weird-ass convention with people in costumes. He checks out the food but does not partake, caution guiding him. At this point, he'd rather eat something Riou cooked, and that is saying something. But, if there is one thing Samatoki has in spades, it's trust issues.

The mekurabe moves into his field of vision; he has not bothered naming it; what the hell do you call a pile of skulls making a bigger skull, huh?

You should eat.

"What are you, my wife?" Thankfully this staring contest is brief, his familiar's response, brief but effective. Because right then, a roll flies from the table and into Samatoki's mouth.

The yakuza's red eyes fly wide; he attempts to spit the bread out but can't. Somehow those glowing blue eyes seem satisfied with themselves. Rude ass bastard! Only one way out of this, obviously, eat the damn roll.

Samatoki, instead, is pulling at it, trying to dislodge and otherwise rid himself of it while he mumbles curses and threats around it at the smug familiar just staring at him.

"If you keep talking to him like that, he should be."

Xayah usually keeps her thoughts to herself, but she doesn't appreciate other creatures being hassled. Especially by humans; they take them for granted. She's a lot shorter than the guy when she steps out of the Inn, cowl pulled over her head and purple and red hair, hiding her familiar that's peeking from underneath it.

Her bird-like yellow eyes fall onto the cigarette and she has to hold back the urge to grab it. She doesn't know what the thing he's smoking is or whether it's bad or good for him, she doesn't care, but it smells SO bad and it's ruining the precious air.

Edited 2020-11-03 12:16 (UTC)

"Eh? What's it to you?"

He pulls up, standing straight as a tendril of smoke filters up above his head. Samatoki does not mean to hassle the mekurabe, though can a collection of smaller skulls making a bigger skull be called a creature? He's pretty sure the fact they are skulls alone makes them dead. But, at least they are skulls and not some furry something or other.

The last of his smoke burns away, and while he may be rough, rude, and most of the time, not a nice guy, Samatoki does have some respect, and so he smashes it between his fingers to be sure there are no hots and shoves it in his pocket.

He'll toss it in the garbage later. For now, he is just watching her with a cautious red gaze. The fact that she is covering her head raises his hackles. Not the most trusting of a guy under good circumstances, these are hardly good. Oddly, his familiar seems to do the same thing he is doing, stare at the woman, except the one set of eyes glowing from it seem to be blue.

Even if they did disallow animals at the banquet, Kuroko probably would've found a way to include Nigou anyway. But he was a polite puppy, and didn't go running off for random scraps of food, instead sitting on top of his head like a hat.

Amon, the shadowy demonic hellhound with multiple glowing blue eyes trailed behind him silently, many of the partygoers giving the spectral dog a wide berth, not realizing Kuroko even existed.

Still, he saw a man in distress over by the tables, and he was causing a scene. "Excuse me. Are you choking?"

The collection of skulls in front of Samatoki turns, one pair of glowing blue eyes fixing on the young man as it stares. Right then, Samatoki gets mad enough he bites a chunk out of the roll, and it dislodges; he grabs it in his hand and glares at his familiar. "Bastard, I should throw this at your head. Heads...Tch."

Then he cuts Kuroko with a sharp glare from red eyes.

"If I was fuckin' choking, how was I supposed to answer you dipshit?"

Really, clearly, the yakuza is. not phased by the demonic hellhound. Or if he has any reaction to it, no one but Samatoki will know about it because he'll internalize it.

"That's why I was asking," Kuroko said, not really moving because of the puppy on his head. Nigou barked once in agreement, though he seemed to become restless.
"Oh, it looks like Nigou wants to say hello." The little dog was set on the ground where he scampered over to Samatoki's leg and put up his paws politely, tail wagging. "I am however glad you are okay."

Amon was more interested in the roll in Samatoki's hand, even sniffing at it with his flaming snout. He really wanted the roll.

"Y'know kid, someone is chokin' can't talk." Is this not computing, even Samatoki with his one brain cell knows that. His own familiar does little more than stare at Kuroko.

All the damn thing does is stare and apparently try to choke him with bread.

"Tch.." He scoffs, but he also goes into a squat and gives the dog a scratch on his ears, nothing too enthusiastic and he holds the position because it's a normal and comfortable one for him, nose to nose now even with the hellhound he just gives the creature his roll, not like he wanted it anyway.

"The hell kind of name is Nigou?"

"If you hadn't responded, I would've promptly assisted you," Kuroko said like his logic was the most normal thing in the world to follow. It made sense to him, really. He didn't want to hurt a person that wasn't actually choking.

Nigou just barked happily and licked his hand, though refraining from the outgoing theatrics most dogs tended to. Amon on the other hand, almost delicately took the bun out of Samatoki's hand, all of his 6 eyes blinking before absolutely devouring it. "My team named him. His full name is Tetsuya #2, because he apparently looks like me."

Indeed, their big blue eyes shared a striking similarity if Samatoki bothered to look closely enough. "He says you're very nice."

"I could be dead by then dipshit." This guy's logic is flawed or Samatoki is just not in the mood to participate in this plot. Both are totally viable possibilities.

That the dog did not get jumpy is a plus point, when it licks his hand the yakuza pulls it back and fixes him with a stare from those red eyes. "None of that shit." He is not a bone, go chew on his familiar, it's nothing but bone. Only, no don't really chew on it little pup. The yakuza looks between the boy and the dog, then lets out a sharp bark of laughter "Ain't that some shit."

"He's full of shit and so are you." He is not nice, okay maybe sometimes he is, but he absolutely is not right now.

Spending all his time around people like the Generation of Miracles let Kuroko not so much as blink as Samatoki was a rude asshole towards him. Nigou whined sadly, putting his little paws up on the man's leg again.

"Well, you greeted Nigou properly for one. I also trust his opinion." He knew what tsunderes were like, though Midorima was decidedly less violent about it. Now Amon was looking for more snacks, and he was looking for them in Samatoki's hands. Kuroko grabbed up the pup, however, before the man decided differently and kicked the poor animal away. Some people just didn't like dog slobber, he guessed.

Samatoki is now just watching the young man, the mekurabe not needed for magical assistance it would seem decides to fade from view, off to live it's life till Samatoki calls for it again or it decides to harass him because it can.

"He's a damn puppy, I gave him some attention, for all ya know I could be usin' the dog to make ya relax. Don't be so damn naive brat." The thing is, the kid isn't really a brat, he has been completely polite, Samatoki is just not entirely sure what to say or do here. He doesn't exactly make it a habit of chatting up random strangers.

"You wouldn't tell me that if you were really trying to catch me off guard, though," Kuroko pointed out. This guy was probably just trying to save face or something, but he was really cute petting his dog. "Ah, I forgot to introduce myself. My name is Kuroko Tetsuya, and this is Nigou. My familiar is Amon, and I'm afraid he's trying to steal any food you have left."

"Never know, could just be trickin' ya, point is, you can't believe everythin' some stranger tells ya, kid." Who knows with Samatoki at this point. What he does know is he wants a cigarette.

"Samatoki Aohitsugi and he's shit out of luck, I didn't take anythin' but the damn roll that rickety pile of bones tried to choke me with." The man reaches in his pocket, pulling out the pack of smokes and making a glance toward the door, looks like he intends to just walk away and head outside without much more to be said less the kid has something to say.

Samatoki Aohitsugi | Hypnosis Mic

red spring

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Banquet

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Arrival

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Soaking in your arrival

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