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avalaughs2021-02-28 11:49 pm
avalonmods) wrote in avalaughs2021-02-28 11:49 pm
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TEST DRIVE MEME ⚔️️ 5
 Premise ⚔️️ Rules ⚔️️ FAQ ⚔️️ Taken ⚔️️ Reserves ⚔️️ Apply ⚔️️ Locations ⚔️️ Bestiary ⚔️️ Top-Levels Only ⚔️️  A ⦿ Soaking in Your Arrival
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 slightly chilled 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. It's still chilly, but not enough that you can't manage on your own. The Lady of the Lake is swimming around under the water, but seems to be focusing on coordinating a band of chia manatees to help rescue any wayward new arrivals. Chia manatees are a special Avalonian manatee that is green in color and has what appears to be a patches of grass or other short plantlife growing on its back. While some are fully green, others sport small flower blossoms that haven't yet grown in or various types of mushrooms. If anyone tries to ask the Lady of the Lake for directions, she will direct you to Archimedes at the Rent-a-Ride. Those with animal magic may get their info from the manatees, though may notice that they're really overly friendly and have zero concept of personal boundaries. Everyone may notice they have no concept of personal space, as they will happily run right into someone's belly for a snoot squishing. 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. *Reminder: Your character's familiar may or may not be with your character in their initial plunge. If the familiar isn't partial to water, it may meet your character on the beach or sit atop their head while they swim. Or if they are, they might splash about and swim alongside your character. Familiars have different personalities and body specs and we leave those up to the players. B ⦿ The Caravan to Camelot
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
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. It may be a little chilly when you get out though, so make sure you don't slip rushing back indoors when you get out! 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.  The Isle of Avalon is abuzz with excitement for the upcoming Spring Equinox (though some of the more posh citizens will insist it's the Vernal Equinox, tut tut). Unlike the very specific rituals of the Winter Solstice that require much preparation, the Spring is welcomed throughout the month through a variety of small rituals to help the world along as it renews itself, growing new plants and allowing nature to make new life. A ⦿ The Lesser Banishing of Frost Fairies
The first step: create bait. Fill a planter with dusty miller and silver sage, with a night-blooming flower at the center. The silvery-white leaves pique the curiosity of the Frost Fairies because they look snowy, yet when they see the flower bloom, they know it cannot be. The plants won't be damaged at all in the ritual, so you'll get a moon garden out of it, which can be incidentally draw adorable little moon rabbit kits in to play inside your home while the moon is out. They're friendly, though they do tend to enjoy pack-sized snuggles-- you may find yourself stuck with no fewer than 15 rabbits attempting to climb on you for attention and need someone's help to pull them off. You may need to get them under control before you continue with the ritual. Once you've assembled your miniature moon garden, you'll need to find a stranger to perform the ritual. You need to bring a new energy into your home in order to let the Frost Fairies know that it's time to meet something new. Take hands with the new person and dance in circles around the miniature moon garden. The plants will start to glow and the Frost Fairies will become visible-- short, fat, all-white penguin with flamingo-length legs and icicle crowns. They will immediately challenge you and your summoning partner to a duel! Though, you can pick what kind of challenge it is as their culture dictates. They're pretty overconfident, just remember not to pick something that involves touching them unless you want to end up needing a healer. B ⦿ The Language of Flowers
The dragons will attack anyone who comes into their area but seem to be friendly toward anyone wearing a flower crown, as they seem to accept them as a part of their hoard if the flowers send the right message. Use the language of flowers to communicate with the dragons and try to get them to follow you by wearing a flower crown that matches one you offer to the dragon. A flower crown that says sympathy and sadness might not be as effective as something that says virtue and bravery. Just be careful not to woo them the wrong impression with something that says eternal love and devotion, or you might have a different kind of dragon problem... Regardless, since the dragons are guarding the flowers you need to make the crowns out of, you'll need to find a way to get past their attacks to gather flowers to begin with to find the flowers you want to make your crown with. Flower crowns need at least two types of flowers to communicate with the dragons, so it's recommended you work together with others to try to gather as many flowers as you can to find the flowers you need. Thankfully, since dragons are sacred, most of the Dusklight Woods creatures will leave you alone, so it's best to hug that side of the mixed path. You and whoever you're working with only have to worry about fighting alongside the baby dragons to fight off the Land of Rot creatures that hang around the edge: Skeleton warriors that can only be scattered but not killed, Fogueria (a lion made of fire that likes to play with its food in sadistic ways), and rattlesnakes. Once you're at the foot of the Ash Mountains, the baby dragons will fly back up to their cave on their own. With the baby dragons returned to their nest, you can head home, and the townsfolk can start decorating for the Spring Equinox. C ⦿ Spiritual Cleansing
A plague of smoothie hockers has also cropped up around town, which means portable carts offering different magical smoothies is going around selling their fruity and flowery spring flavors for a refreshing boost of your spirit. No, really boost it. The magical effects are in small text underneath the flavors, so they may be easy to miss.  Spring is in the air, the Equinox is coming, and prep is underway. But all work and no play can get a little boring, right? Avalonians have come together and set up a few activities for Adventurers. While all of these activities can be completed and enjoyed without using magic, participants will be encouraged do to so, don’t worry if it goes a little haywire. There are magical force fields around the play zones to contain any mishaps. A ⦿ Keep it Rollin' Rollin'
To make things a little more interesting, the planners had a bit of mischief with the barrels... As barrels reach a quarter of a way down the hill, the outside will burst into flames. Surprise! While they are enchanted so that the flames aren't actually hot, participants are not aware of this. Sorry, the guys running this game aren’t that big on explaining; after all, it’s just rolling a fire barrel down the hill; what’s so complicated? Fire makes it look like it's going faster and is way more exciting to watch! B ⦿ Hop Skip and a Jump
Of course, once more, the folks running the show forgot to mention one tiny thing, a quarter of the way into the board, random spots will drop away as you go, leaving holes in the ground! Yikes, better take that leap! Don’t worry, if you miss, the bottom of the hole is filled with marshmallow fluff in bright pink, yellow, and pastel purple. (Kind of reminds you of something, huh...?) Down in the hole are rungs and footholds to get yourself back out, but boy, will that put you behind the other guy if they didn’t fall. Well, guess victory will have to be a little sweeter than you planned! C ⦿ Gettin' Brewy With It
You can pick any ingredients you want, but all participants are instructed that a sprinkle of that magic at just the right time will make it perfect. When asked what the right time is, all they will be told is they’ll know when. Some may get it right, depending on instinct. Others might sprinkle too much and cause the drink to burst all over them and their partner, and their workstation or have some other silly side effect, like make them hiccup uncontrollably or catch a case of the giggles. Or maybe they cast for too long or too short a time and the drink turns sour, turns to ash, grows wings on the cup, and flies away. Brewery magic can be fickle, so there's lots that can go wrong.. but get it right, and you can have one heck of a drink to enjoy! 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. • 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. • If nothing here tickles your fancy, try one of this month's Quests for your TDM prompt. • The first "Arrival" prompts are present on every TDM, but contain seasonal tweaks for flavor. 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. |
Red Spring
Undaunted, she steps closer. "I understand your frustrations, and I did not wish to add to them by calling out and distracting you. I have...been struggling as well." But it seems perhaps her presence was a distraction all the same.
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"Chris." Hi, yo, whatever. The surprise is at least a welcome one. Without having to pry he's willing to bet she has a True Rune of some kind. "You too, eh? You still...have it, right?" He makes the fist again, suggesting the Rune in his hand.
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His acknowledgement is met with a nod of her head and a small smile. "Hello again. I must admit I didn't expect our reunion to be so soon. Certainly not in this manner, at least." She looks at his clenched fist, then down at her own gauntleted, Rune-bearing hand. "I do, but it's gone dormant. Nothing more than a fanciful-looking mark on my hand." She confirms, looking back up. "I have been having some success trying to replicate it using the form of magic I have been bestowed with here." She hesitates for a moment. "Some small successes, that is." Magic has never been her forte, even after gaining a True Rune.
"You're well, though? Or as well as can be expected, given the circumstances." She looks around. "Are...any of your unit here?" She asks, looking and failing to see any familiar faces from the Southern Defense Force. None of the other knights had turned up, but perhaps Geddoe had been luckier.
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A slow shake of his head. "No sign of them that I can see. No other Zexen Knights, then?"
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She shakes her head. "Sadly, no. But at this rate perhaps it's Hugo we should be keeping our eyes out for. The two of us arriving here at the same time? I find it unlikely to be a coincidence." Hugo and Geddoe had both been valuable pillars of support despite for her in the Fire Bringer, despite their abrupt meeting and her own past...conflicts with the Karayan.
Unfortunately, aside from the possibility that Hugo might be here as well, the news doesn't get much better with who else is. "Yuber is here. He and I crossed blades here in this yard." He must have skulked off to lick his wounds if he hasn't tried coming after Geddoe yet. But that's only a matter of time.
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Hugo, though. Yes, if all three of them were there, that would make sense. Geddoe tugs at his glove idly and looks away, as a seasoned mercenary does when privately discussing sensitive topics. "What do you make of this...idea, that we're here to help some other world in order to help our own?"
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Chris gives pause to his question, shifting slightly, arms across her breastplate. "I'n...not sure." She admits. "I'd be inclined to think it some sort of ruse, but we are clearly not the first group to have been brought in." She looks back out across the training yard. "To have fooled so many people for so long? I'm not sure. And if this is a lie, what is the purpose? Our power is taken away from us but we're given new magic to compensate? I don't see the sense of it." She looks back towards Geddoe, her expression serious.
"What I do know is that any force that can seal the powers of the Twenty-Seven is not a power to be taken lightly, whether it intends good or ill."
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He's only been practicing a few hours, though, so not being able to find something that measures up to a Hammer of Raijin might just take time. Frustrated he may be but he can also be patient.
"Anyway. You managed fire magic? Interesting. Have they given us the use of all elements, then? I wouldn't consider it fair compensation, but..."
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Chris laughs. "Try not to sound so surprised, Geddoe." She says good-naturedly. "After all, I was able to manage some the True Fire's lesser invocations." She'd be a pretty poor Flame Champion if all she couldn't manage to produce any fire at all. "It's my understanding that we can control all the elements yes, but I was in danger and fire was...familiar. Yuber was a fool for not considering I might still have some power in that regard." She hasn't yet tried to branch out into the other elements, though. Once she can master the familiar, then she can try for the unknown.
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No judging! Okay maybe a little judging, if only because she seemed tailor-made for Wyatt's Rune but he can hardly claim it wasn't possible. Had he not already had one, True Fire might have chosen him. There was an equal chance any of them could have been the one. It takes a very long moment for him to wrap his mind around it, though. At last, under his breath, he adds, "So what they were saying about alternate time...it's true."
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All three of them had made it, to the hidden sanctum in the mountains behind the Chisha Clan, if for different reasons. The truth of the man history recorded as the Flame Champion, his life and his death laid bare by Chieftain Sana, and an offer to claim the power that had allowed him to unify the Grasslands against Harmonia fifty years ago, and all the responsibility and burdens that came with wielding such power.
Hugo seemed gripped by an inner conflict, and Geddoe was a stoic as she'd learn he ever was. In the silence that followed, she knew what she had to do. Harmonia was pressing upon the Grassland, and if they took it, Zexen was sure to follow, too small and cut off from help to resist the might of the theocracy. She had left Brass Castle for different reasons altogether, but there in that cave, she understood the need to take action. For Zexen, Grassland, and all of them. And so she stepped forward and pledged to claim that power. It was perhaps not the expected choice; the original Flame Champion had been a man of the Grasslands, and perhaps his successor should have been one too. But Hugo seemed too conflicted, and so Chris had taken it upon herself, and never looked back. Even though it had meant having to pass on the True Water Rune her father had carried so long to Hugo later on. The choice was made and she did not regret it.
Geddoe was there. Why was this a shock to him? "I'm sorry?" She asks, not quite catching what he muttered. "Geddoe, forgive me but I'm quite at a loss here. What am I not understanding?"
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"Something I read," he goes on, "on the, uh. The thing with the screen. It mentioned time being stopped and other peculiarities. It sounded to me like it was possible that we came from different times - for all I know I could have been snatched before the treaty was even broken, or from the first war. So if there was any chance at all that True Fire could have chosen any of the three of us..." He makes a face. It's a heavy thought, but it's all he has. "That moment in time could have split three ways. It sounds ridiculous but it makes sense."
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"So...you and I come from different versions of the same world, then." She concludes. A world marked by a single difference. And maybe the consequences of that decision. "Well, clearly the differences aren't so vast that we are unrecognizable to each other, at least." They had both been operating under the assumption they were the versions each other was familiar with, and there had been no issue until the truth had come out.
Strange that Chris would come from a version of events where she was Flame Champion, but the same was not true for Geddoe. Maybe it had to do with the True Fire Rune? It might lie dormant now, but it is still one of the Twenty-Seven, that powers fundamental forces of nature in their world. Perhaps it is impossible for two of such a power to exist side-by-side, even if they are from different versions of the same world, even dormant.
Or maybe there's no logic to it whatsoever and she's just overthinking things.
Putting that mystery without an answer aside, Chris chuckles. "So, you followed Hugo, did you?" She asks, impressed. She knew the boy had leadership potential, and it seems where Geddoe was from he was able to realize it. "I take it you were likewise successful in foiling Luc's plan?"
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He tips his head in a quick nod. "The kid stepped up when he was called," he admits, "it worked out fine. Although I don't envy him taking a Rune at his age, he's going to be stuck being called a kid for eternity. We were." A slight twitch of his eyebrow, he recalls her mention of the vision Luc showed her - showed the Flame Champion, it seems - but that vision is common to the True Runes, he's seen it himself at other times. "You too, then. That's a relief. I should hate to think there's a timeline in which he succeeded."
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"You're right about his age, but truthfully I've not really come to terms with my own immortality yet." For the most part she's not thinking about it; how can she, knowing that she's now destined to see all her comrades and friends grow old and die while she remains unchanging? Forever unchanging? Unless she eventually finds a suitable successor to pass on the True Fire Rune too, but even that seems dependent on the Rune allowing her to do so. "Harmonia won't give up its plan, either. I...suppose eventually I shall have to do what you and my father have done in the past. Disappear as best I can." Not a prospect she enjoys the thought of much.
"I've been wondering how you plan to handle that." She adds, looking at him. "You went back to Caleria, did you not? Doesn't that put you in danger, being back on Harmonia's doorstep now that they know who you are?"
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It's a lot for all of them to have to shoulder; he, at least, has that loner streak that makes it easy for him to sever connections and fuck off for years at a time. For both Chris and Hugo, that's going to be a lot harder. Geddoe eases a step closer to her, to make sure their discussion remains somewhat private - easier out in the open than in the inn full of people. "Your status is an advantage, right now. Being in the public eye, you have all of Zexen as well as the grateful clans of the Grasslands to make sure nothing happens to you. Harmonia would never risk it, lest they be accused of violating the treaty. But...someday, yes. Don't get comfortable and forget it until you have assassins on your doorstep." Wyatt's one real mistake. He won't say it out loud, not until he feels he really knows Chris as her own person and not just Wyatt's extremely capable daughter. "At least, it's not something either of us have to be concerned about so long as we're here, pulling off yet another save-the-world gambit, but I suppose we can sit around and speculate about it while we have the luxury of time."
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She's not surprised how much thought Geddoe has given this. He's probably had to do it dozens of times already. She considers his words. "A decade, then. Maybe fifteen years." Probably no longer than that, and even fifteen years was probably creeping dangerously close to the time her father had stayed with her and her mother. She sighs heavily. Harmonia's backed off for now, and Sasarai was a worthy ally against Luc...but he was also a Bishop of Harmonia. His friendship now didn't guarantee anything down the road. They'd come for her eventually, treaty or not. "Does it ever get easier?" She asks plainly. "Building something, just to drop everything and walk away?"
He does have a point, though. That's an issue for later, not something they need to worry about until they've set things right here. "Ah, forgive me. I've managed to stumble my way into feeling melancholy again. You are right of course." Besides, if their True Runes really are sealed into dormancy, it's likely their immortality has been put on hold as well.
She manages a smile and claps him on the shoulder in comradeship. "Different world or not, it is good to see you again, Geddoe. You are very much a welcome sight."
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Geddoe won't let the rest go without at least a partial answer, though. He can reply and sum up the situation all at once. "Don't think of it in those terms. We all do things a little differently, and some handle it better than others. But..." He sighs deeply. "Your father was my best friend. If you ever want to sit down and talk about it, you have my ear. Both as his daughter, and as the Flame Champion." Far from an obligation, it's perhaps the only thing he really does value, or give purpose to. Lucky Chris.