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Entry tags:
May 2022 Test Drive Meme
MAY 2022 TDM
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to Folkmore's monthly Test Drive Meme! Please feel free to test drive any and all characters regardless of your intent to apply or whether you have an invite or not.
All TDMs are game canon. You can choose to have your TDM thread be your introduction thread upon acceptance or start fresh. Each TDM will provide a scenario for how characters arrive in-game that particular month.
Playing TDMs will allow characters to immediately obtain canon items from homes especially weapons or other things they may have had on their person when they were pulled from their worlds! There will always be a prompt that provides some sort of "reward" to characters who complete certain tasks.
Current players are allowed to have in-game characters react to TDMs via the Network or make a log with the prompts. Current players are always encouraged to tag new people on the TDM!
TDM threads can be used for spoon spending at any time by characters accepted into the game.
Content Warnings: Possible insanity via cuts by thorns. Temporary nullification of abilities.
DEATH BY A THOUSAND CUTS
OUT OF THE WOODS
DEATH BY A THOUSAND CUTS
The world comes into focus in one sharp, overwhelming rush. You are laying on the ground surrounded by staggering walls of flowers of all types and colors. Their sweet scent fills the air and the sky above is clear, blue, beautiful, and endless. It would be easy to be lulled into a quiet nap in such a peaceful place. You can even hear a soft, disembodied voice singing songs from some unknown place all around you. After some time, this siren song creates an intense yearning that will eventually bring you to your feet and pull you forward. You are filled with the urge to find someone important. You may know who or you might just have some aimless, faceless person at the forefront of your mind.
All you know is that when you finally find them, you'll know. Is it love? Is it a friend you have always needed? The perfect enemy? Only time will tell, but for now, you must find them. The flower maze is dense and for now, it doesn't seem like flying out and above them is an option. If you try, you just wind up vaulted back into the maze. Nope! This trial is about using other means of exploration. Maybe you can destroy the flowers, but you will find that this flower field is apparently endless. If you get cut by thorns along the way, you will become increasingly hectic about finding this mystery person. Some have been thrown into insane desperation just looking for their People among the flowers.
But once you finally find them, you're both filled with relief and the flowers around you blossom wider. You can then treat the flower maze like a solvable puzzle and get your way out of it. However, some people spend a bit more time in the maze since once you do find your person or people, you will be stricken with the urge to talk to them, to "open up" about your yearning to find them...even if you've never met them before!
OUT OF THE WOODS
Just outside of the flower maze is a little festival set up just on the edge of Willow and partway into Epiphany! Little stalls of food and drinks have been set up - and we mean little! The good folk who set up these stalls are magical cats standing upright and wearing clothes like little people! All the stalls are cat-sized and so are the dishes and food - which means most of the people walking through will likely be quite a bit bigger! That's okay, the cat folk seem happy to serve you bigger or multiple helpings of their yummy soups and bread. None of them seem able to really communicate with the new arrivals, but that's okay, their cute meows are fun to listen to anyway.
The music is a bit more pronounced here and a handful of cat couples are dancing around. Don't be surprised if they encourage you to join in the dancing! Maybe you didn't actually find someone in the flower maze - if not, the cat folk will encourage you to dance with another new arrival to get to know them! Because apparently dancing with someone you don't know is a good formal introduction? Ah well. Sometimes it's just the idea that counts.
There will also be some supplies to help patch people up who have gotten a lot of cuts from the flower maze. Some of the bouts of insanity are probably still going a bit hectic, so you might want to lay down in the recovery area until you feel a bit more stable. Talking to people apparently helps with the stability, so maybe strike up a conversation with a fellow newbie?
Content Warnings: Optional selective amensia and/or altered sense of self, possible monster/creature violence, temporary enchantments, forced relocations.
LONG STORY SHORT
DAYLIGHT
LONG STORY SHORT
You're in a very unusual, specific outfit and in a place you might have seen once or twice in a storybook or in the imagination of your childhood. For some, you might pick up on what's happening immediately. For others, you might be so immersed in the role that you don't realize it - but you're featuring in a classic fairy tale. Maybe it's Sleeping Beauty or Little Red Riding Hood or Tale of the White Snake or The Mirror of Matsuyama. Either way, you're the main character or the main antagonist and it looks like you're going to have to play out the story with whoever you're stuck with!
The other person in the trial can either match up to the other side of the story or just arrive as themselves and have to play along. Trying to just abandon the trial is quite literally impossible! You're stuck in the weird woods or high tower and trying to "leave" just results in you going in repeated cycles until you wind up where you started. You have a role to fill and you might as well get used to playing roles in Folkmore! It's time to understand how these trials work. What lesson are you supposed to take away?
If you're grumbling about it or are left confused, don't worry! Thirteen will appear to those struggling and explain the situation: "You need to play out the story! C'mon. Everyone knows this story...Right? Well, whatever, it's obvious! If you play your part, I promise I'll give you something you want." Can you really trust a fox though? Especially the fox who brought you here? She laughs before you can really pester her for more information and vanishes in a burst of red dust. Foxes really are mischievous, aren't they...At least most fairy tales are incredibly short, basic, and straightforward so most people should be able to figure it out!
In theory.
DAYLIGHT
At least the Fox wasn't lying. When you complete the task of the story, the fairy tale world will melt into one of the settings in Folkmore and you will be brought back into the current reality. You will be left in the weird clothes, but fear not! A mystery trunk has appeared in front of you and whoever you completed the trial with. Inside the trunk, you will find some of your canon clothes and a few canon items. Nearby, there will be some weapons sticking out of the ground: basic swords, guns, shields, etc. These items might not be enchanted, but at least you have something to work with!
Better yet, you don't necessarily have to complete the Long Story Short prompt to find these trunks either! They seem to be dotted around Folkmore and you might find them just by virtue of exploration! The trunks seem to mysteriously know who is opening them so you won't find someone else's stuff by accident, but you might have to fight over who gets the sword in the stone...
A word of caution to those who grab the weapons...You will immediately be tested on how good you are with them. As soon as you have pulled them out of the ground, the ground will begin trembling and a serpent-like creature will form out of the ground. If you're in Wintermute, you have a sizeable icy creature to deal with. If you're in Cruel Summer, meet the fire-breathing snakey nightmare that's going to try and roast you alive. Don't think Epiphany or Willow will have gentler creatures! They might be covered in moss or flowers but they will hit just as hard. You have to defeat the angry creature - or try running for your life. They are relatively easy to beat and people without powers can manage if they are highly skilled or...really lucky...Or if someone far more capable finds them! Good luck. As a pro-tip, maybe don't pull weird swords out of the ground in the future.
no subject
It's a good question. Sure, Asahi knows the basics, but anything even remotely technical is beyond her expertise. She raises her free hand to scratch the back of her head in thought. ]
There's a machine inside of it that makes it run. [ .. does he know what a machine is?
Who knows, Asahi thinks. But she's not sure she can explain this any other way. ]
It runs on gas, which is made out of oil.. you put that in the machine, and it then makes the car run. [ She shakes her head. ] I've never driven one before though. Too young for it!
no subject
He looks again at the drawing.] I can’t imagine exactly how gas and oil work in a machine to power that but, I know someone who probably does.
It’s about the size of a horse cart, right?
cw: mention of traffic accidents and their effects
[ .. Asahi imagines so, anyway. It's not like she sees horse carts every day, but she's pretty sure they have been in some series that she's watched.. and they seem comparable enough for her to nod at the other. ]
That sounds about right. They go a whole lot faster than horse carts though, that's why the age limit is there. If you don't know how to handle one, you can cause a whole lot of damage with it. [ Asahi at least seems a little more serious when she adds: ] You could kill people with it. That happens a lot in traffic accidents, actually.
[ She shakes her head. ]
So it's not like my world is some sort of perfect place with advanced technology that makes everything only better.
[ There's definite downsides to it too.
But Asahi would still prefer that place to this one ten times over. ]
no subject
Oh, don't worry. I wouldn't have believed it if you said that it was perfect. Even in great age of magic when towers were supposedly built in a day...they had their flaws and downsides.
[And every time Percy talks about tech he always stresses that tech has downsides and can be dangerous.]
I don't think a society or age will ever be perfect. But I guess the upside is is we can always strive to be better than we are.
no subject
.. do you think this place could be like that too?
[ Sure, more than anything.. Asahi just wants to go back home. To her friends. To everything that's familiar. She definitely doesn't want to be stuck in this place for any longer than she has to be.. but she also hasn't quite spotted a way to leave here, especially since that fox sure doesn't seem to feel like bringing them back to their own world until they reach their 'full potential' or whatever.
So if they have to deal with this place until then.. ]
Do you think that we could make it better? [ Or at the very least a place where people's emotions aren't randomly being manipulated inside of a maze, thanks. That would already be a step up to Asahi, who really dislikes people being messed with like that.
Maybe she's asking Vax exactly because she's older than her. Asahi isn't really the type to just believe anyone because they're older, but in this case it at least means he's got a lot more life experience than her, which is something one could use while answering a question like that. ]
no subject
We know so little about this place. That doesn't mean we can't try to make it better. I think there's nothing wrong with trying. The more people try, the more likely we can change something.
[He leans back slightly and it makes the light fall on the runes in the scrollwork on his armor.] It's just finding what we want to try to change.
no subject
[ Even if his answer didn't really satisfy her.. but she doesn't blame him for that either. He's just being honest. Asahi is pretty sure that none of them who are suddenly stuck in this situation know what to do about it, or can even fully grasp it yet. Of course he doesn't know how to make things better, or whether they can at all.
No one does. There's no one who can comfort her by honestly telling her it'll be okay.
And while that's hard, she prefers it over white lies. So Asahi speaks up with those words from before, sounding determined about it. ]
Even if I don't know what to do yet.. I refuse to just sit here let us all be stuck in a place that's got some real crappy sides to it. I want to make it better. For everyone.
[ Maybe it's a little too idealistic, but she can't help it.
She glances over at him. ]
I don't know if I could live with myself if I just stood by and did nothing, you know?